Philip and the Superstition Kid (9781452430423) (10 page)

“
You went up thirteen
stairs,” Philip said, slumping back against the side of the
house.

“
No, no. When Miss Vampire
chased me upstairs now, I was careful. I did eleven steps. I
did.”

“
Not when you ran up the
stairs with your dress on before that,” Emery said gloomily. “I
watched. We counted. Thirteen.”

Leon realized his mistake. “Oh, no.
Everything happens to me.” He slumped back against the wall.

“
Now what?” Emery
muttered.

No one had an idea until Philip said,
“There’s only one thing to do.”

Emery looked doubtfully at Philip.

Philip explained. “If we can’t go in the
back door, we’ll have to go in the front door.”

“
Oh, great,” Emery said
sarcastically. “She’ll scream at us and then call my mother to say
we snuck out. My mother’ll ask me how we got out. Vampire girl will
tell her we couldn’t have gone out the front door. I’ll have to say
we went out the window. My mother’ll go crazy . . .”

“
All right. All right,”
Philip interrupted. “That wasn’t what I meant. Leon.”

Leon lifted his head and stared gloomily at
Philip.

“
Now
what do I gotta do?” he asked forlornly.

“
You gotta knock on the
front door again.”

Leon moaned. “She’ll kill me.”

“
Then you have to push
vampire girl or kick her or something and get her to chase you. Get
her to chase you all over the house. Get her to chase you outside
if you can, yeah, outside would be better. When you get her away
from the front door, Emery and I will sneak in that way, and she
won’t know we were ever outside.”

“
Yeah,” Emery agreed
enthusiastically. “You can do that, Leon. Your life’s already a
mess.”

Leon nodded. “It is. It really is.”

“
Go, Leon,” Philip said,
giving Leon a shove on the shoulder.

Leon walked away mumbling,
“Why did
I
have
to be the one to get triskaidekaphobia?”

“
Let’s follow him,” Philip
said softly. “And be ready to duck inside.”

Emery nodded.

The boys hid behind the two rose bushes that
grew alongside the doorway to Emery’s house.

Leon stood in front of the door, staring at
it.

“
Knock,” Philip called in
a loud whisper. “And do what I told you.”

Leon nodded, sighed and knocked.

The door opened and Amanda
cried, “What! Not you again. What did I tell you? How did you . .
.
OW!”

Leon kicked her hard on the knee and then
raced past her into the house.

“
Hey you little . .
.”

Philip and Emery looked at each other,
astonished at the language Amanda used as she turned and ran after
Leon.

“
Come on, Emery. Now’s our
chance.”

Philip tiptoed up to the door Amanda had
failed to close and peeked in. He ducked back quickly and pointed
toward the inside.

Emery could hear Amanda shouting at Leon to,
“get back here, you little . . .”

“
She knows a lot of
words,” Emery whispered awestruck.

“
Okay,” Philip said after
peeking in. He ran to the stairs and went up quickly, Emery right
behind him.

When they reached Emery’s bedroom, they
stopped and listened. Below, they could still hear Amanda screaming
at Leon. After a few moments it got quiet.

“
There,” said Philip and
he brushed his hands together as if cleaning them off. “We’re all
finally in.”

“
Good plan,
Philip.”

“
When vampire girl throws
Leon back in here with us, let’s make sure he doesn’t do another
thing that could possibly get us in trouble. I hope when he goes
back home, the trisaphobia goes back home with him. Get your mother
to clean this room real good after he leaves.”

They waited. Five minutes. Ten minutes.

“
Where is he?” Emery
wondered.

“
We better go down and
look.”

They left the room and casually went
downstairs to the kitchen.

“
I don’t hear anything,”
Emery said. “I’ll go look.” He walked to the living
room.

Philip followed behind.

The front door was wide open, and the living
room was empty.

Suddenly, Amanda stomped into the house and
slammed the front door angrily behind her.

“
What’s wrong with that
cousin of yours?” She glared at Philip.

“
Uh, he’s
Emery’s
cousin.” Philip
threw a thumb Emery’s way.

“
Well?” she demanded,
glaring at Emery. “What’s wrong with him?”

“
He’s got
trisatrikaphobium,” Emery replied nervously.

Amanda stared.

“
This whole family’s nuts!
Go back upstairs where you belong,” Amanda ordered.

The boys went slowly toward the stairs.

“
Okay she’s gone. Where is
he?” Emery whispered once Amanda had disappeared into the living
room.

Philip peeked into the living room. Amanda
saw him and pointed up. Philip ducked back and said, “Check the
house quick.”

Leon was nowhere to be found.

Amanda appeared outside the living room.

“
Up, I said. And if either
one of you comes down here before your parents get home . . .” She
ran a finger across her neck.

Philip and Emery jumped and went up the
stairs.

In Emery’s room they sat on the edge of the
bed perplexed.

“
Where do you think . . .
?” Emery began.

Suddenly they heard a little voice come
through the window.

“
Hey guys.”

Philip and Emery looked at one another.
Leon!

They went to the window and looked out.
There was Leon sticking his head out from behind the tree.

Emery raised the screen.

“
What are you doing out
there?” Emery called, hoping Amanda had the TV turned up real
loud.

“
She didn’t chase me
outside long enough,” Leon answered. “And she could have got me
’cause I fell down right over there ’cause of these long
shoelaces.”

“
Oh, Leon,” Emery cried.
“Now we have to get you back inside, and the vampire girl won’t let
us out of this room.”

“
Go knock on the door
again,” Philip advised impatiently.

“
Oh, no,” Leon said,
waving his hands in front of him. “I’m not doing
that
anymore.” Leon
looked the tree up and down doubtfully. “Maybe I can climb back
up.”

“
You can’t even reach the
first branch,” Philip told him.

All three boys knew what had to be done, but
no one wanted to say it.

Finally, Philip said, “Take the sheet off
your bed, Emery. We gotta go into the tree and pull him up to the
first branch.”

Emery scowled. “Why don’t we just leave him
out there?”

“
Okay with me,” Philip
said.

“
No, guys. I can’t stay
out here. Come on.”

Emery stared down at Leon. “When you get
back in, you gotta just sit and don’t do nothing. Your stupid
phobiobium. . . .”

“
I will. I will,” Leon
interrupted. “Just get me back in before vampire girl finds
me.”

Emery went to his bed and angrily pulled off
the sheet. He bundled it into as small a ball as he could.

“
Let’s go,” he said to
Philip.

He and Philip carefully crossed the tiny
roof.

“
Don’t fall,” Leon
called.

“
Thanks for the advice,”
Emery called down as he stepped across into the tree and watched
Philip.

Philip made it and together he and Emery
lowered the sheet.

“
Now hold on and try to .
. . you know . . . walk up the trunk and we’ll pull you,” Philip
said.

“
Okay guys,” Leon
answered. He grasped the end of the sheet and put his feet against
the tree trunk. Philip and Emery weren’t holding the other end of
the sheet tight enough, though, and little by little Leon leaned
back until he was sticking out from the tree like another
branch.

“
Pull tighter,” he
called.

“
We’re pulling. We’re
pulling,” Emery snapped.

Little by little Leon got straight enough to
begin to climb. Finally, without mishap, he reached the branch
Philip and Emery were on, and they pulled him on board.

“
Yuk yuk. I did it. No
problem. Pretty lucky, eh?”

“
Yeah,” Emery said
heatedly. “You’re the luckiest boy in the whole . . .”

Suddenly, a scream rang out.

The boys looked down and there were Philip’s
and Emery’s parents. It was Emery’s mother who had screamed.

“
Get down from there,” she
cried. “Oh, don’t fall. Don’t move. Get down.”

“
How can we get down if we
don’t move?” Emery called back in disgust.

“
I’ll call the police.
I’ll call the fire department. They’ll get you down. Don’t move,”
Emery’s mother cried. Her husband tried to console her.

“
We don’t need anybody,”
Emery called back. He turned to his friends. “Come on. It’s all
over and we’re dead.”

Emery hung down from the branch, and dropped
to the ground. Then came Philip and finally Leon.

The four parents marched the three boys
toward the front door, which opened as if by magic. Amanda was
standing inside the door, an evil, satisfied smirk on her face.

Chapter Fifteen

Mr. Wyatt sent Amanda home after paying her
and apologizing for the boys’ behavior. Then Emery had to explain
why he, Philip, and Leon were up in a tree holding a bed sheet,
when they were supposed to be inside the house for the evening.
Mrs. Wyatt went on and on. Did the boys know they had spoiled the
night out the two couples had planned? And did the boys know how
lucky it was the two couples were still in Philip’s house when
Amanda called Mr. Wyatt’s cell phone and reported they were up in a
tree?

The boys had their own ideas about whether
that was a lucky thing or not, but after mispronouncing
triskaidekaphobia seven times and failing to make totally clear why
Leon spent a day in a dark closet wearing an inside-out dress they
had bought for three dollars, the boys were sent upstairs, and the
grownups made an evening of it in the Wyatts’ living room.

“
Gimme your stupid
rabbit’s foot,” Philip ordered Emery. He took both charms and went
into the kitchen. He lifted the lid of the trashcan and tossed the
rabbits’ feet inside.

“
Good idea,” said
Emery.

The last thing Philip heard as he went
dejectedly up the stairs behind his friends was his father’s voice
telling Mrs. Wyatt that of course he knew she loved her family very
much.

The next morning Emery phoned Philip.

“
Leon’s going home,” Emery
reported.

“
I thought you had him
longer.”

Emery shook his head even though Philip
couldn’t see it. “My mother called his mother and told her about
shoelaces and trikatrisaphobium and his wearing a dress and sitting
on the dining room table with his Egyptian headdress and a bunch of
other stuff. His mother’s coming this morning to get him. Want to
come over? You allowed?”

“
Yeah. I’ll be right
there.”

When Philip arrived, he joined the other
boys in the living room. Leon was sitting on the sofa, his head
hanging dejectedly, his traveling bag at his feet, and Emery was
watching cartoons.

Leon looked up at Philip and said, “I gotta
go home.”

Before Philip could answer, the doorbell
rang. The three boys turned and saw Emery’s mother answer the door
and welcome Leon’s mother. The women stood in the hallway talking,
and Emery’s father joined the group.

The parents spoke in low voices,
occasionally throwing sad looks the boys’ way. Philip watched
Emery’s mother explain something and Leon’s mother shake her head
slowly. Then he saw Leon’s mother say something, and Emery’s
mother’s eyes widened, and Philip could easily read her lips.

“
Oh, no,” she said and
waved her hands in front of her.

Leon’s mother pleaded.

Emery’s mother shook her head some more but
didn’t wave her hands as much.

Emery’s father patted his wife on the back
in sympathy.

Leon’s mother kept talking.

Emery’s mother gave a deep sigh and shook
her head slowly in resignation.

Leon’s mother walked into the living room.
“It’s time to go, Leon,” she said.

Leon stood up.

“
Did you really do
everything . . . ?” She raised her hand as if she didn’t really
want to know the answer. “You have an appointment with Dr. Sissaby
early Monday morning. Tell him
everything.
”

Leon didn’t answer. He just cast a look of
despair at Emery and Philip.

“
Come here,” said Leon’s
mother to her son. “You two stay there.”

Philip and Emery watched Leon go into the
hallway and stand in front of his mother. Leon’s mother spoke to
Leon and pointed at Mrs. Wyatt. The boys could see him look up at
her and say, “I’m sorry.”

Then Leon’s mother spoke some more, and
Leon’s eyes brightened slightly. He nodded and then crossed his
heart.