CHAPTER THREE

SAINTLY MS. GRISHAM

Tuesday.

Mara's variation of Amazing Grace had been stuck in my head on an endless loop. It wasn't a bad thing--the music rocked me to sleep at night and nudged me awake in the morning--but the melody had kindled a blistering thirst that couldn't be satisfied. When I was alone, the girl's voice was so translucent that I swore she was hiding between my bedroom walls or serenading me from the distant woods.

I had to see her again. But opportunities were gonna be sparse.

Three days into summer vacation and Whit was already a regular at the Parker home. His parents worked all day, so the moms decreed that the bulk of our playtime would be spent at the castle. Whit's mom even taught my mom how to assist with his nightly leg stretches.

Luckily, the castle was the perfect place to have a best friend and a mystery to unravel. Tucked behind my clothes in my bedroom closet was a secret passageway with a door small enough for a garden gnome. I told the lil' tykes that it lead to Narnia and Cair Paravel, but the real passage was a million times cooler than some make-believe world. The walls were lined with cotton-candy insulation. There were knotty joists, archways of colorful wire, and mysterious rattling sounds that spurred my imagination. I had to crawl for the first few feet, but then the tunnel grew into a plush cavern and I could sit upright without bumping my head against iron pipes. An orange extension cord ran from my bedroom, beneath the tiny door, to a power strip where I could charge my camera batteries, play my stereo, or run a fan during the summer. The only source of light came from a naked bulb screwed between the plastic ears of a Mickey Mouse lamp. I had a personal stash of books, journals, and Batman comics stacked beneath the rectangular duct in the corner. On the opposite end of the secret cavern, the tunnel narrowed, curved right and led to another tiny door in the library. My best screenplays were written in that dusty womb beneath Mickey's dim light.

To fit through the opening, Whit had to vacate his chair and crawl. “You're the only person who'll ever see me do this,” he said. “It's flippin' embarrassing.” Although he moved a bit like a broken marionette, I retained my dignity (as Dad would say) and held back my laughter.

“I'm not a bad case,” he told me in the cavern's musty pink fluff. “I don't have any of the usual symptoms of spina biffida. I don't have learning disabilities, I'm not fat--no offense--and I'm not allergic to latex.”

Whit was halfway through a book about secret codes and taught me clever ways to disguise my secrets. Our production notebook became a tome of cyphers; I would write, “Please Eat Nine Interesting Smarties, Brother. Reptiles Eat A Tiny Hamburger!” Whit would write: “All Signs Say We're Inbred People Eaters!” then we would trade messages and die laughing.

When Mom (who upheld “sucks” as a dirty word until I turned eighteen) discovered the notes in the trash, it didn't take her long to decipher our intricate system of words. My teeth were promptly smeared with a bar of soap and Whit was sent home with an apology letter to his parents.

We regrouped the following morning. Mrs. Conrad dropped her son off in the driveway and I carried his chair up the foyer steps. He hoisted himself back into his seat and rolled to my bedroom. When the door was closed, he clapped his hands once and declared, “We gotta make this movie!”

I stood beside my bed and stared at the tussled remains of a restless night. “We need a camera to make a movie,” I barely replied.

“We've been planning this thing since Christmas. Two weeks ago I couldn't shut you up about the monsters and the castle and the fireworks. Then we run into one little snag, and you act like you don't care anymore!”

My sheets were covered in big, primary-colored dinosaurs roaming cotton ripples and the damp stains. “I've been busy,” I said.

“You remember Dave-the-nose-picker?”

“Uh huh.”

“His mom got first place at The Lakeshore Celebration Art Show last year. She makes real ugly pictures; I think she gives finger paint to a toddler and calls it art.”

“So what.”

“So she won! And her trophy was huge!”

“We're kids. We’re not gonna beat real artists with a movie.”

One of the twins blew through the door, tongue flubbering in a torrent of slobbery motorboat noises. He made a running leap for my bed but I caught him mid-air, spun him around like an airplane, aimed him at the exit, and said, “Scat!” The boy buzzed away and I slammed the door behind him.

“Why don't you talk to Danny,” Whit suggested. “See if he'll give you back the camera.”

I sighed and paced my bed. “Roslyn's gone, remember?”

“So trade him somethin' else. Your dad’s an architect.”

“So?”

“He’s rich.”

“I've got bigger things on my mind than a stupid fairytale.”

“Hey! I've been producer on this thing since--”

“Since Christmas, I know.”

“And I'm the co-writer, too.”

“Bull Shanky! You came up with one idea!”

“And it was good! The Girl gets seduced by a nasty monster--”

“We don't have a camera!” I shouted, then snapped the little-kid dinosaur sheets off my bed.

Whit rolled his eyes. “How long till the tape comes back?”

“We sent it two days ago.”

“Crap. So another five?”

“At least.”

“You better not watch it without me. You promised.”

I balled the sheets in my arms, threw them at the hamper, and plopped down on the bare mattress.

“Think your sexy girlfriend is on the tape?”

“It's not tape, it's film. And for the bagillionth time, I don't know.”

“Think we'll see her bedroom? I love the smell of girl-bedroom.”

“You wouldn't know a girl's bedroom from a hamster cage.”

“Why are you so crabby?” Whit rolled to the bed and poked me in the arm. “Are you whipped?” When I didn't respond, he sang, “James and Mara, sittin' in a tree--”

“Grow up.”

“F-u-c-k-i-n--”

“Whit! Knock it off!”

He groaned. “Why aren't we having fuuuuun!”

I sighed again. “I have a question...”

“What.”

“You wore diapers 'til you were eight, right?”

Whit's face crumpled into an angry snarl. “They fixed that. And if you tell anybody--”

“I think something's wrong with me.”

He grabbed his wheels and jerked back. “What? What happened?”

I turned over and pressed my face in my pillow.

“James?” he said. “What the heck happened?”

“Last night,” I said. “I wet the stinkin' bed.”