Blubber (7 page)

The next morning, when Linda got on the bus, she stood next to my seat and said, “You should see my stomach … it’s all black and blue.”

“I’ll bet.”

“It is. My mother had to take me to the doctor.”

“So?”

“He said you knocked the wind out of me.”

“I knew I smelled something bad yesterday!” I turned to Tracy and the two of us absolutely cracked up. I guess nobody ever told Linda about laughing it off.

Right after group science Mrs. Minish told the girls to line up alphabetically. “We’re going to the nurse’s office to get weighed.”

Everybody groaned. We get weighed every fall and again every spring. If I had known that today was the day I’d have eaten a huge breakfast and worn my fisherman’s sweater. It’s the heaviest thing I own.

I was first on line, with Donna Davidson right behind me and Linda behind her. Wendy and Caroline were near the end of the line since their last names start with
R
and
T
.

When we got to the office the nurse said, “Take off your shoes, please.” Then she called, “Jill Brenner.”

“Right here,” I said. I didn’t take off my
sneakers. I was hoping that the nurse wouldn’t notice. Then I’d weigh two pounds more and she wouldn’t be able to give me a lecture about being underweight and how I should drink malteds every day.

“Please take off your shoes, Jill.”

“I can’t.”

She gave me a funny look. “Why not?”

“I promised my mother I wouldn’t. My feet get cold when I go barefoot.”

“It will only be for a minute.”

“I’ll get sick if I do.”

“Jill … stop being silly and take off your shoes.”

“Oh …” I kicked off my sneakers and stepped on the scale.

I hoped it was at least five pounds overweight.

“Hmmmm …” the nurse said, wiggling the marker all around. “Sixty-seven and a half.”

I smiled at her to show I was pleased.

She checked the chart. “That’s not much of a gain … only half a pound since last spring.”

“Well,” I told her, “I guess I’m just lucky because I’m always eating.”

“You should try to build yourself up. I’d like to see you weigh about seventy-two. Why don’t you start drinking a malted every day?”

“Okay …” I said, stepping off the scale. I
have never had a malted in my life but what the nurse doesn’t know won’t hurt her.

The nurse was pleased with Donna Davidson. She has one of those perfect bodies where everything fits the way it should.

Linda was next. I took a long time getting my shoes back on so I heard everything.

“Are you feeling better, Linda?” the nurse asked.

“Yes.”

“Good … now, let’s see … oh my, ninety-one pounds … that’s too much for your height.”

“I have big bones,” Linda said.

“Even so, according to my chart you should lose some weight.”

“But I’m on a diet.”

“Well, that’s a step in the right direction. Remember, no sweets.”

“I know it.”

After lunch we went outside to jump rope and Donna taught everyone this jumping rhyme she used to sing to the fattest counselor at her summer horse camp.

Bruce seemed to enjoy jumping to Donna’s rhyme best of all. It suits him even more than Linda because he weighs over a hundred pounds and when he jumps his whole body shakes like Jell-O. He’s the one who should be on a diet.

Linda didn’t wait her turn on line. She ran back inside and didn’t come out at all during recess.

“I think you should know that Mr. Machinist is showing everybody in Hidden Valley those pictures he took of you on Halloween night.” Wendy told this to me and Tracy on the way home from school. She and Caroline were sitting opposite us on the bus.

Me and Tracy looked at each other. We’d forgotten all about that.

“But don’t worry,” Wendy said. “He only got the back of you and with the pillowcases over your heads nobody will ever be able to identify you.”

“You saw the pictures?” I asked.

“Last night … he brought them over himself.”

Caroline said, “When he came to my house
I told him I didn’t know who you were even though Tracy’s feathers were hanging out.”

“You could see my feathers?” Tracy asked.

“It’s all right!” Wendy said, and she gave Caroline a look that made her shut her mouth and turn to the window. “Nobody’s going to say anything. Believe me!”

It’s important to be Wendy’s friend, I thought. I only hope that what she says is true.

When we got off the bus me and Tracy stopped at our mailboxes, the way we do every day. I got a letter from the Superior Stamp Company. Probably the approvals I sent for last month, I thought.

“You don’t think Mr. Machinist will find out who we are, do you?” Tracy asked.

“Definitely not,” I told her. “You heard Wendy.”

“I guess you’re right. But from now on every time my doorbell rings I’m going to faint.”

“Me too.”

“Listen … I’ll call you later. I’ve got to go to the dentist this afternoon.”

“Maybe he can pull out your loose teeth and then you can ask for a check.”

“Maybe.”

“Good luck.”

“Thanks,” Tracy said. “I’ll need it.”

As soon as I walked into the house Kenny said, “Guess what … Mrs. Sandmeier’s going to Switzerland on Saturday.”

I dropped the mail on the hall table and ran into the kitchen. “It’s not true,” I said. “You wouldn’t leave us.”

Mrs. Sandmeier put her arm around me. “Now, now … it’s only for three weeks.”

“Three weeks! We can’t live without you for three weeks.”

“Of course you can.”

“But who’ll take care of us?” I asked.

“Oh … your mother and father will think of something.”

“I don’t see why you can’t wait until summer … when we’re away at camp.”

“Because my mother’s going to be eighty-five,” Mrs. Sandmeier said, “and I want to be there for her birthday.”

“Your mother? I never knew you had a mother.”

“Everybody has a mother,” Kenny said.

I shot him a look. “You know what I mean,” I told Mrs. Sandmeier. I never thought of her as somebody’s daughter.

“Mama’s a wonderful woman. She lives with my sister in Zurich, and I just decided I don’t want to miss this birthday.”

“I’ll bet they get Grandma to come,” Kenny said, shoveling in a handful of potato chips.

“Oh no!” I said. “Not Grandma for three weeks!”

“Or they could call the Carol Agency,” Kenny told me.

“What’s that?”

“It’s the biggest baby-sitting organization in the world. It’s in Los Angeles. They have eight hundred registered baby-sitters working for them.”

“Why would Mom call a California agency when we live in Pennsylvania?”

“I don’t know.”

“Kenny Brenner … your facts are driving me up the wall!” I went to my room. If Grandma comes I’m moving to Tracy’s for three weeks. Grandma makes me so nervous I get diarrhea just from being around her. One time, when my mother couldn’t find anyone else to watch us, Grandma moved in for a week. And she wouldn’t let me or Kenny do any of the things we always do, like ride bicycles or roller skate, because she thought we’d get hurt. Another thing that got me really sore was the way Grandma made me wear a hat and mittens when it was positively roasting out.

I sat down at my desk and opened the letter from the stamp company. It said:

I turned the letter over and wrote my reply.

The second my mother and father got home I asked, “Is Grandma coming when Mrs. Sandmeier goes to Switzerland?”

Mom wriggled out of her coat.

“And how come you didn’t tell us Mrs. Sandmeier’s taking a vacation?” I followed Mom into her bedroom.

“Because she wanted to tell you herself,” my mother said. “Nothing was definite until yesterday. Please, Jill … I’d like to take my shower and then we’ll talk about it … okay?”

I nodded and waited on Mom’s bed. When the water stopped running I stood outside the bathroom and asked, “Is Grandma coming … yes or no?”

My mother opened the bathroom door. She had a towel wrapped around her middle and was brushing her hair. “No … I don’t think she’s up to spending three weeks with us.”

I looked away and smiled. I couldn’t help it. “Then who is?” I asked.

“Who is what?”

“Who’s going to take care of us?”

“Great Maudie.”

“Great Maudie!” I couldn’t believe it. Great Maudie is Grandma’s sister but they are complete opposites. They haven’t talked to each other in ten years, ever since Great Maudie
moved in with her friend, Alfred. “She’s really coming?”

“Uh huh. I spoke to her this morning.”

“Is Alfred coming too?” He is a very good magician. He has this one trick where he cuts a grapefruit open and there’s a dollar bill inside it.

“Alfred can’t get away from work so Great Maudie will come without him.”

“What will Grandma think?”

“Well …” Mom said, “I don’t see why she has to find out. She’s in Pittsburg and Great Maudie is in New York. Hand me my robe, please …”

I went to Mom’s closet and pulled down her favorite robe. It’s pink and there’s a hole in one sleeve. I gave it to her, then went into the living room.

Kenny and my father were playing chess. “Did you hear who’s coming?” I asked. “Great Maudie.”

Kenny nodded and moved his bishop.

I stood over my father’s chair. “I thought she’s supposed to be crazy,” I said, while I scratched his back. My father just loves to have his back scratched.

“Not crazy …” he said, “just different … mmm … that feels good.”

“Because my nails are growing!” I showed him. “See … they’re almost past the tips of my fingers.”

Tracy called later. “No news is good news,” she said. “Mr. Machinist didn’t show up.”

“And if he hasn’t found out who we are by now we’re safe,” I told her.

“I think you might be right,” Tracy said.

And then both of us added, “I hope,” at the same time.

School isn’t as boring as it used to be. Wendy and Caroline made copies of their
How To Have Fun With Blubber
list and on Monday morning they passed them out.

We made Linda say,
I am Blubber
,
the smelly whale of class 206
. We made her say it before she could use the toilet in the Girls’ Room, before she could get a drink at the fountain, before she ate her lunch and before she got on the bus to go home. It was easy to get her to do it. I think she would have done anything we said. There are some people who just make you want to see how far you can go.

Two days later she was saying
I am Blubber, the smelly whale of class 206
without anyone forcing her to. She said it
before
she got a drink
at the fountain,
before
she went to the toilet,
before
she got on and off the bus, and during lunch, she said it
before
she started eating.

“Very good,” Wendy told her. “For that you get a reward. You get to kiss Bruce Bonaventura.”

Bruce wasn’t all that willing to get kissed, which is why Robby and Irwin had to chase him around the room and then hold him down while Wendy and Caroline dragged Linda over to him.

Bruce said, “If she touches my lips I’ll spit at her … so help me, I will!”

So we had to settle for Linda kissing Bruce on the cheek. If you ask me she enjoyed it.

On Thursday we made Linda show the boys her underpants. She wasn’t anxious to do that so Caroline had to hold her hands behind her back while Wendy lifted her skirt.

Irwin found some names for Linda in the Random House Dictionary, which Mrs. Minish keeps in the corner on its own table. He’s really good at looking things up. He can tell you exactly on what page certain words are found. We called Linda “flubsy,” “carnivore” and “bestial.” I didn’t recognize any of them, but they all sounded good.

On Friday, Wendy brought a small piece of
chocolate to school, wrapped in gold foil. It came from a box of Barricini’s somebody had brought her mother. Wendy showed it to Linda after lunch. “My father had to go all the way to New York for this chocolate-covered ant.”

All of us gathered around Linda’s desk. Wendy unwrapped the chocolate. She held it close to Linda’s face. “You’re going to eat this ant, Blubber.”

“No I’m not … and you can’t make me,” Linda said.

“Want to bet?” Wendy asked.

“I could get sick and die and then you’d be in big trouble.”

“I’m willing to take that chance,” Wendy told her.

Linda mashed her lips together and moved her head from side to side, all the time making noises that sounded like she was smothering to death.

Wendy handed me the candy. Then she said, “Grab her hands, Caroline.”

It’s good that Caroline’s so strong because Linda was really wiggling around. Once Caroline had Linda’s hands behind her back Wendy pinched Linda’s nose which made her open her mouth. As soon as she did I shoved in the chocolate.

“Now chew and swallow!” Wendy told her,
putting one hand over Linda’s mouth so she couldn’t spit anything out.