The Battle of the Red Hot Pepper Weenies (6 page)

I
love Thanksgiving.
Or, at least, I did until about half an hour ago. That's when my cousin Krystal and her family showed up. She's a lot older than I am, and has a husband and two gooey little kids. They were passing through Pennsylvania today on their way down to Florida, so Mom and Dad invited them to join us for dinner. On Thanksgiving. Which is the absolute worst day in the world to sit down at a table with vegans.

I hadn't even known that word before today. Here's how I learned it. Right after Cousin Krystal and her family came through the door, she handed Mom a big box wrapped in foil. “I brought a tofurkey,” she said.

“What's that?” I asked. It almost sounded like a bad word.

“A tofu turkey,” she said. “We're vegans. We don't eat meat or fish or milk or eggs.”

“Meat is murder,” her daughter, Aggy, said.

“Meat is tasty,” I said.

“Now, Eric, you need to respect other people's beliefs,” Mom said.

And they don't have to respect mine?
I kept my mouth shut.

Mom put the tofurkey in the oven. I helped set the table. Aggy and her little brother, Sam, followed me around. “Do you have any companion animals?” he asked.

“What?” I didn't have a clue.

They both looked at me like I was stupid, then said, “Dogs or cats?”

“You mean pets?” I asked.

“That's what unethical barbarians call them,” Aggy said. “Civilized people call them companions.”

“Yeah. I've got a companion. He lives in a bowl of water in my bedroom. He stinks at keeping me company because every time I take him out of the water so we can do stuff together, he starts to die.” I did an imitation of a gasping fish. I think it was pretty good. My second cousins thought otherwise.

“Mom!”
Aggy shouted, “Cousin Eric is being mean.”

“You stink,” Sam said. “Fish killer.”

Mom shot me a glare wrapped in a long sigh, which I knew was a dangerous combination. But I could tell that Dad was struggling not to laugh.

The real food was ready, so we sat down at the table. “Happy Thanksgiving,” Dad said. He put the turkey on the table and picked up the carving knife. The bird was a beauty. Twelve pounds, fat and juicy. And it came from the local turkey farm, right across the river. I couldn't wait to bite into a drumstick. At least I wouldn't have to fight my second cousins for one.

“Happy turkey slaughter day,” Aggy said.

I turned toward her and made a slashing motion with my knife. “I'm pretty sure most of the turkeys were slaughtered a couple days ago.”

“Mom!”
Aggy shouted. “Make him stop!”

My mom shot me another glare. I shut up. But Cousin Krystal kept lecturing us. “Meat is ruining the whole planet. They put all sorts of hormones in cattle feed. And all that stuff washes into the rivers and pollutes everything. It's a miracle there aren't giant fish or something flopping on the banks. On top of which, you're two miles from a nuclear reactor, and less than three miles from a pesticide plant. It's amazing you all aren't mutants or giants.”

“Or giant mutants,” I muttered, just loudly enough for Dad to hear.

“Meat pollutes your whole body,” Cousin Krystal said.

“Vegans are healthier,” Aggy said. “We make better athletes. I'll bet I can run faster than you.”

“Mmmmmm, nice thick gravy.” I licked my lips. “Some things aren't meant to run. Like gravy.”

After I finished the drumstick, which I purposely chewed with my mouth open while staring at Aggy, I got a slab of white meat and drowned it in gravy.

“Animals have feelings, too,” Cousin Krystal said.

“This one feels crispy,” I muttered. I kept my voice down, but Dad flashed me a smile. He loves steak.

I was just helping myself to thirds when the side of the house crashed in. I heard the loudest gobbling sound in the world, and a giant turkey burst into the dining room. It was so tall, its comb touched the ceiling.

“Run!” Dad shouted.

We all scrambled outside through the opening in the wall. The turkey in our house wasn't alone. I could see several more giant turkeys making their way across the river from the turkey farm.

We raced out of our yard and headed up the hill behind the house. I was feeling a bit sluggish from all that food. Aggy hadn't exaggerated about her foot speed. She and the rest of the vegans got way ahead of us. As Cousin Krystal reached the top of the hill, she paused long enough to taunt me. “See? Meat will get you killed. You pathetic carnivore.”

She might be right. The turkeys were catching up with us.

“At least my last meal tasted good!” I shouted as I tried for a final, desperate burst of speed. I stumbled and fell. I was too stuffed to get up.

Seconds later, one of the turkeys hovered over me. It pecked at my leg, sending a jolt of agony through my thigh. I braced myself for another peck, but the turkey paused and cocked its head, as if thinking. Instead of attacking me, it did something I didn't know birds could do. It spat. Then it shuddered, gobbled some giant turkey sounds at its giant turkey friends, and raced past us meat eaters, heading up the hill toward the vegans.

“I hope they don't like the taste of vegans, either,” I said. As much as I didn't want to have another meal with the vegans, I didn't really want them to become a meal, either.

The shrieks that came from the other side of the hill a couple moments later told me I hadn't gotten my wish. So, while these particular turkeys aren't vegans themselves, it turns out that, unlike me, they like having vegans for dinner. Go figure.

Mom got up and dusted herself off. “There's pie,” she said.

“Sounds good,” Dad said. “And we can have sandwiches later. There are plenty of leftovers. That was one large bird you cooked for us this year.”

“I've seen bigger,” I said.

Dad grinned at me. “I guess we'll always be able to say that.”

Mom and Dad headed down the hill. I followed. Dad was right. Pie sounded good.

T
he first sign
was the left glove. Gerald tugged at it and managed to get it on. But it felt tight. The right one had slipped over his hand with no trouble.

“Mom, my glove is tight,” he called.

“It probably shrank when it got wet,” she called back from the living room. “It's leather. It'll stretch.”

But the glove didn't stretch. The next day, Gerald looked for his old gloves. They were wool. Wool definitely stretched.

The second sign, a week or so later, appeared when Gerald was washing his hands. This happened rarely enough, but he'd gotten ketchup on them while he was eating his fries. As he rubbed them together under the water, he noticed that the left hand definitely seemed larger.

“Mom,” he called, “my left hand is bigger than my right hand.”

“People aren't perfectly symmetrical,” she called back.

Gerald wasn't sure what that meant. He dried his hands, put on his right glove, forced on his left glove, which stretched so much, he could see his skin through the knitted
wool, and tried to put on his jacket. But his left hand wouldn't fit through the sleeve.

“Mom,” he called. “My jacket doesn't fit.”

“People grow,” she called. “Look in the closet for another one.”

Gerald searched through the closet. He found a coat with bigger sleeves. It hung way past his knees, but he didn't care.

A month later, that coat didn't fit, either, but the weather had grown warm enough so he could get by with just a sweater—which wasn't too hard to tug on.

Soon after that, Gerald realized he had to stop putting anything in his left pants pocket because there was no way he could reach in to take stuff out.

His left hand was a lot bigger than his right. A month or so later, this became a real problem.

“Mom. I can't get any of my shirts on,” he called.

“It's warm enough to go shirtless!” she yelled back.

So he did. Eventually, his fingertips started to bleed. Gerald realized they were scraping the ground when he walked. He found his old wagon and put his hand in it. That was better. But even with the wagon, his shoulder was starting to ache all the time.

He went inside. “Mom, can you look at my hand?”

“Stop being such a baby,” she called back.

“Please?”

“Oh, come in then,” she said. “But hurry up. The commercial's almost over.”

Gerald walked down the hall to the living room. He went through the doorway and squeezed past the gigantic left foot that was propped on a stool near the couch.

“What's the problem?” his mom asked. She didn't look away from the television.

“Nothing,” Gerald said. Sighing, he dragged his hand back into the hallway.

I
think summer camp
was invented by the same person who dreamed up opera. There's no reason for it to exist, nobody except grown-ups thinks it's a good idea, and it can cause an extreme amount of misery for everyone involved.

So there I was, unpacking my clothes in cabin five at Camp Wamaguchi. Right after I jammed the last of my T-shirts into the locker and tossed out the vitamins Mom had packed for me, the kid at the end of the row waved me toward his bunk. He was a heavy kid—but not really fat—with a bad haircut and a nice shirt. I noticed he chewed his fingernails.

“Come here,” he whispered. He glanced around like he was making sure none of the counselors was nearby.

I could have said,
No, you come here.
Or I could have ignored him. But I went. There's no point making enemies on the first day. “What?”

“Check it out.” He leaned down and slid something out from under his bunk. It was a blanket. Actually, something wrapped in a blanket. He pulled back a corner. I saw brass and wood. Now he had my interest.

“BB gun? I asked.

“Yup.” He dropped the blanket back in place, slid the gun back under his bed, and winked at me. “We're going to have some fun this summer.”

A minute later, we all got called outside so we could meet one another. The kid's name was Elton. I noticed he didn't participate all that much in any of the activities. Mostly, he hung back and kept looking at our cabin.

That evening, after dinner, when we were supposed to be reading quietly and not bothering the counselors, Elton said, “I'm going shooting. Want to come?”

“Sure.” My cousin had a BB pistol. I liked plinking at cans and stuff. I followed Elton outside. We snuck along the path away from the counselors' cabins and followed the trail downhill to a large clearing.

Elton finally stopped in the center of the clearing. “There's one.” He pumped the lever, raised the BB gun, and fired off a shot.

I followed the line from the muzzle to the sky and saw a bird about twenty yards away.

“Not cool,” I said. “You shouldn't shoot at birds.”

“It doesn't hurt them,” Elton said. “It's just a little BB.”

He spun away from me and shot at another bird. This one was closer. I thought I saw it startle, but it kept flying and didn't seem to be injured.

“Want a shot?” he asked, holding out the BB gun.

“No, thanks.”

“Chicken?”

“Not me.” I grabbed the gun, pumped it, and waited to spot a bird. They weren't hard to find. They were heading to
their nests to settle down for the evening. When I saw one, I aimed a bit low before I fired.

“I think you missed,” Elton said.

“I'm not much of a shot.”

“Stick with me,” he said. “I never miss.”

I stuck with him until he was done, but promised myself I'd make an excuse the next time he wanted to go out. I really didn't think it was fun to shoot at animals. I mean, hunting was one thing. I had relatives who hunted. But this wasn't hunting. It was something sick and evil, and it told me as much as I needed to know about Elton.

He invited me out again the next evening, but I said I had to write some letters. I found another excuse the day after that. Elton just shook his head and said, “You're no fun.” I figured that was the end of it.

I saw my first dead bird at the start of the second week. I was out near the clearing, looking for arrowheads. The bird was lying at the edge of the woods, dark and ruffled. I couldn't say for sure that it had been killed by a BB, and I wasn't about to conduct an autopsy, but the sight didn't make me feel very good.

I saw three more dead birds in the next two days. And a dead squirrel that had been shot in the eye. Finally, I forced myself to do something I really didn't want to do. I told a counselor that Elton had a BB gun under his bed. I watched from the doorway as the counselor stormed into the cabin and reached under the bed. He slid the blanket out and dropped it on the mattress.

Elton sat there, not saying anything. He seemed weirdly calm for someone who was about to get in a ton of trouble.
The counselor unfolded the blanket, revealing a two-piece fishing rod.

“Sorry to bother you,” the counselor said. He glared at me as he left the cabin.

Elton flashed me a smile, then went back to his magazine. I figured he'd jump me later, when it got dark. But I made it through the night without trouble.

The next afternoon, when I was swimming in the lake, I felt a sudden sting on my cheek. I dove underwater, figuring it was a bee. But when I came up, I spotted Elton on the far bank. He was holding something behind his back. Then he walked into the woods. I touched my cheek. There was a small round hole—not deep enough to draw blood, but deep enough to sting.

I got shot a couple more times that week. I would have put up with it, maybe, except I also stumbled across a whole cluster of dead birds.

I needed to stand up for the animals. Elton must have hidden his BB gun in the woods. That much, I'd figured out. I'd just have to follow him tonight and see where he kept it. Then I could break it or jam it somehow, so he wouldn't be able to use it again.

After he slipped out of the cabin that evening, I followed him. “You'll be safe soon,” I whispered, looking up at the birds overhead. I knew that was stupid. But I felt like I was here to protect them.

There were more birds overhead than usual. I saw a steady stream of them flapping toward us from all directions. There was something odd about the way they were flying, but I couldn't tell for sure what the difference was. Maybe
they'd all been injured. That thought gave me the courage to do whatever it took to stop Elton.

He crossed the clearing and entered the woods on the far side. He kept going until he reached a smaller clearing. There were birds all over, circling in the air and swooping across the sky.

I moved closer, but stayed out of sight behind a tree. Elton reached under a bush and pulled out the BB gun. As he raised the gun, I thought about tackling him. Even though he outweighed me, I was pretty sure I could take him in a fair fight. But I had the feeling he was a dirty fighter. He'd probably hit me with the butt of the gun. This would be better. I could wait, and then break the gun after he left.

My fists clenched in anticipation of his first shot. But before Elton could pull the trigger, he said, “Ouch!” and slapped a hand on top of his head. He put the hand back on the trigger and looked around, like he was puzzled about something. Then he shrugged and raised the gun to his shoulder again.

“Ouch!” This time, he dropped the gun and looked up. I still had no idea what was going on. But I heard the next one. I guess it hit his forehead. There was a definite plunk. Elton jerked, grabbed his head, and hunched over.

Above us, the birds chirped and swooped. I heard a couple more isolated thumps, and then a steady cascade of taps and clunks as the birds dropped their rocks. Pebbles and small stones rained from the sky.

I took a couple steps toward Elton, thinking maybe I could lead him back to the shelter of the woods. But one hit from a plummeting stone on my knuckles was enough to make me change my mind.

Elton staggered toward the trees, but the bigger birds had shown up by now, with bigger rocks. They dove toward him before releasing their loads, striking him at an angle and forcing him back to the middle of the clearing.

I didn't want to see this part. Eager to move beyond the sound of striking stones, I made my way back toward camp. I guess out here, deep in the woods, Nature sometimes finds a way to deal with human nature.