The Nose from Jupiter (12 page)

He’s Okay

Just a couple of more things to say. I take the job at Safeway, working for Mr. Grunewald. Mom does her shopping there, stopping in on her way home from work. Usually I’m finishing my shift about then, so I get a lift with her. I end up seeing more of her, not less. Also it means I can help with the shopping. We haven’t had rice, or chicken tenders, in awhile.

I’m supposed to go to the hospital in Toronto again next month, for another MRI test. My nose feels the same as always, but somehow I doubt that they’ll be able to see a mysterious spaceship shape inside the garage part of my nose.

Mom asks how my imaginary friend is doing. When I tell her he seems to be gone, she nods her head. “It’s all part of growing up, Alan,” she says.

“I miss him, sometimes,” I tell her. “I hope he’s okay.”

“I’m sure he’s fine,” my mom says.

And she could be right. A few days later I’m at Miranda’s for dinner, again – yes, I’ve been over a few times now – and we’re sitting on the couch afterward, watching a country music special on TV. Live from the Rose Bowl or someplace. Someplace warm and outside, k.d. lang is onstage, singing about a big-boned girl, smiling but bothered by…well, on TV it sure looks like an insect. You can see it in the spotlight, following her around the stage. She’s shaking her head back and forth, and waving her hands. Suddenly there’s a screech; sounds like feedback noise from the microphone. Anyway, k.d. stops for a second, recovering herself. And when she goes on singing, she’s distracted. You can see it because the camera is right in her face. Her nose…I’ll swear her nose is twitching.

At the end of the song, the crowd goes wild. k.d. takes a handkerchief out of her pocket. We go to a commercial about laundry soap.

Copyright © 1998 by Richard Scrimger

Published in Canada by Tundra Books,
75 Sherbourne Street, Toronto, Ontario M5A 2P9

Published in the United States by Tundra Books of Northern New York, P.O. Box 1030, Plattsburgh, New York 12901

Library of Congress Catalog Number: 97-62178

All rights reserved. The use of any part of this publication reproduced, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, or stored in a retrieval system, without the prior written consent of the publisher– or, in case of photocopying or other reprographic copying, a licence from the Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency – is an infringement of the copyright law.

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Scrimger, Richard, 1957-
        The nose from Jupiter

eISBN: 978-1-77049-042-0

I. Title.

PS8587.C745N67   1998      jc813’.54      C97-932439-4
PZ7.S37No   1998

We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry Development Program (BPIDP) and that of the Government of Ontario through the Ontario Media Development Corporation’s Ontario Book Initiative. We further acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council for our publishing program.

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