Bunnicula Meets Edgar Allan Crow

TWO

Excellently Weird

That night at dinner Mr. and Mrs. Monroe couldn’t stop talking about their brilliant son. I don’t mean Toby, the really brilliant one. I mean Pete, the temporarily brilliant one.

“We didn’t even know you’d entered this contest, Pete,” Mr. Monroe was saying as he sat down at the table and I was moving into my usual spot next to Toby’s chair. Toby has been known to slip me a little something from time to time when nobody’s looking. Like I said: The kid’s brilliant.

“I didn’t want anyone to know about it,” Pete answered. “In case I lost.”

“Oh, Pete,” said Mrs. Monroe, “we wouldn’t have thought anything of it if you had lost. I just can’t believe you won— out of so many entries! I want to read that letter again.”

Mrs. Monroe passed by me on her way to her seat, carrying a platter of meat loaf in one hand and the letter from M. T. Graves in the other. After a silent, unanswered prayer that the meat loaf platter might slip from her fingers, I listened as she pulled her chair out and began to read the letter aloud.

Dear Peter Monroe,

Congratulations! After personally reading all fifteen thousand entries in the “Why Flesh-Crawlers Gross Me Out the Most” contest, I have selected yours as the winner! I am delighted that my books gross you out so much, but what impressed me even more was what you wrote about yourself and your family. I particularly enjoyed your description of your unusual pets.

As you know, the winner of this contest receives a visit by me to his or her school. I look forward to visiting your school, Peter! My publisher will be in contact with you about the details. Ordinarily, I would ask to be put up in a hotel, but you have made your family—especially your pets—sound so intriguing that I wonder if I might be so bold as to ask for lodging in your home. I will be bringing my good friend Edgar Allan Crow with me. Please be sure to ask your parents if they would very much mind housing an author and his corvine companion.

Until we meet, and with my gratitude for your enthusiastic support of my work, I am

Yours truly,

P.S. I’m looking forward to spending some quality time with your special pets!

“What do you think?” I asked Chester. As was his habit during meals, he was curled up under the table. Howie was curled up next to him.

“What do I think?” Chester said. “The guy read fifteen thousand entries on why his books are gross. He needs a life, that’s what I think.”

“Maybe that explains it,” Howie remarked. “Maybe M. T. Graves has been so busy reading all those contest entries he hasn’t had time to write any books. There haven’t been any new ones in a long time. Pete and I have been worried.”

Just then Mr. Monroe asked, “Pete, would you reread that part of your letter where you wrote about the animals? It was so descriptive.”

I could hear Pete’s big sigh even from under the table. “If I have to,” he said.

“Ooh, poor Pete,” Toby moaned. “Has to read his prize-winning letter again. Too bad I didn’t even know there was a contest!”

“Jealous!”

“Am not!”

“Are too!”

“Boys!” Mrs. Monroe interjected in a no-nonsense tone.

“Fine,” Pete said. I heard him rustling some papers, and then:

“‘And the number one reason I think your books are the grossest is the excellently weird animals you put in them. I have pets who are weird, too, although they are not always excellently so.’”

Hmm. Do I bite him now or later?

“‘I have two dogs. Harold is big and old. He drools a lot.”’

Now.

“‘My brother Toby gives Harold chocolate treats, which everybody knows you’re not supposed to do, because chocolate can make dogs sick. I don’t think it has hurt Harold, though, except maybe in the brains department. He’s no Einstein, if you know what I mean.’”

Okay, so I wouldn’t really bite Pete. I’m not a biter. But I was considering some serious drooling on his foot when a piece of meat loaf suddenly materialized before me. I gratefully accepted it from Toby’s fingers. When I looked up to say thanks, I found him looking down at me with a worried expression on his face. I knew what he was thinking. Pete had given away our secret! Now that Mr. and Mrs. Monroe knew, would there be no more treats for my sweet tooth? How would I live without the occasional chocolate cupcake with cream in the center? Luckily, Mr. and Mrs. Monroe didn’t seem to be paying attention to anything other than Pete’s literary genius. Personally, I couldn’t help wondering how Mr. Monroe, who is a college professor of literature, could be proud of anyone who wrote “excellently weird.” But for the moment at least, it looked like my future relationship with chocolate was secure.

Pete read on:

“‘Then there’s Howie. He’s this wirehaired dachshund puppy we got at this boarding kennel called Chateau Bow-Wow. He chases birds and barks at cars, and sometimes he lets out these totally bizarre howls that could make your flesh crawl. (Get it?) You’d probably like it when he howls, though. You’d think he was possessed or something. I mean, really, he could be a character in one of your books.’”

Poor Howie, I thought—until I noticed the dreamy smile on his face.

“Wow.” He sighed. “A character in an M. T. Graves novel. How awesome would that be?”

Chester shuddered. “Oh, yeah, right,” he said, “that’s what I live for—to be a psycho-creature in one of M. T. Graves’s demented novels. Is this guy totally warped or something? What’s he got against reality?”

Pete continued:

“‘But wait, it gets even weirder. Chester is our cat. But he’s not what you’d call a normal cat. He’s more like a cat from outer space. Sometimes he gets this look in his eyes like he’s beaming in messages from the home planet. And sometimes he does stuff that you’d have to be from a whole other galaxy to even think about doing! Like one time we came home and found him pounding a sirloin steak on top of our sound-asleep rabbit! Is he unreal or what?’”

Chester lifted his chin and said, “Reality is so overrated.”

“Hey, I wonder what Pete will say about Bunnicula,” Howie said.

I don’t know if I’d describe our bunny as “excellently weird,” but he is definitely unusual. Chester is convinced that Bunnicula is a vampire just because he’s turned a few vegetables white by draining them of their juices. Oh, and he can get in and out of his cage without anyone knowing how he does it. And he sleeps all day and is awake at night. And he has these fangs, and . . . well, Pete was doing a pretty good job of describing him, so I’ll let him take it from here:

“‘If you think Chester’s weird, you haven’t heard anything yet. We have this rabbit called Bunnicula. We named him that after we found him at a movie theater where Dracula was playing. When he came to live with us, our vegetables starting turning white. It took us a while to figure out that maybe he had something to do with it. Ever since we did, he’s been on a liquid diet, and there have been no more white vegetables. Other than the vegetable thing, he’s not so bad. I mean, he doesn’t drool or howl or beam in messages from his home planet or anything. In fact, you might even say he’s kind of cute and cuddly. Of course, he does have these red eyes that glow in the dark.

“‘In conclusion, Mr. M. T. Graves: You might write some weird stuff, but with pets like mine, I live it!’”

Mr. and Mrs. Monroe couldn’t help breaking into applause. I, meanwhile, couldn’t help wolfing down the piece of broccoli Toby had just lowered to me.

Chester shook his head. “Broccoli! You aren’t just weird, Harold. You’re excellently weird.”

“Why, thank you, Chester,” I said, my tongue trying to nab some florets that had strayed to my whiskers. “It’s nice to be appreciated.”

“Yes, well, appreciate this, my excellently weird friend. There’s something mighty peculiar going on here—and I’m not talking about broccoli. I’m talking about M. T. Graves and his ‘corvine companion.’ Meet me in the living room after the others have gone to sleep and I’ve had a chance to do some research.”

“May I come too, Pop?” Howie asked.

Chester rolled his eyes at being called Pop. It’s an automatic response at this point, since Howie has called Chester “Pop” for as long as he’s been calling me “Uncle Harold.”

“Yes, yes, you may come, too,” he said.

And so it was that a little before midnight Howie and I found ourselves stationed in front of Chester’s favorite chair in the living room. Sitting amid stacks of FleshCrawlers books, Chester looked down at us and warned, “There is trouble ahead. I told you that crow was an omen.”

“What are you talking about?” I asked, stifling a yawn.

“The Potato Has a Thousand Eyes, My Sister the Pickled Brain, My Parents Are Aliens from the Planet Zorg, Don’t Eat the Cookies!—that’s what I’m talking about, Harold.”

“Chester,” I said, “do you remember when you went to see that nice psychiatrist, Dr. Katz? Do you remember how much he helped you?”

“I do not need a psychiatrist, Harold!”

“Okay, then, do you remember when you used to meditate? Do you remember how it calmed you down and helped you think clearly? Shall we try that now? Shall we chant? Help me out here, Howie. Om. Ommmm.”

Chester’s eyes narrowed to slits. “I do not need to meditate and I do not need therapy. What I’m trying to tell you—”