The Traveling Vampire Show

Chapter Seventeen

” When Rusty’s house came into sight, so did a crowd of parked cars.

“Oh,” Rusty said.

“What?”

He looked at me and bared his teeth. “Mom’s day to host her bridge club.”

“Oh.”

“Forgot all about it.” Looking pained, he said, “There’ll be like a dozen ladies in the living room.”

I nodded.

My mother also belonged to a bridge club, though not the same one as Rusty’s mom. I’d been in our house when she hosted her group. The air was so thick with cigarette smoke you wondered how they could see their cards… or breathe. And the noise! I had no problem with the clinking of glasses and coffee cups that sounded as if you were in a crowded restaurant. The constant chatter wasn’t so bad, either. What I couldn’t stand were the outcries of surprise and delight that kept blasting through the house: ear-splitting whoops and squeals and cackles and shrieks.

“We can’t go in,” Rusty said.

“What about the back door? We could sneak into the kitchen.”

Rusty scowled. “I don’t know,” he muttered. “Mom’ll be running in and out… and no telling who else.” He shook his head. “We’d get caught. Then Mom would have to introduce us to everyone.”

I grimaced.

Our mothers always introduced us to company. It’s a horrible, embarrassing experience even when you’re fully dressed. I sure didn’t want to be paraded shirtless in front of all Mrs. Baxter’s lady friends.

It would be even more humiliating for Rusty, since his physique was nothing to brag about.

“But I’ve gotta get some food in me,” he said.

He frowned down at the sidewalk as if pondering his options. Then he said, “We might as well try and sneak into the kitchen. We can grab something to eat and then haul ass.”

“What about shirts?”

“Forget it. How’m I supposed to get to my room?”

I gave him a look.

“It’s not my fault,” he said.

“I know.”

“But at least we can grab some food.”

In case we were being watched from the living room, we kept our eyes away from Rusty’s house until we were past it. On the other side of the driveway, we ducked behind the parked station wagon and made our way to the garage. Then we went around the garage to the back yard and crept up the stairs to the kitchen door.

Rusty bent forward. Hands cupped to the screen, he peered in. Then he eased open the door.

I followed him into the kitchen. Nobody was there except for us. Both doors to the rest of the house were shut—probably to keep the bridge club ladies from noticing the kitchen’s clutter.

The doors kept out most of the smoke, but not the noise. Mrs. Baxter’s group sounded exactly like my mother’s—like a gang of merry female lunatics.

The kitchen counters were littered with dirty glasses, cups, plates and silverware. By the look of things, Mrs. Baxter had served cherry pie a la mode to her friends. On the table in front of us were two pie tins, empty except for crumbs of crust and spilled red filling.

Rusty ran a fingertip across the bottom of a pie tin, came up with a gob of filling and stuck it in his mouth.

I didn’t bother.

Hunched over, head swiveling as he glanced from door to door, Rusty tiptoed around the table and made his way to the refrigerator. He pulled it open. I stepped up beside him. The chilly breath of the refrigerator drifted against my skin. It felt great.

With both of us standing close to the open refrigerator, Rusty found a pack of Oscar Meyer wieners. He pulled out a hot dog, stuck it into his mouth like a somewhat droopy orange cigar, then offered the package to me. I slipped out a wiener and poked it into my mouth.

Rusty, Slim and I often ate cold hot dogs—but only when no adults were around. Put a mother into the picture, and a wiener has to be heated and slipped onto a bun. Like it’s the law. Only problem is, the bun is usually dry. To make the bunned hot dog edible, you need to slather it with mustard or ketchup (and Rusty always needed pickle relish, a disgusting concoction), which killed the taste of the wiener.

I chowed down my cold dog and accepted Rusty’s offer to have another.

While we held them in our mouths, Rusty put the package away and pulled out a big brick of Velveeta cheese.

“Mmm?” he asked.

Nodding, I affirmed. “Mmm.”

We turned away from the refrigerator, I eased its door shut, and we headed across the kitchen. Rusty took a cheese slicer out of a drawer. At a clear place on the counter, he set down the Velveeta and peeled back its shiny silver wrapper. With the taut wire of the slicer, he cut off an inch-thick slab.

He handed it to me. As I sank my teeth into it, he started to cut off another slab.

One of the doors behind us swooshed open.

We both jumped.

Through the swinging door stepped Bitsy.

The actual name of Rusty’s fourteen-year-old sister was Elizabeth. Her nickname used to be Betsy. Like everyone else in Rusty’s family, however, she was on the husky side. So Rusty started calling her Bitsy. She liked it, but her parents didn’t. They seemed to think it drew attention to her size, and not in a flattering way.

When the door swung open, I figured we’d had it.

Rusty gasped and whirled around like a burglar caught in the act.

Seeing that the intruder was only Bitsy, though, he rolled his eyes upward. I smiled at her, my tight lips hiding my mouthful of yellow cheese goo and my right hand holding a wiener.

“Hi, guys,” she said. She looked glad to see us.

Especially glad to see me. She was always glad to see me. She was smitten with me, and had been for years. Maybe because I was such a handsome fellow. Or maybe because I always treated her like a regular person and never teased her and often stuck up for her when Rusty started giving her crap.

As the door swung shut behind her, Bitsy blushed and smiled into my eyes, then checked out my bare torso, then met my eyes again and said, “Hi, Dwight.”

I nodded, swallowed some Velveeta and said, “Hi, Bitsy. How you doing?”

“Oh, fine, thank you.” As if suddenly worried about her own appearance, she patted her hair and glanced down at herself. Her hair, as usual, resembled a shaggy brown football helmet but without the face guard or chin strap. She was wearing an old T-shirt and cut-off blue jeans—the same sort of outfit Slim normally wore, except Bitsy was barefoot. Plus, her T-shirt was more ragged than Slim’s and she wasn’t wearing a bikini top underneath it. She could’ve used one. Or a bra. Especially since her T-shirt was so thin you could pretty much see through it.

“Hey, Bits,” Rusty said. “Wanta do us a favor?”

“Like what?”

“Get us some shirts.”

She frowned slightly at him. “What for?”

“To wear, stupid.”

I gave him a look. One thing that always puzzles me; people smarting off when they’re asking for someone’s help. It seems not only rude but incredibly dumb.

Trying to sound extra-nice to make up for Rusty, I said, “Our shirts got ruined over at Janks Field.”

Bitsy’s eyes widened. “You were at Janks Field? She glanced at Rusty. ”You’re not supposed to go there.”

“Thanks, Dwight. Now she’s gonna tell on me.”

To Bitsy, I said, “You won’t tell on him, will you?”

“If you don’t want me to.”

“Thanks.”

“You’re welcome.”

“Anyway, our shirts got ruined when we were there.” Seeing the concern in her eyes, I explained, “A dog attacked us.”

“Oh, no!”

“We’re all right, but our shirts got wrecked. We’ve been running around without them all day and we’re getting pretty sunburned.”

“You’ve got a good tan,” she told me, blushing.

“Thanks. But anyway, we just want to borrow a couple of shirts so we don’t get burnt any more than we already are when we go back out.”

“What sort of shirts do you want?” she asked.

“Anything,” I said.

“Just go in my closet and grab us a couple, okay?”

“In your closet?”

“Want me to draw you a map?”

With a sort of pleased, now-the-tables-are-turned look on her face, she said to Rusty, “But I’m not supposed to go in your closet.”

Rusty’s eyes narrowed. “You have my permission. This once.”

“Well well well,” she said.

“Just do it, okay?”

“Why can’t you do it yourself? They’re your shirts. It’s your closet.”

Before Rusty could answer and probably make matters worse, I told her, “We don’t really want to meet the bridge club, you know?” Shrugging, I glanced down at myself. “No shirts? It’d be kind of embarrassing.”

Nodding and blushing, she stared at my bare torso.

“C’mon, Bits. We haven’t got all day.”

I scowled at Rusty. “Leave her alone. She doesn’t have to get the shirts if she doesn’t want to.”

“I’ll get them,” she said, speaking to me.

“Thanks.”

“You’re welcome. How many do you need?”

“Twenty-eight, you moron, ” Rusty said.

“Just two will be fine,” I told her.

“What about Slim?” she asked.

The sudden reminder made me go sick inside. Trying not to let it show, I said, “What about her?”

“Does she need one, too?”

“Let’s ask,” Rusty said, and looked over his shoulder.

“Slim isn’t with us,” I explained.

“Why not?”

Rusty and I spent a little too long thinking about that one.

Bitsy suddenly looked worried. “Is she all right?”

“She’s fine,” Rusty said.

“No she’s not,” Bitsy said. Her eyes turned to me. “Something happened to her, didn’t it?”

Considering Bitsy’s crush on me, you might’ve expected her to be jealous of Slim. But it didn’t work that way. Instead of hating Slim, she idolized her. I’m pretty sure she wished she could be Slim: cute and slender and athletic and smart and funny, and hanging out with me almost every day.

“Where is she?” Bitsy asked.

I shrugged.

“She had to stay home and do the laundry,” Rusty said.

Bitsy’s eyes stayed on me. Clearly, she didn’t believe Rusty’s explanation. She wanted to hear it from me.

“Why don’t you go ahead and get us the shirts?” I said, a gentleness in my voice that surprised me. “Just two shirts. We’ll wait in the backyard, okay? And I’ll tell you about Slim.”

“Okay.”

When Bitsy shoved open the door, the noise of the bridge ladies swelled. The door swung shut, coming half-open again on our side and fanning in a few gray rags of smoke.

Rusty muttered, “Shit.”

Then he cut off another thick slab of Velveeta cheese, folded the end of the wrapper, and returned the cheese to the refrigerator. While he still held the door open, he asked, “Another dog?”

I shook my head.

He shut the door. Both of us holding what was left of our wieners and cheese, we hurried outside and down the stairs to the backyard. Over near a comer of the house, we stopped to wait for Bitsy and finish eating.

“Jush wha’ we nee’,” Rusty muttered, his words mushy from a mouthful of partly-chewed lunch.

“Don’t worry about it,” I said.

He swallowed and said, “Why’d you have to go and tell her about Janks Field?”

I shrugged. “I have a hard time lying sometimes.”

“Tell me about it.”

“Sorry. But look, she’ll be all right.”

“Easy for you to say, she isn’t your sister.”

The screen door swung open. Bitsy rushed out and bounded down the stairs. Her hands were empty. I figured something must’ve gone wrong. As she hurried toward us, though, I saw that the front of her T-shirt bulged more than usual.

“Got ’em,” she said. Stopping in front of us, Bitsy patted her bulge. Her T-shirt was so thin I could see the wrinkled bunch of fabric underneath it.

Rusty put out his hand and snapped his fingers. “Give,” he said.

Fixing her eyes on me, Bitsy asked, “Where’s Slim, really? Something’s wrong, isn’t it?”

“You have to promise not to tell,” I said.

Rusty groaned.

“I promise.”

“She’ll tell.”

“No, I won’t.” She raised her right hand. “I swear.”

“First time something doesn’t go her way….”

She threw a glare at him. “I will not.”

I said, “We’re going to look for Slim right now. She was still at Janks Field last time we saw her. So that’s where we’re going.”

“How come you went off without her?”

I gave Rusty a look, then faced Bitsy and said, “She wanted to stay behind.”

“How come?”

“To look at some stuff,” I said. “Anyway, we have to get back and find her.”

Bobbing her head slightly as if she now understood, Bitsy reached with both hands under the bottom of her T-shirt and dragged out a couple of shirts. They were both wrinkled, but looked clean.

“This one’s for you,” she said, and handed me a checkered, short-sleeved shirt.

“Thanks,” I said.

“You’re welcome.”

“And this one’s for you.”

The shirt she held out toward Rusty had nothing wrong with it that I could see, but he snatched it from her grip and muttered, “Thanks a lot.”

Turning again to me, she said, “Are you sure Slim doesn’t need a shirt, too?”

“Nah,” I said. “She has ours.”

“What happened to hers?”

“The dog got it,” I said.

“I thought you said it wrecked your shirts.”

“Indirectly,” I said.

“Huh?” Bitsy asked.

“Shit on a stick,” Rusty said, “why not just blab everything?”

Holding the stub of my wiener in my mouth, I put on the shirt.

“I’m coming with,” said Bitsy.