Of Mice and Nutcrackers: A Peeler Christmas Read online

Michael picks up the ball and throws it, almost as hard as the teacher. At whom does he aim? Why, me of course. I think Michael must hate me particularly – he’s always picking on me. I don’t know why – I’m not mean to him. I don’t make fun, or anything. I picked him to be Godfather Stahlbaum in the play. Most of the time I try to be nice to him. And not just because he’s a bully, the way you’d be nice to a Mafia don who happened to be in your homeroom.

  Anyway, I stand still, like a deer in the headlights, only I’m not as big – say, a woodchuck in the headlights, while the ball travels toward my face at the speed of light, looming bigger and bigger, blocking out the rest of the world.

  Then Brad steps in front of me and tries to catch the ball. He misses. He’s out. “Sorry, Jane,” he says.

  I smile at him – a nice guy. “Thanks for saving me,” I say.

  “Got you, Brad!” cries Michael. “Brad the weenie!”

  Patti’s face is red. She picks up the bouncing ball and hurls it at Michael. It goes way high, hits the basketball backboard, and actually bounces in.

  We all laugh and cheer. “Good shot!” I call to her.

  She stares at me. Her eyes are narrow. My best friend – what’s wrong with her?

  Michael and Jiri are the two biggest and strongest boys in the class, and they’re on opposite teams. Michael throws the ball really hard, but Jiri always seems to hold back.

  “Harder!” his team shouts at him. “Throw it harder, Jiri.”

  What he can do is catch the ball. In dodgeball, if you catch the other team’s throw before it bounces, the thrower is out. Jiri has the softest hands. He has trouble hitting anyone else with the ball because he doesn’t throw very hard, but he gets lots of people out because he catches their throws.

  Another thing he can do is dodge. I don’t know how. He’s big and a bit bulky, but he sideslips effortlessly. Time and again I’m sure someone is going to nail him, but at the last second he shuffles to one side and the ball sails past. He’s the size of a moose, but he swoops like a bird, out of the way of oncoming trouble.

  It helps that Michael is not throwing at him. Michael prefers to pick the other members of the team. One by one, we all fall to him.

  When I am hit, fairly early, I sit on the end of the bench. Brad comes over to sit down.

  “Hey, thanks again,” I say.

  Then Patti gets hit, and runs to sit beside me. “Hi, there!” I say, glad to see that she’s got over being mad. But she’s not even talking to me. Head turned, she has something to say to Brad.

  Only two people left. Michael on one side, and Jiri on the other. Mr. Gebohm is smiling around the whistle in his mouth, and rubbing his hands together. I realize, now, that this is what he wanted. The two boys are opponents. He didn’t like Michael sticking up for Jiri on the playground. “Come on, boys. Throw hard now. Next one’s the winner.”

  Jiri has the ball. He frowns, and puts the ball down. “A tie,” he says.

  “No!” shouts Mr. Gebohm. “I Want One Of You To Get It!”

  Jiri frowns at him. “Please?”

  “Come On!” Mr. Gebohm mimes throwing the ball. “Throw, Stupid!”

  Jiri shrugs, and aims a gentle toss at Michael, who doesn’t even try to catch it. He lets it roll to him, then in one motion picks the ball up and whips it as hard as he can – at Mr. Gebohm.

  It hits him right in the cheek. His glasses go flying. His whole head snaps back. There’s a muffled tweet from his whistle – the last sound a canary would make on its way into the cat’s mouth – and the teacher falls over, hitting the gym floor.

  “Gebohm go boom!” says Michael.

  Jiri frowns, then he gets the joke. He opens his mouth wide, and laughs and laughs. Mr. Gebohm is sitting up now. The whistle dangles. “Gebohm go boom!” says Jiri.

  I walk over to the teacher. “Can we rehearse our play in the gym after school today?” I ask. “Please, Mr. Gebohm.”

  He stares blankly up at me. “No,” he says.

  And so we have another rehearsal in class. Miss Gonsalves arrives in good time and good spirits. She laughs when I tell her about meeting the principal, and trying to convince Mr. Gebohm.

  “Wait until they hear my news,” she says, opening her music.

  “What news?”

  “I’ll tell you tomorrow. I won’t know for sure until then.”

  Snow is falling when I get out of the rehearsal. I can hear the scrape of shovels on the sidewalks – a sound muted by the falling snow. Bill is busy on our front walk. He isn’t the only one. His friend David is there too. A big kid, David. Bigger than Bill – than me, come to that. He looks like a bear in his winter coat, and hat with the earflaps dangling.

  “About time,” says Bill. “Hurry and help us, Jane. She won’t let us in until the walk is cleared.”

  “What do you mean, she? She, who?”

  “Who do you think – Grandma.”

  “Oh.”

  “Your grandmother reminds me of my aunt,” says David. “Very strict.”

  “Strict?” says Bill. “She’s crazy.” Then he says something I don’t understand. Sounds like “sugar.” “Is that right?” he asks David.

  David smiles. “That’s right,” he says, bending to lift another shovelful of snow.

  The back door of the house opens onto a mudroom. Hooks for coats, a tray for boots, a box for recycled papers. We hang up our coats.

  The smell from the kitchen is powerful. A strong and sweet smell, like burning sugar. Bill and I share a glance. Grandma is probably the world’s worst cook. Did you ever hear of the Donner party? They were in the Sierras in California and they ended up eating each other. Maybe I’d rather go to one of Grandma’s dinners than the Donner party – but it would be a tough choice.

  “Is the walk done?” yells Grandma from the kitchen. “And is your hairy friend here?”

  “The walk’s done, Grandma,” I say.

  “David isn’t hairy,” says Bill. “And he’s gone home.”

  “Well, hang up your coats!” Grandma coughs loud and long, and spits in the sink.

  Yuck.

  I run upstairs to check on Dad. He’s asleep. Back down on the second floor, I notice Bernie’s bed has been rolled into Bill’s room. The door to Bernie’s room is closed. Grandma is moving in. Am I ever glad I’m a girl. No way they’re going to put Bernie in with me.

  Bill’s sitting on his bed. “Ha-ha,” I say from the doorway. “Got yourself a roomie, hey?” Not serious teasing, you understand. Just enough to let him know that I’m doing better than he is.

  Bill ignores the teasing. “Do you think David’s hairy?” he asks.

  “He sure is,” I say. “And messy too.”

  “Shut up.”

  Back in the kitchen, the smell is stronger than ever. It’s coming from the oven. I don’t know what it is. Bernie is kneeling on a chair. He has the games box out on the kitchen table, and he’s trying to get Grandma to play something.

  He holds up the dominoes. “Do you want to –”

  “No,” says Grandma.

  “Oh. Well, what about –”

  “No.” Grandma opens the oven door. Heat shimmer blurs the atmosphere.

  Bernie opens a pack of cards. “What abou –”

  “No.”

  “Well, what do you want to do?”

  She closes the oven door, stares over at him. “You wouldn’t believe me.”

  “I’ll play with you, Bernie,” I say.

  He smiles, fans the playing cards in his two hands. “Pick a card,” he says.

  I take a card. Bernie gets off the chair and walks away. “Hey, Bernie!” He keeps walking. I’m left holding the card. Bernie goes upstairs.

  I thought the deck in his hands looked kind of thin.

  “So, how’s it going?” I ask Grandma. “Do you like my new earrings?” Two of them, high up on my left ear. Plain rings. I got them in time for Halloween. Dad didn’t like the idea. Actually, “didn’t like” puts it mildly.


  Grandma shrugs at my earrings. “How’s it going? I’ll tell you how it’s going. I’m living in a room with teddy bears on the wall,” she says.

  “Aren’t they cute?”

  “No.”

  “What’s for dinner?” I ask.

  There’s smoke coming out of the oven now. Grandma whirls around. “Son of a ditch!” she yells, throwing open the oven door. She takes a pan out of the oven. In it is a smoking mass – or should I say, a smoking mess. I have no idea what she’s cooking. Rounded, flatish, black things. Sandwiches? English muffins? Mini pizzas? Frisbees? Wagon wheels?

  Grandma holds the pan over the sink, and starts scraping the black off the … things.

  “What are those?” I ask.

  “Pork chops,” she says.

  I don’t say anything.

  “Shut up,” she growls, scraping. As the top black layer flakes off, I start to recognize them. It’s like archaeology, I suppose. The trick is to see the meat underneath the coating of … of what?

  “What’s the stuff on top?”

  “Marshmallow,” she says.

  Of course.

  “Pork goes with sweet things,” she says. “Applesauce, honey …”

  “And marshmallow,” I say.

  Grandma puts down the pan, and stirs something cooking on the stove. I don’t ask what it is.

  “Beans,” she says, without looking around. “And brown sugar. You’ve had it before.”

  The front door opens. “Hello?” calls Mom. Her voice sounds tentative. She doesn’t know what to expect. I run to the front hall.

  “Mom!” cries Bernie from upstairs.

  Mom has a funny expression on her face. “What’s for dinner?” she says.

  “You won’t believe it,” I whisper, peeking back over my shoulder. “Grandma is cooking pork chops with –”

  “Marshmallow. That’s it.” Mom nods her head. “I recognize the smell.”

  “She’s done this before?”

  “Dinner!” calls Grandma.

  Grandma finishes first, pushes her chair back, and opens her pack of cigarettes. Empty. She frowns at it, crumples it up, and tosses it onto her empty plate.

  I swallow a small mouthful of dry burnt leather – that’s what dinner tastes like.

  “There’s another pack of cigarettes in the bathroom,” I say.

  “I know,” says Grandma. She doesn’t move. Grandma has always smoked. Her apartment on the other side of the city has ashtrays and lighters on all the tables. One lighter is shaped like a gun. Last time we visited. Bill almost set Bernie’s hair on fire.

  “What’s everyone staring at?” she says. “I don’t need a cigarette. I’ll wait.”

  “Good for you!” says Mom.

  Grandma doesn’t say anything.

  “Smoking is bad for you,” says Bill. He’s not eating the pork chops, I notice. He’s trying manfully – boy-fully, anyway – with the beans.

  “Why is smoking bad for you?” asks Bernie. He doesn’t go to school yet, so he hasn’t seen all the anti-smoking videos.

  “Smoking turns your lungs all black,” says Bill, “so that you can’t breathe. You pant and fall down. And then your arteries get all hard, and you have a heart attack. And –”

  “Boys,” says Mom, “can we talk about something else, please?”

  “No, no,” says Grandma. “Keep going. Tell me more about how my body’s falling apart. I love it.” She coughs.

  Mom’s cell phone rings from inside her purse in the hall. She stands up. “Please excuse me, Mother, but I’m expecting an important call.” She carries her plate to the counter. She hasn’t eaten everything.

  Grandma sniffs. “Important call,” she says.

  “What’s Daddy getting for dinner?” I ask.

  “Soup,” she says. “Plain chicken soup out of a package. That’s all he wants.”

  Lucky Dad. Packaged chicken soup sounds pretty good.

  “Do you wish you had a cigarette now?” I ask Grandma.

  “Yes,” she says.

  “And do you really like hearing about your body falling apart?” asks Bernie.

  “No.”

  The scariest thing happens to me that evening.

  My favorite thing to wear in the universe is a fluffy oversize vest I bought on sale for fifteen dollars. Under the vest I like to wear a dark green button-down shirt from the Goodwill and what they call end-user pants – the kind with lots of ties and zippers. I can’t find my vest or my end-users in my closet or dresser, or in the pile of dirty clothes that grows on the floor beside my bed. I haven’t worn them in a few days. Did Dad wash them? I go down to the laundry room to check.

  When I’m at the bottom of the basement stairs, I hear whispering behind and above me. The basement door shuts, leaving me in the dark.

  “Very funny, Bill!” I call.

  This isn’t the scary bit. I can hear him and Bernie giggling, and I know the basement light is two steps in front of me. There’s a long pull chain, dangling from the bare bulb in the ceiling. I walk forward in the dark and wave my arms about until I make contact with the string. I pull it, and everything jumps into focus.

  Our basement is unfinished. There’s a lot of exposed bricks and insulation and wires strung near the ceiling. A crib in the middle is filled with all kinds of junk we’ve outgrown. Washer, dryer, and laundry tub against one wall, with a pile of dirty laundry in front of them. Dresser against another wall – filled with more junk. Our old furnace crouches in the far corner, like a giant hunkered down for the winter, wheezing and grumbling. That’s about all there is in the basement, except dust and spiders, and I don’t mind either of them. And the single bulb with the pull chain.

  I find my end-users in the pile of dirty clothes, and they’re clean enough to wear. Good. I put them off to the side. I’m bent over again, hunting for my vest, when there’s a flash, and the light goes out.

  I freeze. It’s really dark. And quiet.

  Something moves away from me, rustling against things in the dark. “Bill, I can hear you!” I say.

  The rustling stops.

  “Hey!” I shout. No reply. “Hey!”

  I turn around and reach for the pull chain, but I can’t seem to find it. I flail around and lose a sense of where I am. You know how it is in the dark.

  There’s Bill again. I can hear him rustling ahead of me. Wait until I get my hands on him. I edge forward. And edge some more. And some more. And ….

  It’s taking me longer than I expect. I keep my hands out in front of me so I don’t bump into anything.

  Spiderwebs! Drat. I don’t mind them when I can see them, but I hate brushing against them in the dark. I wipe my face, and keep going, slowly, slowly….

  Ah! The pull chain. What a relief. I pull it and – nothing happens. Maybe Bill didn’t turn the light out. Does that mean I’m alone down here? “Bill?” I call, moving forward.

  I bump into something with my knee. Ouch! I reach out and touch the laundry tub. I thought I was by the staircase, but I’m nowhere near it. I’m in the wrong part of the basement.

  The rustling comes back. I freeze solid. In front of me is a wall. On the other side of the wall is Cisco’s house. No way could Bill be there. In front of me is just a wall.

  The noise is coming from there. From inside the wall. I scream.

  Screaming is like pouring ketchup from a full bottle. It may be hard to start, but once you’ve started screaming, it all comes out in a rush. You usually end up with too much, noise covering everything, pooling in the middle of the plate, running off the sides, and you wish you’d kept your mouth shut.

  I stagger backwards, screaming. I bump against something, trip, and end up by the stairs. I keep screaming and screaming.

  *

  A shaft of light, shining down on my dark world. Light from the kitchen. The door is open. Mom calls my name. I can’t stop screaming. Mom runs downstairs.

  I spend the rest of the evening in the family room. I try
to tell Mom about the rustling noise, and she says there, there, and strokes my hair. That feels nice. Then she wraps a blanket around me and turns on the TV. She has work to do upstairs. Bernie bounces on the couch beside me. Ordinarily this would bother me, but tonight it’s soothing. He’s company.

  I can’t help wondering if it was Bill down in the basement all the time, scaring me. If it was, I’ll kill him.

  During a commercial I wander into the kitchen for a glass of juice. The basement door is open. I go over. I hear noise coming from the dark below.

  “Hello?” I call. If it’s Bill downstairs, I’ll close the door and see how he likes it.

  The basement light comes on. “Hello, yourself,” calls Grandma.

  I go down a couple of steps and peer into the basement. Grandma is standing on a chair, screwing in the lightbulb. “Can you hear a rustling noise down there?” I ask.

  “You know, missy, I think I can.” She steps down off the chair, pulls the chain so that the basement disappears in darkness.

  I should do homework, but I can’t bring myself to do it. I watch TV shows I don’t care about, following images across the screen, not paying attention to the dialogue. Bernie stops bouncing, trots off. I hear him talking to Grandma. “Do you want to –”

  “No,” says Grandma.

  I dream about going camping, which is strange because we don’t camp. Not since the time two years ago when Bill, pretending to be a pioneer, insisted on chopping firewood. He swung hard, smashing the container of spaghetti sauce instead of the log he was aiming at. Then he swung again, knocking down the tent; and again, slicing a big hole in the canoe. Three strokes and we were out – no dinner, nowhere to sleep, and no way to move on. That incident ended Bill’s attempt to live the pioneer life.

  I wake up. There’s the smell of smoke in my nostrils. Cigarette smoke. Strange, because no one in the household smokes – no, wait. I’m forgetting Grandma. I frown, and go back to sleep. I dream some more, this time about an outdoor bowling alley. There’s a shoe rental, a vending machine selling potato chips, and a campfire. Someone a few lanes over is crying for help. There’s a witch sitting around the campfire, roasting marshmallows. She cackles when the pins go down.