• • •
When I propped up the cardboard TV Calista made against my bedroom doorway and lay flat on my stomach, I could see all the way down the hallway, straight through to where the Living Room Channel was playing.
Dad on his treadmill, that’s what was on that channel. Running, running, running. Getting sweaty under the armpits. Not answering the phone when it rang. Not noticing the drippy faucet in the kitchen that would’ve driven Mom crazy. Not asking what happened to the A-10 Thunderbolt box with the bow on top. Not seeing me, for twenty minutes, lying on the floor of my bedroom, staring at him through a cardboard TV.
I pushed all the buttons on Calista’s cardboard remote, but the channel never changed.
sad.
Before I even tugged down the covers on Monday, I knew it would be a day not even donuts could solve. I told Calista that when she came over early to help get me ready for school.
“It’ll be all right, Albie, I promise.” That’s what Calista said. “Get up, okay? We have to leave soon or you’ll be late. And I’ll be there to pick you up when school gets out, and I have a special birthday present for you, and we can get donuts too if you need them. Three kinds.”
I curled tighter into a ball under the covers. “No,” I told her.
“Albie . . .” Calista sat down on the foot of my bed. You’re being silly. That’s what I thought she was going to tell me. That’s what Mom would’ve said. You don’t have a choice, so just get out of bed already. That’s what Dad would’ve told me.
Calista didn’t say those things.
Instead, she pulled the covers gently back from my face, and when I felt her do that, I opened my squeezed-shut eyes to look at her, even though she was blurry from the tears I’d been trying not to cry.
“Oh, Albie.” That’s what she said. “What happened?”
And so I told her. I sat up, and I sniffled, and I wiped at my face, and maybe I even cried a little bit more while I said it all, but right then I didn’t even really care that much. I told Calista everything.
I told her about the stupid baby who didn’t even know the Vulcan salute.
I told her about how much I missed gummy bears.
I told her about how it stunk to not be a famous TV star, even though I never knew before I wanted to be one in the first place.
I told her about how I hated Darren Ackleman more than a million hissing cockroaches.
I told her about the A-10 Thunderbolt, the first one and the second one, and the smashing and the smithereens.
I told her about the cupcakes.
I told her about “retard” and “freak baby” and “dummy.”
I told her that I couldn’t go to school. Not again. Not ever.
And when I was done with all the telling, I got back under my covers and curled into a ball, my knees against my stomach, and Calista rubbed my back in tiny circles, and I let her.
“You’re right,” she told me softly. “This is too big for donuts.”
• • •
After Calista left me under the covers, I kept waiting and waiting for her to come back and tell me it was time for me to get ready already. But she never did. And after a while, I was pretty sure it was past when we should’ve been out the door. And after a long time, I knew it was past then. But Calista never came to get me. So I just stayed under the covers, curled into a ball, knees to stomach, and I cried.