Imaginary Friend Read online

  The old man grumbled. “A cat? For Christ’s sake. Cataracts. I don’t see too well. It’s like my eyes are full of clouds.”

  Christopher froze.

  “What do you mean, clouds?” he asked.

  “I see shapes. But they’re covered over with clouds. That’s why I’m here. I hit a deer with my car. I didn’t even see the God damn thing. Banged my head on the dash. They’re going to take my license this time. I know it. I won’t even be able to get away from that home for five minutes now. Fuckers.”

  Christopher smiled at all the swearing. He loved it. It felt like breaking the law. So, he kept quiet and listened to the running commentary as he watched the lights from the television dance on the old man’s face. After a while, Mr. Ambrose “rested” his eyes in a grumpy old man way, and eventually he started to snore. Christopher turned off the TV with the chipped plastic remote in Mr. Ambrose’s hands.

  “Thanks, junior,” he said. Then, he turned over and fell back to snoring.

  No man had ever called Christopher “junior” before. And it made him smile. He went back into the hallway. But for some reason, it wasn’t scary anymore. He walked past the nurses’ station. Nurse Tammy was on the phone again. She didn’t see him.

  “Dad, please stop calling. I have to do rounds. I promise to bring the merLOT,” she said, exasperated.

  Just before he went into his room to go back to sleep, he looked down the hall and saw Father Tom. He had never seen a priest outside of church, so he was curious. He tiptoed down the hallway and looked in as Father Tom made the cross over an old man. The old man’s family was there. His wife. Two middle-aged daughters. Their husbands. And some grandchildren, who looked like they were in middle school. They were all crying as Father Tom performed last rites.

  “Christopher,” Nurse Tammy whispered. “Back to bed, hun. This is nothing for a little boy to see.”

  She ushered him down the hall back to his room. But before he settled in, they passed Mrs. Keizer’s room. The old lady was sitting up in bed, watching static on the television. Her yellow teeth drowning in a jar on her nightstand. She turned to Christopher and smiled a sick, toothless grin.

  “She took another one. She’ll kill us all before the end,” she said.

  “Don’t pay attention to her, Christopher. She doesn’t know what she’s saying.”

  Chapter 12

  When Christopher woke up the next morning, he didn’t remember when he had fallen asleep. But he saw the light coming through the blinds. And that meant Friday. And that meant no more hospital. And that meant Bad Cat 3D!

  He turned to the bathroom. The door was open.

  His mother was washing her hands.

  And the hissing feeling was gone.

  “Wake up, lazy bones.” She smiled. “You ready to go home?”

  When the nurse pushed him in the wheelchair out of the hospital, he pretended he was Bad Cat’s rival, Ace, the flying squirrel who always got motion sickness. The vinyl seats of their old car never felt better. His mother brought him to the diner next to the motel, and he ordered chocolate chip pancakes. Normally, that would be the highlight of his day.

  But this was not normal.

  This was Bad Cat 3D day. All morning and afternoon, Christopher thought about Bad Cat and his best friend, Ice Cream Cow, who made delicious soft serve. He looked at the clock on the wall and used Ms. Lasko’s lessons about telling time. As the seconds ticked away to their tickets at 4:30, it was worse than the waiting on Christmas Eve.

  “Why can’t Christmas be a day earlier?” he would ask his mother.

  “Then, you’d be groaning on December twenty-third,” she would reply.

  At three o’clock, they headed over to the movie theater near South Hills Village to get in line. By four o’clock, the line was around the block. Special Ed arrived with his mother, both of them dressed as Bad Cat characters. Christopher’s mom thought Special Ed probably browbeat his mom into making a fool of herself. At least, she hoped that was the case. The kid had enough struggles ahead of him without having a mom who voluntarily dressed like a donkey named Kicker.

  When the usher finally opened the doors, Christopher was so excited. He got his chunky 3D glasses. “Just like a rich kid!” he said. They found their perfect seats right in the middle. Christopher’s mom left to get snacks and returned with every bit of junk food that Christopher loved.

  He had finished half the snacks by the time the trailers ended. But with each trailer and each chomp of popcorn, his excitement only grew. And when the movie finally started, the children erupted into applause.

  *

  This would forever be their childhood, Christopher’s mother thought.

  She remembered the movies she loved when she was a girl. Back when she believed that maybe she was a long-lost princess who belonged to a much nicer family than her own. It wasn’t true, but somehow, she still gave birth to a prince.

  “I love you, Christopher,” she said.

  “You, too, Mom,” Christopher whispered, distracted by the movie.

  She looked up at the screen and smiled when Bad Cat walked up to his crab neighbor, Leonardo di Pinchy, who was halfway through painting his girlfriend, Groan-a Lisa.

  Bad Cat said, “Nice painting, Leonardo. Were you going to finish that?”

  And all the kids cheered.

  When the movie was over, Special Ed’s mother “absolutely insisted to Christ” that she take all four of them to TGI Fridays for dinner. Her treat.

  “So, the kids can have wings, and we can have our ‘mommy juice,’” she said with a wink.

  All through dinner, Christopher’s mother listened to Special Ed’s mother “for Christ’s sake, call me Betty” as she margarita’d (it’s a verb now) her way through stories of almost finishing college and marrying Special Ed’s father, who just opened his sixth “count ’em. Sixth!” hardware store in the tristate area.

  She leaned over and whispered through her boozy breath, “You know that C-U-Next-Tuesday, Mrs. Collins? Well, her husband—the notorious P.I.G.—keeps developing housing plans and people keep borrowing money to fix ’em up nice, so God bless is all I have to say. Suck it, Home Depot! My husband is rich! Waitress, the bottom of my glass is dry, and I can still remember my troubles!”

  Christopher’s mother thought that maybe she made something of a friend in Betty Anderson. Some people are born to talk. Others are born to listen. And it’s wonderful when the two meet.

  “I like you, Kate,” Betty said as they walked to the parking lot. “You’re a great listener.”

  On the drive home, Christopher fell asleep, his belly full of food. His mother carried him up the stairs to their motel room and put him in bed.

  “Mom?” he said from his sleep.

  “Yeah, honey?”

  “Can we see Bad Cat again?”

  “Sure, honey. Anytime you want.”

  She kissed his forehead and left him to dream. She made a beer on the rocks and savored the night. Because she knew that tomorrow, the bill was due, and she couldn’t possibly pay it.

  Chapter 14

  When Christopher woke up Monday morning, his “vacation” was over. He was going back to school. Back to Brady Collins and Jenny Hertzog saying “Floods.” But most importantly, he was going back after missing two whole weeks.

  Even Special Ed is going to be smarter than me now, he thought. He looked down. One little Froot Loop floated like a life raft in the milk.

  “I will be here to pick you up at three,” his mother said as she dropped him off. “Do NOT leave this school.”

  “Yes, Mom,” he said.

  Christopher’s mother gave him an extra-long hug, then he walked to the entrance. Normally, he was ignored until he reached homeroom, but this morning, he was the “missing” kid. When the pigtail girls saw him, they stopped jumping rope and stared. A couple of the kids said “Hey.” Then, the twin brothers ran up to the school. The minute they saw him, something amazing happened.

&n
bsp; “Hey, Christopher. Heads up,” Mike said and tossed him their little plastic football.

  Christopher couldn’t believe it. Matt and Mike wanted to play with him. He looked up, and saw the ball sailing down at him. He was so bad at sports, but he prayed with all his heart that he wouldn’t miss the ball. It came down, and right before it almost hit him in the nose…

  He caught it!

  “Hey, Chris. Hit me deep,” Matt with the lazy-eye patch said. Then, he started to run.

  Christopher knew he couldn’t throw, so he thought really quick about how to keep himself in the game.

  “Flea flicker,” he said and tossed the ball underhand to Mike.

  It worked! Mike grabbed the ball and sailed it twenty yards down the sidewalk to his brother. A perfect spiral.

  They spent the next three minutes throwing the ball together. But to Christopher, it was as fun as a whole Saturday. He ended up being pretty good at catching the ball.

  Mike and Matt, who liked to be called the M&M’s, actually said he was pretty fast, too. Mike was older than Matt by three minutes and taller by two inches. And he never let him live that down. But if anyone else made fun of Matt, look out. Especially Matt’s lazy-eye patch. Jenny Hertzog somehow got away with “Pirate Parrot.” But if anyone else said it, Mike would simply beat them up.

  Even fifth graders.

  When Christopher got to homeroom, the chatter stopped, and all eyes were on him. Christopher sat down next to Special Ed, trying to blend into his desk. But the M&M’s hovered, asking what happened to Christopher when he went missing.

  Christopher was normally very shy when kids talked to him, but the brothers were being so nice. So, as the class waited for Ms. Lasko to be her usual five minutes late, he told them the story. As he spoke, he noticed that no one else in the room was talking. All ears were on him.

  Suddenly, Christopher felt a little more confident. So, he started to add details about the hospital and getting to stay up late and watch The Tonight Show, which was very impressive to everyone.

  “You stayed up past midnight?! Holy shit,” Mike said.

  “Holy shit,” Matt said, trying to be as tough as his brother.

  Christopher was in the middle of the story of the old woman in the men’s room when he suddenly heard a voice.

  “Shut up, faker.”

  Christopher looked up and saw Brady Collins. He’d gotten a haircut in the two weeks Christopher was gone. He looked even meaner without bangs.

  “You pretended to get lost. I know you met your boyfriend in the woods, you big faker. Now shut up,” Brady said.

  Christopher’s face turned red. He immediately got quiet.

  “He’s telling us a story, Brady,” Mike said.

  “Yeah, he’s telling us a story,” Matt echoed.

  “So, shut up,” Special Ed said with newfound bravado, knowing that Mike was there to back him up.

  The room got pin-drop tense.

  Christopher immediately tried to keep the peace. “It’s okay, guys. I’ll stop.”

  “No, Chris. Screw him,” Mike said.

  “Yeah. Screw him,” Special Ed said, beating Matt to the punch.

  Mike finally smirked and whispered, “Sit your ass down, Brady, before I give it a new crack.”

  Brady’s eyes narrowed to slits. He looked violent. Until the girl with the freckles laughed. And then, the geek with glasses laughed. And pretty soon, everyone was laughing. Except Brady. He looked angry and embarrassed and suddenly small. But he was still as dangerous as seventy-five pounds could be. Christopher had seen that kind of violence in someone’s eyes before. Jerry was just a lot bigger.

  “So, what happened after the old woman?” Mike asked.

  Christopher started to tell the story again, and he was so grateful for new friends that he did something daring. He did his impersonation of Leonardo di Pinchy from Bad Cat 3D.

  “Were you going to finish that story?” he finished, switching to Bad Cat.

  All the kids laughed. Story time was over when Ms. Lasko finally came into class with her thermos and bloodshot eyes. She fished out a couple of aspirin from a tin in her desk, then said the worst two words in the English language.

  “Pop quiz.”

  The kids groaned. Christopher’s heart fell. First period was math. Dreaded math.

  “Come on now. We’ve spent the last two weeks working on addition. You can do this, boys and girls,” she said as she gave a small stack of quizzes to each kid in the front row. The tests moved back like a wave at a football game. Christopher sank in his chair. He felt Ms. Lasko’s manicure on his shoulder.

  “Christopher, I don’t expect you to know how to do this. Just give it your best shot. You can always retake it. Okay?” she said.

  Christopher nodded, but it wasn’t okay. He was always terrible at math, and now he was almost two weeks behind. He was going to fail, and his mom was going to have to say, “Don’t worry. Keep trying. You’ll get it.”

  He wrote his name in the upper-right-hand corner with a big green pencil. Then, he looked up at the clock. The red seconds hand swooshed past the twelve, and it was exactly eight o’clock in the morning.

  Christopher looked at the first problem.

  2 + 7 = ____

  Ms. Lasko always liked to start with a really easy one to give the kids confidence.

  2 + 7 = 9

  He was sure that was right. Christopher looked down at the test. Only six more problems. He was determined to get at least one more right. At least one more.

  24 + 9 = _____

  Christopher stopped. Normally nines were really tricky because it never got all the way to ten. If it were twenty-four plus ten, that would be pretty easy. Thirty-four. No problem. But then Christopher figured out something. Just add ten and take off one. That made sense. That was easy. His big green pencil put down the answer.

  24 + 9 = 33

  He couldn’t believe it. He got the first two right. If he could just get one more, that would be three of seven. Three plus seven is ten. Ten minus seven is three. He looked at the next problem. It was a money problem.

  If you had two nickels, one dime, and one quarter, how much money would you have? ______ cents.

  Ms. Lasko always liked to challenge them on the third one. And normally, this was the time Christopher would feel stupid. But not this time. Christopher realized the money was just numbers. And if he could add two numbers, he could add four numbers.

  45 cents!

  Christopher was so excited, he almost jumped out of his chair. He never got the first three on a pop quiz. Never.

  36 - 17 =

  Ms. Lasko was being smart again, but he knew what to do now. Thirty-six minus sixteen minus one.

  36 - 17 = 19

  Slowly, he got this feeling. A small, quiet hope that maybe, just maybe he could get a perfect for his mom. He never got a perfect on a test. Not in any subject. Not in his whole life. His mom would buy him Froot Loops for a year.

  If you were at the baseball game for 1 hour and 6 minutes, how many minutes is that?

  This was Ms. Lasko being nice again. Any kid could look up at the clock and count around the clock face if they wanted to. But Christopher didn’t need to. Sixty tick tick ticks. With six more.

  66 minutes

  Two more to go. He wanted that perfect so badly. He wanted his mom to be proud of him. He didn’t even care about the Froot Loops. He looked at the next problem, tap tap tapping the green pencil.

  There are 91 people on a boat, but only 85 life jackets. How many more life jackets are needed?

  Christopher took the numbers out of the words and saw ninety-one minus eighty-five. And this time, he didn’t even need to do ninety-one minus ten and add four. He didn’t need to do anything. He just understood.

  6 life jackets

  The last question. Christopher could barely bring himself to look. He only needed one more answer to get a perfect. Brady Collins got them all the time. So did Dominic Chiccinelli. Kevin Dor
wart. Even Jenny Hertzog. But this was his.

  Bonus Problem:

  12 x 4 =

  Christopher’s heart sank. He had only started to learn multiplication before he went to the woods. There was no way he could figure this out. So, he just thought about the number twelve. And how there were twelve people in the jury box in his mom’s old movies on Friday nights. And how if there were four movies, that would be four sets of twelve jurors. And how that would be forty-eight jurors.

  Christopher stopped breathing.

  The answer was forty-eight.

  He knew it. Like the moment he learned how to tie his own shoe or know his left from his right (your left hand makes an L!). His mind went CLICK. Everything in his brain that had been cloudy was lifted.

  Bonus Problem:

  12 x 4 = 48

  Christopher had to make extra sure he would get that first perfect, so before he put down his pencil, he went back over the whole test. He did each problem again. And when he got to number three, he stopped.

  If you had two nickels, one dime, and one quarter, how much money would you have?

  It didn’t even occur to Christopher the first time through. This was a math test after all. Not a reading test. But there were so many letters. And he realized he didn’t switch his letters back. Not once. He had read the sentence without even sounding it out. He thought there must be something wrong, so he read it again.

  If you had two nickels, one dime, and one quarter, how much money would you have?

  45. Or forty-five. There were so many e’s. Seven, to be exact. But that didn’t stop him. And nickels didn’t look like…

  ncikels

  They were nickels. And one quarter was one quarter, not…

  Qautrer

  His chest was pounding now. He looked up at the posters around the room. The ones that had given him trouble all month.

  RAEIDNG IS FNUDAEMANTL

  He didn’t even have to sound it out. He did it all in his brain.