10

BY COMPARISON, EVEN
BESS LOOKED NORMAL.

I don’t know who was more freaked out. Me or Bitsie slash Zola. We just looked at each other and screamed for a while.

Then something happened that never happens in real life, but happens all the time on those lame TV sitcoms.

We both went, “What are you doing here?!?” at exactly the same time.

The puppet stood there glaring at me as if I just let my dog poop on his lawn or something.

My heart was pounding and my brain was really noisy. It was like someone in my mind was in a big panic, running from room to room going, “Do you know why this puppet’s talking?…Do you know why this puppet’s talking?” But nobody did.

None of this made any sense. How could a puppet walk and talk on its own? And why was it so mad at me? Maybe I wasn’t supposed to be in the studio by myself—but I was pretty sure it wasn’t supposed to be there either.

I decided the best thing to do was to act like this was all a dream, which I figured it probably was. I’d just play along with it and see what was up. That meant I had to answer him/her/it. (How hard could that be? Even I find it easy enough to talk when I’m only talking to myself.)

I said, “I’m here because it reminds me of my room at home. I have a little hiding place under my bed I call Dreemland. What are you doing here?”

Just like that. Nice and calm.

I was expecting Zola’s voice or Mel’s. Or even Bitsie’s voice, I mean the kiddie one Jimmy uses for TV. Instead the puppet had this smart-alecky cabdriver-type voice.

(Quite a contrast to his yellow fuzzball hair and the little sparkly hearts bouncing around on top of his antennae. It was like seeing a really short blue mobster all dressed up for Hallowe’en or something.)

“What’s it to you?” he said.

I didn’t let that bug me. I just said, “I told you why I was here, now it’s your turn to tell me.”

But did he?

No. He went, “Why would anyone lie under their bed?

Can’t your parents afford a mattress?”

I realize now that I should have said, “As a matter of fact they can’t afford a mattress” and made him feel bad. But then I was thinking this was just a dream—so what difference did it make? I’d just talk.

I told him all about Dreemland—the food, the books, the clothes. I said how it made me feel safe under there, even though right until the moment the words came out of my mouth I didn’t know that was how I felt. I didn’t mean “safe” like someone was trying to get me—I meant “safe,” the way you feel when your mother’s actually relaxed enough to sit down for a while and you can lean against her on the couch and read your book.

I told him that sometimes I like to imagine living under there. I’d never said that to anyone before because, of course, I know how stupid it is. It’s not like I’d really do it—lie flat on my back under a bed for the rest of my life—but sometimes I just liked the idea of it. It was so much less complicated than everything else.

Believe it or not, he seemed to be getting kind of interested in what I was saying. He sat on the floor with one little yellow beanpole leg crossed over the other. Every so often he nodded or said, “No kidding.” He played with the heart on his left antenna as if it was helping him think or something.

Then he laughed and said we were complete opposites. I want to hide. He has to hide. He’s dying to see the world. I don’t want to see anymore of it than I absolutely have to.

That was true. He was making me think about things I’d never thought about before. I wondered if my Dream Interpretation for Teens book covered talking puppets. (The only things I could remember reading about were snakes in dreams and falling. I’ve avoided dreaming about them both ever since.)

We talked about a lot of stuff.

I said I was surprised he could speak.

He said he was surprised I could speak too. (A lot of people in the studio would be.)

I asked him if that was his real voice.

He asked me if that was mine. (Typical.) After taking a moment to enjoy his own witty remark, he admitted he could imitate the voice of everyone in the studio. It just took a little practice. (That’s why he was working on Mel’s and Zola’s voices. Not that he needed to. He had them nailed.)

He asked me about my family. I told him the whole story.

And—surprise, surprise—he loved Bess. He acted like she was a character in a TV show or something. He kept saying, “Then what did she do?” and laughing his head off about her popping wheelies on Mr. Zwicker’s lawn tractor or putting so much vodka in Grammie’s prune juice that she fell off the toilet. I didn’t even feel bad about him liking Bess. I was just kind of enjoying making him laugh.

I was running out of Bess stories—if you can believe it—so I asked him about his family.

He looked at me like I was nuts.

“Family?” he said. Then he said it again, louder. “Fa-mi-ly?!?” His eyes were bugging out of his head like “You idiot!”

“I’m a puppet! How can I have family?! And who, exactly, would my family be?!?”

Normally, a mood swing like that would have thrown me, but this was just a dream, right? So I kept going.

“Well, what about Bytesie…or Rom…or Ram?” I asked.

You’d swear I’d just called his mother a hairless mole rat or something. He was so insulted.

“Oh nice!” he said. “I remind you of those…zombies, do I?!” He got this crazy look on his face. All he needed was some froth coming out of his mouth and an axe and he’d have made the perfect “Puppet from Hell.” “Do I look…to you…like some foam-head who can’t function until someone sticks a hand up my bum?”

I had no idea what he was talking about. But it was obviously something that meant a lot to him. (That’s what the family counselor said when Bess kicked out the window in her office.)

“Do I look like I’m moving my mecs?!?” He put his hands up in the air like “I’m not doing anything!” and then crossed and uncrossed his eyes until I was worried he might get sick.

“Do you see Jimmy’s hand anywhere down here?” He pointed his rear end in my direction and bent over.

Right over. So his head was coming up between his legs and he could get a good close look up his own empty bum.

He went, “Gee…I don’t see anything!” like he was all surprised or something. He whipped himself back up straight, then turned around, really full of himself, like one of those TV lawyers who’s just won his case.

“If you think those plastic dolls can do this on their own, you’re crazy. They’re just puppets!”

He was having a good little laugh at what a moron I was when I asked the obvious question.

“Then what are you?”

He stopped chuckling and tried to give me a “Can-you-believe-this-kid?” look, but I knew I had him. I didn’t say anything. I just waited. After a while, he shrugged.

“Okay, I’m a puppet too. But I’m different. In case you haven’t noticed…” Big pause. “I’m alive. It’s not much of a life, I admit, playing Bitsie the Bonehead all day, then spending all night watching TV or finishing Jimmy’s crossword puzzle—but hey! It’s my life.”

Gee, how sad was that. Even the old people at the Mayflower Rest Home get bingo on Saturday nights.

“Don’t you have any friends? Someone to hang out with?” Suddenly, it was like I was his guidance counselor or something.

“You’re my one and only, baby! No one knows about my special little talents but you. And I didn’t even mean that to happen. As you know.”

“Why not tell people?”

“Why? Miss Hide-Under-the-Bed-with-my-Best-Friends-the-Dust-Bunnies has to ask why? Because I don’t want the hassle. Can you imagine what would happen if anyone ever found out about me? Everyone would want a piece of me.”

Like he’s so special or something.

“They’d all be trying to make money off me. Then I wouldn’t even be able to live the crummy little life I have now. I’d be spending my entire life in front of the camera instead of just eight to four, Monday through Friday, with an hour off for lunch and two fifteen minute coffee breaks.

If you think I’d want that, you’re dreaming, kid.”

That made me laugh.

“What’s so funny?” he said.

“It’s just funny to be dreaming about dreaming,” I said, wondering if they covered that in my dream book. It probably meant I was dead or insane or something.

He gave me one of those “puh-leese” sighs.

“You’re not dreaming.”

“Yes, I am.” I kind of laughed.

“No, you aren’t.”

“Am too.” He was starting to bug me.

“Are not.” He was serious.

“Am too.”

“Are not.”

“Am too.”

“Are not.”

“Am too!” I shouldn’t have screamed, but I’d had it.

I don’t know why. It just wasn’t funny anymore.

“Okay, I’ll prove it,” he said.

“Go ahead.” I tried to say that the way Bess would have.

Like “You and what army?”

Bitsie was enjoying this. He knew I couldn’t back down.

If it were just a dream, what was there to be afraid of? So he goes, “Take your index finger…Yup. That’s the one. With the long nail…”

“Okay.”

“And shove it up your nose…That-a-girl…Farther… farther…Get it right up there…”

“Ouch!”

I couldn’t do it anymore. It hurt. And it was grossing me out too.

“See?” he went. “I told you you weren’t dreaming. You wouldn’t even have felt that in a dream. Proof positive: I’m as alive as you are!”

I wanted to argue with him, but there was nothing I could say. That guy in my brain started running around again, asking if anyone knew what was going on. Nobody had a clue. (In fact, they were all getting out of there as fast as they could. None of my brain cells wanted to stick around to find out what weird thing was going to happen next.)

I started to get really freaked out. I felt cold. And scared. I couldn’t catch my breath. There had to be an explanation.

Think. Think. Think. Think. Think. Think. Think.