Box of Shocks (10 page)

I squeeze the bolt tightly in my hand as I step out the front door. Heading down the street, I cut around the corner and double back along the alley to my old house. Just as I hoped—the car's gone; the place will be empty for another hour and a half.

I slip through the creaky gate and lift the rock by the back fence. Yes! The back-door key is still here. I creep up the steps to the door and slide the key into the keyhole. I give it the usual three little jiggles up and down, then turn it hard to the left.

Something's wrong.

There's no clunking sound when the key turns in the lock. I try again. Three little jiggles up and down, then sharp to the left.

Nothing. No clunking of the old lock unlocking. If the lock isn't unlocking, I'll have to do something drastic to get into the house, like crawl through the hole under the stairs into the basement.

Before heading back down the stairs, I give the doorknob one last twist, and—

Amazing!

Miraculous!

Unbelievable!

The door swings open! It wasn't even locked! What sort of people would leave for the day and not lock the door? In our new house, Mom and Dad have two locks on each door, plus an alarm system. Not these people.

After putting the key back under the rock, I run up the stairs, step through the door and into the kitchen. I stop suddenly.

Something is wrong.

The kitchen is completely empty. No kitchen table. No kitchen chairs. Nothing! Absolutely nothing! Just a big open space.

Mom used to have canisters of beans and rice lined up along the counter right beside the toaster. But there are no canisters now. There isn't even a toaster. To the right of the fridge, where the microwave is supposed to be, there's nothing. Except for a couple of empty beer cans and a crumpled chip bag, the countertops and shelves are bare.

At least the fridge is the same. My parents left the old one behind. Mom was always so strict about how everything was organized in the fridge. The milk and yogurt always went on one shelf, the juice and jars of jam on the next one down, the vegetables always had to be in the bottom drawers, and the cheese had to be put in the little side compartment. I'm curious to see how the new people organize the fridge.

I open the fridge door. All I can see are empty racks— no carton of milk, no bottle of juice, no tubs of yogurt or jars of jam. Nothing, except for an old pizza box, a mostly empty jar of peanut butter and a carrot that has turned black. I pull open the drawers where Mom used to keep the fresh vegetables. Nothing. I check the freezer. Nothing. Even the ice-cube trays are empty.

I close the fridge and go to the breakfast-cereal cupboard. It was always my favorite cupboard. Not only did Mom store the breakfast cereal there, that's also where she kept the snack food—healthy stuff like whole-grain crackers, rice cakes, dried fruit—that sort of thing. Mom's all about avoiding sugar. I only wish the snack food and the breakfast cereal could have been a little tastier, but even so, it was better than nothing.

Which is what I find when I open the cupboard door. No breakfast cereal! As for snack food, all I see is an open box of crackers. The crackers aren't even whole wheat. Plus, right beside the box are what look like chocolate sprinkles, until I pick one up and realize it's a mouse dropping. In the next cupboard over—the dish cupboard—there are only two plastic cups and a metal bowl that looks like a dog's dish. But they don't have a dog.

It looks like these people haven't even moved in yet. What do they eat? Do they get take-out every night? I doubt it. From what the kid brings for lunch at school, I don't think they're big on food—period.

I check the clock on the stove. There's plenty of time before the kid comes home. I push the swinging door from the kitchen to the living room. The door swings back and bangs me on the shoulder as I stop dead and stare at the room. What's with these people? The wood floor is bare. There are no pictures hanging on the walls! No family photos on the mantel above the fireplace! No
TV
or sound system! No bookshelf full of books!

Over in the corner where I used to spend ages practicing the piano, there's just a big empty space. Not that practicing piano is my favorite thing to do in the world, but the room seems weird without a piano.

And there's no couch against the wall or rocking chair over by the window. The only furniture in the living room is a rickety old lawn chair, a wonky folding table and a twisted metal lamp with no lampshade. This must be the light I see every night. I wonder what the kid does all the time under the light of this bare bulb. He's sure not playing video games or watching
TV
. And he's not doing his homework, because since the start of school, he hasn't had it done even once.

I leave the living room and head up the stairs to my bedroom. At the top of the stairs, I turn left and go to the end of the hall. My bedroom door is closed. Normally, I'd bust through the door and head into my room. For some reason, I hesitate. Maybe it's because it's weird that someone else is living in my room. Maybe it's because I know I shouldn't be here. I pause for a second, turn the handle and push the door open.

There it is. My room. Except…it's different. Way different.

On the wall where my map of Antarctica was, there's nothing but the faded outline of where the map used to be. And at the far end of the room, I can see the four holes in the wall from the tacks holding up my map of Japan. But this kid doesn't have any maps tacked to the walls. He doesn't even have pictures torn out of magazines. The walls are completely bare.

I look toward the window and see where my dresser and laundry basket used to be. Mom's a neat freak when it comes to my clothes. If I throw stuff at the laundry basket and miss, or leave dirty clothes on the floor, I'll hear about it. Same thing if I cram my shirts into the bottom drawer without folding them. I wear neat, clean clothes no matter what.

But now, instead of a dresser and a laundry basket over by the window, there are just some scratches on the floor. I can't see a dresser or laundry basket anywhere in the room. So where is this kid supposed to keep his clothes?

Mom and Dad always got after me for kicking the wall when I was doing my homework. But now, there's nothing in the far corner where my desk used to be, except dents in the wall. I can see why this kid never gets his homework done. He's got no desk.

Over by the wall where my bed, bedside table and reading lamp were, there's only a mattress lying on the floor. And there's no quilt spread across it. There's just a grungy woolen blanket twisted up in a heap. I don't even see a pillow.

I take another look around my old bedroom. The kid who lives here now is the same age as me. We're in the same class at school. Mom even thinks he looks a bit like me. Maybe we are a bit alike, but look at his room! How could a kid that's so much like me live in a room like this? It looks like a skeleton of my room, picked clean of everything that made it mine.

Then I remember what I came for. There's still one thing in this room that
is
mine. I head for the closet. The door is closed. I wonder if the kid even uses the closet. Maybe he crams everything into it so his mom wouldn't bug him about keeping his room clean. But I doubt it.

I feel my hand squeezing the bolt harder as I open the closet door. The closet is empty. No stuff hidden from his mom. It looks like this kid has nothing to hide.

I step in and take a close look at the wall panel. What a relief! It doesn't look like it's been touched. Then again, maybe the kid took it off and found my hiding place and managed to put it back exactly as it was. I can't relax until I see my Box of Shocks with my own eyes.

When I reach toward the wooden panel, the bolt slips from my fingers and clatters to the floor. I look down but can't see it. Where is it? Where'd it go? My eyes scan the closet floor back and forth, left and right, but I can't see my bolt anywhere. Even in the daytime, it's pretty dark in the closet, so I get down on my knees and begin to feel around with my hands. Back and forth, back and forth, I sweep my hands across the floor, but I can't find it! Where is it? Where could it have gone? It has to be here somewhere!

As I'm moving my hands across the closet floor for about the hundredth time, I hear a sound. It's a
thunk
, and the floor moves a little.

I know what that is. I've heard it and felt it a million times before. It meant my parents were home. It meant they'd just come through the side door and slammed it shut.

But my parents don't live here anymore. Neither do I. Someone else has come through the side door. And now, I can hear them walking down the hall. Their footsteps are headed toward the stairs!

I can't leave without my bolt, so I run my hands back and forth, back and forth, back and forth as fast as I can. Nothing! How can it have vanished? Is there a hole in the floor I don't know about?

I hear a creaking, cracking sound. Someone's climbing the stairs!

I've got to get out of here! I'll have to forget about the bolt for now and scram!

Maybe I should wait for them to come up the stairs and explain to them what I'm doing in their house. But if it's the kid, I'll have to tell him about my Box of Shocks, and I can't trust him. And if it's his parents, they might figure I'm a burglar and that I'm breaking the law right now. They could have me arrested and thrown in the slammer! What would my parents say? What would they do? My mom would never bake a cake with a hacksaw in it to help me escape. My dad is such a slow driver, he'd be useless driving a getaway car. I'll be stuck in jail for the rest of my life!

I've got to get out of here right this second. But I can't go down the stairs, so how am I supposed to get out? I'm trapped!

Or am I?

There is one way out—through the window. Below the window is the part of the porch roof that slopes down to the back lawn. It's my only chance.

I tiptoe across the room, open the window and squeeze out onto the roof. Then I close the window. As it slams shut, I realize I can't open it from the outside. I'm stuck on the roof. There's no turning back. What's weird is that when I lived here, I always wanted to crawl out onto the roof, but I knew my parents would put bars on my window if I ever tried it.

So here I am. Standing on the roof. It's way steeper than it looks from inside.
Way
steeper. I get on my hands and knees and very slowly inch down the roof. When I reach the edge. I look down.

Definitely far to jump. If I jump from this high up, I'll definitely break both legs, maybe an ankle or two, and probably my arms, not to mention my skull and spine. From this height, I'll probably shatter every bone in my body!

The only thing between me and the ground is a tall, skinny bush. It's my only hope for getting off the roof without killing myself.

I sit on the edge of the roof with my legs dangling over and take a quick look back up at the bedroom window.

The kid is looking out the window! If he looks to the right, he'll see me. I can't let that happen, so I push off the edge of the roof and try to hug the bush as I fall. It doesn't work so well. My face gets thwacked with branches about a thousand times on the way down, but at least it breaks my fall.

When I hit the ground, I do a backward roll across the grass and jump to my feet. It doesn't feel like I broke anything, although my ankle's pretty sore. I must have twisted it when I landed. I also discover that Mitzi, the next-door neighbors' old German shepherd, still poops on the lawn.

I scramble across the yard, my ankle throbbing. Once I'm through the back gate, I hobble into the alley and flop down with my back against the old fence.

I'm breathing hard and my heart's pounding as I think about the kid staring out the window. Did he see me? If he did, would he recognize me? Will he call the police? Will he tell his parents?

I get to my feet, limp down the alley and cross the street to my new house. I'm about to run through the front door when I remember that my sweater's covered with bits of shrub, not to mention dog poop. If Mom sees me like this, she'll wonder what happened. I could tell her I had a fight with Dean about mollusks, but I don't think she'd buy it.

I push the front door open just a crack and peek into the front hall. I'm in luck. She's in the kitchen, so I creep down the hall to the stairs and scamper up to my bedroom as quietly as I can. I'm sure glad the stairs aren't like the creaky ones in my old house.

Inside my room, I close the door, lean back against it and look around. On the wall by the window is my map of Antarctica. Below the map is my desk. I cross the room and rest my hands on the desk's smooth wood. I always used to hate this desk because Mom and Dad made me do my homework here. Now, I'm thinking this desk isn't so bad.

Something that is bad is the smell of my sweater. I pull it off, along with my shirt, and toss them at my laundry basket. As usual, I miss.

I take four steps backward and flop onto my soft bed. I don't land on some grimy mattress with a twisted-up old blanket. Instead, I'm sprawled out on a quilt Mom made. I used to think it was the worst birthday present a kid could ever get, but after a few years, I'm pretty used to it. My room wouldn't be the same without it.

Supper will be ready soon, so I'd better head down. I get up off my bed and go to my chest of drawers to get a new shirt. When I open the top drawer, I suddenly remember.

My bolt! I was so freaked out I completely forget about my bolt and my Box of Shocks. They're both still back in my old bedroom. What happens if the kid finds the bolt? He won't know that it came from the Pegasus Valley Bridge. He won't know that I risked my life to get it. He'll think it's garbage, and he'll probably throw it out.

I've got to get my bolt back. Plus, I've got to rescue my Box of Shocks before he discovers that too. Even though I almost got caught and I nearly killed myself escaping from the house tonight, I'm not giving up. I have to go back. And it has to be soon.