30 - It Came from Beneath the Sink (6 page)

“But—but—” I sputtered.

“Oh, I get it!” she laughed. “You really had me fooled! I thought you were
serious!” She tossed the Grool to me.

I tried to catch it, but I didn’t want to touch it. It plopped to the floor.

“Pretty funny, kid.” She chuckled as she turned to leave. “You have a great
imagination. Just like your aunt.”

I picked up the Grool and examined it closely.

Not warm.

Not breathing.

Not moving at all.

Dry and hard.

An ordinary sponge.

Aunt Louise thought I was joking. But the joke was on me.

The Grool had tricked me again!

I hurled the creature back into the gerbil cage. It lay there lifeless. “I
hope you rot in there!” I exploded.

Before my amazed eyes, the dry brown sponge began plumping-up. In a few
seconds, it became fuller and moister.

“Yuck!” I groaned, watching it turn pink and then red.

The Grool huffed and puffed.
Whoa-ahhhh. Whoa-ahhh.

Those little black eyes peered out at me excitedly.

The Grool snickered softly.

Why was it so pleased with itself? I wondered. Nothing horrible had happened.

Or had it?

I thought of Dad’s fall off the ladder. The tree branch. Mrs. Vanderhoff’s
fingers. Killer running away. My spoiled birthday party. Our dry, rotted
backyard.

It was all too much. Too much!

With a desperate cry, I yanked the evil thing out of its cage. Then I slammed
it down hard on my desk.

Breathing hard, my heart pounding, I grabbed one of my heaviest textbooks.
And I slammed it down onto the Grool.

“Die!” I shouted. “Please! Die!”

I raised the book high. Pounded the Grool with it.

Again. Again.

I pounded hard enough to kill
anything.

Finally, I stopped. Gasping for breath, my arms aching, I stared down at what
I’d done.

Yuck. What a mess.

Brown and pink shreds of Grool littered my desk.

I had smashed it to pieces.

“Yes!” I cried breathlessly. “Yes!”

Finally! I had finally destroyed the evil creature!

“Yes!” I cried again.

But the cry stuck in my throat.

As the pink and brown shreds started to move, I stared down in horror—and
began to shake all over.

“This can’t be happening,” I whispered.

But it was.

The pieces—the shreds of Grool—they were sliding across the desktop.
Slithering. Rolling together.

Coming back together.

Forming a brown ball. A sponge.

It didn’t take long. A minute at the most.

And now the Grool stared up at me again. And it vibrated so hard that my desk
actually began to rock.

Its cruel snicker cut through my shocked silence.

Heh, heh, heh.

“Shut up! Shut up!” I screamed.

But it snickered even louder.

Frantic, I grabbed a dirty sock from the clothes hamper. I used it to pick up
the Grool. And then I hurled the thing back into the cage.

Heh, heh, heh.

With a cry, I threw myself face down on my bed and covered my ears. “Will I
have this bad luck for the rest of my life? Is there
anything
I can do?”

I was so frightened. So angry. So confused.

I couldn’t even pretend to be my usual cheery self.

When Aunt Louise took me and Daniel out to an ice-cream parlor, I couldn’t
even finish a small butterscotch sundae. Usually, I’m good for a triple decker.

But how could I ever be happy again? I was stuck with the Grool—forever.

“Wake up, Kat! Wake up!” A frantic voice whispered in my ear.

I slowly raised my head off the pillow. “Huh?”

Daniel was waving his bookbag back and forth about an inch above my head.
“Get that away!” I shouted, grabbing for it.

“Hey, I’m only trying to help you,” he replied, snatching the pack away.
“You’re going to be late for school. You’d better get moving!”

He ran out of the room.

I tore the covers off and raced to the closet. I slipped on my Save the Earth
sweatshirt and purple flowered leggings. Then I remembered.

“Daniel, you little dweeb!” I bellowed. “We have no school today! There’s a
teachers’ conference!”

He peeked back into my room.

“Got you!” he gloated.

I hurled a pillow at his head and hit him in the face. A nice shot.

“You’re a bad sport,” he said, laughing. “Carlo’s coming over after
breakfast. We can play
Mega Monster Warriors.”

I slammed the door in his face.

Daniel’s stupid tricks usually don’t bother me too much.

And a day off from school always puts me in a great mood.

But how could I enjoy myself? I just kept wondering what bad thing was going
to happen next.

What bad luck would the evil Grool bring today?

After breakfast, I hung around on the back porch, reading a magazine. And
trying to ignore Daniel’s and Carlo’s shrieks and wild laughter as they played
computer games.

I really missed Killer. He usually sits next to me when I read.

After about an hour, I got bored. I decided to go up to my room and work on
my social studies assignment.

I had to write an essay for Mrs. Vanderhoff.
My Family and What They Mean
to Me.

But I kept thinking about the Grool and how it was totally
ruining
my
family.

So far, all I had written was: “I’m Kat Merton and my family means an awful
lot to me.”

Not exactly grade-A material. And the paper was due tomorrow morning.

I decided to take a break. I went to the kitchen and poured myself a glass of
chocolate milk and grabbed a handful of oatmeal cookies.

On my way back upstairs, I peeked into the den. Things seemed very quiet in
there.

I didn’t see Carlo. Only Daniel, playing
Underwater Adventure Quest.

“Where is Carlo?” I asked.

“Um,” Daniel replied, his eyes glued to the submarines and torpedoes
flashing across the computer screen.

“Was my question too hard for you?” I asked sarcastically. “I’ll go slower
now. Where… is… Carlo?”

“Home,” he mumbled.

“Did he get mad because you sank more enemy submarines than he did?” I joked.

Daniel didn’t answer.

I headed upstairs to my room. I set down my milk and cookies. I couldn’t help
but glance at the gerbil cage.

It wasn’t what I saw that made a prickle of fear run down my back. It was
what I
didn’t
see.

The cage stood empty.

The Grool was gone.

Escaped.

How had it escaped? The Grool had never even
tried
to get out of its
cage before.

In fact, the stupid sponge never seemed very interested in going
anywhere.

Why did it disappear now? And where did it go?

And what kind of trouble was it planning to make?

It couldn’t get very far, I told myself. It had no legs.

I started to call to Daniel. But my throat choked with panic.

I frantically started to search for the Grool. I slid on my stomach under the
bed. Not there.

I pulled everything out of my closet. I opened dresser drawers. No sign of
it.

I checked every inch of the room. I even called out to it: “Here Grool, here
Grool.”

No. No way. The creature was gone.

The words from the
Encyclopedia of the Weird
suddenly flashed into my mind: “Anyone who gives the Grool away will DIE
within one day.”

“Daniel!” I shrieked. “Daniel!” I tore downstairs and into the TV room. I
shook him so hard, he dropped his computer mouse.

“The Grool is gone!” I cried. “It escaped!”

Daniel turned away from the computer screen. “Excuse me? What do you mean—gone?”

“It’s gone! The cage is empty!” I wailed.

Daniel scrunched up his face, thinking hard. “I know where it is,” he said.
“Carlo.”

“Huh?” I cried. “How could you? How could you let Carlo take it?”

“I didn’t
let
him!” Daniel snapped. “He must have grabbed it when he
left. Carlo thinks it’s all a big joke. He said there’s no way a little sponge
can do anything bad.”

“What a jerk!” I sputtered. “Maybe we should let him keep the Grool. It would
teach him a lesson—a real nasty lesson!”

“Kat, we can’t!” Daniel exclaimed. “He’s my best friend. We have to get the
Grool back from him—before something terrible happens!”

Daniel and I pulled our jackets out of the hall closet. Then we ran out to
the garage. We jumped on our bikes and pedaled furiously down Maple Lane.

“Where do you think he went?” I shouted.

“Let’s try the school playground,” Daniel suggested. “There’s always a bunch
of kids there.”

“Yeah, and Carlo’s a big show-off,” I exclaimed. “He probably went straight
to the playground to show off the Grool.”

“He is
not
a show-off,” Daniel protested.

“Is too!” I argued. Pedaling furiously, I shot way ahead of Daniel.

I made it to Chestnut Street a few minutes later. “Only two more blocks!” I
called breathlessly. I slowed down so that Daniel could catch up.

I turned the corner.

“Oh, no!” I screamed.

I squeezed on the brakes. Stopped short.

Who was that lying in the middle of the street?

Was it Carlo?

Yes!

Carlo. Sprawled on his stomach. His arms and legs stretched over the
pavement.

“We’re too late!” Daniel cried. “We’re too late!”

Our bikes crashed to the ground as Daniel and I leaped off them. We bent over
Carlo, calling his name.

“Ohhhh, wow.” Carlo let out a low moan. He clutched his right leg.

“Carlo!” I yelled breathlessly. “What is it? What happened? Are you okay?”

Carlo bent his leg carefully and winced. “My knee
really
hurts. I
twisted it when I fell off my bike.”

I looked up and saw his bike, on its side under a tree.

“How did it happen?” Daniel asked weakly. My brother hates the sight of
blood.

“Some of the older kids wanted to race me,” Carlo groaned. “I didn’t really
want to race them—but they dared me.”

He sat up, still rubbing his knee. “Man, I was
flying!
Then, well, I
hit some gravel—and skidded into a tree. Those kids all thought it was a riot. They just rode off and
left me.”

“Daniel, help me get him up,” I instructed. We put our arms around Carlo and
guided him over to the curb.

Then we just sat there, staring at Carlo’s mangled bicycle. The handlebars
looked like a giant metal pretzel.

“You know what?” Carlo finally said. “I didn’t even see that stupid tree
until I was right on top of it.”

Daniel poked me. I knew he was thinking what I was thinking.

The Grool strikes again.

We had to get the Grool back.

“Carlo, where is the Grool?” I asked.

“Right there in my bike basket.” He pointed.

I reached over the tangled handlebars and felt around the basket with my
hand.

And felt again.

Nothing in the basket. Completely empty.

“Carlo, give me a break,” I complained. “There’s no Grool in there. Where is
it?” My voice got high and shrill. I could feel the panic sweeping over me.

“Huh? It’s
got
to be in there!” Carlo declared. “That’s where I stuck
it. I was going to take it right home.”

“Oh, sure, Carlo,” I snapped. “Like you weren’t going to bring it to the playground and show it off?”

Carlo hung his head. “Well, maybe for a couple of minutes.”

“Great! Just great!” I fumed. “Because of you, the Grool is missing.”

Daniel leaned close to me, his face pale with fear. “We’ve got to find the
Grool, Kat,” he whispered. “Remember what the encyclopedia said. If you don’t
find it in a day, you’ll
die!”

“I remember,” I replied with a shudder. “But how are we ever going to find it
now? Where can it be?”

“I don’t even know where to start looking.” I sighed.

“Maybe it fell out of the basket when I hit the tree,” Carlo suggested.
“Maybe it rolled somewhere around here.”

Daniel tugged on my sleeve. “Come on,” he urged. “Let’s start looking.”

Carlo stood up. “I’d better get home,” he said. He limped away. Luckily, his
house was on the next block.

Daniel and I hunted all over the block. In doorways, underneath cars, in
flower beds—anywhere the Grool might have rolled.

No luck.

As we were about to give up, I spotted a sewer grating a few feet away from
Carlo’s bike. Could the Grool have tumbled down there?

Daniel saw the sewer, too. “Kat? I’ll bet it rolled down into the sewer! It’s down there. I know it is!”

I dropped to the pavement. On my stomach. I peered into the darkness through
the grating.

“It’s way too dark to see anything,” I reported. “Somebody will have to go
down there.”

“Uh… somebody? Maybe… maybe I could go,” my brother offered in a
shaky voice.

Daniel acts really brave. But I know he’s afraid of a lot of things. Like
dark sewers.

He’d freak out down in the sewer.

“No. I’ll do it,” I said. “The Grool knows me better.”

We lifted off the heavy grate. I felt around with my sneaker. It slid against
a narrow ladder built into the side of the sewer.

“I guess this is the only way down,” I said softly. “Here I go.”

Slowly, I lowered myself into the dark wet hole. The ladder rungs were wet
and slippery. The walls were thick with sewer slime.

“This place really
stinks!”
I called up. “I can’t believe I’m doing
this.”

Squishhhhh!

As I reached the sewer floor, my sneaker landed on something wet and oozy.