The bedtime stories had been there for as long as Izzie could remember. Her dad claimed he’d started telling them to her when she was a baby and he was up with her in the middle of the night trying to rock her back to sleep. He hadn’t made any effort to tell stories that would appeal to a baby, instead relying on the soft sound of his voice to soothe her. He was vague about how well this strategy had worked.

As she got older, the stories became part of Izzie’s regular bedtime routine. Once she was settled under her covers, her dad would sit on the floor with his back against the bed and tell her a story or two before she fell asleep. The bedtime stories were of a uniform length, rarely more than several minutes in duration, and they were all about the same guy, a vaguely-characterized man named Oakley Mutt. Each story began with the same ten words: “One night near the middle of his life, Oakley Mutt…”

Sometimes Izzie would request a specific story, but that didn’t guarantee her dad would comply. Usually, Izzie’s dad would return to a story for his own reasons: on a whim or because it fit his mood or because it had been a long time since he’d told it. Or maybe there was a system which Izzie did not discern. But on rare occasions, Izzie’s dad would tell a new story, permanently introducing it to the rotation. By the time Izzie was nearly fifteen years old, the pool of bedtime stories from which her dad could draw on a given night was 249 deep.

Because Izzie’s dad never wrote a bedtime story down, they were all a bit fluid, although the more times he told a story, the more consistent its telling became. Still, sometimes in the twentieth telling of a story, a new detail would appear, and then disappear again in the thirtieth. Pieces of dialogue would float in and then shift and mutate for a few tellings before solidifying. The phrasing of his narration was the most likely element to change from telling to telling. It was hard for Izzie to know how much of these alterations were the result of conscious editing on her dad’s part and how much they were caused by forgetfulness, tiredness, or distraction. He didn’t talk about his process with her. In fact, they rarely talked about the bedtime stories at all. The subject seemed somehow inappropriate outside the confines of Izzie’s bedtime.

Izzie didn’t know when the 250^th bedtime story would arrive, but she knew it would be, in a general sense, soon. She doubted the 250^th bedtime story would be much different than the 249 that preceded it. Previous milestones had passed with little more than a mention from her dad, and sometimes not even that. But Izzie had recently discovered the pleasure of ranked lists. She found that she enjoyed reading ranked lists written by others even when she had no familiarity with the things they were ranking. The next step was to labor over ranked lists of her own, agonizing over the distinction between her third favorite birthday of all time and her fourth favorite birthday of all time, pondering how much, when ranking family vacations, the experience of witnessing that horrifying motorcycle crash should count against the road trip her family took when she was 11, especially since the crash didn’t happen until they were headed home and the vacation had been so fun up until that point.

So, in anticipation of the imminent arrival of her dad’s 250^th bedtime story, Izzie decided to rank the top ten of the existing 249. Since there was no master list, Izzie had to first construct one from memory. Once that was accomplished, she studied the list with a pink highlighter in hand, marking all those that stood out to her on an instinctive, gut-reaction level. From this pared-down list of 32 stories, she then did the difficult work of choosing her top ten, which was then followed by the even more difficult work of ranking those ten in reverse order. After a few more minor adjustments, she settled on a final ranked list that, although she was not completely at peace with it, she could not justify adjusting further.

Here, then, follows Izzie’s final ranked list of her dad’s top ten bedtime stories so far and an attempt to record an accurate version of each.

 

 

#10 UNINTERPRETABLE

One night near the middle of his life, Oakley Mutt checked his mailbox and found what at first appeared to be an invitation, but turned out not to be, or maybe it was? Whether or not it was an invitation was the question. It was hard to tell. That was the trouble.

The piece of mail, whatever its intent, was a small, square card inside a peach-colored rectangular envelope. The card read, “You are being made aware of a party at the Prescos’ house!” The only additional details included were the date and time of the party.

Oakley showed the card to his wife, Bria. She frowned. “‘Being made aware of?’”

“That’s the part that confuses me,” said Oakley.

“Is it an invitation or not?” asked Bria.

“That’s what I asked you,” said Oakley. “It seems to be going out of its way to not invite us.”

“But why make us aware if we’re not invited?” asked Bria. “Just to hurt our feelings?”

“I don’t think so,” said Oakley. “The Prescos don’t seem mean-spirited. But I don’t know.”

Oakley and Bria examined the card more closely. They analyzed the size, font, alignment, and color of the text printed on it. What about the date and time of the party? Did those details have any bearing on whether or not this card should be taken as an invitation? What about the fact that the envelope had apparently been intended for a card with different dimensions? None of this led them closer to an answer.

“I’ll just have to call them and ask,” said Oakley.

“That could be embarrassing,” said Bria. “But I think you’re right.”

The following morning, Oakley called Ace Presco. “This card we got from you about your party,” said Oakley. “Is it an invitation to the party or not?”

“We deliberately left it open to interpretation,” said Ace.

“But we can’t interpret it,” said Oakley. “We tried and failed. That’s why I’m calling you.”

“I can’t interpret it for you,” said Ace.

“All right, then we’ll just be there for the party,” said Oakley. “We’ll see you there.”

“Based on your interpretation of the card we sent?” asked Ace.

“No,” said Oakley. “We like you guys, we like parties, so we’ll come.”

“I knew I shouldn’t have answered your call,” said Ace. “You have to make a decision based on your interpretation of the card. Do not factor this conversation into your interpretation of the card!” He hung up.

Oakley gave his wife a full update once she got out of the shower.

“So he doesn’t want us to come to the party?” asked Bria.

“I don’t know,” said Oakley.

“So let’s just forget it,” said Bria. “If they’re gonna be difficult, let’s not go. Let’s do something else.”

“But they might take that as us interpreting the card as not an invitation,” said Oakley. “But that’s not what we’re doing. We’re not interpreting the card one way or the other. Because we can’t. It can’t be done, not really.”

“So what do we do?” asked Bria

“We fight back,” said Oakley.

On the night of the Prescos’ party, Oakley, with Bria at his side, stood on the Prescos’ front porch and rang their doorbell.

Ace answered the door promptly. “Ah!” he said. “So you decided on an interpretation?”

Oakley smiled. “We brought you this,” he said, and he handed Ace a 44-ounce fountain drink, the straw protruding from the lid with its top portion still covered by the half-torn wrapper.

Ace looked confused. “But you’re here for the party, right?”

“We brought you that,” said Bria, pointing at the fountain drink in Ace’s hand, condensation from the outside of the cup collecting on the sides of the fingers with which he gripped it.

“So you’re not here for the party?”

“We,” said Oakley, “brought you that.” He pointed at the cup in Ace’s hand.

Oakley and Bria were well fed. They’d both used the bathroom right before they arrived at the Prescos’ house. They wore comfortable shoes. They could do this for hours.

 

#9 CHIPPERTWIG JUSTICE

One night near the middle of his life, Oakley Mutt, while enjoying a flashlight-lit walk along a little-used bike path, stumbled upon an injured rodent. It appeared to have been run over by a bicycle. Had Oakley been able to determine the type of rodent it was, perhaps he would have left it lying in the weeds alongside the bike path. But as he trained his flashlight beam on its writhing form, Oakley could not tell what kind of rodent it was, and that intrigued him enough to stop, and then, when he noted the extent of the rodent’s injuries, pity took root inside of him and he scooped the rodent up, cradling it against his stomach with his free arm as he turned on his heel and headed for home. Why had he made this decision? Oakley didn’t know. It was as if it had originated from an outside source, and if not imposed upon him, then at least emphatically suggested.

When he got to his house, Oakley dumped Christmas decorations out of a green plastic tub and placed the rodent inside along with a dish of tap water and some handfuls of grass ripped from just beyond the property line separating his back yard from his neighbor’s back yard. Having now prevented predators from turning the rodent into an easy meal, Oakley had no idea how to facilitate the rodent’s healing. He took pictures of the rodent with his phone and performed an internet image search for “types of rodents.” Nothing looked quite right. It wasn’t a squirrel, it wasn’t a mouse, it wasn’t a rat, it wasn’t a hamster, it wasn’t a chipmunk. It wasn’t a zebra mouse or a kangaroo rat. It wasn’t a tuco-tuco or a gundi or a paca. It certainly wasn’t a mountain beaver. Oakley didn’t even know if it was full grown or a newborn baby or what.

When he found the rodent still alive the following morning, Oakley decided to name it. But what would be a good name for a rodent of indeterminate species? The word “Chippertwig” wedged itself in the midst of Oakley’s thoughts. Had it come from the same place that the decision to bring the rodent home had come from? He went with it. He named the rodent “Chippertwig.” But the rodent did not seem heartened to have a name. But maybe the inspiration for the name had been for Oakley’s benefit, a means of strengthening his attachment to the suffering rodent.

Oakley spent the rest of the morning trying to nourish Chippertwig with various foods from what he had on hand – pretzels, a glob of peanut butter, celery, bread chunks, chocolate covered almonds, raisins – and then at noon, Chippertwig shuddered, sighed, and died.

As Oakley buried Chippertwig in the flowerless flowerbed along his back fence, he reflected on the fact that he had not done a good job of nursing Chippertwig back to health. He wondered if Chippertwig would have actually preferred to be an easy meal for a predator instead of lingering in a plastic tub that smelled like Christmas decorations for fourteen more hours of pain. Not knowing what kind of rodent Chippertwig had been had certainly been an impediment to caring for it, but Oakley suspected it wouldn’t have made much difference in the outcome. He was not suited to nursing anything back to health. But if he couldn’t save Chippertwig – and that ship had certainly sailed – then Oakley could seek justice on Chippertwig’s behalf.

Later that evening, Oakley returned to the point on the bike path where he’d found Chippertwig. He was able to identify the exact location because some of Chippertwig’s rodent blood still stained the pavement. The cyclists were few and far between, but as each rode by, Oakley flagged them down and asked them if they had run over a rodent at that spot the day before. The most common response was “no.” The second most common response, to Oakley’s growing frustration, was, “What kind of rodent?” When he couldn’t provide a satisfactory answer, the smug cyclists would scoff and ride away.

What would Oakley do if he managed to find Chippertwig’s killer? How would he exact justice? He wasn’t sure. He hoped that when the moment arrived, the correct means of achieving justice would be given to him in the same way that the choice to take the rodent home and the name “Chippertwig” had been.

Oakley had not seen a cyclist for nearly 30 minutes and was about to give up for the night when a woman astride a bike far too big for her came wobbling around the bend. She wore no helmet. When Oakley motioned for the woman to stop, she veered off the path and tipped sideways, stumbling clear of the bike as it twisted and fell.

When Oakley tried to ask the woman if she had run over a rodent at that spot the day before, she confessed before he could finish the question. She said that it had been an accident caused by her inability to control her too-large bicycle, but that she knew this was not a valid excuse. She said she had now returned to the scene of the accident hoping for a chance to make things right.

“Chippertwig is dead,” said Oakley.

The woman knew he meant the rodent, although he had not yet told her the rodent’s name. “Then you’re here to punish me,” she said. “I’ll accept whatever punishment you think is just.”

Oakley frowned. “Nothing is coming to mind,” he said. “Give me another minute.”

They both waited in silence as twilight again asserted itself.

“Maybe you should kill me?” said the woman. “A life for a life?”

“No, no, I don’t think so,” said Oakley, shock disrupting his concentration. “I mean, I don’t even know what kind of rodent it was. Do you?”

The woman shook her head.

“I think coming back and being sorry and feeling guilty is enough,” said Oakley.

“You really think so?” asked the woman.

Oakley shrugged. “Nothing else is occurring to me.”

The woman smiled sadly, nodded, struggled back onto her bike, and wobbled off into the dusk.

On the way home, it suddenly came to Oakley that the woman actually should have been put to death, that justice demanded her execution. “Too late,” he said out loud. “And,” he added, “get real.”

 

#8 THE MOON’S VIEW

One night near the middle of his life, Oakley Mutt found a teen boy gazing at the half moon while standing in a field of thigh-high soybean plants through which Oakley waded to greet him.

“Hello,” said Oakley. He adopted a non-threatening hands-in-jeans-pockets posture. “What are you doing?”

“Oh, just, you know,” said the boy. He gave Oakley a sidelong glance. “Just getting some views.”

“Ah, yeah,” said Oakley. “The views here are pretty nice.”

“No, not those kind of views,” said the boy. “Views like opinions.”

“Opinions on what?” asked Oakley.

“All kinds of stuff,” said the boy. The moonlight softened the appearance of his acne.

“You’re getting these opinions – these views – from the moon?” asked Oakley.

“Yeah,” said the boy. “It’s got a view on pretty much everything.”

“This is like astrology?” asked Oakley.

“No, not really,” said the boy. “The moon doesn’t make anything happen. It just has views.”

“Are the views good?” asked Oakley. “Do you listen to the moon’s views, I mean? Like, do you take them seriously?”

“Yeah, I do,” said the boy. “The moon doesn’t have an agenda. Plus it’s been around for a long time. It’s got a unique view on things. But I don’t let it tell me what to think. I come to my own conclusions.”

Oakley scrutinized the boy more closely. He wore a t-shirt with the sleeves cut off and jeans with a hole in the left knee. He was lean, probably from regular activity, much of which was probably aimless and probably fruitless. His hair was fractions of an inch from being describable as “long.” Differing standards for the term would have also made such a description possible. Also, imprecision.

               “Give me an example,” said Oakley. “One of the moon’s views.”

               “All right,” said the boy. He studied the moon for a long minute. Then he said, “Its view on you is that you’re sneaky and insecure and unreliable.”

               “That’s its view on me?” asked Oakley.

               “Yeah,” said the boy. “And its view is that you should stop being so negative and appreciate the little things more. Little things like the breeze.”

               Oakley squinted up at the moon. It was yellowish tonight, and wreathed in cloud bits. Odd to think it couldn’t feel this breeze that rippled among the soybean leaves and shivered the soybean pods. It had never felt any breeze ever and never would. Yet it had the temerity to have view on this breeze?

               “What does the moon know about breezes?” asked Oakley, trying not to sound sneaky, insecure, or unreliable.

               “It has a more objective view than we do,” said the boy. “Our experiences with breezes make us biased.”

               “Is that another one of the moon’s views?” asked Oakley.

               “No,” said the boy. “That one’s mine.” Was the look he gave Oakley extremely disdainful, or was that another effect of the moonlight?

               “So because the moon has a bad view of me, now you do too,” said Oakley.

               “Calm down,” said the boy. “They’re just personal views. Why would you care what I think of you? I don’t care what you think of me.”

               Oakley wanted to agree, but couldn’t quite get there. “So why do you have to stand in a field to get the moon’s views?”

               “I don’t,” said the boy. “You can get the moon’s views anywhere you can see the moon if you know how. I’m out here for other reasons.”

               “Like what?”

               The boy didn’t answer. He let the question dangle in the air just above the soybeans, twisting and flapping and drawing attention to itself. When he spoke again, it was to ask a question of his own. “Why are you out here?”

               “I asked first,” said Oakley.

               “The moon’s view is that you’re lost,” said the boy.

               “Ha!” Oakley’s response was more shout than laugh. “Lost? Not at all. I’m headed that way.” He pointed to a line of trees at the far edge of the field.

               “There’s a swamp over there,” said the boy. “A big one.”

               “Exactly,” said Oakley. “What better way to lose my pursuers? Especially with all their bloodhounds.”

               “Oh,” said the boy. “You’re being chased but you stopped to talk to me?”

               “Yeah, I’ve got a pretty big lead on them,” said Oakley. “I kind of doubt they’ll make it this far. Going through the swamp is just to make extra sure.”

               “Huh,” said the boy.

               “Looks like the moon’s view is pretty wrong on this one,” said Oakley. “Makes you wonder what else it’s wrong about, huh?”

               The boy watched him, waiting for something definitive to happen.

               “All right, well, bye,” said Oakley. “If you’re still here when my pursuers show up, feel free to point them in the wrong direction.” He winked, then turned and walked off through the field and toward the swamp, resisting the urge to look over his shoulder every few steps to see if the boy was still watching him go, wishing he had worn any shoes but these, his most cherished shoes.

              

#7 CHALK CHILD

One night near the middle of his life, Oakley Mutt checked into a motel plopped in the wilds between two towns that were not far from each other, but which were both far from Oakley’s home. The clerk at the desk, a visibly exhausted woman who Oakley assumed would soon be asleep on the job, handed him a keycard and said, “Room 303. It’s the only room available.”

“Really?” asked Oakley. “The parking lot’s almost empty.”

“We’re doing some work on most of the other rooms,” said the clerk.

Oakley carried his one suitcase onto the elevator and rode it to the third floor. Room 303 was near the elevator, a convenience he noted with very, very mild satisfaction. Inside 303, he found a motel room indistinguishable from most of the motel rooms he’d ever seen except it didn’t have a TV. Instead, on top of the low dresser against the wall opposite the bed where one would expect to find a TV, Oakley found a new-looking TV-sized chalk board on a stand that allowed it to swivel on a horizontal axis so that one could write on either side if one had chalk, which Oakley did not. He looked for chalk in the dresser drawers and on the shelf in the closet more out of curiosity than a desire to use the chalk board. He found none. The absence of a TV was more annoying in principle than practice, though. Oakley just wanted to shower, sleep, and be on his way.

As Oakley opened his suitcase to unpack the items he needed for the night, he heard a light tap at the door to his room. He looked through the peephole in the door and saw an empty hall but for a few wisps of dark hair sticking up into his field of vision. Opening the door, Oakley was confronted with a girl, maybe seven years old, wearing what looked to him like a dark green school uniform. The wisps of dark hair belonged to her, he could now see where those wisps were rooted in her head. She had her left elbow through the handle of a basket full of fresh pieces of chalk in three different colors: white, yellow, and pink.

“Chalk delivery,” said the girl. “How much chalk do you need?”

“Ah,” said Oakley. “I was wondering where the chalk was.” He chuckled.

“How much do you need?” asked the girl. “And what colors?”

“I don’t think I need any,” said Oakley. “I’m not planning on using the chalk board.”

“So I came here for nothing,” said the girl.

“Maybe someone else wants chalk,” said Oakley.

“Yours is the only room with a chalk board,” said the girl in a weary tone. She went to the elevator and it swallowed her, 3-2-1.

After his shower as he lay encased in the motel bed’s tight sheets, Oakley could not stop thinking about the girl with the chalk. Was she an employee? Wouldn’t that violate child labor laws? Maybe the motel was a family business and she was family and she was required to help in an unofficial capacity. But it had been almost midnight when she knocked on the door of Oakley’s room. That seemed very late for a girl of her age, especially talking to strangers unsupervised. Strangers in a cheap motel! Unsupervised!

Downstairs in his pajama pants, a hoodie, and his sneakers with the laces untied, Oakley found the clerk sleeping with her cheek pressed against the surface of the desk. “Excuse me,” he said.

The clerk awoke and sat up straight and unembarrassed.

“Who was the girl who tried to bring me the chalk?” asked Oakley.

“What do you mean ‘tried?’” asked the clerk.

“I told her I didn’t need any chalk,” said Oakley.

“You brought your own?” asked the clerk.

“No,” said Oakley.

“Then how are you gonna use the chalk board in your room?” asked the clerk.

“I’m not,” said Oakley. “So who is she?”

“She delivers the chalk,” said the clerk. “We had the chalk board installed in 303 so she’d have some guests to deliver her chalk to.”

“Does that mean she was trying to deliver chalk here before there were any chalk boards?”

The clerk nodded. “Even before the motel was here. We felt bad for her.”

When Oakley returned to the third floor, he found a young boy in a dapper little suit waiting for the elevator. He carried a basket filled with spools of thread. “Oh, hey,” said Oakley, acting on impulse. “Can I get some thread? Uh, brown, red, and, uh, yellow?”

The boy looked skeptical. “Which room are you in?”

“303,” said Oakley.

“That’s the room with the chalk board,” said the boy. “The room with the sewing machine isn’t ready yet. You’re sure you want it?” His voice brimmed with fragile hope.

“Yeah, I’ll take the thread with me when I check out,” said Oakley. “I have a sewing machine at home.”

The boy accepted this, selecting spools of the three specified colors from his basket and handing them to Oakley.

“Thanks,” said Oakley.

“Thank you,” said the boy, beaming up at him.

Oakley had been back in bed for ten minutes when there came another knock at his door. Then, a little later, another. And another. And another. A variety of rhythms, of patterns, a range of little knuckles. Baskets of darts, of batteries, of quarters, of forks, of printer paper, of more, of more, of more until the feeble morning light prodded Oakley back to the open road.

 

#6 HEATHEN RINGERS

One night near the middle of his life, Oakley Mutt awoke to the sound of his doorbell ringing. It was the fourth night in a row. He had not managed to catch the ringers in the act on any of the previous nights and had given up trying. “This is it,” he said to his wife, Mallory. “It’s time to throw money at this problem.”

“I said that three nights ago,” said Mallory.

The next day, Oakley had a doorbell equipped with a camera installed.

“It won’t stop someone from ringing your doorbell in the middle of the night,” said the doorbell technician. “But you’ll be able to see who did it. It’s motion activated. When it senses motion, it starts recording. If it’s a neighbor kid who did it, for example, you can show their parents with video proof.”

That night, the doorbell rang three times. Oakley checked the camera live feed each time and saw nothing. The camera had recorded movement neither leading up to nor directly following any instance of the doorbell ringing.

When the doorbell technician returned the following day, he examined the doorbell and said, “Well, doesn’t look like anything’s malfunctioning. Your nighttime doorbell ringers must not be religious, that’s all I can figure.”

“What do you mean?” asked Oakley.

“The camera doesn’t ‘see’ anyone who’s not religious,” said the technician. “Anyone godless. Heathens, in other words. Some consider it a flaw in its design.”

“Uh, yeah,” said Oakley. “Count me among those.”

“But it’s really not a major problem,” said the technician. “Unless whoever’s ringing your doorbell and running away or stealing your packages or vandalizing your porch is a heathen.”

“But wouldn’t that be most of the people who do that kind of thing?” asked Oakley.

The technician scowled. “The statistics say otherwise. I myself would probably be considered a ‘heathen.’ Do you think I’m ringing your doorbell in the middle of the night?”

“I don’t know who’s doing it,” said Oakley. “That’s what I want the camera to show me.”

“So you’d rather have our doorbell camera that can’t see religious people?” asked the technician. "The one that only sees heathens?”

“I’d rather have one that sees everyone,” said Oakley. “Whether they’re religious or not. But if my only options are one that doesn’t see heathens and one that only sees heathens, then I guess I’d want the one that only sees heathens.”

“What?” The technician was aghast. “But then all the religious hypocrites will get away with everything! You won’t catch a single religious hypocrite!”

“It seems like heathens are the ones ringing my doorbell in the middle of the night,” said Oakley. “That’s who I want to catch.”

“You’re being very shortsighted,” said the technician. “Sure, in this one case, it’s heathens, but what about a week from now, a month from now, a year from now? If the religious hypocrites find out your doorbell camera only sees heathens, it’s gonna be open season on your whole front porch, pal, not just the doorbell.”

“I think,” said Oakley, “that we’re gonna go with a different company entirely.”

               The technician for the other doorbell camera company was baffled by a lot of Oakley’s questions. “What would someone’s religious status have to do with being visible on the camera?”

               “Exactly,” said Oakley. “Thank you.”

               “Religious status is too superficial,” said the technician. “Our doorbells perceive people on a much deeper level, penetrating to the very cores of their beings.”

               “But they show everyone,” said Oakley. “Right?”

               “Oh yeah,” said the technician. “Everyone except for the true heathens.”

               Oakley covered a groan with a cough.

               Later, when the doorbell rang at 1:49 a.m., Oakley grabbed his phone off of his night stand and poked the icon to open the app for the camera live stream. He saw only his vacant porch. But just as he was about to hurl his phone across his bedroom in a fury, the doorbell rang again. Though not visible on the camera, whoever was ringing his doorbell had not gone. Oakley was half way down the hall to the front door when the doorbell rang a third time. As he opened the door, he fully expected the ringer to have fled, vanished, evaporated. But no, a man waited on Oakley’s porch within easy reach of the doorbell. He wore clothes of no style and held a small stack of pamphlets in his trembling hand.

               “Hello, sir,” said the man. “Sorry to bother you at such a strange hour, but I have a very important question for you.”

               “What is it?” asked Oakley.

               “Do you ever get the sense that there are people you can’t see for one reason or another?"

“It’s these doorbell cameras,” said Oakley. “They’re very choosy about who they’ll show you.”

The man nodded. “That’s so,” he said. “But you don’t have to accept that. You can overcome that.” He selected a single pamphlet from the middle of his stack and extended it toward Oakley, the tremble in his hand intensifying.

Oakley glanced at the pamphlet’s title. BE A HEATHEN, SEE A HEATHEN. He did not accept the pamphlet.

The following morning, Oakley began designing a doorbell that would send a debilitating electric shock through the finger of anyone who rang it between the hours of midnight and 6 a.m.

 

#5 EXCHANGE HOLE

One night near the middle of his life, Oakley Mutt, out for a stroll in one of the many dinky towns in which he often found himself, stepped into a tavern to use the bathroom. Inside, two couples sat at opposite ends of the bar. They were the only customers. The bartender, somehow intuiting Oakley’s purpose, pointed to a dark hallway on the far end of the main room.

               Weaving among the empty tables on his way to the hall which he assumed led to the bathroom, Oakley passed a shoulder-high hole in the wall, perfectly round, the diameter of a quarter. Above the hole was a less-discolored rectangle of drywall indicating the former presence of a sign, a plaque, a label, something.

               As Oakley, with his bladder emptied, observed himself in the bathroom mirror washing his hands, his thoughts returned to that hole in the wall. Its existence had seemed purposeful. It was not prominently placed, but neither was it concealed like a peephole meant for surreptitious spying might be.

               Exiting the bathroom, he returned to the hole, tracing his thumb around its perimeter.

               “Don’t bother.”

               Oakley turned to see that the bartender was talking to him, the white rag draped over his shoulder dampening his gray button-up shirt. He was older than Oakley but younger than Oakley’s deceased father would have been.

               “Don’t bother?” asked Oakley.

               “Don’t bother looking in the exchange hole,” said the bartender.

               The couples on either end of the bar were deep in silent conversations, their lips moving inaudibly over empty glasses as they paid zero attention to Oakley or the bartender.

               “I didn’t know that’s what it was,” said Oakley. “So you’re supposed to look into it? What for?”

               “It never did this town any good,” said the bartender. “That’s for sure. And it was worse for them.”

               Oakley walked over to the bar. “To be honest,” he said, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen one before. You called it an ‘exchange hole?’ What does it do?”

               The bartender sighed, transferring the rag to his other shoulder as if he could not bear to have unevenly dampened shoulders. “It lets us see how they do things over in that other town. Their way of life, their customs. And it lets them see us, too, our way or life and our customs. It was supposed to facilitate cultural exchange. To allow us to learn from each other.”

               “It didn’t work?” asked Oakley.

               “Well, on a basic level it did,” said the bartender. “We could see them and they could see us. But to be honest, I never felt like either of us was getting much out of it. And then they saw the pool hall on 2^nd Street and it all went downhill pretty fast.”

               “How do you mean?” asked Oakley.

               “I guess if you’re curious you might as well take a look,” said the bartender. “Go ahead.”

               Oakley felt uneasy. He didn’t know why. But still, he returned to the hole in the wall, took one more glance over his shoulder at the bartender, and then bent to position his eye one half inch from the dark circle, peering into it and then peering through it. At first, the view was disorienting, like watching someone flip channels on a dim and fuzzy TV screen, sometimes lingering on a scene for up to a minute, sometimes abandoning a scene after only a few seconds. But with what little information the bartender had provided as context, Oakley was able to assemble a rough idea of what he was seeing. These were scenes from another town, possibly even live, real-time looks. This was the town on the other end of the exchange hole as it now was. The exchange hole offered a wide sampling. Oakley saw streets, sidewalks, lawns, the exteriors of houses and businesses and churches. And he saw interiors, too: offices, restaurants, living rooms, gymnasiums, boutiques. But what most arrested his attention was the incredible quantity of pool tables. They were everywhere, crammed anywhere they could fit and some places they couldn’t, and nearly all of them were in use, surrounded by nonchalant observers exchanging cash, muttering commentary, waiting their turns. Men, women, children, everyone. Scarcely a scene went by that didn’t have a pool table in it somewhere, and even in the few without, most of the people in those scenes carried pool cue cases, presumably hurrying to a pool table or from a pool table. And then, looking beyond the pool tables and pool-crazed citizens, Oakley saw the sorry state of the town, the decay, the dilapidation, the deterioration of any aspect of the town not related to the game of pool.

               Oakley took his eye from the hole, snapping back into his physical surroundings. He returned to the bar. “They’d never been exposed to pool before?”

               The bartender shrugged. “We don’t know. The exchange hole doesn’t allow for direct communication.”

               “And you didn’t get anything from them?” asked Oakley.

               “Well, before pool destroyed their society, we saw that they had a park named after a prominent citizen,” said the bartender. “Whereas our main park is called ‘Pretty Park.’ But now we’ll probably change the name if we ever get a citizen prominent enough.”

               Leaving the bar, Oakley found his way to 2^nd Street without much trouble. The pool hall was a ruined shell, glass blown out of the windows, roof collapsed, rubble ash-sprinkled and blackened. That was too bad. Shooting a little pool sounded like fun. Oh well.

 

#4 FORETOLD

One night near the middle of his life, Oakley Mutt walked into a diner and was greeted with delight and amazement by the customers, the waitresses, the cooks, everyone who was there. One of the waitresses took him by the elbow and ushered him to a booth blocked from use by a gray velvet rope. A yellowed piece of paper taped and re-taped and re-re-taped to the tabletop read, “RESERVED.” The waitress unhooked the rope and tore the paper off of the table. “Sit!” she said. “I’ll bring your menu!”

“What’s going on?” asked Oakley. “Why is everyone watching me? Why am I getting this special treatment?”

The waitress grinned. “Oh, we’re just happy you’re here,” she said. She trotted away.

Oakley gave the watching diner folk a limp wave and slid into the booth. Looking out the window, he saw two cars pull into the parking lot in rapid succession, then a truck, their occupants piling out and scampering toward the diner entrance. One young girl noticed Oakley watching and pointed at him, covering her mouth with her other hand and hopping in place as her siblings hurried back to join her.

Just as Oakley had decided that his best move might be to leave, his menu arrived borne by a different waitress. None of the waitresses wore name tags, and although they all wore uniforms, none of the uniforms matched. This new waitress wore a diagonally striped apron and scuffed tennis shoes. “I’ve been here the longest,” said the waitress as she handed the menu to Oakley. “I pulled rank.”

Oakley did not ask what this meant.

“Are you ready to order your, well, you know?” asked the waitress with a giant wink.

“Uh, give me a minute to decide,” said Oakley. This drew a big laugh from everyone in the diner. And more people were coming inside now, they were asking what was so funny and people were telling them that he had said he needed a minute to decide what he wanted to order, and then these just-arrived people were laughing too.

“Am I the millionth customer or something?”

“No,” said the waitress. “Well, I don’t know, maybe, wouldn’t that be a strange coincidence? You as the millionth customer?”

“I’m sorry,” said Oakley. “But do you think you know me?” He put his arm on the back of his booth and twisted to address the crowd that was now crammed into the diner, people of all ages, kids on their fathers’ shoulders, teens seated on the counter, an old woman in a wheel-chair staring at him with her hands clasped in front of her mouth from four feet away. “Do you all think you know me?”

“Just order!” called a man’s voice from somewhere in the crowd.

Everyone clapped and shouted their approval.

Feeling hot and strangely itchy, Oakley scanned the menu and said, “OK, well, uh…”

An expectant hush fell over the diner.

Oakley could hear his own pulse as he said, “I’ll just have the patty melt. With fries. But can-”

The crowd roared, applauded, whistled, and whooped. They exchanged high fives, they hugged each other. They opened a path for the waitress as she floated around behind the counter to the pick-up area where a plated patty melt and pile of fries promptly appeared accompanied by the merry ding of a call bell. She deposited the meal in front of Oakley less than 30 seconds since he’d ordered it. “Does everything look OK?” she asked. Her tone made it clear that she considered her question to be one of the most rhetorical ever asked.

“Actually,” said Oakley, “what I was trying to say before everyone started making noise was that I wondered if I could get the patty melt with sourdough instead of rye bread? I don’t like rye bread.”

A new hush fell over the diner, a worse one.

“And, uh, this looks like rye bread,” said Oakley, pointing at the patty melt.

The waitress looked hurt. The crowd was murmuring now. Some of the murmuring sounded nervous. Some of it sounded angry.

“Is there a no substitutions policy here?” asked Oakley. “I didn’t see that on the menu or posted anywhere.”

“No,” said the waitress. She opened her mouth as if to elaborate, then closed it. Then the first waitress, the one who had seated Oakley, appeared next to her colleague with an indignant expression on her face. She pushed Oakley’s plate aside and slapped a piece of old, crumpled notebook paper on the table in front of him.

Oakley blinked and looked at the paper. Most of it was taken up by a crude pen drawing of a man. Below the drawing, in a shaky hand, someone had written, “Patty melt. Fries. Will forget to order a drink until reminded.” The paper was signed and dated. Oakley couldn’t read the signature but the date was more than 50 years in the past. He looked up at the waitresses. “You think this is me?”

“It is you,” said the first waitress. “It looks exactly like you. How else would everyone recognize you as soon as you walked in?”

Oakley studied the drawing. It looked like it could be any of dozens of people, if not hundreds. If you considered everyone who had existed within the last 50 years and everyone who would exist in the future, then that number easily climbed into the thousands, tens of thousands. Could he be counted among the many men to potentially resemble this drawing? Maybe, sure.

“So, what?” he said. “You’re upset because I wanted to substitute sourdough for rye? I still ordered a patty melt.”

“But the prophecy doesn’t say you’d ask for a substitution,” said the second waitress, her eyes wet.

“It’s not a very detailed prophecy,” said Oakley. “It doesn’t say I wouldn’t ask for a substitution.”

“But it’s so specific about the drink,” said the first waitress. “About how you’d forget and then be reminded.”

“I guess,” said Oakley. “But it doesn’t even say what kind of drink I’m gonna order after I’m reminded.”

“Yeah, I guess,” said the second waitress. “That’s true.” The first waitress put her arm around the second waitress’s shoulder. They were recovering.

During the ensuing pause in the conversation, the murmuring in the crowd turned relieved, even appreciative. They were accepting Oakley’s rationalization.

“Anyway,” said Oakley, “I’ll eat the patty melt with the rye, it’s fine.” He paused. “But I don’t want a drink.”

The ensuing silence was that of mass death.

“Just kidding,” said Oakley.

The ensuing laugh was the most collectively desperate sound Oakley ever heard.

 

#3 THE OWNER’S FAVOR

One night near the middle of his life, Oakley Mutt sat on his front porch tolerating a glass full of a new kind of iced tea when a greyhound trailing a leash came trotting into his yard and began to sniff around the base of one of the two trees that Oakley referred to as “the big ones.” It didn’t take much effort to get hold of the leash. The greyhound was not afraid of Oakley. He took the dog inside and found a phone number etched into the metal tag hanging from the dog’s collar. The word “Countess” was etched into the tag as well.

“It’s OK, Countess,” said Oakley, stroking the dog’s muzzle as he dialed the phone number from the tag. “We’ll have you home soon.”

“Hello?” The woman’s voice on the other end of the call was hoarse but high.

“Hi,” said Oakley. “Are you missing a greyhound named Countess? I have her here.”

“I’m Countess,” said the woman.

“Oh, OK,” said Oakley, choosing to roll with it, choosing not to ask why she’d put her own first name on the dog’s tag. “Are you missing a greyhound?”

“Yes,” said Countess. “Her name is Girly Girl. I’m Girly Girl’s owner. If you give me your address, I’ll come pick her up right away.”

Ten minutes later, Girly Girl was curled up on the back seat of Countess’s car in Oakley’s driveway. Standing with her arms resting atop the open driver’s side door, Countess, a young woman dressed like an old woman, said, “I’m very grateful, Oakley. I wish I could afford to give you an appropriate reward, but you’ll have to settle for a promise that I will return the favor at the earliest opportunity.”

“Oh, that’s all right,” said Oakley. “I’m just glad to see you and Girly Girl reunited.”

“When do you think you’ll be most likely to next walk your dog and lose your grip on the leash allowing him or her to run away from you and into my yard?” asked Countess.

“I don’t have a dog,” said Oakley. “Why do you ask?”

“So I can return the favor,” said Countess. “So I can balance the scales. I want to be in your debt for as little time as possible.”

Oakley allowed himself a moment to absorb this. “So…you want to do the exact same thing for me that I did for you?”

“Of course,” said Countess. “I want to return the favor, not just any favor. If I do a different favor for you, then it will almost certainly end up being a bigger favor or a smaller favor than the one you did for me and we’ll still be unbalanced.”

“But I don’t have a dog,” said Oakley.

“How soon can you get one?” asked Countess.

“I’m not going to get a dog,” said Oakley. “And if I did, I’d be doing so as a favor to you. An even bigger favor than calling you about your dog.”

“You’re right,” said Countess. “In fact, anything you might do to make it easier for me to return the favor would be another favor.” Her shoulders drooped.

“Better to just forget the whole thing,” said Oakley.

“I can’t,” said Countess. “Releasing me from the obligation of returning the favor is also another favor.”

“Do you believe in revenge in the same way you believe in returning favors?” asked Oakley.

“No,” said Countess. “That kind of thinking poisons your soul.”

Oakley carefully organized his features into an unsympathetic expression. Then he opened the back door of Countess’s car and said, “Girly Girl, go! Run! Run away!” Girly Girl obliged, springing from the car, sprinting down the street, her leash lashing about behind her like an eel in grave peril.

Countess tried to penetrate to Oakley’s intentions with a hard stare. “Did you do that to…? Was that another…?”

“No,” said Oakley. “I did it because you’re irritating and I’m sick of talking to you.” He turned and walked back into the house before Countess could ruin everything with even a glimmer of gratitude.

 

#2 THE SIXTY SIGHTINGS OF JACKET CARRIER

One night near the middle of his life, Oakley Mutt and his wife Juniper arrived at the estate when the party was already in full swing. Since the party was located as much on the grounds of the estate as inside the enormous main house, Oakley had brought a jacket so he wouldn’t get cold strolling the meticulously tended lawns, but the night was warmer than he had anticipated and he was eager to check the jacket so he wouldn’t be stuck carrying it around all night. But at the coat check stand inside the front foyer, the coat check girl told him that their coat storage was at capacity and they could not accept any more coats.

Oakley looked at the other party guests mingling nearby. “No one else is carrying a jacket around.”

“They all got here before you,” said the coat check girl. “They already checked their jackets. That’s why there’s no room for yours.”

“So I’m the only one who has to carry his jacket around all night?” asked Oakley. “I’ll look like a fool.”

The coat check girl broke into a flawless customer service smile as if Oakley had uttered the magic phrase to conjure one on her face. “It’s for these exact circumstances that we offer our premium jacket carrier service.”

“And what’s that?” asked Oakley.

“For a fee, one of our highly-skilled jacket carriers will carry your jacket around for the duration of the event, or until you’re ready to leave.”

“So a guy is going to hover around us all night holding my jacket,” said Oakley. “And it’s going to cost more? I’d rather just carry my own jacket.”

“You misunderstand,” said the coat check girl. “You will never even see the jacket carrier until the very moment you want your jacket, at which point you’ll make a subtle gesture – very easy to learn – and the jacket carrier will appear with your jacket, hand it to you, and then again melt away until you’re ready to give the jacket back to him, if you so desire, at which point you’ll simply make the gesture again, he will materialize next to you – almost as if from thin air – and you will again dismiss your precious jacket into his care, at which point he will again-”

“This does not sound possible,” said Oakley.

“That’s why we have our guarantee,” said the coat check girl. “The initial fee for the premium jacket carrier service is one hundred dollars, but for each time you see the jacket carrier when you have not called for him, we give you ten dollars. And let me just say that since we instituted this policy, we’ve never had to give more than twenty dollars to a customer, and that customer was making a very concerted effort to spot the jacket carrier as a challenge to her own observational powers.”

“Just do it, Oakley,” said Juniper. “I know a hundred dollars is a lot, but this is a special night, I think it’s fine to indulge.”

So Oakley paid for the premium jacket carrier service. After a brief phone call, the coat check girl said the jacket carrier would arrive shortly, and he did arrive shortly, a bright-eyed, fervently groomed young man wearing a serviceable suit and smiling with easy modesty as he accepted Oakley’s jacket and draped it over his arm. He demonstrated the subtle gesture Oakley was supposed to use when he wanted his jacket or wanted to relinquish his jacket – a two-fingered collarbone tap – and then told Oakley and Juniper to enjoy themselves, stepping out of sight in an almost uncanny manner.

“I’m glad that’s dealt with,” said Juniper as she took Oakley’s arm and they strolled down the hall into the ball room which served as the party’s central hub. They were just about to fully commit to admiring the grandeur of the ball room when Oakley said, “Hold on.” He pointed into the mass of circulating guests. “Isn’t that the jacket carrier with my jacket?”

Two and a half hours later, Oakley and Juniper returned to the coat check stand.

“I see you have your jacket,” said the coat check girl. “You must have remembered the gesture.”

“Yes, I remembered it,” said Oakley. “But I didn’t need to use it. I just walked up to the jacket carrier and asked for my jacket back.”

The coat check girl’s smile flickered. “Ah, OK, so you…”

“I saw him, yes,” said Oakley.

“So you’re here for your ten dollars.”

“No,” said Oakley. “I’m here for my 590 dollars.”

“Five hundred and ninety? But sir, we only charge one hundred for the service.”

“I know,” said Oakley. “But I saw the jacket carrier 59 times. So the first ten sightings get me the hundred back that I paid. And then the 49 sightings after that get me another four hundred and ninety dollars.”

“59 sightings?” The coat check girl narrowed her eyes. “I’m sorry, sir, but I don’t believe you. You would need some kind of proof to support such a-”

“I have proof,” said Oakley. He pulled his phone from his pocket. “Look, I took pictures of every sighting. I’ll show you all 59. Look, there he is in the ball room two minutes after I first gave him my jacket. He’s looking right at me. Here he is again in the ball room looking at a statue. There he is on the second level in the ball room leaning on the balcony. Here he is dancing in the ball room, I don’t know who that is he’s dancing with. OK, here he is getting some food. See how he’s holding the jacket so the sleeve is dangling on the table? He got some kind of sauce on it.” Oakley paused his narration of the pictures to show the coat check girl the red stain on his jacket sleeve. “So then we went outside thinking maybe he’d just stay in the ball room, but nope, look, here is on the lawn. He’s kind of trying to crouch behind that bush but he’s not doing a good job. Here he is by the pond. Here he is looking surprised after her literally ran into my wife in the hedge maze and knocked her down. OK, we’re back inside now, here he is in the downstairs bathroom and notice how you can see my jacket is kind of draped on the edge of the sink while he uses one of the urinals. And then here he is back at the food tables, but now he’s wearing my jacket, and this is when he dripped something on the collar.” Oakley paused again to display the yellowish stain on his jacket’s collar. “Anyway, here he is still wearing my jacket, but now he’s doing an impression of me for a few other guests, but no one’s laughing or really responding at all because they don’t know who I am, and it also wasn’t a good impression because he doesn’t know me, or maybe he just isn’t good at-”

“Enough,” said the coat check girl. “I get it.”

On the way home, Oakley stopped at a gas station. He wanted to take advantage of the rare opportunity to buy gas at the cheaper price per gallon by paying cash. After heading inside to settle up at the register in the convenience store, Oakley returned to the car with a pallid face and tremulous hands. He showed his phone screen to his wife. “Look at this picture, Juniper. Right there by the fountain drink machine. Look who it is.”

“But the party’s over,” said Juniper, hands clasped at her chin. “When will it stop?”

Oakley didn’t know. Oakley couldn’t guess.   

 

#1 AND THEN SHE WOKE UP

One night near the middle of his life, Oakley Mutt went to a book store intending to buy a book.

Browsing the fiction section, Oakley had made it to the author surnames beginning with “U” without finding a book he wanted to buy when an employee approached him to ask if he needed help. Two things about this employee immediately stuck out to Oakley. The first was the constant, rapid flickering of her eyelids. The second was the button she wore next to her nametag which read, “I am asleep. Please do not attempt to wake me.” Not knowing how to take either of these things, Oakley then took note of the rest of her, which appeared normal. She was a few inches shorter than Oakley, her straight, dark hair hung even with the line of her jaw, and she wore a sweater teetering on the line between grayness and greenness. Her nametag read, “Polly.”

“I, uh, don’t really know what I’m looking for,” said Oakley.

“A book, presumably?” asked Polly. Her tone was playful but her facial expression did not change. “Are you looking for a particular book?”

“No, no,” said Oakley. “Just something to read before bed. Something, uh, good.”

“You’re in the fiction section,” said Polly. “You’re looking for a good novel? I’d be happy to recommend something if you can give me a little more to go on. What do you like? Something challenging? Something uplifting? Are you more of a plot guy or a tone guy?”

“Why does your button say you’re asleep?” asked Oakley.

Polly fingered the button without looking down. “Because I’m asleep,” she said. “I work here while I’m asleep. Don’t try to wake me up.”

“I won’t,” said Oakley. He tried to peer into the eyes beyond the flickering eyelids, but saw only white there.

“So what kind of book were you looking for?” asked Polly.

“Something long,” said Oakley.

“Something good and something long,” said Polly. “Not a lot to go on. But fortunately for you, I’m good at my job.” She walked back along the fiction section to the author surnames beginning with “G” and pulled a substantial, hard-cover book from the shelf. “Here,” she said, returning to Oakley and handing the book to him.

“Wow, heavy,” said Oakley. He opened the book and flipped to the end. “906 pages. That definitely takes care of ‘long.’” He closed it to examine the cover. “And you’re confident I’ll like this? Even though you’re asleep?”

“Because I’m asleep,” said Polly. She stood with her hands folded in front of her as if resting them atop an invisible counter. “That’s the book for you.”

“But, OK,” said Oakley. “Like, why do you think so?”

“That book,” said Polly, “will steady you on a precipice. That book will converse with parts of you that rarely bother to speak up. That book will remind you of the titles of other books you should have read but forgot to. My subconscious is attuned to yours. I can discern the importance of that book to you, how impactful reading it will be for you. That book will treat you to a portrayal of personhood that you will wish to replicate in real life. That book will teach you how to experience luxuries on a budget. That book will not diminish your appreciation for any books you read after it. That book will numb physical pain almost as well as ibuprofen. That book will hold up after innumerable re-reads. That book will keep you guessing. That book will change the way you think about your career and the concept of work. This is not conjecture. These are not outcomes that I merely hope for. This is not a sales pitch. That book will always feel as if it’s arrived at just the right time. That book will dismantle long-held grudges. That book will show you the error of some of your ways and the correctness of some of your other ways. That book will reignite one of your fizzled passions. That book will elicit low whistle after low whistle from you. That book will make you feel smart. That book will expand your vocabulary. That book will give you an ‘in’ with groups you admire. That book will redeem every second of your life that it consumes. That book will give you a leg up on your enemies. That book will give you a head start. That book will hold your hand but not in a condescending way. That book will be your new favorite book. You will like that book a lot. You will think it’s very good. You will find, in the end, that it has improved your life in more ways than you can list.”

“Definitely sounds intriguing,” said Oakley. “I’ll give it a shot.”

At that moment, a physically fit and frazzled-looking man rushed up to Polly, grabbed her by the shoulders, and placed a firm kiss on her mouth.

Polly’s eyelids ceased their persistent operation. They lowered gently and remained closed. Seconds passed.

And then she woke up.

Polly’s eyelids parted and her eyes were there: dark irises, darker pupils. The man who had kissed her watched her face, waiting for recognition. After another moment, it came. “Grover? Why are we still at the store? What time is it?”

“Your shift isn’t done yet,” said Grover. “But we have to go. It’s an emergency.”

Polly blinked. Much, much slower than before. As if feeling watched, she turned her head to look at Oakley. He could see that she did not recognize him. He could see her forming an impression of him. Her eyebrows arched. “Oh, wow,” Polly said, pointing at the book in his hands. “You’re gonna read that book?” Her mouth curled into a derisive smirk.

“We have to go,” said Grover. They went, Grover scowling, Polly chortling.

Oakley was again alone in the fiction section. He put the book down and walked away.  

 

Three nights after Izzie completed her list of the top ten bedtime stories so far, her dad came into her room at bedtime, sat down on the floor with his back against the bed, and told her the 250^th bedtime story. “This story,” he said, “is called…”

 

THE TOP TEN BEDTIME STORIES SO FAR

One night near the middle of his life, Oakley Mutt roamed the empty streets of Multioak, encountering no one. A grocery store was closed and silent. Not just closed for business. Closed up. Closed off. Closed closed. A different, smaller grocery store was also closed and silent. A large church was closed and silent. And so were all the other stores, shops, offices, and public buildings – even a zoo – most of them the kinds of places that you’d only visit maybe once in your life, maybe twice in your life.

Oakley roamed the residential streets of Multioak too, observing the now-familiar closedness and silence of every home. Eventually, he chose a house at random. He found the front door unlocked. The interior of the house was even more silent than it had looked from the outside. Standing inside of it with the front door open made the house feel in no way less closed. Oakley went upstairs and entered a bedroom that looked as if it belonged to a teenage girl. On a white desk beneath a narrow window, he found a list labeled “The Top Ten Bedtime Stories So Far.” The list was written in reverse chronological order from number ten to number one. As he read through the list, some of the titles tickled his brain while others went through him like a lance. “Chippertwig Justice,” for example. “Chippertwig” was not a word one would expect to run into by coincidence. Same with “Exchange Hole.” He had only ever encountered that term in one other context in his life. Yet here it was, written on this piece of paper in a youthful, feminine hand. How could this girl, whoever she was – whoever she had been? – how could she know these-”

 

“Stop,” said Izzie. She lay with her head propped on two stacked pillows, hugging herself under the comforter. Across the room, her white desk rested undisturbed beneath her narrow window.

“What’s wrong?” asked her dad.

“What did you say the name of the town was?” asked Izzie. “Moldy-what?”

“Multioak,” said her dad.

“But that’s not our town,” said Izzie. “We don’t live there.”

“I never said we did,” said her dad.

“But you were describing my room,” said Izzie. “And my list.”

Her dad didn’t speak.

“I don’t want to hear this one,” said Izzie.

“Why not?” asked her dad. “You should give it a chance.”

“No,” said Izzie.

“OK,” said her dad. “I won’t finish telling the story tonight.”

“And don’t try to tell it again some other night,” said Izzie. “Drop it from the rotation.”

“I will for now,” said her dad. “But you’ll want to hear the rest of it someday.”

“No, I won’t,” said Izzie.

“Don’t worry,” said her dad. “I’ll wait for you to ask.”