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urs is not a typical family.
We moved to Bridgeton because, as Mom kept saying, “It's a small town with good people and an excellent school.” She was pretty much rightâthe people were nice, and the school wasn't bad.
We could have moved wherever we wanted. My dad had written this computer program that was really popular. He sold it to some big company for a lot of money. Every three months, they'd send him another check. The more copies of the program people bought, the more money Dad got.
I guess a bunch of people bought the program, because Dad doesn't have to go to work. He spends a lot of time playing with his computer, but he also takes off whenever he feels like it so
we can throw a ball around or go for a hike or rent a movie.
Mom tells everyone she has two kids, but one of them is grown. She means Dad, of course. He doesn't mind. He enjoys kid stuff. Dad's really a lot like me. We both love games, and we're both pretty smart, and we both wear glasses and are kind of skinny. Mom doesn't really mind the way Dad acts, either. Anyhow, we're not the normal Bridgeton family. I started figuring that out right after we moved here.
Every other dad in town seems to live for his lawn. The amazing thing is that they all keep to a schedule. If it rains for a few days in a row, you could bet anything that on the first sunny day, all the dads will be out mowing the grass. If the sunny day is during the week, they'll all be mowing as soon as they get home from work. If it's a weekend, they'll all be mowing by nine in the morning.
“They're all lawn weenies around here,” Nick said. He's the kid who cuts our grass. I guess Dad would do it or ask me to do it, except we don't own a lawn mower. The last place we'd lived before here was an apartment. When we moved to Bridgeton, Nick had shown up at the door and offered to mow the lawn. Dad had hired him right away.
I liked Nick. We'd hang out sometimes. He lived on the other side of the tracksâwhere the houses weren't as pretty and the lawns were mostly weeds and dirt. “It'll happen to your dad some day,” Nick said to me one afternoon as we walked out of school.
“What'll happen?”
“He'll turn into a lawn weenie. He'll get a mower, and he'll be just like the rest of them. And mowing's only the start. After that, he'll be spraying and spreading all sorts of chemicals on the grass. And when he isn't mowing, he'll be washing his car, or doing something to the fence, or some other stuff that isn't any fun at all. They all do it, but they don't enjoy it. Watch their faces.”
“You're crazy,” I told him.
“Look around, buddy,” he said. “Take a good look around where you live. Then tell me I'm crazy.”
I did look around. That weekend, I took a long walk. Every dad in sight was washing his car. Except for my dad. He was trying to hook up a radio-controlled airplane to the computer. The next morning, all the other dads were pruning trees or trimming hedges. That afternoon, they were all patching holes in their drivewaysâevery single one of them.
And all their faces looked the same. They had no expression. Their mouths showed no emotionânot happy, not sad, not tired. Their eyes were open but not alert. They might as well have been walking in their sleep.
“Well?” Nick asked me on Monday when I saw him at school.
“You're right,” I said. “It's almost scary.”
“Get used to it,” he said. “Nobody escapes. When they're not doing stuff around the house, they play golf. They never take their kids. They never do anything with their kids. It's only a
matter of time until your family is just like the others.”
I shook my head. “Not my dad. We're different. We're not like the other families.”
Nick grinned, then said, “You'll see.”
That afternoon, I sat in the kitchen, watching Mom make a pie. Life was good. Dad liked to do fun things. So did Mom. She played games with us. We all went for bike rides when the weather was nice. And she liked to cook. She'd gotten really good at it, too.
Just to make sure things weren't going to change, I hunted Dad down. He was in the living room, playing a video game.
I got right to the point. “Dad, do you ever feel like cutting the grass?”
“No thanks,” he said, shaking his head. “Why'd you ask?”
“Just wondering.” I sat down next to him, picked up a joystick, and said, “Challenge you.”
“You're on,” Dad said, hitting RESET so we could start a two-player game.
Life was definitely good.
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Three weeks later, Nick came up to me in the park. I'd gone there to shoot some hoops after school. “Your life is over,” he said.
“What?” I missed my shot. The ball kicked off the rim and bounced to the other side of the court.
“I hate to be the one to tell you this. I was at the hardware store last night. They're delivering a riding mower to your house.”
“What are you talking about?”
“A Lawnmaster 3000 self-mulching mower,” Nick said. “Your dad must have ordered it. I heard Mr. Barklay at the store telling that guy Vito who works for him to deliver it to your house. This is the end, good buddy.”
I shook my head. “You've got to be wrong.”
“No mistake,” Nick said. “And the minute your dad hops on, starts it up, drops the blade, and begins cutting a path across your yard, he's going to be hooked. He's going to be sucked into the life of a lawn weenie. Then there'll be the chemicals and the car washing and all that other stuff. Your life is over.”
It couldn't be. I wanted to hit Nick. I wanted to punch him and tell him what a liar he was. But Nick would have taken the punch without blinking and then broken me in half. Instead, I ran from the park. I didn't even go after my ball. I had to get home and stop Dad. He'd listen if I explained. The evidence was all around. I could show him. He'd believe me.
As I ran through town, I could see dozens of dads opening up garages. All around, mowers were roaring to life, getting set to eat the grass and spit out clippings. I ran. There was a dad to my right, riding across his lawn on a mower. Another to my left. They were all over.
I ran. I stumbled. My glasses went flying. There was no time to stop and search for them. I had to get home.
I ran. My breath was almost gone. Why did we have to live at the top of a hill? I forced myself up the street, pulling my body toward the house.
Ahead, too far off, I could see our garage door sliding open. I squinted. There was something large and red inside. The mower. There was someone sitting on it.
“Stop!” I yelled.
I got closer. I could barely breathe. Maybe I could reach him in time. “Don't!” I shouted.
The mower pulled onto the driveway, then turned toward the lawn. I heard the blade drop. The mower reached the edge of the grass, jolted, slowed, then started across the lawn.
“Dad! Stop!”
I raced past the edge of the yard. The world was a blur without my glasses. Drops of sweat stung my eyes. I ran in front of the mower, waving my arms. “Stop!”
The mower stopped. “What's wrong?”
I froze. I squinted. The voice. It wasn't Dad.
“What's the matter?” Mom asked from her seat on the mower. “Do you want a turn? Is that it? I don't mean to hog it to myself, but gosh, this is fun. I'll probably need all evening to get the lawn looking right. It's a shame we haven't been taking better care of it. That'll change. Guess I won't have time to cook dinner. But we can heat up something from a can. That would be fine. Well, I'd better get back to it.”
Mom started up the mower again and continued cutting the grass. I stepped aside and let her pass. Her face was blank, her eyes empty.
Ours is not a typical family.
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tacy and I had spent half the summer wondering about the girl on the hill. We knew she was thereâsometimes we'd catch a glimpse of her through the treesâbut we'd never seen her close up.
“I think she's our age,” Stacy said as we sat on my front porch and looked up the hill at the house behind the trees.
“We'll find out when school starts,” I said.
“Maybe. Unless she goes to private school. That's a big house. Her folks probably have a ton of money.”
I hadn't thought about the possibility that she wouldn't go to our school. I couldn't stand the idea that the mystery might remain unsolved. Suddenly, I had an urgent need to meet her. It had to be now. I couldn't wait. “Hey,” I said, turning
toward Stacy as the idea hit me, “I know. Let's stroll up there and say hi.”
“What? Just like that?”
“Sure. Why not?” I stood and walked down the porch steps. Behind me, I heard Stacy following. We went along the block to the driveway in front of the house on the hill. I'd never seen any cars come in or out. A month ago, a moving van had gone up the driveway. A few hours later, it had come back down. And that had been the only traffic.
As we started up the slope, I called out, “Hello. Anyone home?” I didn't want her to think we were sneaking around.
There was no answer. We reached the top of the driveway and I climbed the porch steps and knocked on the door. Nobody came.
“Let's get out of here,” Stacy said.
“Maybe she's around back,” I said.
“We can't just go walking through her property.”
I could. I was sure she was in the back. I went around the side of the house, along a path that led through high bushes. She was there in the yard behind the house.
“Hi,” I said.
She was lying in a lounge chair, wearing a two-piece bathing suit, her eyes closed, soaking up the sun. She didn't move. The thing that really caught my attention was the chair. It was metalâmaybe aluminum or steel. I wasn't sure. But it must have been hot. There were a couple other chairs of the same kind on either side of her. I couldn't imagine lying on something like that in the sun. I
touched the edge of the closest chair, then jerked my hand back from the scorching heat.
“Hi,” I said a bit louder, stepping closer. Stacy stayed a few feet behind me.
The girl's eyes opened, but just the slightest bit. She didn't seem surprised or startled to see us. “I love the sun,” she said.
She closed her eyes again.
“I'm Kelly,” I told her. “This is my friend Stacy. We live at the bottom of the hill.”
The girl just lay there with her eyes closed. I decided to give it another try. “We wanted to come up and say hi. And, uh, see if you wanted to play sometime.”
She said nothing. I stood, not sure what to do. If I left, I knew I'd feel like I'd lost some sort of strange game. But if I stayed, I also felt I'd be losing.
The voice from behind startled me.
“Hey, aren't you afraid you'll get a sunburn?” Stacy said. She stepped forward and pointed at the chair.
To my surprise, the girl opened her eyes again. They still didn't open very wideâthey were barely more than slits. “I never burn,” she said. Then she closed her eyes.
“Everyone burns,” Stacy said.
The girl didn't answer.
“Everyone burns,” Stacy said again.
Oh boy. I could hear it in her voice. Stacy was probably about to lose her temper. She didn't like being ignored. I was pretty sure something would happen, but I didn't know what.
“I said, everyone burns!”
Stacy shouted. She kicked the leg of the chair, jolting it.
The girl didn't open her eyes. For an instant, her tongue flicked over her lips, but her face remained emotionless.
“Hey, I'm talking to you.” Stacy kicked the chair again. Sunlight flashed off of it as it shook, cutting streaks through my eyes. But the girl didn't seem to notice or care about the disturbance.
Normally, I try to calm Stacy down when she gets like this. But I was angry, too. The girl was rude. She had no right to treat us this way. We were just trying to be friendly.
I waited to see what Stacy would do next. Motioning for me to be quiet, she took another of the metal chairs and set it so the sunlight was reflecting on the girl. Then she went over and did the same thing on the other side. Both chairs bounced the harsh sunlight against the girl.
“Well,” Stacy said as she stepped away from the chairs, “I guess we'll be on our way now. Bye-bye.”
She walked off.
I watched the girl for another moment. She was bathed in light. She must have felt the increase in heat. Still, she didn't open her eyes. Unbelievable. I turned and followed Stacy back down the hill.
“Was she for real?” Stacy asked when we reached my porch.
“Who knows. I sure hope she doesn't go to our school.”
“Maybe she just sleeps all winter,” Stacy said. Then she giggled.
I laughed, to. And we said some more nasty and
funny things about the girl on the hill. But later, as the sun was moving well past its highest and hottest position, I started to worry.
“Maybe you shouldn't have done that,” I told Stacy. “She might get a bad burn.” I imagined her sizzling like a strip of bacon, slowly curling up in a pan.
“Hey, you heard her. She never burns.”
“Still ⦔ I felt bad. “Look, she wasn't nice to us, but that doesn't mean we should let her get hurt.” I knew I had to go back and make sure she was okay.
“Coming?” I asked Stacy.
“No thanks.”
So I went up the hill by myself this time. As I walked, I kept getting images of a slab of burned meat lying on a metal chair. Despite the heat, I started to jog, then run. I had a feeling something terrible had happened.
I made noise and called out, like before, just to make sure nobody thought I was sneaking around.
She wasn't in front. She wasn't inside.
She was still in the back. It looked like she hadn't moved. It looked like not one single hair had shifted.
She was exactly as she had been beforeâexcept that her skin had turned red. For a moment, I couldn't even speak. From the times I'd been sunburned, I knew that this was the start of something awful.
“Hey, wake up. Come on. You got burned.” I reached to shake her shoulder, but stopped. I was afraid to touch herâafraid of the agony it would
bring. Her shoulder was worse than just red. There were blisters and small cracks with black edges. How could she just lie there?
She opened her eyes. Then she smiled. “I told you, I never burn.”
She reached up and grabbed my wrist. Her whole arm was red and cracked. “But look at you,” I said.
She shook her head. “I don't burn,” she told me again.
Something was happening to her skin. First along her arm, then all over her body, her skin was crinkling and curling and flaking off.
“None of us burns,” she said.
There was something underneath her skin, just beginning to show itself.
“But if I get too much sun, I do shed,” she said as the flesh dropped from her body and her face. Beneath, there were soft scales, not yet hardened by exposure to the sun.
I tried to pull away. She was too strong.
“It doesn't hurt,” she said. “Shedding doesn't hurt at all.”
Her eyes locked with mine. I couldn't move.
“But it really builds up an appetite.”
She must have squeezed my wrist harder, because I heard a crunch. But I didn't feel anything. I just looked at those eyes, and the tongue, split and slithery, that flickered out from between her lips.
Her eyes, now fully opened, gleamed in the sunlight.