Jasper John Dooley, Left Behind (6 page)

That night they made a trail of cracker crumbs. In the morning the crumbs were gone but Hammy was still on the loose. Dad looked in the fridge for something else hamsters might like to eat. He opened some containers. “Why are there so many empty containers in the fridge?” he asked.

“They're not empty!” Jasper said. “Close them! Quick! That's Nan's air!”

“How about raisins?” Mom said. “Everybody likes raisins.”

After breakfast they made a trail of raisins. Then Mom suggested they all go out again. “Let's go to the library. Let's get some advice.”

They rode their bikes to the library and locked them in the rack out front. Inside, they went over to the desk where the librarian sat like a hen on a nest. Jasper asked her, “Do you have a book called
How to Be Smarter Than a Hamster
?”

“Let me check.” She looked on the computer. “I'm sorry. We don't. But we have one called
Caring for Your Hamster
.”

The librarian was nice. She led them to the shelf where the book was. Jasper, Mom and Dad sat down to read. The book said hamsters liked to eat hamster food. It didn't have any advice on what to do when your hamster is on the loose.

Jasper put his hands over his Band-Aids and moaned.

“What's wrong, Jasper?” Mom whispered. “Are you sick?”

“What if Hammy never comes back?”

“Don't worry, son,” Dad whispered. “We'll find him.”

“What if Nan never comes back!” Jasper wailed.

“She's coming back tomorrow,” Mom said in a hushed voice.

“
Tomorrow?
”

“Yes. Tomorrow.”

“But we're not finished the cruise ship!”

People were looking at them. Old people frowned and made snapping noises with the newspapers. Kids looked up from their picture books and giggled. Over at the desk, the nice librarian clucked.

“You can work on it this afternoon,” Mom said.

“I can't! Ori doesn't want to build it with me anymore!”

Mom put her fingers to Jasper's lips. “Why not?”

Jasper whispered now. He didn't want anybody to hear. “Because I blacked my thumb and waved it in his face and made him sick.”

“Why did you do that?”

“Because he was being bossy! He said he was the boss!”

Mom said, “I think Hammy needs a little more time to get back in his cage. Why don't we visit Ori?”

They left the library and got back on their bikes and pedaled over to Ori's house. Mom and Dad waited while Jasper rang the doorbell. When Ori opened the door, Jasper held his two pink thumbs up high so Ori could see them.

Ori smiled.

“I'm sorry I blacked my thumb,” Jasper said.

“It's okay,” Ori said. “Do you want to work on the ship?”

“It's too late. We'll never finish.”

“The thing is,” Ori said, “I'll help now.”

Jasper said, “I have a better idea. Do you have any paint left?”

Jasper spent the rest of the day at Ori's working on the better idea. Mom and Dad worked in the yard. The three of them stayed out of the house almost the whole day. Then Dad called across the alley and one house down that supper was ready.

“Bad news,” he said when Jasper came in the door.

Hammy had eaten all the raisins. He still wasn't in the cage.

That night Jasper made a trail of macaroni to his room. He was so so worried that Hammy wouldn't come back. If he didn't, Jasper would get called to Mrs. Kinoshita's office. He'd probably have to stay in Mrs. Kinoshita's office for the rest of his life! And what about Nan? He wanted her to come home and see the better idea he and Ori had built. He missed her so so so so much!

“I'm so so so so tired,” he told Mom when she came to kiss him good night. “I got so much exercise looking for Hammy and riding bikes to the library and building.”

“I know,” she said.

“Is Nan really coming home tomorrow?”

“She is.”

Before he closed his eyes, he asked, “How long are we going to have to use the toilet paper in the box in the bathroom?”

“A long time,” she told him.

“Please,” he said. “Never get me my own hamster.”

Whirr! Whirr! Whirr!

Whirr! Whirr! Whirr!

Jasper woke in darkness. When he turned on the light, Hammy was sitting on his wheel. He didn't seem too bothered. He just looked at Jasper and wiggled his nose. “Thank you, Hammy,” Jasper said.

He got out of bed and closed the door of the cage.

On Monday morning, Jasper opened his eyes and saw Dad standing in the doorway, smiling. “Will you look at that?” Dad said.

Jasper thought he was talking about Hammy. But he was looking at Jasper's tummy. The covers were down and his pajama top was up. Jasper's tummy looked white as an iceberg and all wrinkly. He couldn't see any holes.

“Did you take off my Band-Aids?” Jasper asked.

“Didn't you?” Dad asked.

They lifted the covers. Thirty-four Band-Aids were stuck on the sheet. They had come off in the night and stuck themselves there like a pancake. Jasper ripped them off. “Look,” he said.

Under all the Band-Aids, there was a hole in the sheet.

Then Jasper remembered. He gave a big cheer. “Nan's coming home today!”

After school, Jasper and Mom and Dad picked Nan up at the ship. All three of them fluttered long strips of toilet paper in the air. The toilet paper was Jasper's idea, so they could use up the loose paper in the box faster.

“Nan!” they called as she came down the ramp.

The first thing Nan did was grab Jasper and kiss him seven times, once for each day of the cruise. Jasper could feel the happy lipstick flowers blooming on his cheeks.

Then she held him out so she could look at him. “Jasper? What happened? You look so thin. You look so tired.”

“He'll be fine now that you're back,” Mom said.

Mom and Dad carried Nan's suitcases. Jasper carried Nan's purse and held her hand. He was never going to let it go. He was going to hold it for the rest of his life. During the drive, neither of them spoke. They sat in the backseat, Jasper sniffing Nan's hand. She smelled the same as ever.

Instead of taking Nan back to her apartment, they brought her to their house where Dad was cooking a special supper. Mom said, “Jasper. Go get Hammy to show Nan.”

Jasper was sitting on the sofa with Nan, still holding her hand. “You have to come with me,” Jasper told her.

“Nan's tired. Let her rest,” Mom said.

“I can't let go of her,” Jasper said. “She might get loose again.”

Nan said, “I'm not that old. I can get up.”

Jasper brought Nan to his room and showed her Hammy in his cage. Nan took a step back. She said, “I'm not that fond of mice.”

“It's a hamster,” Jasper told her.

Back in the living room, Mom carried in all the yogurt containers on a tray. Nan opened them one by one using the hand Jasper wasn't holding. “What's this?”

“That's the rain you missed.”

Nan dipped a finger in the rain. She dabbed some on her wrist and some behind her ears. She opened another yogurt container. “And what's this?”

“That's the air you missed.”

Nan put the air on like perfume, too.

“You haven't mentioned the cruise, Nan,” Mom said. “Tell us about it.”

“Did you see an iceberg?” Jasper asked.

“No! It rained the whole time. Not a single iceberg. Except for iceberg
lettuce
!”

“Yuck!” Jasper said.

“But I met a lot of people, and I played a lot of cards. Except on Wednesday. On Wednesday, I stayed in my cabin and read a book. I told everybody that on Wednesday there was only one person I'd play cards with.”

“Me!” Jasper said.

“That's right!” Nan said. “The people were very nice, but they were old. Old people everywhere. I need to be with young people, too.”

“I'm young!” Jasper said.

Nan squeezed his hand. “You're my perfect companion. I'm glad I went, but I won't be taking another trip for a long time. Or I'll take you with me.”

“Yeah!” Jasper said.

Then Nan said, “Tell me everything that happened to you while I was gone, Jasper.”

“Nothing happened.”

“Nothing? I don't believe it.”

“Jasper!” Dad called from the kitchen. “Things happened!”

“Lots of things,” Mom said. “Tell her about your snake story. Tell her about Annie.”

“You have to meet Annie,” he told Nan. “She has a ring in her nose.”

“And you got a mouse,” Nan said.

“He's a hamster. And he's not mine. I have to give him back tomorrow.”

“Didn't you spend all yesterday afternoon building something for Nan?” Dad called.

Jasper said, “Yes!” He made Nan get up off the sofa again so he could lead her out of the house and all the way across the alley and one house down.

Ori was in the backyard playing on the better idea. “Oh, Jasper!” Nan cried when she saw it. “You made me an iceberg! How did you do it?”

Jasper told her all about their plan for the cruise ship. “It was as big as an apartment building lying on its side. It was so big it had a swimming pool and a ballroom and a Ping-Pong room. It had ten different restaurants. One only sold popcorn. It even had a back door!”

“I'll show her,” Ori said, and he ran into the garage and came back with the plan. Nan unrolled it. She said it looked exactly like the cruise ship she went away on.

“But then we ran out of time because I blacked my thumb and waved it in Ori's face.”

“The thing is,” Ori said, “I was being bossy.”

“So we unnailed the cruise ship and put all the wood back in the pile. Then we painted it white.”

“It looks exactly like the icebergs I was supposed to see,” Nan told them.

Then Jasper remembered. “Nan! Something did happen when you were gone! Mom tried to eat our jujubes!”

Nan gasped. “She wouldn't!”

“She did!”

Nan pulled her hand out of Jasper's so she could hug him. It was a long, long, long hug that smelled of rain and fresh air.

She said, “Jasper, it's a good thing I'm back.”