Night of the Zombie Chickens (8 page)

I
think about it during dinner as I play with my food. I think about it when I'm supposed to be doing my homework. It keeps me awake at night. I need a plan. Finally, I decide the only way to solve the problem is to hold an epic brainstorming session.

In the past, Alyssa and I always brainstormed together, preferably at her house because she had better supplies. Her mother always kept plenty of Fritos, Doritos, and Cheetos on hand, and lots of soda. At my house, we had to eat Garden Veggie Straws and drink seltzer. My mother always says we are what we eat and she doesn't want an artificially flavored daughter.

At Alyssa's, we'd stay up late and hole up in her room. After we fed our creative brain cells, we'd start calling out ideas. One of us would write them all down, no matter how stupid. Usually, we ended up laughing hysterically, hopped up on sugar and junk food. We always came up with a lot of dumb ideas, but usually there were good ones, too.

Still, I'm sure I can brainstorm just fine on my own. I sneak downstairs and check the fridge. There's organic milk, orange juice, and two cans of O'Leary's Natural Pomegranate soda. I sigh and scoop up the cans. In the back of the refrigerator, I find a half-empty can of Easy Cheese that Alyssa smuggled in on her last sleepover. I grab that, along with a jar of whole pickles. I scrounge around until I find the other two must-haves—a big pad of blank white paper and colored markers that squeak when I write with them. I like the squeaking. Whatever I'm writing immediately sounds more creative.

It's getting late by this time, but that's okay. Another rule is that brainstorming must take place late at night. My parents are already in bed and the house is spookily quiet. It's perfect. I arrange all the supplies around me on my bed. Then I fish a pickle out of the jar, spray Easy Cheese on it, and take a big bite. I'm convinced that pickles unleash the imagination. There's something about crunching down on that cold, green, vinegary, cheesy deliciousness that makes the mouth and the brain salivate. I polish off my first pickle and down a soda. So far, so good. It's not quite the same without someone to laugh with, though. Laughter definitely helps crack open the creative sinus passages.

I once read about how, in India, they have laugh clubs, where people get together just to laugh. They take it really seriously and even do laughing exercises. I try an experimental chuckle. It's kind of fun, so I try a deep “ha-ha-ha.” It feels so bizarre to be giggling alone, at nothing, that it makes me laugh for real, and I have to stick my head under my pillow so I don't wake up my parents.

I uncap a purple marker and grab my pad. The smell of sugary grape Kool-Aid fills the room. My mother is still buying me fruit-scented colored markers. I guess she hasn't noticed that I'm not ten years old anymore. Too busy with her chickens to pay attention. I stare at the ceiling, the marker quivering over the bare paper.

“Boil her in corn oil.”

Hmmm, that seems a little extreme. I write it down anyway.

“Shave off her hair while she's sleeping.”
Squeak, sq
ueak.

“Slip something in her food that will make her smell like BO.” I kind of like this one so I put a star next to it.

“Drench her in hamburger juice and unleash a pack of hounds.”

Okay, I stole that last one from the movie
Cheaper by the Dozen
. Still, all the ideas seem kind of flat, maybe because there's no one to laugh at them.

I sigh and grab a red marker. While I'm brainstorming, I might as well work on the ending to my movie, too. There has to be a way to finish it without Alyssa. The marker smells like rotting strawberries, which doesn't sit well with the pickle in my belly. I hold the marker away from my nose and try to think.

“Buy a life-size doll with a long blond wig. Put it in bed under the covers. A zombie attacks it.”

Even my voice sounds flat. I try to inject some enthusiasm. “LOTS of blood ALL OVER. The END.”

Hmmm, maybe something with more action.

“Derek in blond wig and dress runs into woods. Dad-zombie chases. Branches start SHAKING. Add GROWLING, CRUNCHING bone sounds. BLOOD spatters the lens. The END.”

The marker squeaks as I write this down. Nothing else comes to mind. I fish out another pickle, squirt twice the amount of Easy Cheese on it, and gobble it down. A second later, I belch up cheesy vinegar. If Alyssa were here it would be funny, but right now it's just nasty. I fan the air and read over what I wrote.

They aren't the happy ending I'd hoped for. To have a happy ending, I need Mallory smiling, and that's impossible without Alyssa.

The pickles are starting to percolate in my stomach. Another whiff of sickening strawberry doesn't help. I lie back in bed. My two problems start running together in my mind. Too bad I can't just turn Alyssa into a crazed zombie. That would make her unpopular at school. I could slip zombie pills into her lunch. I could film her as she chases down our classmates and gnaws on them with her blackened teeth....

When I wake up, my alarm feels like a jackhammer drilling a hole in my head. My stomach rumbles queasily. Did I really eat two jumbo pickles and half a can of Easy Cheese last night? I read hopefully through my list of ideas, but there's not a decent one in the bunch. So much for brainstorming.

At school, I feel like I'm sleepwalking through the hallways. Alyssa passes by in a whirl of girls, all trying to laugh the loudest. They stare sideways at me as they pass, and I wish I could be like Violet in
The Incredibles
and make myself disappear. It's hopeless. Alyssa's in with the in crowd and nothing's going to dislodge her.

At least it's Friday. I slump into a seat in choir, feeling defeated. I've expended my best efforts and all I have to show for it is a sour stomach. I have no plan for Alyssa, and no ending for my movie.

I glance up when Mr. Cantrell plays a riff from “Tomorrow,” the song from
Annie
. Lydia is telling him that he should make her Annie.

“No, really,” she insists. “Can't you just see me as Annie all dolled up in a red wig? It'll be hilarious.” She pretends to stomp onstage and strikes a pose.
“Tomorrow, tomorrow, I love you tomorrow,”
she shrieks at the top of her voice, and everyone laughs. Even pale, serious Mr. Cantrell smiles. “And I can dance, too.” Lydia does a slapstick tap dance. Then, Alyssa and her other pals get up and do a crazy dance with her. It makes my stomach turn, but Mr. Cantrell laughs. I can see he thinks Lydia would make a great Annie because of her energy. With her luck, Lydia will get the part
and
the Cute Red Wig. Everyone wants to wear it. In my weaker moments, even I do.

That's when it hits me. Everyone wants to wear it. An idea explodes in my brain with the mega-voltage of a nuclear warhead. I know exactly how to teach Alyssa a lesson. A cold prickle slides down my spine, but I'm not sure if it's fear or excitement. Maybe both.

S
ometimes, flashes of genius hit when you least expect them. I sit for a moment in class, but no one seems to have noticed my gasp of excitement. That's because no one pays any attention to me. First, I savor my idea. It's so easy, yet so impossible....

Then, I immediately tell Mr. Cantrell that I feel sick, which is kind of true after watching Lydia's and Alyssa's silly dance. He excuses me to go see the nurse, and half an hour later, my mother pulls up to the curb.

At home, I dash into my room, lock the door, and run to my computer. If my life were a movie, then Alyssa would be the villain. Everyone knows the villain doesn't win. The good guy always comes out on top. That means I need to write an ending where I triumph and Alyssa gets her just reward.

It reminds me of a movie my dad made me watch once called
The Maltese Falcon
. I wasn't too excited, because it's old and in black and white, and the lead actor's name is ­Humphrey Bogart. Not too promising. But my dad said his nickname was Bogie, which is kind of cool. He said if I wanted to be a Hollywood director I had to see this movie because it's one of the best-ever examples of
film
noir
.

So I looked up
film noir
(pronounced “nwar”) on the Internet. It's a film style that was really popular back in the nineteen forties and fifties. The movies are mostly crime dramas with harsh lighting, deep shadows, and plenty of hard-boiled characters. Most of the endings are not happy. Some of the acting is kind of corny, but now it's one of my favorite movie genres.

In
The Maltese Falcon
, Bogie plays this tough detective who falls for a Beautiful Dame. It turns out she's setting him up to take the fall for a murder she committed. Bogie's too clever, though. He outsmarts her and sends her to prison, even though she's probably the love of his life. Like I said, not a lot of happy endings.

So here's my genius idea. I'll write a scene like something out of
The Maltese Falcon
. I'll be Bogie, who makes sure the Beautiful Dame gets what she deserves.

It's not like I want to get Alyssa expelled or anything. I just want her to know how it feels to get dumped by people you think are your friends.

There's this old saying my mom loves to quote about not judging people until you've walked a mile in their shoes. I guess that's because you don't really understand what someone else is going through until you go through it yourself. That's why I think it will do Alyssa good to tromp around in my size sixes for a while. They may pinch since she's a size seven, but as my dad loves to say, no pain, no gain. So really, I'm doing Alyssa a favor. I'm helping her to understand other people's pain.

Once my computer's up and running, I open my scriptwriting software and gaze at the blank screen. The first words are always the hardest. I glance around my room, searching for inspiration. A photo on my bulletin board catches my eye. It's Alyssa and me when we were seven, laughing like crazy at something, our heads thrown together. There's another photo of us on my tenth birthday, holding up a pink cake, blowing out the candles together.

I push back from my desk and wander over to the open window. It feels like it should be a cold, drizzly day, but the sky gleams deep blue, like someone cranked up the color knob on the TV. As I close my eyes and the sun pours through the glass, warming my face, it occurs to me that maybe I'm overreacting. After all, friends have fights all the time. Friends go their separate ways.

A breeze stirs the trees outside and I can hear their leaves whispering. I've always loved trees. They weather storms, wind, hail. They stand their ground. They lean on each other, they protect each other. Alyssa and I were like two intertwined trees. Other people had fights, but not us. We always had each other's back. We were closer than sisters. She was like my second half, my cosmic twin.

I guess that's why I've never been hurt this much by anyone in my entire life. I've never been so mad, either, which makes me feel like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. There's no point in denying it. I miss Alyssa. I wish I could call her and pretend like nothing happened. I wish we could shoot the perfect last scene for
Night of the Zombie Chic
kens
.

I could call her. But what if I say sorry and then she doesn't? What if she pretends it was all my fault or, even worse, acts like she doesn't care if I'm sorry or not?

A shadow falls over me and I open my eyes. A cloud has slid across the sun. I push away from the window, feeling chilled.

If I did call, Alyssa would probably be with Lydia. She would pretend to be nice and then laugh at me behind my back. After all, she's best buddies with the MPG while I've come down with a bad case of Crapkateitis.

I grit my teeth and sit back down at my desk. I can't call Alyssa. What I can do is come up with a plan. If I have a plan, that means I'm doing something. I'm not just giving up like Henrietta. And once I have a plan, I'm pretty sure I'll feel better.

I crack my knuckles and stare at the blank screen. I stare at the blinking cursor. I stare out the window. Hey, even J. K. Rowling probably gets writer's block.

Finally, the words start to flow:

INT: SCHOOL HALLWAY—DAY

BOGIE strolls down the hall with MARGARET YORKEL.

BOGIE

Oh, look, what's that?

Bogie points to a piece of paper. Margaret picks it up and opens it.

MARGARET

(reading aloud)

“Alyssa, please meet me after fifth period in the music room. I need to ask you something. Jake.”

(This is where knowing Alyssa so well comes in handy. NOBODY else knows she has a crush on Jake. She says she's over it, but I know she will be in that music room, no matter what.)

BOGIE

I wonder if Alyssa dropped it.

MARGARET

Should we give it back to her?

BOGIE

I can't. I'm not talking to her. Why don't you give it to her? I'm sure she'll appreciate it.

CUT TO:

Gym class. Margaret approaches Alyssa and hands her the note. Alyssa opens it and her face goes dead white.

I write the rest of the afternoon until the script is done. I consider teaching Lydia a lesson, too, but it seems silly. It would be like getting mad at the sun for burning you—what's the point? Strange as it sounds, I know Lydia doesn't have anything against me. She must know that she ruined my friendship with Alyssa, but she's probably too busy being popular to worry about how I feel. If someone told her I was miserable, she might put an arm around my shoulders and say “Why so serious?” in her best Joker imitation, but that would be it. The stories about the chickens, kicking the poop around—it's all just laughs to her. It's about creating a whirlwind of energy and being at the center of it. Lydia is just being herself. Alyssa is being her anti-self.

So my script focuses on Alyssa. And everyone has their part to play, even Mr. Cantrell. The timing is important. It needs to happen before the
Annie
auditions. In fact, the sooner, the better. I study the calendar and circle Monday in red crayon on my calendar. D-Day (Duh-lyssa Day) is three days away.