The more Lulu thought about it, the more irritated she was at the fact that her parents had kept such huge secrets from her. She couldn’t believe that her entire life she’d been lied to about the reality of her family. Lulu hated secrets. Or at least she hated the ones that were kept secret from her and this was the mother of all secrets. Events like Christmas and birthdays were veritable torture until she was able to uncover what her parents were hiding in order to surprise her.[38]Once she found out the secret that her parents were trying to keep from her, though, she liked having the secret that she knew what the secret was. Nobody ever knew that she knew the secret, because when it was revealed she would always act super surprised, too.
She even had special methods for unwrapping and rewrapping her Christmas presents so that nobody could tell. She knew all the places her parents thought were super secure. She knew where all the hidden keys were. There was one instance, besides the current witch situation, in which her parents had nearly driven her mad with a secret, and that was the birthday when Bob came into her life.
“Now sit there and cover your eyes, Lulu,” Anne told her, even as the candles on her cake were still releasing little streamers of smoke into the air, “and no peeking or you'll have to give your present back.” It was her ninth birthday, when Anne informed her that her present was waiting in the next room. Lulu's spine prickled as if she'd reclined against a cactus as she put her hands up to her eyes. What could it be? A microscope? A chemistry set? An ant farm? A cool vampire outfit with black sequins? The last thing was what she secretly hoped for.
Lulu could hardly imagine how they had kept her from finding out what her present was. She'd looked in every hiding place for weeks, and for the first time ever she'd been totally unable to find it. She looked under beds, in the backs of closets, in drawers, in the attic--everywhere. She even dismantled the refrigerator while her parents were out one day and when she couldn’t reassemble it in time, was forced to blame the ghost of Narcissa Whitman, which, oddly, they didn't question as much as might have been expected. At the time she’d marveled at their belief of her far-fetched tale. Her parents then had to spring for an exorcism and a new refrigerator, which, Lulu reasoned was their own fault.
This time, however, was different and she was just about to explode with anticipation. She felt like an overfilled water balloon, and with the prickling in her spine that reminded her of a cactus, she could just picture a messy outcome. It was impossible once she thought about it not to picture herself exploding and spewing blood and guts everywhere. All over her parents, who hid her present so thoroughly as to make her explode, and all over her pest of a brother, and all over the birthday cake, and her mom's good dishes, and the nachos and everything. Her granny Lopez would probably faint. Her cousins, Cybil and Caleb would have their red running shoes ruined, or maybe not. They'd probably have to scrape parts of Lulu off the ceiling. It would be the grossest thing ever to happen in Walla Walla.
She smiled. That would be one birthday party nobody would forget and her parents would later tell everyone how sorry they were for hiding the present so securely that Lulu exploded. They'd have to have a big funeral for her because of all the people who would want to come to see what was left of the exploding girl. Plus, it would be on TV and in the newspaper. She'd be world famous. Maybe there would even be video. And everyone would have to wear black. They'd probably name a bridge or something after her too: The Lulu Lopez Exploding Girl Memorial Bridge--or maybe she'd get a statue. She'd make sure to come back as a ghost and haunt all kinds of things, too. She would haunt her family, and her school, for sure. Probably also her memorial bridge. And all because they hid her present, so it would serve them all right. She'd try her best to come back as an exploding ghost, so everyone had to relive the horror--over and over. Lulu would return every single day to some location in Walla Walla, sometimes the Red Star Department Store, sometimes Pioneer Park, sometimes Ft. Walla Walla. It would be the worst haunting ever recorded in all of history.
By the time her birthday rolled around, Lulu was positively writhing with anticipation. She was sure that they were keeping the present at some other location. Lulu would never forget when she finally opened her eyes and her mom held the wiggling, black and white puppy out to her. That was how she met Bob Barker, which is his full name. She’d sort of forgiven them for the torture they’d put her through because Bob was the greatest dog ever, so unlike any ordinary dog.
Bob was a dog of many talents, chief of which was digging. So talented at digging was Bob that he had created a vast network of tunnels throughout the neighborhood where Lulu lived. His tunnels allowed him to go underneath all of the houses and all of yards and gardens without anyone ever seeing him.
Sometimes he disappeared for many hours into his warren of tunnels, only to reemerge when he got tired of eating the critters he found down there. Little did the humans know, Bob’s tunnels would eventually prove very interesting when wickidity struck. The truth of his excavations was far stranger than anyone suspected.
Reggie actually liked excavating with Bob, digging great holes in the fields and finding nasty things to gross Lulu out. Like the time Lulu found a two-inch long Jerusalem Cricket in her bed. In case you’ve never seen one, a Jerusalem Cricket is a really big, icky looking, striped bug, with big scary pincers.
As far as Lulu was concerned it was one of the most hideous things alive. Some entomologists[39], undoubtedly, would attest to their beauty because they really like bugs. Lulu liked reading about bugs, but the Jerusalem Cricket would have been in right by her feet if she'd have gotten in bed without looking. It could have bitten her, and caused her foot to swell to the size of a watermelon and then she might have had to get surgery. She would much rather read about such creatures.
Lulu liked to read about almost everything. She liked reading about monsters too, but didn’t particularly want to meet up with one on a dark and stormy night. Many of her books portrayed that as the most likely way of encountering them. Neither did she want to encounter a big bug in her bed.
Reggie got in trouble for the Jerusalem Cricket affair and didn’t get his dessert that night after dinner. Lulu made sure to savor every bite of her pineapple upside-down cake as Reggie sat without any. That, of course, made the dessert the most delicious Lulu had ever eaten.
“Mmm. This is the best cake you’ve ever made,” Lulu told Anne as she prepared to take another scrumptious bite. It was Reggie’s favorite dessert. She looked over at him to make sure he was taking it all in. He was, too.
“I don’t care about not getting dessert,” he told Lulu quietly as their mom was clearing the dishes.
His color deepened from fulvous to flammeous as she helped herself to seconds and thirds. Her only disappointment was that she couldn’t eat enough to see him turn completely virescent.
Who, Lulu wondered, wouldn’t get tired of a brother like Reggie? Why did her parents never understand that she was justified in getting angry with him? He gave her that self-satisfied look that made her want to punch him.[40]She didn’t, though, because she knew she’d just get in trouble. She vowed to wait until the chance to get revenge presented itself.
She read somewhere that revenge was like a dish of ice cream; it was best served cold. Which, to Lulu, meant it might melt if you waited and, truly, that was what usually happened. She usually didn’t really feel like getting revenge any more after a little while, and eventually forgot all about it.
It might be worth noting here that she had the quote a bit wrong. It’s really, “revenge is a dish best served cold,” with no mention of ice cream. Lulu had mistakenly added the ice cream bit because it was also a thing best served cold.
Anyway, now you know about Lulu's family. Often she and Reggie visited their Granny Lopez who lived very nearby. Her wonderful cousins, Cybil and Caleb, lived in the same town in their very own houses. They were old enough they didn’t need parents any more, or at least that was the impression Lulu had gotten.
Cybil and Caleb had their own business making red running shoes that were the fastest in the world. (This assertion was based on the theory that because red shoes create less light-resistance, they make you faster.) They made shoes for all of the best runners in the world and everyone swore they really did work to increase speed. In fact, nobody who was a really super fast runner ever raced without them, which proved that they were the key to racing success.[41]
[38]She liked surprises, but only when they were actually surprises, meaning that she didn't already know they were coming.
[39]Bug studiers.
[40]He was still pretty puce.
[41]Lulu would later learn that this was a logical fallacy, based on mistaking cause and effect. (If you wish to obfuscate say something like this: Post hoc ergo propter hoc.) Scientists, however, have documented real positive effects of good luck objects in performance activities. In other words, if you believe that the shoes will make you faster they might. But they won't help you win a raffle. The possibility that the shoes had some real magical charm attached to them has not been adequately researched to make an assertion in that regard at this point in time.
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