Page 20 of The Summer Show
Everyone stared. Everyone. This was hell and I was in the center, lowering myself into the burning pit with my tiny T. rex arms.
“I’ll just be going now, but I really need my pen back. I have postcards …” Stuck in T. rex mode, I shuffled toward Effie and hoped someone would change the subject soon.
“You no watch TV?” One of the others at the table spoke up. A delightfully flamboyant man with arms covered in bangles that rattled as he set down his frappe. “She no watch TV.” There was more after that, but he switched backed to Greek so it all went over my head.
On the far side of the table, Nick raised his eyebrows at me.
What was that supposed to mean? Was it a critique of my dinosaur skills? Was he disapproving of my attempt to retrieve my pen? Was he judging me?
Was this residual resentment because of my up-close encounter with his fear of flying? On top of that, I suppose I had stolen his bed—sort of—so maybe he had a legitimate beef. An argument could be made that he tried to steal my bed, so was his beef justified, or should I be the one with the beef?
My stomach growled at all my meat thoughts.
Everyone was staring at me again. There was a lot of whispering and I knew from experience that it was about me, even if I didn’t understand the words.
“Can you fight?” Fancy Bangle Man rattled as he plonked his elbows on the table.
“Sure, I argue with book suppliers all the time. I’m getting better at it. I just really have to work on my mean librarian voice. The thing is, I’d hate to accidentally grump at one of my kids, especially in a library of all places. We try to get them to love books.” I looked around the table. “That’s not the kind of fighting you mean, is it?”
“Can you wrestle? Do karate?”
Did I look like a wrestling karate expert? No, I did not. But surely even I had some kind of innate attack skill. Wait …
“I can do this.”
To illustrate, I did the windmill, slicing the air with my spinning arms.
“That looks like something my cousin Vivi would do,” Effie said.
I smiled. “Thank you.”
“I hate my cousin Vivi. She is a big mouni.”
Yikes. Whatever that was, it didn’t sound good. “Well, that’s all I’ve got in my arsenal. May I please have my pen?” I poked around in my bag and held out my hand to show off my postcards. “I’ve got postcards.”
Nobody gave me my pen. Instead, they huddled together over the table, whispering again. Then finally, a whippet thin woman with pigtails down to her waist grinned at me. She threw her hands into the air.
“Congratulations! We want you to be a contestant on Greece’s Top Hoplite!”
The crowd went wild, which was nice for them but not so much for me.
“I … what now?”
“You will be on the show,” Effie said. “If the casting director likes you.”
“I can’t be on the show. I’m an elementary school librarian. I’m on vacation. Best I can do is read books and tell you obscure facts. Did you know that ears never stop growing and earwax is a type of sweat?”
“That explains why my papou has ears like an elephant,” Bangles said.
“No, no, you are perfect!” the woman with the braids told me. “You are a soft, normal person.” I raised my arm and poked the place where my biceps should be. I wasn’t that soft, was I? “The audience will love you and they will be very sad when you lose.”
Lose?
I dropped my arm. “What if I win?” Now my mouth was writing checks it had no way of cashing.
Everyone laughed.
Everyone except Nick Merrick, who was sitting stock still. He was so rigid that I was starting to wonder if he’d been replaced with a statue.