Several kids let out startled screams as the enormous worm skyscraper tilted … tilted … tilted….
“No!” Patrick screamed. He reached out both hands to stop it.
And missed.
And the heavy wood-and-glass structure toppled onto the next table with a deafening crash of shattered glass.
“No!” a girl screamed. “That’s Liquids and Gases! Look out — it’s Liquids and Gases!”
Dirt poured out of the broken skyscraper. Several worms came wriggling out onto the table.
As Todd pulled himself to his feet, wild screams filled the gym.
“Liquids and Gases!”
“What’s that smoke?”
“What did they break? Did they break a window?”
“Liquids and Gases!”
Thick, white smoke poured up from a broken glass bottle under the fallen skyscraper.
“Everybody out!” someone yelled. “Everybody out! It’s going to blow up!”
No one was hurt in the explosion.
Some strange gases escaped, and it smelled pretty weird in the gym for a while.
A lot of worms went flying across the room. And there was a lot of broken glass to be cleaned up.
But it was a minor explosion, Todd told his parents later. “Really. No big deal,” he said. “I’m sure everyone will forget all about it in five or ten years.”
* * *
A few days later, carrying a small, white carton in both hands, Todd made his way down the basement stairs. He could hear the steady plonk plonk of Ping-Pong balls against paddles.
Regina and Beth glanced up from their game as he entered the room. “Chinese food?” Beth asked, spotting the little box.
“No. Worms,” Todd replied, crossing the room to his worm tank.
“Are you still into worms?” Beth demanded, twirling her Ping-Pong paddle. “Even after what happened at the Science Expo?”
“It all got cleaned up,” Todd snapped. “It was no big deal.”
“Hah!” Regina cried scornfully.
Todd gazed at his sister in surprise. “Hey, are you talking to me again?” Regina was so furious, she hadn’t said a word to him since the big disaster.
“No. I am not talking to you,” Regina replied with a sneer. “I will never talk to you again.”
“Give me a break!” Todd muttered. He opened the carton and poured the new worms into the big glass aquarium where he stored his collection.
Plonk. Plonk. The girls returned to their game.
“You know, what happened at the Science Expo was no tragedy,” Todd called to them. “Some people thought it was kind of funny.” He snickered.
“Some people are kind of sick,” Beth muttered.
Regina slammed the ball hard. It sailed into the net. “You ruined everything,” she accused Todd angrily. “You ruined the whole expo.”
“And you ruined our project,” Beth added, reaching for the ball. “You made us look like total jerks.”
“So?” Todd replied, laughing.
The girls didn’t laugh.
“I only did it because you sent Danny and me to that creepy old house,” Todd told them. He used a small trowel to soften the dirt in the worm tank.
“Well, you wouldn’t have won, anyway,” Regina said, sneering. “Patrick’s skyscraper made your puny house look like a baby’s project.”
“You’re jealous of Patrick — aren’t you, Todd!” Beth accused him.
“Jealous of that copycat?” Todd cried. “He doesn’t know one end of a worm from another!”
The girls started their game again. Beth took a wild swing and sent the ball sailing across the room.
Todd caught it with his free hand. “Come here,” he said. “I’ll show you something cool.”
“No way,” Regina replied nastily.
“Just toss back the ball,” Beth said, holding up her hand to catch it.
“Come here. This is really cool,” Todd insisted, grinning.
He pulled a long worm out of the tank and held it up in the air. It wriggled and squirmed, trying to get free.
Regina and Beth didn’t move away from the table. But he saw that they were watching him.
Todd set the long worm down on the table and picked up a pocket knife. “You watching?” With one quick motion, he sliced the worm in half.
“Yuck!” Beth cried, making a disgusted face.
“You’re sick!” Regina declared. “You’re really sick, Todd.”
“Watch!” Todd instructed.
All three of them stared at the tabletop as the two worm halves wriggled off in different directions.
“See?” Todd cried, laughing. “Now there are two of them!”
“Sick. Really sick,” his sister muttered.
“That’s really gross, Todd,” Beth agreed, shaking her head.
“But wouldn’t it be cool if people could do that?” Todd exclaimed. “You know. Your bottom half goes to school, and your top half stays home and watches TV!”
“Hey! Look at that!” Regina cried suddenly. She pointed to the glass worm tank.
“Huh? What?” Todd demanded, lowering his eyes to the worms.
“Those worms — they were watching you!” Regina exclaimed. “See? They’re sort of staring at you.”
“Get serious,” Todd muttered. But he saw that Regina was right. Three of the worms had their heads raised out of the dirt and seemed to be staring up at him. “You have a weird imagination,” Todd insisted.
“No. They were watching,” Regina insisted excitedly. “I saw them watching you when you cut that worm in two.”
“Worms can’t see!” Todd told them. “They weren’t watching me. That’s stupid! That’s —”
“But they were!” Regina cried.
“The worms are angry,” Beth added, glancing at Regina. “The worms don’t like to see their friend cut in half.”
“Stop,” Todd pleaded. “Just give me a break, okay?”
“The worms are going to get revenge, Todd,” Regina said. “They saw what you did. Now they’re planning their revenge.”
Todd let out a scornful laugh. “You must think I’m as stupid as you are!” he declared. “There’s no way I’m going to fall for that. No way I’m going to believe such a stupid idea.”
Giggling to each other, Regina and Beth returned to their Ping-Pong game.
Todd dropped the two worm halves into the tank. To his surprise, four more worms had poked up out of the soft dirt. They were staring straight up at him.
Todd stared down at them, thinking about what Regina and Beth had said.
What a stupid idea, he thought. Those worms weren’t watching me.
Or were they?
“Todd — rise and shine!”
Todd blinked his eyes open. He sat up slowly in bed and stretched his arms over his head.
“Rise and shine, Todd! Look alive!” his mother called from the foot of the stairs.
Why does she say the same thing every morning? he wondered. Always “Rise and shine, rise and shine!” Why can’t she say, “Time to get up!” or, “Move ’em on out!” or something? Just for a little variety.
Grumpily, he pulled himself up and lowered his feet to the floor.
Why can’t I have a clock radio like Regina? he asked himself. Then I could wake up to music instead of “Rise and shine!”
“Look alive up there!” Mrs. Barstow called impatiently.
“I’m up! I’m up, Mom!” Todd shouted hoarsely down to her.
Bright sunlight poured in through the bedroom window. Squinting toward the window, he could see a patch of clear blue sky.
Nice day, he thought.
What day is it? he asked himself, standing up and stretching some more. Thursday? Yeah. Thursday.
Good, he thought. We have gym on Thursday. Maybe we’ll play softball.
Gym was Todd’s favorite class — especially on days they went outside.
His pajama bottoms had become totally twisted. He straightene
d them as he made his way to the bathroom to brush his teeth.
Are we having the math quiz today or tomorrow? he wondered, squinting at his sleepy face in the medicine chest mirror. I hope it’s tomorrow. I forgot to study for it last night.
He stuck his tongue out at himself.
He could hear Regina downstairs, arguing about something with their mother. Regina liked to argue in the morning. It was the way she got her mind into gear.
She argued about what to wear. Or what she wanted for breakfast. One of her favorite arguments was whether or not it was too warm to wear a jacket.
Todd’s mother never learned. She always argued back. So they had pretty noisy mornings.
Todd liked to sleep as long as possible. Then he took his time getting dressed. That way, Regina was usually all finished with her arguing by the time he came downstairs.
Thinking about the math quiz, he brushed his teeth. Then he returned to his room and pulled on a clean pair of faded jeans and a navy blue T-shirt that came down nearly to his knees.
Regina and Mrs. Barstow were still arguing as Todd entered the kitchen. Regina, her dark hair tied back in a single braid, sat at the table, finishing her breakfast. Their mother, dressed for work, stood on the other side of the table, a steaming cup of coffee in one hand.
“But I’m too hot in that jacket!” Regina was insisting.
“Then why not wear a sweatshirt?” their mother suggested patiently.
“I don’t have any,” Regina complained.
“You have a whole drawerful!” Mrs. Barstow protested.
“But I don’t like those!” Regina cried shrilly.
Todd grabbed his glass of orange juice off the table and gulped it down in one long swallow.
“Todd, sit down and have your breakfast,” his mother ordered.
“Can’t. I’m late,” he said, wiping orange juice off his upper lip with one hand. “Got to go.”
“But you haven’t brushed your hair!” Mrs. Barstow exclaimed.
Regina, chewing on a piece of rye toast, laughed. “How can you tell?”
Todd ignored her. “No need,” he told his mother. “I’m wearing my Raiders cap.” He glanced toward the hook on the hallway wall where he thought he had left it. Not there.
“I can’t believe the school lets you wear your cap all day,” Mrs. Barstow murmured, refilling her coffee cup.
“They don’t care.”
“Has anyone seen my Raiders cap?” Todd asked quickly, before Regina could answer.
“Isn’t it on the hook?” Mrs. Barstow asked, glancing toward the hall.
Todd shook his head. “Maybe I left it upstairs.” He turned and hurried toward the front stairs.
“Come back and eat your cereal! It’s getting soggy!” his mother called.
Grabbing on to the banister, Todd took the stairs two at a time. Standing in the doorway to his room, his eyes searched the bed. The dresser top.
No cap.
He was halfway to the closet when he spotted it on the floor. I must have tossed it there before bed, he remembered.
Bending down, he picked up the cap and slid it down over his hair.
He knew at once that something was wrong.
Something felt funny.
As he bent the bill down the way he liked it, he felt something move in his hair.
Something wet.
It felt as if his hair had come to life and had started to crawl around under the cap.
Moving quickly to the mirror over the dresser, Todd pulled the cap away — and stared in shock at the fat, brown worms wriggling through his hair.
Todd shook his head hard. A shudder of surprise.
One of the worms toppled from his hair and slid down his forehead, dropping onto the dresser top.
“I don’t believe this,” Todd muttered out loud.
He tossed the cap to the floor. Then he reached up with both hands and carefully began un-tangling the worms from his hair.
“Regina!” he screamed. “Regina — you’re going to pay for this!”
He pulled three worms off his head, then picked up the fourth from the dresser. “Yuck.” He made a disgusted face in the mirror. His hair was damp and sticky where the worms had crawled.
“Okay, Reggie! I’m coming!” he shouted as he barreled down the stairs, the worms dangling in one fist.
She glanced up casually from the table as Todd burst into the kitchen.
“Your cereal is really getting soggy,” his mother said from the sink. “You’d better —” She stopped when she saw the worms in Todd’s hand.
“Very funny, Regina!” Todd exclaimed angrily. He shoved the fistful of worms under his sister’s nose.
“Yuck! Get away!” she shrieked.
“Todd — get those worms away from the table!” Mrs. Barstow demanded sharply. “What’s wrong with you? You know better than that!”
“Don’t yell at me!” Todd screeched at his mother. “Yell at her!” He pointed furiously at his sister.
“Me?” Regina’s eyes opened wide in innocence. “What did I do?”
Todd let out an angry groan and turned to face his mother. “She stuffed worms in my cap!” he exclaimed, shaking the worms in Mrs. Barstow’s face.
“Huh?” Regina cried furiously. “That’s a lie!”
Todd and Regina began screaming accusations at each other.
Mrs. Barstow stepped between them. “Quiet — please!” she demanded. “Please!”
“But — but!” Todd sputtered.
“Todd, you’re going to squeeze those poor worms to death!” Mrs. Barstow declared. “Go put them away in the basement. Then take a deep breath, count to ten, and come back.”
Todd grumbled under his breath. But he obediently headed down to the basement.
When he returned to the kitchen a minute later, Regina was still denying that she had loaded the cap with worms. She turned to Todd, a solemn expression on her face. “I swear, Todd,” she said, “it wasn’t me.”
“Yeah. Sure,” Todd muttered. “Then who else did it? Dad? Do you think Dad filled my cap with worms before he went to work?”
The idea was so ridiculous, it made all three of them laugh.
Mrs. Barstow put her hands on Todd’s shoulders and guided him into his seat at the table. “Cereal,” she said softly. “Eat your cereal. You’re going to be late.”
“Leave my worms alone,” Todd told his sister in a low voice. He pulled the chair in and picked up the spoon. “I mean it, Reggie. I hate your stupid jokes. And I don’t like people messing with my worms.”
Regina sighed wearily. “I don’t mess with your disgusting worms,” she shot back. “I told you — I didn’t do it.”
“Let’s just drop it, okay?” Mrs. Barstow pleaded. “Look at the clock, guys.”
“But why should she get away with that, Mom?” Todd demanded. “Why should she be allowed to —”
“Because I didn’t do it!” Regina interrupted.
“You had to do it!” Todd screamed.
“I think you did it yourself,” Regina suggested with a sneer. “I think you stuffed worms in your own cap.”
“Oh, that’s good! That’s good!” Todd cried sarcastically. “Why, Regina? Why would I do that?”
“To get me in trouble,” Regina replied.
Todd gaped at her, speechless.
“You’re both going to be in trouble if you don’t drop this discussion — right now,” their mother insisted.
“Okay. We’ll drop it,” Todd grumbled, glaring at his sister.
He dipped the spoon into the cereal. “Totally soggy,” he muttered. “How am I supposed to —”
Regina’s shrill scream cut off Todd’s complaint.
He followed her horrified gaze down to his bowl — where he found a fat purple worm floating on top of the milk.
Todd tried to concentrate in school, but he kept thinking about the worms.
Of course it had to be Regina who had put the worms in his cap and in h
is cereal bowl.
But she had acted so shocked. And she said again and again that she didn’t know anything about them.
Todd kept thinking about the afternoon in the basement. About cutting the worm in half. About the other worms watching him from their glass tank.
“They saw what you did,” his sister had said in a low, frightened voice. “And now they’re planning their revenge.”
That’s so stupid, Todd thought, pretending to read his Social Studies text.
So stupid.
But thinking about Regina’s words gave him a chill.
And thinking about the worms waiting in his cap, crawling so wetly through his hair, made Todd feel a little sick.
He told Danny all about it at lunch.
They sat across from each other in the noisy lunchroom. Danny unpacked his lunch from the brown paper lunch bag and examined the sandwich. “Ham and cheese again,” he groaned. “Every day Mom gives me ham and cheese.”
“Why don’t you ask for something else?” Todd suggested.
“I don’t like anything else,” Danny replied, tearing open his bag of potato chips.
Todd unpacked his lunch, too. But he left it untouched as he told Danny about the worms.
Danny laughed at first. “Your sister is really a jerk,” he said through a mouthful of potato chips.
“I guess you’re right,” Todd replied thoughtfully. “It’s got to be Regina. But she acted so surprised. I mean, she screamed when she saw the worm floating in the cereal.”
“She probably practiced screaming all day yesterday,” Danny said, chomping into his sandwich.
Todd unwrapped the tinfoil from his sandwich. Peanut butter and jelly. “Yeah. Maybe,” he said, frowning.
“Come on, Todd,” Danny said, mustard dripping down his chin. “That worm tank of yours is really deep. The worms didn’t crawl out all by themselves. And they didn’t crawl upstairs to your room and then find your hat and crawl inside.”
“You’re right. You’re right,” Todd said, still frowning thoughtfully. He pushed back his Raiders cap and scratched his brown hair. “But I just keep seeing those worms staring up at me, and —”
“Worms don’t have eyes!” Danny declared. “And they don’t have faces. And, mainly, they don’t have brains!”