Diary of a Dummy Read online

  CONTENTS

  TITLE PAGE

  SLAPPY HERE, EVERYONE.

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  SLAPPY HERE, EVERYONE.

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  SLAPPY HERE, EVERYONE.

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  EPILOGUE FROM SLAPPY

  SNEAK PEEK!

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  ALSO AVAILABLE

  COPYRIGHT

  Welcome to SlappyWorld.

  Yes, it’s Slappy’s world—you’re only screaming in it! Hahaha!

  I’m in a good mood today. That’s because I looked in a mirror! My reflection is almost as good-looking as I am!

  I know this book is going to be awesome. That’s because it’s about ME! Hahaha!

  I’m so brilliant, I’m the only one on earth who can outsmart myself!

  Do you know how smart I am? Of course you don’t! How could you? Hahaha!

  I have powers, too. I can control people. Watch. I’m going to make you read the next sentence.

  THE NEXT SENTENCE.

  See how I did that?

  Our story today is about my diary. Why do I keep a diary? I like to read books about fabulous characters. And I love sharing my brilliant thoughts—with myself! Haha!

  The fun begins when a boy named Billy McGee and his sister, Maggie, find my diary. And when I say fun, of course I mean scream-out-loud scares!

  I call this story Diary of a Dummy.

  Go ahead and start screaming. It’s another one of my frightening tales from SlappyWorld.

  You’re probably asking, “Hey, Billy McGee, how did you get to be the new kid in this fancy middle school? And with a hole in your sneaker, and wearing your cousin Shawn’s ragtag old jersey with the stain on the front that won’t come out?”

  I know you’re saying, “Look at those guys you’re playing soccer with. Check out their designer jeans and NBA sneakers. Check out their cool haircuts. Bet their dads didn’t cut their hair in the bathroom with an old pair of scissors.”

  Go ahead and make comments. I know I look a little different from them. Maybe my dad doesn’t give the best haircut in the world.

  But, you know, we’re just trying to save up some money. And everyone has been really nice to me since I started here at Middlebury Middle School last week. (We call it Middle Middle.)

  The kids I’ve met don’t care if I wear the newest sneakers or if my red hair is long and wild. Or if my cousin’s old clothes are a few sizes too big for me. (My dad says I’ll grow into them.)

  But when you’re in the middle of sixth grade and you move to a new school, you feel like an outsider no matter what. I mean, these guys here on the soccer field with me have known each other forever.

  My sister, Maggie, and I are the only new students in Middlebury this year, and we don’t know anybody. But we’re making friends.

  “Hey, look out!” I tried to kick the ball to Damien, who’s on my team. But my foot slid right over the ball and I flew headfirst to the grass.

  “Unnnnh.” I heard everyone laughing as the breath whooshed out of my body.

  “Glad you think it’s funny,” I choked out.

  Damien helped me to my feet. “Billy, have you ever played this game before?” he asked.

  That gave everyone another laugh.

  “We didn’t have grass at my old school,” I said. “We were tough. We played on dirt.”

  “That explains it,” the kid named Ramone said. I’m pretty sure he was being sarcastic.

  We started the game again. It went okay till I misjudged a kick, and the ball went sailing off the field, across the street.

  “Don’t know my own strength,” I said, trying to cover up my embarrassment.

  Damien patted me on the back. “Bet you’re good at other sports,” he said.

  “Not really,” I confessed.

  See? These guys are really nice. No one seems to care that I don’t exactly fit in here.

  So how did Maggie and I get to Middlebury?

  Well, it’s kind of a long story.

  Here’s the short version. My mom died and my dad lost his job. We couldn’t afford our house. It was big, and it came with big bills. The three of us were miserable and depressed.

  Someone told my dad about a fixer-upper house here in Middlebury. A “fixer-upper” means a falling-down wreck. And so we really had no choice. We moved. As soon as Dad saves up some money, he’ll start fixing it.

  Maggie is in fourth grade, and she’s a lot better with new people than I am. I mean, she’s not shy at all. She’s funny and fun and very peppy, and kids always like her right away.

  It takes me a little longer. I haven’t been sleeping well, and I think a lot about Mom. But as I said, the kids here have been okay.

  I glanced down the street.

  Oh no.

  My stomach tightened with dread.

  Cold dread. It’s the one thing I’d been worried about since I started here.

  And it was coming toward us fast. And it was going to pass right by our soccer field.

  And I knew there was nothing I could do about it.

  I took off running, kicked the ball to Ramone, and shouted, “Let’s go! Go!”

  I was hoping to keep them from seeing what was rolling down the street. But no way.

  They were all staring along with me as the bright red-and-blue truck, pulling a huge blue trash dumpster, rolled by the soccer field. And they all read the tall yellow words painted on the truck door: DUMPSTER DAVE.

  And then … yes … yes … no way to stop it … no way to keep it from everyone. My dad was at the wheel of the truck. Everyone watched him stop at the curb, the dumpster squealing behind him. And they all saw him wave to me.

  “Hey, Billy, how’s it going?” Dad shouted.

  And then my new friends all knew. Dumpster Dave was my dad.

  My dad took a job hauling trash to the Middlebury town dump. The job was one of the reasons we moved here.

  I knew my face was bright red as I waved back to Dad. I shouldn’t have been embarrassed. I knew I shouldn’t have. But I was.

  The dumpster squealed again as Dad started the truck up and pulled away from the curb. The guys watched it rumble away. Then they all turned to me.

  “Your dad is Dumpster Dave?” Damien asked.

  I nodded. I tried to make a joke. “The job really stinks.”

  They all laughed, but it was kind of phony laughing.

  Damien had a twisted grin on his face. He jabbed me in the belly with his fist. “You know what that means?” he asked.

  “No. What?”

  “It means you’re Dumpster Billy.”

  That wasn’t funny at all. But everyone laughed like it was the best joke ever. And then a few guys kept repeating it. “Dumpster Billy. Dumpster Billy.”

  Well, I can survive this, I thought.

  I didn’t know just how bad things were going to get.

  “This school is so seriously cool,” Maggie gushed. “We all get tablets so we can play Fortnite.”

  Some parents probably wouldn’t know what Fortnite is, but of course Dad does. Ever since Mom died, he’s tried really hard to keep up with “what the kids are doing.” He means well. “Maggie, why do you play Fortnite in class?�
� he asked.

  “It’s a special project. To see how much about the real world you can learn while fighting zombies,” she replied.

  Dad spun the wheel and turned the truck onto Manchester Road. Maggie and I were jammed in the front seat beside him. He glanced at me by the window. “And how was your day?”

  “Okay,” I said. I sure wasn’t going to tell him the guys called me Dumpster Billy. He would feel terrible.

  The sun had lowered behind the trees, and everything appeared gray. Dad clicked on the headlights. The dashboard clock read 7:05.

  “Sorry it’s so late,” Dad said, squealing to a stop as the light above the road blinked from yellow to red. “We’ll grab some dinner after I dump this load off.”

  “How come you’re so late?” Maggie demanded. She had a small pack of Skittles in her lap. She was eating them one by one, and she wasn’t sharing.

  “Save me one,” I said, grabbing for the pack.

  She smacked my hand away. “No, Billy. You’ll spoil your dinner!” She cackled, pleased with herself.

  I’m used to her.

  “I’m late because I had an extra-large haul today. But I’m not going to let this job get me down in the dumps,” Dad said.

  It was a lame joke. But of course Maggie and I laughed.

  Dad has a long, narrow, bloodhound-type of face. He always looks serious, even when he’s being funny. He has black hair cut very short, with a little bald spot on the back of his head. And he keeps complaining about the dark circles around his eyes. But he’s always had those.

  The sky had deepened to purple. The trees on both sides of the road stood like shadows, black against the dusky sky.

  Dad eased the truck through the entrance to the dump. We bumped over the rocky ground, the loaded dumpster squeaking and creaking behind us.

  The dirt road ended in a circle. Dad followed it slowly, then threw the gear into reverse and backed the dumpster toward the shallow ravine where the trash was piled.

  Peering out the open truck window as we edged backward, I could see an ocean of trash. Chairs and cartons and big plastic garbage bags in all shapes, some standing upright like living creatures; shimmering metal objects; tall heaps of stuff I couldn’t recognize; stacks of newspapers; piles of clothing.

  A strong breeze blew and made everything move. The trash was tinkling, shifting, crinkling, and rattling. It looks alive, I thought. I shuddered and realized my heart was pounding. Why was I letting my imagination go wild like that?

  Dad pulled a lever on the dashboard, and I could hear the dumpster start to move behind us. I shoved open the truck door and jumped down to the ground. Maggie followed me.

  We watched the dumpster slowly tilt up, ready to spill its load onto the pile of rubbish in front of us. The dumpster squealed as it moved. The trash began to slide out, crashing onto the ocean of garbage that seemed to stretch forever.

  “Can we explore?” Maggie asked.

  Dad rubbed his chin. “Sure. But don’t go too far. It’s dark. Some of the stuff in here could be dangerous.”

  Dangerous?

  If only Maggie and I had listened.

  Dad turned back to the dumpster. Maggie and I walked along the edge of the trash. A bright half moon hung low in the sky. It sent an eerie gray light over everything. Somewhere far in the distance, a cat cried.

  A shiver ran down my back.

  “All this garbage is freaking me out,” I said. My voice came out muffled by the creaks and groans of the shifting trash.

  Maggie turned and stepped into the ravine of rubble.

  “Hey—where are you going?” I called.

  In the distance, the cat let out a long, mournful howl.

  Maggie took several steps, her shoes crunching on plastic garbage bags. Then she bent down and lifted something from the pile. “Billy, look. Someone threw away an old PlayStation. The controllers are here and everything.”

  “Put it down, Maggie,” I said. “It’s probably broken.”

  Of course, we were desperate to have video games. But that wasn’t in the budget. Maggie and I didn’t even have phones. I’d bet just about every kid at Middle Middle had one.

  She dropped it back into the tangles of trash. “Come here. There’s lots of cool stuff,” she called.

  So I followed her, stepping carefully over squishy bags and boxes and heaps of old clothing. And that’s when we found the suitcase.

  I saw it first. A very large brown suitcase. The moonlight made the metal latches glow. I pointed. “Maggie, check it out. It’s like new.”

  She turned and stood across from me. “Think there’s anything in it?”

  “Only one way to find out.” I grabbed the handle and stood the suitcase up. I gripped the latches and flipped them up.

  The lid fell open.

  “Oh—!”

  I stumbled back as a creature came leaping out.

  A blur of pink and gray. It happened so fast, I couldn’t see it. The animal landed on my sneaker with a heavy thump.

  “Oh …” I struggled to tell Maggie. “On my foot! On my foot!”

  The creature slithered under my jeans. Warm fur brushed my leg. I could feel scratchy nails prickling my skin. My whole body shook.

  “Help me!” I cried. “It—it’s climbing up my leg!”

  “Billy—” Maggie’s eyes were wide with horror. “What … what is that?”

  “I—I think it’s a MOLE or something!” I tried to scream, but it came out in a choked whisper.

  I shook my leg hard. I kicked at the air.

  Too big to be a mouse or a rat. It pressed against my skin. I leaned back and kicked with all my strength.

  The big creature slid out from under my jeans leg and went sailing over the trash. I watched it land hard on its feet. A mole. Yes, it was a fat mole.

  It scampered away in a straight line. Suddenly, three or four other moles poked up from the carpet of junk and went running after it.

  I took a deep breath. Tried to step out of the trash. Tripped over something I didn’t see. And flopped onto my back.

  “Maggie—help me!”

  I felt something sticky on the side of my neck. I tried to hold my breath against the putrid stench. Why wasn’t Maggie helping me to my feet?

  Still afraid to breathe, I pulled myself shakily to my feet. Maggie had the suitcase lid raised and was peering into the case. “Billy, look. There’s something else in the suitcase.”

  I gasped. “Another mole?” I could still feel the prickly feet digging into my leg.

  I hurried over to my sister. “I had a mole climbing on my leg, and then I fell into the trash,” I said. “Don’t you even care?”

  “You should be more careful,” she said.

  “Ha. Funny.”

  I peered into the case. Two round black eyes stared up at me. Round eyes in a wooden head. The face had an ugly grin painted across it.

  “It’s a dummy,” Maggie said. “You know. Like ventriloquists use.”

  The thing was folded into the case. It was dressed in a gray suit with a white shirt and a red bow tie. Its black hair was painted on its head. It had a small chip broken off its pointy nose.

  “Why would someone throw a perfectly good dummy in the trash?” Maggie said.

  I reached in and lifted it out of the case. It was heavier than I thought it would be. The grinning head tilted to one side. At the end of its dangling legs were black shoes, scuffed and stained.

  “Maybe the ventriloquist decided to retire,” I said. “Or maybe a doll collector threw it away. Or a puppet-maker who couldn’t sell it.”

  The dummy appeared to stare at me with its wide-open eyes. The grin appeared to grow bigger, but I knew I was imagining that.

  “I think he’s cool,” Maggie said. “You know, people find treasures in the trash all the time. That’s what Dad says.”

  I slid the dummy back into the suitcase, and we carried it to the truck to show to Dad. He was fiddling with the dumpster, but he turned when we
came near.

  “I wondered where you were,” he said, mopping sweat off his forehead with the back of his hand. “I told you not to wander off.”

  “Look what we found,” I said. I pulled open the suitcase lid and lifted the dummy out.

  “Can we keep him?” Maggie asked.

  Dad squinted at the grinning dummy. “Better put him back,” he said. “He’s probably crawling with bugs.”

  “No, he isn’t,” Maggie said. “He’s clean.”

  I decided not to tell Dad about the mole that jumped out of the suitcase.

  “We’ll check him out when we get home,” I said. “He’s totally cool. Let us keep him, Dad.”

  “Please. Please.” Maggie went into full begging mode.

  Dad sighed. “Okay. Okay. Put him back in the case. Maybe we’ll spray him before we take him inside.”

  We both cheered and thanked Dad.

  Of course, we were making the biggest mistake of our lives.

  By the time we washed up and changed our clothes, we were starving. Dad threw some frozen dinners into the microwave. The chicken dinner is pretty good. But the macaroni and cheese dinner is always too soft and too runny. We always fight over who has to eat that one.

  While we waited in the kitchen, I lifted the dummy out of the suitcase to study it. My cousin Ariel had a dummy that she got for a birthday present. She used to try to do a funny ventriloquist act with it, but she wasn’t very funny.

  Ariel’s dummy had an opening in its back. You put your hand inside it, and you could control the dummy’s mouth and eyes.

  I pulled up this dummy’s coat jacket and searched all along his back. But I couldn’t find an opening.

  In the jacket pocket, I found a small slip of white paper, folded in two. I unfolded it and read the words in tiny type.

  “Hey, this paper says the dummy’s name is Slappy,” I told Maggie.

  She snickered. “Dumb name,” she muttered.

  I squinted at the slip of paper. “Weird,” I murmured. “There are a bunch of strange words here. I don’t know what language they’re in.”

  “Read them,” Maggie said.

  I read the words out loud: “Karru Marri Odonna Loma Molonu Karrano.”

  “Hey!” I cried out. “The dummy just blinked!”

  “The eyes are meant to open and close, Billy,” Dad said. He slipped an oven glove over his hand to take out the microwave dinners. “See how the eyelids slide up and down?”