“Mr. President. You’re breaking up. Please repeat!”

  “I said, giant——crackle-crackle—— are——hiss—hiss——the world and you’re the only one who can——crackle-hiss, hiss-crackle——”

  “Mr. President! Mr. President, can you hear me?!”

  But it does no good. All he hears is the crackle-crackle of the static, the hiss-hiss of a line going bad, and the—

  giggle-giggle

  chomp-chomp

  Wait a minute! What was that?

  giggle-giggle

  It sounds like it’s coming from under the bed.

  chomp-chomp

  What on earth?

  Suddenly, our superhero drops his superhead to spy under his super-bed. And, sure enough, there is someone or something underneath. Someone or something that is giggle-giggling while it is busy chomp-chomping through our superhero’s phone line.

  But this is not your everyday someone or something. You know better than that. No way, this is a giant dust bunny that’s giggle-giggling and chomp-chomping.

  Oh, and it’s doing one other thing...

  It’s growing at least a foot high with every giggle it’s giggling and chomp it’s chomping!

  Suddenly, the mattress begins bulging from underneath.

  “Hey!”

  And still the dust bunny continues giggling and chomping and growing.

  Now, the mattress begins to tear.

  “Hey! Hey!”

  And still the creature continues with the giggling and chomping. . . until its head finally pops through and—

  “ Wally, what are you doing up this time of night?”

  I looked up from my computer to see one very sleepy Mom standing at the top of the stairs. “I know you love writing, but it’s late. Go to bed.”

  I threw a panicked look toward the vase. The gum finally seemed to be holding. But you could still see the little cracks. I knew she’d eventually find out, but not right away. She was always so busy running around doing the mom things that I figured I’d have a week or two before she slowed down enough to notice. That gave me three options.

  1. Tell her the truth and take responsibility for what I’d done.

  2. Buy another vase and replace it without telling her. (But since the vase was expensive and I’d need a ton of money to replace it, that led me to the scariest option of all . . . )

  3. Ask Wall Street, my best friend—even if she is a girl—for help.

  Unfortunately, since number three was the worst choice, it was the only choice I could make.

  “No problem,” Wall Street said as we strolled down the street early the next morning. Actually, she strolled; I sort of sleepwalked. (Getting only forty-five minutes of sleep the night before will do that to a guy.) But that didn’t slow her down. No sir, when it comes to making money, nothing slows down Wall Street.

  “I’ve got thousands of ideas that’ll make us both rich,” she said.

  I should have been suspicious. Not because she had thousands of ideas, but because she used the word “us”—as in making “us both rich.” You see, Wall Street plans to make her first million by the time she’s fourteen. And, so far, she’s been making most of it off me.

  Unfortunately, not only was I sleepwalking, but I was also sleepthinking, which would explain the rest of our conversation.

  “So, what do you think?”

  “That’zzz nizzzzz. . . .”

  “Wally, wake up.”

  “Huh . . . ?”

  “So do we have a deal?”

  “What’s that?”

  “I think up the ideas, and you pay me a pile of money to use them. Do we have a deal?”

  “That’zzz nizzzzz. . . .”

  The next time I woke up, I was five dollars poorer and the proud owner of a brand-new business. I don’t remember the details, but the ad in the newspaper read:

  WALLY’S RECYCLED DENTAL FLOSS

  Want to do your part in keeping the earth green? Then buy Wally’s preowned dental floss! Taken from the garbage of people with only the least diseased gums, the floss is not only softer from its previous use, but slimier, too, allowing you to slip it in between those hard-to-floss places!

  A foolproof plan, right? I mean, who wouldn’t want to reuse someone else’s dental floss? And look how it would be helping the environment. Unfortunately, it involved me having to climb into people’s garbage cans late at night to search and retrieve the stuff. Even that wasn’t so bad except for my allergy to watchdogs. I kept breaking out into a bad case of dog bites every time they attacked me.

  So, we scrapped that idea, and I purchased the next ad . . .

  WALLY’S BOTTLED CAR EXHAUST

  Hey, those of you from the big cities. Tired of getting homesick whenever you go on vacations or weekend getaways? Then all you need to do is buy a jar of Wally’s Bottled Exhaust. As soon as those homesick feelings start acting up, just unscrew the lid, take a few whiffs, and it’s like you’ve never left home. Good for the entire family. You’ll never have to go without pollution again.

  Another brilliant idea, except for the part about me having to sneak up to cars at stoplights to collect the fumes. No problem, except all those tread marks can do a number on your clothes . . . not to mention your body.

  But that didn’t slow us down. No sir. Not as long as Wall Street had ideas and I was foolish enough to buy them.

  Next up . . .

  CELEBRITY DANDRUFF

  Imagine impressing that certain someone with flakes from the head of his or her favorite celebrity. Just think of having that flaky powder in a jar on the mantel. Better yet, buy the giant econo-size and sprinkle it on your own shoulders to give yourself that same star attraction.

  Not bad, except we didn’t know any celebrities with dandruff. Come to think of it, we didn’t know any celebrities without dandruff. Other than that, it was a foolproof plan.

  By now I was getting tired in an exhausted kind of way. But still, we continued. “What else you got?” I asked.

  Wall Street frowned. “I just talked to Junior Whiz Kid on my cell phone.”

  “Junior Whiz Kid?” I asked. “The seven-year-old brainiac?”

  “That’s the one. He says he needs a lab assistant, so I thought of you.”

  “No way!” I cried.

  “Why not? He’ll pay good money and—”

  “His inventions are nuts! Whacko! Insane!”

  “And your point is . . . ?”

  “What else have you got?”

  “I’ve only got a couple more ideas, Wally. That’s why I thought working for Junior might—”

  “Let’s try them!” I said.

  “But—”

  “Anything but Junior!”

  “Anything?” she asked.

  “Anything!”

  “Well, all right. . . .”

  Which, of course, led us to:

  BAD BREATH SPRAY

  Like going out on dates but hate those icky, gross kisses? Well, fret no more. Just two squirts of Wally’s Awful Bad Breath Spray and no one will ever want to kiss you again. Guaranteed to last for hours and to give you the reputation you want and deserve.

  Another brilliant plan, except the only breath we could find that was bad enough belonged to my brother Burt (or was it his twin, Brock? I can never keep them straight). No problem. It just meant sneaking up on him when he was asleep and capturing his morning breath in a jar. Again, no problem, except the part where he kept catching me and rearranging my facial parts. Then there was his breath. I don’t want to say it was bad, but every container we tried melted on contact with the fumes.

  “Mommfs meext?” I asked. It was supposed to be “What’s next?” but that’s the best I could do with my face stitched and bandaged from Brock’s (or was it Burt’s?) morning greeting.

  “Well, there’s still Junior’s offer,” Wall Street answered.

  “MO MWAY!”

  “All right, all right, don’t blow your stitches about it. I do have one other idea.”

  “MOKAY!” I shouted.

  “It might be a little dangerous, and it might cost you a little extra, but—”

  “MOKAY! MOKAY! MET’S MOO IT! MET’S MOO IT!”

  “All right,” she sighed. “But just remember, I warned you.”

  Chapter 3

  Junior to the Rescue!

  Wall Street stood at the foot of the stairs and thrust a newspaper ad into my hands. One look at it told me I was in trouble. Big trouble.

  BECOME A WALKING DISASTER AREA

  Tired of being athletic and coordinated? Frustrated at never getting to wear full-body casts? Then learn the secret art of clumsiness from the world’s all-time pro—the #1 Master of Disaster . . . Mr. Wally McDoogle!

  I finished reading the ad, then lowered it and gave Wall Street my world-famous death glare.

  “Hey, it’s either that or we call Junior Whiz Kid,” she said.

  “But this is crazy,” I argued.

  “It’s a natural,” she said. “People do take classes from experts.”

  “But who in their right—or wrong—mind would want to try to be like me?!”

  “You’re famous,” she argued. “You’re a household name. When people think ‘klutz,’ they think Wally McDoogle.”

  “Yeah, but—”

  “They think broken bones and body parts, they think you.”

  “Yeah, but—”

  “Mad dashes to the hospital for multiple organ transplants, you’re the man.”

  “Yeah, but—”

  Wall Street looked at me, waiting for more. But, as you can tell, I’d about run out of all my good arguments. Of course, I could fall back on the tried-and-true ‘I know you are, but what am I,’ but somehow it didn’t quite fit.

  “Besides,” Wall Street finished, “your first customer is already waiting outside on the porch.”

  Before I could protest, or suggest the person get a brain implant, the door opened and in walked, snap-snap, giggle-giggle, you guessed it, Megan Melkner.

  “Hello, Wallace,” she said, batting her baby blues.

  “Megan?” I felt my face twitch. “What are you doing here?”

  “Why, learning to be just like you, of course.” More eye batting and gum snapping. Oh, and let’s not forget the grinning—lots and lots of grinning.

  I’ll save you the boring details (along with the additional face twitchings) and just get to the headlines. As a klutz, she wasn’t half bad, at least for an amateur. And when I told her so, she sighed dreamily and said, “I guess it comes from all those months of watching you.”

  (Insert more face twitching here.)

  We covered most of the basics. First, of course, there was the standard

  K-thud, K-thud, K-thud

  stair falling.

  “Not bad,” I said, helping her to her feet.

  “Thank you,” she whispered, batting her eyes romantically.

  My face twitched faster.

  Next came the basic tripping over one’s shadow, then being run over in traffic. She was a great student, but all the eye batting, gum snapping, and tooth glaring (not to mention face twitching) was making me more than a little crazy.

  As we ended the lesson for the day and I closed the door behind Megan, I heard Wall Street say, “Well, now, that went rather nicely.”

  To which I calmly turned to her and ever-so-gently screamed, “WHAT’S JUNIOR’S PHONE NUMBER? WE NEED TO CALL JUNIOR AND WE NEED TO CALL HIM NOW!!”

  Wall Street smiled as she reached for her cell phone. “I thought you’d never ask.”

  Once again Wall Street and I walked through the dark, narrow, and this time very windy alley to visit Junior the Whiz Kid Genius.

  Once again we headed down the steep, scary steps. And, once again we banged on the cold, creepy door.

  “Who is present?” a tiny voice squeaked from the other side of the door.

  “It’s us,” Wall Street answered.

  After about a hundred clicks of locks being unlocked, and clanks of bolts being unbolted (plus the usual chatter-chatter-chatter of my teeth), the door finally

  CREEEEEAKed

  open.

  Inside, it was even darker and spookier. I don’t want to say it was scary, but on the Creep-You-Out Scale of 1–10, I’d definitely give it an 11.

  “Hello?” Wall Street called into the darkness.

  No answer.

  She tried again. “Hello?”

  “Good afternoon,” a tiny little voice whispered.

  “AUGHHH!”

  my tiny little courage screamed.

  But Wall Street wasn’t frightened. No sir, not with her courage (and hunger for money). “Hey, Junior, how come it’s so dark?” she complained. “We can’t do business in the dark.”

  “Shhh,” the tiny voice whispered. At last the lights came on. Beside us stood a kid wearing glasses and sipping a mug of hot chocolate. He was barely seven years old. He stuck out his hand for me to shake and continued, “I am extremely pleased that you have decided to pursue my offer, Mr. McDoogle.”

  (He may have looked seven, but he sounded seventy.)

  “Why are we whispering?” Wall Street asked.

  “It is Tina,” Junior said. He started forward and motioned us to follow. We approached a stack of metal cages. In them were an assortment of animals—rats, mice, hamsters, guinea pigs . . . plus a few dozen worms, snails, and cockroaches thrown in just to make things more interesting.

  But Junior wasn’t concerned with them. Instead, he stopped in front of a cage that held a single, large tarantula.

  WARNING: If you have a thing about spiders, stop reading this immediately. (And while you’re at it, pray I can stop living it.)

  ADDITIONAL WARNING: If you have a thing about spiders and still bought this title with the creepy cover, stop reading this immediately and go see a psychiatrist. (But keep praying for me.)

  “What’s wrong with her?” I asked.

  “Sweet Tina appears to be depressed.”

  “How can you tell?”

  “Step closer and examine her facial features.”

  I moved closer to the cage and squinted inside. All I saw were the usual creepy spider eyes, creepy legs, creepy jaw, and—

  “Tee-hee, tee-hee.”

  “What was that?” Wall Street asked.

  “I am uncertain,” Junior said. “Though it appears to be coming from—”

  “Hee-hee, hee-hee.”

  “Why, that is most remarkable.”

  “What?” I asked.

  “It is coming from Tina.” He turned to me in surprise and continued. “Your presence appears to be relieving her depression and making her

  “Ha-ha, ho-ho.”

  giggle and laugh.”

  “He has that effect on lots of girls.” Wall Street smirked. “Just ask Megan Melkner.”

  Suddenly, Tina really began yucking it up. Then she rolled onto her back and began kicking her legs in the air,

  “hee-hee”-ing, “ha-ha”-ing, and “ho-ho”-ing

  so hard, she could barely breathe.

  “This is most remarkable,” Junior said. “Perhaps it is your scent.”

  “My what?”

  “He says you stink,” Wall Street said.

  “No way.” I frowned. “I showered just last month. Or was it the month before?”

  But Junior wasn’t listening. “This is a world-changing breakthrough of staggering consequ—”

  “Listen,” Wall Street interrupted. “I’m all for world-changing breakthroughs, but can we get on with it?”

  Junior looked up from the cage and asked, “It?”

  “You know, making those great green gobs of cold, hard cash?”

  He scowled slightly. “Making money, is that all you care about?”

  “No, of course not. I care about counting it, too!”

  “Actually,” I said, “we are in kind of a hurry.”

  “Very well.” Junior pushed up his glasses and led us to the other side of the room. “Allow me to present the experiment with which you will be assisting.”

  With that, he pulled aside a huge curtain to reveal an even huger computer. Talk about impressive. This thing had more flashing lights than a Christmas tree gone berserk. Directly beside it sat an old-fashioned barber chair— except this chair had metal clamps to hold down your arms and legs—and a giant football helmet that hung down on an electric cable. On the helmet’s side and top were all sorts of control knobs and electrode-thingies.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  Junior grinned. “It is my Giant Occipital Organ Fortifier.”

  “Your what?”

  “I refer to it as my ‘G.O.O.F.’ for short.”

  I threw Wall Street a nervous look.

  “What’s it do?” she asked.

  “It magnifies the molecular makeup within the various neurons and synaptic pathways, thereby—”

  “Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Wall Street interrupted. “Any chance of having that in English?”

  “Certainly.” He cleared his throat and tried again. “It, uh, duh, like makes you, uh, not so dumb by, um, uh, don’t tell me—” (It was nice to see even brainiacs can have a sense of humor.) “Oh, yeah, by, uh, making your brain, um, a bunch more bigger.”

  “Well, why didn’t you say so?” Wall Street answered.

  Junior shook his head, then walked us to another set of cages. “However, as can be observed from these recent experiments, my success has been somewhat limited.”

  I bent down and looked into the first cage.

  Nothing but more rats. Except these little critters had noses like elephants!

  “Yikes!” I gasped.

  Junior nodded. “Instead of magnifying their brains, my G.O.O.F. enlarged their noses.”

  I don’t want to hurt their feelings, so let’s just say they were gross in a mad-scientist-gone-crazy sort of way.

  Wall Street was at another cage. “What’s with these guys?” she asked. It was full of your everyday guinea pigs—except that they had lips the size of doughnuts!

  Junior sighed wearily. “My most recent attempt. But instead of enlarging their minds my G.O.O.F. enlarged their—”

  “Lips,” I said, taking a half step back. “You gave them giant lips!”

  “I am afraid so.”

  “So how do I fit in?” I asked, already fearing the worst.

 

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