Bugging Mr. G.

Straight off the bat I want to say that I never meant to bug Mr. G. I'm not like that. Mary Alice, she's a whole 'nother story; dad says my little sister was BORN talking so she's always going a mile a minute from the time she wakes up in the morning until she falls asleep with all her stuffed animals and dolls around her at night. Yeah, M.A. has a lot to say all the time. Probably a girl thing. Or a five year old thing.

But me, I'm pretty good about not bothering grown-ups. Unless I have to, and even then I don't like to ask too much because I never know how they're going to react. Dad taught me to be polite and I usually am—it helps, and it did the first time I had to talk to Mr. G.

My best friend Allan Tep and I were playing catch out along the little green strip of lawn by our townhouse. Allan's shorter than me but runs faster. He has lousy aim though, and most of the time I can field his pop flies without even looking. It pisses him off so bad that I can do that—just hold up my glove and snag his tosses—so he started getting harder and meaner with his pitches. It didn't help that I was teasing him about getting a D in Ms. Herman's biology class at the time, but he knows I didn't mean it. Ms. Herman grades hard.

Anyway, Allan, he threw the last pitch and I reached for it, but it bounced off the very edge of my glove and took this wild skim right over the top of the security fence, then disappeared into the next yard. I heard it smack against a wall and thump on the ground and I knew I was in trouble because dad told me Mr. G worked nights and we probably just woke him up with that hit. It was pretty loud.

Then Allan told me I had to go get the ball, and I told him HE had to since he threw it, and he told me I had to because it was my ball and he was right but I was pretty pissed. I threw my glove at him and dragged myself over to Mr. G's door really slowly. I hadn't met him before but I knew what he looked like and dad said he was a baseball fan so I hoped that would make it easier to ask him for the ball back. I rang the doorbell—it was a black metal one shaped like a cricket. Allan was making faces at me the whole time, and I managed to flip him off just as the door opened. I looked up and started to apologize.

"Um, excuse me, my name is Peter Meyer and I lost my ball in your yard?" It sort of trailed off, because it dawned on me that Mr. G was already holding my baseball in one hand, and was looking at me. I couldn't tell if he was mad or not—his face was still and quiet. What my English teacher Mr. Vo would call impassive. I looked at the ball because it was easier than looking at Mr. G.

"I found your ball."

"Uh, thank you."

"It knocked over my cockroach hutch," he told me, and I didn't say anything but I was thinking it was the weirdest thing I'd ever heard a grown-up say. A cockroach hutch? I knew people kept rabbits in a hutch—

"And if you don't mind, I need your help in setting it up again."

Uh-oh. That was grown-up talk for 'you're going to do this because you messed up.' That kind of talk I knew, so I nodded. He motioned with his head for me to follow him and I did, looking around as we went through his house.

Talk about weird. He had butterflies and bugs all over his walls. I mean everywhere—framed and stuff. It looked a little like some weird museum display and Mr. G caught me looking as we passed through his living room and towards the sliding door for his back yard.

"I'm an entomologist. I specialize in insects," he told me and I started to feel a lot less creeped out after that. I mean if it's part of what he does for a job, it makes sense that he has them on the walls, right? The only thing that still bugged me was that so many of them were butterflies. I always thought butterflies were very girly bugs.

Mr. G's back yard was small, like ours, but he didn't have the Barbie Townhouse and bikes and stuff in it. Instead, he had this weird box built along the back fence, with long rows of Plexiglas in it. Next to that was this knocked over brown box on legs, and I knew that had to be his cockroach hutch so I started over to help him get it back up. He took one side and I took the other. When we lifted it I could hear a lot of scratching going on inside the box and I had to wonder just how big his cockroaches were.

My mom, she HATED cockroaches. She called them water bugs and sprayed and got really worked up whenever saw them. Once when I was really little, smaller than M.A.I stepped on one and crunched it good and my mom had a fit about the bugjuice on my shoes. She's dead now, and even though it's been a long time—nearly three years—I still can remember that 'ooh,oohOOOH!' sound she'd make when she saw a cockroach.

Mr. G looked at me. I guess my face must have been funny, because he asked me if I was okay. I nodded.

"It's just my mom didn't like cockroaches, so she'd be freaking out big time if she knew you had some here. Are they okay?"

"A lot of moms don't like cockroaches," he told me. "Even MY mom. Let's check them and see." While he opened the top of the hutch I thought for a minute about Mr. G having a mom. I could sort of see it. I bet she had the same grey hair. But not the beard. Then he reached into the box and pulled out this huge freakin' brown thing that looked like one of my dad's shoe inserts except it had legs and I know I said a bad word and backed up until my butt hit the sliding glass door. It crawled on Mr. G's hand and all of a sudden I though my mom had been abso-freak'n lutely right about them.

"This one's called Drain Man," Mr. G told me. I started to laugh; I didn't mean to. Talk about embarrassing! But I couldn't help it—first the thing had scared me, and now it had a name. A really dorky name. I tried really hard not to crack up, but it came out in sort of a snorty noise and Mr. G. was trying not to smile but I could tell he wanted to. He fished in the box for another one. Now that I knew what to expect I didn't jump, even thought this one was a little bigger.

"And this is Tessaroacha Ferrari."

"Don't you mean Tessarossa?" I asked, and even as I did, I got it. Duh. Roaches, so yeah, Tessaroacha. Mr. G. saw that I figured it out and didn't say anything. I pushed away from the glass and came closer to have a look at the bugs. The one on his right hand had a DM written on it in silver ink, and the other one had a T. I looked at Mr. G and he sighed.

"Even I can't tell roaches apart unless I mark them," he told me, and I could respect that. Bugs really do look alike. I peered down into the hutch and it was all neat inside—six little clear plastic boxes with water dishes and food dishes. Two of the boxes were empty of course, but Mr. G. put Drain Man and Tessroacha Ferrari back.

"What are the other ones called?" I asked him.

"Well, I've got Wally Scaler, Crunch McGoo, Cucaracha Jones and Hissing Jessica Stein."

That cracked me up, and I laughed. Couldn't help it, and didn't want to, but Mr. G smiled a little too and set his roaches back in to the hutch. I helped him latch the top again.

"So you have pet bugs. Cool. Do they do tricks?"

"I race them. The International Championships are in Australia, and there's the Bug Bowl in Purdue, although to be honest I haven't come in any higher than eighth in the last couple of years." He sounded discouraged, and I don't know why that got to me but it did. Maybe because I know how it is when you hit a plateau. I had one in pitching, and I guess Mr. G. had one with roach coaching.

"That's cool though—I never met anyone who raced bugs."

"Roaches," he reminded me, and he sounded just like a teacher. "It's easier than spitting crickets."

"Spitting crickets?"

"Another contest with frozen ones that you spit, for distance," he sighed. "I used to do pretty good at that one until the year I choked."

I gave a little nod and tried to make him feel better. "Yeah, my dad says pressure can be like that."

Mr. G's face twitched a little again and I was starting to figure out that that was his way of laughing. "Sorry Peter, but I mean I really choked. Got a frozen cricket lodged in my throat. My distance was good, but it didn't count since someone was doing the Heimlich on me at the time."

I lost it, then and just busted up big time. I really did because the whole idea of Mr. G choking and then hoicking up a dead bug for a world record just GOT to me, you know? Here he was all dignified and I just couldn't get around the idea of him spitting anything, much less a frozen cricket.

I guess he thought it was funny too because he laughed as well, and then motioned for us to go back through the house.

I didn't mind the butterflies so much this time, and when we got to the porch, Mr. G was about to hand me my ball when he hesitated.

I got it.

I smiled and began to run out along the greenbelt, looking back until I was about twenty yards out. Allan came over and was watching as I waved to Mr. G. "Okay, give it a shot—" I hollered to him.

He stepped off his porch and right into a pitch stance, and it was great because I could see the exact set of his shoulders. He looked left and I grinned—no first base, but he was checking anyway. Then he looked at me and I nodded. Mr. G threw.

My old Rawlings official League rocketed out of his hand in the sweetest fastball I've ever seen. I know Mr. G was holding back but still, it hit my palms and I felt the sting all the way through my wrists. I hung onto the ball, but barely, and Allan was staring.

"Whoah! That was sixty, easy!"

"I know," I yelped, since I was the one waving my fingers and blowing on them. Back at his porch, Mr. G was looking my way, kinda concerned, so I waved a hand at him to show I was okay. Allan took the ball from me and threw it back even as I protested, and Mr. G. snagged it one-handed, just pulling it out of the air. It was then that I figured he'd played a lot of ball when he was a kid.

A lot of good ball from the way my palm was stinging.

"You okay Peter?" he called to me.

"I'm fine—let me try it again with my glove on this time though, 'k?"

Allan was pouting about wanting to catch it, and even though I didn't want to, I gestured to Mr. G to go ahead and throw it to him. Mr. G did, but it was an easy pop fly, and Allan fielded it, grinning the whole time. Then he tossed it back to Mr. G and I got another rocket pitch, but now I had the glove on, so it made this great little smack into the leather. I felt good about catching it; professional almost.

We got into an easy three-way game of catch, and Mr. G made Allan and me work for some of those snags. He had a good pitch, yeah, but his grounders were sneaky, and he kept changing his speed. Right in the middle of a really bouncy pop fly I saw that M. A. was pulling her wagon right out in the middle of our triangle, getting ready to spoil everything like she does whenever I'm having a good time.

Okay, maybe that's not fair, but honestly, she's like a piece of gum on your shoe, you know? Sticks with you whether you like it or not. And here she was, looking at Mr. G with that scowl of hers that I KNEW was going to be trouble. I love my little sister, I do, but that never stops her from being a pain in the butt.

"Hey! Who are you?" she yelled, really loud, embarrassing the heck out of me. M.A. dragged her wagon right up to Mr. G. and planted herself in front of him. In the wagon I could see Charlie, our cat lounging in a baby doll dress. Charlie weighs about twelve pounds and he's the only cat I've ever known who doesn't care if my sister dresses him up. He's so big and round and mellow that Dad and I call him Pudge most of the time. M.A. has him in a green flowered dress and he looks . . . gah.

Like a big fat cat in a dress. I am SO humiliated, and I know it's the end of playing Catch, so I trot in and holler at M. A.

"Mary Alice, go home, okay? Mrs. Sanchez will be mad about you being out front without permission!"

Mr. G. was already squatting and looking at my sister eye to eye. I thought that was pretty brave of him, but he didn't know any better. I did. She was glaring back and I knew why—Dad always told us not to talk to strangers, and since she didn't know Mr. G he was a stranger, blah, blah, blah.

"I'm Gil Grissom. You must be Mary Alice Meyers. I think I have one of your dolls. Are you missing a Barbie with . . ." he paused, and I watched him think about how to ask it, ". . .Er, short hair? VERY short hair?"

"I gave her a haircut," Mary Alice told him, still looking at Mr. G with her suspicious face. "That's Dora's mom."

"Dora's mom. Okay, wait here and I'll go get her, all right?"

"Mr. G—" I muttered, feeling ultra embarrassed now, "You don't have to—"

"—Not a problem," he told me in that calm voice of his. He disappeared into his house and the minute he was out of sight I let my sister have it.

"Thanks a LOT, M. A! He was pitching good and now you had to go and ruin it with your stupid yelling!" I yelled at her.

M. A. just scowled at me. She doesn't cry when I yell at her; probably because I do it a lot. Instead she just started stamping her feet.

"Dad said no strangers and YOU talked to one!"

"He's not a stranger, he's Mr. G!"

"No he's not, he's GilGrissle! And he is TOO a stranger!"

Allan was hooting and laughing like he always does when I get into it with M.A. but he's smart enough not to take sides. He did once, and M. A. hit him. It should have been on his leg, but her hand slipped, and . . . well, now Allan doesn't take sides—at least not when my little sister's around.

"He's NOT, M. A. He gave me my ball back and he's getting your stupid Barbie, so he's cool, all right?"

My sister was not about to give in though, and when Mr. G returned she was still looking mad. Then she sees her doll and she yells again.

"She got CLOTHES on!"

"Yes . . . I wasn't comfortable having her lie naked on my bookcase, so took the liberty of buying her a dress. I hope you don't mind," Mr. G. said to her as he handed M. A. her stupid doll. M. A. looks at it a minute, then takes it and grabbed Mr. G's hand and gave it her serious hard handshake. He looked a little startled, but I clear my throat. It was going to be okay now—Mr. G's in M. A.'s good book.

"You are NOT a stranger now, GilGrissle, so thank you. Wanna play Barbies?"

"Another time," he told her and when he looked at me he winked. I snort into my glove, and it dawns on me that through all of this Mr. G is actually a pretty cool guy.

For a dude who keeps cockroaches.

-OOO-

So that's how we met Mr. G. And after that first day it was cool to wave to him and say hi. Allan and I talked him into another three-sided game of catch a few weeks later, and he gave us some pointers about pitching. He was a lot calmer than Coach Hanson at school, and when I asked him if he'd ever played for real, he just grinned, all shy.

"I'm flattered, but no—a little in high school and college, a few games on weekends here and there."

"But you're good—way better than even my coach."

"Thank you, but I'm nothing special. Just someone who loves the game," he told me. I respected how modest he was about that—like it was no big deal that he still had a good throwing arm for an old guy.

M.A. liked him too. She and the Pudge sometimes went over to borrow eggs or sugar from him for Mrs. Sanchez, our babysitter. Then M. A. would bring him back a little of whatever Mrs. S made, to thank him. Usually it was cookies—Mrs. S makes these great Mexican wedding cookies—but sometimes it was cake or banana bread. M. A. told me that Mr. G told her stuff about bugs.

"Like what?"

"You gotta keep flies away because when they land on stuff they throw up and eat it again, just like Pepe." That grossed me out—Pepe was Mrs. Sanchez's Chihuahua, and he did that a lot—the recycling his dog food thing. Mrs. Sanchez said it was because he was old, but I think it was because he was always getting into Charlie's cat food and wolfing it down. Dumb dog.

I promised myself I'd wash off any food of mine a fly touched from now on. M. A. kept talking. "An' he showed me his running bugs and let me help feed them dog food because the store doesn't make bug food. And I got to see his married picture up on the wall."

That wasn't right. I shook my head. "Mr. G's not married, M. A. He's like dad."

M.A. stuck her chin out, and picked at the Band-Aid on her knee. "He used to be, like daddy. I saw it on the wall. GilGrissle all dressed up in a black dress and lots of people there."

Now I knew what she was talking about and cracked up. She's such a kid, you know? "Is it the one where he has like a flat thing on his head, with a string?"

"Yep."

"That's his college picture. He's graduating, not getting married, dummy. Gina has a picture like that too, over her fireplace, remember?

Gina is my dad's girlfriend. She's a nurse out at Desert Palms. M. A. and I, we like her a lot. She takes care of us in the afternoons until dad gets home. We have Mrs. Sanchez in the morning and Gina at night, and usually she stays over unless she's doing a night shift.

"But Gina hadda white dress and GilGrissle hadda black one. That's MARRIED pictures." M.A. shouts. She can be really stubborn sometimes. I just shook my head.

"Nuh uh. It's just college pictures. Mr. G's not married."

"I want him to get married," M. A. told me. "Then he can have a baby girl and I can have somebody to play with."

Right. I hoped she never said that to Mr. G.

For a few weeks I didn't see Mr. G much—I had practice three afternoons out of the week, and had to make up for homework on the other two. The real bummer was the extra stuff piled on by Ms. Herman. She's a good biology teacher I guess, but Allan and I were starting to have some trouble with keeping up. My dad wasn't much help—he's good with math and Econ—so I was stuck until he told me to go ask Mr. G.

I hated to ask, but I'd lose my eligibility to play if I got a D in Biology, so I went over to Mr. G's house. He was home.

"Peter. Are you all right?" I guess it kind of showed on my face. I took a deep breath, and just let it out.

"Mr. G, I'm screwing up in Biology and Mrs. Herman's going too fast so I can't keep up and if I get a D I'll have to drop baseball and that would suck really, really bad so my dad said to ask if you knew anything about DNA."

He gives me this look, all serious and for a minute I think he's going to tell me he can't help; that he's got things to do. I bite my lips because I'm not going to beg, but if he says no, I'm really, really screwed at this point . . . .

"I know something about DNA," he tells me with a nod, and I suck in a deep breath, feeling kinda dizzy. Mr. G grins a little at me, and holds a hand out. I give him my big fat textbook and follow him inside.

His house is still tidy, but I can see he's been fixing dinner or something, because he's got some dishes and utensils out in his kitchen. He waves for me to sit at the table as he thumbs through my book. My homework assignment falls out, but he catches it without even looking. "Orange juice? I'm out of milk—"

"Oh! Um, sure. Thanks."

"So this is your assignment?" he asks and looks over the sheet as he pours an orange juice. No pulp, yeah! I drink up, and it tastes really good.

"Yeah. I'm supposed to extract DNA from something and bring it in tomorrow, but part of the directions got lost, so---"

"—So I have an idea. We're going to need my blender, and some gloves, I'm pretty sure I have some meat tenderizer and some test tubes—Peter, what were you going to extract this DNA from?"

"M.A." I tell him jokingly, and Mr. G sort of grins, but shakes his head.

"No. Not only is it a tad unethical, I refuse to deal with your little sister's mucus on any level. How about some—" He thinks for a minute, and I can tell he's going for something easy. "--Dried peas?"

"We have some at home—" I slide off the stool and run back home. Dad helps me find the bag in the pantry and reminds me to thank Mr. G. Like I was going to forget—the guy's saving my grade, you know? When I get back he hollers for me to come in, and I do, putting the bag of dried peas on his kitchen counter. Mr. G looks at me over his glasses.

"Notebook. You're going to need to record this."

I pull out my notebook and put the heading on the page, then lay out the procedural like Mrs. Herman likes it. Mr. G hands me some plastic gloves. I pull them on, and for a minute I wonder where he got them from. Then he points to the blender.

"Measure out half a cup of peas and about a cup of cold water. I need to get some test tubes---"

He heads out to his garage, and I do what he says. The peas are weird—some float, but most of them sink. I write it all down in the notebook, and try to draw it, since Mrs. Herman gives extra credit for illustrations. Mr. G comes back and he's got test tubes and a rack to hold them, just like the lab at school.

"You have test tubes? In your garage?" Okay, it comes out kind of rude, but I thought he just studied bugs. I didn't think he had any scientific stuff. Mr. G sets the rack up and looks at me from the corner of his eyes.

"I have test tubes. Part of being a scientist is having the right equipment." He looks at the blender full of wet peas. "Mostly."

"Okay. So—now what?"

"Now, we need meat tenderizer, salt, and dishwashing soap," he tells me.

Weirder and weirder. I'm helping him add the salt when the doorbell rings. Mr. G. and I look at each other.

"M. A. probably," I sigh. Mr. G. motions with his head for me to answer the door. I yank it open, all set to yell, but it's not M. A.

Whoa. There's a lady there, looking just as surprised as me, and I can smell her perfume. She's tall and pretty, and has sunglasses on the top of her head and she's pretty and has this sort of gap in her teeth and I look up at her.

She's pretty.

"Grissom?" she says. I shake my head.

"No, I'm Peter . . . " what is my last name? From behind me in the kitchen I hear Mr. G.

"—Meyers. Sara?"

"Grissom." Her smile gets bigger and she looks at me again. "Peter."

"Uh . . . " Could I sound like any more of a doofus? I let her in, and she walks past me. Nice perfume, like Kylie Arnstein's in my English class. I follow her into the kitchen and she sets a folder down, then looks at the blender of peas. Mr. G has a little smile on his face and all of a sudden I think maybe she's his girlfriend because it's just the same sort of smile my dad gets around Gina.

Oh well. I slump on my stool.

"Needed you to sign off on the McAllen case since Ecklie's making us submit all the evidence. So—making dinner?" she says.

"Extracting DNA. Peter asked for some help," Mr. G says and he takes the folder. It looks funny to see it in his gloved hands. The Sara lady gives a nod and holds out a hand to me.

"I'm Sara Sidle and I work at the crime lab with Grissom." I shake her hand.

"Crime lab? I thought you were a bug scientist?" Suddenly Mr. G is a WAY lot cooler than I thought he was. A crime scientist! Whoa! Wait until I tell Allan!

"I'm still an entomologist. I just happen to work for the police as well," he murmurs, and hits a button on his blender. The peas go spinning and for a moment all three of us stare at it. A big green gooey tornado under glass. If Charlie was here he'd want to eat it.

Who am I kidding? M.A. WOULD eat it. Mr. G turns it off and picks up the pitcher part. Ms Sidle is grinning again. "DNA frappe?" she says.

"Decidedly. Peter, hand me that strainer hanging on the hook by the fridge." I do and watch him pour the stuff in, letting the thin part run through. He winks at me. "This is exactly what the four thousand dollar centrifuge does at the lab, for far, far less. Now we need to add the dish soap."

"Dish soap?"

"Dish soap," Ms Sidle says. "The blender separated the cells, but now you have to break up the nuclei to see the DNA."

Double brains helping me—I am SO going to ace this assignment! Mr. G hands me some of the tubes and makes me pour the pea juice in them, about one third full each. We have three now, and he sets them in a rack, then hands me a bottle of Joy.

"A few drops, then we wait."

I manage to squirt some liquid soap in each tube, and just when I'm finishing up, the doorbell rings again. This time it HAS to be M.A. I just know it.

It is. She marches right past me into the place, her stupid Barbie in one hand something little in the other one. She looks up at Ms. Sidle.

"Hi."

"Um, hi."

"GilGrissle I gotta another bug for you," my sister tells him and now I know what what's in her hand. Gross. But Mr. G doesn't even seem freaked out; he just gets one of the empty test tubes and puts it against M.A.'s dirty hand by her thumb and pointer finger and she lets the bug go. It sort of wobbles down into the tube. A lady bug who looks kind of . . . squashed. Mr. G puts a cap on the tube and looks at it. He is wincing a little, and Ms. Sidle has a hand over her mouth but I can tell it's so she doesn't laugh.

"Thank you, Mary Alice. This is a nice specimen of Hippodamia convergens."

"No, it's a ladybug." M. A. tells him, then she looks at Ms. Sidle again. "My name is Mary Alice and I have a cat. And a Barbie."

"Pleased to meet you. My name is Sara Sidle and I have a badge. And a plant."

Mr. G gives her this sharp look, and I can tell he's surprised a little, but I don't know why. I scope out the test tubes and then glare at my sister.

"Come on, M. A., beat it all right? I have to do get my experiment done!"

"Well I NEED to give the ladybug to GilGrissle because Charlie tried to EAT it and I had to wipe all the spit off her," M. A. says and then she's climbed up on one of the stools and is looking at Ms. Sidle again, waving her stupid Barbie. "This is Dora's mom. Do you think she's pretty?"

"She's . . . interesting," Ms. Sidle says, and this time Mr. G's mouth is twitching and I'm about to start laughing too. Bald Barbies with nothing on but a pair of shorts are NOT pretty, but you can't tell my sister that. I look at Mr. G and sigh.

"I should take her home."

"We're almost done. She can stay," Mr. G tells me and he's handing me a shaker of meat tenderizer. "Add some of this to each tube—just a pinch."

"What is it?" I do what he says. The pea juice was cloudy but now it's getting clearer. M. A. is looking at the blender and before she can reach up and push the button on it, Ms. Sidle catches her hand.

"Hey!"

"Hey yourself—there's no lid on the blender right now. We'd have peas flying everywhere, kiddo. And I look terrible with green hair."

Mary Alice giggles. Mr. G takes the mushed peas and pours them down his garbage disposal with a big gloopy sound. Mary Alice giggles again, dopey kid. "I want green hair. I wanna be a mermaid and have green hair in the bathtub."

"You want hair that looks like boogers?" I tell her, and then I remember we're not at home and look at Mr. G and Ms. Sidle. "Sorry, that was gross, I know."

"I've worked with worse," Mr. G says. "Now we need some rubbing alcohol and some swabs. And in answer to your question, we've added enzymes, which speed up the chemical reaction."

"Oh." I grab my notebook and write that down, taking a minute to catch up on the pictures. M. A. is making her stupid doll swim in the air.

"Now Dora's mom is a mermaid, but she needs a tail."

"Welll-- could make one for her—" Ms Sidle says, kinda softly. I look at her. Mr. G looks at her. M. A. looks at her. She shrugs. "All I need would be a green sock, some duct tape and a marker—Grissom?"

"—I'm fairly sure I have a sock I can sacrifice to the cause," he says, and I can see he's almost smiling that way again at her.

Grown-ups are weird.

Mr. G goes off to the back of his apartment and I poke at one of the test tubes with my pencil. M. A. is still looking at Ms. Sidle.

"Can I see your badge?" Boy my sister is pushy.

"Sure." Ms. Sidle fishes it out and I take a look myself. It's not like Gina's from the hospital; this one has the police emblem, and in her picture, Ms. Sidle looks pretty, but tough. M. A. touches it.

Mr. G comes back and he's got the sock and tape and marker and some rubbing alcohol too, that he gives to me, along with a bunch of Q tips.

"Time to extract some DNA. Sara, your ichthyic necessities—"

"Ickky--?" My sister wrinkles her nose.

"--Fish stuff," Ms. Sidle says. "Let's make a mermaid and let your brother finish his homework, Mary Alice."

So with Mr. G's help I manage to pour some alcohol in two of the tubes. He swabs one out, and I do the other; we get this long white stringy goo on the Q-tips. Mr. G carefully spreads it out on one of his dinner plates and I poke at it a little. "That's DNA?"

"That's DNA. The soap and meat tenderizer helped the cells to break up and layer into the water, which is heavier, and the alcohol, which is lighter. You can keep some of strands in a test tube of alcohol if you need to show them for your teacher."

"Oh that would be very cool, Mr. G. And can you sign off on the bottom that you helped me with this?"

Mr. G nods, and I can tell he's pleased to be asked. I clear my throat a little. "Thanks. A whole lot. I really needed this."

"Glad to help." He says in a low voice, and it's kind of cool because I know he means it for real-- Mr. G liked doing the experiment. Mary Alice runs over and grabs him by the hand right then.

"Gotta see! Dora's mom is like Ariel!"

And whoa, she is. The dopey doll really DOES look like a mermaid. The sock is up over her legs to her hips, and taped at the waist so it stays on, and there's another piece of it for like, a bra on her chest. Ms. Sidle even drew scales on the sock, and down at the bottom she used tape to make little fins on the sides.

Even Mr. G is impressed. I see him look at Ms. Sidle but he doesn't say anything. She smiles and they're doing that grown up thing again.

"Your talents never cease to amaze me," he tells her. She grins again and it's so pretty that I wish she'd do that at me.

"Good to know, Mr. Wizard. I have to get going—dinner break's going to be over soon."

M. A. pulls on Ms. Sidle's hand and makes her bend down so she can whisper in her ear. My sister says thank you like that—right in your ear. She says it's because it's because thank yous are only for one person at a time, like a secret, and I can kinda understand that. Then she hugs her doll and just when I think it's going to be okay and I pick up my notebook---

"Are you going to marry GilGrissle and make a baby for me yet?"

I so want to kill her sometimes.

-OOO-

My sister kept her mermaid for almost two weeks. She took it into the bathtub with her, slept with her and everything until Mrs. Sanchez finally decided that while a green tail was nice, a black one wasn't, and took the mermaid apart.

Boy was THAT a bad move. M.A. threw a fit and Mrs. Sanchez ended up calling my dad at work because my sister locked herself in the bathroom and couldn't unlock it again. My dad had to come home and take the door off its hinges and M.A. was grounded for two weeks. Mrs. Sanchez was pretty pleased about that.

Mrs. Herman liked my DNA write up and even posted it on the bulletin board in class, so I was back to passing Biology and staying eligible for baseball. In fact, I got moved from right field to second base, and Gina told me that when I wrote Mr. G my thank you note I ought to invite him to one of my games. I asked her why I couldn't just run over and thank him and invite him and she said something about good manners and respecting his privacy—all that grown-up stuff that means you're going to do it THEIR way.

So I had to get a card from the drugstore and Gina helped me figure out just how to write it so I didn't sound too stuffy. Here's what I wrote//Dear Mr. G, Thanks a million for helping me out with the DNA extraction and thus helping me save my grade. I'm glad you knew what to do, and also that M.A. didn't freak you and Ms. Sidle out too much. My team, the Panthers, are playing over at Kroeger field next Saturday, and if you would like to come watch, I'd sure like that. Here's one of my Snack Shack coupons because M.A. says you like popcorn. Hope you can make it, and thanks again, Peter Samuel Meyers./

I asked Gina what kind of sense it made to put a letter in the mail and have it go all the way to the post office just to be sorted and sent back to an address only two doors down, but she just rolled her eyes and sighed.

Man I was tense. The Rangers were good; better than I remembered, and they had a pitcher who was slaughtering us. He was a big moose of a guy—Gunner they called him—and damn, the name fit. He had two pitches, a fastball and this other one, and while we could get a hit or two off the fastball, that weird pitch of his was killing us.

It was like he held it back, just a few seconds, and that made everybody overswing almost every time. That pitch would come sailing in just a second or two behind where you THOUGHT it was, and well, let's just say it wasn't pretty. The Rangers were up by two runs, and our dugout was one gloomy place. Both Allan and I had struck out twice, and he was on his way to do it again when I heard a voice coming through the chain link.

Mr. G.

I scooted over on the bench and kept my head down; coach has a rule about not talking to anybody through the netting because it distracts us, but the way I was feeling I didn't much care. In a minute Allan was going to be out and then it would be my turn to stand at home plate.

"Are you all right, Peter?"

"I'm okay," I told him. I wasn't, of course, but I wasn't going to talk about it. At least Mr. G had made it to the game, even if it was a stinker. For a minute he didn't say anything, and I could hear the jeers for Allan out at home plate. It felt like Mr. G's racing roaches were in my stomach now.

"I've been watching. The pitcher's got a flick." Mr. G. told me. I looked up; he was sort of a shadow through the netting, but I liked the sound of his voice. He wasn't frustrated, like dad was, or soothing, like Gina. Mr. G sounded thoughtful.

"A flick?"

"A flick. He's got a way of delaying his pitch by about a second before release. It's a nifty little trick to throw a batter's timing off."

Outside the dugout I heard the umpire call the second strike on Allan. People in the Rangers bleachers were getting loud. And mean.

"Yo! Shoot him down, Gunner!"

"Easy Out! Easy Out!"

I started pulling my batting gloves on. Mr. G cleared his throat and I looked at his shadow on the netting again.

"You can count it out, Peter."

"Mr. G, I'm going to strike out. I'll see it and I try not to swing but I'll just end up swatting air every time." I didn't mean to sound like a whiny baby, but it was just, you know, a downer.

I wanted to do good for Mr. G.

I wanted to win.

He sighed. "You can count it out—listen to me. I've been watching, and the flick is a 'one, two-two, THREE' flick. The stutter in the second count is the delay. Say it—'one, two-two, THREE.'"

"One two-two THREE," I mumbled. Mr. G laughed a little.

"Again, Peter. Think about the pattern. One, two-two, THREE. Swing on the three like there's no tomorrow, and I guarantee you'll wipe the smile off that pitcher."

"Mr. G—"

But he was gone. The crowd outside was really loud and Allan was slogging back to the dugout. Nobody came near him, and I felt the roaches back in my gut when coach called my name.

It was like, a million miles to home plate. I looked over and saw Jose camped out on third and Tran doing his lead off on second, trying to rattle his baseman, but it wasn't working; the Rangers looked like they knew they had this sewn up.

"Batter up—" the umpire called to me, and I braced myself over home. I looked at the backstop, just to see if I could spot dad and Gina and MA, but instead I saw Mr. G. standing there. I looked at him and he winked at me.

A serious wink.

And you know it's really weird, but all I could think was 'one, two-two, THREE' when I looked towards the mound where Gunner was eyeing me up. I braced, let my fingers find the right grip on my Easton, (one, two-two, THREE) flexed my knees a little (one, two-two, THREE) and nodded.

Slow, like a movie that's winding down until you can see each one of the little boxes, the windows going by and DAMN I could feel my blood pumping because Mr. G was abso-fricken-lutely RIGHT itwasonetwotwoTHREEandhereyouGOGunnereatTHATyouSONOFA---

"Run Peter, RUNNNN!" M.A. was screeching like a wild thing. I freaked, dropped the bat and gunned it for first and I tell you I was flying on the wave of the crowd behind me. Allan told me later that there was so much noise from the bleachers that the chain link of the dugout was shaking from it. All I remember is hitting the bag and feeling like all the air had been squeezed out of my lungs. Out in left field the Rangers were still trying to relay the ball home.

My coach was yelling, Jose was in, Tran was in and now we had a tie game.

We didn't win; we tied. After my run, Jim Tichner struck out but we held the Rangers off from scoring anything more. I grabbed every guy I could and told them about one, two-two THREE and most of them got it. We started hitting; pop flies mostly, but it broke Gunner. He knew his streak had fizzled and that was good enough for me, especially when they pulled him and got the relief in there.

Afterwards, Dad and Gina took us to pizza—we invited Mr. G along and I was really glad he came too. I didn't think he was going to, but M. A. took his hand and told him she would show him how to work the jukebox, and that kind of won him over I think. So we all went off to Pizza and Pipes to celebrate.

Pizza and Pipes is kinda weird, but they honestly do make the best pizza in the world. Even M.A. likes their pizza, and trust me, to get my little sister to eat in a public restaurant is like, a very big deal. She won't eat McDonalds, and Burger King and the people at Del Taco probably hate her guts because she's so picky about her French fries. But for some reason Pizza and Pipes always gets her food right, so Dad and Gina and I feel pretty safe bringing her with us her.

The walls have this red and gold wallpaper that dad says looks like it's out of a bordello, whatever that is. And they have a big dining room and at one end there's this big old organ with gold pipes on the wall. Usually Mr. Zigler, the organ player is there, but he's got the night off tonight because his handmade sign is there, taped to the pipes//Closed for Spiritual Renovation. Bless you for coming and please enjoy the Pizza. M.Z./

Mr. G is looking around with this gleam in his eye, as M. A. tells him about Mr. Zigler.

"Mr. Zigler was a player inna church but he got really sick for a long time but now he plays for pizza. He has a long ponytail and when he's here I always ask him to play Wizard of Oz for me because we both like it, and he lets me sing even though nobody can hardly hear me because the organ is so loud, but that's okay because Mr. Zigler told me the angels always hear me every time I sing. Do you want to touch it?"

Mr. G looks at me and I sigh. "Somewhere Over the Rainbow, and Mr. Zigler lets the kids play on the organ if they want when he's not here—it's turned off."

"Fascinating," I heard him say, and after we all ordered pizza, he let M. A. lead him back to the organ. I rehashed the game with Dad for a while, and Gina listened in too. Then the pizza came, so I had to go get M.A. and Mr. G.

They were on the carpet, looking at the something under the keyboard, and it was weird to see them lying on the floor side by side looking up—like they were knocked out or something. Nobody else seemed to pay too much attention, but I was starting to crack up. Mr. G looked comfortable. M.A. was wiggling her feet.

"What else does the label say, Mary Alice?"

"B-r-a-t-t-l-e-b-o-r-o-m-a-s-s-1-9-2-6. What's that?"

"Well, Brattleboro is a town in the state of Massachusetts where Mr. Zigler's organ was made. Can you tell me what year that was?"

"1-9-2-6." My sister says. "Right?"

"Very right. That means this organ is eighty years old," I hear him tell her.

"Is that as old as you, GilGrissle?"

I get down on my hands and knees to let my sister have it. "M. A! Get real, Mr. G isn't old! Eighty is like, Grandpa John's age! You hurt his feelings!"

M.A. looks over at Mr. G. lying on the carpet. I can see his mouth is twitching like he's going to laugh, but I'm still embarrassed for my sister. She reaches over and touches his beard, then scooches over to whisper in his ear. Mr. G nods all serious-like, taking her apology. "That's all right, Mary Alice. It's not easy to know how old people are sometimes. I'm fifty this year."

"I'm gonna be six," she tells him in this sad voice. "So I'm pretty old too."

"Doofus," I tell her and start pulling on her leg to drag her out from under the organ bench. "The pizza's here."

We had pepperoni and black olive, and M. A. had a little tiny pizza with pineapple and M & Ms on it (don't ASK, it's just one of those things that Dad and Gina and I just . . . whatever, you know?) Dad and Mr. G. talked about baseball and got into some terrific stories while I listened and just felt good.

Sometimes I feel like I'm almost there when grown-ups talk—they don't mind me listening to them, and once in a while they ask me stuff too. It's weird and good at the same time, like when Gina tells me how tall I'm getting, or when I think about Kylie Arnstein . . . but that's private.

Anyway, we're all sitting there around the empty plates, feeling good and full when M.A. comes up with her hands cupped around something. She's grinning at us, and Mr. G and I have a pretty good idea of what she's holding. She grins up at Mr. G. and I can see the gap where she's lost one of her front baby teeth.

"Guess what I got!" she says it like she's singing. Mr. G. and I look at each other and I grin, because this is too easy.

"It's a bug," I tell her. M. A. pouts a little, but doesn't open her hands.

"Yeah, well guess the kind?" she orders. Mr. G. shifts to look at her, looking at her hands carefully.

"A moth?"

"Nope."

"A cricket?" My dad asks. M.A. shakes her head, still grinning.

"An ant?" Gina tries.

"Nope!"

"A cock—er, a water bug?" I ask, thinking about what could possibly be here at Pizza and Pipes. Dad and Gina kind of wince at each other and I can see Mr. G. fighting a grin. M.A. steps closer to him, almost against his knees now as he sits on the padded bench. She holds her hands higher.

"It's not a running bug. I found it by the door because it wanted to come in and it's a curly spider."

"A curly spider?" Mr. G. asks and then M.A. opens her hands almost right under his nose.

FUCK!

I mean, I am sorry, but Jesus! My sister is holding a frigging SCORPION in her grubby hands and it's HUGE! It's big and yellow-brown and it's sitting in her hand and all I can think is she's gonna DIE because it's like the size of golf ball!

I hear Gina give a little scream, and my dad shouts, "Holy HELL! Mary Alice DROP IT!" She looks at all of us and I can see her get scared right then and there; my baby sister knows she just did something bad and so she jumps a little and the scorpion runs up her arm. It stops at the edge of her sleeve and M.A. is whimpering now, looking down at it with eyes so big I think they're going to pop.

Dad jumps up, but Mr. G. stops him. "Dan, sit down and DON'T. MOVE. Mary Alice, honey, can you hold still? Very, very still?"

She's whimpering now, and I'm frozen, staring like a dummy at the thing on my sister's arm. It's waving one of its big ugly claws, but it's just sitting there. Mr. G. reaches out and lays his hand right in front of it. The thing doesn't move. I can hear Mr. G talking softly. There are people coming over now, and somebody else is starting to yell.

"Shhhhh, Shhhh, It's going to be all right. Are you okay Mary Alice? Did you pick him up all by yourself?" Mr. G. asks.

"I-I-I s-saw him by the door!" she sniffles, and she's starting to shake a little. "He walked right on my hand. I thought he liked me!"

"He probably does because you're warm," Mr. G. says and I can't get over how cool and relaxed he is. If you didn't look in his eyes and see how all scary-sharp they were you'd think everything was hunky dory. "But we don't want to scare him if we can help it. I'm going to scoop him up, all right? Gina?"

"Gil—" She mutters.

"Might want to get ready to go 911, just to be safe. Peter, keep everybody back for me, okay?"

Something I can do—I get up and start waving people to step back. They do it, too, which surprises me, but then again, maybe it's just because Mr. G. seems to know what he's doing. He slides his other hand behind the scorpion and begins to scoop. One, two, three and he's got it, it's off Mary Alice who runs to Gina and hangs on to her.

Me, I'm frozen, looking at Mr. G, and I see the scorpion flick it's tail just as Mr. G shakes his hand and lets the bug fall onto one of the pizza plates. He turns one of the clear plastic cups upside down over it, and bang, just like that, it's over.

Scorpion's trapped. We're safe.

I can't believe it. I stare up at Mr. G. and then something makes me look down at his hand and I can see the sting there, a little red hole on the edge of his hand right in the middle of a white circle. Like a bee sting almost, but I know it's not. It's a scorpion sting, and Mr. G. took it instead of letting it happen to my little sister.

He let it sting HIM instead of M. A.

I can't say anything, my throat's all choked up. Mr. G. looks at me. "Can I have some of the ice out of your drink, Peter?"

I fish it out; hand it over while Gina soothes M.A. who decides to start crying now, and Dad is carrying the scorpion outside. People are talking all loud and relaxed, and I watch Mr. G put the ice on the edge of his hand and my stomach is suddenly really really tight with what could have been.

"Mr. G—" I start, and I don't know what to say. He smiles at me and right then and there I feel like I just walked through a doorway from being a kid to being, well, almost a grown up.

"It's going to be fine. For me, it's equivalent to a bee sting," he tells me in a low voice, "and I don't want you to worry about it, all right?"

"Okay," I told him, and I took a deep breath. "Thank you Mr. G. For all of it. I know it doesn't mean much because I'm a kid and all, but . . . thank you."

And right then M. A. wriggled away from Gina and sort of launched herself at Mr. G. and hugs him hard. And it was weird and good, because I watched her do it and wished I could have hugged him too, but I'm just too big for stuff like that now.

I guess I really had finally stepped through that doorway.

END