The Missing Rib

A girl in love asked her boyfriend.

Girl: Tell me. Who do you love most in this world?
Boy: You, of course!
Girl: In your heart, what am I to you?
Boy: The boy thought for a moment and looked intently in her eyes and said, "You are my rib. It was said that God saw that Adam was lonely, during his sleep, God took one of Adam's rib and created Eve. Every man has been searching for his missing rib, only when you find the woman of your life, you'll no longer feel the lingering ache in your heart."
After their wedding, the couple had a sweet and happy life for a while.
However, the youthful couple began to drift apart due to the busy schedule of life and the never-ending worries of daily problems, their life became mundane.
All the challenges posed by the harsh realities of life began to gnaw away their dreams and love for each other. The couple began to have more quarrels and each quarrel became more heated.
One day, after the quarrel, the girl ran out of the house. At the opposite side of the road, she shouted, "You don't love me!"
The boy hated her childishness and out of impulse, retorted, "Maybe, it was a mistake for us to be together! You were never my missing rib!"
Suddenly, she turned quiet and stood there for a long while. He regretted what he said but words spoken are like thrown away water, you can never take it back. With tears, she went home to pack her things and was determined in breaking-up.
Before she left the house, "If I'm really not your missing rib, please let me go." She continued, "It is less painful this way. Let us go on our separate ways and search for our own partners."
Five years went by...
He never remarried but he had tried to find out about her life indirectly. She had left the country and back. She had married a foreigner and divorced. He felt anguished that she never waited for him.
In the dark and lonely night, he lit his cigarette and felt the lingering ache in his heart. He couldn't bring himself to admit that he was missing her.
One day, they finally met. At the airport, a place where there were many reunions and good byes. He was going away on a business trip. She was standing there alone, with just the security door separating them. She smiled at him gently.
Boy: How are you?
Girl: I'm fine. How about you? Have you found your missing rib?
Boy: No.
Girl: I'll be flying to New York in the next flight.
Boy: I'll be back in 2 weeks time. Give me a call when you are back. You know my number. Nothing has changed.
With a smile, she turned around and waved good bye.
Good bye...
One week later, he heard of her death. She had perished in New York, in the event that shocked the world.
Midnight, once again, he lit his cigarette. And like before, he felt the lingering ache in his heart. He finally knew. She was the missing rib that he had carelessly broken.
Sometimes, people say things out of moments of fury. Most often than not, the outcome could be disastrous and detrimental. We vent our frustrations 99% at our loved ones. And even though we know that we ought to "think twice and act wisely", it's often easier said than done.
Things happen each day, many of which are beyond our control. Let us treasure every moment and everyone in our lives.
Tomorrow may never come. Give and accept what you have today

The Ring

A girl was sitting on a chair at the gas station she worked at. She looked up and saw her boyfriend walk in. As he was looking at snacks, a man walked in and pointed a gun at her. He had been admiring her ring her boyfriend had given to her as a token of his love. When he asked her to give it to him, she said no. Her boyfriend looked up just in time to see her shot. He ran over to the killer and beat him over the head with a hammer that was for sale. Then he ran and called 911. When the ambulance came, he was sobbing uncontrollably near his girlfriend.

The doctor came over and felt for her pulse. Then he stood up and said she was still alive. Later at the hospital, as he was sitting beside her, he asked"Why didn't you just give him the ring?" and then she softly spoke"Because when you gave it to me, you said it was part of your love for me and I knew if I gave him the ring, I would lose that love." The next day, she was pronounced dead.

Let me Love You

Once upon a time, there was once a guy who was very much in love with this girl. This romantic guy folded 1,000 pieces of papercranes as a gift to his girl. Although, at that time he was just a small executive in his company, his future doesn't seemed too bright, they were very happy together. Until one day, his girl told him she was going to Paris and will never come back. She also told him that she cannot visualise any future for the both of them, so let's go their own ways there and then... heartbroken, the guy agreed.
When he regained his confidence, he worked hard day and night, slogging his body and mind just to make something out of himself. Finally with all these hardwork and with the help of friends, this guy had set up his own company...
"You never fail until you stop trying." he always told himself. "I must make it in life!"
One rainy day, while this guy was driving, he saw an elderly couple sharing an umbrella in the rain walking to some destination. Even with the umbrella, they were still drenched. It didn't take him long to realise those were his ex-girlfriend's parents. With a heart in getting back at them, he drove slowly beside the couple, wanting them to spot him in his luxury sedan. He wanted them to know that he wasn't the same anymore, he had his own company, car, condo, etc. He had made it in life!
Before the guy can realise, the couple was walking towards a cemetary,and he got out of his car and followed them...and he saw his ex-girlfriend, a photograph of her smiling sweetly as ever at him from her tombstone... and he saw his precious papercranes in a bottle placed beside her tomb. Her parents saw him. He walked over and asked them why this had happened. They explained, she did not leave for France at all. She was stricken ill with cancer. In her heart, she had believed that he will make it someday, but she did not want her illness to be his obstacle ... therefore she had chosen to leave him.
She had wanted her parents to put his papercranes beside her, because, if the day comes when fate brings him to her again he can take some of those back with him. The guy just wept ...the worst way to miss someone is to be sitting right beside them but knowing you can't have them and will never see them again.
The End."
A tragic story that perhaps happens only in the movies. At the end of the day, money is money is money but love is divine. In our quest for our material wealth, take time to make time for our loved ones. There will be a time when we have only memories to cling to.
Take this weekend to show our "love" to all that are close to us.

Nasty Bug

Every night, Harold would go down to the liquor store, get a six pack, bring it home, and drink it while he watched TV. One night, as he finished his last beer, the doorbell rang. He stumbled to the door and found a six-foot cockroach standing there. The bug grabbed him by the collar and threw him across the room, and left.

The next night, after he finished his 3th beer, the doorbell rang.

He walked slowly to the door and found the same six-foot cockroach standing there. The big bug punched him in the stomach, then left.

The next night, after he finished his 1st beer, the doorbell rang again. The same six-foot cockroach was standing there. This time he was kneed in the groin and hit behind the ear as he doubled over in pain. Then the big bug left.

The fourth night Harold didn't drink at all. The doorbell rang. The cockroach was standing there. The bug beat the snot out of Harold and left him in a heap on the living room floor.

The following day, Harold went to see his doctor. He explained events of the preceding four nights. "

" What can I do? " he pleaded.

" Not much " he doctor replied. " There's just a nasty bug going around."

Professor Panini

Before my many years' service in a restaurant, I attended a top science university. The year was 2023 and I was finishing the project that would win me my professorship. In the end, it resulted in my becoming a kitchen employee.
My forty-second birthday had made a lonely visit the week before, and I was once again by myself in the flat. Like countless other mornings, I ordered a bagel from the toaster. 'Yes, sir!' it replied with robotic relish, and I began the day's work on the project. It was a magnificent machine, the thing I was making - capable of transferring the minds of any two beings into each other's bodies.
As the toaster began serving my bagel on to a plate, I realised the project was in fact ready for testing. I retrieved the duck and the cat - which I had bought for this purpose ñ from their containers, and set about calibrating the machine in their direction. Once ready, I leant against the table, holding the bagel I was too excited to eat, and initiated the transfer sequence. As expected, the machine whirred and hummed into action, my nerves tingling at its synthetic sounds.
The machine hushed, extraction and injection nozzles poised, scrutinizing its targets. The cat, though, was suddenly gripped by terrible alarm. The brute leapt into the air, flinging itself onto the machine. I watched in horror as the nozzles swung towards me; and, with a terrible, psychedelic whirl of colours, felt my mind wrenched from its sockets.
When I awoke, moments later, I noticed first that I was two feet shorter. Then, I realised the lack of my limbs, and finally it occurred to me that I was a toaster. I saw immediately the solution to the situation - the machine could easily reverse the transfer - but was then struck by my utter inability to carry this out.
After some consideration, using what I supposed must be the toaster's onboard computer, I devised a strategy for rescue. I began to familiarise myself with my new body: the grill, the bread bin, the speaker and the spring mechanism. Through the device's rudimentary eye - with which it served its creations - I could see the internal telephone on the wall. Aiming carefully, I began propelling slices of bread at it. The toaster was fed by a large stock of the stuff, yet as more and more bounced lamely off the phone, I began to fear its exhaustion.

< 2 >

*

Toasting the bread before launch proved a wiser tactic. A slice of crusty wholemeal knocked the receiver off its cradle, and the immovable voice of the reception clerk answered. Resisting the urge to exclaim my unlikely predicament, I called from the table: 'I'm having a bit of trouble up here, Room 91. Could you lend a hand?'
'Certainly, sir. There's a burst water pipe on the floor above, I suppose I'll kill two birds with one stone and sort you out on the way,'
The clerk arrived promptly, leaving his 'caution, wet floor' sign in the corridor. He came in, surveying the room in his usual dry, disapproving fashion. I spoke immediately, saying I was on the intercom, and requested that he simply press the large button on the machine before him. 'This one, sir?' he asked, and before I could correct him, the room was filled with a terrible, whirling light, and he fell to the ground.
A minute later he stood up again, uncertainly, and began moving in a manner that can only be described as a waddle. The duck, meanwhile, was scrutinising the flat with an air of wearied distaste. I gazed at the scene with dismay. Suddenly an idea struck the clerk, and with avian glee he tottered towards the window. I spluttered a horrified warning to no avail. He leapt triumphantly from the balcony, spread his 'wings' and disappeared. I would have wept, but managed only to eject a few crumbs.

*

Hours of melancholy calculation and terrible guilt gave no progress, and left me with a woeful regret for the day's events. Determined not to give up hope, I began to burn clumsy messages into slices of bread, and slung these desperate distress calls through the window. I sought not only my own salvation, but also to account for the bizarre demise of the clerk, who must no doubt have been discovered on the street below. I soon found my bread bin to be empty, and sank again into a morose meditation.
A large movement shocked me from my morbid contemplation. Before me, having clambered up from the floor, stood my own body. It regarded me with dim cheer.

< 3 >

'I have been upgraded,' it announced in monotone. The room was silent as I struggled to cope with this information. Then:
'Would you like some toast?'
The truth dawned on me, and I wasted no time in seeing the utility of this revelation. I informed the toaster, which was now in control of my body, that I wished it to fetch help. It regarded me warily, then asked if I would like that buttered. Maintaining patience, I explained the instruction more thoroughly. I watched with surreal anticipation as my body of forty-two years jerked its way out of the flat. It rounded the corner, and there was a hope-dashing crash. It had tripped up on the 'caution: wet floor' sign. To my joyous relief, however, I heard the thing continue on its way down the corridor.
Minutes passed, then hours. I entertained myself flicking wheat-based projectiles at the cat. On the dawn of the third day, I concluded that the toaster had failed in its piloting of my body, and that help was not on its way. Gripped by the despair of one who must solve the puzzle of toaster suicide, I resigned myself to my fate.
Pushed on by a grim fervour, I began igniting the entire stock of bread. As the smoke poured from my casing, and the first hints of deadly flame flickered in my mechanisms, I began the solemn disclosure of my own eulogy.
Suddenly the fire alarm leapt into action, hurling thick jets of water across the flat, desperate to save its occupants. A piercing wail erupted from all sides, and a squabbling mixture of annoyance, relief and curiosity filtered into my mind.

*

Once the firemen had visited and deactivated the alarm, I was identified as the fault, unplugged and hauled away to a repair shop. The staff there, finding nothing to remove but a faulty speech chip, apparently put me up for sale. I only know this because, on being reconnected to the mains, I found myself in a shiny, spacious kitchen. Missing my electronic voice, I could only listen to the conversation of the staff, discussing the odd conduct of their new cook. The end of their hurried discussion heralded his arrival. I gazed at the door in silent surrender, as my body stepped proudly on to the premises, displaying its newly designed menu. At the top of the list I could discern 'Buttered bagel'.

The Bar Story

This guy goes to a bar that's on the tenth floor of a hotel. He sits down and has a couple of drinks, then stands up, announces loudly that he has had enough, and goes over and jumps out the window. Now, there are two men who are sitting at a window table, and having that natural human curiosity about the grotesque, watch as this man plummets to certain death.

However, just as he is about to hit the ground, he rights himself, pulls his feet underneath himself,and lands gracefully. He then turns and comes back into the building. Naturally, the two men are amazed. The guy comes back into the bar, orders a few drinks, then repeats the process. The two men at the window seat are astounded! When the guy returns and repeats the procedure AGAIN, the two men stop him before he jumps and ask him how on earth he does that. He replies "It's simple, really. There's an air vent down by the ground, and if you catch the updraft, you can right yourself and land on the ground with no problems." Then he proceeded to jump out the window again. Well, these two men decided that they just HAD to try this, so they jumped out the window, and SPLAT! -- made a mess hitting all over the ground.

Meanwhile, the first guy has made it back up to the bar. When he sits down to order his drinks, the bartender says "Superman, you can be a real ------- when you're drunk!"

First Job

"A young family moved into a house, next to a vacant lot.

One day, a construction crew turned up to start building a house on the empty lot.

The young family's 5-year-old daughter naturally took an interest in all the activity going on next door and spent much of each day observing the workers.

Eventually the construction crew, all of them "gems-in-the-rough," more or less, adopted her as a kind of project mascot."

They chatted with her, let her sit with them while they had coffee and lunch breaks and gave her little jobs to do here and there to make her feel important.

At the end of the first week, they even presented her with a pay envelope containing ten dollars.

The little girl took this home to her mother who suggested that she take her ten dollars "pay" she'd received to the bank the next day to start a savings account.

When the girl and her mom got to the bank, the teller was equally impressed and asked the little girl how she had come by her very own pay check at such a young age.

The little girl proudly replied, "I worked last week with a real construction crew building the new house next door to us."

"Oh my goodness gracious," said the teller, and will you be working on the house again this week, too?"

The little girl replied, "I will, if those as*!#!es at Home Depot ever deliver the fu*#'ng sheet rock..."

(Thanks Joe)

Fear No More

"Fear no more the heat o' the sun…"
(William Shakespeare, Cymbeline, IV, ii)

Jonte faced playtime with mixed feelings. When the bell rang, the others would rush into the open air, laughing and chattering. He felt left out. Yet these were also times he enjoyed. He could daydream about how things might have been.
Sometimes, though, he would watch the play − not directly, that would have been impossible − but on the big screen in one of the classrooms. Cheering on his friends made him feel part of the action. Even through the screens, however, watching for long often made his eyes hurt. Sunlight reflected strongly off the silvery turf, and even more from the trees around the ground. Players in motion trailed flashes of light which left black spots in his vision.
It was during a tense game that the summons came through. The shelter Principal, no less, wanted him at once in his office. Jonte uttered a mild swearword, though realising that he had already been watching too long − his head was aching. He made his way to the admin sector; signalled his arrival; and went in.
The Principal was behind his desk directly opposite the door. He was a small man, with metallic black hair cut short, silver-grey hands in constant fidgety motion, and an expression of perpetual irritation. He waved in the direction of a chair placed in front of the desk.
But to Jonte's surprise, there were several other people in the office. It was difficult at first to see them all clearly: not only had the effects of watching the match still to wear off, but the lighting was poor. Perhaps the Principal had only remembered at the last minute to close the heavy shutters and switch on a lamp.
As his vision returned, Jonte's surprise grew. The six men and two women, who sat in a half circle to one side, judging by their job tags, were senior…very senior. Four were from the administration. The two women and the other two men seemed to be scientists from different research bodies.
Jonte was used to the fact that other people were inscrutable. He would have been able tell from gazing in a mirror into his own eyes, with their blue irises surrounding dark pupils, how he was feeling, even if he hadn't known already. But other people's eyes were silver discs, giving away nothing. He could sometimes see from the rest of their faces whether they were happy or sad, smiling or frowning; but their skin reflected the light, so that he could never be quite sure. From the way they were sitting, he thought, the visitors seemed anxious.

< 2 >

"Jonte", the Principal said, "these people have a favour to ask, and I hope you can help them. Please sit down."
Jonte's surprise grew. What possible favour could these people want from someone like him?
"I'll help if I can", he said.
"You know," the Principal went on, "that you have had to grow up here because going outside would be dangerous. Your body wouldn't be able to withstand the radiation, even at night-time. Ordinary people are born with protection; but in your case…."
"So you see", one of the women interjected quickly, "you are really a very interesting young man. We want you to let us get to know you better."
"The people here," the Principal resumed, "are from the government's science and research council. They would like to take you to one of their centres in the south, where the facilities are supposed to be better than we can provide…."
"But I'm quite happy here," Jonte felt he should say. "My friends….."
"….and in any case, "the Principal insisted a trifle sourly, "you wouldn't be able to stay much longer. The shelter is being closed down."
Jonte took this in. "So when do I have to go?" he asked.
"If you can pack your things together quickly, "one of the men replied, "we should like to move you this evening…say in an hour. Is that all right?"
An hour! The suddenness of it all puzzled Jonte. His condition had been known from the moment he had been born when his parents − so he had been told − had handed him over for special care. But it also excited him. Apart from a short journey when he had been much younger to a medical centre, he could not remember ever having left the shelter. He didn't really have much to pack anyway.
"OK", he said.

*

The transporter that was to take him south was a large one, larger than anything he had been in before. Even so, there was only one other person in the closed seating section besides himself: the woman who had said she wanted to get to know him better. Looking at her in the dim lighting that came from a single small unit on the roof, he thought she must be quite old. Her slightly puffy silver-grey face was framed by precise waves of bronze hair. The tag on her suit said she was chief psychologist at the Regional Institute for Human Research.

< 3 >

"Are you all right?" she asked. "Not too upset at having to leave suddenly like this?"
Jonte shrugged. "I'm fine", he said. "Where are you taking me?"
Behind her blank eyes, the psychologist seemed to be thinking. Eventually she said: "I'm going to be open with you, Jonte. Something has come up which makes it very important for us to…to examine you, give you some tests, things like that. But don't worry. It'll all be quite painless. Even fun, perhaps," she added, smiling. "By the way, my name's Eden."
"But the medics from the centre come and test me all the time!" Jonte exclaimed, not responding to the offered name. "There can't be anything they don't know by now. Why don't you get what you want from them?" But at the same time the thought came to him that this suggestion was stupid: that wasn't at all what they really wanted. He should have known straightaway from the "being open" bit at the start.
"Oh, the tests we want to run are quite different from anything done here," Eden replied. "Besides, our facilities are much better than theirs. And I'm afraid the level of expertise in those places is extremely low compared to what it used to be. Only in centres like the Institute…."
She stopped abruptly, as both she and Jonte were jerked from their seats. The transporter seemed to swing crazily from side to side before making a sharp ninety degree turn, and then slowly overbalancing onto one side. Eden rolled into one corner. Jonte pulled himself up by one of the seats and made sure they were still sealed from the outside. Fortunately the small centre light was still working.
From the front there came sounds of shouting; then three or four muffled thumps; then nothing. Eden tried unsuccessfully to get up, so that Jonte felt he was now the one in charge.
"You OK?" he asked. "I suppose we've been in a crash or something, but it can't be too bad. I expect they'll get this thing going again quite soon."
On cue, with faint scraping sounds, the transporter began to right itself. Eden pulled herself back onto a seat, and sat for a moment gasping. Then, in a strained whisper, she told Jonte to keep as quiet and still as he could, adding: "They may not know we're here."

< 4 >

Jonte was about to object, when, all of a sudden, he caught on. They had been hijacked! This first long trip away from the shelter was turning out stranger that he could ever have imagined. He was just about to ask Eden what was really going on, when the transporter shot into motion, throwing them back against their seats. For a few minutes it travelled normally, then began to lurch and jolt about as if being driven over very rough ground. Jonte began again to ask what was happening and where she thought they were going; but the psychologist seemed not to hear. Instead she appeared in shock, gripping the sides of her seat tightly and staring straight ahead with opaque eyes.

*

The journey turned out to be a long one. After an hour of being tossed around as the transporter travelled at high speed over uneven terrain, Jonte had the impression that it had driven up a ramp and parked. Then it began to vibrate and lurch erratically from side to side. A loud, rattling engine noise came from outside.
"Oh my God!" Eden suddenly exclaimed, "they're lifting us out by helicopter!" The realisation seemed to revive her. She moved closer to where Jonte was sitting, and began talking in a rapid whisper.
"When we get there, Jonte, somehow you've got to escape. We can't let them have you. Jonte, this is terribly important. You'll have to hide until we can mount a rescue. Perhaps I should have said something earlier. As far as we know, you're the only one anywhere; and all the others want you too. I'll try and think of something."
Eden, it seemed to Jonte, had raised rather a lot of questions. He decided to ask the one he felt the most important: who were "they"?
"They could be any one of several," Eden whispered back. "In the Union, even, there are people who are acting behind our backs. Then there are the Chinese, the Latin-Americans, the Mid-East…all of them are running projects. Perhaps we'll get some idea from the time it's taken when we land."
This gave Jonte his second and third questions. "What exactly are these projects?" he asked; "and what have they to do with me?"
Instead of replying, Eden was suddenly very still. Her blank eyes were unreadable, but Jonte had the impression that she was regretting her first response. The projects, whatever they were, were meant to be secret; or at least secret from him.

< 5 >

Then he remembered Eden's earlier remark. The sudden removal from the shelter, and what had happened since, began to make sense. If it was true that he was unique, and with people after him, the administration would want to put him somewhere secure as soon as possible. But then: the only way in which he was unique, as far as he knew, was in being never able, for the whole of his life, to leave an environment shielded from the outside. And again: that had been known since his birth. So he was back to the question: why now?
For some time Jonte and Eden both remained silent, Jonte trying to work out possible answers, Eden inscrutable and unmoving. The vibrations and rattling engine noise continued to penetrate the interior of the transporter, though the lurches from side to side had stopped. Presumably they were in the air and moving forwards, though it was impossible to gain any sense of direction.
The silence between the two lasted about half an hour. By the end, Jonte had reached the conclusion that there must have been a sudden catastrophe or dramatic new discovery, with his peculiar condition significant in some way. Whatever the event was, it must have been a major one to justify what had happened. His own role, too, he realised with a mixture of sneaking pride and lurking panic, must also be major.

*

Abruptly, the transporter tilted forwards and side-to-side movements began again. Eden recovered from her apparent paralysis, and moved to Jonte's side.
"I think we're about to land," she said. "When we do, keep behind me if you can, and I'll try to find a way to get you hidden."
Jonte didn't think there was any chance of that happening. "Where do you think we are?" he asked.
"We've been just over three hours," Eden replied. "Not the Americas or China, then. Perhaps Africa; or the Mid-East; or still in the Union in the north or east."
The transporter began to level off; there was a sharp bump; the engine noise, together with the vibrations, stopped. At once the transporter began to moving again, as if being driven down a ramp. Jonte concluded that they had left the helicopter. After a short period of smooth motion, they once again began to travel over rough ground. Jonte saw Eden's eyes search the interior as if looking for a window or crack; but of course there could be no gap in the shielding. To know where they were they would have to wait until they arrived, though that place would have to be fully shielded too − that is, if whoever they were wanted Jonte alive and well.

< 6 >

At last they came to a halt. Eden moved to the rear door and signalled that Jonte should stand behind her. When the door opened, Jonte saw at once that he had been right about their destination. The transporter was inside a large, windowless, dome-shaped hanger, the only lighting provided by suspended neon strips. Three men faced them, one carrying a hand-gun of some kind, another a large reel of adhesive tape. The third silently beckoned Eden. It was possible they had not yet noticed Jonte behind her.
Shouting "Run and hide…now!" Eden launched herself at the man with the gun. She did not even reach the ground before being struck by what turned out to be a taser. Jonte stood still at the open door of the transporter, and looked down at the men. All three had metallic grey European faces, close-cropped metallic copper hair and were wearing nondescript over-suits without identity panels or other markings.
The third man silently signalled to Jonte to leave the transporter, pointing first to the man with the taser and then the crumpled figure of Eden on the ground. The message was clear enough. Jonte lowered himself from the rear of the transporter and turned to take a better look at where he had arrived. He was virtually certain that no immediate harm would come to him − not, at least, from the three in the welcoming party − given the trouble taken to get him there.
He was only partly right. His hands were quickly taped behind his back, a loop placed round his neck, and another strip attached to it like a dog-lead. Two of the men then led him to a doorway at the other side of the hanger, while the third, Jonte could just see, was taping Eden's arms to her side and hobbling her legs at the ankle.
Jonte and his escort reached the door, which one of them opened. The other went though, pulling Jonte after him.

*

As he quickly looked around, Jonte's first impression was that the room they had entered was vaguely familiar: rather like the medical centre to which he had been taken some years before. After a moment's thought, however, Jonte realised that this was bound to be the case. If Eden had not been entirely deceitful, both the authority she belonged to and its competitors wanted him in order to carry out some kind of medical research.

< 7 >

Still without saying a word, the third man led Jonte through an archway into a weakly-lit passage, turned to another door, opened it, and signalled that Jonte should go through. He did so; and at once his lead was slipped, the tapes round his neck and hands swiftly cut, and the door closed behind him. He hardly needed to confirm that it was also locked.
Looking round, Jonte saw that the room was much like his study/bedroom at the shelter − but of superior quality. Besides a bed and washing area there was a comfortable-looking easy chair and a low table; and one wall was almost entirely taken up with a video screen, almost as large as the ones in the shelter classrooms. A recess held a water spigot and a glass, besides a bowl of the specially-grown, unmodified fruit which Jonte had until now only experienced as special treat. This was not, Jonte realized, a randomly-chosen prison cell. It had been prepared − and that must have been some time in advance − for just him.
How did such long-term planning fit in with the abrupt move to get him away from the shelter, and his guess that people were after him as a result of some unexpected event?

*

The next few hours brought no answers. Nor did the next few days. One of his three captors would silently bring his meals at appropriate times. At first, he had expected that the large screen would quickly provide him with information; but when he switched it on all he received were instruction videos in his own language, hardly different from those he would have been seeing back in class. Once, he had been told, it had been possible to access many hundreds of channels, sounds and pictures too, sent out from anywhere in the world and without cable connections. The radiation had ended that. Communications were now quite difficult − almost, he had heard, at the level of the telegraph systems existing two or three hundred years before.
Remembering what he had learned on the journey, he expected at any moment to be taken for medical examination. Nothing happened. As the days passed he began to feel in need of some different surroundings, and also some company apart from the three silent men. What, he wondered, had happened to Eden?

< 8 >

This started as a casual thought. Bit by bit, though, it grew into something more: a question to which he really wanted to know the answer, and then a plan of action. Instead of spending day after day in one room, following school courses for anything better to do, he would get out somehow and find the psychologist. She would be able to go out into the open, and find out exactly where they were. Then they could work out how to get home.
The best way to escape, Jonte thought, was to make sure that the door could be unlocked after he had been brought a meal. He knew a trick with a piece of cloth and a fork or knife which worked on the simple locks on cupboard and bathroom doors in the shelter. Fortunately the lock to his present room was virtually identical.
He decided to try out his plan on the next day as soon as breakfast had been delivered − the trick was to insert the cloth before the door was fully closed. Nobody would be coming again until lunchtime.

*

Jonte looked through the archway; and then back down the passage in the other direction. It led to a dead-end. However, opposite his own room, from which he had escaped without difficulty was a second door of much the same type. Jonte tried the handle, but it was locked. If he was not going to be trapped, he would have to risk the medical centre.
Then he heard a sound coming from behind the door. He put his eye to the keyhole and pulled back in surprise: a silver eye was about to look through from the other side. A quiet voice said: "Jonte, is that you?" Then "yes, I can see it is."
He had found Eden at the first attempt!
"Are you all right? Can you get me out?" Eden went on.
"I'm OK," Jonte replied. "But I don't think I can open the door." Then, after a pause, he realized he needed the answers to some questions of his own.
"Do you know where we are?" he whispered. "And why are they keeping us locked up? I thought you said they were going to do tests on me; but all I've had so far is school work."

< 9 >

"Listen," said Eden rapidly, "this is important. We're in the Ukraine. They let me have some medical things with writing on the packaging. So we're still in the Union. They seem to be using you as a hostage to get whatever it is they want, and I'm supposed to contact the authorities and put terms to them."
"What should I do?" Jonte asked.
There was a pause before Eden replied. "I think the best thing," she eventually said, "is for you not to do anything rash. I'm going to agree to get in touch with council headquarters; and if I can let them know roughly where we are they may be able to send a rescue team."
To Jonte, this did not seem very heroic. His first thought had been somehow to steal a transporter and find help − admitted, he had no idea how to drive; wouldn't, in any case, be able to sit in an un-shuttered driving cab; and didn't speak a word of Ukrainian. Then a second thought came to him: he had only a few hours either to hide or escape, because the man coming to deliver his lunch and take away his breakfast tray would discover that he wasn't there. He could, or course, go back. But what would happen when they found the door unlocked?

*

Jonte cautiously slipped through the arch into the medical examination room. Opposite was the door leading to the domed hangar. At either end of the room were two more doors, both shut, but with glass panels to see through. In the room itself were various pieces of equipment, some display screens and terminals together with a couch and racks of bottles, boxes and small instruments.
Jonte decided to see what was beyond the doors with the glass panels. He tiptoed to the one on the left and looked through; then immediately retreated in alarm. Beyond the door he had seen what seemed to be a small conference or dining room, and had caught a glimpse of about ten people sitting round an oblong table. That was not the main reason he had run back, however. The room had been lit, not by the artificial lighting he was used to, but by direct sunlight coming through an un-shuttered window.
He crept to the door on the right. Beyond was another passage leading to a further door. The passage was lit by low-power bulb; but the light coming from under the far door was too bright to be artificial. There was no way out for him there.

< 10 >

That left the hangar, and the possibility of, perhaps, stowing away in a shielded transporter. This time, his luck was in: beyond the hangar door it was pitch dark. There was still time before lunch, he calculated, to talk again with Eden, and perhaps work out some joint plan. If it hadn't been for the fact they would find him missing at lunch-time he could even have told her how to get out when her own meal was delivered.
Then a solution occurred to him. He went back through the arch and tapped on Eden's door.

*

Once again in his own room, Jonte sat with a dry mouth and the sound of his heartbeat loud in his head. The odds, he told himself, were mathematically 50:50. But his instincts told him they were probably better: they would serve Eden first. As the usual time for lunch approached. Jonte put his ear to the door. The sound of footsteps drew near and at first appeared to stop just outside. Had he lost the gamble? But then Jonte heard the key turning in the door opposite. If Eden could carry out the trick with the cloth and a knife, they would have a few minutes to get home free.
The footsteps receded down the corridor. There was a click. Jonte opened his door and stepped into the corridor to see Eden there on the other side. Rapidly he led through the arch and across the still deserted examination room to the door leading to the hangar.
Then it all began to go wrong. Jonte confidently pushed the door wide open; but, instead of darkness, bright light from the suspended neon strips illuminated the entire hangar. Beside the parked transporter a group of men were sitting on a bench, eating. Worse: in probably less than a minute the man with Jonte's lunch would appear. Going back to their own rooms would involve explaining why they were unlocked. They had only seconds to take the remaining option: the door to the second corridor.
They listened as footsteps delivered Jonte's lunch, discovered that he was not in his room and ran back to report. There was a rush of other footsteps, and a short while later a loud shout, as − presumably − Eden was also found to be missing. They probably had only a minute or two before someone thought to look where they were hiding.

< 11 >

"I suppose you'd better get out," Jonte said miserably. "There's nowhere I can go now except back to my room. Do you think they'd believe me if I said I'd been hiding under the bed?"
"No," Eden said. "Not when I'm missing too." Then: "besides, you must come with me. I can contact the Council office in Kiev, and they should be able to locate us before we're caught."
Jonte looked at Eden in disbelief. As soon as there was no shielding from the sun's radiation he would quickly fall ill, and probably die within days. Wasn't that what all this was about?
"But, Eden, you know I can't!" he cried out
All Eden replied, though, was: "Trust me". Turning, she grasped the lever-handle of the door at the corridor's end; pushed it down; and pulled the door open. Raw sunlight poured in. He threw his arms over his eyes and sank to the floor. Was Eden trying to kill him?
The psychologist seemed unruffled. She bent down, put her hands under Jonte's shoulders and lifted him to his feet.
"Here, swallow these," she said, handing Jonte three pink, oval pills. "They'll keep you safe for a time. I'm afraid I've no water, so you'll just have to get them down without." After nearly choking on the first, Jonte managed to swallow all three.
"Now keep your arms over your eyes," Eden said, steering him through the open door. "In a while, though, you'll be able to take them away"
Jonte staggered forward into what he knew must be the outside. He could feel the heat of what must be direct sunlight on his head and hands, and waited for the expected harmful effects to strike. How long before he burned up, or fell unconscious; or died?
"Try to keep moving as fast as possible," Eden said, pulling him along by one arm. "We're going to turn right. Then we need to get over a fence, and make for some trees. See if you can look directly now."
Jonte risked opening his eyes and glancing between his arms. They were on a path beside the wall of a building, the corner of which they immediately rounded. Ahead was the promised wire fence − fortunately a low one − and beyond a strip of silver field and then some woodland, which sparkled in metallic greens and polished copper as the leaves moved in the breeze. It looked very much like the countryside round the shelter which he had seen through the screens.

< 12 >

By the time they reached the fence Jonte risked lowering his arms completely, and was able to get over without difficulty. Eden still held on to him as they ran across the field, but let go as soon as they reached the cover of the trees. They kept going for some minutes to get completely out of sight, then stopped for a rest.
Eden said: "It's time I told you the truth."

*

"I'm sure you've been taught about the environmental crisis of the mid-twenty-first century," said Eden: "the floods, the storms and so on. But the worst, of course, was what no-one had predicted: the rise in solar radiation. At first they thought it would be enough to build huge shelters, or go underground; but that didn't deal with the dying of the forests, the grass, the animals − in fact practically the whole of the natural environment."
"I've often wondered," Jonte broke in "what would have happened if they hadn't made the changes."
"We would have become extinct," Eden replied shortly. "It's been calculated that nothing would have survived much above the level of bacteria."
Both remained silent for a moment. Jonte hadn't realized until then how enormous a problem the people then had faced.
"Fortunately", Eden went on, "the science of biotechnology was making great progress at the time; and you know what was done. In a single generation, not just human beings, but plants and animals too, were genetically engineered to live with the higher radiation. It worked for most species − though not all" she added, more to herself than to Jonte. "Actually, we probably lost more than half the biosphere."
They had reached the crucial question.
"Why hasn't it work for me?" Jonte asked.
Eden paused again for several seconds before replying. "We don't know," she eventually said.
"Perhaps you've wondered, Jonte," she went on, "why everyday things we use like video-screens and transporters are much the same as those you read about in history books? They're not. They're worse, a lot worse. The Great Crisis caused huge disruption, and resources had to be put into saving our and other species. Did you know men were about to build a settlement on the moon then, and even travel to the planet Mars? That had to be abandoned. So did practically every other attempt at progress in science or technology."

< 13 >

"And now, it seems", Eden concluded with a trace of bitterness, "we've gone backwards. We can recreate the original vegetation and most animals from seeds and zoos. But we can't sequence the human genome any more, let alone change it!"
"Why do you need to?" said Jonte.
"Why do you think I let you come out here in the open?" Eden responded. "Why do you think every science centre in the world wants you? It's been kept from you in case you tried to leave the shelter."
"Because the radiation is dropping, of course; in fact has dropped so suddenly and so fast that it may soon be back to where it was before the Crisis. In that case, we'll all be freaks, hopelessly unsuited to the environment. That is, all except you, Jonte − you and your DNA."

*

Jonte found the walking among the trees an amazing experience. Though he had of course seen scenes like it on the screens, they were nothing compared to the reality. He could hear birds calling from among the branches, and even saw a couple, their varicoloured metallic wings catching the sunlight that filtered down. If it was really safe for him now, he thought he wouldn't mind staying outside.
After no more than ten minutes' walk, however, they came to the other edge of the woodland. Looking out, Jonte saw a complex of single-storey buildings on the other side of a sloping field, with more trees beyond. Several small transporters were parked along access roads, and every now and again someone emerged from one of the buildings to cross over into another.
"I need to find a terminal quickly and contact Kiev," Eden told Jonte. "You stay here and wait. It shouldn't take long if I can make them understand. Then I'm afraid you'll have to get back into a shelter: even with the radiation lower and the pills, you shouldn't be outside for more than an hour or so."
Leaving the cover of the trees, she quickly crossed the field and went to a side entrance to the nearest of the buildings. The door opened and she disappeared inside.
After about half an hour, Jonte began to get anxious. Even with the language problem, it couldn't take that long to get the use of a terminal; and then, surely, she would come back or at least signal him to join her? After an hour his anxiety had grown considerably. He began to wonder what he should do: stay where he was as Eden had said, or go down and find her?

< 14 >

Another half an hour passed. The sun he had feared so much was falling below the horizon − a sight he watched, for the first time, in some awe − and it was beginning to get both colder and darker. Artificial lights began to come on in some of the buildings below. He had already been outside more than double the time that Eden had said was safe.
Crouching down where he could behind tussocks of silvery grass, now turning black in the dusk, he made his way cautiously over the field to the nearest building. The side door was half-open, with light coming from inside, and Jonte flattened himself against the wall next to it to listen. He heard nothing. Leaving the wall, he pulled the door fully open, and went inside. A man was standing only a few feet away.
"Welcome back," said the Principal.

*

In the Principal's study, Jonte sat looking out of the now only half-shuttered window. He had been out there only a few minutes before, looking down at the shelter without recognizing it; but, of course, he had never seen it from the outside before. The Principal, on the other hand, had been able to see him coming without difficulty − and, of course, Eden coming before him.
"You have caused a lot of trouble," the Principal said. "And that psychologist has been criminally irresponsible. We shall have to give you a thorough medical examination as soon as possible."
"Is Eden all right?" asked Jonte.
"As well as can be expected," replied the Principal curtly.
"And what's going on? Why all this?" Jonte continued.
The Principal's silver-grey hands, which had been lying twitching on the desk in front of him, became even more agitated.
"Do you think I was going to allow those people down there to take all the credit?" he said, as much to the room as to Jonte. "When it's me, my team here, who have brought you up, provided your special food, studied you, done all the basic research? I suppose you know now what the situation is. We're about to save the human race − and they want to close us down!"
The Principal hands sank back to desk and he appeared to calm down.
"You're bright," he resumed. "No doubt you've worked out by now what happened".

< 15 >

Jonte had. The long journey in the transporter and the helicopter had been intended to convince him that they had taken him somewhere far away, whereas it had merely circled back to where they had started. But why?
Then the answer came to him. He wasn't the one who needed to be deceived. The long journey had been for Eden's benefit. Once she was convinced they were in the Ukraine, she would get a message through asking for help. No-one would guess that he, Jonte, was back near the shelter.
Jonte said what he had deduced.
"Nearly," the Principal replied. "Actually there was no helicopter. We couldn't have got hold of one anyway. But we did find an old training machine that would simulate being in one; that and a noisy engine." For the first time Jonte could remember, the Principal smiled.
"So now, while the authorities are scouring the Ukraine − yes, we arranged for your psychologist friend to get off a message before she guessed where she was − I shall be left in peace to complete the project," he said. "If we could only get the equipment, it would be a matter of just months."
"What if you can't?" said Jonte.
This time the Principal did not reply. Instead he pressed a button on his desk, and one of the school assistants, a woman whom Jonte recognized, came into the study.
"I think it would be best if you went back to your old room now," the Principal said. "Hanna here will take you."
It was not until he had been lying in his bed for about an hour than Jonte began to feel sick.

*

He knew immediately that he was back in the medical centre from the smell. Looking round, he recognized the room from which he and Eden had escaped, it seemed to him, only hours before. The room was now full of people: three doctors whom he recognized, two of the men who had served him meals, two nurses….he looked for Eden, but she was not there. He found that was loosely tied down to the couch and that a tube was feeding something into his right arm.
Jonte remembered waking up in the night with a bad headache, and then throwing up violently while trying to reach the washbasin. He had then slept badly and been sick twice more before the normal waking time. He had tried to get up, but had felt disorientated and weak. The last he remembered after that was falling backwards as he pulled open the study/bedroom door.

< 16 >

The doctors, together at one end of the room, were arguing. One of the nurses noticed that Jonte was awake and quickly came to the side of the couch.
"How do you feel?" she said to Jonte; and then to the doctors: "He's round at last."
Jonte felt terrible, but said feebly: "OK, I think. What happened?"
"You passed out," one of the doctors replied, checking Jonte's pulse and smiling. "Don't worry; you probably ate something that doesn't agree with you. You'll be all right."
The other two doctors, however, were not smiling. One looked very angry.
"Wouldn't it be better to face the truth, Komar?" the angry one said, his voice loud enough for Jonte to hear clearly. "Good God, this is radiation sickness! No-one's treated a case like this for more than a century. Have you any idea what to do?"
"The first thing is for you to be quiet!" the first doctor replied in a harsh whisper. "We can handle this if we keep our heads."
The third doctor gave a discordant laugh. "If we can't, we'll certainly lose them," he added.
"Let's discuss this outside," the first doctor responded; and all three went through into the meeting room.
Jonte had heard enough to know that he was in very bad trouble. For his whole life it had been drummed into him that going outside could prove fatal, and he had always taken care never even to go into a room unless the windows were heavily shuttered. Until the day before. Why had Eden done it? Why had he believed her? To his shame, he found himself beginning to cry.

*

Jonte was not sure how long it was before open dispute broke out. He still felt sick and weak, and remained tied down. Doctors and nurses came and went, and from time to time angry shouting came from the meeting room. Suddenly there was a commotion in the passage from which he had left the building, and one of the doctors and a nurse were violently pushed back into the room. Following them were the two men who had been there earlier; and following them, the Principal.
"I'm taking over here," the Principal announced. "There will be no question of calling in any outside help."
The doctor − the one who had laughed − got up from the floor.

< 17 >

"And what will you tell them when Jonte dies?" he asked the Principal.
"Jonte will not die," the Principal replied. "Dr. Komar assures me he can handle it."
"If Dr. Komar told you that," the other said, "he's a bigger fool than I thought."
So that's it, Jonte said to himself. Everything about being special and being able to help save humanity is fantasy. Between them, the Principal and Eden have condemned me to death.
He felt a new rush of tears coming.
And then chaos broke out. There was a loud explosion behind the door leading to the hangar, some gunfire, and an amplified voice demanding that arms be laid down. Simultaneously the door to the meeting room burst open, and the angry doctor, accompanied by two orderlies, came in.
Behind them came Eden. Her silver-grey face was no longer puffy, but gaunt and streaked with dirt, and her bronze hair was dishevelled. At the same time she seemed somehow younger and more forceful. She went up to the Principal.
"You are despicable!" she told him. "How did you think you could get away with keeping Jonte to yourself? You've got no equipment and no proper staff here. You could have damned us all. Fortunately this doctor had the good sense to let me contact the authorities."
She turned to Jonte. "How are you doing?" she asked.
Jonte looked at her through his tears. "I'm going to die," he said. "Because you took me outside".
The room suddenly filled with more people: military personnel in helmets, a number of those whom he had first seen in the Principal's study before the journey. Everything seemed to have turned out well…except that he was dying.
"Nonsense," said Eden. "You'll be perfectly all right once the effect of the pills wears off. I'm sorry you had to go through all this; but it was our insurance."
"Which worked just as well here as it would have in the Ukraine," she added, turning to the Principal. "Even better, in fact. − your people have no idea what radiation sickness is actually like, do they?"
"On this occasion," she added, with an apologetic half-smile in the direction of the doctor who had come with her, "Dr. Komar's diagnosis was quite correct."

*

Jonte was extremely surprised to find that he would be staying in the shelter for at least a time. Eden − who appeared to be a great deal more important than mere chief psychologist at the Regional Institute for Human Research − explained that an inter-regional agreement had been reached to provide samples of his DNA to every research centre working on the retro problem. It wouldn't hurt at all: as little as a hair or a swab of saliva from him would do.

< 18 >

Meanwhile it would probably be better for him to continue his education where he was, where his special needs could be met and among people he knew. The Principal and a number of others would be gone; but the teachers and, of course, his contemporaries, had not been involved.
Jonte felt a little let down. And then the thought came to him that at least he would be able to get outside with the others at playtime. He wouldn't need to watch every game through the screens any more. Was it possible he might even be able to join in…?

Weight Loss Plan

A man calls a company and orders their 5-day, 10 lb. weight loss program.

The next day, there's a knock on the door and there stands before him a voluptuous, athletic, 19 year old babe dressed in nothing but a pair of Nike running shoes and a sign around her neck.

She introduces herself as a representative of the weight loss company.

The sign reads, "If you can catch me, you can have me."

Without a second thought, he takes off after her.

A few miles later huffing and puffing, he finally gives up.

The same girl shows up for the next four days and the same thing happens.

On the fifth day, he weighs himself and is delighted to find he has lost 10 lbs. as promised.

He calls the company and orders their 5-day/20 pound program.

The next day there's a knock at the door and there stands the most stunning and beautiful woman he has ever seen in his life.

She is wearing nothing but Reebok running shoes and a sign around her neck that reads, "If you catch me you can have me."

Well, he's out the door after her like a shot.

This girl is in excellent shape and he does his best, but no such luck.

So for the next four days, the same routine happens with him gradually getting in better and better shape.

Much to his delight on the fifth day when he weighs himself, he discovers that he has lost another 20 lbs. as promised.

He decides to go for broke and calls the company to order the 7-day/50 pound program.

"Are you sure?" asks the representative on the phone. "This is our most rigorous program."

"Absolutely," he replies, "I haven't felt this good in years."

The next day there's a knock at the door; and when he opens it he finds a huge muscular guy standing there wearing nothing but pink running shoes and a sign around his neck that reads,"If I catch you, you are mine!!!"

He lost 63 pounds that week.

(Thanks Barbie)

Lizard Boy

"You know how, like, if a lizard surrenders its tail it'll grow a new one? Well it works both ways."
I laughed. "If a tail surrenders its lizard?"
"No, of course not. If a tail … How could that happen? Shut up and listen a minute."
Jimmy left a pause to see if I would fill it. When I didn't and he was sure he had my fullest attention, he said, "The lizard grows a new one in, like, five days or something. Well, the tail grows a new lizard."
"Well I said …"
"So if an animal, like that cat, attacks and forces the lizard to surrender its tail, it actually makes two lizards. If the cat doesn't eat the tail or scratch it up or anything."
There wasn't a thing about roaches and snakes and spiders and lizards and all that kind of thing that Jimmy didn't think he knew all about.
We were standing over the desk in his room looking down at the lizard tail that wasn't moving anymore. I had found it in a deserted lot just five minutes ago, the cat who always hung out there standing next to it and looking — I think, though Jimmy says I must be mental — sheepish and slightly peeved about losing out on a snack. The tail was grey and not so long, only four inches or so, but it had caught my eye because it had been moving so violently. At first I had thought it was a worm, but on closer examination it clearly wasn't. So I had picked it up and ran to Jimmy's place to show him. I could feel it wiggling in the bowl I had made from my hands, but the dancing was slowing, winding down. I really wanted Jimmy to see it moving, otherwise he would say something like, "Mickey, you're full of it. Dancing." Jimmy always did that when he didn't believe you, repeat something you said in that tone. Dancing.
But Jimmy had believed it, said he'd seen it before himself and had kept it, but his mother had thrown it out.
We were still looking down at it. I said, "It looks in pretty good shape to me. I don't think the cat bothered with it much."

< 2 >

"Maybe. That cat's a lazy little B."
Jimmy was always saying that – B. He said it was cooler than using the full word. I knew it was because his mother would wallop him one if she heard him cussing.
I said, "I saw him catch a mouse once, a big one."
"Yeah, fat and slow," Jimmy said.
We both watched the lizard tail for a while, but it didn't twitch again.
I said, "So let's keep it and grow a lizard."
"Why bother?"
"So then, when it's a fully grown lizard," I was thinking as I went along here, "we can scare it into releasing its tail, then grow another one, then we'll have two."
"What'a we need two lizards for, Mickey, you dumb B?"
"Then we can scare them and get four lizards, then eight, then sixteen …"
"What, you want a lizard army? Give them little helmets and boots and stuff? Then eight, then sixteen."
"No, no. But I bet we can sell them at school. Right? I don't know how much, but I bet we can."
Jimmy looked down at his shoes and thought about it. He always looked down at his shoes when he had to think about something, as if he had the answers written on them. I looked — he didn't. I don't know what he did when he wasn't wearing any.
"Okay," he said, "let's do it. But at your house. We'll never get away with it here."
We put the tail in a yogurt pot Jimmy's mother had cleaned out and left by the sink to dry before she added it to the others she kept under the sink and would someday find a use for. Then we took it to my house and my room. My mother had me on a kind of honour system where I could pretty much do what I wanted within reason, but would risk virtual imprisonment if I screwed up too bad. Breeding lizards had never been discussed at family meetings, so I decided it was a grey area and she would probably never know about it anyway if I put the tail in the gap between my bed and desk, hidden from the doorway.
I saw an empty glass on the desk and said, "Do you think we should give it water or something? Some food?"

< 3 >

Jimmy looked at me with his brows knitted. "Is it going to eat with its backside? When it grows a backside. Food. But maybe some water, though. With this kind of thing, you always have to think of nature. Like, if this tail was out in nature and not in your house, would it get water?"
"Depends on the season. In winter a lot, in summer …"
"Exactly. But lizards are summer creatures, right? So just pour a little water on it, like every two or three days. Just a little. That should do it."
And so we were all ready to grow a lizard. We spent a long time — about ten minutes or so — watching the tail, but it failed to grow in that time so we went outside to hunt for more lizards without success. Then my mother came home, then Jimmy's mother called my house to get Jimmy to go home and I was left with the tail in a yogurt pot on my floor.
The summer holiday stretched out in front of Jimmy and me like it always does at the beginning. The best feeling in the world. Days and days of essential nothingness with a few day trips and mandatory family visits thrown in. We killed most of those few weeks — they seem so short now — enjoying ourselves by simply being free. No school or homework and none of the politics of the school ground. Of course, every day started and ended with a measuring of the tail. We made up a chart to plot its progress and ensure we watered it regularly, twice a week. Every day we measured it and every day nothing had happened but the tail had turned a duller shade of grey. Even when we increased the watering it had still dried out by the next time we checked on it again.
On the last day that we had the tail disappointment had reached the peak that only a young child can know. It was the weekend and Jimmy's mother was visiting mine and the tail had actually shrunk. Five weeks had passed. In the kitchen, we could hear our mothers chattering away about nothing of anything — or so it always seemed to us — and we were stood over the desk, the tail now hard and leathery, starting to curl. We had a ruler laid out and the tail positioned along it, curling back into its shape after I had straightened it.

< 4 >

I said to Jimmy, "I thought you said it would only take five days. Didn't you say that?"
"No, actually, if you remember, I said it took the lizard five days to grow back its tail, not the tail five days to grow back its lizard. You got it the wrong way around."
"Still, it's shrinking, Jimmy. It's never been smaller."
"It takes time is all."
"You don't know what you're talking about is all."
"Shut up, Mickey. You're the one doesn't know anything about anything. Dumb B."
"You always make out like you know everything about everything, but this lizard thing is stupid. It's not going to grow. It's dead."
"Stupid. Stupid, says the guy who's had it next to his bed for the whole summer. If I'm so stupid then why did you keep it?"
Our voices were getting loud now. I made a conscious decision to cool it down before our mothers came in. I said, "Just throw it out, Jimmy. It's not going to grow."
"S'your house and your tail, the way I see it. You throw it out."
"Fine."
I picked up the tail and started over to the open window, ready to throw the thing down into the bushes. Jimmy's hand on my shoulder stopped me and he said, "You don't know it's not gonna grow. Put it back."
"No!"
I pulled away from him, the tail held out in front of me, not even swinging as I went it was so stiff. Then Jimmy was on me, his hands gripping into my arms and pulling me back. I pulled one arm free and spun round and pushed into him, all my disappointment fermented into that consuming red rage you can get when you're a kid. We were both pushing away at each other and Jimmy feinted and rammed his shoulder into my chest, sending me down to the floor, momentum carrying him after me. He landed heavily on me and I was suddenly aware that I didn't have the tail anymore, didn't even know where it was.
Jimmy was trying to pin my arms down with his knees and I was trying to outmaneuver him. I saw his face for the first time since this stupid fight began and I saw that he was as angry and red raged as I was. It came as a shock and I still don't know if it was because he was a mirror to my own ugly rage or the fact that, being a kid, I had never really understood that other people had the same feelings and urges and impulses that I had, that I wasn't totally special and unique and the center of everything. I think I grew up a year or two right then.

< 5 >

He had my right arm pinned at the wrist now and the pain just gave me all the more strength to swing with my left, catching him in the gut as I yelled, "Get off me, you stupid bastard!"
Jimmy rolled off and froze for a second, that word, in its entirety, throwing him off. Then he was clutching his stomach with one hand and steadying himself on the floor with the other as he kicked at me, getting in a few good shots, too.
All I could hear was my own panting breath, and somewhere, a million miles away, Jimmy's. But then there was an almighty crashing sound and we both froze and looked up. My mother and Jimmy's mother were standing in the doorway, my mother with her hand on the door knob that she had just used to swing my door all the way open so it banged my desk. Her other hand was at her side, making a fist. Jimmy's mother was going for the more traditional hands on hips look.
All four of us were frozen for a time, the parents staring at their child with that cold kind of burning every mother perfects at some kind of school or something; and both us kids staring back at our respective parent with that rabbity look where you're wondering just how mad she is.
Then all of a sudden a burst of movement — both parents lurching forward and grabbing their child and Jimmy and I trying to stand our ground (and failing) to save face.
Then came the volley of words as the mothers started in with their obligatory What do you think you're playing at? and You say sorry right now. Funny how mothers always make their child take the blame. Kind of backwards when you think about it. As a child you're always thinking of things like that.
I heard Jimmy say, "He called me a stupid bastard!" And I saw his mother clip him round the ear as she said, "How many times have I told you not to say that word?"
For my part, I was telling my mother how Jimmy had started it and how I had had my back turned and about just how stupid he was.

< 6 >

The mothers looked at each other, silent communication passed between them — another thing they must have learned at that school — and they nodded. Then Jimmy's mother was dragging him by one arm out of the room, Jimmy barely able to keep up while trying to face me to give me one of the scowls he was so proud of. When we made eye contact, I stuck my tongue out at him, and he cried, "He stuck his tongue out at me!" His mother pulled even harder and he nearly flew as I pulled myself away enough from my own mother to hold his eye with my tongue out. He did it back and I shouted, "Don't stick your tongue out at me!" Jimmy's mother gave him another one round the ear and they were gone. I heard the front door slam and then there was silence.
My mother broke it, shouting at me some more, but I don't remember any of it because I was looking at the tail on the floor. When she had exhausted her stock of reprimands — and she was amply stocked — she told me I was to stay in my room for the rest of the day with no supper and maybe that would teach me how to treat guests. Once she had left and slammed the door as the final exclamation point on her disappointment, I bent over for the tail. Finding my stomach too sore, I bent at the knees, picked it up and put it back in the yogurt pot. Then I put the pot back in the gap between my bed and the desk and dropped a few drops of water onto it from my fingers.
I spent the last week of the summer holiday mostly on my own or with my mother. By the morning after the fight she had mostly forgiven me, but she had that kind of forced normality where you know there is another shouting-at just waiting for the chance to jump out at you.
For the first couple of days I managed to hold onto my anger at Jimmy, but by the third it was hard to maintain and I found myself bored and wishing I wasn't alone. Life was never boring with Jimmy. When the doorbell chimed or the phone rang I was on my feet to answer, but it was always a salesman or one of my mother's friends or something else of no interest at all to a young boy.

< 7 >

I spent a good deal of time watching the lizard tail, though I knew I was wasting my time. I guess I just wanted to be sure I had been justified in calling Jimmy a stupid bastard. Those were strong words to just be throwing around without good cause and I wanted to assure myself that I was the one in the right. No doubt Jimmy was doing the same thing.
The summer holidays ended and it was back to school; that awful feeling when you wake up and realize and for just a moment you're able to cling onto the hope that it's all a dream, until the sun creeping around your curtains and your mother standing over your bed, yanking your blanket away, makes horrible reality crash home.
I walked alone to school, keeping an eye out for Jimmy — we usually walked together — unsure what I would do should I see him. I decided on a plan of catching up to him and just carrying on as normal, as if there were no lizard tails or bad words in the world. But I didn't see him. I did see some other kids from my class, but didn't go up to them. I didn't really know them.
When I got to school and into the classroom, Jimmy was already there at his seat. My seat was at the next table (Teacher had separated us long ago) and I took it, making a show of ignoring Jimmy when I realized that that was what he was doing to me. Jimmy had a temper on him like I've never known. That boy could hold a grudge for his whole life.
I could see him muttering with the boy seated next to him, George, and felt a horrible feeling when George looked up at me and laughed before returning to his huddle with Jimmy. Jimmy was good with other kids, for a while anyway. It wouldn't take long for his bossiness and that tone of voice he used to ostracise him. I was never good at making friends — I was always so conscious of saying the right thing that I said the wrong thing, or the right thing but all wrong, with the wrong tone and inflection.

< 8 >

Soon all the kids were in their seats and Teacher came in and quieted the post-summer hum of What did you do's and You'll never believe what I saw's. School was back. And then I noticed all the other kids had pieces of paper and notebooks in front of them and I had that horrible sinking feeling — homework was back, too, and I hadn't done it. I had put it off until the last minute like I always did, and had been so caught up in the whole lizard thing and the fight with Jimmy that I had forgotten all about it.
Teacher went around collecting up the work as I frantically looked around for someone else with nothing in front of them and that cold, panicked look on their face. And I found it — George looking around like I was, hoping to see someone else in the same boat as he was. I heard a familiar voice: "I forgot. You had all summer. I was busy." Followed by a short and sharp, "Shut up, Jimmy."
Teacher came to my table and took up everyone's work and held her hand out at me. She could see I didn't have it. The mean old witch just wanted to make me say it in front of everyone. I did and she acted surprised and disappointed, making a real show of it. She said, "Mr. Parker, you've had all summer to do your report. Everyone else has done it, so I don't see why you should be the exception. Go on, to Mr. Johnson's office with you."
I saw it coming and was glad when it did. Being sent to Mr. Johnson was far better than having to spend any more time with Teacher. You're supposed to be scared of going to the big man's office, it's like they're training you for when you have to get a job, but Mr. Johnson was one of those that didn't subscribe to the whole shouting business. Instead he would always ask you why you didn't do your homework, or why you pushed that other kid, and then he would explain why it was wrong and then quiz you. As long as you looked regretful and gave back more or less the same words he had given to you in his explanation, you were fine with Mr. Johnson. Being sent to him also meant having to sit down outside his office, in the corridor next to his secretary's office, and wait. And waiting meant not being in class.

< 9 >

I got up and pushed my chair in to avoid a ticking off from Teacher, then walked out of the classroom, feeling everyone's eyes on me and hearing the little titters from the girls that you always get when someone is being punished. I could never understand the girls in my class — what was so funny about everything? Why all the whispering?
I went into see Ms. Chamberlain, the secretary, in her office, and reported why I was there. She gave me that thin-lipped look she always gave no matter why you were there and told me to sit on one of the chairs. Soon, George came along and spoke to Ms. Chamberlain. He said, "I'm here because Mrs. Banks said I look sick, I need a note for my mother."
I always wondered what would happen if you lied. I never tried it. Turns out Ms. Chamberlain had somehow learned some of the same powers that mothers have. She said, "Don't you even try that with me, George Smith. It won't wash here. First day back and already I'm dealing with you. Take a seat and wait your turn."
George sat next to me and scowled back at Ms. Chamberlain who was already busy with some papers. We sat there in silence for a moment or two. George turned to me and said, sotto voce, "Jimmy told me he told you that lizard tails grow new lizards."
I didn't know what to say so I said nothing and looked at my shoes.
"And he said that you said you believed him and wanted to make a lizard army. Or something like that."
I looked at George and he was smiling, not a nice and friendly smile, more like the smile a boy gets when he's taunting another, almost a giddy anticipation of cruelties to come.
"He said your new name should be Lizard Boy."
"That's not true," I said. "Jimmy believed that, too."
"So you did believe it then, Lizard Boy?"
That wasn't my name so I ignored the comment and just then I was called in, anyway. Mr. Johnson did his usual pause-filled question and answer session and sent me on my way once I had convinced him of just how sorry I was. He really was a pushover. Walking back into the classroom, I once again felt all the stares of my peers, but this time I thought I could hear something whispered by one of the girls, followed by the usual giggles. I could have sworn I heard Lizard Boy.

< 10 >

By lunchtime it had gotten worse. As I stood in the queue, David Kenneth and his little gang, and Robert Johnson and his rival gang, and Jane Dennis and her boy-hating gang, all called "Lizard Boy" to me. I saw Jimmy off in a corner with his new best friend, George, smiling. I wasn't that hungry anyway, so I decided to skip lunch and go straight outside to sit under the big tree out there, out of the sun, and just watch the world go by until the bell.
I was the first kid out so I had that great feeling you get when you have a whole place to yourself. Soon, though, others started to come out and that ruined my reverie. I saw Jimmy come out, George with him, acting like a lizard. Jimmy seemed to think he was pretty funny, but George was looking a little irritated already.
As I sat there, nice and cool in the shade, a couple of girls came over with their skip rope. When they saw me they whispered between themselves, then one of them stage-shrieked and pointed. "Ah! A lizard, oh no!" Then they both fell into giggles and ran away as if I were chasing them, looking over their shoulders. I never understood girls at all.
That sort of thing happened a couple of times. I tried to ignore it all, but it did start to get to me. There's nothing more frustrating to a kid than suffering injustice and lies. How often do kids say, "That's not fair"?
Jimmy and George were watching me, waiting for another kid or two to approach me with some new witticism. After a while — and because I ignored it, I am now old enough to understand — it got old and kids got back to kicking balls around and chasing each other and exchanging cards. That's when George grabbed hold of Jimmy's shirtsleeve and yanked him up. They both walked over to me.
George said, "Hey, anyone seen any lizards? You gotta be careful of those lizards. We will fight them in the parks, we will fight them in the school ground …" He couldn't go on for laughter. They were both killing themselves. I was staring hard at Jimmy. Mr. Traitor was avoiding my gaze.

< 11 >

When they had calmed down, I said, "Jimmy told me about it. I believed him because I thought he knew what he was talking about."
Jimmy said, "I fooled you is all, and you fell for it."
"You're a liar."
"You're a liar. You would say that, wouldn't you?"
George butted in: "Course he would."
"You're lying and you know it. You're trying to make me look stupid so you won't feel stupid. But you are."
George said to Jimmy, "You can't let him get away with that, Jimmy. You gotta …"
"You were afraid I'd tell everyone about it, so you thought you'd get there first and make out like it was all my fault. But it wasn't, it was yours. You're a liar."
George again: "You gotta sort that out, Jimmy."
Jimmy swallowed, looking at me, then turned to George. "What are you, a gangster? You gotta sort that out."
George stared at Jimmy hard, then pushed him at me. Jimmy fell into me and I threw out a punch on instinct. I'm not proud of it. It wasn't very hard and it glanced off his shoulder, but Jimmy threw one back anyway, almost as half-baked as my own. It hit me in the stomach and the shock of it made me hit again, hard this time and connecting with his thigh. It was real and serious now, my very first fight, and it was with my best friend. Jimmy had always said that he'd been in loads of fights and won them all, but I never believed him. George was shouting now — "Fight, fight, fight!" — in that primal way that kids do, and others were running over to watch and circle us, all of them taking up the same refrain. "Fight, fight, fight!"
Me and Jimmy were wrestling on the dusty ground, neither of us able to get a good hold of the other as we rolled and skidded around. The sound of the other kids' shouting was ringing in my ears and gave it all an otherworldly feel. I wished it wasn't true. Even as I was there, in the heat of it, I wished that.
Then a voice rose out above the chanting: "Teacher!"
And that simply the circle broke up. I caught a glimpse towards the school and saw a teacher — I couldn't be sure which one — strolling over, confident of the power her presence held and letting it do all the work for her before she was even on the scene. I was suddenly rolled off Jimmy as he shifted his weight and then we were both lying on our backs, our necks craned back so we could see towards the school, the approaching teacher upside down.

< 12 >

I didn't even feel any worry or anything — I was too tired. Then I felt a nudge at my arm and turned to see Jimmy almost smiling at me. He nodded towards the fence. There, on a post, perched a lizard, darting its tongue in and out as lizards will. I swear to God it was staring right at us. I stared at it and chanced a glimpse to see that Jimmy was too — you always have to watch things like lizards or they'll disappear on you. Then, and I swear this is true, the lizard darted out its tongue and held it there, sticking it out at us. The teacher's footsteps could be heard now and we both broke our stares to see how close she was — nearly on us. Then we looked back at the lizard. It was gone. I looked at Jimmy and he was smiling and then I was and then we were both laughing until it hurt, lying there in the dirt, the teacher standing over us now and trying to suppress her confusion to maintain her cold gaze. She failed.
Mr. Johnson said he had never had a student in his office twice in one day. He drilled Jimmy and I on proper behavior and we passed the test so he let us go without too much of a telling-off.
Walking home together, we didn't even talk about the lizard thing. We just talked about how old Mrs. Chamberlain had stared at us and how easy Johnson was. Easy stuff to ease us back into normality.
Then Jimmy stopped in his tracks and looked down at the floor. I followed his gaze and there on the floor was a dried up strip of snakeskin.
Jimmy looked up at me and said, "You know, snakes shed their skin all the time."
"Shed?"
"That's the word for it. Shed." He bent down and picked it up, pinching it between his thumb and forefinger and letting it swing down. "They grow new stuff underneath and then the old stuff falls off."
"So?"
Jimmy looked at me like I was missing something very obvious. "So, snakeskin is valuable. My mother's got this bag made of it she's always taking out with her when she's got somewhere special to go. But what's special about bingo? Anyway, if we catch a snake we can collect its skin and sell it."

< 13 >

I shook my head a little, "Sell it," I said. "It would take us a year just to get enough to make a purse. Sell it."
Jimmy shrugged, dropped the skin, and we walked off home. Jimmy talked about snakeskin the whole way.