I went into my room and yelled, “It’s party time, Rosa!”
She didn’t seem as excited as I had hoped. As a matter of fact, she was asleep under a rock. I had the perfect thing to get her excited.
“Hey, look what I made for you,” I said, going over to my desk and picking up the bag of party supplies I had bought at the 99-cent store. I pulled out the smallest party hat ever made, just the right size for a tarantula. I had worked on it the night before. What I did was cut off the very tip of one of the party hats in the package of six. That tip made a mini cone no bigger than your little fingernail. I even cut the elastic band down to Rosa’s size and attached it to either side of the itsy-bitsy hat, being careful not to glue my fingers together like I usually do with superglue.
“Look, Rosa, you’ve got your own party hat! How many tarantulas do you know who can say that?”
That did it. She stuck one of her hairy legs out from under the rock, then a second, and so on, until all eight of her gorgeous legs were creeping around her tank. I think she was trying to get a glimpse of her new head wear. She seemed to like it. At least, I think that’s what it means when a tarantula’s body starts to bounce up and down on all eight legs. Either that or she was hungry for a cricket. But at the moment, I chose to go with the hat theory.
I gathered up the other supplies I had bought for my party. The silver balloon that said “Get Well Soon” was still floating on its string, with plenty of bounce left in it from the day before. I tied it around my wrist, so I could carry it to Harvey’s without losing it. I put the party favors, hats, and horns into a plastic grocery bag. I had wrapped the whoopee cushion and Rosa’s party favor using the comics section from the New York Post and a lot of Scotch tape. It might seem weird to wrap your own present, but I think a big part of the fun of getting a present is pulling the paper off, and I wanted to be able to do that. Of course, I’d have to help Rosa, but that would be fun, too.
I grabbed the handle on top of her plastic tank and headed for the door.
“Bye, Mom,” I hollered as I left the apartment.
As I pushed the elevator button, I realized that my left hand…or maybe it was my right hand…that’s a difference I’ve never been able to figure out…anyway, one of my hands was completely empty. I got the key back out of my pocket, opened the door, went in, and shouted, “Hello, Mom!” Then I went back to my room, where I had left all the party supplies in the bag on my desk. Welcome to Hank-land, home of the brain that forgets everything except my name.
On the second try, I made it out of the apartment, down the elevator, and out onto 78th Street. It was really cold, and you could smell that it was going to snow. The wind was coming up my street from the Hudson River, and I had to bend into it to make my way down to Broadway. I didn’t want Rosa to get too cold. Even though her legs were pretty hairy, I wasn’t sure it was a winter coat. She was from Mexico, after all, and I hear it’s hot there. So I unzipped my jacket partway and tucked her small plastic tank inside as far as I could to protect her from the gusts of New York wind.
My first stop was Babka’s Bakery, which is three doors down from Harvey’s. You’re probably thinking that I was going there to get a birthday cake. But surprise! You’re wrong! I had changed the cake plan at the last minute. Why not? I am an independent party planner and goer, you know. I could change plans whenever I felt like it.
I pushed open the door and pulled a number from the customer machine that tells you what your place in line is. Wow. It was eleven, my favorite number. That was good news already. And even better news was that they were already on number ten, so I only had to wait one minute.
“Who’s sick, Hank?” Trudi said. She’s worked at Babka’s all my life, and my mom and I have bought lots of after-school treats from her.
“No one,” I said. “Everyone’s fine. Why do you ask?”
“Um…the balloon,” she said, nodding her head at my wrist.
The “Get Well Soon” balloon was so light and floaty that I had forgotten it was tied around my wrist.
“Oh, that!” I said. “No one’s sick. No one that I know, that is. But I’m sure someone is sick somewhere, so I figured why not send them a get-well wish?”
“That’s very sweet of you, Hank,” Trudi said. “More people in the world should have your kindness. Now, what can I get for you? No, don’t tell me. Your favorite, right?”
“You got it. One black-and-white cookie, which I have been thinking about since seven forty-five this morning.”
“Well, you’re in luck. They were baked fresh this morning. I’ll get you one.”
“Make that two,” I said to her. “One for now, and one for later.”
“Wow. What are you celebrating?”
“As a matter of fact, Trudi, I’m celebrating my birthday.”
“Nothing like a black-and-white to do that,” she said. “Wait here. I’ll go in back and get you two fresh ones.”
While she was gone, the door opened and a woman came in pushing a stroller. I didn’t even have to turn around to know that she had a stroller, because I heard the little kid screaming and crying all in gibberish.
“Sshhhh, pookie, Mommy’s just going to get dessert for dinner, and then we’ll go home for a nice nap,” she said.
Good plan. It sounded like the kid needed a nice long nap. I turned to catch a glimpse of this Pookie guy. You know exactly what he looked like. Soggy Cheerios plastered on his face, little corduroy pants that snapped up the inside of his leg. And there was no stopping this kid’s wail. Wow, did he have a set of lungs on him.
Then a thought came to me.
Maybe he’d like to meet Rosa, I thought. I’ll bet he’s never seen a real tarantula. And who’s not interested in that?
I reached into my jacket and pulled out Rosa’s plastic tank.
“Hey, Pookie. Check this out. Aren’t spiders funny?”
I held the plastic tank up in front of him. Wow, I thought Pookie’s mom’s eyes were going to detach from her head and fly through the glass door without opening it.
“Get that thing away from my baby,” she gasped. She was so freaked out, she couldn’t even get enough air to speak in a normal voice.
“Rosa’s really friendly,” I said. “And maybe she could get Pookie there to calm down. Not that he needs to, of course, but if you’d like him to.”
“A spider should not be around little children,” she said, almost throwing herself in front of Pookie’s stroller. “It’s terrifying!”
“Excuse me,” I said in my most polite voice, “but have you noticed something?”
“Yes, I’ve noticed that you brought a spider into a bakery.”
“That’s true,” I said. “But have you noticed something else? The Pookster there has calmed down. He’s stopped crying.”
We both turned and looked at the stroller. Pookie was leaning as far out as he could, trying to get a better look at Rosa. The mom looked totally surprised. And to tell you the truth, I was kind of surprised, too. I thought maybe Rosa would give the baby something to think about other than the soggy Cheerios on his face, but I didn’t really think she would work so well. That baby was not only not crying, he was smiling at Rosa. And by the way, there were a few soggy Cheerios stuck to his front four teeth as well.
I felt pretty good about that smile. My idea about Rosa had really worked, and in Hankville, that doesn’t happen all that often. I have more bad ideas than good ones. But I’m here to tell you, when I have a good idea and I get to see it in action, it feels pretty darn good.
“You’re excellent with little children,” Pookie’s mom said to me. “You must have a baby brother or sister.”
“Not yet,” I said, “but one’s coming soon.”
“Well, when that baby comes, he or she is going to be awfully lucky to have you as a big brother,” she said.
Score one for the Hankster.
Put that compliment on top of the two piping hot, right-out-of-the-oven black-and-white cookies that Trudi had just brought out, and this was turning into a pretty tasty way to start the day.