Chapter Three:

Aliens on Parade

“A parade?” Pockets asks. He reaches for his sandwich and then frowns when he sees only crumbs are left. “How could we hold a parade? Everyone would see us.”

I shake my head. “Not a regular parade, a costume parade. Or, at least that’s what people will think they’re seeing. We can put up posters around the area advertising a costume parade and a prize for the craziest outfit. If regular people join in, that will be even better.”

“I think it can work!” Dad says. “The drivers would march alongside their aliens, and then each group can veer off when they reach their homes.”

“Let’s do it!” Pockets declares.

Then things happen fast!

First, Pockets announces the plan to the room, giving me credit for coming up with it, which makes me feel very grown-up. Since all the cell phone signals are knocked out, the drivers line up to use Barney’s landline phone to ask their relatives to bring them old Halloween costumes. Toe whips out some crayons and he and some of the more artistic aliens make posters on the back of Barney’s paper menus. Barney’s staff hurries outside to tape them up on telephone poles along the parade route.

I’m a bit jealous they get to go outside on such a nice Saturday afternoon. I may not have mentioned the smell in the hot, overpacked restaurant, but ohh, the smell. It’s a cross between festering garbage and wet earwax. It’s totally not the aliens’ faults that their bodies react with our atmosphere this way. Even Toe’s natural chocolate chip cookie odor can’t make a dent in the stench.

I want to wear my baseball uniform as my costume, but since Mom is out at the park with Penny, we can’t reach her. Pockets suggests Dad and I look in Barney’s back room to see what we can put together, but the aliens have eaten or taken everything in sight, even the coffee beans and sugar packets. They left exactly one paper hat and one bag of flour (which we found toppled over and hidden behind a cabinet). This explains why Dad is now dressed as a chef and I’m a ghost—a ghost who’s going to be picking flour out of his hair and ears for weeks!

Within an hour, we’re lining up outside Barney’s to march down the middle of the street. Pockets organizes everyone so that the people who live closest are in the front of the parade and can just leave the line when their houses come up. That way it’s nice and orderly. I would never have thought of that, but that’s why he’s the boss!

Small groups and families begin joining us, dressed as firefighters and witches and baseball players and ducks. It’s awesome! Even more people line up on the sidewalks to watch, never guessing that they’re looking right at aliens from planets across the entire universe. I feel bad that we couldn’t reach Mom. Penny would have loved this.

Barney himself leads the parade. Someone gave him a pink wig to cover his bald head. The bagpipe he’s playing must be his, though; I don’t think many people have one lying around! Someone brought candy and is now throwing it out to the crowd as the parade passes by.