Chapter 3

My mom’s a girl, but I’d never say she asks ridiculous questions. She does, however, make some silly requests.

Barely a few days into summer break, for example, Mom tiptoes into my room, stands over my bed, and yells, “Wake up!”

How crazy is that? Why bother tiptoeing if you’re going to follow it with an annoying audio blast? Plus, asking a kid to wake up early during summer break is absurd, right?

I try to open my eyes enough to see what’s going on, but the Eye Crust Fairy has apparently visited me during the night. With my eyelashes stuck together, it’s hard to tell what’s happening.

All I can see is a blurry version of my mom, which perfectly matches my blurry brain.

Where am I? I wonder. Why am I being awakened? If coffee stains my dad’s teeth brown, then why doesn’t orange juice stain his teeth orange?

I decide my brain is awake enough to try and speak.

“Why me so that sleep is for longer till lunch parade?” I mumble.

Not my best sentence to start the day, but also not my worst. My brain obviously needs between five more minutes and five more hours of sleep. Then I’ll be ready to speak again.

Unfortunately, that plan won’t work because Mom is now laughing really hard. How many people have I told that obviously funny joke to?

“Wake up, sleepyhead,” she says. “We’ve got to get going!”

“Mom, it’s summer,” I say, making a mental note that when I become president, I’ll work on a law to make it illegal to wake kids up during summer break.

Mom pulls the covers off my bed, so I try another approach.

“I’m not sleeping! I’m, uh . . . planking. I have a planking tournament coming up, and I need to practice for five hours every morning.”

“That doesn’t look like planking,” Mom says. “Aren’t you supposed to be on your toes and forearms with your body straight off the ground?”

“That’s a different kind of planking!” I explain. “For this planking tournament, you lie very flat and very still on top of a soft surface. It also helps if you keep your eyes closed and nobody talks to you. I can’t miss a training day. Please come back in five hours.”

“You’ll be sleeping on a plank outside if you don’t get up,” Mom replies. “You promised to help with Vacation Bible School.”

Now my brain is fully awake. I love Vacation Bible School! Although I do think it needs a better name. After all, it’s not a vacation from the Bible. And the word school shouldn’t be in there at all. Especially during the summer. It might keep kids from wanting to go.

VBS, as we call it on the street, is actually pretty awesome. You do art projects, sing, have snacks, and learn how to use the Bible purposefully in your life.

Hey, maybe they should call it “Bible Users Real Purpose”! Wait. Those wouldn’t be great initials. Maybe my brain isn’t fully awake after all. But going back to sleep isn’t an option.

First of all, I really do want to help at VBS.

Second, Mom is now playing what I call the “evil song” on her phone.

You see, years ago my mom recorded my younger brother, Brian, singing a solo in his school play. I wasn’t there, but evidently the play was about a cat who got its tail caught in a door. At least that’s what my brother, who obviously played the role of the wounded cat, sounded like as he was singing.

Mom likes to play that song on her phone to get me out of bed. It works every time.

“I’m getting up!” I insist. “Please turn off that wailing.”

With my brain suddenly at full power, I jump out of bed and get ready to volunteer. I’m playing a Bible character in a play for the younger kids at VBS. And, unlike my brother’s play that I didn’t see, this one is going to be really good because it’s from the Bible.

The Bible is so interesting! It’s full of crazy stories. It has heroes and villains. Lots of Bibles even have maps in the back! Just don’t try to use those when you go on vacation. My family tried and was lost for days.

Anyway, the play I’m in is based on one of my favorite Bible stories. I’m taking on the role of Shadrach, who famously got thrown in a fiery furnace with two other strangely named characters. All three guys refused to worship an idol. They only worshiped the one true God, which made the king mad. So the king decided to throw them in a fiery furnace.

But God had different plans. He protected all three of them from the flames. See, I told you the Bible has some great stories!

Anyway, my part is very detailed and complex. I’m pretty nervous because I have to remember all my lines.

First, I say, “Oh, it’s hot!”

Then I go, “Wow, it’s so hot!”

Finally, when it’s clear that God is going to save me and my friends, I say, “Oh, it’s not that hot.”

It’s a lot to remember, but I feel like I’m up for the challenge.

Mom and I arrive at the church on time. My youth leader is super excited to see his main actor walk through the front door.

“Oh, I forgot you were in the play,” he says to me with enthusiasm.

We run through our lines, and then it’s time for the big show. All the VBS kids bound into the church auditorium. I wish I could say they walked, but they are so hyped up on juice boxes and candy that it looks more like bounding.

As rowdy as they are, they quickly fall silent as soon as the lights go down and the play begins.

I feel like I do pretty well. I only get two of my lines wrong. I also accidentally knock over one of the walls that is supposed to be the inside the fiery furnace. It really isn’t my fault. All I do is throw my body into it, so I don’t see how anyone could blame me.

You see, in the play God sends an angel to protect the three main characters from getting burned. When the angel arrives, that’s when I’m supposed to say, “Oh, it’s not that hot.” And I deliver my line almost perfectly! My youth leader was really excited, because my other two lines hadn’t gone as well.

Then I try to show the audience that the fire isn’t hot at all by touching the painted flames on the wall.

But to add some action to the scene, I run and throw my entire body against the painted flames, yelling, “Ahhhhh . . . it’s burning! Just kidding! It’s not that hot.”

I think we can all agree this version makes the play much better, but unfortunately, when I throw my body against the painted flames, the entire wall falls down. Wham!

Being an amazing actor, the loud noise doesn’t bother me. I save the scene by adding, “Not only is the fire not that hot, it’s pretty drafty in here all of a sudden.”

This gets a laugh from everyone but my youth leader. He’s a tough critic.

All in all, the VBS play is a hit! Also, it looks like there’s a positive outcome to the wall falling down. After VBS is over, I ask my youth leader what he’s going to do with the broken wall.

“I’m going to throw it away because two boards cracked when it fell,” he says.

Actually, he says “when someone knocked it over,” but I don’t think that part of the story is important to dwell on. The important thing is that I ask him if I can have the wall and he says yes!

The first wall of my tree house has already arrived, and summer has just barely begun.