So I invited myself to Ziggy Zombie’s for a sleepover last night. I really try to avoid those kinds of things, because hanging out with Ziggy at school is WAY more than enough.
But I needed to scope out the joint—er, his house. I had to figure out a plan for coming down his chimney and stuff. I mean, Christmas is only ONE week away! And now that I’ve got a suit, a sled, and a reindeer-wolf, I’m starting to take my job as Fake Santa pretty seriously.
Right away, Ziggy wanted me to listen to his new “Moans and Groans” playlist. That’s not really my kind of music, but I didn’t figure Ziggy had a lot of rap in his collection. So I said sure, as long we could listen to it in the living room.
Pretty soon he was dancing to the music—if you can call it that. Mostly he just staggered around the living room with a goofy grin on his face.
That gave me time to check out the fireplace. And do you know what I saw crawling out of that thing? A HUGE HAIRY SPIDER.
Yup, I almost screeched like a ghast in the Nether.
Until I saw that it was LEGGY, Ziggy’s pet spider.
I’m not a big fan of Leggy. See, he spins these webs all over the place, and for some reason, I ALWAYS get stuck in them. So sharing the chimney with Leggy is just not going to work for me on Christmas.
I told Ziggy that. He had to turn down his music to hear me, but he said he knew JUST how to keep Leggy out of the chimney.
Then the zombie poured a bucket of lava into the fireplace. As if FLAMES shooting up the chimney was going to make it easier for me to come down. Sometimes I think that zombie has a head full of rotten flesh instead of brains.
Then I remembered what Willow said about potion of fire resistance. Could she brew me up some of that stuff? I didn’t have a lot of time to think about it, because Zoe suddenly zoomed into the living room, riding her pet chicken.
Why can’t zombies have NORMAL pets, like squids?
Anyway, Zoe was so FAST on that chicken—like a tiny spider jockey. But she kept getting too close to the lava in the fireplace. Ziggy told her to slow down, but she listened to him about as much as my sisters listen to me. Which is not a lot.
Then Ziggy said if she stopped riding around like a crazy zombie, he’d tell her a secret.
I thought that was a GREAT idea, until I heard what he said. (Zombies really don’t know how to whisper.)
After he told Zoe the big secret—MY big secret—he grinned at me and tried to wink. Or maybe he just had a twitch in his eyebrow.
Either way, I did NOT smile back. Partly because I had just gotten stuck in one of Leggy’s cobwebs, and partly because now that Zoe knows Santa is coming, there’s no backing out.
Not even if the chimney is full of cobwebs.
Or shooting flames of lava sky high.
I’m in this thing now. And there’s no turning back.
