January Joker Read online

  Lucy wrote on her pad. “What else?” she asked.

  “I don’t believe it, either,” Brian said. “But write down that printout we saw next to Josh’s computer.”

  Lucy added to her list.

  “The phone calls,” Nate said. He couldn’t stop himself from grinning.

  “Excellent!” Lucy said. “Okay, here’s what we saw: aliens, a circle in the snow, weird footprints, Polly and Pal are gone, the big kids have disappeared.…”

  Lucy looked up. “This is creepy,” she said.

  Suddenly they heard a tapping noise.

  “They’re here!” Bradley whispered.

  “Chill out, Brad,” Brian said. “It’s just a woodpecker … or something.”

  They heard the tapping again.

  This time they all looked at the window behind the table.

  A green face with big teeth was peering in at them. An instant later, the thing vanished.

  “The aliens are back!” screamed Brian.

  “Look! There’s another one!” Lucy shouted, pointing at the window over the sink. This time the face was yellow.

  It had no teeth, but two huge eyes stared in at them. As the kids watched, the figure shot up into the air.

  “RUN!” yelled Nate.

  The four kids bolted out of their seats. They dashed around the kitchen, bumping into each other.

  Finally, they all ended up in the small closet under the stairs.

  They huddled together like sardines in a can.

  They heard each other’s breathing.

  “Can you hear them?” Bradley asked.

  “Hear them what?” Brian asked.

  “I don’t know, walking around,” Bradley said.

  The kids stopped whispering and listened. They heard a clock ticking. The refrigerator motor hummed. A car horn honked in the street.

  Nate giggled. “I think I hear them opening the refrigerator.”

  “Real funny, Nate,” Bradley said. “Now do you believe me?”

  “I don’t want to, but I guess I do,” Nate said.

  “I might,” Brian stated. “Those things were scary-looking!”

  “What do you think they want?” Nate asked.

  “Easy,” Bradley said. “They want us.”

  “Shut up!” Nate wailed.

  “We need a plan,” Lucy said calmly.

  “I already have a plan,” Nate said. “I’m never leaving this closet.”

  “Lucy’s right,” Bradley said. “We can’t stay here all morning.”

  “Why not?” Brian asked. “Mom and Dad will be home in less than an hour.”

  “Great,” said Bradley. “You can be the one to tell them Josh has been kidnapped by space creatures.”

  “Maybe we could talk to the aliens,” Lucy said.

  Nate laughed. “Do they speak English?”

  “Brad, what does it say about aliens in your UFO book?” Lucy asked.

  “Lots of things,” Bradley said. “And there are pictures!”

  “Where’s your book?” Lucy asked.

  “In my room, upstairs,” Bradley said.

  Lucy slowly opened the closet door. She poked her head out and looked around. “I don’t see anyone,” she whispered to the boys behind her.

  Lucy stepped into the hallway.

  “Where are you going?” Nate asked.

  “I want to see Bradley’s book,” she said. “I may have an idea.”

  “Come on, Lucy, I’ll show you,” Bradley said.

  “Wait!” Nate said. “We should lock the doors and pull down all the shades.”

  The kids tiptoed from room to room, pulling shades and checking locks. Then they followed Bradley upstairs.

  His book, UFOs and You, lay on the floor.

  Bradley opened to a section that showed pictures.

  The kids looked at photos of strange creatures.

  “Are these real pictures of aliens?” Nate asked.

  “The author says they are,” Bradley answered.

  “But the pictures are fuzzy,” Lucy said. “I can’t tell what the aliens look like.”

  “Guys, we saw two looking in the windows,” Brian reminded them. “They were disgusting! We have to do something!”

  Lucy was flipping through Bradley’s book. She pointed to a picture of a man standing next to a small creature.

  Below was another picture. This one showed strange little tracks in the dirt. Each track had three points.

  “Those are exactly like the prints we saw outside!” Bradley yelled. “I told you guys!”

  “Listen,” Lucy said. She read a caption under the pictures: “ ‘Dr. Wilfred Ditz says he met several space aliens. He says they were shy and friendly creatures.’ ”

  “Friendly!” Brian squawked. “They’re gonna eat our pony!”

  “So what’s your plan?” Nate asked.

  “Those two aliens we saw outside the kitchen might just be hungry,” Lucy said.

  “Yeah, for some nice juicy first graders!” Brian moaned.

  “So what if we feed them?” Lucy continued.

  “You mean make them lunch?” Bradley asked.

  “Yes,” Lucy said. She grinned. “And then we capture them!”

  “Capture them?” Brian squeaked.

  “You mean to keep for pets?” Nate asked. “Cool!”

  “I’m not touching any aliens!” Brian said. “They could have space cooties!”

  “What do we do with them?” Bradley asked.

  Lucy closed the book. “We trade them for Dink, Josh, and Ruth Rose,” she said. “And Polly and Pal.”

  The three boys stared at Lucy.

  Brian’s mouth fell open.

  Nate started to laugh.

  “I think it’s a great idea!” Bradley said.

  Nate stopped laughing. “How do you catch an alien?” he asked.

  “We leave a trail of food, then trap them,” Lucy said.

  “We have a skunk trap in the barn!” Bradley said.

  “The aliens are too big,” Lucy said. Then she grinned. “But we could trap them in that closet!”

  “I think this is crazy!” Brian said. “Is this what kids do in California?”

  Lucy shook her head. “No, but I saw it in a TV movie,” she said. “The kids doing it left some food out. The aliens followed the food right into a closet. Slam! They were caught!”

  “Then what happened?” Nate asked with wide eyes.

  “I don’t know,” Lucy said with a shrug. “My dad made me go to bed.”

  “Great,” Brian said. “We trap some aliens in our closet. Then they breathe fire and burn the house down!”

  “They’re not dragons,” Nate said. “They’re just cute little people from another planet.”

  “Cute little monsters that eat kids and pets,” mumbled Brian.

  “Let’s go check the fridge for bait,” Bradley said.

  “Any minute now I’m gonna wake up from this dream,” Brian said.

  The kids followed Bradley to the kitchen. He pulled open the refrigerator door. “Let’s see, milk, grapes, cheese, yogurt …”

  “How about that chocolate cake?” Nate asked.

  “No way!” Brian said. “That’s for our dessert tonight. I’m not sharing it with any guys from Planet Nutso!”

  Lucy pulled out the bowl of green grapes.

  “Aliens like grapes?” Nate asked.

  Lucy began making a grape trail on the floor. “I don’t know,” she said. “But maybe green aliens like green food.”

  Bradley opened the door to the closet under the stairs.

  Lucy placed grapes so they led right into the dark space. She put the rest of the grapes inside.

  “Now we hide,” she said. “If they go in, we lock the door.”

  The kids hid behind the sofa in the living room.

  “Um, we forgot one thing,” Bradley said.

  “What?” Nate asked.

  “We locked all the doors,” Bradley said. “How are the aliens su
pposed to get in the house?”

  “Oops,” Lucy said.

  She dashed into the kitchen, opened the door, then ran back.

  “Come on, little guys. Come and get it,” Bradley whispered.

  “I need to use the bathroom,” Brian announced.

  “Shhh,” Bradley said. “Aliens have excellent hearing.”

  “Brad, I have to go!” Brian said. He scooted toward the bathroom.

  Lucy, Nate, and Bradley waited.

  And waited.

  The next thing they heard was quiet footsteps.

  “Is that Brian coming back?” Nate whispered.

  “I don’t know,” Bradley said.

  Suddenly they all heard a little yelp.

  “What was that?” Bradley asked. “Where’s Brian?”

  They heard a thump.

  They heard chewing and swallowing noises.

  Then they heard nothing.

  The house was silent again.

  Nate let out a little giggle. “I guess they didn’t like the grapes, so they took Brian instead!” he said.

  “Don’t joke around!” Bradley said. “I’m going to look for him!”

  “We’re coming with you,” Lucy whispered.

  “We are?” Nate asked.

  Lucy nudged him. “We’re all in this together!” she said.

  The three kids peeked out from behind the sofa. On hands and knees, they crawled into the hallway.

  “Look, the bathroom door is open,” Bradley said. “Brian’s not there!”

  “And all the grapes are gone!” Nate said.

  It was true. Lucy’s trail of grapes had disappeared.

  Lucy pointed to the closet door. It was closed.

  “I thought we left it open,” Nate whispered.

  “We did,” Lucy whispered back.

  Suddenly the hall closet door burst open. Brian jumped out. “Boy, am I glad to see you!” he said. “I thought the green guys got you, too!”

  “And we thought they got you!” Bradley said, grinning at his twin.

  “They did!” Brian yelled. “I was coming out of the bathroom when something fell over my head! It felt like a hundred little arms grabbed me. They stuck me in the closet!”

  “Ugh!” Nate said, pointing to a piece of lint on Brian’s shoulder. “Space cooties!”

  “Very funny, Nate,” Brian said. But he wiped the lint off.

  “Did you eat all the grapes I left out?” Lucy asked.

  “No, it must have been them,” Brian said. “I just ate the ones you put in the closet.”

  “Did you see the aliens?” Nate asked.

  “No!” Brian said. “They threw this over my head!” He reached into the closet and pulled out a fuzzy red cloth.

  “That’s what Mom puts under the Christmas tree,” Bradley said.

  “Guys, what if they know about Lucy’s plan?” Nate asked. “What if they’re planning to capture us?”

  “They’re not getting me again!” Brian said. “I’m hiding!” He tore up the stairs.

  “Let’s barricade ourselves in our room,” Bradley said.

  He and Lucy and Nate followed Brian. They found him under his bed.

  Bradley got down on his hands and knees. “Bri, come on out,” he said. “We locked the bedroom door. We can move the dresser in front of it.”

  “I’m staying here till Mom and Dad get home,” Brian said.

  Nate knelt down, too. “The first place the aliens will look is under your bed,” he said.

  They heard Brian sigh. “Maybe it is a dream,” he said. “And we’re all in it.”

  Bradley reached under the bed and pinched his brother.

  “Hey, what’s that for?” Brian yelled.

  “See, you’re awake,” Bradley said. “It’s not a dream. Come on out, Bri. We need you to help us move the furniture.”

  Brian slid out from under the bed. His jeans and shirt were covered with dust.

  “Hey, what’s that?” Lucy asked. She was pointing at Pal’s rubber hot dog on top of Brian’s bed.

  “It’s Pal’s toy hot dog,” Brian said. “He must have left it there.”

  “But he took it outside when we were eating breakfast,” Lucy said. “I saw him. I remember thinking he’d lose it in the snow.”

  Nate picked up the dog toy. “Does Pal have two rubber hot dogs?” he asked.

  “Nope, only one,” Bradley said.

  “Then how did it get up here in your bedroom?” Lucy asked.

  The four kids stared at each other.

  Bradley looked up at the ceiling. “Oh no,” he whispered.

  Then he put his fingers to his lips. He pointed up. There was a heat vent in the ceiling.

  Bradley grabbed a paper and pencil. He scribbled a note and held it up.

  The note said:

  Bradley dragged the other kids into the hallway.

  He closed the bedroom door quietly.

  He motioned for them all to follow him into the bathroom.

  He shut that door, too.

  “What’s going on?” Brian asked.

  “The aliens are hiding in the attic!” Bradley said. “They have Pal up there!”

  “How do you know?” Lucy asked.

  “Because Pal must have dropped his hot dog down through the ceiling heat vent,” Bradley said. “It landed on Brian’s bed.”

  “Oh my gosh!” Brian said. “Bradley’s right! You know that red Christmas thing they threw over my head? Mom stores all the Christmas stuff in the attic!”

  The four kids looked up at the bathroom ceiling.

  “Do you think they can hear us?” asked Lucy.

  “There’s no vent in here,” Bradley said.

  “We don’t even know if aliens have ears,” Nate said.

  Everyone just looked at him.

  “Well, maybe they don’t,” insisted Nate.

  “Guys, we need to focus!” Lucy said. “What if we write them a note telling them we want to swap for our families?”

  “But the creepos in the attic don’t have our families,” Brian reminded them all. “Dink, Josh, and Ruth Rose called us from a spaceship.”

  “Yeah, but maybe the guys in the attic can beam our message to the spaceship,” Bradley said. “Write the note, Lucy.”

  Lucy dashed out of the bathroom. She was back in two minutes with paper and a pencil. “I locked the attic door,” she said.

  Lucy wrote in her best printing:

  She showed the other kids the note.

  “ ‘We will let you go’?” Brian said. “We don’t have them. They have us!”

  “Well, maybe they don’t know that,” Lucy said.

  Nate took the note from Lucy. “ ‘Your Earth friends’?” he read. “Lucy, these guys are kidnappers from outer space! They’re our enemies!”

  “Well, it doesn’t hurt to be nice,” Lucy said.

  “What if they can’t read English?” Nate asked.

  “Spaceships go everywhere,” Lucy answered. “Aliens must know a bunch of languages.”

  Nate grinned and started to giggle. Bradley slapped his hand over his friend’s mouth.

  “Hey, wait a second,” Brian said. “Why did the spaceship take off and leave two of their guys here?”

  “Maybe so no one would see the ship,” Bradley said. “It’s probably just riding around up there, watching our house.”

  “Yeah, and they left their guys here to kidnap us,” Nate said. “Then they’d signal the spaceship to come back and pick us up.”

  “Guys, I just thought of something else,” Brian said. “What if it’s not just us? What if the aliens grabbed a lot of people, not just our families? They could have taken people from all over Green Lawn. That spaceship could be filled with our neighbors!”

  “Nah, we’d have heard about it on TV,” Bradley said.

  “Brad, we haven’t even turned the TV on yet this morning,” Brian said. “For all we know, the whole town has disappeared. We could be the only ones left!”

 
; “Don’t panic,” Lucy said. “Let’s just give the aliens the note and see what happens.”

  “Not me!” Brian said. “I can still feel their yucky fingers all over me!”

  Lucy folded the note neatly in half. “I’ll do it,” she said.

  “What, you’re just gonna open the attic door and walk up there?” Nate asked. “What if they keep you, too?”

  “I’m not afraid of aliens!” Lucy said. “I’ll just … I don’t have a good idea.”

  Bradley reached behind the door for a mop. “I do,” he said. “We can stick the note up through the ceiling vent on this.”

  “Brad, the ceiling is too high,” Brian said.

  “Lucy can stand on my bed,” Bradley told his brother.

  The kids trooped back to the bedroom.

  Bradley gave Lucy some tape.

  Lucy stuck the note to the end of the mop. Then she stood on the bed. The vent was right over her head.

  “Ready?” Lucy whispered.

  The three boys looked up and nodded. Lucy poked the mop handle through one of the holes in the vent.

  She held it there.

  Lucy looked down at the three boys with big eyes. “I feel something,” she whispered.

  They all heard a sound. It was the tape being removed from the handle.

  Lucy lowered the mop.

  The note was gone!

  “Now what?” Nate asked.

  “I don’t know,” Lucy said. “I guess we—”

  Suddenly they heard loud thumping noises over their heads. Then they heard screeching, like fingernails on a blackboard.

  “Run for your life!” Brian yelled. “They’re mad at us!” He dove back under his bed.

  Nate charged into the closet and slammed the door.

  Lucy and Bradley stayed where they were, looking up.

  The noises from above their heads stopped. Tiny pieces of paper fell from the vent like snowflakes. They landed on Lucy and Bradley.

  Lucy grabbed some of the pieces. “It’s my note!” she said.

  “They tore it up,” Bradley said.

  Brian poked his head out from under the bed. “I guess that means they don’t want to swap,” he said.

  Bradley opened his closet door. “Come on out, Nate,” he said.

  “Now I’m getting mad!” Lucy said. “That was totally rude!”