Like a Gigantic Fly on the Wall

Dr. Crisp came back to the orchard last night to pick up my math exam, just like he promised. He parked the big moving truck next to the house and accepted Mrs. Appleton's invitation to step into the kitchen for pie and coffee before he had to leave for his meeting. I snuck over to the truck and of course it was unlocked.

As quietly as I could, I opened the back, crawled in feet-first, and pulled the doors shut behind me. There wasn't room for me to stretch out my legs, and the roof was too low for me to sit up, but at least I fit. It was comfortable too, cuz Doc had cushioned the floor with padding.

Good old Doc, always looking out for me. What would I ever do without him?

I almost drifted off to sleep but I woke up when the front door of the truck opened and closed and I heard Dr. Crisp tell the Appletons to "Take care, now." Then the motor came to life and we were off.

My sleep-deprived brain was spinning in a frenzy during the entire trip. I could fit into a truck, and that meant I could go anywhere--well, anywhere a big moving truck could go, which is quite a lot of places. If I had a driver, I could visit big cities, forests, deserts...I could see the ocean, and go for a swim in water too deep for me to stand!!!

Except I've never learned how to swim, so I'd need to take lessons first.

The truck stopped and I heard Dr. Crisp get out, his footfalls fading away across the pavement. I waited a few minutes before I emerged from the truck and verified that yes, I was just outside of Town Hall and there was nobody else around to see me. My legs were cramped up from just that short trip, so I had to stretch a bit and rethink my grand plans to tour the country in a truck like this--but maybe they make trucks in a bigger size that would give me more room?

I found the window Dr. Crisp said would be open, and stood to the side of it where I could hear and still be out of sight. The meeting was already going--or should I call it "the fight"? Mr. Peterson was loudly proclaiming that they'd be ice skating in Hades before I'd be allowed to disrupt classes in his town.

"We have to educate her," said Mrs. Lee. "If she doesn't graduate high school, she'll never go to college, marry a rich man, and get to buy lots of expensive clothes and designer footwear!"

"We'll pay for continued tutoring at her home," said Mr. Peterson. "And there are plenty of colleges that offer courses over the Internet."

"You can't keep Melly at home forever, Cedric," said Dr. Crisp.

"Sure we can," said Mr. Peterson. "In fact, I'm looking for the funds to build a thirty-foot gate around that orchard to keep her from ever menacing ordinary folks again!"

I seriously considered saying something just then, and letting them know I was there, but they were all talking at once and shouting over each other so they wouldn't have even heard me.

"The issue in front of us is very simple," said Mrs. Lee, when the room had calmed down again. "We have to treat Melinda Mills like any other student and allow her to come to school if that is what her guardians want for her to do. As long as we can reasonably accommodate her physical disabilities--"

"Being tall is not a physical disability," Coach Saunders stated. "If it was, I'd be able to get much better parking spaces."

"Melly can't fit through standard doors, or stand upright in the hallways, or fit into most classrooms," said Mrs. Lee. "She can't do necessary things the other children can, and from a legal standpoint that's a physical disability."

"Humph," said Coach Saunders. "You're not putting her in my gym all day. The physical education program is already stretched thin without losing our biggest space."

My heart fell. Was a school gym really the only place I'd fit? No wonder Coach Saunders was against me, and Mr. Peterson too, which meant Dr. Crisp would have to win over Mrs. Rodriguez in order to get a majority of board members on my side!!!

"I worry about the safety of the other children," said Mrs. Rodriguez.

"Melly is well-behaved and respectful," said Dr. Crisp. "She wouldn't hurt a soul."

"I've brought a witness who says otherwise. Mr. Appleton, would you come in here?"

Mr. Appleton? Had I heard that right? I know I was sleep-deprived and not thinking clearly but I couldn't imagine what would Mr. Appleton be doing at the school board meeting. I risked a peek into the window but it wasn't Mr. Appleton who stepped sheepishly into the hall. It was Jay Appleton.

"Have a seat, Mr. Appleton," Mrs. Rodriguez said formally to Jay. "Are you comfortable?"

"Yes, ma'am," said Jay.

"Good. Tell us about the day you first saw Melinda Mills."

I know the day I first saw Jay. It was after my first disastrous trip into town, when they chained me up like an animal, and when the Appletons volunteered to look after me--but that's not the day Jay told the school board about.

"It was last summer," he said. "There's a huge fence between our orchard and the Mills Farm, with lots of signs that Mr. Mills put up that trespassers would be shot on sight--but I found a gap at the bottom that I could just squeeze through, so I thought I'd look around and see what was so gosh-darn secret. That's when I first saw Melly, washing her cows in the creek."

My jaw dropped and my fingers twitched all on their own, wanting to strangle that little creep for spying on me in my own private farmland. And I didn't just wash the cows. I also washed my clothes and on warm days I took a nice long bath--what exactly had Jay seen? I felt myself blushing at the thought.

"Did you ever go back after that?" asked Mrs. Rodriguez, leading Jay through his story like an expert lawyer on TV.

"Every Tuesday, for a while," Jay confessed.

THAT LITTLE PERVERT!!! I wanted to kill him!!!

"Now can you tell us what happened on Tuesday, October 9th of last year?"

My heart almost stopped and my throat went dry. That was the day Pa died. Was Jay there when it happened?

Jay started to say something but instead he asked, "What has six legs and two heads?"

"We're not here for riddles, son," snapped Mr. Peterson.

"It's not a riddle," said Jay. "It's a monster!" He pointed to the other side of the room, at my horrible two-headed dream-beast of exposed bone and rotting flesh, with four legs on the floor and two more dangling at the sides of its barrel-shaped body.

"Nice doggy," said Mrs. Rodriguez, adjusting her thick glasses.

The creatures howled and-- I woke up in the back of the truck. Dr. Crisp looked at me through the open doors. "You missed the whole meeting, Melly. You really should try to get more sleep at night."

I tried to sit up and of course bumped my head. "Did they--? Was there--?"

"The vote was three to two. You're going to school, Melly."

"Okay, good, but that's not important right now. Was there a monster at the meeting, and did Jay Appleton tell everybody...stuff...about me?"

Dr. Crisp looked at me curiously. "There were no monsters or teenage boys in attendance. Just the five board members and a whole lot of boring talk. It probably would have put you to sleep again, even if you'd woken up for it in the first place."

Doc drove me back to the orchard and gave me some pills to take for my bad dreams so I could get some sleep. I plan to sleep for the entire weekend and deal with Jay on Monday.