Show and Tell

“And next up for show and tell is Angie!”

I walked up to the front of the classroom and squeezed my hand real tight. Miss Cook smiled at me and gave me a thumbs-up. Miss Cook isn’t really a cook though. She’s really my Kindergarten teacher. Her name is real confusing. I think she should change it to Miss Teacher, but she said that’s not how that works.

Anyway, I took my biggest breath and started my story…

“The night I got inducted by aliens, I had my dog Bandit with me. He was peeing on the little baby stick tree that my mom wants to grow real bad. When we got it, it was an even littler stick that kinda looked like a fishing pole with a big glob of dirt all around the bottom. My dad dug a huge hole and stuck it right in the ground and now my mom goes out to sing to it or something because she says it makes it grow faster. I don’t think the tree likes her singing very much because it’s still all skinny like an old man. Anyways, Bandit loves to lift his leg up and pee all over it at night when Mom can’t yell at him to ‘get off that damn tree!’”

Miss Cook was not really smiling as much then. I think ‘cause I said that “damn” word… Oops.

“But I never say that, ‘cause ‘damn’ is a bad word that I’m not allowed to say ‘cause then I have to go in the time-out chair. But I also don’t say it ‘cause I think it’s funny when Bandit pees where he’s not opposed to. Anyway, Bandit was by the tiny tree with his leg way up in the air and he was wizzing all over that thing. My brother taught me that word, ‘wizz.’ He said it’s not like a wizard, it’s like going pee real loud.

And then all on the sudden, a bright light came flashing down on us from the sky! I started feeling real weird in my tummy, like when I’m about to throw up on the carpet again. And then my feet came up off the ground and I started flying! Bandit had his ears stuck out like an airplane and then he kinda looked like Dumbo, ‘cept he has triangle ears like Doritos and not big flappy elephant ears.

I saw an alien movie once where they got sucked up into the alien ship so I figured they’d look like big green bugs when we got up there, but really they don’t. They had purpley kinda eyes and even purplier skin that had wrinkles all over like when I swim in the pool too long. They talked like, ‘Zeep zorp,’ or something; I don’t really know. It sounded all weird like it was someone talking behind me but then when I turned around, nobody was even there. The only word that I ‘stood them say was ‘beef’ I think, so I took out some dog treats from my pocket. I was opposed to give them to Bandit if he wizzed somewhere that was not on the stick tree, but I figured it was okay to share since Bandit didn’t ever really pee in the right spot anyways. I tried to give one of them to the guy in the middle but they were all too far away, and there was a big counter thing in the middle of the room in the way. So I just threw the treat to him. But he’s really not that good at catching and he kinda didn’t even move at all so it just stuck to his skin slime and got all goopy - and HERE IT IS!”

I stuck out my slimy beef treat so everybody could see it. I waited for them to go like, “ooh” and “ahhh,” but they all said, “Eww!” That’s not even the right sound! My eyebrows got all scrunchy and I kinda really felt like stomping my foot.

“Not ‘Eww!’ It’s cool! It’s got alien slime on it! They should want to put this in that science place we went for the field trip!”

“The museum,” Miss Cook said, but she had a look like she didn’t really like my show and tell that much.

Then stupid Billy said he thinks I just sneezed on it and the slime is really my snot all over it. That got me real mad.

“NO! It was from the alien,” I yelled, but only a little. “And ‘sides, I’m not even done with my telling part!”

I stood up taller in my spot in front of everybody and kept going.

“Anyways, so the treat was stuck on the middle guy, and then I felt that ‘Oh no’ feeling in my tummy because then I ‘membered how much Bandit loves these beefy things, and he got a look in his face like he was gonna do somethin real bad and make mom say ‘damn.” And he sure did. He drooled a big puddle on the ground, and then his tail started doing my favorite thing where he spins it around all wonky like a weird helicopter. . . ‘Cept now it was not my favorite thing very much cause I knew we were both about to probably have to sit in the alien’s time-out chair.

Bandit jumped all the way over that counter in front of them and landed right on top of the middle guy, and was licking all over him trying to get the beef treat. But it was really stuck up kinda in that guy’s neck area and it just wasn’t coming off. Then there was slime all over the ground, too, and the alien was all jiggly like a blob and Bandit thought it was so much fun to jump on him and lick that treat on his neck. But I thought maybe they must like cats better, because those wrinkly purpley jelly guys did not look too happy. But also none of them were even helping the middle guy even at all. They just sat there looking all wrinkled and blobby with their alien mouths open super wide like they were singing opera. They looked like how Miss Cook looked when I just said ‘damn’ earlier, even though it was just on purpose and I didn’t even mean to.

Anyway, so then I had to run over and since I have fingers to use and not just a tongue, it was way easy for me to get the treat off, but now it’s all sticky and slimy still cause I didn’t take it in the bath with me last night. That middle guy had Bandit’s hair all stuck on him, and he looked like my slime whenever I drop it on the carpet. Then the spaceship started shaking and the purpley guys got all orangeish instead. I thought maybe that meant they were mad, and I was probably right because then they sucked us back down to my backyard just like how we came up, but backwards! As soon as we were back on the ground, the spaceship just zoomed away like it wanted to get the heck away from us.

Me and Bandit just stood there for a little while just looking at each other. Then Bandit turned around and throwed up all over the stick tree. The end.”

I waited for everyone to clap for me now that they knew the whole story of the slimy beef treat, but they started laughing instead. And not ‘cause it’s funny but because they were being mean.

Miss Cook stood up at the front of class and made everyone be quiet. “Angie, you have a wonderful imagination,” she said.

I tried to tell her that it wasn’t even my magic nation and that it happened for real, but she just told me stuff like, “That’s enough,” and, “Have a seat.”

At 4:00 it was time to go home. My dad picked me up in his big white car and asked me how did my day go at school and I told him, “Fine,” because I didn’t even really feel like telling any more stories today. We drove home real quiet and I just looked out the window, thinking about how nobody even believed me about the aliens. I could still feel the sticky wet of the beef treat in my pocket and my throat felt like I swallowed a big chunk of gum and my eyes started getting all runny.

We were almost home, and then I saw Miss Cook get out of her car at a house close to mine. I blinked real hard to get the tears out of the way because just right then when I was looking, something real bright flashed down on Miss Cook and she started looking like she was flying in the air. Her legs were all swinging around crazy and I just smiled ‘cause I knew she didn’t even have any beef treats with her.