CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
“How good are you at keeping secrets?”
“Good.”
Toby shook his head. “That’s not enough. I need you to be the biggest secret keeper in the entire world. Even better than the president. Do you know how many secrets the president keeps?”
“No,” Garrett admitted.
“He keeps thousands of secrets. He knows things that could destroy the entire United States if he let them get out. That’s how serious I am.”
Garrett looked doubtful. “You’re going to tell me something that could destroy the entire United States?”
“No, not that extreme, but I would like to show you something that you can never tell. You can’t tell Mommy, you can’t tell Hannah, you can’t tell Mrs. Kingston, you can’t tell anybody in your class…nobody. No matter how much you want to tell, you can’t tell this secret to anybody, no matter who asks.”
“What about the president?”
Toby pointed to the ground. “If the president were standing right here, right now, I wouldn’t tell him. He might say, ‘Darn it, Toby, I demand that you tell me this secret or I’ll have the entire Secret Service punch you for hours!’ and I would say, ‘No, I refuse to tell my secret.’ But if you can keep it to yourself, I’ll tell you.”
Eyes wide, Garrett nodded. “I won’t tell.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Do you blood swear?”
“What’s that?”
“It’s where we cut our hands and press them together, and swear in blood that we won’t tell.”
Garrett looked a bit tentative, but nodded.
“I won’t really make you blood swear. Mommy
wouldn’t like that. But I think you’re old enough, so we’re going
for a walk in the woods…”
“If you get scared, it’s okay,” Toby assured him. “I’m not going to make you do anything you don’t want to do. Just know that you’ll be safe, I promise. I’ll take care of you. Are you scared now?”
“No.”
“Good.”
They weren’t far from the shack—maybe another two minutes of walking. What if this was a really, really, really bad idea?
It wasn’t. He’d taken almost absurd safety measures. There was no possible way Owen could escape. Even if he somehow developed supernatural strength and broke free from one of the chains, there’d be two more holding him, each fastened to a different tree so even if the tree itself ripped in half he couldn’t get loose. And if a chain broke, Garrett wouldn’t be anywhere near close enough to get hurt by a swinging claw.
It was completely safe.
Maybe not safe from weeks of nightmares, but Toby just knew that Garrett would understand. He’d be delighted.
The three of them, friends forever.
The shack came into view. “Remember your promise,” Toby said. “It’s a blood swear.”
“I know.”
“We’re almost there, then. It’s behind that little house.”
Owen looked extremely unhappy in his chains, but that changed as soon as he saw Toby and Garrett. His face lit up and he stood up straight.
Garrett stopped walking. He gasped and clenched Toby’s hand tight.
“It’s okay,” said Toby. “He can’t get loose.”
“Daddy, I want to go home.”
“He won’t—”
“Daddy, I want to go home!”
“Okay, okay, we can go.” Toby led him back through the trees, away from Owen, who let out a whine of disappointment. “I should’ve told you what we were going to see, it was my mistake, I’m sorry.”
“What is it?”
“It’s my friend.”
Garrett scowled as he tried to process that. “Is it—is it a guy in a costume?”
“No. He’s real. He won’t hurt you, I promise. He lives in the forest. I’ve known him since I was a kid.”
“You have not.”
“I have! I blood swear that I have. I wouldn’t play a joke like this on you. He’s my best friend. His name is Owen.”
“Owen?”
“Yep.”
“Is he always locked up?”
“No. I did that for you. He won’t hurt you, but I didn’t want you to be scared of him. He’d like to say hi to you.”
“He talks?”
“Not like you and I talk, but he can do hand signals. I’m going to leave it up to you. We can go home, and maybe come back some other day, or we can go over now and see him. Just remember that you promised not to tell anybody.”
“I won’t.”
“Do you want to see him?”
Garrett considered that for a long moment. “Yeah.”
They walked back around the shack. Twenty feet away, Owen’s chains rattled as he signaled: Hello.
“Say hello,” Toby urged.
“Hello, Owen.”
Hello, Owen repeated.
“Is he a Bigfoot?” Garrett asked.
“I don’t think so. He might be a Bigfoot’s cousin. I don’t know what he is, for sure. Nobody else knows about him, though. Just you and me.”
Well, nobody else alive…
“Can I go closer?”
“No.”
“Does he like the chains?”
“He hates the chains. Don’t you, Owen? You hate those things.”
Yes.
“See? He can do thumbs-up to mean yes. Ask him a question. He doesn’t always understand, but he can get it a lot of the time.”
Garrett seemed hesitant, but Toby nudged him. “Go ahead.”
“Owen, are you going to eat me?”
No.
“Owen,” said Toby, “are we best friends?”
Yes.
“And are you and Garrett going to be friends?”
Yes.
“And would you ever do anything to hurt Garrett?”
No.
“See, Garrett. He understands. Ask him something else.”
“Owen, is one plus one two?”
Owen didn’t respond.
“Smart-ass,” said Toby. “I didn’t teach him addition. Ask him a real question.”
“That was a real question!” Garrett insisted. “Owen, could you get loose if you wanted?”
No.
“Ask him his favorite food,” Toby urged.
“Owen, what’s your favorite food?”
Owen mimed scooping a spoon into a bowl.
“That means ice cream.”
“I like ice cream, too,” Garrett said. “What’s your favorite flavor?”
“He likes strawberry,” Toby said. “But I don’t think he much cares one way or another, as long as it’s ice cream. Sort of like your mom with pie.”
“I like mint chocolate chip,” Garrett told Owen. “There was one kind of mint chocolate chip that Daddy brought home one time that I didn’t like, but usually it’s my favorite.”
“Isn’t he cool?” Toby asked.
“He’s supercool. Does Mommy know?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“She’d be scared.”
“But he wouldn’t hurt her.”
“I know, but you can be scared of things that wouldn’t hurt you. You have to admit, it’s kind of weird to have a best friend who’s a monster in the woods, isn’t it?”
“Yeah.”
“We’re a couple of weirdos!”
“Yeah! Big weirdos!”
“Big weirdo dorks! But that’s okay. There’s nothing wrong with being weird. Do you know anybody else who has a monster friend?”
“No way!”
“You think the kids at school would be jealous?”
“Yeah! I bet nobody would pick on me if they knew.”
“They sure wouldn’t. But you can’t tell them.”
Garrett rolled his eyes. “I know. You’ve already told me a bazillion times.”
“So I’m telling you a bazillion and one times.”
“Can I touch him?”
“No.”
“Next time?”
“Maybe.”
“You’re going to bring me back again, right?”
“I sure am.” Toby gave his son a hug. “You’d
better believe it.”
Garrett talked nonstop about his new monster friend as they walked home. Toby was absolutely elated—giddy, even. In fact, it was a good thing that he had to immediately turn back around to unfasten Owen’s chains, or Sarah might question his emotional state.
“You can go in and play Nintendo, or read a book,” Toby said.
“I’ll play Nintendo.”
“Or draw.”
“Nintendo.”
“Fine. Have fun.”
“That wasn’t so bad, was it?” Toby asked, unfastening the collar around Owen’s neck.
Hurts.
“Yeah, it looks like it chafed a bit. I’m sorry, buddy. There’s nothing else I can do. You liked seeing Garrett, though, right?”
Loved it.
“Well, he loved you, too. When I’m dead and buried, you and he can hang out just like we do. If you didn’t have those damn hooks for fingernails we could bring out his handheld video game and you guys could play together.”
He unfastened the strap around Owen’s right wrist. The monster immediately began to lick the area.
“I know, I know, it hurts. Was it worth it?”
Yes.
“Good.”
“Yes. All the time now.”
“So what did you two do today?” asked Sarah, plopping a large spoonful of mashed potatoes onto Garrett’s dinner plate.
“Cool stuff.”
“Well, I know that! What kind of cool stuff?”
“It’s a secret.”
“A secret from your own mom? That’s not allowed!”
Garrett put a hand over his mouth and giggled.
Sarah gave him a mock-stern glare. “This is no He-Man Women Hater’s club, bucko. What trouble did you two get into?”
“Ummmmm. Dad showed me naked boobies.”
“What?”
“He’s kidding,” Toby said.
“Naked boooooobies in a magazine!”
“You’d better not have shown him anything like that,” Sarah told Toby.
“I would never expose our child to breasts. I don’t know what that little bozo is talking about. What are you talking about, bozo?”
“At school, Jimmy Wilson said that his dad had a stack of magazines with naked boobies, and he left them right in the bathroom.”
“Well, Jimmy Wilson’s dad is a pervert,” Toby said. “Naked boobies are evil. They should be banned.”
“What’s a pervert?”
“This is not appropriate dinner-table conversation,” said Sarah. “And naked boobs are not evil, they just shouldn’t be shown to an eight-year-old boy.”
“I didn’t show him any!”
“I know, but don’t talk about it.”
“The bozo brought it up!”
“I was just kidding,” said Garrett. “We went to look at some stupid moss.”
“Oh, well, I’m sorry that the moss wasn’t as exciting as your video games, your highness.”
“It sure wasn’t.”
Toby kicked him under the table.
“I’m glad you were able to keep a secret,” said Toby as he
tucked Garrett into bed. “But you really need to work on
a better cover story.”
“Will Owen be okay out there by himself?”
“Yeah. Owen will be fine. He’s been out there for a long, long time.”