The Anybodies by N. E. Bode

course, he is! Gosh, I’m hot. It’s hot in here, like a furnace. She’s gotten old, Fern. Much older than ever. How could she have gotten so old? Has that much time passed by? And the Miser is here!”
    â€œThis is good! Can’t you see it’s working?” Fern said, excited that her plan was taking shape.
    â€œIt’s like an oven in here. Don’t you think? Hot, hot, hot.” He sighed, stuffing one hand in the pocket of his sport coat so that his elbow stuck out, like someone in the middle of singing, “I’m a little teapot…”
    Fern kept staring at him because his nose, which had been chubby and fat and red, was shrinking. It was thinning out, narrowing to the Bone’s naturally small nub. “Your nose!” Fern said. “Your…your nose!”
    The Bone grabbed his nose. “No! No!” he said. “I can’t believe this!” He stared up at the ceiling, chiding himself, “Get it together, Bone! Get it together!”
    â€œIt’s okay,” Fern said. She could hear Mrs. Appleplum in the kitchen, the ping of spoons on china. “Don’t panic. Do you have a hankie?”
    He nodded, pulling a crumpled one from a back pocket of his ugly polyester suit slacks—Mr. Bibb, it turned out, shopped at low-end discount stores.
    â€œKeep sneezing,” Fern said. “I’ll distract her! And don’t forget your lisp!”
    Mrs. Appleplum walked in and served them tea. Each cup handle had a string wrapped around it with a note that read: DRINK ME . Maybe you know the book about Alice, a girl who fell down a rabbit hole? Well, Fern thought of her right away, the fact that when the girl drank things labeled DRINK ME , she shrank.
    â€œAre you going to drink it?” Mrs. Appleplum asked.
    â€œAm I? I guess so. It says to drink it,” said Fern.
    â€œAre you afraid to drink it?” Mrs. Appleplum asked.
    â€œDo you mean, am I afraid I’ll shrink or something?”
    â€œHumph!” Mrs. Appleplum said, a little disappointed. “Well, well. I didn’t know you’d pass that test.” Fern hadn’t known it had been a test. Mrs. Appleplum looked up with her bulgy fish eyes at Fern. “The sign at the end of the driveway says ‘Must be well read.’ I have my ways of finding these things out. There’s nothing worse than a poor reader.” And here she glared at the Bone, dressed as Mr. Bibb, hiding behind his hankie. She looked at him sharply, as if maybe she knew he wasn’t Mr. Bibb at all.
    The Bone sneezed. “Dusst! I’m allergic to dusst!” the Bone said. “Can we take the tea up to our room to drink? It’ss been a long day!”
    â€œFine. Follow me.”
    Mrs. Appleplum lead the way up the staircase, narrowed by books. The hallway was lined with bookstoo. Fern was dizzied by all of the books. How would they ever find the one book they needed…how in the world?
    When they passed the first door, Mrs. Appleplum put her finger to her pink poodle-bow lips to remind them that the whiskery guest preferred quiet. Fern passed by the closed door slowly. She listened hard and thought she heard a small scratching noise, then a cough, then nothing.
    Mrs. Appleplum opened the second door. “Here’s your room. One room. The two of you will have to share,” she said. The room was small, book-cluttered, with two single beds separated by a small nightstand. Mrs. Appleplum cleared her throat. Her eyes got a bit glassy. “It used to be my daughter’s room, but she’s gone now. She passed away.”
    Fern’s throat cinched tight. She thought she might cry. “I’m sorry to hear that,” Fern said, but she said it too convincingly. She said it with too much love. Mrs. Appleplum looked at her oddly. Fern busied herself with the room. She realized she was hoping it smelled of lilacs. She remembered the Bone telling her that her