The Kingdom of Kevin Malone by Suzy McKee Charnas Page A

mumbled.
    â€œYou’re not dressed,” she said. “Are you sick? Did you catch cold, getting wet like that?”
    â€œI’m fine,” I said.
    â€œThis girl—Joyce—what’s her last name? I’m going to call up her mother.” Her eyes narrowed. “What’s that on your head?”
    â€œIt’s a hamster,” I said.
    She stared incredulously. “A hamster? ”
    The moorim lay very still. Was it sick? In shock over the humongous lies I was telling? Maybe I had burned out its judgmental system by overloading it.
    â€œIt’s a toy, actually,” I gabbled brightly. “Somebody was handing them out in school last week, a kid in the Modern Issues elective who’s doing a paper on deviant experience.”
    â€œDeviant experience?” my mom said. “Wearing animals on your head? That’s a bit much even for the Cornford School. Teaching kids about deviance isn’t on the curriculum that I remember, and frankly I’m not sure it’s what your father and I meant your tuition money to pay for.”
    As she spoke, I was thinking: tomorrow was a school day. If I wanted a chance to tell Rachel about the prophecy without the whole world poking their nose into our business, I was going to have to do it now, tonight. If I could just get away from my mom. . . . I got up and began digging clean clothes out of my closet.
    Mom watched me thoughtfully. “Amy,” she said, “while in some ways it’s rather diverting, and God knows I need diversion these days, I am not very happy seeing you walk around with a rodent-doll on your head. How long are you going to wear it?”
    â€œJust today,” I said. “I have to test people’s reactions to it for twenty-four hours.”
    â€œI think I smell baloney,” Mom said dangerously.
    â€œWhere did Dad go?” I asked. “He’s not due back in Los Angeles until tomorrow, he told me.”
    â€œHe went over to Shelly’s apartment,” Mom said, her eyes tearing up again. “I left my keys there, and I just couldn’t bring myself to go back again—where are you going? I’m about to put dinner on the table.”
    â€œI have to go out,” I said, dressing fast. “Rachel is thinking of running for class president. She wants me to help plan her campaign.”
    Rachel, in school politics? What a hoot! But my lie brought no response from the moorim. Maybe it had caught pneumonia in the shower and expired? I could feel it sprawled on my scalp like a miniature tigerskin rug. It made a soft humming noise, like purring. I hoped Mom couldn’t hear it.
    â€œYou just spent all day running around with this Joyce from school instead of being here with us,” Mom said as I sidled past her and headed for the front door. “Friends are important, but at a time like this you have to think of your family, Amy. Can’t Rachel’s political career wait an evening?”
    Mom thought Rachel was snooty and spoiled and fixated on her looks, which was true but not exactly in the way Mom thought. In fact, Rachel lived for the day when she could get her nose fixed because she thought it ruined her looks. We’d argued about all this before. I wasn’t in any mood to take up the subject again, so Mom tore on uninterrupted.
    â€œI think you should stay here tonight"—Her eyes focused on my head again and widened. “It moved!”
    â€œOh, that’s the fun part,” I said. “They’re plastic. I squeeze a bulb in my pocket and the hamster wiggles.”
    The moorim not only wiggled; it nuzzled my ear. I felt triumphant: Take that, Branglemen! You think you’re so smart!
    Mom’s jaw dropped. “That thing,” she said flatly, “is alive. Get rid of it, Amy. I don’t care what arcane science project they are doing at that school, you are not going around with a rat on your