Keeper (Touchdown Edition)

Chapter 1

I have a secret. Not the kind of secret like I saw our neighbor Mrs. Higgenlooper once in the parking lot at Costco in the way back by the dumpsters and I swear I saw her kissing a man in a blue striped shirt and he wasn't Mr. Higgenlooper. And not a secret like Jenny Chow wrote nasty things on the wall in the bathroom at school with the edge of a fingernail file. This secret is about me.

I'm afraid of things.

All kinds of people are afraid of spiders and snakes (so it's okay that I'm totally and completely freaked out about those). And I know some people are afraid to fly in airplanes or go to movies with skulls on the posters. That's all considered normal. I've got bigger problems.

I'm sort of afraid of everything. Clowns. Big trees. Any room that's dark. Thunder. Firecrackers. Cats. Motorcycles. Bees. Snowballs. Most knives. Some forks. Car wash places. Elevators. Hamsters. The guys behind the sushi counter who yell when you come in. Certain shades of purple. Alleys. Sprinkler heads. Any dog bigger than a cat and I already explained about the cats. Men in beards. Men in moustaches. Blood. Catsup (because it looks like blood). And most kinds of cheese. That's just my starter list.

I think you get the picture. Now if you think it's hard being completely and totally terrorized by a package of string cheese, think about this: I've got to hide the fact that the hair is standing up on my arms and I'm feeling like running from the room screaming when someone pulls out a piece. I've got to pretend to be normal. It's a big, big struggle. No wonder I'm tired all the time.

That's why my friend Courtney is so important. She's known me since we were in kindergarten and I refused to sit by the window (I'm uncomfortable with most heating units and there was an old radiator there). I got moved to the seat next to her, which put me as the only one not sitting in the correct position.

Courtney's last name is Bilsesser and my last name is Lewis. She should have been sitting next to Ryan Cork. I think they figured that sitting alphabetically would help us learn to read easier or something. Well, I screwed that all up. Fortunately I already knew how to read when I got there. And I don't think it's right to blame me for the fact that the school had a disproportionate number of slow learners that year.

Anyway, back to Courtney. She's the kind of person who collects squirrels and baby birds when they fall out of trees and then feeds them sugar water with eye-droppers in old shoe boxes stuffed with cotton balls. And her squirrels and baby birds LIVE. (Did I mention that I'm afraid of squirrels?).

Courtney has two big brothers and a mother who is a pediatric oncologist which means she treats kids with cancer so they're tough as nails in that house. Her dad works at an advertising agency doing I don't know what but he comes home all the time with tapes he makes us listen to and then we have to tell him what we think, which is always really that they stink, but we don't want to hurt his feelings so we say they're good. Courtney says he really always wanted to be a rock star but it didn't work out. How do you know that stuff about adults? He doesn't look like he could ever be a rock star. He looks like a guy losing his hair who is kind of worried a lot.

So starting in kindergarten Courtney took me on like one of her stray cats (she feeds six every day in the alley behind her house). The Bilsessers have two dogs, and three parakeets that live inside. The reason Courtney and I are best friends and closer than sisters (I don't have a sister and neither does she so this can never be put to any kind of real test), is because she thinks when I tell her that the Aspen trees have eyes in their bark and are staring at me I'm being funny. She doesn't believe I really mean it. She just smiles and gives me a little shove. I'm literally trying to keep from jumping out of my own skin and she's giggling. You gotta love her for that. I do.

So Courtney Bilsesser is kind of my anchor to anything that's normal. I live with my Grandma whose name is Reneta Bertha Beckdell. My name is Sasha Beckdell Lewis so I've got my middle name from her last name. I'm glad I didn't get the Reneta or the Bertha part. Sasha is crazy enough. I call my grandma "Nammy" and I guess it's because when I waslittle I couldn't grit my teeth or something. Sometimes I call her "mom" but I think she likes the "Nammy" thing better and we both know she's really my mom without me saying it. My real father was kind of a 'no-show' from the 'get go' as Nammy says. And my real Mom was never a good driver even though the accident was technically not her fault. So that has left me with Nammy. There are worse places to be left, believe me. And I know.

So it's me and the lady who loves the weather channel, anything with butterscotch, and crossword puzzles.

Courtney says that Nammy is like a cat that was de-clawed. She doesn't feel comfortable going outdoors because she doesn't have any defenses. Little does she know I'm worse than the de-clawed cat. I only go out because they have laws that say kids have to go to middle school. If they didn't I'd be parked in front of the TV with Nammy picking sunflower seed shells out of my teeth and drinking diet soda.