***
I looked at my cousin. “Marisa, what makes you think that kid has anything to do with this Story Plague we’re trying to solve?”
She looked at me smugly. Even though she was half a head shorter than I was, it always felt like she was looking down at me. “Because that’s no ordinary kid, Billy. That’s Tom Sawyer.”
“Oh, yeah. I think he played on my Hot Stove team a few years back.” He hadn’t, but I loved to torment Marisa by saying things like that.
“Not hardly,” she replied. “He’s from a book by Mark Twain that took place back in the 1840’s, I think.”
“You think?” I laughed. “You mean you don’t know? The great Marisa Kingsford, All-Star Brain of the continental United States doesn’t know everything?”
“Oh, cut it out!” She stalked away from me, heading for this Tom Sawyer character. I started to feel bad. After all, it wasn’t Marisa’s fault she was such a brain, and she had figured out what to do with that poor Ichabod Crane guy and the Headless Horseman.
“Hey, wait up!” I ran alongside her. “Look, I’m sorry, okay? I shouldn’t have given you such a hard time. We’ve gotta work together if we’re going to solve this Story Plague, or whatever it is.”
“Fair enough,” she said, and gave me a high-five. “Now, come on, let’s see what we can do for poor Tom here. I think you’ll like him – he’s a trouble-maker, just like you.”
Leave it to Marisa to always have the last word.
Tom Sawyer, meanwhile, was staring sadly at the fence in front of him. He twirled his paintbrush absently as we approached.
“Hey,” Marisa said.
“Hey, yourself,” Tom replied. “You two new around these parts?”
“Uh...no,” I said. “You’re the new one.”
Tom stood up straight. “Am not. I’ve lived here in St. Petersburgh all my life.”
“Good for you,” I said, “but this isn’t St. Petersburgh. It’s Alliance, Ohio.”
He squinted at me. “Is not.”
“Is too.”
“Is not.”
Marisa tried to step between us. “Boys, let’s not fight about it.”
“Of course not,” Tom said. “That dandy over there probably doesn’t know how to fight.”
“Just try me!” I shouted.
“Ah, I could beat you with one hand tied behind my back!” Tom boasted.
“Could not!”
“Could too!”
“Come on, guys, let’s stop all this...” Marisa gave peace one last chance, but it was too late. Tom threw a punch that hit me square in the jaw. For a fictional character, he had a mean left hook.
I jumped on him, and we rolled into the grass, punching and grabbing at one another. He had been wearing some kind of little cap, which I pulled off and smashed into the dirt. That made him mad, and he got me in a headlock and tried to flip me over. I kicked backward with my right foot and caught him in the kneecap, then spun around to face him. I was ready to try all my Bruce Lee karate moves, figuring a kid from the nineteenth century had never seen anything like that, when Marisa stepped between us.
“ENOUGH!” she screamed. “Now cut it out, both of you!” Her cheeks were red with anger.
“Boy!” Tom whistled in admiration. “If I weren’t already in love with Amy Lawrence, you’d be the one for me!”
Marisa’s cheeks went even redder, but not from anger this time. She was blushing!
“Look,” Marisa said to Tom. “You’re confused. You might think this is St. Petersburgh, but it’s not. You’re a character in a story by Mark Twain, and my cousin and I have got to get you back where you belong.”
Tom scratched his head. “Hmmm... I don’t know anything about any story, unless it’s Bible stories that my aunt tries to teach me, or pirate stories like my friend Joe Harper and I make up. All I know is it’s a beautiful day for swimming, but Aunt Polly is making me paint this whole fence instead.”
I picked up Tom’s hat, brushed it off, and handed it back to him. He paused a minute, not sure if he should accept it, but finally did.
“The whole fence?” I asked. I felt bad for him. “It’s huge.”
“Thirty yards long and nine feet high,” he said. “It’s all my brother Sid’s fault. He told Aunt Polly I skipped school to go swimmin’, and so here I am, painting on the most glorious day that God ever made.”
Marisa pulled me aside. “That’s it!” she whispered. She held out the old book she’d been carrying, the one that had contained the Story Plague before it had escaped all over Alliance. “This is how we can get Tom back into the book!”
“By helping him paint a fence?” I asked. “Marisa, we’ve only got seven and a half more hours to cure all the Story Plagues. Painting that fence could take days!”
“That’s the point,” she answered. “We don’t paint it ourselves. We get other people to paint it. Watch!”
She called Tom over and explained her plan. Halfway through the explanation, Tom started to grin. By the end, we were all grinning. It just might work!
Moments later, Tom was dipping his brush into the pail of whitewash, smiling and whistling all the while. He was quite an actor: he made painting look like the most enjoyable pastime in the world.
Soon, a small boy came walking along the sidewalk in front of Tom, carrying a fishing pole and a bucket of worms.
Marisa and I were hiding around the corner of the fence. “Now watch this!” Marisa whispered.
“Whatcha doin’, Tom Sawyer?” the boy asked. “Working?”
Tom smiled. “Working? You call this working, Ben Rodgers? Why, I’m having the time of my life!” And he dipped his brush back into the bucket and started applying another coat.
“Say, can I try it?” the boy named Ben asked.
“Oh, I don’t know,” Tom replied. “Aunt Polly is very particular about this fence, and I’m not sure you could do it right.”
“Sure I can, Tom!” Ben fished in his pocket. “I’ll give you this apple if you let me paint a while.”
Tom pretended to consider. “I don’t know...”
Ben was desperate now. “Oh, please, Tom!”
“Well,” Tom said slowly. “If you promise to do it carefully...” And he took the apple from Ben and handed him the brush.
A few minutes later another boy came along, just as Ben was growing tired. Tom traded him the paintbrush for a kite, and so had another new painter to work on his aunt’s fence.
He turned and winked at Marisa. “Great idea,” he whispered. “Why, there’s no shortage of suckers who’ll pay to paint a fence, if I just pretend that painting’s fun!”
Marisa smiled back. If I didn’t know better, I’d think she had a crush on the kid!
Just then, I noticed that Tom, his “volunteers,” and the fence were beginning to fade. I took the book from Marisa and, sure enough, on the next blank page I saw The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain. As Tom and his crew faded, the words became darker, and by the time I could read them clearly, there was nothing left in front of me but a vacant lot where the fence had been.
“It worked!” I shouted. “And look, here’s another clue!” Next to the title, I read: I’m a Straw Man. “What do you think it means?”
But Marisa didn’t answer, and I saw a tear run down her cheek before she wiped it away. Even brains can fall in love, I guess.
“Come on,” she sniffed. “We’ve still got eight more stories to cure.”
To Be Continued
Story: Chris Schillig
Art: Steve Wiandt
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