Don't Stop Now by Julie Halpern Read Free Book Online Page A

and bleach his hair into the ugliest skunk do. Then he enrolls in high school. “Which part of Hiding Out are we talking exactly?” I’m leery. “Because I’m not going back to high school. Or shaving my beard.”
    â€œLet’s buy ourselves wardrobes from Mars’ Cheese Castle! And dye our hair in the bathroom!” Josh is hyper-enthused, almost more than the time he found a copy of the ancient Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy computer game on eBay. A little scary, really. But also kind of funny, too. I shrug an OK, and we head inside. At least it’s the beginning of a plan.
    On our way in, we pass the cop and the baseball-hat bitch-mom coming out. The cop nods at me, and I wink at her.
    â€œDid you just wink at that cop?” Josh whispers.
    â€œYep,” I answer. I just winked at a cop.
    The Castle is buzzing with tourists sifting through fridges and freezers of cheese fare. We make our way over to the racks of Wisconsinalia clothing. Josh pulls out a green shirt that proclaims, WISCONSIN: SMELL OUR DAIRY AIR . I laugh and find a tank top reading, WISCONSIN: SMELLS LIKE CHEESE .
    â€œHalf of these are about smells,” I note.
    â€œAnd the other half are about cows.”
    â€œAnd the other half are about cheese and cows,” I add.
    We grab a selection of goofy shirts, some grotesque sport shorts, Packers boxers, bikini undies covered in cheese wedges for me, and a couple Badgers fleece blankets. In the grocery section we pack a Styrofoam cooler with pop, chips, CornNuts, beef jerky, bread and, of course, cheese. Josh adds a couple of cheese hats—giant yellow foam hats in the shape of cheese wedges—at the register. I give him a quizzical look. “In case we need a disguise,” he says. As if wearing wedges of yellow Swiss on our heads will make us incognito. The hair dye will have to come later, since that is one product that Mars’ Cheese Castle does not carry. If only it were cheese based.
    Whenever I imagined a no-holds-barred shopping spree, à la Pretty Woman , I thought it would be in a fancy department store, complete with doting salesgirls and an appropriate montage soundtrack. Never did it involve cheese products.
    We pack up the car and are about to drive away when I realize, “Wait. We don’t have any maps.”
    â€œMaps? We don’t need no stinkin’ maps,” Josh accents.
    â€œRight. We already barely have any idea where we’re going, but we’re going to try and get there without maps? I don’t think so.”
    â€œAll we have to do is drive west, baby.” Josh has one hand on the steering wheel, one hand hanging next to me on my seat back.
    â€œYeah, and end up fried to a crisp in Death Valley. I’ll be right back.”
    â€œYou have a morbid imagination!” Josh yells after me as I walk into the Cheese Castle.
    I pick out a few maps in the Castle, add in a pack of Chuckles, and then we’re off.
    â€œSo which way do we go?” Josh asks.
    I pull out the Wisconsin map and scan westward. Portland is a long way off, so we have a lot of possible terrain to cover before we either (a) find Penny or (b) give up and turn her in. As long as we’re on the road, we may as well stop and see some of our glorious country before I go off to school (or get thrown in jail for aiding a fraud) and Josh goes, well, somewhere. I trace my finger along the treasure of lines and spot something that jars a wonderful family (pre-divorce devastation) road-trip memory. “The House on the Rock!” I yell. “We have to go!” I’m so excited I’m bouncing in my seat.
    â€œWhat’s the House on the Rock?” Josh asks, intrigued.
    â€œWords do not describe, my dear. Just drive where I tell you.”
    â€œAye aye, Captain.”
    â€œI can’t hear you…,” I sing.
    â€œAye aye, Captain!” Josh cries, and we drive off singing the SpongeBob theme