The Secret Life of Owen Skye by Alan Cumyn Read Free Book Online

didn’t want his brothers seeing where Sylvia lived.
    He put on his winter coat, which didn’t completely cover the tails of his blazer, and pulled his boots on over his cramped shoes. Then he went off in the wrong direction, to confuse his brothers, and doubled back through the woods when he was out of sight. He had his school bag with him, and secretly he’d put in some wrapping paper and tape.
    In the woods he wrapped up Uncle Lorne’s hand-carved ashtray. Then he ran the full mile to Sylvia’s house and arrived only about ten minutes late, puffing and sweating, his feet sore in those tight shoes and the flannel pants rubbing roughly against his legs.
    He was the only boy at the party! There were six girls, including Sylvia, all in pink dresses with pink or white tights and shiny, buckle-up shoes. Sylvia’s house was beautifully new and clean, with no holes in the roof, and the basement was just like the upstairs. It had carpets and paneling, a leather sofa and a huge dollhouse where Sylvia and her friends spent most of the afternoon.
    Owen stayed upstairs helping Sylvia’s mother ice the cake. Every so often he would go downstairs and look at the girls. The dollhouse had a doll living-room set and a doll kitchen and even a doll bathroom with a toilet and a sink.
    It was as if Owen had come from a different planet and didn’t understand the language of these aliens. So all he could do was watch for awhile, then go back upstairs.
    He fit in better when the cake was served. He ate six pieces one after another, a personal record. Then it was time to open the presents.
    The pink girls huddled around Sylvia while she unwrapped two brand-new dolls, a tea set, a brush and comb set, and a flowery book with blank pages to record her secret thoughts. Then it was time to open Owen’s present.
    It was pretty heavy, and because he’d wrapped it in a hurry in the woods it almost fell out of the paper by itself. Sylvia turned it around and looked at the gargoyles and the little grooves for the cigarettes. Some of the girls started laughing.
    Sylvia looked at Owen for the first time in the whole party and said, “What’s
this
supposed to be?”
    Owen felt worse than Uncle Lorne in the kitchen with Mrs. Foster. He tried to think of what to say, but now everybody was laughing. The laughter spread faster than the fire in the ditch, ugly and unstoppable. Why had he ever thought of giving her Uncle Lorne’s ashtray?
    Owen ran over to Sylvia, grabbed the ashtray, then held it high in the air.
    â€œI am Doom Monkey the Unpredictable!”
he announced.
“And this is my Atrocious Hat!”
    He plunked the ashtray on his head and raced around the house. The girls had no choice but to chase him and try to capture the source of his extraordinary powers. Even though they were girls and fast runners, they were slowed down by their long dresses and for hours he managed to squirm out of their grasp.
    At the end of the party, furniture was tipped over, there was cake and ice cream in the carpet and on the walls, in hair and on flannel pants and dripping from pink puffed sleeves. The dollhouse had been raided and restored three times, and the Western Hemisphere had been kept safe for civilization.
    â€œThank you for your wonderful present,” Sylvia’s mother said at the door when Owen was leaving. Sylvia nodded her head a little bit. She was wearing the ashtray and the gargoyles were hanging upside down. “Did you make it yourself?” Sylvia’s mother asked.
    â€œIt was made in the canyons before the beginning of Time,” Owen said. “And will survive the swirling of a billion storms!”
    â€œWell, it sounds very special,” Sylvia’s mother said. Sylvia seemed to be holding her breath, waiting for him to go.
    â€œIt held a hunchback’s heart and has been used by the Emperors of China and Bolivia,” he continued.