Running down the street to get away from the angry woman and her nipping dog, the boy raced home and swung into the door quickly, closing the door behind him with a slam. He thought about going to his room and lying down to try and clear the fog in his mind, reeling as he was from the strange ordeals he had been enduring thus far in his day. Looking at the cuckoo clock in the foyer, the boy saw that it was nearing lunch time, so he just went into the living room and flopped down on the couch, grabbing the remote and turning on the television to his favorite cartoon network. He could hear his mom in the kitchen and could smell the food she was cooking. The scent of soup was soothing, and the couch was comfy. Here at last, sanity seemed to have come back.

The boy’s mom had heard the front door slam and could hear the loud sound effects of the cartoon on television, so she entered the living room carrying a pot of soup in one oven-mitted hand while stirring it with a wooden spoon in the other. “What are you doing home?” she asked, stopping next to the television in front of the boy. Looking up at his mom, the boy exaplained, “Well, yesterday my teacher gave us all an assignment to learn a new word. So when I got home last night, I did. This morning when I went to school, I told her my word. She sent me to the principal’s office, and then when I told him the word, he told me to come home.” His mom walked over to the couch, still stirring the steaming pot of soup, and she asked, “Well, son, what was the word?” “Pumpernickel,” he said. Upon hearing the word, his mom shrieked and slammed the heavy pot down on the boy’s head, spilling boiling liquid all over him. Alternating between hitting him with the wooden spoon and the pot, his mom shrieked, “Get out! Get out of my house now! I mean now! You’re no longer my son!” Terrified and scalded, the boy jumped up, dropping the remote in an attempt to cover his head with his arms to fend off the blows as he ran out of the house, now slamming the door from the other side. He could still hear his mom’s angry screams and shouts from the other side of the door. Not knowing where to go, the boy took off down the street towards the downtown, thinking maybe he could head for the library or the arcade–anywhere where he could hide out for a while to ponder what was going on in his life right now.

Wiping chicken broth and noodles from his hair and arms, the boy continued down the street, entering the downtown. It sure felt colder out now that he was wet and now that he had been kicked out of not only his school but also his home. He plodded wearily down the sidewalk, paying little attention to the passersby. In fact, he probably would have missed all the passersby, even those giving him funny looks, if it weren’t for the fact that one of them stumbled out of an alley and ran into him. It was a drunk bum, clutching feverishly to a brown bottle wrapped in a brown paper bag. The boy, reeling from having been run into so suddenly, stopped and looked at the teetering man before him and then the boy reeled from the man’s stench. The bum spent a few seconds trying to focus in on the boy–who probably looked like two boys at this hour of the day–and slurred, “What’re you doin’ outta shool, boy? You’s playin’ hoo-hic!-hookey?” The boy shook his head and tried to side-step the reeking man. “No, I’m not playing hookey. See, my teacher gave me an assignment to learn a new word, and I did. When I told it to her this morning, she sent me to the principal’s office, and when I told it to him, he sent me home. When I got home and told my mom the word, she kicked me out of the house.” The drunkard gave the bottle a long pull then stared blearily down at the shivering boy. “Wha’s th’word then?” the bum asked loudly. “Pumpernickel,” the boy said. Upon hearing the word, the drunk bum moved with a speed hitherto thought impossible of someone whose senses had been so dulled by decades of alcohol abuse, smashing the brown bottle in its brown bag over the boy’s head, sending a shower of shards and Schlitz all over the boy’s head and shoulders. “Gid outta here, ya scallop!” cursed the drunkard. Terrified, the boy fled down the street away from the drunk bum and his shattered bottle. The boy knew there was something horribly wrong with the world when a drunk was so easily offended!

To be concluded…