Dogs Don't Tell Jokes (Someday Angeline 2)

“So how’s school?” he asked. Then whispered, “You doing anything top-secret?”

“No.”

Gary rubbed his chin as he stared at her. “Well, of course you have to say that.”

“We don’t do anything top-secret,” Angeline repeated.

Gary nodded knowingly. “Your secret’s safe with me,” he said.

“We do mostly boring stuff,” said Angeline. “Some of the junk is interesting, but it’s like the teachers are trying to fill up our heads with facts. I need to empty my head, not fill it.”

Gary nodded. When he was with Angeline, he always felt like he understood what she was talking about, but then when he got home and thought about it, he realized he had no clue.

“My head’s empty,” he said. “It doesn’t help me.” He knocked his fist against his head, as if to prove it was hollow.

Angeline laughed.

“There’s going to be a talent show at my school,” he said.

“Oh, that’s perfect!” said Angeline. “You can tell jokes!”

He slapped himself in the forehead. “Now why didn’t I think of that?”

“When is it?” she asked.

“November sixteenth.”

“Oh, Floyd Hicks’s birthday,” muttered Angeline. She did some quick calculations in her head, then angrily slammed her fist into the side of the couch. “Bird feathers!” she exclaimed. “Why can’t it be on a Saturday? Bird feathers!”

“It’s a Friday night,” said Gary. “Maybe you can get home in time.”

Angeline shook her head. “No, I don’t think so. The airport limo doesn’t leave until … Maybe.”

“First prize is a hundred dollars,” Gary said.

“Oh. Well, that’s not important,” said Angeline.

He wondered why she said that. Didn’t she think a hundred dollars was a lot of money? Or did she just think he had no chance of winning?

“You should just tell Mrs. Snitzberry jokes for the talent show,” Angeline suggested. “They’re the funniest.”

“I don’t know,” said Gary. “Nobody would know who she is.”

“So, we don’t know who she is either,” said Angeline.

That was true. “But we know we don’t know who she is,” Gary pointed out.

He had once told Angeline a Polish joke. As far as he could remember, it was the only time she didn’t laugh. She said she didn’t like ethnic jokes. She thought they were cruel.

“It was just a joke,” Gary had tried to explain, but deep down he realized she was right.

So after that he never told jokes that made fun of Polish people, or Blacks, or Jews, or Italians, or any other ethnic group. Instead, he made fun of only one person—Mrs. Snitzberry, whoever she was. The name had just popped into his head.

“Why’d Mrs. Snitzberry always wear two pairs of pants when she went golfing?” asked Gary.

“Why?” Angeline asked eagerly.

“In case she got a hole in one.”