"No," Sam said in a small voice.

"Is something wrong?" Mom asked.

Sam reached into his pocket and very quietly felt the package of gum. "I'm not having a very good day," he told his mom.

"Oh? Why not?"

A tear slid down Sam's cheek. He pulled his hand, in a fist with the gum inside, out of his pocket. He looked at it and felt all choky.

"Sweetie? What's the matter?" his mom asked.

It was because she said "sweetie." That was the worst. Lots of kids at school cried for dumb reasons: because they didn't get to be first for graham crackers at snack time, or because Nicky bit them, or because the carpool car had a flat tire. Sam never cried at things like that. But when your own mother said "sweetie" and you didn't feel like a sweetie at all because you had this bright red giant-sized pack of Dentyne gum in your hand, and you didn't even like Dentyne gum, or want Dentyne gum, and you weren't having a good day at all, wella"

Sam began to sob. He handed the gum to his mother.

And after they returned to the supermarket, found the manager, explained about the gum, apologized about the gum, paid for the gum, and then went outside and threw the gum away in a big trash can, it began, finally, to be a good day again.

8.

"I want a pet," Sam said one evening at dinner.

His mom reached over and patted his cheek. "Oh, Sam," she said, "you know how much we would love to have a dog. But Daddy's allergic to dogs."

"My eyes get all itchy, and I sneeze and feel terrible if I'm anywhere near a dog," his dad said. "And I turn grouchy. I snarl at everyone."

"What abouta"" Sam began.

"Same with cats," his dad said.

"I had a cat once, Sam," Anastasia told him, "when I was younger, before you were born. And Dad was sick for two whole months before we realized it was the cat causing it."

"Was he sneezy?" Sam asked.

"Yes."

"And grumpy?"

"Just like the Seven Dwarfs," Anastasia said.

"Did you have to kill the cat?" Sam asked. He sort of hoped they had. He didn't want anybody's cat to be dead, especially, but for some reason he was very interested in shooting guns and dropping bombs. At nursery school, Sam and his friend Adam always dropped a lot of bombs on stuff until the teacher said, "Time Out, guys," and made them stop. Now Sam was kind of wondering about how you would get rid of a cat that was turning you into a Sneezy and a Grumpy. Maybe you would have to drop a bomb on it.

"Of course not," Anastasia said. "We gave the cat to my friend Jenny. Later it got run over by a car."

"Squooshed flat?" asked Sam.

"Yuck," Anastasia said. "I suppose so. But I don't want to think about it while I'm eating."

"Eat your dinner, Sam," his mom said. "Chicken's your favorite."

"Could I maybe have an alive chicken?" Sam asked. "I really want a pet."

"No, sweetie. People raise chickens on farms. I think your school is going to have a field trip to a real farm some time soon. So you'll get to see lots of live chickens. But you won't be able to keep one, I'm afraid. A chicken wouldn't be a good pet, anyway."

Sam scowled and drove his spoon around his plate, pushing a trail through some peas into a mound of squash. Oh, yuck. Now there were some peas touching his squash. He hated when his foods touched each other. The worst was when spinach juice got onto mashed potatoes and turned them green.

No. The real worst was when beets touched something.

Sam poked at his peas. "Anastasia got to have gerbils," he grumbled.

The whole family groaned. Sam giggled. The gerbils had been terrible. They had had babies, and then they had all gotten out of the cage, and there had been gerbils all over the house for a while.

The Krupniks had all been very glad when they finally gave the gerbils away.

Carefully Sam removed three peas from his squash mound and tried to de-squash them with his finger. It didn't work. No one was looking at him, so he put the squashy peas into his pocket. He could throw them away later.

He gnawed on his chicken leg and wished that he could have a pet. If he had a pet, it would be sitting under his chair right now, right this minute. And he could drop peas down and his pet would eat them and no one would ever know but Sam. A good pet would even eat broccoli, Sam thought.

"You stay in the yard, Sam," his mom said. "And after I finish the dishes, I'll bring you in for your bath. It's almost bedtime." She b.u.t.toned his sweater.

Sam nodded. His mom closed the screen door, went back into the kitchen, and left Sam alone on the back porch. It was boring, being outdoors after dinner. There were no kids around. At school, there would be lots of kids yelling and shoving and grabbing and running. Nicky would be biting people, and Adam would be dropping bombs on the castles that other kids would be building in the sandbox, and Skipper would be going down the giraffe slide headfirst, and it would be a whole lot of fun.

But being alone in the back yard was boring. Sam sat for a minute on his tricycle. He pushed the pedals with his feet, rode the tricycle into a bush, got off, and left it there, mashing the rhododendron.

He watched a squirrel climb the side of a tree trunk. Squirrels couldn't be pets; they always ran away very fast if you came close. A pet should be willing to sit beside you, eat your peas, and listen quietly while your mom read you a story. A squirrel wouldn't do any of those things.

He wandered over to his sandbox, sat down on the triangular corner seat, and reached for a big spoon that was partly buried in the sand and dirt.

When he picked it up, he saw a worm.

Sam wasn't afraid of worms. Sam wasn't afraid of anything much, except maybe the Terrible Twos, which he still had never seen. And Nicky at school, who bit, and left little pink circles of teeth marks on your arm.

But he had never thought very much about worms until now. He picked this one up and examined it. It was long and fat and glistening, and it wiggled in the palm of his hand.

Could a worm be a pet? Sam wondered. He had never heard of anyone who had a pet worm. But maybe no one had thought of it yet.

A worm was small, the way a pet should be.

It was alive.

No one was allergic to worms. He was pretty sure of that. Daddy was allergic to dogs and cats. Sam's friend Adam was allergic to orange juice, so at snack time at school Adam always had tomato juice instead. And Sam's mother was allergic to ironing; he had heard her say that lots of times.

But no one was ever allergic to worms, Sam was quite sure.

And a worm would never surprise you by having lots of babies the way Anastasia's gerbils had. Worms didn't have babies. In his whole entire life, Sam had never once seen a baby worm.

A worm would never ever run out into the street and get squooshed flat by a car the way a cat might. Because worms didn't have legs. Sam lifted the worm and dangled it in the air, checking. No legs.

And Sam thought of something else good about worms. Sometimes, when they were walking to the store, his mom would grab Sam's hand and say, "Watch out. Dog mess." Sam would have to walk very carefully around it.

But she never once said, "Worm mess." So that was another thing that worms didn't do and another problem that a pet worm wouldn't be.

A worm would sit quietly beside you while your mom read a story, Sam was sure. This worm was sitting quietly in his hand right now.

Would a worm eat peas? Or broccoli? Probably not. Sam wasn't even sure that a worm had a mouth. He held this one up and examined each end of it carefully. There were things that might be a mouth, but he wasn't certain.

But he was certain of something: it wouldn't bark or whine. That would certainly please his parents, who didn't like barking and whining one bit. There was a dog across the streeta"Mr. Fosburgh's poodle, Clarence, who barked and whined a lota"and sometimes Mrs. Krupnik said that she wished Mr. Fosburgh would move to Australia and take Clarence with him.

"Saaaammmm!" He could hear his mother call him from the kitchen door. It was time to go in for his bath.

"I'm coming!" Sam called back. Carefully he rolled his worm into a ball and put it into his pocket, where it would have three peas to eat just in case it was hungry, just in case it did have a mouth, just in case it was willing to eat peas.

Trotting to the house, he tried to think of a name for his new pet. He had wanted to have a dog and name it Prince. But he had named one of Anastasia's gerbils Prince, so that name was taken, even though they didn't have the gerbil anymore.

What was a better name than Prince?

King, Sam thought, with satisfaction. He grinned, climbing the porch steps. He patted his pocket.

King of Worms, he thought.

9.

Sam was at the public library with his sister and his mother late one afternoon. The public library was one of his very favorite places.

He liked to call it the liberry, even though everybodya"his mom, his dad, his sister, and the librarian herselfa"had all told him about a million times that liberry was wrong. He knew that. He knew it was really library.

So he said it correctly, aloud. But to himself, Sam always said "liberry." He liked the sound of it better.

Sometimes on Sat.u.r.days, the librarian showed children's movies. The Red Balloon was the one that Sam liked best. It had no scary parts at all.

Winnie-the-Pooh was pretty good, too, but Sam always got a little nervous when Pooh was up in the air, dangling from the balloon, and bees came along. Sam was just a teensy-weensy bit frightened of bees.

After he had chosen his books, and the librarian had checked them out, Sam went to the bulletin board by the library's front door. He wanted to see if they would be having a movie soon. He looked all over the bulletin board for a picture of Dumbo, or Bambi, or w.i.l.l.y Wonka.

None of those things was there.

But Sam did see a sheet of pink paper with some drawings of dogs and cats. They weren't very good drawings, but you could tell they were dogs and cats.

And there were some words on the paper.

Sam screwed up his face and began to sound out the letters.

P was easy. "P, p, p," Sam sounded in a whisper.

And "T, t, t," he said.

"Pet," Sam read aloud.

Then he started on the second word. Sam knew that "Sh" was the sound of being quiet, and the second word began with "Sh."

"Pet Shhhhh," Sam said quietly. He looked at the next letter. An O.

"PET SHOW!" Sam yelled.

Everyone in the library turned to look at him. A man with a newspaper scowled, but most people smiled.

"That's right, Sam," the librarian said. "We're having a pet show for children on Sat.u.r.day morning. With prizes. Do you have a pet to bring?"

Anastasia was at the counter, checking out Gone With the Wind for the fourteenth time. "You can't take my goldfish," she said hastily. "Frank the Second is not one bit interested in being exhibited."

"I'm afraid he doesn't have a pet," Mrs. Krupnik said to the librarian in a sad voice. "My husband is allerga"a""

"I do!" Sam said. "I do! I didn't tell you! It was a secret!"

Back at home, he raced up the stairs to his room, with his mother and sister behind him. He opened his closet door, pushed aside the boots and sneakers and slippers on the floor, and found the little box he had hidden in the corner.

His mother was looking very nervous. "Sam, what do you have in there? If it's a snake or something, I really don't think I cana""

Sam took off the lid. "Shhh," he said. "He may be asleep."

"Yuck," Anastasia said, peering into the box. "It's just dirt"

"No, no, it's in the dirt! Look! I'll find him!" Carefully Sam poked through the dirt until he found his pet. "Here he is! His name is King of Worms!" Sam held the earthworm in the air.

His mother and sister stared at it. They didn't say anything.

"I could tie a ribbon around him for the pet show," Sam suggested.

"Yeah, right," said Anastasia. "Cute."

"I have to get dinner started," Mrs. Krupnik said. "Sam, be sure to wash your hands carefully after you put your, uh, your pet away. Anastasia, make sure he washes, would you?"

Anastasia nodded.