Annie XXIX, Dummy

(Chronological index: Ray/Denise Married, Ruth known)

The kids looked up from their hand games or books when the door opened.

But instead of the promised clown, a woman in a business suit entered. She was holding a clipboard and talking softly into a cellphone.

The kids all started to hush, trying to hear what she was saying. Much faster than if she'd asked for quiet, she had the rapt attention of a silent room.

"But they're kids staying in a hospital," she said urgently. "Surely you can sympathize?" She listened to the phone for a second. "Well how big is the leg cast?"

She appeared to finally notice the audience. She clasped the clipboard under her arm and gestured 'wait one' with her free hand.

"But that's only on one leg, right?" Her tone carried more than a bit of exasperation. "Well, you can do your tumbling act with the left side of your body. Half an act's better than none, right?" Some of the kids giggled. She dropped her volume and they shushed each other.

"So, you're telling me that you won't drag yourself out of a bed in orthopedics, stomp to the elevator, use your crutches to hit the tenth floor, and entertain a bunch of young cancer patients?

"Sir, these kids have to deal with IVs and Chemo and nurses, that are all the time telling them to stop swinging from the light fixtures." She listened to his response until the laughter died down.

"No, I don't think they'd be scared if you fell and broke your other leg. Do you remember being ten? I think they'd laugh twice as-" She paused, listened for a while, then folded the cell and pocketed it. They watched as she shook her head and crossed off something on the clipboard.

"Honestly, the work ethic in this country. Break a leg, expect not to have to do a handstand." She looked at the assembled kids. "Do you think that's fair?"

There was round of no's, except for one cautious girl. She put a hand on her leg cast and nodded slowly.

"Oh, don't worry, pumpkin," the lady said. "We wouldn't expect you to fill in." She looked at her list.

"It's just that the clown we had hired has a pony he uses in some of his acts. Both of them came down with hoof-and-mouth disease. Something about sharing the same tube of lipstick…." The kids 'Euuwwwwed' enthusiastically.

"Then we were going to have the SEALS from Mayport teach you guys black-ops skills. So when the nurses come with a shot you could slip out through the false overhead." She shrugged apologetically.

"Turns out we need parents' permission for something like that." The disappointed 'Aws' were everything you could have asked for.

"Then the tumbler," she went on with a tap on the clipboard, "slipped on a banana-flavored pancake and broke his leg. I dunno. There's only one act left that we could bring into the hospital to entertain you guys."

She stared at the clipboard. The kids stared at her. One boy finally broke the tension to ask, "What do they do?"

"Oh, it's a ventriloquism act," she said. "Nothing you'd be interested in."

The protests carried down the hall. Turns out that the young cancer patients would be quite willing to sit through such an ancient form of entertainment.

Annie and Ray listened as Denise asked them three times. "Are you really really really really SURE?"

"YES!"

"I think we have a quorum," Annie said.

"I think we better get in there before they riot," Ray replied. He nodded to the nurses. The opened the doors and Annie drove the wheelchair through.

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"Do you guys like kids?" Denise had asked a week before. Ray and Annie looked at each other for a moment then regarded her suspiciously.

"As in babysitting or adopting?" Annie asked.

"Entertaining," Denise explained. "They're having problems keeping the kids in our hospital entertained. It seems to be the season for birthday parties and school parties and graduation parties… There just aren't enough acts to go around."

"And the purchasing agent is involved…." Ray drawled.

"I'm just trying to help," she said weakly.

"I think she lost a bet," Annie said.

"Think if we don't help," Ray asked, "we could get pictures of her in a clown costume?"

"Oh, Pet would be so sorry she missed that!" Annie replied.

Denise glared. Then she sagged. "If I say please? And promise oral sex? And chocolate?"

"What kind of chocolate could I get?" Ray asked. Annie spun around and kicked his arm.

When compensation was agreed to, or as Denise put it, the extortion, they thought about what they could perform that would entertain kids.

"We could do our ventriloquist act," Annie suggested. Denise sat very still, not pumping the air in victory.

"How long would we have to practice?" Ray asked.

"Counting today? Six."

Annie nodded decisively. "Done. We had it pretty polished. Just need to rehearse."

"And, uh, take out all the dirty stuff," Ray said.

"Dirty stuff?" Denise asked.

"Well, it was developed for college students," he explained.

Annie had been ventriloquist dummy for three years of college. Her old Raven costume was still in fairly good repair. But the act wasn't.

They took out everything that was flat -out dirty. Then they took out everything that had been topical back in the day. These kids had probably never heard of Reagan.

After that, the emotional issues that hung in the minds of college students went.

They ended up with maybe three jokes that would get a laugh out of adolescents and preadolescents.

"We have no act," Annie moaned. Just then, her beak fell off. "Prophetic," she squawked.

"Well, we have a week to rewrite," Ray said.

"What if we come at it from a whole new direction?" Annie asked. "It might help make the jokes fresher."

"What direction?" Denise asked.

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Denise stepped back as the wheelchair entered. Ray sat very still in the chair. He wore makeup to make his skin look unreal and his eyes look bigger. Lines on his chin made him resemble a ventriloquist dummy.

An assembly of ropes and pulleys hung from a tower of metal bars over his head. His arms drooped limp at his side.

Annie wore a tuxedo stripped off of a Zatanna doll. She stood on a platform across his lap. There was a small stage, an arrangement of levers on one side, and a driving station.

She was pretend-swearing at the controls as the chair surged and veered. "Not towards… No. NO! Over to… Stupid human-sized contraption! Buffaloed son of a cat-tickling feather crimper! I can't believe I paid two felker karb dollars for this thing!"

It came to a stop and she kicked the station. There was a whine, then it surged towards the giggling kids.

She stepped into view, waving. "Hey, kids! I'm Annie! This is my dummy, Ray, and we're here-"

"That's no dummy," a kid in the front row protested.

"He sure is," Annie replied.

"He's a real guy!"

"He's a dummy!" she insisted. She looked around the room. "Wanna see me prove it?" The kids cheered. She grabbed a couple of the levers. Ray's arms rose.

"I could only control a dummy like this, huh?"

"He's just letting you," the critic shouted. Annie pretended to consider this.

"What if I had him hit himself?" she asked. They cheered. Ray's eyes widened.

Annie pushed levers and Ray's right arm went straight out. Then she cranked on a wheel. He got stiffer and stiffer, arm getting closer and closer to the platform. Ray whimpered.

"I'm not making you talk," Annie said, "so shut up!" Two more turns of the wheel there was a sharp click. Another wheel turned and his fingers closed up into a fist. Tighter, tighter and tighter. She grunted and set the wheel.

Annie moved to another lever. She grabbed it and braced herself. "And in three…two…"

She and most of the kids shouted ONE at the top of their lungs. She yanked the lever.

Ray's fist smashed up into his forehead. His eyes crossed and he rocked backwards in the chair, then slumped down listlessly.

"Now no one can argue! That there's a dummy!" Annie announced, shouting over the screaming giggles.

"He's just letting you!" critic-boy said.

"Then he'd have to be a dummy to do that, huh?" The other kids cheered. Critic let it go.

Annie looked up at her puppet's face. "Ray's going to be out of it for a while." She turned to the crowd. "So. How are you guys doing?"

There were some noncommittal remarks. She pointed to a pale girl in the third row. A cancer patient, she had only a few wisps of while hair on her head. "Hey, sweetheart! You and I are a lot alike."

"Um…how?"

"We both do our hairdo with a toothbrush." She walked behind the stage until the laughter died down. She shot a victorious look up at Ray as she did.

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"I say we joke about their condition," Annie said.

"That would be insensitive," Denise protested.

"What, you think they don't know they have cancer? Or a broken leg?" She marched over to Denise's place at the table. Ray was still jotting down joke ideas.

"I just don’t think they'll enjoy cancer jokes."

"Denise, trust me. I know what it's like to face big, huge, life-threatening difficulties." The woman winced and picked the sylph up to her face. Annie didn't squirm or fight. They looked each other in the eyes.

"When people try to pretend the difficulties aren't real, it doesn't make you feel any better. But we won't make fun of THEM. We'll make fun of their situation. Make fun with them. I promise. Cross my widdle heart."

"You may know what you're talking about, Annie," Denise allowed.

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"We all have a lot in common," she told them, "but you guys are the lucky ones." They stared at her in confusion.

"Well, anyone here ever have a shot?" They all raised their hands. "And the doctor tells you this may hurt a bit?" They shouted affirmatives.

She bent down behind the stage and lifted up a cardiac syringe. The needle was as long as her body. "Mine says, 'Quick! Hold her down!'" The kids' eyes were as round as their mouths.

"Okay," she announced with a look up. "I think Ray the Riddling Doll is reset. Who wants to hear a riddle?"

She worked levers as the kids cheered. With her at the controls, Ray introduced himself and the duo told a few simple riddles. Then they opened up the floor to attempts to stump the Riddle Robot.

The two had studied the immortal works of Burns & Schreiber. Once the kids asked a question, Annie had to keep the kids entertained while Ray tried to come up with a funny response. She pulled on levers and spun the cranks. Strings went around pulleys and bells rang and Ray flopped around.

She swore as she had while trying to drive the wheelchair into the room. "Gosh-pumpkin double penguin hammer! This worked in rehearsal! You stupid overengineered…"

At a silent signal from him, she shouted in victory and pulled a final lever. Ray sat up straight and delivered the answer.

If he couldn't think of something funny, he just opened his mouth and squeezed the whoopie cushion between his thighs. "Sorry," he'd say. "Termites."

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"It's going well," one of the nurses said softly.

Denise nodded. "Here, I'd thought the hard part was going to be getting them up here. Now I'm not sure how to get them back to the car."

"How'd they ever get this idea?" the other nurse asked.

"They used to show off in college, I hear. Good thing, too."

"Why's that?"

"Their first plan was to hand out Glo-sticks. Then teach the kids to come back from radiation therapy, put a glowing stick in their PJs and say they don't feel so good."

The women laughed good-naturedly. "Seen that before," one said. "Always brings a laugh when the kids see the looks on parents' faces."

"But I've never a whole ward do it," the other pointed out.

"True, true. That's a lot of parents…" They smiled. The older nurse noticed that the sylph kept looking around the 'dummy's' elbow at them.

"I suppose we should grab a cup of coffee," she said. "Before the act's over." She winked at the tiny performer and edged her partner through the door.

Quick as a wink, Ray pulled the small bag out from under the lap table. "Okay," Annie said. "This is our last act. And you guys get to perform it. Who's getting radiation therapy?"

Hands went up. "Okay, listen closely…"



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