Meet Sunny Sandy

It is just a kids’ book: a title spelled in rainbow blocks. Thick pages. It’s almost a baby book. The recommended age is 3-5. Zoe and I found it in a dusty box in the storage room at the Colvin Preparatory School.

Mrs. Lemon, the owner, tries to make us feel better by calling us “afterschool teachers,” but we are babysitters. The most teaching we do is to remind the kids to not pick their noses during snacktime. Our real job is to keep the kids safe and at least somewhat entertained while their doctor and lawyer parents make the money to pay the tuition. The work isn’t glamorous or interesting, but, for a part-time job, the pay is good. Private school and all.

There were only a handful of kids today. Mrs. Lemon said it was a popular week for vacations. Seeking to make the most of her money, Mrs. Lemon assigned me and Zoe to clean out the storage closet while she watched the children. We weren’t sorry. Mrs. Lemon was a seasoned teacher. She could have a circle of screaming children around her and still keep her cool while she doted on each one in turn. Zoe would just say “Now who’s problem is that?” I would have a panic attack.

Cleaning out the closet was easier. The hardest part was not choking on the dust. Even in the dark closet, we could see the thick gray blankets of dust on the cluttered shelves.

“Can you turn on the light, Hooper?” Zoe asked. I flicked the switch. Nothing happened. “Hooper?”

“Sorry. I did.” I looked up to see an empty socket.

“Well damn.”

I gave Zoe a nervous look. “Don’t say that. Mrs. Lemon might hear you.” Zoe was the best part of the job. I didn’t want her to get fired.

“Shit. That’s right. I wouldn’t want to lose this chance of a lifetime.”

I tried to not let her see my dopey grin. “We better get started.”

I ripped open a box. Its cardboard was soft with age. Manila folders filled with what looked like old personnel records. “Box of junk here.” I looked back to see Zoe playing on her phone. I coughed to encourage her to get to work. “What about you?”

She sighed and started to tear open the box closest to her. It was a smaller box about the shape of a pizza box. It sat crooked on a bigger box like someone had thrown it in the closet in a hurry.

“Well let’s see.” She tossed the strip of cardboard into the shadows and pulled out the book. From the fluorescent light in the hallway behind us, I could just see its cover. It showed a paper mache sun with a platinum blonde girl in a pink dress smiling. Or, it was supposed to be a girl. Walking over to Zoe to look at the book more closely, I saw that it was actually a grown woman. She looked like a girl because she had sharp circles of blush on her cheeks and stone-stiff pigtails on her shoulders. Her toothy smile looked like it hurt.

“What the hell?” I asked.

Zoe didn’t seem to notice how wrong the book was. She laughed at it like it was a tacky knicknack. “Oh man! How long do you think this has been here? It’s probably older than Mrs. Lemon.”

“P-put it down? Let’s get back to work…”

“Hold on, hold on. We have to read it.” She sat down on a box and gestured for me to sit in front of her.

I sat. I have never been able to tell a girl no. “Okay. Quick.”

Zoe started to read like she was back in the classroom trying to calm down a mob of kids. She turned the cover towards me with a dramatic flair. I looked away. The woman’s smile was too bright.

“The National Television Network presents Sunny Sandy.”

I should have ripped the book from her hands right then.

Meet Sunny Sandy.

Sunny Sandy lives in Sunnyside Square

Where the sun can never stop shining.

Sunny Sandy is a good girl.

She is always sunny.

She is never sad.

Or angry.

Or tired.

Or hungry.

Or scared.

That would be bad.

Sunny Sandy is a good girl.

She is always sunny.

Always.

By the time Zoe read “Always,” the hairs of my neck were standing straight. I breathed a sigh of relief when she closed the book. I expected to see her sharing my fear. Or, knowing Zoe, maybe rolling her eyes. I did not expect her smile.

“How precious!” she cooed. “Wasn’t that precious?” Her eyes were harsh rays of sun beating down on me. I stood up to escape the heat.

“Not particularly. Let’s get back to work.” I went to take the book from her. She held it tight.

“Now, don’t be silly, Hooper. We’re going to read it again.” She took my hand and tried to drag me back to the ground in front of her. The iron of her smile matched the iron of her grip.

“Like hell!” I snatched the book from her. When she tried to hold onto it, she fell backwards over the box she had been sitting on. In the cramped closet, there wasn’t enough space between her head and the wooden shelf. Her head cracked on one of the crossbeams on her way down. I dropped the book and rushed over to her.

She was lying in a slump between the box and the shelf. Her arms and legs were stuck up like she was an insect on its back. Blood rushed from the crack on the back of her head. I couldn’t see the wound, but the red pool told me it had to be deep. Through all that, she held her smile.

“Come on!” I shouted. I lifted her into my arms. “We have to get you to the hospital.”

Her voice was perfectly calm. “Thank you, Hooper. That’s very kind of you.”

I took her to Mrs. Lemon who drove her to the hospital. Between the crack on the wood and when I laid her in the passenger seat of Mrs. Lemon’s pickup truck, Zoe never stopped beaming.

I watched the kids until their parents came for them. I played pretend with them to stop my mind from imagining what might be happening to Zoe. I didn’t want to go home at the end of the day. I still hadn’t heard anything, and I wasn’t ready to be alone with my thoughts. Procrastinating, I went back to the storage closet. Standing in the hallway light, I saw the woman smiling up at me.

I thought back to what Zoe had said. “We’re going to read it again.” This book had broken my friend. But how? It was just a kids’ book.

I opened it. The first few pages are as boring as any other kids’ book from the 90s. Pictures of the woman walking through a cartoon town square then down a brick Main Street. Then they turn wrong.

On the page with the words, “She is never sad,” the woman stands over a cat and water bowl that says “Mr. Tiger.” The cat is dead.

Another picture shows her sitting in a country church pew beside a woman dressed in black.

In another, she sits in a closet smaller than the storage closet around me. It looks like she has not bathed or been outside in days.

On the last page, with the words “She is always sunny. Always.” the woman lies in a coffin. She still wears pigtails in her hair. She still smiles: the same smile I saw on Zoe’s bloody face.

I feel like that woman—that girl?—is inside me now. She’s watching me to see if I behave. I’m not sure how long she’ll let me write freely. I wish I was fighting back tears. Or a scream. But, to someone else’s eye, I’d look like I was reading a love letter from Zoe. I look peaceful. I am scared. Very scar—

Happy Hooper is a good boy.

He is always happy.

Always.