Emily Jenkins - Toy Dance Party

Introductions are made, and Buttermilk explains that all the other toys who talk are in the basement playroom, not the ground-floor bedroom. Shay sleeps with Buttermilk, so the duck almost never gets to talk to anybody unless she navigates the stairs, which is hard to do without legs or sizable flippers. But Shay is kind to her. It is not a bad life, even though Buttermilk is lonely.

“You look excellent with all that makeup on,” says Plastic. “I wish I had some. I could be a glitter ball!”

“I think they’re going to have to wash me,” says the duck, nervously.

“Don’t be scared,” says Lumphy. “I’ve been in a washing machine lots of times, and it’s not bad at all. In fact, it’s—” He breaks off, thinking of Frank and the Dryer.

“What?” asks Buttermilk.

“I have a friend,” says Lumphy. “She’s having repairs. I don’t know if she’ll get better.”

“Who’s having repairs?” asks Plastic.

“The Dryer.”

“Oh dearie,” says Plastic, and falls silent.

“She was all pulled from the wall with wires showing,” Lumphy continues. “Frank is really upset.”

“Isn’t there something you can do?” asks Buttermilk.

Lumphy shakes his head. “I don’t think so. I tried to think of a get-well present, but it’s hard to find a present for a dryer. She doesn’t play games or wear clothes or eat or read. She can’t even talk right now.”

“Oh.” Buttermilk is on Shay’s bed, and she waddles around Shay’s sleeping body to the windowsill. “Look outside,” she says.

Plastic and Lumphy join her.

“You can wish on a star,” says Buttermilk as they gaze at the sky. “That’s what I do when there’s nothing else.”

“That’s what StingRay said you could do at sleepovers!” cries Plastic. “Make wishes on stars!”

“Sometimes my wishes come true,” offers Buttermilk.

“What do you wish for?” Lumphy asks.

“One time I wished for visitors,” says the duck. “And now you’re here.”

“We’re here! We’re here!” Plastic spins herself in a circle.

“I also wished for new books, and Shay got a library card.”

“Ooh!” Plastic likes that idea.

“And I wished for Shay to stop snoring.”

“So let’s wish,” says Plastic. “We’ll pick three different stars and all wish for the Dryer to get better.”

“But she might not, anyway,” Lumphy worries.

“They don’t always come true,” concedes Buttermilk as Shay rolls over in her sleep and begins to snore.

“Yes, but then we know we tried to get her better,” says Plastic. “Then at least we did something.”

So Lumphy picks a star to the right, and Buttermilk picks a star to the left, and Plastic picks one high up near the moon. And they all wish.

. . . . .

“A sleepover is fun for kids,” announces StingRay to Spark and Sheep when Honey brings them home. “However, it is not fun for buffaloes and stingrays and balls, because all they get to do is

lie on the floor lonely and bored,

and not even get played with because people

are playing with Barbies,

and makeup,

and Barbies,

and clown wigs,

and Barbies,

and board games.

Then everybody goes to sleep on a bed that

isn’t even high—

or over anything.

And that’s all there is to it. It’s not even

special.”

“Plus you have to go in the backpack to get to it,” adds Lumphy. “And there’s a new weird smell in there.”

“I made a friend!” cries Plastic. “Her name is Buttermilk. We wished on stars!”

“Was there grass?” wonders Sheep, hopefully. “Or maybe clover?”

Plastic shakes her head. Or rather, she shakes her whole self. “There were handstand forward rolls,” she says. But neither Spark nor Sheep is particularly interested.

. . . . .

On Wednesday afternoon, Honey and Lumphy are watching television in the living room when the workman comes again for the Dryer. He goes down to the basement with a toolbox and a new part.

Lumphy is thinking so much about Frank and the Dryer, he cannot concentrate on the TV. The show is about some kids who drink pink milk, and Lumphy does not wonder why the milk is pink, or how it got pink, or why they like it pink—the way he would ordinarily. He is strategizing how he can get to the basement without waiting until everyone in the house has gone to sleep.

What can he do?

There is nothing sticky nearby that he can get on his fur.

And he cannot move in front of Honey.

Luckily, Honey decides she wants to make pink milk. She turns off the TV and brings Lumphy to the kitchen. Her mother is in the basement, watching the workman, and her father is not home from work yet. Honey opens the fridge. And the freezer. And two cupboards.

Strawberries. Vanilla ice cream. Milk.

Frozen raspberries.

Then plain yogurt.

Flour.

Ketchup.

Half a tomato.

A jar of pimientos.

Chili sauce.

And barbecue sauce.

Honey puts all these ingredients on the table and begins mixing them in a bowl. She mashes up the strawberries with her fingers and scoops in most of the ice cream from the carton. Then she adds milk and a big squirt of ketchup. Some of the ketchup gets on the table.

A chance! As Honey searches for a whisk, Lumphy tips himself into the puddle of condiment.

“Not again,” Honey scolds when she sees him. “You are the messiest buffalo.”

But—she doesn’t bring Lumphy to the basement. Instead, she wets a dishrag and wipes the ketchup from his body. “You didn’t get any in your woolly front fur,” she tells him. “So I think we can just wipe it off.”

That was not supposed to happen. Lumphy needs to get to the basement as soon as possible. An operation is going on down there!

Honey picks up the half tomato and squeezes the juice into her bowl. Then chili sauce and a few shakes of barbecue. She adds some yogurt and a handful of flour. Her experiment is only a light pink color. She whisks and whisks.

Now she adds frozen raspberries. These make the milky mixture quite a bit pinker, but now it is lumpy. She adds pimientos. Now it is very lumpy.

“I need a sieve,” Honey says to herself, and rummages for one in a low cupboard. She finds it, gets a large mug, and begins to strain the pink milk.

Lumphy sees his opportunity. The sieve is an inch away from his nose, and Honey is holding it with one hand and pouring with the other—but she is not holding the mug. He takes a risk, while she is concentrating, and—

Bonk!

Lumphy bangs his nose into the sieve and tips the mug over. The pink milk spills across the table, under Lumphy’s buffalo belly, and over the edge to the floor. Honey drops the sieve and knocks Lumphy into the puddle of milk. She runs for the dishrag and some paper towels. “Mom!”

Lumphy lies there, triumphant, letting the pink disgustingness soak into his fur.

Any minute now he’ll be in the basement.

. . . . .

When Lumphy arrives, the Dryer is still pulled out from the wall, her front door completely off. The workman has a collection of tools spread across the floor, but he is sitting on a plastic lawn chair with a tired expression on his face.

It doesn’t look good.

Honey’s mother shoves Lumphy into Frank’s washtub and grabs TukTuk and some Girl-clothes out of the full laundry basket. She loads the washer and goes back upstairs to deal with the pink milk problem.

The cycle begins. When the water rushes in, Lumphy can no longer hear what’s going on in the basement. And he can’t talk to Frank, because Frank won’t answer with the repairman in the room.

“Hi,” Lumphy whispers to TukTuk. “Do you know what’s happening with the Dryer?”