17 - Why I'm Afraid of Bees (7 page)

I flew onto a tree and tried to figure out which way to fly. When you’re an
insect, everything looks different to you. Things that seem small to a person
appear huge to a bee. So I wanted to be sure I didn’t get myself mixed up and
fly off in the wrong direction.

Standing on a big leaf, I gazed up and down the block until I was sure I knew
which way to go. As I got ready to take off, a large shadow suddenly loomed over
my head. At first, I thought it was a small bird. But then I realized it was a
dragonfly.

“Stay calm,” I told myself. “A dragonfly is an insect, isn’t it? And insects
don’t eat each other, right?”

I guess no one had told the dragonfly.

Before I could move, it zoomed down, wrapped its teeth around my middle, and
bit me in two.

I uttered a last gasp and waited for everything to go dark.

It took me a few seconds to realize that the dragonfly had turned and buzzed
off in the other direction.

My imagination was running away with me. That’s what always happened when I
got overtired.

I took a deep breath, grateful to still be in one piece. I decided I had to
use my remaining strength to get to Ms. Karmen at the Person-to-Person Vacations
office.

I rose up into the air, looked both ways for oncoming dragonfly traffic, then
fluttered away.

After a long, tiring trip, I floated past a street sign that told me I’d made
it to the right block. Roach Street.

I buzzed along the sidewalk until I came to the Person-to-Person building.
Then I sat down on the stoop and tried to figure out how I was going to get inside.

Luckily, as I rested on the warm cement, I saw a mailman marching up the
street, stopping at each house along his route. Quickly, I flew over to the
Person-to-Person entrance and checked it out. Just as I’d hoped, there was a
mail slot in the middle of the door.

I buzzed over to the doorknob, and waited for my chance. Slowly, the mailman
trudged up to the building.

“Hurry up!” I screamed at him. “Do you think I have all day here?” Of course
he couldn’t hear me.

He fumbled around in his bag and pulled out a bundle of letters. Then,
slowly, he reached out and pushed open the mail slot.

Before the mailman had a chance to react, I swooped down in front of his nose
and buzzed right through the mail slot. As I zipped along, I heard him gasp, and
I knew he’d seen me. But for once, luck was with me. I moved so quickly, there
hadn’t been any time for the mailman to try to swat me.

My luck held when I flew up the stairs.

I’d just reached the top when the door to Person-to-Person Vacations opened,
and a girl about my age came out. She had long, curly red hair and had a
serious, thoughtful expression on her face. Was she thinking of trading places with someone?

“Go home!” I shouted at her. “And don’t come back. Stay away from this place!
Just look what happened to me!”

Even though I was screaming, the girl didn’t even turn her head. But she left
the door open just long enough for me to buzz into the Person-to-Person office.

I flew across the waiting room and saw Ms. Karmen, sitting in the same chair
she’d been in when I first met her.

I shot right toward her—and smacked into something hard.

Pain roared through my body. I dropped to the floor, dizzy and confused.

As my head began to clear, I remembered the glass wall separating Ms. Karmen
from the waiting area. Like some kind of brainless June bug, I’d crashed right
into it!

I shook myself to clear my mind. “Ms. Karmen!” I yelled. “Ms. Karmen. It’s me—Gary Lutz. Look what happened! Can you help me?
Can
you?”

Ms. Karmen didn’t even glance up from her paperwork. Once again, I realized
no one could hear my squeaky insect voice.

With a defeated moan, I sank down onto the seat of the chair and curled up
into a tiny ball. I’d come all this way for nothing, I realized. I’d found the
one person in the world who might be able to help me. And she couldn’t even hear
me!

“I give up,” I whispered sadly. “It’s hopeless. I have to get used to the
idea of being a bee forever! There’s no way I’ll ever get my old body back.”

I had never been so miserable in all my life. I wished someone would come
along, drop into the chair, and sit on me!

A strange sound startled me from my unhappy thoughts. I sat up straight and
listened hard.

“Whoo-ah. Whoo-ah.”
It almost sounded like someone breathing. But how
could that be? It was so loud!

I floated up off the chair and buzzed around the room, trying to find out
where the sound was coming from. I had circled the room twice before I figured
it out.

Ms. Karmen was bending over to pick up something she’d dropped on the floor.
Her nose and mouth were only inches from the top of her desk. And the microphone
she used to talk to people had picked up the sounds of her breathing!

Suddenly, I had a brilliant idea. If I could get to the other side of the
glass, I could use the microphone to make Ms. Karmen hear me.

I swooped over to the wall and flew straight up to the ceiling. No luck
there. The sheet of glass went all the way up. There was no space for me to
wedge myself through to the other side.

I buzzed down to the place where the glass met the top of Ms. Karmen’s desk.
Yes! There was a small slot in the glass. I remembered how she had passed
through the book of photographs on my first visit to the office.

The slot wasn’t very large. But it was plenty big enough for my round little
bee body.

I shot through the hole and jumped up on top of the microphone.

“Ms. Karmen!” I shouted, putting my mouth next to the hard metal. “Ms.
Karmen!”

Her eyes opened wide. Her mouth dropped open in confusion. She stared out
into the waiting room, searching for the person speaking.

“It’s Gary Lutz!” I called out. “And I’m down here on your microphone.”

Ms. Karmen stared down at the microphone. Then her eyes narrowed in fear.
“What’s going on? Who’s doing this? Is this a joke?”

“No!” I cried. “It’s no joke at all. It’s really me—Gary Lutz!”

“But—but—” she stammered, but no other words came out. “What’s the joke?
How are you doing that?”

Her voice was so loud, the sound waves nearly blasted me off the microphone.

“You don’t have to yell!” I cried. “I can hear you.”

“I don’t
believe
this!” she exclaimed in a trembling voice. She stared
down at me.

“It’s all your fault!” I shouted angrily. “You messed up the transfer
operation. When you made the switch, one of my neighbor’s bees must have gotten
into the machine. So, instead of putting me into Dirk Davis’ body, you put me
into a bee!”

Ms. Karmen blinked. Then she slapped her forehead. “Well that explains it!”
she cried. “That explains why Dirk Davis’ body has been behaving so strangely.”

She picked up some papers on her desk and started putting them into her
briefcase. “I really must apologize,” she said. “I feel really bad, Gary. We’ve
never had a mix-up like this before. I hope… I hope it’s at least been
interesting
for you.”

“Interesting?” I shrieked. “It’s been a nightmare! You wouldn’t believe what
I’ve been through. I’ve been attacked by screen doors, cats, flyswatters—you
name it! You yourself almost ran me over with your car!”

All the color drained from her face. “Oh, no,” she cried, her voice a
whisper. “I’m so sorry. I—I didn’t know.”

“Well, what about it?” I asked her impatiently.

“What about
what?”

“What about getting me back into my body! Can you do it right away?”

Ms. Karmen cleared her throat. “Well, I
could,”
she replied slowly.
“Normally, I could transfer you right back. But there’s a slight problem in your
case.”

“What kind of problem?” I demanded.

“It’s Dirk Davis,” Ms. Karmen replied. “It seems he’s become very attached to
your old body. He likes your house and your parents, too. In fact, he even likes
your sister, Krissy!”

“So?” I cried. “So what’s that supposed to mean?”

Ms. Karmen stood up and pushed in her desk chair. “It
means,”
she
said, “that Dirk Davis is refusing to give up your old body. He says he
absolutely won’t go back to his old life. He plans to keep your body forever.”

“WHAT?”
I screamed, hopping up and down angrily on the microphone.

“Just what I said,” Ms. Karmen said. “Dirk Davis wants to keep your body for
the rest of his life.”

“But he can’t do that, can he?”

“It is very upsetting,” she replied, biting her lower lip. “It wasn’t what he
said in our original agreement. But if he refuses to get out of your body and
your life, there’s really nothing I can do.”

Ms. Karmen gazed down at me sympathetically. “I’m so sorry about this, Gary,”
she said softly. “I guess I’ll have to be more careful in the future.”

“What about
my
future? What am I supposed to do now?” I wailed.

Ms. Karmen shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe you could go back, wait in the hive—and maybe Dirk Davis will change his mind.”

“Back to the hive?!”
My antennas stood straight on end, quivering with
rage. “Do you have any idea what it’s like in there? Cramped together with those
hairy bees in the darkness? Listening to that deafening buzz day and night?”

“It’s a way of staying alive,” Ms. Karmen replied bluntly.

“I—I don’t care!” I stammered. “I’m never going back there! Never!”

“This is tragic. Tragic!” Ms. Karmen cried. “I’ll give your case some thought
tonight, Gary. I promise. Maybe I can come up with a way of getting your body
away from Dirk.”

She crossed the room and opened the office door. “I’m so upset. So upset,”
she murmured. Then she disappeared out the door, slamming it behind her.

Trembling with anger at Dirk Davis, I hopped down to the desk. “Hey, wait!” I
called after her. “You’ve locked me in!”

Ms. Karmen was so upset, she forgot about me!

I rose up into the air and started after her. But, then, I happened to glance
back down at her desk. Dirk Davis’ questionnaire was right on top of a pile of
papers. His address was next to his name. He lived at 203 Eastwood Avenue.

Eastwood Avenue was near the computer store, so I knew where it was. “Maybe
the
old
Dirk Davis will know how to get my body back!” I told myself.

It was worth a try. I ducked through the slot in the glass and flew around
the waiting room.

No exit. No open window. No crack in the door.

Once again, I was trapped.

Frantically, I buzzed all around the waiting room. Then I went back through
the slot in the glass. I checked out the whole equipment room. Every window was
closed tight.

I flew past a calendar and happened to see the date. “Oh, no!” I cried. “It’s
Friday! It’s the weekend. Ms. Karmen might not come back to work for two whole
days.”

In two days, I realized, I would starve to death!

I
had
to get out! I went over to the far wall and noticed another door
I hadn’t seen before. I zipped through it.

The room turned out to be a tiny bathroom. With one small window. Which was
open just a crack. It was all I needed.

“Hurray!” I yelled. I shot out through the window and sailed into the open
air. Then I turned right and headed for Eastwood Avenue. Luckily, it wasn’t very
far away. All this flying around was really beginning to wear me out.

I found Dirk Davis’ house without any trouble. When I got there, I saw
“Dirk” himself—or whoever he was now—standing in the front yard. I recognized him from the
picture I’d seen in the Person-to-Person album.

“Hey!” I yelled to him. “Hey, er… Dirk!”

The tall, good-looking boy turned around and stared at me. His mouth moved,
and it looked as if he was saying something.

But I couldn’t understand any words. All I heard was a humming sound.

“I’m Gary Lutz!” I cried in my little voice. “Can you help me get Dirk Davis
out of my body?”

The boy stared at me. Then he grinned.

I was confused. What was he grinning about?

“Hey, you can hear me!” I cried.

Now “Dirk” motioned with his hand.

“You want me to follow you?” I asked. I felt excited. “Are you taking me
someplace where we can get help?”

“Dirk” grinned again. Then he turned and walked around the corner of the
house. I didn’t know where we were going. But I knew I had to follow him.

I found “Dirk” in the back yard. “Hum,” he said to me. “Hum.” He pointed to a
big rosebush and grinned. Then he stuck his nose deep inside one of the
blossoms. “Hummmmmmmmm,” he said. “Yummmmmm.”

I gaped at him in shock. “Of course!” I cried.

“You got the bee’s mind when I got the bee’s body!”

“Dirk” didn’t say anything. But when he pulled his face out of the rose, the
end of his nose was covered with yellow pollen.

“Dirk” looked a little surprised. And disappointed. I guess he missed his
long, sucking tongue—the tongue that was now hanging off the front of
my
face.

“You can’t help me,” I muttered to him. “You’re in worse shape than I am!”

“Hum?” he replied. “Hum?”

He looked kind of silly with that yellow nose. But I felt sorry for him. He
and I had the wrong brains in the wrong bodies. I knew exactly how he felt.

“I’m going to go get help for both of us,” I told him. “If I get my body
back, maybe you’ll get yours, too.”

With a loud buzz, I flew out of the Davises’ yard. As I left, I thought I
heard “Dirk” buzz back at me. I glanced over my wing and saw him sticking his
face into another rose. Maybe this time he’d have better luck getting the pollen
out.