HOW I STOLE JOHNN DEPP’S ALIEN GIRLFRIEND BY GARY GHISLAIN FOR ILO AND SISKO, MY TWO FAVORITE SPACEGIRLS IN THE ENTIRE UNIVERSE… AND BEYOND! 1 EXPIRATION: 111 HOURS T here are a few things everybody knows about Zelda: 1. They caught her stealing food in a supermarket just outside Paris. 2. She was “scantily dressed” in some sort of…let me see…“futuristic fetish outfit.” 3. She resisted arrest and sent two security guys to the hospital with concussions and a few broken bones. 4. They couldn’t find her relatives, or any sign of a past, or anyone who knew her—like she had just fallen from the sky. Which makes it that much more interesting when she says she’s from outer space. I’ve been passing by Dad’s office again and again, pretending to go to the bathroom but really trying to get a good look at her through the open door. Here’s the extra data I’ve gathered during my expeditions: 5. She has long, dark-blond hair. It’s curly and messy, and she keeps hiding her eyes behind it. 6. Regarding the eyes: I managed to see them when she blew her hair sideways to take a good look back at me. They’re green and mean. sideways to take a good look back at me. They’re green and mean. 7. She’s pretty in a scary sort of way. Like something you’d really like to touch but that will probably bite. 8. Oh, and she’s very tall for a girl. I think she’s quite thin, too but it’s hard to tell because she’s wearing the oversize, worn-out jeans and sweater they give them at the juvenile detention center. I’d say she’s about fifteen or sixteen, but she told Dad she’s three hundred twenty- five—that’s three hundred twenty-five years on her planet. I decide to make another round trip to the toilet. She has moved her hair sideways, like she knew I was coming. “Why are you staring at me like that?” “I’m not staring at you.” I point toward the bathroom. “I live here. I was just passing by.” “So keep on passing by, DWARF!” The policewoman sitting next to her jerks her handcuffs. I walk away and lock myself in the bathroom. Dwarf? Pfft! I’m only fourteen. I might still be growing. Dad lives on a farm in the middle of nowhere—nowhere being the very edge of Normandy, one hundred miles from Paris. His village is surrounded by cornfields, apple trees, cows, and hateful villagers. The village is called Cornouaille. The villagers are called Cornouaillois, which is a ridiculous name and probably adds to their resentment. The Cornouaillois hate Dad unanimously. He’s from Paris, and he’s a famous therapist, and that’s more than enough to tick them off. They call him the “nutty professor” and his house the “nut farm” because of all the “troubled” teenagers the judge sends here to be fixed. Now Dad’s fixing Zelda. Now Dad’s fixing Zelda. “Is she crazy?” I ask. Dad smiles. He’s making her a hot chocolate and gazing at the cornfield beyond our back garden while the milk warms up. “No one is ever crazy, David.” I look down at the tray he’s bringing her. He’s not using the cheap chocolate cookies he usually gives patients. He’s giving her my cookies! The fancy new crème brûlée ones I brought with me from Mom’s place in Paris. “Is she dangerous?” “No, she’s not dangerous.” “So why is she handcuffed in your office?” “Mm? Good question, son.” He blows gently on her hot chocolate, thinking it over. “You’re right, it does show very little trust. I’ll take the handcuffs off tonight.” I’m having a nightmare where Zelda asks me to cut off her hands to remove her handcuffs when I’m awakened by a commotion downstairs. As I leave my room, I see two uniformed policemen arguing with Dad down in the foyer. A train conductor has been beaten up. Zelda has escaped. They brought her back. “She’s a demon, a tigress, THE DEVIL!” one of the policemen tells Dad. I sit down at the top of the stairs, where no one can see me. “She escaped because she thinks she’s here on a mission,” Dad explains. But the policemen don’t care what sort of nuts she is. They don’t want Zelda to beat up any more train conductors. “Use the damn shackles and lock her in her room!” “I will,” Dad concedes. “But she’ll escape again. Her drive is that strong.” You can hear the pride in Dad’s voice. It must be very annoying for the policemen. Dad offers them coffee—or something stronger, like a Cognac or a local Calvados. One of the policemen relaxes the second a Cognac lands in his hand. “She’s not your everyday little girl.” He empties his glass in a single gulp. “Took four of our guys to immobilize her. Two of them are lying in the hospital as we speak.” “She’s tough,” Dad agrees, and refills their glasses. I’m alone, eating my second serving of Coco Pops. Dad’s still sleeping, recovering from last night’s madness. I made him a pot of coffee and toasted some bread, hoping the smell would wake him up so I can keep grilling him about Zelda. In the meantime, I flip through the letters the postman just dropped on the kitchen table. I’m trying to find the exciting ones, like Dad’s daily hate mail. Last summer, Dad received two rabbit heads in a shoebox. The villagers would love to see him and the nut farm gone, and they don’t mind wasting a rabbit or two to let him know. One letter catches my eye because of the funny snake logo and the thick, fancy paper. It’s been addressed to Dad’s office in Paris and forwarded here. I open it. It’s another cuckoo message about Zelda. We’ve gotten plenty of those since Dad was on TV to talk about his work with her. It’s just a few words beautifully handwritten on the thick sheet of paper: Let the Traveler go. Zelda belongs with us. First warning. It’s signed “The Sanctuary” with an S like a snake. I quickly put the letter back in its strange envelope and drop it on the table when I hear Dad coming out of his room, yawning loudly. He grabs a cup of coffee, sits at the table, and reaches to gently stroke my hair. “Why did you tell them she’s on a mission?” I ask, pouring extra milk over my Coco Pops. Dad looks up from his coffee cup. The pouches under his eyes are two shades darker than usual. “Were you listening last night?” I nod. It’s no big surprise. Dad already knows how nosy I am. I nod. It’s no big surprise. Dad already knows how nosy I am. “She’s on some sort of quest,” he explains. “Like what?” Dad never avoids a challenging question. He believes children deserve the truth, no matter what. I still regret asking him where babies come from at an age when most kids are perfectly happy with the stork theory. “She’s looking for a boyfriend.” Even my Coco Pops stop popping. “Or a soul mate, if you like,” Dad says, buttering a cold piece of toast. “She calls him her ‘chosen one,’ and she believes he’s waiting for her, somewhere…around here.” He draws a large circle with the butter knife. By “around here,” he means Earth. 2 EXPIRATION: 91 HOURS “I told you to leave me alone, dwarf.” Zelda’s sitting on the floor in Dad’s office, pulling hard on her shackles like she’s trying to break the chain tying her ankle to the couch. “I’m not a dwarf. I’m only fourteen. I’m still growing.” She stops yanking on the shackles and turns around to give me a mean green look. “Same thing. You’re small.” She gives the shackles a serious pull. Clank! “There’s no point doing that. They’re not going to break.” She gives a series of even stronger pulls. Clank! Clank! Clank! Even the couch must have felt those. “Stop it. You’re just hurting yourself.” She closes her eyes and lies down, breathing heavily. “Are you going to stare at me like that all day?” “I’m not staring. I was on my way to see Olivier before you started dismembering yourself.” She reopens her eyes. “What is Olivier?” “My friend. Our neighbor. He’s fourteen, too.” “Another dwarf!” “He’s actually quite tall.” She sits up, rubbing her ankle. “He’s a bit fat, too.” Out of nowhere, she flips around and lands on all fours, looking straight into my eyes. “His mother says he’s big boned.” I take a step back. She looks kind of threatening. “And he had a real girlfriend last year at summer camp. You can ask him: Kissing a girl is like kissing raw chicken.” I’m not usually this talkative. “Raw chicken?” “Yeah, all weird and gooey.” She seems to think about this, then—CLANK!—she leaps forward. The couch, an iron monster of about a gazillion tons, jumps forward a good half inch, and I’m so startled I fall back on my butt in the corridor. Here’s another thing about Zelda: She’s really stubborn. “She wants a boyfriend.” “You mean she wants to have sex?” Olivier says sex with the excitement you normally associate with climbing Mount Everest. “Dad didn’t say anything about that.” We’re sitting in his garden, eating blue-cheese snacks and daydreaming about Zelda. “Is she hot? Can we go see her?”