Free Captain Nobody by Dean Pitchford Page B

him.
    Dad smiled. He seemed relieved to end that conversation. His pager beeped, but he punched the button that switches it off and turned his attention back to me.
    â€œSo, are your teachers right?” he asked. “Are you thinking about your brother a lot?”
    I felt like I’d been poked in the heart.
    â€œOh, yeah,” I said quietly. “A lot.”

    We sat at the kitchen counter and ate sloppy joes that I made from a can. Dad told me how Chris’s doctors were “baffled,” but they were continuing to “feel optimistic.” He talked about the machines Chris was hooked up to and the tests they were running, and how there were so many balloons and flowers in my brother’s room that the nurses started to distribute them around the hospital.
    Then Dad took a picture of me with his cell phone and sent it to Mom.
    Suddenly, in the middle of our great conversation, the walkie-talkie in my backpack squealed.
    â€œWhat’s that?” Dad asked.
    I jumped off my chair and grabbed my bag. “Sorry! Cecil’s trying out this new gadget on me,” I said. “I’ll take it in the dining room.”
    Once I was out of earshot, I pulled out the receiver in time to hear: “This is Cecil Butterworth calling Captain Nobody. Come in, Captain Nobody. Over.”
    I pushed the “talk” button. “What is it now, Cecil?” I groaned before I added, “Over.”
    â€œWe need you, Captain Nobody! My uncle wants to move a freezer out of his basement, and I told him I know just the guy to call. Over.”
    I stared in disbelief at the walkie-talkie in my hand before I squeezed the “talk” button again. I made hissing and crackling noises, “kshhrkkkkpppfffsshhhh . . .”—sprinkled with fragments of words—“. . . can’t hear you . . . pssshhhh . . . losing battery pow . . . bbbbblljjjkkkshhhh.” Then, just before switching off the walkie-talkie once and for all, I said very clearly, “Over.”

    I finished my homework and was getting ready for bed when Dad stuck his head into my room.
    â€œYour mom got the picture of Captain Nobody. She says she hasn’t stopped laughing, and she’s showing everybody in the hospital.”
    â€œReally?” My smile was about two feet wide. It seemed like a good moment to ask the question I had been wanting to ask all evening.
    â€œDad? When can I come visit Chris?”
    Dad sat on the edge of my bed and patted a place for me to sit beside him.
    â€œRight now, kiddo, Chris’s doctors still have tests they want to run. They have specialists they want to consult. Until then, they’re saying, ‘No visitors.’ As a matter of fact, Chris’s coach dropped by, and his teammates keep showing up. But nobody gets in.” Dad put an arm around my shoulder. “So, can you give us another day or two before you come by?”
    I squeezed my lips together and nodded.
    â€œSure.”
    â€œBut,” Dad said brightly, “just because you can’t visit doesn’t mean you can’t see your brother.”
    â€œWhat do you mean?”
    â€œWell, visiting hours are over for the night,” he said, pulling his cell phone out of its holster on his belt, “but look what your mother took for you.”
    He flipped open his phone, pushed a button, and there, on the tiny screen, was a short, wobbly video of Chris lying in his hospital bed. He looked pretty much the same as when I go to wake him in the morning, except that bundles of wires and tubes snaked out from under his hospital gown and connected him to a bunch of machines with green blips rolling across their screens. Dad explained what every machine was for. Since the little movie lasted only about ten seconds, we played it four more times.
    When we were done, my eyes stung and I couldn’t think of anything to say. After I closed the phone and handed it back to Dad, he kissed the