oh, that trickster is up to his old tricks again and this time he’s broken the baby. it’s not like me and the baby are best friends or anything, but she was always following me around, crashing at my place, showing up at the disco and crawling around the dance floor in my gold sequined dress and then trying to say that she didn’t by yelling, “no! no! no!” and crying really loud. i knew she was lying because was there dried up drool on the front of the dress and a streak of poo inside. if you’re going to borrow my clothes without asking then at least wear a diaper and don’t try to lie, but the baby wasn’t very smart and i didn’t even have to do an investigation for one second to know what she did. i didn’t think much about it when i hadn’t seen her in a few days. maybe she was in a playpen somewhere with her annoying baby friends, crying and pooing and pretending not to know how to talk or how to get into discos by not wearing a diaper because they smell and show through clothes. but i knew something was up when the trickster left a message on my walkie-talkie inviting me for sushi lunch at the sushi restauranté – his treat. the trickster never treated, so I knew right away that part had to be a trick and i didn’t know why he wanted to meet me since we didn’t hang out anymore. we used to be best friends: me, trent, shifty, the trickster, but one time the trickster kept imitating me and doing everythingiI did and repeating everything I said and so I hated him. then one day when i was at school the teacher was reading a book about being nice and saying you’re sorry when you are mean to someone and i thought maybe the trickster was being nice like that. but i wasn’t going to take any chances, and put on my investigator’s disguise. i got to the sushi restauranté right on time and no one could tell it was me because i was undercover under my hat. there was a tray of sushi waiting for me at the table, but the trickster wasn’t there — only his picture, and the left arm of the baby. i could tell it was going to take my very best investigation skills to solve this case and put the baby back together.

johnson wilson and the case of the broken baby: part 1 — left arm

i had the left arm of the baby and a clue. the basement window of my townhouse was open and i didn’t leave it open. there were royal blue threads caught on a nail that was sticking out. i investigated the threads and they were definitely from the trickster because they smelled like the trickster. trent my dog said one time that the trickster smelled like the ’80s and he and shifty thought this was the funniest thing ever, but the trickster got really mad and i didn’t know what they were talking about. but i knew the smell of the trickster and he had been in my rumpus room. he made a mess and didn’t clean it up so i had to, which made me very mad. there were records all over the floor and i investigated until i found that one wasn’t in its sleeve. it was on the turntable with that picture of the trickster he leaves for me when i’m investigating him. the right arm of the baby was right there on the record. i thought that was a pretty good idea actually, and that maybe one day after he case was solved i could borrow an arm from the baby when it’s my night to dj at the disco and i could use it for scratching on the records. the baby was going to owe me big favours forever – but only after i could find the rest of her parts and put her back together. i tied the two arms to my belt and took out my magnifying glass. ah-ha! the trickster wasn’t tricky enough to make sure more threads from his smelly eighties stuffed body weren’t left on the carpet in the rumpus room. there were more blue threads, then red ones and yellow ones and some white ones at the bottom of the stairs. then i heard footsteps and “hee, hee, hee.” trickster! the front door slammed when i reached the top of the stairs. i ran to the door and opened it but the trickster was already driving away in his tiny round car. i looked down at the two arms dangling from my belt and was sad about the baby being in parts and that the trickster probably really hurt her feelings by being so mean. i got a white wine drink box from the fridge and called trent and shifty on my walkie-talkie. i told them to meet me for a play date at the disco. it was going to be a long night.

johnson wilson and the case of the broken baby: part 2 — right arm

i didn’t sleep at all. since shifty has an after-hours disco in his garage, trent and i went back to his place after the real disco closed. i felt a little bit bad because i tried out one of the baby’s arms on the turntables when i was spinning for a set, but trent and shifty said she probably wouldn’t mind and they knew her better than i did. they had grown up in houses with babies, so they were used to babies and their weird noises and yucky smells. shifty told me once that i was a baby and trent said he even saw me when i was a baby and i was crying and pooing my diaper, but i didn’t believe either of them. they said those things when i was still friends with the trickster so he probably made up that story about me being a baby and told trent and shifty to tell me to trick me. i kept investigating at the disco and at shifty’s. someone said they saw the trickster at the 7-eleven buying chocolate milk which could be true. i’d bet the baby would cry and cry if she didn’t have something to drink in her bottle. someone else said they saw the trickster returning some videos. i talked to everyone and investigated them, but didn’t get any firm leads — until i got home. it was already morning and i was starving and almost dead so i went to the kitchen to have something to eat. i grabbed a brand new box of cereal and some milk and i didn’t notice for a minute, but the trickster had replaced my cereal with his special trickster cereal, laff-o-pops. and the prize that fell into my bowl was the baby’s right leg, not the toy camera that was supposed to be the prize in my regular cereal. this made me madder than before because I needed that camera for future investigations. i didn’t want to eat the baby’s leg – or the trickster’s cereal because it could have poison — so i ate some gummies and some mini ravioli. i was really tired, but I didn’t want to have a nap. naps are for babies and i might miss something like the clue that could solve the whole case. i thought that maybe I should see what was going on at the playground, but my tummy felt sick and i had to lie down before i could do anything more for the broken baby.

johnson wilson and the case of the broken baby: part 3 — left leg

the trickster didn’t listen to the sign I have on my bedroom door that says: JOHNSON WILSON’S ROOM PRIVATE KEEP OUT! i was happy that he didn’t make another mess, but my dolls were naked on my bed wearing masks that looked like the trickster, and he took all their clothes. i looked around, and i found the baby’s left leg stuffed under my pillow, but i couldn’t find my dolls’ clothes so I’d have to investigate that later, when the baby was back together and my tummy ache was gone. i lay down for a minute and thought about the trickster and what he would do next and how i could stop him and catch him and put him in jail. i had two baby arms and two baby legs, but that wasn’t very good without a body and a head. but maybe if the baby only had her arms and legs and body and no head then she wouldn’t cry all the time and she wouldn’t drool on my dresses and be as annoying. i closed my eyes only for a second and i’m sure the trickster did something to make me sleep, like putting a sleeping spell on me because i woke up after a long time and it was already the next day. i knew i didn’t sleep on purpose because i never get tired and I can stay up later than everyone and watch tv. i woke up when trent’s voice came through on my walkie-talkie, which i always have on in case of emergency. i told trent i had the left leg of the baby and he said he heard from his friend that the trickster was just at the grocery store near the school buying apples and that he had a sack in his hand that kept moving by itself. i asked trent who told him this and he wouldn’t tell me, but he promised that his friend was telling the truth and swore to god and hoped to die. he knows how important it is to me to know who to believe for clues when i’m investigating a case. when trent said his friend saw the trickster at the grocery store near the school i knew it was for real. since i’m an investigator i even find clues in my dreams. when I was under the sleeping spell i dreamt that the trickster had the baby’s body and head in a sack and was laughing, “hee, hee, hee,” and skipping along a path that looked like the one i sometimes take wheniI go to my school — which is exactly where the clues were telling me he was heading. i’d have to move fast to catch up.

johnson wilson and the case of the broken baby: part 4 — right leg

i couldn’t be sure i was on the same path that i saw the trickster on in my dream since i hadn’t been to the schoolhouse in a while. my teacher knows all about my important investigations and lets me take work home or sometimes draw a picture instead of doing math or spelling. and one time at show-and-tell i brought my magnifying glass and walkie-talkie, but all the boys wanted to play with them and got germs all over which was gross and I had to wash them when i got home. it was okay that travis played with them at recess because i think he’s cute and he’s nine and i don’t think he has as many germs. school hadn’t started and everybody was playing and running in the field.iI rushed around asking about the trickster, but the kids were doing games and chasing each other and weren’t being serious.iI climbed to the top of the slide and shouted, “has anyone seen the trickster? he’s broken the baby and i need your help!” a group of girls laughed and started saying, “has anyone seen the trickster? has anyone seen the trickster?” they were pretending to sound like me and act like me and that makes me more mad than anything. i untied one of the broken baby’s arms from my belt, slid down the slide and smacked each of the girls in the face with the arm until they started crying. “there he goes!” travis yelled and pointed to the side doors of the school. it was the trickster all right, slipping into the building.iI ran super fast to catch up, but by the time i was inside he’d disappeared and i couldn’t tell which way he went. but then I thought that if the trickster did everything the same as always did, he’d want me to find the next part of that broken baby and he’d put it somewhere i’d be sure to go – like my homeroom. i saw it as soon as i walked in. the body of the broken baby was on my desk at the back of the class and the trickster had put an apple where her head should be. i sat down because i needed to make a plan and take some notes, but there were books covering my notepad and the books weren’t mine and one was open to a page with a picture of the trickster. i investigated the books closer. they were from the library and they were overdue. i grabbed the books and the baby’s body off my desk. i left the apple for my teacher and ran out of the class as the morning bell rang. school would have to wait.

johnson wilson and the case of the broken baby: part 5 — torso

the trickster is a very bad clown. he bugs people by imitating them, he doesn’t return his library books on time and he broke the baby. the library was quiet and dark when i arrived. i stopped at the front desk and slipped the trickster’s overdue books through the return slot. then i took all the baby parts i’d collected and put them together. as soon as i popped that last leg onto her body she started squirming like crazy and jumped off the desk and started crawling around. but of course she could see because she didn’t have a face or eyes so she kept bumping into things and making little angry fists. but she couldn’t cry and i was happy about that. i picked up the baby’s headless body and this time she didn’t squirm or complain. we walked into the library’s main room. there were stacks of books on the floor and book arranged in no particular order on shelves. for a library, it was very disorganized and they probably didn’t even know the trickster’s books were overdue. i set the baby’s body down for not a millionth of a second to make a quick note to come back and investigate this library later to find out why it’s so messy and who works there and why they probably don’t care about overdue books when they should. it wasn’t a trillionth of a second, but it was long enough for the trickster to come darting out of nowhere and swipe that baby right back up and run away yelling, “hee, hee, hee,” like he always does. i chased him behind piles of books and down cluttered aisles. i was faster than him, but he was a tricky one. he was nearly in reach when he started pulling books off the shelves as he ran and letting them drop to the floor and making me trip on them. he was gone and I was almost ready to give up and go home or maybe back to school. but then i thought about the baby, taken hostage by the trickster again and that he might break her into pieces and the case would never be over and the baby would have to go to a special hospital when she was rescued. i rounded a corner came to the door of an unlit room. i tiptoed in using my best investigator walk, and then – there she was! the trickster had propped the baby’s body up on a stack of books and made her hold a book with his face right on it. i was about to pick her up when i heard a familiar sound: the cry of the broken baby. i swung around and there was her head, wobbling on top of a golden stick. i grabbed the head and placed it on the baby’s body. she smiled at me and some drool got on my scarf and she started crying again which was extra irritating since i just saved her life. i took a quick look around for the trickster, but he was surely long-gone. the case of the broken baby was closed, but i’d get him next time. ciao!     click here to go back to johnson wilson world or return to the pamelaklaffke.com homepage.

johnson wilson and the case of the broken baby: part 6 — head