Pineapple on Canvas: The Odd Adventures of a Toy in the City

The one where the Bully goes "Timber!"

      Thanks to Henry, the ride to the 53rd and Lexington stop was as simple as could be. Henry had even instructed Papple on how to find Ella’s office. Just look for the huge funky painting hanging in the lobby, had been Henry’s advice.

     When Papple exited the subway, he saw the Frank Stella piece immediately through the large glass wall of the front lobby and knew he was at the right building.

     The only minor hiccup Pineapple encountered was actually entering the building. The door was not a door like at Maher’s place, but instead was a merry go round of sorts. He lost time from the schedule as he had to consult S.K. on how to get through the revolving doors, after having gotten stuck, going round and round in circles, on his first few attempts.

     After that, it was all smooth sailing. Using Lou's slingshot trick he was able to engage the elevator and get himself quickly and unnoticed to the eleventh floor of the office building, which was the very same floor that held the office of the evil Dick  Shermane.

     Although Papple knew Dick's office number, he found he didn’t even need to look for it because he could already smell Dick Shermane from a mile away. To Papple, Dick had the unmistakable smell of manure, which was fitting in light of what the toys had planned for him.

     Moving slowly, Papple tiptoed into Dick's office and made his way across the room, careful not to draw any attention to himself since Dick himself was sitting at the large mahogany desk in the middle of the room. In retrospect, Papple need not have been so careful as Henry the hippo was absolutely right, humans can be the most unobservant of creatures--the majority of them wouldn’t even notice a brightly colored plush toy dancing the Macarena right in front of their feet.

     After what seemed like hours, but in reality was only a few minutes, Papple was on Dick’s desk. The stench from Dick's pores was horrifying, and it took all Papple’s effort not to gag.

     Unfortunately, Papple saw that while Dick was drinking from a coffee, he seemed to never put the cup down, which made it impossible for Papple to complete his mission. Time was of the essence as Papple needed to make it home before Maher got off work, which was only a few hours away.

     Finally, Papple's window of opportunity came when Dick put down the mug and started typing on his computer. The moment Dick did this, Papple, too scared that this would be his only chance to administer the liquid, dumped in the entire contents of the bottle (being five times the recommended dosage of the Disaster Diarrhea potion) into Dick Shermane’s cup.

     Papple then  quickly jumped off the desk before stirring in the potion. Only when he was safely in the far corner of the office did he remember that he had forgotten this critical part of the mission, as stirring was necessary to help disperse the taste.

     When evil Dick reached back to take a swig of his drink, he made a funny face and looked at the mug quizzically. Papple held his breath and his stuffing heart seemed to stop beating. Would this not work? Why hadn't he taken the time to measure out just one dosage? Why hadn’t he remembered to stir it in?

     Dick moved over to the sink in his office, and looked just about ready to pour out the coffee. However, Papple was quick to act and used his slingshot to fire packet of sugar towards Dick. Zoe had packed this into Papple's bag just in case and boy was he glad at Zoe’s over planning!

     Dick looked a bit confused as to where the sugar had come from, it seemed to appear out of nowhere right beside his cup, but nonetheless he put it into the coffee and, miracle of miracles, took another swig. This time Dick nodded in satisfaction and proceeded to down the rest of the mug.

     Papple let out a huge sigh and sunk back down on the carpet to wait for his potion to take effect.

     After about ten minutes, evil Dick turned green and his stomach began to rumble so loudly that the noise frightened Papple. With the screech of a chair being pushed back with great force, Dick got up and doubled over, as if a tornado had hit his stomach, and ran off to what Papple presumed must be the washroom. Success!

     On a whim, Papple walked back over to Dick’s desk, threw up the rope, and hoisted himself so that he could look at Dick Shermane’s computer screen. He was curious because he knew Ella was always looking and sighing at an object just like this, a Not T.V. but also a Not iPad machine.

     During the time that Papple had been waiting for his potion to take effect, he noticed that the computer seemed to put a grin on Steve’s face very similar to the one on the Grinch’s face in that movie Papple had watched with S.K., called “How the Grinch that Stole Christmas.”

     When he got up, he started pushing around buttons and a large Word document with many, many words came on the screen. It looked no different than Ella’s Not iPad. Maybe this one wasn’t that special after all. . ..

     Switching back on his device, Papple used S.K.’s program to video conference the kids to celebrate.

     Kitty answered. “Papple, are you still in the office?”

     “Papple a success!” he said, and started to do his infamous Pineapple Shake. “Come on everybody, let’s do the Pineapple Shake!”

     “Papple, you lovely idiot,” Kitty said affectionately but sternly, “hurry up and get out of there before he comes back!”

     From the background, Sir’Duke laughed, “Oh, Papple has time, the effects of that dose will have that jerk glued to the toilet for days!”

    The video screen was gyrating and while Papple’s big, cheerful grin occupied the majority of it, Kitty saw something out of the corner of her eye that made her gasp. “Papple, stop, stop!” she exclaimed. “Show me what’s on the screen, its important.”

     “Oh yes,” he said. “Me want to ask about this. This machine make evil Dick very happy. Is this different from Ella machine? Ella machine make her sad. Me want to see what is difference. Maybe we take this one instead and give to Ella?”

     “Right, right,” said Kitty, pushing all of the other toys out of the way. “Papple show me that screen now! It’s vitally important!”

     All the kids scrambled towards the screen and froze in horror. Could this really be?