CHAPTER ONE
Big News
Marvin is so excited that he runs in circles on James’s desk. Karl and Christina are coming to visit! Karl is James’s father, an artist just like Marvin, except that he doesn’t draw tiny pictures. He paints giant ones, full of color. Christina is Karl’s girlfriend and James’s friend, and Marvin likes her very much. She works at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Marvin thinks the Met is the best museum in the whole world.
Karl and Christina see James often, but today, they are coming because they have big news. What could it be?
“Maybe they’re getting a dog!” James says.
James would love a dog. But he lives with his mother and stepfather, Mr. and Mrs. Pompaday, and no dogs are allowed in their apartment.
Marvin races across the desk to a picture he once made for James, a drawing of the beach. He taps it with two of his legs.
“Oh!” James says. “Do you think they’ll take me to the beach?”
Marvin does not want James to go away, but it’s fun to think about a trip to the beach.
“I have an idea,” says James. “Maybe my dad is getting a new car.”
He takes a little toy car from his shelf and zooms it across the desk.
Marvin watches it fly past.
“Hey,” James says. “Want a ride?”
Before Marvin has time to think, James picks him up and puts him in the front seat of the tiny car.
Marvin is in the driver’s seat! He puts his front legs on the steering wheel.
James taps the car with his finger.
Whoosh!
It speeds across the desk.
Marvin is driving!
James laughs. “Now you’re a race-car driver.”
Why didn’t they ever do this before? Marvin loves riding in the car. It is so fast, much faster than crawling.
“Let’s put it on the floor,” James says. James and Marvin race the car across the bedroom rug over and over again, with Marvin driving.
Once, it bangs into the leg of the chair.
Bump!
Marvin almost falls out.
But the rest of the time, the car goes very fast in a straight line. Marvin thinks he is an excellent driver. He wishes his cousin, Elaine, could see how fast he’s going.
“Wouldn’t it be cool if my dad got a new car?” James says.
They are just thinking how great this would be when they hear a knock on James’s door.
Karl and Christina are standing there, smiling.
Marvin sees their happy faces and has a sudden feeling that the big news is not a dog or a trip to the beach or a race car.
“James,” Karl says, bending down with his arms out. “We have something to tell you.”
Christina hugs James too, as they say in one loud, excited voice: “We’re getting married!”
James looks at them with wide eyes. “Wow,” he says.
Marvin slips out of the tiny car and crawls behind it so nobody will see him.
“Isn’t it fantastic?” Karl asks.
“We’re so happy,” Christina says. “Are you happy?”
“Yes,” James says quickly. “That’s great.”
Marvin is watching James. He thinks that James does not look very happy. He certainly doesn’t look as happy as Karl and Christina.
But why not? James loves Christina. Marvin knows that.
“The wedding is going to be at the Cloisters,” Christina tells James. “Have you ever been to the Cloisters?”
James shakes his head.
“It’s a very old church that was moved here, stone by stone, from France.”
“Really?” James says. “Across the ocean?”
This sounds strange to Marvin. But he has learned that humans sometimes do the strangest things.
“Yes,” Christina tells him. “It’s part of the museum, even though it’s a few miles away. The Cloisters has some of the Met’s art from the Middle Ages.”
“And it will be a nice place for a wedding,” Karl says. “It’s high on a cliff above the Hudson River.”
“Cool,” James says.
Marvin thinks James seems especially quiet.
“I know this is a lot to take in, buddy,” Karl says. “But I have one more thing to tell you … or ask you, really.”
“What?” James looks up at Karl.
Text copyright © 2019 by Elise Broach
