ONE
The world famous obstetrician walked towards the Van Pelt house, his green scrub surgery cap jaunty, and his mask not quite covering his big black nose.
Contractions, Mrs. Jones? Not to worry. I am accepting an award for most successful Caesarian Sections in the Western Hemisphere later, but today I must visit my latest patient.
Congratulating himself on having taken up medicine after fighting World War I and playing hockey with Bobby Orr, the surgeon opened the gate to the home of Lucy and Linus Van Pelt.
There was Lucy Van Pelt, sitting on the front steps, wearing a tube top and tight jeans. Dr. Snoopy came up close and poked her in the stomach with his paw. He'll be kicking a bit, we see.
Lucy leaned back, enraged. "You stupid beagle. I'm not showing. I don't need a gynecologist, or an obstetrician. Not yet! And you're a DOG."
The world famous obstetrician looked about the yard haughtily. I will need rags and boiling water, he thought, and of course a root beer, as Cliff Huxtable may drop by. The doctor waved an instrument of his practice at the patient.
Lucy was alarmed. "You stupid beagle, that's not a speculum, that's a tuning fork. Get away from me, have you lost your mind?" It amazed her that Charlie Brown's dog was still alive.
Here Lucy was, in the bloom of young womanhood—and she was beautiful, she knew that—and she was knocked up, her life was falling apart, and that blockhead's dog was still in delusion land.
The doctor waved his "speculum" around, and adjusted his surgical mask, so he looked especially professional. Near the end of your trimester, Mrs. Smith? I will induce labor by putting prostaglandins near the cervix. No, no compliments please, it's all part of my work. It amazes me too, that I moonlight as a world famous attorney. John Does' wife may be coming in for an examination soon.
The door of the Van Pelt house opened, and Charlie Brown and Linus Van Pelt emerged. Charlie Brown was looking quite dispirited. On the verge of his eighteenth birthday, C.B. was already balding, and inconsistently had youthful acne appearing all over his pate.
Charlie Brown also had, to Lucy's disgust, a bit of a pot belly sticking out of his zigzagged shirt.
Lucy looked at Charlie Brown and then down at the world famous obstetrician. My God, his owner's belly is bigger than mine, but the dog wants to treat my pregnancy. Why can't he be a world famous aerobics instructor, and get Charlie Brown in shape. Is my life over?
"My dad was really nice about it, Linus" Charlie Brown was saying, "But his friend, the dean of the barber college says I am not really coordinated enough to give haircuts, he recommended that I unload trucks or something after graduation."
Charlie Brown looked at his feet, and Linus patted his shoulder. "What's so depressing about it all is, my little sister dropped out of high school sophomore year, and is a full time hairstylist and manager of Dad's barber shop now."
Linus smiled patiently. Having skipped second, fifth and ninth grades and then turned down a full ride to the YaleDivinity School—so he and his brother Rerun could market , a thriving business, his future was secure. The orders were rolling in.
"Perhaps college, Charlie Brown?" Linus said, smiling. "I can loan you the money for your first semester." But Linus looked a bit doubtful.
Charlie Brown hung his head. "I don't belong in school anymore, Linus. I'm a C blah student and I've always been. Everyone is surpassing me, you with your mail-order blankets and Schroeder possibly getting accepted at Julliard—"
"SHUT UP YOU BLOCKHEAD!" Lucy screamed as she turned on Charlie Brown. As Lucy screamed, Charlie Brown and Linus bounced in the air, just as they had when she screamed at them in childhood.
Lucy looked at the two of them, lying on her porch floor, and stomped off, nearly knocking down the world famous obstetrician who thought, "The patient is hysterical. But with me here, there will be no need to call in the midwives."
Three small birds that had followed Dr. Snoopy into the yard turned an exited in tandem, rather hurriedly, in front of the departing Miss Lucy Van Pelt.
Charlie Brown sat up on the porch and wondered. He had a somewhat different relationship with Lucy than he'd once had. She was no longer the bully who pulled the football away.
Lucy, although temperamental, had long raven hair and was full breasted and kind of sexy. She wore intense red lip gloss!
Sometimes, in a rare good mood, she'd give Charlie Brown a hug and a kiss, and he liked that a lot. What was wrong now?
"Oh, you haven't heard?" Linus said, as he sat nearby."She's pregnant, Charlie Brown."
TWO
Schroeder sat at his second-hand Steinway, scratching his head, and idly plinking Mozart's 40 inG minor. The rejection letters from Julliard, Berklee and the state music college lay on the bench beside him.
I'm just not good enough, Schroeder thought. I spent years playing on the toy piano, because of my cheap parents, and then I earned enough playing the organ at a local hotel to get this piano…but I'm not really a gifted composer…just an appreciator.
Though he loved playing Beethoven, Bach and Chopin, and obsessively reading their biographies, collecting the sculptured busts…it didn't make him Mozart! Schroeder sighed.
On the other hand, Schroeder had gotten a call from an agent for the nearby Waffletown Syrups, a farm baseball team that could lead to playing for the Yankees or the Red Sox! Schroeder had been a baseball catcher since childhood, and Joe Shlabotnik, a former player and now a recruiter, had seen Schroeder's batting and catching on the high school team…and they wanted him.
And he had to get out of here! Piano, or no piano, he had to leave town, fast. Lucy—oh God, there she is stomping through the front yard, and of course Mom will let her in, he thought.
Pregnant. Good Grief. One night he'd finally succumbed to Lucy's entreaties after a decade of her stalking him. Well, several nights. And afternoons. And the money he could have used for Trojans had gone for blank composition paper, which was EXPENSIVE, dammit.
And now she (shudder) wants to marry me. Before Lucy came into his room, Schroeder read Joe Shlabotnik's offer again.
THREE
"Are you sure?" Marcie asked as Sally Brown shaved the side of her head. "I've never seen a hairstyle that had to be maintained with Elmer's glue."
"It's going to be great" Sally said, as she finished the last bristles of Marcie's black hair. "Just spike it every day, and you'll look really hip. Big Brother will love it, I'm sure."
Sally winked at Peppermint Patty, who was hiding a grin as she sat over by the big picture window of the Brown barber shop—no, the recently re-named Brownette Beauticians.
Sally thought to herself—With a friend like that, who'd need enemies? Sally had never really had many close friends, she'd always enjoyed her own company best. In school she'd answered history test questions with "I will never need to know the date of the Battle of the Bulge as I am going to be a housewife…and besides, I'm not fat." and truly, even not being a housewife, she'd gone to work for Dad, cutting hair, and was truly her own woman! Power!
But Peppermint Patty thought that Charlie Brown might ask HER to the prom…if she tipped the odds against her best friend. But it was a lively blue Mohawk…
Marcie looked up at Sally as Sally was edging the side of the spikes. The glasses with the spikes were quite a contrast. "Charles doesn't seem like the New Wave type, and my mother will be quite upset with this hairstyle. I look like Marilyn Manson."
"Marcie, trust me. My brother is very interested in exciting and um, distracting women…look at his fascination with the little red haired slut—er, girl. This will hypnotize him, I'm sure. And look how people keep staring at you in the window."
Marcie smiled over at Peppermint Patty. "Sir, I really appreciate you coming over here and encouraging me to have this done. It shows good sportsmanship as I know you also had an interest in Charles. Do you want to get a Mohawk as well?"
Peppermint Patty said with a straight face. "Well, I wouldn't want to compete with you, Marcie." Then she looked down at the"Rolling Stone" magazine, biting the inside of her cheek.
Suddenly Lucy Van Pelt stomped into the barber shop. She was hysterical and enraged. She slammed the door and balled her fists. "Sally, forget about that haircut. You advertise massages, right? Soothing massages. My life is over, Schroeder says he won't marry me, and he wants me to get an abortion."
Peppermint Patty stared up at Lucy. "Lucille, babe, Marcie was here first. Why do you want to marry that dork anyway? His music is dead man, no talent. He doesn't even know Ray Charles's birthday."
Marcie climbed out of the chair. "I know you must be upset, Lucy. I'm getting a this exciting hairstyle so Charlie Brown will ask me to the prom."
"I'm having morning sickness, and now I'm going to puke, since you look like Daniel Boone after the Indians got him. Put a bag over your head and Charlie Brown can do the same, and you can go to the prom together."
Marcie burst into tears, and Lucy ignored her. "Where's my soothing massage, dammit?"
Sally looked at Lucy critically. "I'm actually not doing massages right now, you'll have to get one from my assistant."
Lucy rolled her eyes. "If that stupid beagle is your assistant…"
But then what appeared to be a midget canary pitter-patted out of the back room with a towel on his wing.
Sally smiled. "Woodstockwill see you now."
Lucy screamed so hard that Brownette's Beautician's shook from its foundation. "I'M NOT GETTING A SHOULDER RUB FROM A STUPID BIRD!"
FOUR
Charlie Brown and Linus sat in the deserted pumpkin patch, passing the joint back and forth. For years, Linus had missed Halloween candy waiting for the Great Pumpkin to arrive. Then he'd realized that at some point that he'd missed nothing—it was about the peacefulness of the patch. There was no Lucy haranguing him to give up the blanket, and no Sally stalking Linus and calling him her "Sweet Baboo."
"What kind of future am I going to have, Linus?" Charlie Brown asked as he toked deeply. "I can't live with my folks forever, and I'd really hoped to play baseball professionally." Charlie Brown looked at the marijuana cigarette critically. "I'd deal drugs, but I seem to have an invisible sign saying "BUST ME" on the front, and "RIP ME OFF" behind…"
Joe Cool, hip college guy strolled into the pumpkin patch, gazing at the stoners contemptuously through his sexy shades. Joe don't do drugs, no, no…I can get the beagle-ettes with the soft paws with my big charm, my Thelonius Monk records…oh yeah.
Joe leaned a bored paw against one of the pumpkins, which was about the size of Joe Cool himself. Joe contemplated his post-adolescent greatness. Maybe I'll head over to the student union, play a rubber of bridge, man…check out the coeds!
"You're good guy, Charlie Brown" Linus said, diplomatically avoiding the uncomfortable topic of Charlie Brown's baseball career. Charlie Brown had not only not made the high school team, but he'd not even been allowed to be a water boy, as Charlie Brown was widely regarded as a jinx to ballplayers everywhere.
Joe Cool saw a poodle mincing along unsupervised, and left the pumpkin patch to follow coolly (of course) hoping to get her "digits"….have her come up to campus this weekend, oh yeah!
"I tried working at Starbucks, but you know that the foam machine went wild and slurped out in this tidal wave, chasing me across the store" Charlie Brown said to Linus sadly. "Good thing I have my lifeguarding job, everything else has panned out."
"It's true, Charlie Brown" Linus said, as he finished off the dope. "You have the strangest coordination problems or maybe it's kryptonite karma. You're terrorized by kite-eating trees, and when you try to write with a pen, the ink shoots across the library. I'm not sure you should work with your hands at all, old friend."
Charlie Brown shrugged. "Well, I've gotta go over to the pool."
Linus nodded. He and Charlie Brown had been working as lifeguards at the YMCA until Linus got his security blanket biz going. "I hear you're doing well at the Y, Charlie Brown, they promoted you to swimming instructor, you got a raise."
Charlie Brown smiled. "The kids like me and the director wants me to take over as head of Aquatics & Water Aerobics temporarily until they find someone. They did offer it to me as a full time job after I graduate, but I really wanted to do something more meaningful, you know?"
Linus's eyes widened. "More meaningful than teaching scared kids to swim, and being a lifeguard? Are you kidding? That's a great career, Charlie Brown. The life you save may be your own."
FIVE
Lucy regarded Violet curiously. Violet had always been even nastier and bitchier than Lucy, and two years ago, when Violet had gone into the convent, Lucy had thought it was some sort of weird scheme, maybe Violet was trying to seem superior…a Mother Superior, maybe…
But Violet was really different now, she laughed more, and was quite generous of spirit. Although as a modern and more aggressive nun, of course, Violet eschewed the traditional habit for the white robe and black belt of a Kung Fu expert.
She forced her faith!
Violet smiled, leaning on the bench they shared. "What's wrong, Lucy. Tell your friend the martial arts nun. I'll have you know I've the best instructor in town, the Masked Marvel."
Lucy looked over at the ill fitting mask on the ever-present beagle. Lucy and the Masked Marvel had once had an arm wrestling contest, but he'd slurped her head at the critical moment, and was declared the winner. Hmmm.
Violet touched Lucy's arm. "I know Schroeder went off to baseball camp, and he asked his mother not to give you contact information. I know you're broken hearted. I also know that you dodged a bullet, if he'd tried to marry you, even as a nun, I would've been against it. The guy's a coward, Lucy, and you can imagine what I thought of his offer to pay for you to go to the clinic for an um, "operation".
"No no…Violet! Lucy sobbed. "Schroeder's a talented musician, and about to become a semi-professional baseball player. It was my fault. I was careless."
Startled, Lucy felt a furry paw on her hand. She looked around and the Masked Marvel, her old foe was holding her hand sympathetically. Should she slug him? Would he slurp her again? Did Batman act this way? Of course in a moment he might don a miter and become the world famous bishop so…
Violet's eyes narrowed. "It's your fault? It's no one's fault. A baby is a miracle, no matter where it comes from. You could give it up for adoption, or something, but I will be in total support of you. Maybe you could marry someone else. Nice, decent, and…"
Human, I hope, Lucy thought, staring at the big black nose of the Masked Marvel nervously.
Conclusion
[from "Wedding Announcements" in Peanutstown, U.S.A.]
"the marriage of Miss Lucille Van Pelt, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Mark Van Pelt to Mr. Charles Brown took place December 19 at Second Avenue Church. There were four bridesmaids, including one with a fashionable Mohawk hairdo of cobalt blue.
"He's a blockhead but I love him" the new Mrs. Brown announced. Mr. Brown is director of the local YMCA Aquatics Branch, and the couple will share quarters with the only living World War I flying biplane ace, who battled the Red Baron