The King of Rock Malcolm yelled I’m terrible at this No matter how fast his fingers slid up and down on the neck of the plastic guitar he just couldn’t keep up with the blaring rock song Whose stupid idea was it to give him a Rock Like a Star video game for his birthday anyway Oh yeah his dad’s The guy loved that old geezer music His best friend Dandy’s fingers flew over the frets of his red guitar His score 4
was three times higher than Malcolm’s Dandy really knew how to rock Malcolm sighed I give up He set his blue guitar down and plopped onto the couch Dandy still stood legs slightly apart twanging along with the video game He chewed his tongue as he concentrated And he barely blinked his eyes His score rolled higher and higher and higher With a huge blast the song finally ended Dandy held his arms up in a victory V I am the King of Rock Wow Malcolm couldn’t believe it Dandy had scored over 95,000 points Far better than the lousy 20,000 he’d scored You’re really good at this What can I say Dandy wiggled his fingers in front of his face I’ve got the magic touch 5
You can play it any time you want Malcolm said It’s not really my kind of game Thanks Dandy beamed trying to put his guitar down The strap got caught on his ear When he turned the controller around to pop it loose some of the buttons got caught in his hair I’m sorry you didn’t get the video game you wanted he said as he tried to untwist the gadget Malcolm was sorry too He’d asked for Ghost Stalkers the Home Game It was based on his favorite reality TV show In the game the players try to detect famous ghosts and zap them with lasers Malcolm knew he could score high on that one Ghost detecting and zapping were his specialties I never asked for Rock Like a Star I think my dad wanted it Malcolm said 6
Dandy still struggled to get his hair loose from the controller He gave new meaning to the phrase plucking a guitar Parents are like that sometimes Dandy said For my birthday my mom gave me a DVD of Medical Miracles season one I don’t even like that show And she only watches it because she thinks one of the actors is dreamy She gets all giggly and gaga when he’s on Dandy made goo-goo eyes to imitate her I know which actor you’re talking about Malcolm said Every time they show him Grandma Eunice nearly jumps out of her wheelchair She whistles and hoots and yells things like He’s hotter than a jalapeño on a grilled-cheese sandwich The more Dandy tried to free his hair the more it got caught in the buttons 7
