The Curious Chronicles of Jack Bokimble and His Peculiar Penumbra

By James DeMonaco

Shortly after Jack is born, strange things are afoot in the Bokimble house—glasses fall from shelves, and nothing seems to be where Mr. and Mrs. Bokimble left it. Jack’s parents begin to sense that there’s something strange about their son, and it’s not long before they realize that he has a secret friend: his magical shadow.

Is Jack’s shadow a superpower that he needs to control and master? Or is it a curse that will separate him from others? Travel with Jack on his boyhood journey as he learns not only how to control his magical shadow but what it means to be different—a story that mines the potential for magic and mystery in all of us.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Inkshares
• Release date: Nov 7, 2017
• ISBN: 9781942645719

James DeMonaco

James DeMonaco, a lifelong New Yorker, is the award-winning screenwriter, director, and producer of the Purge series. DeMonaco also wrote The Negotiator, starring Samuel L. Jackson and Kevin Spacey. He co-authored Feral, a dystopian thriller novel, with Brian Evenson. The Curious Chronicles of Jack Bokimble and His Peculiar Penumbra is his first children's book.

Book preview

I

STRANGE THINGS AFOOT AT THE BOKIMBLE HOUSE

Three nights after he was born, Jack Bokimble came home from the hospital. It was on this night that the Bokimble family would experience the first of many peculiar events—events that would bedevil their lives on a daily basis. Mr. Bokimble rightly sensed something strange in the air as he carried his son home from St. Mark’s maternity ward. The wind was unusually gentle, and the light from above silvered the streets.

Lady Large yet Lovely Nostrils, Mr. Bokimble said to his wife, addressing her in his usual unique way. It’s a strange night. It’s so bright out, I feel like the moon is watching us, he exclaimed, as he looked up at the white ball in the sky.

It’s a beautiful night, Mr. Plentiful yet Perfectly Patterned Back Hair, said Mrs. Bokimble happily, also addressing her husband in her own distinctive way. (The Bokimbles didn’t call each other Honey or Sweetie or Baby, as other couples did—they felt that was too ordinary, lacking imagination—so they created their own specific pet names for each other, and never used the same name twice.)

It’s the night our son comes home with us. It’s Jack Bokimble’s night. And that’s his moon. Mrs. Bokimble pointed at the moon, trying to get her son, Jack, to look up. But Jack was sleeping. So she kissed her newborn son on the head and continued into their apartment building.

Mr. Bokimble remained outside for a moment. He couldn’t take his eyes off that moon, feeling hypnotized by the pearl in the sky. A cold chill ran down his spine. Once again he sensed that something strange, something magical, was going to happen.

He was absolutely right.

Strange things were afoot.

What kind of things?

Peculiar things.

What else?

Otherworldly things—are you going to interrupt me while I tell my tale?

If I have something to say, I should have a voice too.

Is that so? Can I continue now?

Okay, please do.

Mr. Bokimble smiled at the moon as his beautiful young son slept, completely unaware of what those peculiar things would be. He entered the apartment to join his wife, baby Jack, and something else.

Something quite extraordinary.

Later that night, Jack was busy waving his tiny, wrinkled hands over his bald head, familiarizing himself with his new environment. He missed his mother’s womb—amniotic fluid smelled great and moisturized his skin wonderfully. But he didn’t mind his new home. I like it here; it doesn’t smell too bad, even though my skin is quite dry, he thought.

All seemed perfectly normal in the Bokimbles’ New York City apartment. The wind hovered outside the window, calm and breathless and bored. But, strangely, Mr. Bokimble sensed something ominous and impending once again. It was at this moment that the first of many peculiar events that would begin plaguing their lives happened. The new Hess toy truck on Jack’s bureau top, all the way across the room from the Bokimble family, moved forward as if a small mouse were behind the wheel, taking the truck for a quick joyride. CRASH! A loud BAM! broke the dead silence of the night. WHAM! BANG! Jack’s new toy truck fell off his dresser, crumpling in a fantastic heap of spinning wheels and shattered plastic.

Both Bokimble parents jumped skyward in sudden fright.

Tell me that was just the wind, Gentleman Giant Earlobes? Mrs. Bokimble asked her husband.

I think it was the bogeyman, Madame Mumbles a Lot, joked Mr. Bokimble.

But it wasn’t the pure, innocent wind. He was just a scapegoat. It wasn’t even that rapscallion we’re all familiar with, the bogeyman (whose real name was Hank Lovejoy, from Detroit, just in case you were wondering), like Mr. Bokimble joked. It wasn’t even a small mouse with poor driving skills steering the truck. All the mice had moved out after the Bokimbles moved in—they didn’t like the inadequate Bokimble cheese consumption or the sour stench of Mr. Bokimble’s left pinky toe hangnail.

It was something even more extraordinary than all those things. Little did anyone know, it was the Bokimble’s newborn son who had done it.

But how could he have done it?

You’ll find out soon enough. BE PATIENT!

Fine. Get on with it.

You see, even baby Jack didn’t know he had broken that truck. He was far too young to understand what he could do and how unbelievably fantastic, powerful, and peculiar his talent was.

So, after that moment of initial surprise, the Bokimbles went back to admiring their son with the enthusiasm of kids on Christmas morning. There would be many more unexplainable occurrences, and tonight was Jack’s first bright night home. Their son had arrived, and that was more important than anything.

THE INVISIBLE HAND

Months went by, winter turned into spring, spring turned into summer, motionless and sticky hot. Everything in New York City seemed ordinary, except what was happening in the Bokimble apartment, which overlooked Central Park, where nothing was ever ordinary.

Mr. Bokimble continued his elaborate smelling experiments in his den, where he was attempting to manufacture a spray that would make smells visible. Ever since he was a young man, Mr. Bokimble had had a keen olfactory sense. He could identify any smell or any combination of odors. If there was an unusual smell somewhere, Mr. Bokimble knew exactly what was causing it—that’s a wacky waft of unwashed hair, honey-baked ham, and leftover bean curd, with an underlying hint of wet sock. His nose was very small but incredibly powerful. Some even said Mr. Bokimble’s nose was freakishly small—just two tiny holes in a round face. He endured a lot of abuse as a child, but eventually Mr. Bokimble and his wee nose were hired by perfume companies to create enticing scents. Just recently, he started his dream project, creating the Smelluminator—a product that could be sprayed into the air, making any smell (or combination of smells) visible and identifiable by a certain color or colors. If the air was saturated with a smell of dog poo, one could spray Mr. Bokimble’s spray and see the dog dropping smell and avoid it. If the air was filled with the wonderful aroma of red roses, one could spray Mr. Bokimble’s spray and see the flowery smell and walk directly into it. He was still years away from finding the right formula for the Smelluminator, working long hours in his home lab to create it.

While Mr. Bokimble worked on his smelling solution, Mrs. Bokimble made decisions for people on her Internet site: ILLMAKETHEDECISIONSYOUCANT.COM. It was a simple webpage, where people who had trouble making daily decisions would log on and ask Mrs. Bokimble to decide for them. A man from Italy had just asked Mrs. B what color underwear he should wear to work—blue striped or woolly red. A woman from Oklahoma had recently asked Mrs. Bokimble if she should eat old pizza, canned ham, or pea soup as a midnight snack. Mrs. Bokimble answered quickly—pea soup. The woman was ecstatic.

As the Bokimble parents both worked in their home, baby Jack was always nearby, growing into a healthy boy. But every day since his birth, a countless number of peculiar events had plagued the Bokimbles’ once-cozy residence. More toys were broken (164 to be exact, not including the truck). Glasses dropped off shelves in the kitchen at an alarming rate (89, approximately). Picture frames fell off the walls in the living room (3 Kandinskys and a grotesque imitation Picasso). The Bokimbles couldn’t explain why any of this was happening, and they were growing very concerned.

It wasn’t until Jack was nine months old that the most peculiar of all the peculiar things came to pass. This peculiarity wasn’t one single event. It was a culmination of numerous peculiar phenomena, a series of strange sightings and feelings. An unseen presence had entered the Bokimble home and was wandering about, creating the ever-increasing havoc.

Now, this may sound very unlikely, and quite bizarre indeed, but here goes anyway—Mr. and Mrs. Bokimble began to feel an invisible baby’s hand, as Mrs. Bokimble described it, moving about their apartment freely.

It happened frequently at night when that now-familiar white moon was out, providing soft light to the dark hours. It was downright eerie, completely weird, and inexplicably intrusive. Mrs. Bokimble encountered the so-called invisible baby hand first, while she was on her computer, making a decision for a woman who couldn’t decide if she should trim her nostril hair before or after dinner.

Tiny fingers, tiny fingers like Jack’s, running softly over my face, grabbing my hair, pulling my nose while I was working. It never hurts. I can’t see it. But I can feel it! It’s an invisible baby hand in our home!

It’s time you saw a doctor, Lady Luscious Love Handles, Mr. Bokimble joked.

But it wasn’t long before Mr. Bokimble felt that invisible hand too. It cracked him hard in the face one night when he was lying on the couch, enjoying a nap after