Slider

David thinks that he got his metabolism from his dad, who is hyperactive and leaps from project to project when he’s not at work. David gets home to find his mom is making pizza for dinner. He tells Mom that he has already had one pizza today, but he suspects that eating more won’t be a problem. Mom is exasperated with David. Dad is working late. David’s sister, Bridgette, and her boyfriend, Derek, arrive. They’re in college, but Bridgette comes home once a week for dinner. Mom asks David to check on his younger brother, Mal, who has autism. David reflects that they have been checking on Mal for 10 years.

Mal is rocking happily on his bed, staring at his Wall of Things, where he’s collected a large assortment of leaves, feathers, and other nature-related items. Mal loves to rock back and forth and has done this since he was a baby. When he began collecting Things, he and Mom were at odds about what was allowed on the Wall, and Mal would have frequent meltdowns. He has accepted the rules now and follows them well. David informs Mal that it’s dinner time, and they’re having pizza. Mal stops rocking. David can tell from Mal’s body language that Mal isn’t interested.

Downstairs, Bridgette brags about her recent test scores, and Derek talks about real pizza from Italy. David boasts about his pizza-eating time, but Derek is the only one who is impressed. David demonstrates on a slice of pizza, devouring it in seconds. Mom, exasperated, asks David to try to retrieve Mal again. Upstairs, Mal eats potato chips, which is one of the few foods he likes. The others are fish sticks, crackers, Cheerios, and pizza crusts. Their dog, Arfie, waits nearby, begging for chips. Mal won’t come to dinner for pizza crust if he has potato chips.

David returns to the table to inform Mom about Mal’s chips. Mom has tried hiding them, but Mal always tracks them down. Derek suggests that Mal has superhuman senses, which he says have “been observed in autistics” (17). David and Mom correct Derek—they don’t use the term autistic in the house, because Mom doesn’t like labels.

David uses labels all the time, just not around Mom. David labels himself as the steamed, pulverized beef that cements the buns of a slider together because he is the middle child holding the family together.

David eats slowly for the rest of dinner, so Mom won’t be upset, but she still loses her patience and sends him away. David grabs one more slice, insisting that the crust is for Mal, but he secretly finishes the whole slice once he’s upstairs.

On his computer, David reads about the latest updates in the competitive eating world. A famous yet controversial eater named The Gurge won a chicken wing contest but has been accused of cheating. The Nathan’s Famous contest is coming up soon, and many notable competitive eaters participate each year. David finds an auction for the preserved half of a hot dog: the one that Jooky Garafalo lost the contest by last year. The starting bid is 50 cents, and no one has bid. The auction closes in about five hours, at midnight. David calls HeyMan to tell him about it and decides to bid.

David has Mom’s credit card information written down from when he needed to buy a textbook online. He knows that she will be angry that he used her card, but he reasons that he can pay her back. David places the opening bid.

David ends up in a bidding war with another user. The amount goes up slowly from 50 cents. When Mom calls him to do dishes, David activates an auto-buy feature, which will automatically bid for him up to a certain amount. David has $20, so he enters that amount into the auto-buy feature and leaves the computer, certain that he will win the bidding war while he’s away. While David is finishing the dishes, Mal starts screaming upstairs.

David rushes upstairs to Mal. When Mal starts screeching, everyone in the house stops to tend to him. David suspects that Mal is screeching because he ran out of chips, but he isn’t sure. David wraps his arms around Mal from behind and gives him a tight hug. This technique sometimes helps Mal’s meltdowns, but not today.

Mom shows up with the rug, which is a long section of industrial carpet that Dad brought home from work. Mal fell in love with it quickly, and rolling him up in the carpet is one of the most effective ways to calm him. Mal can spend anywhere from five minutes to an hour in the carpet, content as can be, but when he wants out, the family must act quickly to avoid further meltdowns.

David agrees to watch Mal while he is a “burrito” wrapped in the rug. David studies Mal’s Wall of Things. He has noticed certain patterns in the way Mal orients the items. One time, he swapped the position of two leaves. When Mal noticed, David feared a meltdown, but Mal just smiled knowingly at David and switched them back. Mal is mostly nonverbal, but David believes that Mal understands what they say. He thinks that the Wall is Mal’s way of communicating. David recalls a time when Mal was given alphabet soup. He noticed that Mal sorted the letters, and David spent a long time trying to decode the pattern. He finally realized that Mal sorted the letters into letters with straight lines and letters with curved lines.

Mal says his one word, okay, when he’s done in the carpet. Okay can mean a myriad of things given the context. David talks to Mal while unrolling him. Mom wants the family to talk to Mal as much as possible. She thinks he’ll eventually say more than okay. David returns to check on the auction and finds that he is the top bidder at $2,000. David realizes that he must have made a decimal error on the auto-buy feature. He cancels the feature, but it is too late. He stays up late, hoping that the other bidder will outbid him, but the auction expires with no new bids. David wins the Jooky dog.

David struggles to sleep, worried about the mistake of spending two grand on half a hot dog. He calls the auction site customer service line. They can’t refund him, but they help him to relist the hot dog with a reserve for $2,000 so he can make the money back.

In the morning, Mom runs an errand. Dad must leave for work, so he puts David in charge of watching Mal until Mom gets back. David complains, pointing out that he has things to do too. He feels that his parents never prioritize him when Mal needs to be watched. Nevertheless, he agrees.

David tells Mal about the hot dog situation and speculates about the consequences. Mal responds okay to everything he says. David snaps that it’s not okay, upsetting Mal, who understands the phrase not okay. David reassures Mal that he’ll figure it out. David’s auction has no bids. He takes Mal to the backyard so Mal can collect more Things.

David hangs out at HeyMan’s house and tells HeyMan about the auction gone wrong. HeyMan suggests involving Cyn, but David worries that Cyn will think he’s stupid. HeyMan reassures David that Cyn has known them both for years and already knows they are stupid. David agrees that Cyn is much smarter than them, but he still doesn’t want to tell her yet.

David goes home. Mom asks him to check on Mal, which is routine. David checks Mal, then checks his auction. There are still no bids. He evaluates everything worth selling in his room to see if he can come up with the money, but he would barely make $400.

Derek calls David to tell him about a slider-eating contest that pays $200 and is sponsored by Derek’s fraternity. The winner last year ate 20 sliders in five minutes. David thinks he can beat that but isn’t sure. Derek offers to bring over SooperSliders for practice that night. David wants to skip dinner, but he eats some grilled cheese and salad to make Mom happy. When Derek arrives with 20 SooperSliders, David wishes that he hadn’t eaten so much, but he doesn’t back out.

David begins eating and develops techniques to move faster, like smashing the air out of the buns before eating them. Mal watches. Each time David finishes a burger, Mal says okay. David feels the burgers piling up in his digestive tract, so he stands up and jumps a few times to loosen them. David finishes in three minutes, 39 seconds. He doesn’t feel good and rushes to the bathroom.

Derek picks David up on the night of the contest. In the car, Derek muses that everyone is good at something. Derek is good at finding opportunities, and David is good at eating. Derek asks if David has any other hobbies or a girlfriend. David reminds Derek that he’s only 14. Derek asks about Cyn, referring to her as “the Chinese girl” (53). David corrects Derek and states that Cyn is Korean American, not Chinese, and that she is just a friend. Derek nonchalantly says they’re the same thing. David is angry and wishes Cyn were there to punch Derek for saying that.

The frat house is a mess due to partying college students. They pass a girl serving loose-meat sandwiches. David is hungry, but Derek stops him from taking a sandwich. Derek takes David to Randolph to pay the entry fee. Randolph is manning a grill, where he is cooking up Possy, an opossum who served as the fraternity’s mascot until she recently got hit by a car. David loses his appetite.

Derek leaves David alone for a bit. David finds a quiet corner to people-watch. Last year’s winner, Hoover, offers David some loose-meat sandwiches. David declines, but Hoover leaves some with David anyway.

At the start of the contest, Randolph announces that, in honor of Possy, every contestant must start with a chunk of possum. David is so disgusted that he hesitates, giving Hoover a head start. He eventually manages to eat the chunk of possum and start his sliders. He didn’t have to unwrap them during practice, but now this step is giving him trouble. He gets a rhythm down and gets into the zone. The crowd fades away, and all his concentration is on the sliders. David finishes his entire box of sliders before his time is up, so he grabs one of Hoover’s sliders and takes a bite as the bell rings.

The whole crowd celebrates David, referencing David and Goliath. David feels sick, but he’s proud of himself. However, the joy is short-lived when David finds out that the prize is really a $200 gift card for SooperSlider.

On the way home, David’s stomach feels terrible. Derek offers to buy the gift card for $50, but David declines. At home, David tells Mom about winning the contest. She thinks it’s disgusting and tells David to make money in other ways. When he asks how, she doesn’t answer. David is stressed because the Visa bill will come soon.

David checks his auction, but there are still no bids. He lies down and considers his desperate situation. He hears Mal and Dad get back from their drive and listens as Mal makes his way upstairs to David’s bedroom. David sometimes wishes that Mal didn’t exist. Mal tries to give David a Cheerio by placing it against his lips, but David declines. When Mal leaves, David feels terrible.