The Key That Swallowed Joey Pigza

Joey Pigza, a hyperactive boy who manages his condition with medication patches, lives in his family's run-down row house on Plum Street with his mother, Fran, his baby brother, Carter Junior, and two Chihuahuas named Pablo and Pablita. His father, Carter Senior, has been missing for six months after fleeing a botched face-lift that left his face badly scarred. Mom has hidden Joey's medication patches in a baby-safe place to protect Carter Junior from accidentally ingesting them, but she has grown so depressed and mentally foggy that she cannot remember where she put them. Without his meds, Joey feels himself slipping toward the out-of-control behavior of his younger years. He copes by wearing a yarmulke, a small skullcap, and stacking his Chihuahuas on his head to prevent a compulsive hair-pulling tic he calls the yips. Joey possesses what his former special-education teacher called a special gift: the ability to feel everything that everyone else feels, making him capable of intense happiness and crushing sorrow.

The family lives in deep poverty. A friendly delivery man named Mr. Fong brings pizza every night, and Joey pays with food stamps. Joey saves the last slice each night hoping Dad will return for it, but he never does.

Joey must repeat a grade because his parents' failed attempt at homeschooling left him unprepared. On the first day of school, he arrives unmedicated. The school nurse, Mrs. Holyfield, discovers his old, expired patch, discards it, and gives him an emergency replacement from his file. His new teacher, Mrs. Fabian, has the class act out Greek myths and assigns Joey the role of the Oracle at Delphi, the prophetic figure who tells people's fortunes. Mrs. Fabian coaches him to make only positive predictions, and Joey improves.

His first day is cut short when Mom's desperate voice crackles through the classroom intercom, saying that only Joey can help her (32). Mom tells him she is afraid she will hurt Carter Junior and is walking to the hospital to check into a program for depressed mothers. Joey races home and finds Mom half sitting in bed, face frozen, while Carter Junior plays safely nearby. She tells Joey she is broken and beaten down and fears she will ruin Carter Junior the way she believes she already ruined Joey, calling him a ticking time bomb. Joey is devastated but recognizes that Carter Junior can still be protected. Mom makes him promise two things: Tell no one she is gone, so Child Welfare will not take the children, and do not let Dad steal the baby. She warns that Dad has been lurking across the street at night wearing a mask. Then she packs a suitcase and leaves.

Joey throws himself into becoming the man of the house. He cleans top to bottom, finds hidden money in Mom's closet, shops for groceries, and roach-proofs the kitchen. Trying to retrace Mom's foggy steps, he shoves his hand into an old baseball glove in his closet. What he thinks is a spider bite turns out to be a paper cut from the med patches Mom had stuffed inside. He laughs with relief, realizing she hid them there because Carter Junior, who imitates Joey's every gesture, would have tried to put patches in his mouth.

Joey's former girlfriend Olivia then arrives unexpectedly. She is a fierce, sharp-tongued blind girl who carries a scarred black stick and wears a hitchhiking sign around her neck. She has been suspended from her church boarding school for refusing anger management therapy and spray-painting "I AM NOT ANGRY!" across the building. Olivia bonds with Carter Junior and agrees to stay and help. The next morning, she stands motionless in the backyard with her arms raised, waiting for a bird to nest in her coiled braids. She confides in Joey about a gleaming black box floating in the darkness of her mind that she believes contains all her hopes and dreams but can never open, fearing her anger will set it on fire. Joey tells her to be "pawzzz-i-tive," stretching the word until it sounds optimistic. Before going inside, he secretly sprinkles pizza crumbs into her hair. Minutes later, sparrows land on Olivia's head, and she beams with the biggest smile Joey has ever seen.

Mom calls from the hospital, sounding better and reporting she is on medication. She warns that Dad came to the hospital disguised as a doctor, trying to steal Carter Junior. That evening, Joey opens the front door expecting Mr. Fong but finds Dad in a pizza delivery jumpsuit. Joey hesitates, wanting to give Dad one more chance, and holds Carter Junior out for Dad to see. Dad smacks the pizza box into Joey's face and snatches the baby. Joey chases him through the streets. Dad slides into a kiddie pool and loses his grip, then flees through a hedge. Joey finds Carter Junior sitting unharmed in the murky water. Walking home, he picks up a macramé key chain he once made for Dad, with a single brass apartment key attached.

Joey traces the key to Dad's apartment near Buchanan Park. In a small adjoining room, he discovers a brand-new nursery with a crib, changing table, and a hand-stitched pillow reading "Carter Junior." Joey climbs into the crib and falls into a deep sleep before waking and slipping out. Meanwhile, after Mom calls and asks to see the baby, Olivia wheels Carter Junior to the hospital in a shopping cart. On the way home, she trips into a deep construction hole, and the cart rolls away. Joey returns to a dark, empty house and panics. Olivia arrives bloodied and crying, but moments later Mr. Fong appears with Carter Junior safe on a warm pizza box, having found the baby in a cart at a nearby parking lot. Olivia vows to stop being angry and dedicate herself to hope. She announces she is going back to school.

Joey returns to Dad's apartment, climbs into the crib again, and falls asleep. He wakes to screaming: Dad has found him. Joey feels his special gift activate and senses what Dad is feeling. Dad compares himself to Frankenstein's monster from the Boris Karloff film, citing the scene where the monster befriends a blind man, and extends his hand in friendship. Joey tells Dad to act like he knows the difference between good and bad. Dad calls Carter Junior his second chance. Joey asks if that means Dad ruined him, and Dad surprises Joey by suggesting he is not as messed up as he thinks and should look deeper in the mirror. Joey delivers his ultimatum: "No family, then no baby" (142). If Dad wants Carter Junior, he must come home to the whole family.

Mom calls sounding like her old playful self, announcing she is coming home. Joey orders a carrot cake inscribed with a message of inner strength, self-love, and Pigza pride (146). Olivia and Joey share a parting kiss, and she cracks him across the shin with her stick, calling it "body-braille for love" (148), before tapping away into the dark. That evening, Dad arrives first with a suitcase and Chinese takeout. Joey lets him in. They set the cake on Mom's plate and wait. Then Joey hears it: tap, tap, tap, and a small scream. Mom is at the bottom of the porch steps with a broken heel. She runs up barefoot and embraces Joey. Dad pokes his head around the doorjamb. Mom shakes her head, saying she could picture her crazy, no-good husband waiting inside for another chance. Dad invites her in and claims the four of them together are four of a kind that beats any pair. Mom tells him he had better be playing with a full deck (152). Joey kisses Mom, hugs Dad, and closes his bedroom door. He reflects that the house may still be something of a spook house, but it is his, and the people in it are his family, and he loves them. He believes he is finally going to have a good day, and invites the reader to stop by, promising there is always an extra slice waiting at the House-of-Pigza.