Boy in a Bubble Ages Out, Becomes Teen in a Terrarium

Bertha and Chet Burton knew their Trevor would be “the sickly kid.”  After a traumatic five years of coughs, sneezes, and wheezes, the dutiful parents realized something needed to change. Fearing doctors would prescribe medications that would render Trevor gay, godless, or Libertarian, Bertha and Chet looked high and low for alternatives. One evening, while watching the local classic TV station (WOWO—pronounced Whoa Whoa), Bertha saw a trailer for the ripped-straight-from-the-headlines melodrama, The Boy in the Plastic Bubble. Bertha believed it was a sign, an opportunity to save her hacking boy. 

    “I watched that movie as a kid,” Berta says, extinguishing her cigar in a custom ashtray she named Fusty. “I remembered Robbie Benson being in the bubble; that’s why I was excited to watch it again. But, it was John Travolta. I only like John Travolta in drag. But, if I hadn’t forced myself to watch it, my darling boy might’ve wheezed himself silly.”

    Chet took a job at a plastics factory so he could “secure” suitable materials. They built Trevor a bubble play area outside their Cudahy, Wisconsin home, shielding Trevor from harmful elements. When Trevor continued to have severe sinus infections, they made an air-filtering plastic dome for him. “Our house is over 100 years old,” Bertha says with a phlegmy cough. “Lots of dust.” Trevor spent his school days, 1st-8th grades, with his maternal grandparents. The homeschooling and special enclosure produced remarkable results. Then, his grandparents were arrested and jailed for drug trafficking, embezzlement, and insurrection. 

    “Unfortunately,” Bertha says ruefully, “the judge wouldn’t postpone the trial until Trevor completed high school. So, we had to send him to the high school.” Trevor was attending a public school for the first time in eight years. Would this be a traumatizing experience for the 14-year-old boy?

    “They called me Bubble Boy,” Trevor says, spritzing a button fern with distilled water. “That’s a nickname I could live without. I reclaimed the name. ‘If you don’t know my birth name, you can call me boy in the bubble.’” 

“That Trev’s one tough kid,” Bertha says. 

    “I think Trev’s socially retarded,” Chet says. Bertha nods sadly. The two adults stumble back to the living room.

    Trevor apologizes for his parents and eagerly gets back to his story.

    “People stopped calling me Bubble Boy!” Trevor tells me, a goofy, socially awkward smile on his face. He also noticed that he felt healthy at school, only to get sick again at home. The bubble remained available, but Trevor grew three inches since attending high school. He decided to dismantle the structure and begin living a bubbleless life. That worked for six weeks until flu season introduced a new strain, oddly referred to as the Scooby-Wu flu. 

    “Mom freaked out. She was sure the flu was going to be the end of me. My dad giggled about some ‘meddling kids.’ I had no idea what he was talking about. It was distressing.”

    To get his parents to “shut the eff up,” Trevor agreed to build a new structure. The teen’s specs included removing the bubble shape. “Terrariums are good for plants. Why not a human? And I’m a teen. AND, my name is Trevor.”

    When returning to school Monday, he will be known as Trevor Terrarium. Because, to Trevor, it sounds “so flippin’ punk.”

    Trevor surveys his new digs: spacious, clean, oxygen-rich. “It’s so rad.” Trevor sighs. It’s a victory for the teen in a terrarium. In the background, the Burtons cough, wheeze, and slur words, unaware of their son’s newfound happiness.