Summary

"The Understudy" is an examination of a week in childhood David and his siblings spent in the care of one Mrs. Peacock, a woman hired by David's mother under somewhat mysterious circumstances, to stay at the Sedaris household with them. Sedaris recalls how Mrs. Peacock rarely fed them properly, relying on sloppy joe sandwiches as the normal diet for the bewildered children. She stayed in bed most of the day and demanded the kids take turns scratching her back with a hand-styled back scratcher they christen the monkey's paw.

When one of David's sisters accidentally dropped and broke the back scratcher, Mrs. Peacock insisted on taking the whole brood back to her cramped, impoverished abode because she has another back scratcher there for just such emergencies. The children were put off by the enormous collection of dolls Mrs. Peacock...