by Thomas Tosi
I rolled over on my side in bed, so I faced away from the blanket wall. Though they weren’t saying anything, I could see the glow of Brian and James’ phone as they handed it back and forth. I shut my eyes.
“‘Cause they’re mine—at least they will be if I ever get them. That’s the whole point,” I said to Peg.
She was quiet for a while. I thought that maybe she was falling asleep.
“Okay,” she finally replied.
“You should go to sleep. We all should.”
We did go to sleep. And when we woke up in the middle of the night, it wasn’t because of the storm. It was because of the scream.
Celia Goes Viral and Ballistic
The sound of the rain on the roof was no match for the echo of Celia’s scream from the floor below. Faye was the first out of bed and thumping down the attic stairs. I was next. When I made the turn on the dark and narrow staircase, I could hear Peg’s lighter footsteps following.
Mom, Dad, and Faye were already in Celia’s room by the time I got there, and the screaming had stopped. I held at the doorway, not wanting to race into my girl cousin’s room at night. Peg didn’t hesitate. She pushed right by me.
“What’s the matter? Are you okay?” I heard Mom asking Celia.
Celia sat with her elbows on her desk. Both hands were clenched into fists that were gripping the hair on the sides of her tilted‐down head. I couldn’t exactly see what she had been doing or why she was so upset because everyone was crowded around her.
“No, I’m not okay,” Celia said. “Just look.” Her right hand let go of her hair and reached forward. It tapped something out of my view, blocked by Mom.
I heard more commotion—people yelling, laughing, and knocking things over. Some were angry, and some were excited. But it was a small sound like it was coming from a little speaker.
Celia was watching a video or something on her laptop. If you didn’t count the one Dad used in his office, Celia was the only person in the house who had her own computer. The rest of us had to use the one down in the living room to look stuff up online or write reports and things.
The speaker sound got crazier. People were going nuts.
“I mean, are you physically okay?” Mom said.
“Well, except for bein’ so mortified I’m ‘bout to toss my cookies,” Celia said, “I’m just peachy.”
“You’re upset because of this video?” Dad asked.
“You were screaming,” Mom said.
“I didn’t mean to wake y’all,” Celia said. “But when I logged on and saw it, I just about went crazy. Every time I look, I let loose and holler.”
It sounded like it was safe to be in the room now. I went in farther and pushed my way in front of Peg. I could see the screen of Celia’s laptop. She was on MyVids—which I’m sure you know is pretty much the most popular video upload site on the planet.
The video playing was the doughnut fight in the Sweetly Crisp shop. What made Celia scream was the part where the camera zoomed in close on her face just as a cream‐filled doughnut smashed against her cheek.
Whoever did the video was pretty good. They knew exactly when to slow‐mo it, reverse it, and loop it. All frame‐by‐frame with a scratch‐mix beat, the doughnut squashed as it hit, the frosting splattered, Celia’s skin dented in ripples, and her mouth stretched wide open. Because of the speed of the video, the scream came out low, slow, and growling.
Awesome.
“Celia, do you have any idea how many videos people upload on that site every day?” Dad said. “It’s like a needle in a haystack. The odds that anybody is actually going to see this—”
“Wow! You’ve got like over one hundred and thirty‐one thousand views in less than an hour,” Faye said. “Doughnut Face is a MyVids featured video.”
“‘Needle in a haystack?’” Celia said, turning to Dad. “All my friends were messaging me. I had to shut my dang phone off.”
Dad put on his reading glasses and leaned down low to see the screen better. “Geez, if this keeps up, you could make some real money here.” He was squinting to read the number of views.
Celia glared at him.
“No, it would have to be her video,” Faye said.
“She doesn’t want to make money on this,” Mom said.
“Whose is it?” Dad asked.
“J & B Enterprises,” Faye said, studying the screen.
The video was showing more of the crowd. I saw myself throw a fistful of doughnut stuff. Man, I really thought I had better form than that. No wonder I didn’t play sports like those other kids.
“Holy smokes,” I said, “It’s gone up to one hundred and fifty thousand just while we’ve been talking.”
“And look,” Dad said. “Seven hundred and twenty‐four people clicked the thumbs‐up button.”
That made Celia turn to look at the screen again. The video was back to her slow‐motion close‐up, and she screamed again—both on the video and in real life. Let me tell you; it was a lot louder when you’re in the room with her.
“Everybody, please!” Mom said.
Celia squeezed her eyes shut.
“Well, if it’s any consolation,” Dad said, “there’s a thumbs‐down, too.”
Celia cracked her eyes open and glared at Dad with the same angry and scary look she’d used on Mr. Paczki before the food fight started. “That…was me.”
When everyone was back in their own rooms and settled in, I lay in bed thinking. I thought about how Mom and Dad had asked if Celia could contact MyVids and get them to take Doughnut Face down. Celia said no. She also said some legal stuff she learned from her books.
I thought about how crazy MyVids was—the tons of people who were now watching what happened at the Sweetly Crisp.
And then I thought about…
…how not many people had phones out to record the actual doughnut fight;
…who I didn’t see in the video;
…who had managed not to get very messy during the fight;
…the glow of a phone being passed back and forth in the dark of the attic earlier;
…the only two people who didn’t come running down to Celia’s room when she screamed; and
…how James and Brian were awfully quiet—too quiet.
I thought about J & B Enterprises.
The Buddy System
Most people who didn’t live around here thought Green Hill Academy was a church. It was a red brick building that was over a hundred years old. It smelled like a cross between a cave and all the cleaning stuff the janitors used. It had these huge windows with curved tops. And it had a tower. Seriously, it had a brick tower. The tower was for the big bell, which they hardly ever rang anymore.
Dad pulled into the far parking lot to drop off Faye, Peg, and me.
“I’m okay,” Peg said after Dad stopped the car.
She meant she didn’t need him to walk her. The path from the parking lot to the school went a short way through the woods and over a stone bridge.
“Abe,” I heard Dad yelling as I sprinted away from the car. “Wait for your sisters.”
I didn’t mean to ditch Peg and Faye, but I got distracted when I saw my friends Peachy and Dewey talking with Bridget over by the path entrance. I wanted to catch them before they headed down. I needed to tell them about the doughnuts.
When I got to them, Bridget was gone.
“Dude, you’re poison,” Peachy said.
“What?”
“Bridget told us Marlene marked you,” Dewey said. “None of the girls are supposed to come near you. Not that that’s a bad thing.”
I looked down the path and saw that Bridget had joined the swarm of girls around Marlene. Marlene looked our way. She said something to the others, and they all giggled.
“Giggling,” I said. “Man, if guys want to mess with you, they call you all kinds of crappy stuff.”
“Or shove you against the lockers in the hallway,” Peachy chimed in.
“Or throw your books into a mud pud
dle,” Dewey added.
“Girls for sure have different weapons,” I said. “All they have to do is look at you and giggle. Especially if they do it as a group.”
I don’t know why it bothered me. It was just Marlene—Marlene Paczki. I didn’t even notice her last year. Why did I care who she giggled about? Maybe because I knew it wasn’t the whole group of us guys she was looking at before they all giggled. She was just looking at me.
And there was something else. If one of the other girls, like Bridget, had started the giggling, I wouldn’t have cared. But Marlene’s stupid braids, and eyes, and the way she was holding her books, and—
HONK!
We all jumped.
“That’s Marlene’s dad,” Dewey said.
Mr. Paczki had given a short blast of his car horn as he drove slowly by us. We were still standing in the parking lot. But that wasn’t really why he honked. He shot a mean stare at our group. Like Marlene, he was mostly looking at me.
“Wow, you sure must’ve done something,” Peachy said.
“It was the video on MyVids,” Faye said as she and Peg walked by.
“Doughnut Face,” Peg called out as they continued down the path. “It was really funny.”
Why does everybody think all this doughnut fight stuff is my fault?
Dewey watched Mr. Paczki’s car as it left the lot. Its tires spun and slung gravel.
“Dude, whatever you do,” he said, “stay clear of Marlene Paczki.”
As we made our way down the hallway to Miss Sorenson’s room, I was still trying to get Peachy and Dewey to understand what the big deal was about the wording of the rules on the Sweetly Crisp game piece.
“It’s like saying a penny’s worth twenty doughnuts—”
“What’s up with that?” Peachy interrupted me.
He was talking about the other fifth‐grade classroom. The desks were gone from Mrs. Walker’s room. There were never many anyway because there were only twelve or thirteen kids in each fifth‐grade class, but the room was entirely empty now.
“I bet Mrs. Walker’s turkey timer popped,” Dewey said. He always talked like that. It was Dewey’s way of saying Mrs. Walker probably had her baby sooner than they thought she would.
“What’s that have to do with the desks?” Peachy asked. “Where’d they go?”
“All fifth graders down to my room, please,” Miss Sorenson said. She stood in the hallway, waving everybody along like a traffic cop. “This way, all fifth graders. Let’s go.”
We were buzzing as we entered Miss Sorenson’s room. In order to fit in the desks for both fifth‐grade classes, they were still arranged in rows but were now paired, side‐by‐side, so that each row was twice as wide. For us kids, it was like the world was turned upside down. We all just sort of crowded together and edged along the wall.
“As some of you have probably already guessed,” Miss Sorenson said, now standing in the doorway to her room while the last few stragglers entered, “Mrs. Walker has had her baby.”
Dewey stood right beside me. He made a popping sound with his lips. “Called it.”
“Now, this is quite a bit earlier than expected,” Miss Sorenson said. “But Mrs. Walker and her new little baby are doing fine.”
“Is it a boy or a girl?” Bridget asked.
How do girls remember to ask that stuff?
I mean, it made perfect sense when Bridget asked it, but I would never have come up with that. I was still wondering what was up with the paired desks.
“A little girl,” Miss Sorenson replied. All the girls in the room oohed and aahed. A few of them applauded.
Geez, they really lay it on thick.
Everyone was in now, so Miss Sorenson closed the door and walked to the middle of the room.
“As far as the rest of us go,” she said, “we might have been caught a little off‐guard by the timing, but the school did know this was coming and made a plan. Since the two fifth‐grade classes are so small, Mrs. Walker’s class is not going to have a substitute. Instead…”
Miss Sorenson paused here for effect. Teachers were always doing stuff like that—probably because it worked.
“Both fifth grades are going to share this room and share me as your teacher.”
I cringed at hearing the word share. Bad enough I had to share at home, but now it was spreading to school—two classes sharing a room, sharing a teacher, and even sharing desks in rows.
The girls all gasped at the announcement of Miss Sorenson being the teacher for all of us. This time, almost all of them applauded.
Again? Man, girls don’t miss a trick. Boys, on the other hand…
“Dude,” Peachy said to Dewey. “It’s like musical chairs. Let’s go!” They started toward the desks.
“Wait!” Miss Sorenson held up her hand. “The buddy system. We’re going to use the buddy system. And we’re going to do this alphabetically.”
“Don’t anybody move yet. Let me explain,” she said. “On each desk, there’s a piece of tape with a name written on it. The two students whose names appear on a pair of desks will be buddies—like, for example, on special projects. And they’ll look out for each other. If one is out sick, then the other can make sure that they copy down the assignments and share notes.”
She pointed to the front pair of desks in the row farthest away from the door. “Over there, we begin with A. If your last name begins with letters A through F, go ahead and find your seat.”
You could tell who got to sit next to someone they wanted to and who didn’t by the groans and cheers coming from the first group as they figured out their places.
“Settle down,” Miss Sorenson said. “Next, if your last name begins with G through M, go ahead—quietly.”
Well, “M,” Abe Mitchell, that includes me.
I figured I’d be somewhere near the middle of the room, and I was right.
The not‐so‐good news was I was at the pair of desks behind Bridget and some kid I didn’t know from the other fifth‐grade class. I didn’t have anything against Bridget. I just didn’t like the way she had treated me like I was poison earlier at Marlene’s command. But the great news was that, across the aisle from me and already in his seat from the first group, was Dewey. That didn’t make him my buddy but close enough.
“Check it out,” Dewey said. He nodded his head sideways toward his desk buddy, Bernard.
Bernard wasn’t really in our group of friends—I’m not sure who his friends were. But Bernard was a super genius, grade grubber, teacher’s pet, kind of guy. He already had the top of his desk open, resting on his head, as he hunkered in there organizing his stuff. If they were going to be buddied‐up on projects, Dewey knew he was going to have an easy ride.
We each leaned across the gap, fist‐bumped, exploded it, and made it rain—our special handshake. That’s why I really didn’t stop to think about the fact that I was the last one in my alphabet name group and that only one‐half of my desk pair was filled—by me. The buddy seat beside me was still empty.
“Okay,” Miss Sorenson said. “Now, if your last name begins with letters N through S, go ahead and find your seat.”
Wondering who might have a last name beginning with an N, I looked over at the piece of tape on the desk next to mine. My heart switched gears, and this is weird, but it happened—my ears got hot. Why?
Because there was no person whose last name began with an N.
Okay, so what came next was O, right?
But there was no O.
No N, No O.
NO, NO, NO.
That left P. I looked up as Marlene Paczki came down the aisle and stood by the desk with her arms crossed. She was staring at me and at the empty seat that made the other one‐half of our desk pair.
The Flying Parfait
You’re not supposed to be anywhere near me,” Marlene said, now seated at the desk that was paired with mine.
Her voice was quiet but mad. I’d only ever heard my Mom talk that way. I didn’t kn
ow kids could. She was looking straight ahead when she spoke, but I was still pretty sure she was referring to me. It was kind of amazing. Marlene’s upper and lower teeth stayed tightly together throughout the entire sentence, and her lips barely moved.
“Wow, it’s like you’re an angry ventriloquist,” I said.
“I guess that makes you my dummy.”
Geez, those teeth still aren’t coming apart.
“I think the word you’re looking for is buddy,” I said.
The front of the classroom must have been interesting because her eyes didn’t move from it. She also didn’t say anything else.
“In what universe is this my fault?” I finally asked.
The cafeteria had the little yogurt parfait cups that day. Marlene must have really liked them. I noticed her eating one at her lunch table. After lunch, I saw that she had snuck another one back to class. She was hiding it behind her science book—a thick book with a bug‐eyed frog on the cover.
“You remember I told you all we’d be writing a long paper this year,” Miss Sorenson said. “I’m sure some of you are a little intimidated by that thought. But what you need to know is that no big project is scary if you break it down into small steps.”
Marlene scooped out a little yogurt with a plastic spoon, ducked down low behind the back of Bridget’s head to hide from Miss Sorenson, and snuck the spoonful into her mouth. The throat of the frog on the textbook cover was puffed out like a balloon. It looked like he was trying not to barf. That was basically how I felt about yogurt.
Miss Sorenson came out from behind her desk and was handing out lined paper to be passed down the rows.
“Our first little step is going to be an assessment of your writing skills,” she said.
Everybody groaned.
“We’re going to write a short piece in class. And it needs to be true.”
Marlene slid her yogurt aside when the lined paper made its way to us. We took ours and passed it on.
