The Sixth Grade Nickname Game

by Gordon Korman

  “For International Night,” Cassandra explained. “Jeff and I are working with Mr. Huge on Mexico.”

  Wiley struggled to maintain control. “Jeff’s on International Night? Jeff?” What was going on? Every year since kindergarten, Wiley and Jeff had avoided November Open House like a public hanging. “But—well, how about I help you guys out?”

  “Now, Wiley,” she admonished, “you should have thought of all the total fun you’d be missing when you asked Jeff not to sign you up. Oh, here’s Jeff now.”

  As they pranced away, Jeff was smiling at Wiley with every tooth in his head.

  Wiley folded his arms in consternation. He should have expected something like this after brick day. But it wasn’t over yet. All he had to do was go to Mr. Hughes and get himself on the Mexico team.

  “Sorry,” the big teacher told him. “You see, when we didn’t have enough volunteers, we recruited some third graders, and they’ve really been giving a hundred-and-ten percent. I’d love to have you, Wiley, but it wouldn’t be fair to them.”

  “But isn’t there anything I can do?” Wiley begged.

  Mr. Hughes shook his head. “The little kids are doing the hat dance, and Jeff and Cassandra are making the piñata. We’re full. Try Canada. I hear they’re putting on a pretty big show.”

  Wiley didn’t much care to be on Miss Hardaway’s team. But if he couldn’t work on Mexico, Canada was the next best choice. At least he’d be on the same continent as Cassandra.

  6A was a mob scene. Canada was shaping up to be the main event on International Night. Giant flags of the ten provinces were being painted around the room, and the red and white maple leaf fluttered everywhere. Wiley surveyed the bustling activity. Surely somewhere amid the hockey sticks, snowshoes, and birchbark canoes there was a job for him.

  He found Dinky and Peter making a fur-trading outpost of Popsicle sticks. “Hey, guys, where do I go to join up? Straight to Skywalker?”

  “Nah, she doesn’t know anything,” Peter replied. “You’re going to have to talk to the boss.”

  “The boss?” Wiley repeated.

  “The Iceman.”

  “Okay, Skunk,” groaned Wiley. “Where’s Mike Smith?”

  Peter stood up. “Hey, Gasbag,” he called, scanning the crowded room, “is the Iceman over there?”

  “I thought he wa-a-as with you,” Raymond burped back.

  “The Iceman? He’s in the art room painting the Northern Lights,” called Kelly.

  “Don’t bother going up there,” Dinky advised Wiley. “I know for a fact that there aren’t any decent jobs left.”

  “Except for the horse,” Peter put in. “You know, the one the Mountie rides.”

  “I’ll do anything!” Wiley pledged.

  “You don’t want to be the horse,” Dinky warned. “The costume is about a million degrees, not to mention kind of smelly from people sweating in it for so many years. And there’s something fuzzy growing in the hoofs. Plus you have to carry around the Mountie. It isn’t fun.”

  “I’ll do it! I’ll be the horse!” Wiley cried.

  “Well, you can’t do it alone,” Peter pointed out. “It’s a two-person costume.”

  A diabolical grin worked its way into Wiley’s fair features. “When am I ever alone?” he chuckled. “Of course Jeff will be with me.”

  “I thought Jeff was doing Mexico with Mr. Huge.”

  “Nah, he hated it,” Wiley replied smoothly. “He wanted to work with the Iceman.” And he walked away, congratulating himself. In just a few minutes, he had taken Jeff from Cassandra’s side in sunny Acapulco, and plopped him down in the frozen north as the back end of a horse.

  When Jeff walked into the toolshed that weekend, he found Wiley sprinkling birdseed into the laundry basket.

  “How’s it going, D. D.?” Jeff said to the blue-crested warbler sparrow. He noticed Wiley’s copy of Old Yeller atop an old milk crate. “Pretty good story.”

  Wiley nodded. “I’m almost done.”

  “The dog dies,” Jeff informed him.

  “Awww!” Wiley looked daggers at him. “Thanks a lot for spoiling the ending!”

  Jeff shrugged. “I finished it yesterday. It was my tenth book. That’s tied for the most in class.” He added, “According to Cassandra.”

  Wiley looked up. “When did she say that?”

  “Just now. She left my house about five minutes ago.”

  Wiley’s face darkened. “Well, she’s wrong. I’ve read eleven.”

  Jeff smiled sweetly. “The Dr. Seuss ones don’t count.”

  “The number of books doesn’t count anyway,” Wiley told him. “It’s the number of pages. And I’m way up over 1,500.”

  “I would have read more than that,” Jeff countered, “if I was reading baby books with giant print, like you are. Pages are nothing; it’s how many words.”

  “Not if they’re big, long, hard ones, like in all the books I read!” Wiley snarled.

  “I would have read a ton more,” Jeff boasted, “but Cassandra and I were busy making our piñata.”

  Wiley turned to the blue-crested warbler sparrow underneath the window screen. “Hear that, D. D.? Now Jeff’s bragging about being a traitor.”

  Jeff also addressed the bird. “Tell Wiley I learned it while he was out Rollerblading.”

  In answer, D. D. let out a long warble. He flapped both wings, even the bandaged one.

  “Look at that!” Wiley exclaimed. “I think he’s trying to fly.”

  Jeff nodded. “I guess it’s time to take the splint off.”

  It was a major operation. Soon their hands were pecked and bleeding. At last, Wiley had a firm grip on D. D. The bird shrieked in protest as Jeff carefully unwound the gauze from the Popsicle stick that held the wing in place. Wiley released the sparrow, and both boys stood back.

  D. D. took three dazed steps and then launched off the floor like a missile.

  “Whoa!” Wiley snatched the laundry basket and quickly trapped the bird. He waited for the beating of his heart to slow back down. “I’d say he’s feeling better.”

  “Better?” Jeff echoed. “He’s a World War I flying ace!”

  “He’s a supersonic pilot!” Wiley amended.

  “A NASA astronaut!”

  “An intergalactic space warrior!”

  A month before, they could have gone on all day, topping each other and laughing. But something was different now.

  There was an uncomfortable silence.

  “I know what’s going through your warped mind,” Jeff accused. “You’re thinking that if you bring D. D. to Cassandra, she’ll be so happy that she’ll ask you to the Sadie Hawkins dance.”

  “If I’m thinking it, how come you’re the one who’s saying it?” Wiley snarled.

  “Together,” Jeff said firmly. “That was the deal. We bring D. D. together, or not at all.”

  A HUNDRED-AND-TEN percent.

  The words echoed through Jeff’s head as he sat at his desk, writing the State Reading Assessment. Had their read-a-thon helped? The answers seemed to be coming quickly and easily, but did that make them the right ones?

  A hundred-and-ten percent. That was all Mr. Hughes ever expected of anybody. The big teacher stood at the front of the room, his meaty fist jammed in his mouth to keep him from cheering. But Jeff could see the droplets of perspiration rolling off his chin, forming a small puddle on the floor.

  Concentrate, Jeff told himself.

  He snuck a look around. Heads were down, pencils just a blur. At the next desk, Wiley was completely focused on his test. Like he didn’t care that the two of them had not said a word to each other since that day in the toolshed. Beside Wiley, Cassandra held her long hair back off the paper as she worked.

  She was wearing her circus parade skirt—the same one she’d had on the morning Mr. Doncaster had introduced her as the new girl in 6B. It seemed like a thousand years ago that he and Wiley had first tried, and failed, to hang a nickname on this strange, yet fascinating newc
omer. So much had changed since then….

  Oh, no! He was daydreaming when he should have been working! This was for Mr. Huge!

  All around him, his fellow Dim Bulbs were giving a hundred-and-ten percent.

  But would it be enough?

  INTERNATIONAL NIGHT WAS set to begin at seven, but OOPS was teeming with students by five-thirty. They scurried through the halls like rabbits in a warren, putting the finishing touches on flags, models, and displays. Last-minute rehearsals for skits and demonstrations were going on in every classroom and corner.

  In 6A, Mike Smith received a round of applause from his Canada teammates as he glued the final piece onto an all-toothpick replica of Niagara Falls.

  At the back of the admiring crowd, one sixth grader wasn’t paying attention. Wiley Adamson was keeping a sharp eye on the hallway, watching for the arrival of Cassandra and Jeff and the Mexico team. Wiley didn’t want to miss the moment when Jeff found out that he was no longer Cassandra’s partner, but now fifty percent of a horse.

  The families began arriving shortly after six, and by seven, the gym was jam-packed. The buzz of excitement was electric as the parents toured the displays. These were laid out in a horseshoe shape opposite the bleachers. There was quite a large crowd at the kindergarten exhibit on France. A whole class of hyperactive five-year-olds in berets was handing out paper cups of grape juice representing French wine. Already several purple stains decorated the plasticine Eiffel Tower. Other popular features included the Great Wall of China (fourth grade) made of Dixie cups; the Sahara Desert (first grade), which was an inflatable wading pool filled with sand and toy camels and, strangely, a plastic stegosaurus; and the Amazon rain forest (fifth grade) done entirely in broccoli and watercress.

  Wiley spotted Cassandra introducing her parents to Mr. Hughes. A brilliantly colored sequined sombrero glittered on her red hair. Wiley frowned. Jeff was right there on the scene, being greeted by the Levys like a long-lost son.

  Wiley rushed over. “Hi, Mr. and Mrs. Levy. Remember me?”

  Jeff stared at him. “What are you doing here?” he hissed through his giant fake handlebar mustache.

  Cassandra beamed. “Look, Mom and Dad—it’s Wiley! Did you come to see our piñata?”

  Wiley gestured over his shoulder to the large Canada display. “I’m participating. I’ve got a really important job on the Canada program.”

  “Doing what?” growled Jeff.

  “Oh, it’s—transportation,” Wiley grinned.

  “Well, I find all this remarkably impressive,” put in Mrs. Levy. “There certainly wasn’t anything like it at Cassandra’s old school in Philadelphia.”

  “MVP stuff.” Mr. Hughes nodded proudly. “The kids have really put a hundred-and-ten percent into this.”

  The lights flashed three times. That was the signal for the spectators to take their seats. The program was about to begin.

  “Well, I’ve got to get back to Canada,” Wiley announced. “Good luck.”

  “You, too,” called Cassandra.

  Jeff said nothing. Wiley seemed awfully smug for a night when Jeff, and not Wiley, was Cassandra’s partner. What was going on here?

  The OOPS parents were a kind audience, determined to enjoy whatever they saw. They cheered the kindergartners’ purple-tongued version of “Frere Jacques.” They clapped along with the Dutch team’s earsplitting wooden shoe dance against the gym floor. They pretended not to notice when the high priest of the Incas threw up, or when the lead yodeler’s lederhosen fell down. And they genuinely seemed to love the second graders as British palace guards, bumping into each other because they couldn’t see through their tall fur hats.

  Some third graders were performing Japanese Kabuki theater when Miss Hardaway began circulating through her group for a last minute check.

  “Okay, my loggers are here,” she whispered, marking off the names on a clipboard. “My fur trappers, my Eskimo fisherman—” She stopped in front of Wiley. “Where’s your partner? Where’s the other half of the horse?”

  Wiley shrugged expansively. “I don’t know. I’m not even sure who it’s supposed to be.”

  The teacher stood taller on her four-inch heels. “Well, this is just peachy. How can a Mountie ride half a horse?” She ran a manicured finger down her list of volunteers. “Jeff Greenbaum. Where’s Jeff?”

  Wiley pretended to look around the semicircle of exhibits. “Hey!” He pointed. “Isn’t that Jeff over there?”

  Miss Hardaway put her hands on her hips. “What’s he doing in Mexico?”

  “I’d better get him before Japan finishes,” Wiley advised. “I mean, Mexico’s up next. Once they start, he’s stuck over there.”

  “I’ll go. You stay right here,” Miss Hardaway decided. “And be ready to get into that costume.” And she clicked off, ducking behind the exhibits to avoid interrupting the Japan performance.

  Jeff was standing at Cassandra’s side when a clawlike hand reached out and grabbed him by the shoulder. Petrified, he wheeled, and came face-to-face with Miss Hardaway.

  “What are you doing here?” the teacher hissed. “Why aren’t you in costume?”

  Jeff reached up to make sure his mustache was still attached. “I am!”

  She stared at him. “A mustache for a horse?”

  Jeff was completely bewildered. “What horse?”

  The teacher began pulling him behind the exhibits.

  With equal force, Cassandra hauled on his other arm. “Where are you going? We’re on in a minute!”

  “I think there’s been some kind of misunderstanding,” Jeff tried to explain in two directions.

  Mr. Hughes stepped forward. “What’s the problem here?”

  “Jeff is supposed to be over with my kids!” Miss Hardaway whispered urgently. “I need him right away!”

  “But he’s on my team,” protested Mr. Hughes.

  “No, he’s not! He’s on mine!”

  Jeff was horrified. “I didn’t sign up for Canada!”

  “Yes, you did!” Miss Hardaway waved her clipboard under his mustache. “You’re on my list! See?”

  Jeff gawked. There it was, in black and white: Greenbaum, Jeff–horse #2. He was a horse! A horse in Canada! It said so!

  “But that’s impossible!” Jeff quavered. “I wouldn’t forget something like signing up to be a horse!”

  “Mr. Hughes, we’re on in thirty seconds!” Cassandra put in nervously. “What are we going to do?”

  Mr. Hughes tried to be reasonable. “Couldn’t somebody double up on Jeff’s job?” he asked Miss Hardaway. “You’ve got a lot of kids over there.”

  “And they’re all busy!” she rasped. “We’ve got the biggest show of International Night! I can’t start juggling assignments now!”

  Over the PA system, they heard Mr. Doncaster announce, “Our next presentation is from our neighbor to the south—Mexico!”

  Mr. Hughes made a split-second decision. “All right, Jeff, go with Miss Hardaway. We’ll cover for you.”

  “But—”

  “Break!” the big teacher ordered. And by the time the word was out of his mouth, the applause had died down, and Mexico had begun. Mr. Hughes cupped his hands to his mouth and shouted, “Ole!”

  Cassandra cued the music for the Mexican hat dance. The five third graders ran into the spotlight, gyrating around a giant cardboard sombrero.

  In a daze, Jeff stumbled after Miss Hardaway. He was still stammering excuses, but he was so distraught that he couldn’t finish his sentences. “I don’t think…I can’t understand…I don’t see how…”

  She marched him up to a bench behind the Canada display. There sat someone in the front half of a horse costume. “Now, get dressed!” And she skywalked off amid her Canada team, hissing, “Places, everyone! Places! We’re on in three minutes!”

  Frazzled and disgusted, Jeff stepped into the back half of the horse. To his partner, he muttered, “What a rip-off! I never signed up for this! I don’t even know what I’m supposed t
o do!”

  From the head, a familiar voice replied, “Just be yourself—a horse’s butt!”

  “WILEY?!” JEFF’S CRY of shock echoed throughout the gym, throwing the hat dancers off their rhythm.

  “Shhhh!” Miss Hardaway glared at him.

  Wiley popped off the horse’s head. He said, “Ole.”

  For Jeff, all confusion cleared. The “misunderstanding” wasn’t a misunderstanding at all. It was just another dirty scheme, courtesy of Wiley Adamson.

  “You are low,” Jeff accused, his tone full of loathing.

  “I have to be,” Wiley defended himself, “to get underneath you.”

  The two were distracted by a pure, clear voice rising up in the gym. Wiley and Jeff peered over the wooden cutout of the Canadian Rockies. The hat dance was finished, and Cassandra had taken over the microphone. Unlike the other students who had spoken tonight, she showed no shyness or stage fright. Her voice rang strong and true over the PA. Her sequined sombrero gleamed in the lights, but nowhere near as brightly as her long red hair. Wiley and Jeff were struck dumb.

  “This is a piñata,” Cassandra announced, pointing up to where the large papier-mache figure hung from a ceiling beam. “It is used in traditional Mexican festivals and celebrations. A piñata can be any shape, and is often made to look like an animal. Ours takes the form of the Yucatan cliff-climbing armadillo, which is not only Mexican, but also an endangered species. As you will see, breaking the piñata releases candy for all the children of the village.”

  Mr. Hughes came up behind her and tied a blindfold over her eyes. Then he put a yardstick in her hands, and pointed her in the right direction.

  There was scattered cheering and shouts of encouragement as Cassandra began to poke and prod at the hanging armadillo. These turned to chuckles when it became obvious that the piñata was quite a bit tougher than it looked. Cassandra took hefty swipes, landing some pretty good blows on the armadillo. Still the thick skin would not rupture.

  Mr. Doncaster stepped in to the scene. “What seems to be the problem here?” he whispered, fixing the deer-in-headlights look on the piñata.

  “I guess Jeff and I made it stronger than we thought,” puffed Cassandra, still hacking away.