by Nancy Krulik
“Clean up in aisle four,” he told George as he handed him the mop. “And aisle six. And aisle eight. Get moving.”
George started mopping. What else could he do?
At least this time, the burp had left a mess that could be cleaned up. Once George finished, there wouldn’t be any evidence that it had caused trouble at all.
But if the burp came again tomorrow at the Family Tree Festival Assembly, there would be news cameras there to record the whole thing. Evidence that would last forever.
That would be really bad!
“I’m nervous,” Alex told George on Friday night. “I’ve never hypnotized anyone in front of a big crowd before.”
George sat down in the front row of the auditorium beside his best buddy and frowned. “You’re nervous?” he asked. “What about me? What if the you-know-what slips out on TV?”
Before Alex could answer, Louie came strolling down the aisle. He was wearing a big top hat and a red-and-white-striped jacket.
“Who are you supposed to be?” Alex asked him.
“It’s a surprise,” Louie said. He glared at George. “But I’ll tell you one thing. It’s a lot cooler than being a relative of a make-believe king from a pretend country.”
“King Stanley is not make-believe,” George told him. “Arfendonia is a real place.”
“No one is going to believe that,” Louie replied. “You’re going to make a fool of yourself.”
George gulped. That was completely possible.
Mrs. Kelly climbed up onto the stage. Instantly, the auditorium quieted down.
“I’d like to welcome all of you to Edith B. Sugarman Elementary’s Fourth-Grade Family Tree Festival Assembly,” the teacher said. She pointed to the side of the stage where a news reporter and a cameraman were standing. “With a special welcome to the news team from Beaver Brook’s own Channel Forty-Seven.”
Everyone in the auditorium applauded. The news reporter smiled and held up her microphone.
“And now,” Mrs. Kelly said, “we will hear from our first student, Louie Farley.”
Louie walked up onto the stage. In a very loud voice, he announced, “Ladies and gentlemen. Children of all ages. Turn your attention to the center ring.”
George was surprised. Louie sounded like a circus ringmaster.
“Most of the members of my family have been successful lawyers,” Louie said. “Very successful.”
George rolled his eyes and yawned. No surprise there.
“But when I did my research, I discovered that I had a relative who had a very different job,” Louie continued. “My great-great-grandfather Petey Farley was a show-business star. He worked at the Jingling Sisters Circus!”
George sat back up. That was actually pretty cool.
“Great-Great-Grandfather Petey was responsible for the upkeep of the center ring,” Louie continued. “That’s the most important ring. Only the stars of the circus perform there.”
Louie started to bow and end his presentation, but Mrs. Kelly stopped him. “What was your great-great-grandfather’s official title, Louie?” she asked.
Louie crinkled his forehead. He took a deep breath. Finally, he said, “I couldn’t find the exact title, but my mom told me that it would probably have been something like Chief Large Animal Waste Disposal Engineer.”
George thought about that for a minute. Then he whispered to Alex, “Does that mean Louie’s great-great-grandfather scooped up circus elephant poop?”
Suddenly all the kids in the front rows started laughing. Which made the adults start to laugh. Soon, even the TV cameraman was laughing.
Louie turned bright red. For a minute, George thought he might cry.
George felt rotten. He hadn’t meant to say that so loud. He was just excited that he had figured it out, and it slipped out of his mouth. He really hadn’t meant to make Louie feel like a jerk onstage. He wouldn’t do that to anyone. Not even Louie.
“That’s a very important job, Louie,” Mrs. Kelly said loudly.
The audience grew quiet. Everyone wanted to hear why Mrs. Kelly thought poop scooping was so important.
“Your great-great-grandfather was part of a legacy of circus folk who made sure the animals were kept clean and healthy,” Mrs. Kelly explained. “You should be proud.”
Louie stood a little taller. He smiled.
Buzz . . . Buzz . . .
Just then the cell phone of one of the parents began buzzing in the audience. She turned it off quickly. But not quick enough, because . . .
Suddenly Louie bent over. He scratched his head and started leaping up and down.
“Ook! Ook! Ook!” he shouted.
“Uh-oh,” Alex said.
Mrs. Kelly began to laugh. “What a wonderful imitation of one of your great-great-grandfather’s beloved animals!” she exclaimed.
“Ook! Ook! Ook!” Louie replied.
The audience applauded.
“That’s my son!” Ms. Farley said loud enough for the entire audience to hear.
“Make sure you get a good shot of this,” the news reporter told her cameraman.
Louie scratched his pits. He jumped up and down. He bared his teeth.
“You hypnotized him big-time,” George told Alex. “He looks like an angry monkey.”
“Do you know what monkeys do when they get angry?” Alex asked George nervously.
“No,” George said. “What?”
“They throw their poop,” Alex said.
George gulped. He figured he’d be the first one Louie aimed at.
“What are you waiting for?” George asked Alex. “Get up there and stop this!”
Alex leaped up onstage. He stood next to Louie and snapped his fingers. Hard.
Snap!
Louie stopped scratching, jumping, and ooking. He looked out blankly into the audience.
“What is going on here?” Mrs. Farley demanded. She came running down the aisle toward the stage. “Alex, what did you do to my Loo Loo Poo?”
Everyone in the audience started to laugh, again. Louie turned bright red, again. “Mom!” he shouted. “I told you not to call me that.”
“I hypnotized him,” Alex explained.
The audience stopped laughing. They stared at Alex.
“Why would you do that?” Mrs. Kelly asked him.
“I didn’t mean to,” Alex told her. “I was trying to hypnotize George. Louie was spying on us from behind a tree. I guess he got hypnotized instead.”
“I wasn’t spying on you,” Louie insisted.
“Then how come you got hypnotized?” Alex asked him.
Louie didn’t answer.
“Why were you hypnotizing anybody?” Mrs. Kelly asked.
“I was practicing for my presentation,” Alex explained. “My great-uncle Samuel was a hypnotist.”
The cameraman pointed his camera away from Louie and focused it on Alex.
“I think Louie’s behavior has proven that you’ve mastered that skill,” Mrs. Kelly said. “Great job.”
“I don’t think it’s so great,” Louie insisted. “I don’t want to keep turning into a monkey every time I hear a buzzer.”
“You won’t,” Alex promised him. “Hypnotism wears off. You’re probably going to be fine in a day or two. Just stay away from buzzers until then.”
That didn’t seem to make Louie any happier.
Mrs. Kelly smiled at Alex. “Since you’re up here already,” she told him, “why don’t you go next? I think we are all now very interested in hypnotism.”
The audience applauded. George stuck his fingers in his mouth and whistled.
“You should thank my Loo Loo Poo,” Mrs. Farley shouted to Alex. “After all, he was the one who got himself hypnotized. He’s the real star of your presentation.”
“Um . . . thank you, Loo Loo Poo,” Alex said.
The audience started laughing.
Louie’s face turned bright red. He was really, really angry. Angrier than George had ever seen him.
It was a good thing Alex was there to snap his fingers and snap Louie out of acting like a monkey. Otherwise, the whole auditorium could be covered with flying angry Loo Loo Poop!
George wiggled to the right. He wiggled to the left. He twiddled his thumbs. The presentations were going on and on. And George hadn’t had his turn yet. It wasn’t easy, sitting still waiting. This was the longest assembly ever.
Sure, it had been fun watching Alex hypnotize the news reporter into thinking she was a pigeon that cooed and flapped her wings.
And seeing Sage hold a snake had been pretty cool—until she dropped it and everyone realized it was rubber.
But George was getting antsy. He couldn’t wait for everyone to know about his relation to King Stanley of Arfendonian. And to have a taste of real Arfendonian food.
Not that George had tasted it yet, either. There hadn’t been time. The treat was still warm from the oven when he’d thrown it into the plastic container and jumped into the car to come to the presentation.
But he was sure it had to be delicious. After all, the recipe had been created by the royal chef of Arfendonia.
“And now, we will hear from George Brown,” Mrs. Kelly announced.
George jumped at the sound of his name. Quickly he popped a paper crown onto his head and picked up his food container.
“My research led me to a small island nation in the North Atlantic Ocean,” George began as he stepped up to the microphone. “It is such a small country that most people haven’t heard of it. I sure hadn’t. Most maps don’t even include it. But my relatives come from this place—including His Majesty, King Stanley of Arfendonia, who is my seventeenth cousin twice removed on my mother’s side.”
Everyone in the audience started talking at once.
“That’s so cool,” George heard someone say.
“A king,” someone else added. “Amazing!”
“Well,” the news reporter said into the camera, “it appears we have a royal family right here in Beaver Brook!”
The cameraman on the side of the stage pointed his camera at George for a close-up.
George smiled. Louie had been wrong. People did believe in Arfendonia. And they believed that King Stanley was George’s cousin. Well, his seventeenth cousin twice removed, anyway.
George held up his food container. “This is a traditional Arfendonian meal,” he told everyone. “A blue cheese, anchovy, macaroni, garlic, and chopped tongue casserole. I brought plates and forks so anyone who wants to can have a taste.”
George whipped the top off his food container. The smell of baked stinky cheese, hairy fish, and meat that had once been in the mouth of a cow filled the auditorium.
“P.U.!” Louie shouted. He held his nose. “That stinks. I gotta get out of here.” He ran up the aisle toward the door.
“Right behind you, Louie,” Max called.
“No, I’m right behind you,” Mike shouted. He pushed his way past Max.
“Sorry, dude,” Alex called to George as he ran up the aisle. “But that stuff smells awful. I can’t breathe.”
Everyone was leaving. Even George’s own mom and dad.
The news reporter and cameraman raced off the stage and started to follow the crowd.
“Wait,” George called. “I’m sure it tastes better than it smells.”
The news reporter looked up at the stage. “You haven’t tried it?” she asked, surprised.
“I didn’t have time,” George said. “But it’s a favorite of the Arfendonian royal family, and I’m a member of that family. So I’m sure I’ll like it.”
The news reporter pinched her nose. “Let’s see about that,” she said.
George took a heaping helping of casserole and popped it into his mouth.
Actually, it wasn’t so bad. Maybe you had to have actual Arfendonian blood running through you to appreciate it.
But then . . .
Something else starting running through George’s body. Something wiggly. And jiggly. It was heading up his throat. And into his mouth. And then . . .
BAAARRRFFFF!
George puked. Threw up. Hurled. Spewed. Blew his lunch. Tossed his cookies.
The news reporter sure didn’t want to get that on camera. She and the cameraman raced out of the auditorium holding their noses.
Now everyone was gone. Except for George. He was still there, covered in barf, and holding a blue cheese, anchovy, macaroni, garlic, and tongue casserole. Yuck.
George had a feeling his mom and dad weren’t going to let him get in the car stinking like that. Which meant the seventeenth cousin twice removed from the king of Arfendonia would be walking home through town smelling like barfendonia.
George sniffed the air around him. The anchovies, tongue, and cheese smelled pretty ripe now. Which proved one thing: There actually was something worse than a magical super burp—a king-size Arfendonian barf!
“Hey, Mom, I’m home!” George called as he ran into his house after school, about a week after the family-tree presentations.
“Hi honey,” George’s mom said as she came to greet him. She held out a large, cream-colored envelope. “This came for you this morning.”
“Mail? For me?” George asked excitedly. “Who’s it from?”
“Open it and see,” his mother replied.
George looked at the envelope. “Hey, isn’t that the same seal as the one on the cover of the cookbook Grandma gave me?”
George’s mom nodded. “Yep. It’s the royal seal of Arfendonia.”
George tore open the envelope and pulled out a thick piece of paper.
Dear Cousin George,
One of my royal subjects has brought to my attention that you recently appeared on an American television special and spoke about your Arfendonian roots. I was quite excited to hear about another member of our royal family.
I was especially impressed to hear that you had prepared our traditional casserole. You must be very brave. No one in our family has ever eaten the casserole. We have always insisted our royal tasters try it first—and none of them have ever been able to keep it down.
I look forward to meeting you, my courageous cousin—the 1,214th person in line to become king of Arfendonia.
All the best,
His Majesty, King Stanley of Arfendonia
Just then, George smelled something coming from the kitchen. It stank like dirty socks and vinegar.
“What is that?” he asked his mom.
“Cabbage and brussels sprout soup,” she said. “I’m trying a new recipe from the Arfendonian cookbook.”
George frowned. Now he wished he wasn’t so far down on the list of people to become king of Arfendonia. Because kings had royal tasters to try the food before they did. And George sure could use one of those now.
Or better yet, how about a royal burper! Someone to burp instead of George. Someone else to get in trouble for a change.
Now that would really come in handy!
About the Author
Nancy Krulik is the author of more than 150 books for children and young adults, including three New York Times Best Sellers and the popular Katie Kazoo, Switcheroo books. She lives in New York City with her family, and many of George Brown’s escapades are based on things her own kids have done. (No one delivers a good burp quite like Nancy’s son, Ian!) Nancy’s favorite thing to do is laugh, which comes in pretty handy when you’re trying to write funny books! You can follow Nancy on Twitter: @NancyKrulik.
About the Illustrator
Aaron Blecha was raised by a school of giant squid in Wisconsin and now lives with his family by the
south English seaside. He works as an artist designing funny characters and illustrating humorous books, including the one you’re holding. You can enjoy more of his weird creations at www.monstersquid.com.
Looking for more?
Visit Penguin.com for more about this author and a complete list of their books.
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