“Oh, it is, is it?” Dad says, like it’s not really a question. “Well, why don’t you tell me about the Curse of the Mummy Zombie anyway, son? I could use a good laugh about now. And we can move on to the story about the punishment at school, and then you can tell me about little Izzy’s wet pants.”
“Iggy,” I mumble.
“Excuse me?” Dad asks.
“It was Iggy who wet his pants,” I say, staring at my bare feet. They look so happy, so innocent! It’s as if they’re not attached to the rest of miserable me. “He’s in the first grade, Dad.”
I’m gonna be here forever.
And Dad’s never going to understand about me needing a new spare friend by Friday, which is sure to come up.
Man, I hope I don’t start crying.
But there is no other way out of this tangled-up crystal maze, so I start talking.
11
BABY TALK THURSDAY
“How come the wind always blows after it rains?” I ask my mom. We have just dropped off Alfie at Kreative Learning and Daycare.
It is Thursday, the day after my toilet paper disaster, and the day before Alfie’s big show. Wow, I’m glad I’m not Miss Nancy today. Wait—I’m always glad I’m not Miss Nancy! But especially today, when she’s facing one of the few rehearsals left before tomorrow’s Brown Bear, Brown Bear disaster.
Alfie is still saying “No way!” to the whole red bird thing.
“Good question about the wind, honey,” Mom says, glancing out the car window at the bending trees and skittering leaves. “You know, I always picture a rainstorm as a beautiful lady sweeping through her castle,” she says. “Maybe the swish of her skirts creates a breeze as it follows her out the door.”
Yeah, right, I think, trying not to make a face. I’ll keep that theory to myself, if anyone asks at school. Especially during science this morning.
But that fancy explanation is pure Mom.
I hug my backpack to my chest. Inside is the big library book, wrapped every which way in aluminum foil in case it starts raining again.
I am taking no chances today.
Okay, yes, I am basically sneaking it into school. And that is against the law at our house.
1. Library books are expensive, Mom says. And the librarians work hard ordering them, and getting them ready to be checked out.
2. It is a privilege to borrow library books.
3. That’s why you have to pay a fine if you bring them back late.
4. And if you damage or lose a library book, you have to pay for it. It will cost more than if you just went to the store and bought a new one, too, because of all that librarian work.
Am I asking for trouble?
No, I am not. I do have a plan, though. I have given up trying to convince Jason Leffer what a great-idea guy I am. Instead, I am now trying for Diego Romero, the kid who likes books. Books about cars.
He can be my new spare friend.
This library book is perfect for Diego! It’s all about cars. It has a gold race car on the front, and lots of really cool pictures inside. But it has writing, too. Diego likes writing. We can look at the book during together recess and lunch. I’ll just kind of surprise him with it.
And then later, after I invite Diego to Alfie’s show tomorrow night, I can teach him some of the fun stuff I like to do—like play Die, Creature, Die. He will then be the new-and-improved Diego Romero.
Once we’re friends, I won’t be stranded every time Corey goes to swim practice, or Kevin decides to mooch around with his neighbors instead of with me.
“EllRay?” Mom says, giving me a funny look in the rearview mirror.
“Hmm?” I say, still thinking about hanging with Diego at recess, and about him unwrapping the book. I can’t wait to see the look on his face!
“We’re here,” she tells me. “At school,” she adds, as if I might need more of a clue.
“Okay. Good,” I say, escaping from my seatbelt. I open the car door, get out, and lug my too-heavy backpack after me. Ugh. “See ya,” I shout through the car window, waving bye to my mom.
Out on the playground, the girls in my class are acting extra goofy today—as if the beautiful rain lady sweeping her skirts through the castle got them all worked up, too. The boys are kind of standing back and watching the girls, for once.
Girls-acting-goofy just happens sometimes—for no known reason. They are like stampeding cattle in a cowboy movie, only smaller. Fads happen a lot with girls, too. In fact, the girls in my class run through fads so fast that by the time you realize one is happening, it’s old news—and another fad has taken its place.
Pink Day? They had that before Christmas. No announcements or anything.
Skipping Day? Been there, saw that. The girls even tried skipping in class, until Ms. Sanchez said no. She said a few other things, too.
Don’t-Say-“Boy”-Day? The girls had that one, only nobody noticed until it was almost over. They mostly ignore us boys every day, it seems to me.
So what fad is it going to be today?
“Goin’ onna fwing, EllWay,” Cynthia says, running toward the swing. There’s a pink sweater wrapped around her head.
“Yeah,” Heather says, racing after her. “Goo-goo, gah-gah! Toopid boy,” she adds, pointing at me.
At me! What did I do?
Today, I mean.
Next to the girls’ picnic table, three of them are clustered together, cooing at one another. “You so cute!”
“No, you so cute.”
“Widdle babies,” Fiona chimes in, hugging the other two.
The boys are watching this with nauseated expressions on their faces. I join them. “Hey. What’s up with them?” I ask, clunking my backpack onto the table.
I’ll see if anyone is still talking to me after what happened yesterday.
“Kry says it’s Baby Talk Thursday,” Kevin reports, frowning. “Only I don’t think she’s doing it much. And Emma and Annie Pat can’t decide if they even want to.”
I laugh. “I thought it was Wear Your Sweater on Your Head Day,” I say, trying out a joke.
“That’s supposed to be a baby hat Cynthia has on,” Kevin says, serious as anything. It’s as if he is interpreting the girls to us—like some kind of goofy puzzle-solving scientist.
Kevin is not taking his worried eyes off those girls, in fact.
But me? I’m relieved it’s Baby Talk Thursday! After all, just about every day has to be something if you’re in the third grade at Oak Glen Primary School.
Hurt Feelings Day.
Scared About That Test Day.
Emma’s Birthday Day.
So if this wasn’t Baby Talk Thursday, it might be Thanks a Lot, EllRay! Day. And everyone would still be mad at me.
But because of the girls, we have officially “moved on,” as Ms. Sanchez would say.
“Aren’t you gonna eat anything?” my friend Corey Robinson asks, eyeing my backpack. Corey is always hungry, because of the swimming.
“I guess not until later,” I say. I don’t want anyone seeing the library book yet—or even spotting the aluminum foil it is wrapped in. Aluminum foil inside a kid’s backpack usually means something yummy is inside the foil.
Like leftover birthday cake!
My mouth starts watering for a turquoise-blue frosting rose.
“Shove over. I want a front row seat for this,” Marco says to me, but in a friendly way. I make room for him on the bench.
Two girls skip by, arm-in-arm. “We fwying, Marco!” one of them calls over her shoulder—as if she’s showing off just for him.
“They’re frying?” Marco asks, leaning forward like he just missed something.
“I think she said they’re flying,” Major tells him. “But I don’t know for sure.”
“How long are they gonna keep this u
p?” Diego wonders aloud.
“Probably all day, knowing them,” I say. I try not to sound too overjoyed.
But if the girls do act like babies for the entire day, then I’m out of trouble for sure! Because their being babies will soak up all the attention around here. And that’s a fact.
It’s kind of hard to know how to act around all this baby stuff, though. That’s the only bad thing about today so far.
Are we boys supposed to ignore it?
Or go along with it?
Or argue with it?
Or wrap sweatshirts around our own heads and start making fun of it?
“Let’s see what Ms. Sanchez has to say,” I tell the other guys at the table. “I have the feeling babies aren’t really her thing.”
“Not yet, anyway,” Corey says. “At least not crawling around her classroom, if that’s what they’ve got planned.”
“Yeah,” I agree as the buzzer sounds. And we start for class, dodging a couple of skipping, babbling girl-babies.
Geez, what a break.
Maybe this is my lucky day!
12
HIGH PRESSURE SYSTEM
“Settle down, everyone,” Ms. Sanchez says after she has taken attendance and put on her science apron. It’s the sight of that apron that got us excited, because she usually plans really fun experiments for us to do. And the ones that don’t work out the exact way she planned can be even better. Messier, but better.
Which is why she wears the apron.
“Now, you may have noticed how windy it is outside,” Ms. Sanchez begins, perching on the front of her desk, as usual.
“Goo-goo, gah-gah,” Heather murmurs, swapping baby glances with Cynthia.
“Shh,” Annie Pat whispers, scowling. She and Emma want to be scientists when they grow up, and they probably think Heather and Cynthia are trying to mess with the lesson. Which they are.
“Shh, yourself,” Cynthia whispers back, shrugging to show how bored she is with Annie Pat—and with science, for that matter.
“So,” Ms. Sanchez continues, “does anyone know why it’s windy outside?”
Wow, I think, and my eyes are big with surprise. That is just what I was asking my mom!
Stanley Washington’s hand shoots up.
“Yes, Stanley?” Ms. Sanchez says.
“It’s windy because the weather-guesser on TV said it would be windy,” he says.
“I think they prefer to be called meteorologists, not weather-guessers,” Ms. Sanchez says, laughing. “And before anyone asks, the term ‘meteorology’ comes from an ancient Greek word that refers to any event taking place in the sky. That’s how meteors got their name, I suppose, since they are one thing that can happen in the sky. But what weather-related events take place in our earth’s atmosphere?”
Emma raises her hand. “Rain?” she says after Ms. Sanchez calls on her.
Emma can make things sound like questions even when they aren’t.
“That’s right,” Ms. Sanchez says. “And snow, and—”
“And UFOs,” Jared Matthews says, excited enough to interrupt.
“Like, with space aliens inside?” Heather asks, forgetting for a second to be a baby.
“Raise your hands, please,” Ms. Sanchez reminds them. “And let’s leave UFOs and space aliens for another lesson. Probably not science,” she adds, laughing again. “We’ve got our hands full today with the weather. We were talking about— ”
“The wind,” a few kids say together, finishing her sentence the way she sometimes wants us to. We can always tell when.
“Right,” Ms. Sanchez says. “And it’s windy today because the air pressure is trying to adjust itself after the rain. It likes to be nice and balanced. So the air pressure is trying to move from the high pressure system of the cold, heavy rainstorm we had last night to a lighter and and more normal low pressure system today. And that’s what is making the wind blow.”
Annie Pat raises her hand. “But you can’t really see air pressure, right?” she asks after Ms. Sanchez calls on her. “Except when the wind blows?”
“That’s right, Annie Pat,” Ms. Sanchez says, smiling at her. “But you are seeing the effects of air pressure when the wind blows, not seeing the air pressure itself. Sometimes you can feel air pressure, though. Did any of you ever get to fly in an airplane when you were a baby?”
Lots of hands shoot up into the air. Even mine, because we flew to see my grandparents once. I don’t remember it, but I’ve seen the pictures.
There still used to be paper photographs when I was a baby. Pictures weren’t just on people’s phones or cameras, like now.
“And did one or two of you get an earache in the plane?” Ms. Sanchez asks.
Corey raises his hand. “My mom said I did, once,” he reports, sounding proud. “She said I screamed and screamed when we were landing, and people gave her dirty looks. So she gave me a bottle.”
“Ooo,” a couple of the girls say. One of them pats Corey’s back, as if his plane just now landed, and he might still need comforting.
Next, they’ll probably want him to join their goo-goo, gah-gah baby club.
Good luck with that.
“Your poor little ears hurt because of the air pressure change in the plane’s cabin,” Ms. Sanchez tells Corey. “It’s something babies grow out of, thank goodness. But that’s what we’ll be talking about this morning, people: air pressure. And we have three air pressure experiments to get through. So come on up here, Cynthia,” she says. “And Corey, too. And—how about EllRay? We need three students with good sets of lungs to blow up a few balloons.”
“Don’t wanna,” Cynthia says, turning into a baby again. She sinks down in her chair like she’s melting. “Wah-h-h,” she fake-cries, peeking around to see how we’re taking it.
“I didn’t ask if you wanted to, Miss Harbison,” Ms. Sanchez says. She still sounds pretty cheerful, in spite of everything. “And remember,” our teacher adds. “This is a science class, not a drama class.”
She says that when someone—usually one of the girls—starts acting up.
Wait until Alfie is in her class!
“But I’m feepy,” Cynthia says in baby talk, cradling her arms on her desk and putting her head down for a pretend nap.
“Poor widdle baby,” Heather says, petting her arm. “So cute.”
“Not cute at all,” Ms. Sanchez says, snapping out the words. “And right—now,” she adds, clicking both fingers as she speaks. “Also, no more baby talk, if you please, ladies—or I’ll send out for a few jars of strained lima beans, and we’ll see how you like that. Hurry,” she adds, her usually warm voice turning cool. “Tick-tock.”
Uh-oh. There’s a high pressure system building up.
Cynthia hurries.
And we begin our three air pressure experiments.
“I liked the trick where Jared and Emma jammed their straw into the potato,” Stanley says as we paw through our cubbies, getting out snacks for morning recess.
“We did it using air pressure,” Annie Pat points out, shrugging her arms into her jacket. “And it was an experiment, not a trick.”
“If you say so,” Stanley says, laughing.
“I do say so,” Annie Pat tells him.
“I liked the trick where Ms. Sanchez made the hard-boiled egg squeeze into the bottle,” Jared says. “Like magic. Pop!”
“Using air pressure,” Annie Pat says again.
Give it up, I think, hiding a smile. I zip up my dark blue San Diego Padres sweatshirt and give my backpack—and the hidden library book inside—a friendly pat. Ms. Sanchez says that the meteorological event happening outside now is that it’s drizzling. I can’t risk getting drizzle all over the book.
I’ll wait until lunch to bring it outside, but it has to happen today.
Because I am runnin
g out of time.
Drizzly mornings are perfect for kickball and foursquare, though—and also for yelling and running around. My legs are itching to run, in fact.
“Did you eat your snack yet?” Marco asks, jamming a few little plastic bags into his sweatshirt pouch.
“Most of it,” I admit.
“EllRay likes to chow down before school even starts,” Corey tells Marco, laughing. “You know. Get it over with so he can play more. He even eats what he’s gonna have for lunch, sometimes.”
“Hey. I eat half my lunch before school,” Major says to me, amazed at the coincidence.
“Huh,” I say, grinning at him. “I should try that, so I don’t starve by the time school is out. Anyway, Corey should talk,” I tell Major and Marco, giving Corey a shove. “He’s always eating. His mom packs him twice as much food as normal, that’s the thing. And it’s all healthy.”
“It’s true,” Corey tells Marco and Major, a smile spreading across his friendly, freckled face. “I love to eat. And my mom says if you eat healthy, you can eat more.”
I look around to see where Diego is, but he’s probably already outside, playing.
Your life is about to change for the better, Diego Romero. So get ready!
“I’ll share,” Marco tells me, keeping his voice low.
“Huh?”
“I’ll share my snack with you if you’re hungry,” he says, repeating the offer. “I’ve got string cheese in one bag, and some mini muffins in the other bag. My mom made ’em. And I brought some of my knights to play with, too.”
“I like all that stuff,” I admit as we churn out the door.
Okay. My stomach is officially gurgling now.
“You even like the knights?” Marco shouts over the noise in the hall. “I’ve got a couple of dragons, too!”
“He does have dragons,” Major says. “He’ll even share.”
“I guess I like them,” I say as we run outside. I scan the playground first for my future friend Diego, who is nowhere to be seen. Then I look for Mr. Havens. He is handing out kickballs slowly, like he’s a Santa Claus who is running out of presents.
EllRay Jakes The Recess King! Page 5
