Everett. “May we show you and your students a
fun drawing game?”
“Of course!” she answers.
“Grab a fresh sheet of paper, everyone!” Mr. Rosa
announces.
“You’ll figure it out as we go along!” Mr. Rosa tells
them. “At the end of the game, you’ll have drawn
a complete character from head to toe!”
“Except the characters might not HAVE heads!”
Chad laughs. “OR toes!”
“I’ll go first!” I say. “Draw . . . ummmm . . .”
“. . . and that’s ALL you
draw!” Mr. Rosa says.
“Until the NEXT person
tells us what to add on!
How ’bout it, Teddy?”
“Ah!” Mr. Rosa exclaims.
“So now it’s up to YOU,
cartoonists, to decide
exactly WHERE to draw
that peg leg!”
One Jefferson kid looks confused. “My drawing is
just a nose and a peg leg, floating in space.”
“Perfect! You’re doing it right!” says Mr. Rosa.
“Who’s next?”
Like I always say: There’s nothing like a game of
Add-On to break the ice. When the time comes
for everyone to show off their drawings, we’re all
cracking up. Every single drawing is completely
hilarious. And believe it or not, guess whose is
my favorite?
“That was FABULOUS!” Dee Dee says as we leave
Mrs. Everett’s room an hour later. “I should have
joined the Doodlers YEARS ago!”
“We didn’t EXIST years ago,” Francis points out.
“It was a good meeting,” I say, “once those C.I.C.
kids actually started TALKING to us.”
“Yeah, some of them were pretty nice!” Dee Dee
agrees. “SEE, you guys . . . ?”
Wowza! A girl is walking . . .
No, wait. Let me start again.
A TURBO CUTE girl is walking this way, and . . .
. . . she’s looking right at ME! JACKPOT!!
“You’re Nate, right?” she asks.
“Very smooth,” Teddy mutters. I give him a quick
kick in the shin.
“I just want to tell you,” the mystery girl says,
“everyone thought it was GREAT the way you
stood up to Nolan in the food court yesterday!”
So THIS is what it was like for Eric Fleury. “Sure!”
I say. “I think I’ve got a pen here somewhere . . .”
“Oh, I’ve got one,” she says quickly, pulling out a
marker the size of a salami.
Wait, what? She disappears around the corner, and
I hear an explosion of laughter. A vise tightens in
my stomach as I look down at my wrist.
Then she’s back. Only this time, she’s not alone.
Away they go, laughing their heads off. Bet you
a buck they’re not discussing knock-knock jokes.
“That was tricky dirt,” Artur says.
“You mean ‘dirty trick,’” says Francis.
Dee Dee throws up her hands. “Don’t blame ME!”
she protests. “I was just trying to look on the
BRIGHT side!”
“There IS no bright side.” Chad sighs.
What ABOUT it? I’ll be watching from the bench.
I can’t play basketball with this giant plaster sweat-
band on my wrist.
“Wait, won’t the game be postponed?” Francis
asks. “The gym at P.S. 38 is in no condition to—”
Teddy cuts him off. “We’re not playing at P.S. 38.
They’re moving the game HERE. To Jefferson.”
NOW what? Is this another example of Dee Dee’s
terminal case of Look-at-Me-itis, or . . .
“No,” she says, hands
on her hips. “I’m simply
pointing out how use-
less it is to stand around
complaining . . .”
Apparently, while I wasn’t paying attention, Dee
Dee became a basketball expert. “Okay, then,
Coach,” I say sarcastically. “How DO we win?”
“By finding Jefferson’s weakness, of course.”
“I never said it was
simple,” she tells me.
“But Jefferson’s not
indestructible.”
That’s the SECOND time she’s said that. Who’s
this Achilles dude? And what does his HEEL have
to do with anything?
Later, at home, I decide to find out.
“Dad,” I ask, “what’s an Achilles’ heel?”
Who asked YOU, Ellen? But before I can stop her,
she’s shoving some papers in my face. “I wrote
this report in fourth grade!” she brags.
Difference number 7,387,289 between me and
Ellen: The reports I did in fourth grade are buried
in a landfill somewhere.
The ones SHE did are
carefully stored in a file
cabinet in her room,
right next to her price-
less collection of plastic
panda figurines.
Huh. Yeah, that IS pretty interesting. But why
should I tell HER that? It’s not my job to inflate
Ellen’s ego. She’s got her own built-in pump.
There’s the doorbell. I’ll get it.
Until this very second, I thought Dee Dee was a
little unusual. Okay, maybe more than a little . . .
but basically harmless. Now I’m not so sure.
She might have some deeper issues.
“Why are you dressed
like a cat?” I ask her.
I COULD have said:
“Have you completely
lost your mind?”
“I’m doing a dress
rehearsal!” she answers
happily. “And I’m not
just ANY cat! . . .”
“I’m going to wear this to the game Saturday and
cheer us on to victory! I’ll be our mascot!”
“Are you CRAZY?” I shout. “You can’t show up at
Jefferson looking like THAT!”
“Well, of COURSE not, silly!” she says.
“But bobcats are
FIERCE!” I tell her.
“You look like you
should be rolling
around on the floor
with a ball of YARN!”
“Oh, pshaw,” she says.
“If I’m going to finish your ‘Doctor Cesspool’ story
in time to enter the contest, I’d better get started!”
Oh, right, I forgot about that.
I grab a bunch of paper
from my room. But I don’t
like this. What if Dee Dee
totally messes up my comic?
What if she makes it all . . . well . . . DEE DEE-ish?
“Nate, RELAX!” she says. “I’m not going to ruin
your comic!”
So what happens? Two days later, Dee Dee submits
“Doctor Cesspool” WITHOUT EVEN SHOWING
ME THE FINISHED COMIC!
“I didn’t have TIME to show it to you!” she explains
at the end of school on Friday.
It’s not that I don’t believe her. It’s just that I
wanted to SEE it first. After all, “Doctor Cesspool”
is MY creation.
But what’s done is done. I can’t do anyth—
“In here!” whispers a voice.
“Chad?” Dee Dee says. “Is that you?”
“Yeah!” he whispers back. “Come on in! . . .”
Dee Dee and I squeeze
<
br /> inside.
“Close the door, you
guys,” says Chad. “I
don’t think we’re sup-
posed to be in here.”
It’s basically a king-size closet, packed with all
sorts of stuff: old science equipment that looks like
its last stop was Frankenstein’s lab, a couple of
antique bicycles, a lawn mower, a stuffed owl . . .
“Ooh!” Dee Dee says . . .
“ANOTHER one?”
I say. “They’ve
already got one
on display in
the front hall!”
“Yeah,” Chad says. “Why do they need TWO?”
“Because they’re twice as good as everyone else,”
I grumble. “They’re JEFFERSON.”
“Hiding,” he answers.
“Hiding?” I ask as I pop back into the hallway.
“THERE you are, Tiny!” Nolan sneers at Chad.
“We weren’t playing any games,” I say through
gritted teeth.
“Oh, that’s right, I FORGOT!” Nolan crows.
“P.S. 38 STINKS at games!”
“The only thing you’ll find out is that a BOBCAT is
no match for a CAVALIER!” Nolan says.
You can’t always believe everything you see. Like
this scoreboard, for instance.
You’re probably thinking: Wow! P.S. 38 did it!
They beat Jefferson, 43–29!
Uh, wrong.
See, the scoreboard only has room for TWO-DIGIT
numbers. We scored 43, all right. But Jefferson
didn’t score 29. They scored . . .
And all I could do was sit there and WATCH it.
I felt like running onto the court and clubbing
somebody over the head with my cast . . . but I
stopped myself. I didn’t want to rebreak my wrist.
Chad was on the bench beside me, taking pictures
for the yearbook. Great. We can stick these on a
page called “most humiliating moments.”
Poor Coach. He’s usually Peter Positive, but he
looked like he’d just lost (a) his dog, (b) his best
friend, and (c) a basketball game . . . BY EIGHTY-
SIX POINTS!!
Nobody says much as
we slog home after
the game. Except
Francis. Every time
we lose to Jefferson, he has to analyze exactly what
went wrong.
“Offense, defense, rebounding . . .” he says. “They
beat us in every part of the game.”
“But they didn’t HAVE a mascot,” Chad says.
“Exactly!” answers Dee Dee. “So I won!”
“That’s ridiculous,” Francis says.
“Guys!” I shout. “Let’s DO it!”
“Do what?” everyone asks.
“Right!” I say. “They’ve spanked us at all the
OFFICIAL activities . . .”
Francis is skeptical.
“Like what?” he asks.
“Leave that to ME!”
I tell him.
Have you ever read the Great Brain books? They’re
awesome. The main character, Tom, is a genius.
Like me. And whenever he has a problem that
needs solving, he thinks about it right before he
goes to bed. Then his Great Brain comes up with
a perfect solution while he sleeps. When he wakes
up in the morning, he’s got an answer.
Except it doesn’t work. When I
open my eyes at 8:00 a.m. . . .
. . . all I can remember is that I was having a
dream about Mrs. Godfrey drowning in an ocean
of Cheez Doodles. But no great ideas. No perfect
solutions. I guess my brain took the night off.
And the morning, too. The
hours roll by, and I’m still
stumped. I haven’t felt
this clueless since that last
science test. (Who CARES
about the digestive system
of a fruit fly?) Anyway, I
need help.
And I know just who to ask. Someone with experi-
ence. Someone who knows what he’s talking about.
Mr. Rosa will understand. After all, he’s been
teaching at P.S. 38 since before I was BORN.
I cut right to the chase. “We want to challenge
Jefferson to . . . um . . . something.”
“Hm,” he says. “What kind of something?”
“That’s what I can’t figure out,” I admit.
“Well, nobody’s good at EVERYTHING,” he says.
“And don’t sell P.S. 38 short. Remember, YOU
have strengths, TOO.”
“Think of that C.I.C. meeting
we went to the other day,” he
explains. “Didn’t you think it
was kind of BORING?”
“Oh yeah, it was a no-fun zone in there,” I agree,
“until we showed them how to play Add-On.”
“Right. By the way, who taught YOU that game?”
Mr. Rosa smiles. “I see,” he says. “Very creative.”
Then he pulls two booklets out of a drawer and
lays them on the table. “You might recognize one
of these,” he tells me.
“It sure is,” he says. “And the other is a collection
of drawings by the Jefferson C.I.C. Take a look.”
I get that familiar queasy
feeling in my stomach as I
flip through the booklet.
“They can really draw,” is
all I can say.
“Oh, yes, they’re very good,” Mr. Rosa agrees.
“Huh? There are no STORIES in here,” I say,
scanning the booklet again. “Just drawings.”
“Right,” he says. “But YOUR booklet is FULL of
stories. Some very FUNNY stories, by the way!”
“I repeat,” Mr. Rosa says,
his eyes twinkling. “Very
creative.”
“Yeah, but . . . I still don’t know what kind of
competition to have with Jefferson!” I say as
Mr. Rosa shows me to the door.
“You’ll think of something,” he says simply.
Strengths. Okay, I
get the message: I’m
creative. But how’s
that going to help us
beat Jefferson in any
kind of showdown?
THAT’S IT! Maybe I didn’t find an answer in my
sleep like the Great Brain, but I figured something
out eventually. It just goes to show . . .
I slam into Dee Dee, who for some reason is
standing right in the middle of the sidewalk. “Oh,
my LEG!” she moans as she gets to her feet.
“I think I FRACTURED my KNEECAP!”
“Save the drama for your mama, Dee Dee,” I say,
“and listen to this great idea!”
Her face lights up as I describe my plan, and pretty
soon she’s hopping around like Spitsy with a
kibble buzz. So much for that fractured kneecap.
When we get to Dee Dee’s, she pulls out some
poster board and markers and gets to work. I call
the guys to fill them in. We all agree: This is our
best chance ever to
finally beat Jefferson.
First thing Monday morning, we do a little
decorating in the Jefferson lobby.
“You’re challenging us to a snow sculpture
contest?” Nolan sneers.
“Surprise,” Teddy whispers in my ear.
“We’re not planning on losing,” Dee Dee answers.
One o
f Nolan’s groupies shoots us a suspicious
look. “How do we decide who wins?”
“One judge from each school. That’s fair,” Francis
says.
Nolan shrugs. “Whatever. It’s not going to matter
WHO the judges are . . .”
They walk off, leaving us standing in the
ginormous lobby full of trophies, plaques, and
championship banners.
Chad looks worried. “They seem pretty confident.”
“Yeah,” I say. “But not as confident as I am.”
The school is buzzing all week until—FINALLY!—
Saturday’s here. The air’s cold but not TOO cold.
The snow’s wet but not TOO wet. It’s perfect sculp-
ture weather.
All of us swing into
TRAUMATIC FLASHBACK:
action. By “us,” I
Dad “helps” me build my
mean us KIDS. The
car for the Timber Scout
Driftwood Derby.
Ultimate Snowdown
is for kids only. We
don’t want a bunch
of grown-ups try-
ing to hog the glory.
You know what
happens when so-
called adults try to
take over.
Besides, it’s not like we need any more people.
We’ve got tons of kids ready to roll, and so does
Jefferson. At least I THINK they do. It’s hard to
tell, because . . .
“What’s THAT all about?” Teddy asks.
“Maybe they think we’ll try to copy their
sculpture,” Francis says.
Nolan and another kid sneak out from behind the
school, pulling a sled loaded up with . . . well, what-
Big Nate Goes for Broke Page 4
