My Weirder-est School #3

by Dan Gutman

  Dedication

  To the kids at Cos Cob School

  Special thanks to Jeannie Schnakenberg, Tanabe Yamagishi Yuka, and Cassandra Tai-Marcellini

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Dedication

  1. National Dessert Day

  2. Betsy Toothbrush

  3. Molar Monkey

  4. Our Genius Plan

  5. Plaque Attack!

  6. The Tooth Fairy

  7. Open Wide and Say Ah!

  8. Good News and Bad News

  9. Swish and Spit

  About the Author and Illustrator

  Back Ad

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  My name is A.J. and I hate going to the dentist.

  Dentists are weird. Why would anybody want to be a dentist? Who wants to stick their hands in people’s mouths all day long? That’s just gross.

  I only mention this because the other day the weirdest thing in the history of the world happened. It was October 14. We were in Mr. Cooper’s class. We pledged the allegiance and did the Word of the Day, like we do every day. That’s when the weirdness started.

  “Okay, let’s get to work,” said Mr. Cooper. “Turn to page twenty-three in your math books.”

  Ugh. I hate math. But that’s when a voice came over the loudspeaker. It was Mrs. Patty, the school secretary.

  “Attention, students in Mr. Cooper’s class . . .” she announced.

  “Not again,” muttered Mr. Cooper.

  “. . . please report to Mrs. Cooney’s office.”

  Mrs. Cooney is our school nurse. She has blue eyes that look like cotton candy yogurt. The kind with no sprinkles. One time, she begged me to marry her, but I told her I couldn’t because she was already married to some guy named Mr. Cooney.

  “Pringle up, everybody,” said Mr. Cooper.

  We all lined up, like Pringles. Everybody was wondering why we were going to the nurse’s office.

  “Mrs. Cooney is probably going to check to see if we have head lice,” said Andrea Young, this annoying girl with curly brown hair.

  “Headlights?” I said. “I don’t have headlights.”

  “Why would we bring headlights to school?” asked Ryan, who will eat anything, even stuff that isn’t food.

  “I don’t think headlights would fit in my backpack,” said Michael, who never ties his shoes.

  “You could bring two backpacks,” suggested Alexia, this girl who rides a skateboard all the time. “One for each headlight.”

  “How would you get the headlights off a car?” asked Neil, who we call the nude kid even though he wears clothes.

  “Not headlights, you dumbheads!” shouted Andrea. “Head lice!”

  Oh. Those words sound way too much alike.*

  “Maybe Mrs. Cooney is going to weigh and measure us,” guessed Emily, Andrea’s crybaby friend. “She does that every year.”

  We walked a million hundred miles to the nurse’s office. Alexia was the line leader. Ryan was the door holder.

  “Good morning, boys and girls!” said Mrs. Cooney as we filed into her office.

  As I walked by her, I whispered to Mrs. Cooney, “I just want you to know that I don’t have headlights.”

  “Good to know, A.J.,” she replied.

  We sat down on long benches. I had to sit next to annoying Andrea.

  “Are you going to check us for head lice?” Andrea asked.

  “No,” said Mrs. Cooney.

  “Are you going to weigh and measure us?” asked Emily.

  “No,” said Mrs. Cooney. “How many of you like going to the dentist?”

  Andrea raised her hand. She was waving it in the air like she was stranded on a desert island, trying to signal a plane.

  “I love going to the dentist,” she said. “I go every six months.”

  “Me too!” said Emily, who does everything Andrea does.

  “I hate going to the dentist,” I announced.

  “Me too,” everybody else said.

  “Well, you kids are in luck,” said Mrs. Cooney, “because you don’t have to go to the dentist today. The dentist is coming to you!”

  WHAT?!

  “Today is National Dessert Day,” said Mrs. Cooney. “So I thought it would be the perfect day to bring in a dentist to visit our school. I’d like to introduce you to . . . Dr. Floss!”

  This lady walked into the nurse’s office. She was wearing a white coat, the kind that doctors wear. There was a name tag on it that said “Dr. Betsy Floss.” We gave her a round of applause by clapping our hands in circles, because that’s what you’re supposed to do whenever somebody is introduced. Nobody knows why.

  “Happy National Dessert Day!” she said. “You all have such nice smiles. Look at all the things your teeth do for you. You see them when you smile. You use them to chew your food. They help you talk and sing, whisper, and whistle. It’s nice to see your smiling faces this morning. My name is Betsy Floss.”

  “Didn’t Betsy Floss make the first flag?” I whispered to Andrea.

  “That was Betsy Ross, dumbhead,” she whispered back.

  I was going to say something mean to Andrea, but I didn’t have the chance.

  “Is Betsy Floss your real name?” asked Ryan.

  “Well, I took my husband’s name when I got married,” Dr. Floss told us. “His last name is Floss.”

  “What name were you born with?” asked Emily.

  “Betsy Toothbrush,” replied Dr. Floss.

  “Wait,” I said. “Your last name was Toothbrush and you married a guy named Floss?”

  “Yes.”

  “Is your husband a dentist too?” asked Neil.

  “No, of course not,” replied Dr. Floss. “Why would you think that?”

  “It was just a guess,” said Neil.

  Mrs. Cooney took a step forward. “Tell us a little about yourself, Dr. Floss,” she said. “What made you decide to go into the field of dentistry?”

  “Well, let me think,” said Dr. Floss. “I used to be in the army.”

  “What did you do in the army?” asked Michael.

  “I was a drill sergeant,” she replied, and then she started cracking up. “Get it? Drill sergeant? Ha-ha-ha. That’s a little dentist joke.”

  Everybody pretended to laugh even though she didn’t say anything funny. When grown-ups tell jokes, you should always pretend to laugh. That’s the first rule of being a kid.

  “When I got out of the army,” continued Dr. Floss, “I decided to go to dental school. I’ve been practicing dentistry for ten years.”

  “Don’t you get tired?” I asked.

  “Ha-ha-ha. I get it,” said Dr. Floss. “Any other questions?”

  “What do you do when you’re not being a dentist?” asked Neil.

  “Let me see,” said Dr. Floss. “I like to work with my hands. I play guitar. I collect old tools. I walk my dog. And I like to do roadwork.”

  “You work on the roads?” I asked.

  “I think roadwork means she goes jogging, Arlo,” whispered Andrea, who calls me by my real name because she knows I don’t like it.

  “Did you kids lose any of your baby teeth yet?” asked Dr. Floss.

  Most of us raised our hands.

  “I have a loose tooth right now,” said Emily.

  “Oooh!” said Dr. Floss. “Maybe it will fall out today, and if you’re lucky the Tooth Fairy will come to school. She’s a good friend of mine.”

  “We invited Dr. Floss here today to talk about dental hygiene,” said Mrs. Cooney. “Who can tell me what hygiene is?”

  “That’s when you say hello to somebody named Jean,” I said.

  Andrea rolled her eyes and shot her
hand in the air.

  “Hygiene is all the things we do to stay healthy,” she said.

  “That’s right, Andrea,” said Mrs. Cooney.

  Andrea smiled the smile she smiles to let everybody know she knows something nobody else knows.

  “Our students have been taught all about good hygiene, Dr. Floss,” said Mrs. Cooney. “They know they should brush their teeth at least twice a day.”

  “I brush my teeth seven times a day,” said Andrea. “First I brush when I wake up in the morning. Then I brush after breakfast. Before lunch. After lunch. Before dinner. After dinner. And at bedtime. I have a tooth-brushing calendar in my room. I put a check mark after every time I brush.”

  “Can you possibly be more boring?” I asked Andrea.

  What is her problem? Why can’t a truck full of toothpaste fall on her head?

  “Kids should also eat a healthy diet for the sake of their teeth,” said Mrs. Cooney. “Isn’t that right, Dr. Floss?”

  “No,” replied Dr. Floss.

  “HUH?” we all said, which is also “HUH” backward.

  “I wish kids would never brush their teeth or eat healthy,” said Dr. Floss. “If you all brush your teeth regularly and eat healthy food, there will be no need for dentists. I want kids to stop brushing their teeth, eat more candy and cupcakes, and drink sugary sodas.”

  WHAT?!

  “I don’t understand,” said Mrs. Cooney. “You’re saying you want kids to have poor dental hygiene because it would be good for your business?”

  “Exactly!” said Dr. Floss. “You see, my car is old and it keeps breaking down. If kids have good dental hygiene, they won’t need to visit the dentist very often, and I won’t make much money. I want you kids to eat more sugary junk food, so I can buy a new car.”

  “WOW!” we all said, which is “MOM” upside down. That was weird.

  “October is my favorite month of the year,” said Dr. Floss. “I’ll tell you why. October eighteenth is National Chocolate Cupcake Day. The twenty-third is National Boston Cream Pie Day. The twenty-fifth is National Greasy Foods Day. The twenty-eighth is National Chocolate Day. The thirtieth is National Candy Corn Day. And the thirty-first is National Candy Apple Day.* It’s also Halloween!”

  Dr. Floss reached into her pockets and pulled out a handful of candy. She threw it up in the air for us to catch. I grabbed a Kit Kat. Dr. Floss is my favorite dentist in the history of the world.

  Mrs. Cooney closed her eyes and rubbed her forehead. Grown-ups are always rubbing their forehead. Nobody knows why.

  “I’d love to talk more about dental hygiene,” said Dr. Floss, “but I have to go say hello to the other classes.”

  “No! Don’t go!” everybody was hollering. “We want more candy!”

  “I’ll be back,” said Dr. Floss. “We’ll be celebrating National Dessert Day all day.”

  Yay! This was going to be the greatest day of my life.

  We left the nurse’s office and walked a million hundred miles back to our classroom.

  “Okay, turn to page twenty-three in your math books,” Mr. Cooper told us.

  Math was boring. Why do we need math when we have calculators? Luckily, we didn’t have the chance to finish the lesson, because you’ll never believe who walked through the door.

  Nobody! You can’t walk through a door. Doors are made out of wood. But you’ll never believe who walked through the doorway. It was Dr. Floss! This time, she was carrying a guitar.

  “Yay! It’s Dr. Floss!” everybody was shouting. “More candy!”

  Mr. Cooper closed his eyes and rubbed his forehead. I guess when you get older, your forehead gets itchy a lot.

  “Would you kids like to hear a song?” asked Dr. Floss.

  “Yes!” shouted all the girls.

  “No!” shouted all the boys.

  Anytime anybody asks you if you want to hear a song, always say no. That’s the first rule of being a boy.

  “This is a song called ‘My Favorite Things,’” said Dr. Floss. She strummed her guitar and started to sing . . .

  Snickers and Kit Kats

  and ten Almond Joys.

  Cookies and sodas

  for girls and for boys.

  Milk Duds and gumballs,

  a box of Ring Dings.

  These are a few of my favorite things.

  Ice cream and candy

  and cakes filled with sugar.

  It’s fine with me if you

  eat your own boogers.

  Skittles and Hershey’s

  and one Nestlé Crunch.

  These are the things

  that I want you to munch.

  When you get sick,

  if you feel ick,

  and think you’re gonna die,

  just eat lots more junk food

  that rots lots more teeth,

  ’cause there’s stuff I need . . . to buy.

  That song was weird. Mr. Cooper rubbed his forehead again. He really needs to use moisturizer.

  “I think Dr. Floss is just joking,” he told us. “She doesn’t really want kids to eat lots of junk food. Do you, Dr. Floss?”

  But Dr. Floss wasn’t paying attention. She put down her guitar and picked up a weird-looking puppet. It was a monkey puppet with a big mouth full of teeth. The monkey’s hands were up in the air like somebody was robbing it. Dr. Floss’s hand was inside the back of the puppet to make its mouth move.

  “Hi boys and girls,” the monkey puppet said in a squeaky voice. “My name is Molar. Molar Monkey. And this is my friend Dr. Floss.”

  Dr. Floss was trying not to move her mouth when the monkey spoke, but it was obvious that she was doing the talking.

  “Hi Molar!” said Dr. Floss in her regular voice.

  “We’re going to talk about teeth,” said Molar Monkey. “But first, a few jokes.”

  “I like jokes,” said Dr. Floss.

  “Did you hear about the cell phone that went to the dentist?” Molar Monkey asked us.

  “No, I didn’t,” said Dr. Floss. “What about it?”

  “It had Bluetooth,” said Molar Monkey. “Get it? Blue . . . tooth?”

  Everybody laughed even though the monkey puppet didn’t say anything funny.

  “Hey, do you know why kids don’t like going to the dentist?” Molar Monkey asked us.

  “No, why?” asked Dr. Floss.

  “Because dentists are boring,” said Molar Monkey. “Get it? Boring?”

  I didn’t get it, but I laughed anyway. You should always laugh after a monkey puppet tells a joke. That’s the first rule of being a kid.

  “Okay, enough with the jokes,” said Molar Monkey. “When you brush your teeth blah blah blah blah back teeth blah blah blah blah front teeth blah blah blah blah tops and bottoms blah blah blah blah and don’t forget to brush your tongue blah blah blah blah . . .”

  What a snoozefest. Molar Monkey was right. Dentists are boring. And so are their puppets.

  “Do monkeys even brush their teeth?” I whispered to Ryan.

  “Not that I know of,” Ryan whispered back.

  “Then why is he telling us to brush ours?” I whispered.

  “Why is that monkey even speaking English?” whispered Ryan. “Monkeys can’t talk.”

  “. . . blah blah blah blah,” continued Molar Monkey. “You don’t have to brush all your teeth. Only brush the ones you want to keep. Ha-ha. That’s a little dental joke there.”

  Molar Monkey took about a million hundred hours to explain how to brush our teeth. Like we didn’t know that already!

  “We should talk about flossing now,” said Dr. Floss. “Who knows how to use dental floss?”

  “I do!” shouted Little Miss Perfect I Know Everything in the World. “I’ve been flossing since I was four years old.”

  “Don’t you get tired?” I asked.

  Anytime somebody says they’ve been doing something for years, ask them if they don’t get tired. That’s the first rule of being a kid.

  “Very f
unny, Arlo,” Andrea said, rolling her eyes.

  “Flossing cleans between your teeth where food can hide and your toothbrush can’t reach,” said Molar Monkey.

  “So you kids should never use dental floss,” said Dr. Floss. “Because if you don’t, the food will stay in there and cause holes in your teeth called cavities. And when you have cavities, you’ll have to come to the dentist, and your parents will have to pay me lots of money. And then I can buy my new car.”

  “That’s a horrible attitude, Dr. Floss!” said Molar Monkey.

  “Hey, I’m just looking out for number one,” said Dr. Floss.*

  “Just ignore her,” said Molar Monkey. “Flossing your teeth is a really good thing. I’m going to give each of you some dental floss so you can use it at home.”

  Molar Monkey showed us how to use dental floss and gave each of us a little container of it. Yay! I love getting free stuff.

  “Dental floss comes in lots of flavors,” said Molar Monkey. “My favorite is mint. Remember, you kids should floss every day.”

  “They should not,” said Dr. Floss.

  “They should too,” said Molar Monkey.

  “Should not,” said Dr. Floss. “I need a new car.”

  They went on like that for a while.

  After lunch in the vomitorium, we went out for recess. Michael’s birthday was last week, and we were all playing with the yo-yos we got in our goody bags at the end of the party. Yo-yos are cool.

  Emily was looking worried, as usual.

  “I think my tooth is going to fall out soon,” she said. “It’s really loose.”

  What’s up with baby teeth? Why do we have baby teeth if they’re just going to fall out and get replaced by adult teeth? We should just start with adult teeth and get it over with, if you ask me. Having two sets of teeth makes no sense at all. What a waste of teeth.

  “Maybe we should tell Dr. Floss that your tooth is about to fall out,” Andrea told Emily.

  “I’m scared,” said Emily, who’s scared of everything.

  “That’s a terrible idea,” I said. “Dr. Floss is weird. I don’t even think she’s a real dentist. A real dentist would never tell kids to eat junk food.”