by Dan Gutman
I looked over the candy: Milky Way, AirHeads, Mars bars, Twix, Kit Kat, Chunky, mr. Goodbar, York Peppermint Patties, Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, Mike and Ike, Atomic FireBall, JuJu Fish, Sour Neon Worms, Goobers, Laffy Taffy, Nerds, Sugar Daddy, Baby Ruth, Snickers, Kisses, M & M’s (plain and peanut), gummi bears, Dots, Junior Mints, Milk Duds, Good & Plenty, Whoppers, Twizzlers, Dum Dum, Skittles, Butterfinger, Starburst, Crunch, Jolly Rancher, Sweet Pops, Tootsie Roll….
I couldn’t decide which one I wanted. Everything looked so good. I wanted them all. I thought and thought and thought until my brain was about to explode. Finally, I decided to get a 3 Musketeers bar.
I leaned all the way over.
I reached out to pick up the 3 Musketeers bar.
I picked up the 3 Musketeers bar.
And you’ll never believe in a million hundred years what happened next.
A hand came out from under all that candy! It grabbed my hand!
“Aaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhh!” I screamed.
It was the scariest thing I had ever seen in my life! It was like one of those movies where a zombie hand pops out of a grave in the middle of the night.
But then something even scarier happened. A person was attached to the hand! The person came up from under the candy.
And that person was…Ms. Leakey!
“Aaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhh!” I screamed.
“DROP THAT CANDY BAR, A.J.!” Ms. Leakey said.
I dropped the 3 Musketeers bar. She was still holding my hand.
“What are you doing here?” I asked.
“Saving your life!” she said. “Do you know what they put in a 3 Musketeers bar? Hydrogenated palm kernel! Soy lecithin! Corn syrup! Artificial flavors!”
Finally, she let go of my hand, and I ran all the way to the checkout line to meet my mom.
“So, which treat did you choose?” she asked me.
“I changed my mind,” I told her. “I don’t want a treat.”
9
Ms. Leakey Is Everywhere!
That night I was lying in bed. It was hard to fall asleep. All I could do was think about candy, cookies, cakes, ice cream, and junk food. I just wanted to taste something sweet again.
Then, suddenly, a lightbulb appeared over my head.* I remembered something. A few months back, on Halloween, I’d taken a Hershey bar out of my Halloween candy and hidden it in my closet. I’d known there would come a day when I would want candy after Halloween was over. I had forgotten about it all this time.
The Hershey bar was still in my closet! I could eat it now! This was the greatest night of my life!
I got out of bed and opened my closet door. There’s a lot of junk in there, but finally I found the Hershey bar.
I climbed back into bed with the Hershey bar.
I unwrapped the Hershey bar.
Ummm. It smelled good.
I was about to take a bite of the Hershey bar when the weirdest thing in the history of the world happened.
Ms. Leakey jumped out from under my bed!
“Aaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhh!” I screamed.
“DROP THAT HERSHEY BAR, A.J.!” Ms. Leakey said.
I dropped the Hershey bar. She picked it up.
“Why are you hiding under my bed?” I asked her. “How did you get in here?”
“I climbed in the window,” she told me. “Do you know the average person eats twenty-two pounds of candy every year?”
“But I just…”
“Well, if you’ll excuse me,” Ms. Leakey said, “I need to go do some squat thrusts.”
I had no idea what a squat thrust was, but it didn’t matter. Ms. Leakey opened my window and climbed out. She was gone.
I was still sitting up in bed when my door opened. It was Mom and Dad.
“A.J., are you okay?” Mom asked.
“We heard a scream,” said Dad.
“Ms. Leakey was here!” I told them. “She was hiding under my bed! I went to eat a Hershey bar, but she grabbed it out of my hand! And then she ran away!”
“There, there,” my mom told me as she stroked my head. “You were just having a bad dream. Everything’s fine, A.J.”
“See?” my dad said. “Ms. Leakey isn’t under your bed. It was just a nightmare.”
“No, she was really here!” I insisted. “She ran away! She climbed out the window!”
“Sure she did,” Dad said.
“You go back to sleep, A.J.” said my mom. “In the morning you probably won’t even remember that this happened.”
Oh, I’ll remember. I know what I saw. Ms. Leakey was hiding under my bed, just like she was hiding under the candy in the supermarket.
She was following me! She was watching my every move to make sure I didn’t eat candy, cookies, or junk food. She probably put a GPS in my brain so she could track me.
Ms. Leakey was everywhere.
10
Junk Food Junkies
Ella Mentry School was getting healthy. Disgustingly healthy!
Every day, Mr. Granite told us we were more alert in class, we were standing up straighter, and we were full of energy.
There were no more soda machines in the school. No candy was allowed. Our lunch lady, Ms. LaGrange, was preparing healthy meals. Our moms and dads were packing lunches for us that were filled with fruits, nuts, vegetables, and other yucky stuff. Our custodian, Miss Lazar, put a sign in front of the school that said SUGAR–FREE ZONE. You weren’t even allowed to have your parents bring in cupcakes on your birthday anymore.
It was horrible!
“These tofu hot dogs are delicious!” said Little Miss Perfect while we were eating lunch in the vomitorium. “I feel so much healthier since Ms. Leakey arrived.”
“Me too,” said Emily, who always agrees with everything Andrea says.
“I wish I had a candy bar,” said Michael.
“I heard Ms. Leakey is trying to pass a law that will make it illegal to be caught with sugar packets,” said Ryan.
“I heard she hijacked a truck full of Doritos so it couldn’t come into town,” I said.
“Health teachers can’t do that,” said Neil the nude kid. “People should be allowed to make up their own minds about what to eat.”
“Yeah!”
“Y’know, maybe Ms. Leakey isn’t a health teacher at all,” I said. “Did you ever think of that?”
“What do you mean?” asked Ryan.
“Maybe Ms. Leakey murdered our real health teacher,” I told them.
“Arlo, stop trying to scare Emily,” said Andrea.
“I’m scared!” said Emily.
“Ms. Leakey is probably the evil twin of our real health teacher,” I said. “She killed her sister, and I bet she buried her in the farm she’s got in her office. Stuff like that happens all the time, you know.”
“We’ve got to do something!” shouted Emily. And then she went running out of the vomitorium.
Sheesh, get a grip! That girl will fall for anything.
“I need candy,” said Michael.
“I would pay a million dollars for a Kit Kat right now,” I said.
“I would sell my little brother for just one gummi bear,” said Neil.
We were all candy deprived and depressed. But that’s when I got the greatest idea in the history of the world.
“Hey!” I said. “I know where we can get some candy!”
“Where?” asked Ryan.
“Follow me.”
I scraped off my tray into the garbage can. Then I led the guys out the door into the playground. Even Andrea came along.
It was recess, and kids were all over the playground. I led the gang over to the corner where the Dumpster is kept.
“That’s where Ms. Leakey has been throwing our junk food,” I said, pointing at the Dumpster.
“Of course!” said Ryan. “There must be lots of candy in there!”
“You’re a genius, A.J.!” said Michael. “You should get the No Bell Prize.”
“I don’t know why we didn’t thin
k of this before!” said Neil the nude kid. “Dumpster diving is fun.”
“I’m not eating candy out of a Dumpster,” said Andrea. “It’s dirty.”
“Fine. Don’t,” I told her. “That will leave more for us. Let’s go, guys!”
We sneaked around to the back of the Dumpster really quietly, like secret agents. It was cool.
“Don’t do this, Arlo,” whispered Andrea.
“Shhhhhh!” I said. “If Ms. Leakey finds us back here, we’ll be in big trouble.”
The Dumpster had a heavy lid on it. I couldn’t lift it by myself.
Me and the guys put our hands on the edge of the lid.
We pushed open the lid.
And you’ll never believe in a million hundred years what we saw in there.
I’m not gonna tell you.
Okay, okay, I’ll tell you.
It was Ms. Leakey!
She was sitting on the bottom of the Dumpster, and she was surrounded by every kind of candy and junk food in the world! There were AirHeads, Mars bars, Reese’s Pieces, Atomic FireBalls, Goobers, Nerds, Dots, Milk Duds, Whoppers, Twizzlers, Skittles, Tootsie Rolls….
Well, you get the idea.
And you know what Ms. Leakey had in her mouth?
A Twinkie!
“Ms. Leakey!” I shouted. “What are you doing in here?”
Her mouth was full of sodium acid pyrophosphate and all those other chemicals, so she couldn’t answer right away.
“I’m…guarding the Dumpster,” Ms. Leakey finally said, “to make sure nobody eats this horrible junk food.”
“You’re eating a Twinkie!” I said.
“No, I’m not. I’m…conducting an experiment,” she said, “I want to see if any of the chemicals in a Twinkie can be used to solve the energy problem. Maybe someday we will have cars that run on Twinkies. This is research.”
“It is not!” shouted Andrea. “You’re stuffing your face with junk food! You’re a hypocrite!”
“A what?” I said. “She doesn’t look like a hippo to me.”
“Not a hippo, dumbhead,” Andrea said. “A hypocrite. That’s somebody who acts like they’re better than everyone, but they’re really worse.”
“It’s true! It’s true!” Ms. Leakey said, sobbing. “I admit it. I’m not a health nut. I need sugar! I need sweets! I need candy! I’m a junk food junkie!”
And then she scooped up a handful of candy, jumped out of the Dumpster, and ran away.
Ms. Leakey is freaky!
11
The New Health Teacher
Well, word got around pretty fast that Ms. Leakey was stuffing her face with junk food. Everybody was wondering if she would come to school the next day. And sure enough, she was nowhere to be found. We even looked in the Dumpster.
Me and the guys went to Mr. Klutz’s office to find out what happened.
“Where’s Ms. Leakey?” I asked.
“I fired her,” Mr. Klutz said. “You know how she was always running away to go exercise? Well, it turned out that she was just running to the Dumpster to eat junk food.”
“So you fired her just because she ate junk food?” Ryan asked.
“No,” Mr. Klutz said, “I fired her because she went overboard.”
“She fell out of a boat?” I asked.*
“No, no,” Mr. Klutz told me. “Ms. Leakey just went too far with all that health food stuff. I think it’s okay to have junk food once in a while, as a treat. You just have to be careful not to overdo it.”
“So I guess we don’t have a health teacher anymore,” Michael said.
“Sure we do,” said Mr. Klutz. “Let me introduce you to our new health teacher.”
He took a remote control out of his pocket and pushed a button. And you’ll never believe who walked into the door at that moment.
It was Mr. Slug! He actually walked right into the door!
“OUCH!” said Mr. Slug. “I…HIT…MY…HEAD…ON…THE…DOOR.”
“Mr. Slug is our new health teacher?” I asked. “He doesn’t know anything about health.”
“Sure he does,” Mr. Klutz said. “He’ll show you what you shouldn’t do if you want to be healthy.”
“I…FEEL…LOUSY…,” said Mr. Slug. “NEED…TO…LIE…DOWN.”
“Maybe you should go outside and get some exercise,” Ryan suggested. “Then you’ll feel better.”
“OUTSIDE?” said Mr. Slug. “ARE…YOU…CRAZY? YOU…COULD…GET…HIT…BY…A…BUS…OUT…THERE. EXERCISING…IS…DANGEROUS. LET’S…JUST…CHILL…IN…HERE…WHERE…IT…IS…SAFE.”
“Is it okay if we go eat some of the junk food in the Dumpster?” I asked.
“WHATEVER,” said Mr. Slug.
Well, that’s pretty much the way it happened. Maybe Ms. Leakey will stop hiding under my bed and stalking me in supermarkets. Maybe the police will find Ms. Leakey’s twin sister buried in the farm in her office. Maybe McLeakey’s restaurant will get some food people want to eat. Maybe my mom will start making square pizzas. Maybe I’ll go to Antarctica and eat Twinkies with the penguins. Maybe I’ll try asparagus again. Maybe Mr. Slug will quit smoking and stop walking into doors. Maybe the teachers will stop arm wrestling with each other. Maybe breakfast will stop thinking it’s so important. Maybe they’ll let us do sword fighting in fizz ed. Maybe our teachers will stop dressing up like food. Maybe people will stop talking about boats all the time. Maybe Mr. Klutz will show us his plastic bag full of hair. Maybe I’ll find the GPS that Ms. Leakey put in my brain.
But it won’t be easy!
About the Author and the Illustrator
Dan Gutman has written many weird books for kids. He lives in New Jersey (a very weird place) with his weird wife and two weird children. You can visit him on his weird website at www.dangutman.com.
Jim Paillot lives in Arizona (another weird place) with his weird wife and two weird children. Isn’t that weird? You can visit him on his weird website at www.jimpaillot.com.
Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins author.
Credits
Cover art © 2011 by Jim Paillot
Copyright
MY WEIRD SCHOOL DAZE #12: MS. LEAKEY IS FREAKY!. Text copyright © 2011 by Dan Gutman. Illustrations copyright © 2011 by Jim Paillot. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Gutman, Dan.
Ms. Leakey is freaky! / Dan Gutman; pictures by Jim Paillot. — 1st ed.
p. cm. — (My weird school daze; #12)
Summary: Ella Mentry School hires a health teacher who tries to force the students to eat healthy foods and exercise, whether they want to or not.
ISBN 978-0-06-170403-1 (lib. bdg.) — ISBN 978-0-06-170402-4 (pbk. bdg.)
[1. Schools—Fiction. 2. Health—Fiction. 3. Food habits—Fiction. 4. Exercise—Fiction. 5. Humorous stories.] I. Paillot, Jim, ill. II. Title.
PZ7.G9846Mwl 2011 2010022975
[Fic]—dc22 CIP
AC
FIRST EDITION
EPub Edition © January 2011 ISBN: 978-0-06-206973-3
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
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* What’s up with that? We never assemble anything. They should have assemblies with no assembly required.
* My friend Billy, who lives around the corner, told me that if you walk backward really fast, you can travel through time. I tried to do that once, but I smashed into a tree.
* What a dumb name. If you drove through a window, it would break. You’d probably get cut by the glass, too.
* Well, not a real lightbulb. That would have been weird.
* Why are people always talking about boats?
