by Geoff Rodkey
And when you said, “A table for two, please?” the woman made a funny sound in her nose.
CLAUDIA
They were complete snobs. And right after they told us there weren’t any tables, this gigantic bouncer suddenly appeared.
JENS
I think the bouncer was there the whole time. Only before he moved, I thought he was furniture. Like a bookcase.
CLAUDIA
I have actually never seen a human being that large. I have no idea how they found a turtleneck in his size.
Two seconds later, we were back on the street. But we figured we didn’t actually have to get inside—all we had to do was wait for Deondra to finish eating brunch, then beg her for a photo with the Calvin when she left.
So we sat down on the steps of a brownstone two doors down and started to wait.
That’s when I checked ClickChat and realized things were about to get crazy.
CLICKCHAT POSTS ON “CULVERT PREP SCAVENGER HUNT” WALL
daniR Ed. Note: Daniella R. (The Fierceness) But if its 4 inches cant we get at least 2 pts???
CzarOfTheHunt Ed. Note: Akash No partial credit. A three-inch or smaller Empire State Building is 4 points. Anything else is zero points.
HartAttack01 Ed. Note: Colin (Gingivitis) DEONDRA SIGHTING AT ZOZO
daniR WHAT?????!!!!!
daniR What is ZOZO?
tasha_sez Ed. Note: Natasha (Wut Ups) Do u mean Zoso? The restaurant?
HartAttack01 Y
CzarOfTheHunt Deondra item is a JOKE! Get on with your lives, people.
HartAttack01 Yah but its on the list. So if we get pic its 500 pts. Rt?
HartAttack01 Right? 500 pts for Deondra kissing Clavin
HartAttack01 Right, Akash???
HartAttack01 RIGHT??????
CzarOfTheHunt Hang on checking w Mrs Bevan
CzarOfTheHunt Technically that is correct
tasha_sez OMG I m going to Zoso now. Grove Street in W Village
HartAttack01 Dont bother JKopp is almost there and he will get 500 pts before u
tasha_sez Who cares whose first? We can ALL get 500 pts
AidanTheGrif Ed. Note: Aidan (Killaz) heading there stat
numbah_tehn Ed. Note: Tucker (Wolves) HOLLA DAT
BritSeavs Ed. Note: Brittany (The Fierceness) THIS IS AMAZING!!!!
CLAUDIA
The first thing I saw when I looked up from my phone was Josh Koppelman from Gingivitis, running full speed down Grove Street toward us.
When he stopped and asked where Zoso was, Jens and I played dumb. But he figured it out and barged right in.
Five seconds later, he barged right back out again. When he did, he looked pretty freaked out. Probably because of the bouncer.
JENS
Then the big eighth grade boy, Josh, stands between us and restaurant. So if Deondra comes, he is first.
CLAUDIA
This seemed like a problem.
But pretty soon, we had MUCH bigger problems. Because a minute later, Ella Daniels from The Fierceness came running up the street.
Natasha Minello from The Wut Ups was right behind her.
Then Luke Schwartz from Team Awesome showed up.
Followed by Dimitri and Toby from The Knights Who Say Ni.
Then a whole flood of kids from Killaz… Cutsies!… JBTW… Lords Of The UES… Fire Team Four… The Dark Knights… Wolves… and pretty much every other team in the scavenger hunt.
Plus a bunch of tourists and random people who saw the crowd and figured something must be happening, so they should stand around and watch it happen.
Within ten minutes, there were so many people crowding around the entrance of Zoso that cars were having trouble driving up the street.
Then Athena Cohen and her mom showed up, and the trouble really started.
CHAPTER 21
NIGHTMARE ON GROVE STREET
CLAUDIA
I knew it was Athena and her mom as soon as I saw their stupid chauffeur-driven Town Car turn the corner at the end of the block.
It stopped right in front of Zoso, and there was such a huge crowd that when their driver opened the door for Athena and her mom, it looked like they were making a grand entrance at a movie premiere.
The enormous bouncer guy was outside by now, guarding the front door. And the skinny hosts were sort of cowering behind him. I think because the size of the crowd was freaking them out.
Athena and her mom headed straight for the door, and for a second I got all excited, because I figured they were going to get turned away like the rest of us, and it would be totally humiliating.
So what happened next was a huge and terrible shock.
JENS
I think maybe Athena’s mom eats at Zoso a lot. Because host guy made a big smile and said, “SO GREAT TO SEE YOU AGAIN!”
Then the giant man opens the door so they can go inside.
When he did that, the whole crowd made the noise—how do you say it? “Gapped”? Ed. Note: Jens’s English = not perfect (but adorable)
CLAUDIA
“Gasped.” Everybody gasped.
JENS
Yes. And then Athena made a wave. And everybody was angry.
CLAUDIA
Right before she disappeared inside, Athena turned and waved to all of us.
It was basically Athena’s way of saying, “HA-HA-HA, MY PARENTS ARE SO RICH AND HOOKED UP THAT WE CAN GET A TABLE AT ZOSO WHILE THE REST OF YOU WAIT OUTSIDE LIKE PEASANTS.”
It was the most evil, smug wave I have ever seen in my life.
Everybody else thought so, too.
JOSH KOPPELMAN, Gingivitis team member
I was RIPPED when she did that. What’s that girl’s name? Athena? Total brat.
NATASHA MINELLO, The Wut Ups team member
I pretty much wanted to strangle her.
LUKE SCHWARTZ, Team Awesome
If I had to describe my feelings at that moment in, like, two words? They would be “blind rage.”
CLAUDIA
But as mad as everybody was, it’s VERY important to understand this: no matter what the stupid New York Star said, we did NOT actually start a riot.
The absolutely closest we ever came was maybe halfway to a riot. That was right after Athena did her little wave, and this angry rumble went through the crowd. And people kinda/sorta surged toward the door.
But then the bouncer put his hands up and went, “YO! BACK THE CUSS UP!” Ed. Note: NOTE: not the actual word he used
And when he said that, we all backed the cuss up. Because he was very large, and we respected his authority.
All things considered, the whole crowd was actually very well behaved.
So there was no reason for the police to even show up. Let alone six of them.
AKASH
You are seriously lucky Mrs. Bevan didn’t find out about the cops showing up until that reporter called her, like, four hours later.
CLAUDIA
Do NOT even get me started about that reporter. Almost everything in his article was a huge lie. I am not even going to reprint the whole thing, because it was so ridiculous. But for the record, here’s the top part:
Not. True. At. All. Except for what Toby said about people at Culvert being super-competitive.
AKASH
Are you SURE none of it was true? Like, nobody set fire to a garbage can?
CLAUDIA
No! I think one of the paparazzi threw away a match, and it set fire to a napkin or something. But that was it.
AKASH
Nobody pulled a guy out of his car?
CLAUDIA
No! That guy got out voluntarily to yell at everybody for blocking the street.
And he was kind of a jerk about it, so a couple of the eighth grade boys got a little lippy with him.
But then he just called them punks and drove off.
AKASH
And they weren’t chanting “We want assassination!”?
CLAUDIA
Of course not! It w
as “We want A RESERVATION!”
AKASH
How about “Kill someone!”? I heard people were going, “What do we want? To kill someone!”
CLAUDIA
That is ridiculous. They were going, “What do we want? A KALE SALAD! When do we want it? Now!”
Because supposedly the kale salad is Zoso’s signature dish. And I guess the Gingivitis guys thought they were being hilarious by chanting that.
AKASH
So if it was never an actual riot, why did the cops show up?
CLAUDIA
I seriously do not know. Except I think the skinny guy in the turtleneck must have called them.
And anyway, by the time the cops got there, it was basically over. Because the skinny guy had come out and yelled, “DEONDRA HAS LEFT THE BUILDING! SHE WENT OUT THE BACK DOOR.”
At first, nobody believed him. But then we realized the paparazzi were all gone, so he must’ve been telling the truth.
Plus, by then Athena had posted her totally obnoxious message on the ClickChat wall. Which was basically the final nail in the coffin.
CLICKCHAT POSTS ON “CULVERT PREP SCAVENGER HUNT” WALL
goddessgurrl Ed. Note: Athena (evil) Just got THE CUTEST PIC of Deondra with Calvin the Cat. Will post right after I cash it in for 500 pts!
goddessgurrl She is just the best. SO nice! Sorry you all missed her. She went out back door to avoid the crowd.
goddessgurrl BTW kale salad is to die for. Don’t think I can finish mine, tho. Who wants my doggy bag?
CLAUDIA
Jens and I were walking away when Parvati, Carmen, and my mom showed up.
CARMEN
I have never seen you that sad in your entire life. It was even worse than that time you sprained your ankle in gym class. Ed. Note: volleyball = more dangerous than it looks
CLAUDIA
It actually hurt worse than when I sprained my ankle.
It was a different kind of hurt. But it was definitely worse.
PARVATI
I still can’t believe I missed it. Like, I know nobody except Athena actually SAW Deondra. But it still would’ve been an honor just to be on the same block as my idol.
CLAUDIA
By this point, it was almost 3:00. And since we knew evil had triumphed, there didn’t seem to be any point in killing ourselves to get a few more items before the hunt ended at 4:00.
So we ate an incredibly depressing lunch at a 99-cent pizza place (4 points. Yay.), Ed. Note: sarcastic “Yay” then took the subway back uptown.
BTW, you get what you pay for with 99-cent pizza. The reason it’s so cheap is because it has about 10 cents’ worth of cheese and 5 cents’ worth of tomato sauce. Which is not actually enough to cover the whole slice. So it’s really like eating pizza-flavored crust.
JENS
Please say thank you again to your mother for buying the lunch.
CLAUDIA
It was only $3.96 for all four of us. Ed. Note: (no bevs) But okay.
CHAPTER 22
BEAST SQUAD: THE FINAL HUMILIATION
CLAUDIA
At this point, things looked grim for anybody who wasn’t a Fembot.
But they were especially grim for Beast Squad.
Three-fourths of Reese’s team (James Mantolini was still missing in action) were holed up in Xander’s Park Avenue apartment, working on his “secret plan”—which was to Photoshop their Calvin onto pictures they’d downloaded from the Internet.
This would’ve been a real long shot EVEN IF they were experts at using Photoshop.
But they were definitely not experts.
And their Calvin was just beyond disgusting.
REESE
We tried to wash the Calvin off in the kitchen sink, but we couldn’t really get the stains out. He didn’t smell as bad after we washed him, though, so it wasn’t a total fail.
Then we were going to sew his legs back on and staple his head shut. But none of us could sew, and we couldn’t get the stapler to work. So we used Scotch tape. Which didn’t really stick. So we just kind of stacked his parts together and took a pic.
Then we started Photoshopping the pic. But first, Xander and Wyatt got in a big fight over who was going to use the mouse.
WYATT
No offense to Xander? But he did NOT know what he was doing. I mean, it’s not like I’m some kind of Photoshop expert. But at least I’ve used it before. I don’t think Xander had ever even opened it.
XANDER
Peep this, yo: MY idea. MY Photoshop. MY hand on the mouse.
Also, MY Cheetos.
WYATT
Once he started licking the Cheeto dust off his fingers and, like, getting wet clumps of Cheeto gunk all over the mouse? I was like, “Never mind. ’Cause there’s no way I’m touching that now.”
REESE
We started with a Deondra photo, because, duh, 500 points.
But it turned out to be super hard. It took us forever just to find a picture of Deondra kissing somebody. And swapping in the Calvin was even harder.
CLAUDIA
That might be the saddest thing I have ever seen in my life.
Except for all your other fake photos.
REESE
They weren’t THAT bad.
WYATT
They were terrible. After I saw how bad the Deondra pic came out, I basically gave up and just played Xbox while Xander and Reese worked on the other ones.
REESE
I thought the Flubby one was good.
CLAUDIA
Except you made the Calvin look ten feet tall. When he’s really nine inches.
WYATT
Seriously. He was, like, Godzilla Calvin rampaging through Times Square.
REESE
No way! He didn’t look THAT big. I mean, if anything was Godzilla Calvin, it was the one on the Cyclone.
WYATT
That one was crazy. It was like the Calvin was about to swallow the roller coaster.
REESE
The Yankee Stadium one was okay.
CLAUDIA
That depends on what your definition of “okay” is.
WYATT
It looked like a Calvin superhero flying over the stadium. If the superhero had, like, just gotten sucked through a jet engine.
REESE
We basically ran out of time on that one. Because Dad called and was like, “It’s almost four o’clock—meet me back at Culvert Prep!”
I went, “Did you find James?”
And there was this big sigh from Dad. And he was like, “No… Is there something wrong with that kid?”
And I was like, “Totally. Didn’t I tell you that?”
And Dad was like, “No, you didn’t.”
So I said I was sorry for not giving him a heads up about James before he went all the way to Brooklyn.
And he was like, “Brooklyn was only half of it. I’m coming back from Queens.”
JAMES AND DAD (email exchanges)
From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Date: 10/25/14 1:23:16 PM EDT
Subject: RE: I AM COMING TO GET YOU
On October 25, 2014 at 1:14 PM, Eric Tapper
James, this is Reese’s father. Are you still at the corner of Flatbush and Atlantic? If so, stay there—I will come get you. Either way, text me at ASAP and let me know where you are.
Ok just please hurry some guys from a cult want me to go with them in their van
FROM: [email protected]
TO: [email protected]
DATE: 10/25/14 1:42:11 PM EDT
SUBJECT: RE: WHERE ARE YOU?
On October 25, 2014 at 1:37 PM, Eric Tapper
I’m at Flatbush and Atlantic. Are you here? Please call/text me at ASAP
Yeah sorry guys from cult offered me candy so I went with them. Driving to Queens in their van to play Lazer Tag.
; FROM: [email protected]
TO: [email protected]
DATE: 10/25/14 1:52:54 PM EDT
SUBJECT: RE: PLEASE BE AT CULVERT PREP BY 4:00PM
On October 25, 2014 at 1:47 PM, Eric Tapper
