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Bully Bait

Page 3

by Michael Fry

argued.

  “You made me come down here for that?

  You’re pathetic! I’m leaving you in there!” she

  yelled as she started to shut the locker door on me.

  “Please!” I begged. “I can’t get detention! Just

  get me out of here, and I swear I’ll come up with

  a better plan.”

  Molly just stared at me. Then she rolled her

  eyes, turned around, and said, “Hop on.”

  Hop on? I wasn’t going to let a girl give me

  a piggyback ride. “No way,” I said. I mean, how

  much humiliation can I take?

  “Fine. Be late for class.”

  I guess I can take a lot of humiliation. Which

  is a good thing, because once I was on her back I

  suddenly saw the world in a whole new way.

  I could see EVERYTHING! I could see the

  entire school. I could see every teacher, every

  student, and every clique. I could see the OMGs.

  And the Emogoths.

  And the Unsociables.

  And . . . trouble. We saw Roy and his pals,

  The Future Inmates of America.

  Roy and the FIA had Emily Dickinson Middle

  School’s only single-member clique in their

  sights. That’s when we stopped and hid.

  We were just about to make a tiptoe escape,

  when

  I got a call from . . . KARL?

  He asked, “Wanna hang out?”

  “NOW?” I whispered a bit too loudly.

  Roy and the FIA spotted us. Molly and I took

  off down the hall. We rounded a corner into a

  crowd of students. I got down on my hands and

  knees and yanked Molly down with me. We

  crawled into an empty classroom and hid behind

  a projector. We waited. Nothing happened for a

  minute or so. We thought we were safe. But we

  weren’t.

  That’s when things went from bad to worse . . .

  to weird.

  We were saved by the fire alarm. Normally,

  we’re all in class for fire drills, and everyone

  lines up single file to follow a teacher outside.

  But no one was in class yet. So no one knew

  where to go.

  Except for Safety Patrolman Karl.

  Karl did what he was trained to do: he

  pointed to the exits. This was his first mistake.

  His second mistake was thinking his Safety

  Patrol belt was a real belt. Because somehow,

  by the time we all got outside, Karl had gotten

  separated from his pants.

  Karl’s third mistake was wearing NanoNerd

  underwear.

  And his fourth and final mistake was letting

  Roy find his pants before he did.

  Everyone laughed and pointed as Roy made

  Karl jump for his pants.

  That’s when something inside me snapped.

  I thought someone should do something. Then,

  just as I decided that that someone should be me,

  Molly decided it should be her.

  Molly and I both rushed up to Roy at the same

  time. When I got there, I was so pumped, I said

  something really dumb:

  Molly whispered to me, “Or else what?”

  “I haven’t thought that far ahead,” I

  whispered back.

  Karl said, “I don’t think this is helping.”

  That’s when Roy let go of Karl’s pants and

  went after me.

  Roy grabbed my leg

  and lifted me upside

  down. “This doesn’t look

  very safe to me, Safety

  Patrol Boy!” he laughed.

  As I was hanging

  there, I heard someone

  yell something from

  behind us. It didn’t sound like a kid. But it didn’t

  sound like an adult either. I turned around to see

  who it was, but there was no one there.

  A kid yelled, “What?”

  The same strange voice yelled again. I

  couldn’t make it out. A different kid asked,

  “Bring what? Bring the crazy?”

  And I thought, Right. Like that’s going to

  work.

  But when Roy threatened to bust me like

  a piñata, I decided

  crazy was worth a

  try.

  So I started

  barking like a seal

  and flapping my

  arms like a chicken.

  Roy’s eyes got real wide. He started to look

  confused. And maybe a little . . . scared?

  And then he released me.

  It was working. I decided to push it up a

  notch. I . . .

  Roy was backing off, but not fast enough. I

  was just about to run out of crazy when Molly

  joined in.

  It took Karl a little longer to catch on. But

  once he got going, he brought his own “special”

  kind of crazy.

  After Karl busted his ballet move, Roy just

  stood there. He looked to the crowd of kids for

  help. But everyone just stared back in silence.

  Roy was alone. And maybe, for the first time, a

  little afraid.

  Then . . . he just took off.

  That’s when the weirdest part of all

  happened. The crowd started to cheer. And for

  the very first time, they cheered with us, and not

  against us.

  Molly, Karl, and I all looked at each other.

  Mr. Dupree was right: bringing the crazy

  really worked. We felt good. Really, really good.

  It lasted about twelve seconds.

  Still, it was twelve seconds I wouldn’t give

  back.

  As we all started filing back into the school,

  I spotted Mr. Dupree and yelled, “Thanks for

  reminding me to bring the crazy.”

  Mr. Dupree shook his head. “I just walked out

  here.”

  “If it wasn’t you, then who was it?” I said.

  Mr. Dupree eyes got really wide. “Emmmily . . .”

  He trembled.

  Karl gasped. “She exists!”

  Mr. Dupree nodded. “And she’s been busy,

  because I think she set the fire alarm off, too.”

  I rolled my eyes as Molly said, “He’s just

  messing with you, Karl. There’s no such thing as

  Emily.”

  “That voice was probably just someone who

  heard Mr. Dupree bring the crazy in the hallway

  yesterday,” I said. “And the office just got the

  time wrong on a fire drill.”

  “Wait? What happened yesterday?” asked

  Molly.

  “It doesn’t matter,” I said. “The important

  thing is that after today, I won’t ever get stuffed

  in a locker again.”

  Mr. Dupree smiled. “Expectation is the root of

  all heartache.”

  Molly and Karl looked confused. I shook my

  head. “Don’t ask.”

  Mr. Dupree said, “Tomorrow morning. Seven

  thirty. In the basement.”

  “Why? What’s happening then?” I asked.

  Chapter 9

  The next morning, Molly, Karl, and I stood in

  the school basement.

  Alone.

  Mr. Dupree was nowhere to be found in the

  mess of janitorial supplies and school junk from

  dinosaur days when they watched movies by

  hand.

  We were just about to leave when we heard a

  voice say, “Welcome to Safety Patrol.


  We looked up and found Mr.

  Dupree sitting on a bucket—like

  he’d been there the whole time.

  He was wearing a weird-looking

  hat. He looked serious. Which

  was hard to do in that hat.

  Karl raised his hand. “Can I

  be captain?”

  “Let’s figure what you want to accomplish

  first,” said Mr. Dupree. “What’s your goal?”

  We looked at one another, then did what we

  always do when we don’t know what’ll happen if

  we give the wrong answer: we shrugged.

  Mr. Dupree shook his

  head. “First rule of Safety

  Patrol: no shrugging!”

  That seemed extreme.

  “Tell me, why are you

  here?” he said.

  Karl raised his hand

  again. “I thought there’d be doughnuts.”

  “We want to make the school safe from

  bullies!” interrupted Molly.

  I looked at Molly and said, “We do?”

  “Yesterday, everyone was on our side. It was

  the first time I felt like I fit in,” said Molly. “Like

  I was popular. Bullies don’t pick on popular

  kids.”

  I said, “So?”

  “If everyone fits in, no one will get bullied! We

  need to help everyone fit in!”

  “Even Karl?” I asked.

  Molly nodded.

  “Even Karl.”

  As we talked, Mr.

  Dupree smiled that

  grown-up smile that

  should come with its

  own thought balloon.

  Mr. Dupree said,

  “You won a point. You

  didn’t win the match.

  And you don’t win

  the match by making

  friends. You win by

  taking from the other

  side the thing they’re

  trying to take from you.”

  “Their pants.” Karl nodded.

  Mr. Dupree shook his head. “Have you ever

  heard the story about the man in India who went

  to live in the jungle with the tigers?”

  We all shook our heads no.

  “The man thought

  all creatures could live

  together in harmony. He

  believed that he could live

  with tigers. He thought

  they would accept him as

  one of their own. He lived and played among

  them for weeks.”

  Karl smiled. “Nice tigers.”

  “One day, the man brought one of the tigers

  a banana to eat. The tiger looked at the banana

  and then at the man. You know what happened

  next?”

  Karl raised his hand. “The tiger gave him a

  hug?”

  “The tiger ate him.”

  Karl looked at his shoes. “I don’t like this

  story.”

  Mr. Dupree leaned forward and whispered,

  “Tigers don’t fit in. They don’t have to. Be the

  tiger, not the stupid man.”

  Molly and Karl were a little freaked out, but I

  had heard Mr. Dupree’s stories before.

  “That sounds like another one of your ‘lies

  that tell the truth,’” I said.

  Molly said, “Wait. How can a lie tell the

  truth?”

  “Exactly.” I nodded. I turned to Mr. Dupree

  and said, “How can a lie tell the truth?”

  He smiled. “Patience. Though she be a tired

  mare, yet she will plod.”

  I had no idea what that meant. I turned to

  Molly, but she just shrugged. And Karl was . . .

  well . . . you know . . .

  By the time Molly and I pried Karl out of that

  desk, Mr. Dupree was gone. In his place on the

  mop bucket were two brand-new Safety Patrol

  badges.

  Molly said, “We don’t need badges.”

  Karl was disappointed. “We don’t?”

  Molly shook her head. “Mr. Dupree is wrong:

  we definitely need to fit in. Those badges will just

  make us stick out. We can’t help other kids fit in

  if we don’t fit in.”

  “How are we going to help other kids fit in?” I

  asked.

  “We get the popular kids to accept them or

  else—”

  “We bring more crazy.” I nodded.

  “But what about the tigers?” asked Karl.

  Molly turned to Karl. “There aren’t any tigers,

  Karl!”

  “You’re sure?” asked Karl as he chewed on his

  fingernails. “I really don’t want to get eaten.”

  “No one’s going to eat you, Karl,” I said.

  I shook my head and thought, Welcome to

  Safety Patrol.

  Chapter 10

  Tigers are not our friends.

  Mr. Dupree was right. Molly was wrong. And

  what I got for trying to upset the natural order

  was another case of zombie butt.

  What went wrong? What didn’t go wrong?

  Our plan was for each of us to help one

  unpopular kid fit in.

  Karl picked Warren Pickles. Warren is the

  only kid in school who doesn’t move away when

  Karl sits down for lunch.

  Warren has

  a problem with

  personal space: he

  doesn’t believe in it.

  Karl’s mission

  was to get Warren

  accepted by the Unsociables. Which sounds like

  it would be easy. Strange attracts stranger.

  Right? Wrong.

  It turns out that even the socially lame have

  boundaries. Warren bulldozed right past those

  and made himself at home.

  The result? The Unsociables

  hung Karl and Warren up by

  their shorts. It took a block

  and pulley and twenty minutes

  taking turns, but they did it.

  While Karl waited for rescue, Molly tried

  to get the OMGs to embrace Emily Dickinson

  Middle School’s resident wallflower, Alice

  Frektner. Molly figured the OMGs would leap at

  such a tempting makeover challenge. But they

  didn’t leap. They just sort of stood there and

  stared.

  The problem was that Alice is what Memaw

  would call “plain.” As in, plain hard to see. She’s

  just sort of not there. Which made her kind of

  difficult to introduce.

  The OMGs thought Molly was crazy. And not

  “bring the crazy” crazy. More like “get back, we

  don’t want to catch your crazy” kind of crazy.

  My mission was the hardest. And the most

  dangerous. I decided I was going to go epic or go

  home.

  I decided to recruit Roy to the human race.

  What I imagined would happen is I’d walk up

  to Roy and be all . . .

  What actually happened was I walked up to

  him and said, “Dude!”

  Roy immediately turned to me, and for just a

  second, he looked just

  a little scared.

  And then he didn’t.

  I said, “We’re cool, right?”

  As soon as I said right, I knew nothing

  was right. Roy’s black-hole eyes narrowed. He

  growled. Then snarled. And I think he snorted

  once or twice.

  I panicked.

  I brought the crazy.

  Nothing happened. Roy just s
at there. Mr.

  Dupree never mentioned there was an expiration

  date on bringing the crazy.

  The entire cafetorium was watching. I quickly

  looked around, searching for help—but there

  wasn’t any.

  When I turned back, I came face to face with

  Roy’s gut. I leaned back and slowly looked up. . . .

  You don’t want Jell-O-Meat dumped on you.

  Jell-O-Meat stains. Jell-O-Meat stains skin. Like

  a tattoo. Only light-years less

  cool.

  I screamed. I ducked. I dove.

  I ran.

  And hid.

  Like I said, Roy can’t stuff

  me in my locker if I’m already

  in it. It’s not so bad.

  Except for the zombie butt.

  Chapter 11

  A fter school, Molly, Karl, and I met near the

  buses. Molly and I agreed we were done with

  Safety Patrol. Karl wasn’t so sure. On the one

  hand, fire exits don’t point out themselves; but

  on the other hand, due to constant wedgies, he

  was running out of underwear.

  We were right back where we started. Only

  worse. It was like we had never stood up to Roy,

  and the other kids had never cheered, and we

  were never popular for a whole twelve seconds.

 

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