by Luke Sharpe
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Home Again
I’M BILLY SURE—PIZZA lover, dog owner, and kid inventor. I do a lot of different things, including talking to my mom over video chat. Why do I talk to her over video chat? Because my mom has a super-confidential, TOP-SECRET secret—she’s a spy, and she’s always off doing spy things!
Yup, that’s right, my mom is a spy, complete with coded messages, hidden documents, secret missions . . . you know, all the cool spy stuff.
So sometimes, when she’s away on secret missions, the only way I can talk to her is over video chat. Like now.
“I miss you, Billy,” Mom says from my laptop screen. “I can’t believe it’s been two weeks!”
“Me too,” I say. “Wow. Two weeks already!”
Okay, so backstory. I didn’t always know my mom is a spy. In fact, I only just found out a few weeks ago. Mom used to claim she was a scientist doing research for the government. I thought this was true until my thirteenth birthday, when she surprised me by sharing her real profession. And then she surprised me even more by taking me to her agency’s Spy Academy, where I took spy classes and built inventions to save secret agents on dangerous missions.
This is all 100 percent real. Mom was so impressed with all the inventions my company, SURE THINGS, INC., has produced—inventions like the ALL BALL, which turns into any sports ball; the SIBLING SILENCER, which, uh, silences your siblings; and the STINK SPECTACULAR, which smells super gross but tastes super great. We’re also the company that created GROSS-TO-GOOD POWDER, which makes gross food taste delicious. (If you eat in my school cafeteria, you’re welcome!) Our latest invention is the NO-TROUBLE BUBBLE, an impenetrable bubble where nothing can get to you. (Not even those silenced siblings!)
But it’s been a while since Sure Things, Inc. has come out with a new product, what with my being away inventing at Spy Academy. That was a lot of fun, but I realized that I’m not cut out to be a full-fledged secret agent. I also missed my best friend and Sure Things, Inc.’s CFO, Manny Reyes. So I decided to come home, even if it meant going back to boring “normal” school and dealing with Emily, my boring “normal” older sister.
Like Mom said, it’s been two weeks since I got home from Spy Academy, and this video chat is the first time I get to catch up with her. Seeing her face is really nice. I can almost forget that she isn’t safe and sound at home, rather than possibly battling DANGEROUS NUNCHUK-WIELDING NINJAS in—well, who knows where the lair of dangerous nunchuk-wielding Ninjas is!
“It feels like I was just at Spy Academy,” I tell Mom, “although I’ve been pretty busy. That’s because I told everyone I was on vacation in Barbados, and I had to do a whole report on my trip to Barbados in social studies class. Thankfully, Manny helped me with that research.”
Mom laughs.
“Sorry about the extra assignment. Has the rest of school been all right?” she asks.
“It’s been okay. When I was away, the Fillmore Middle School Inventors Club elected a temporary president. Do you remember Clayton Harris?”
“Of course!” Mom says. “He was, um—”
“Not super cool, yeah,” I say. “The one whose favorite activity is going to the dentist. Well, he was elected club president, and I decided to let him keep that position. I still want to help the club, but I don’t have time to run the day-to-day details anymore. Besides, Clayton has done really well as the president. He’s found his place. He’s made new friends, he’s a good leader of the club, and he’s even become kind of popular—or at least less unpopular.”
Mom smiles widely. “That is WONDERFUL!” she says. “Who knows, maybe Clayton will be president of the country someday, all thanks to your club!”
I try to imagine Clayton running for president or nestled into Mount Rushmore or kissing babies, but all I can picture is the same kid who blew chocolate milk out of his nose at my birthday party.
“And how are things at Sure Things, Inc.? Is Emily still helping out?” Mom asks.
“Sure Things, Inc. is okay,” I say. “Manny and I are working on something really big—a hovercraft. And now we’re feeling the pressure to get this invention out as our Next Big Thing.” Just to fill you in, our hovercraft is going to be the coolest invention ever. It’ll really fly and it’ll change the face of transportation as we know it. There’s just one little problem. We haven’t quite figured out how to make it fly. Manny is waiting on some “QUALITY WINGED MATERIALS” to arrive from overseas. I’m not sure exactly what that means, but Manny says they’re the latest in hover technology.
“As for Emily, she and Manny got along okay while I was away, but she’s been in a pretty grumpy mood ever since I got home.”
“What now?” asks Mom. “I talked to her on her birthday a few days ago and she seemed perfectly happy.”
Right—Emily’s fifteenth birthday. She might have been all smiles on her video chat with Mom, but the day was anything but fun for me and Dad.
It started like this: Emily woke up and started whining for Dad to take her to get her learner permit. Honestly, I didn’t see why the permit was such a big deal. All it does is allow her to take a driver’s test next year when she’s sixteen—or to drive with an instructor now. It’s not like she can pick up her friends and drive to the mall by herself.
But anyway, Emily kept on complaining.
Dad tried to remind her that it was a weekend, so the drivers office was closed.
“It’s not fair,” she sniffed. “Mom took Billy on a trip for his birthday! No one’s offered me a trip. I want to go somewhere. And I can’t even get my stupid learner permit.”
“Actually, I was working the whole time I was at Spy Academy,” I tried to remind her, but Emily ignored me. Emily usually ignores things I say when they don’t support her argument. So she complained ALL DAY until the next morning when Dad took her to the drivers office first thing. Then Emily started pestering Dad about when he would take her out to learn to drive.
I tell Mom all of this and watch her expression change to a frown.
“I wish I could be there to teach her how to drive,” she says. “I always feel so guilty that work keeps me away from you kids.”
“It’s okay,” I tell her. “Dad will totally teach Emily how to drive, but he’s just a little busy right now. His artwork was accepted to an art gallery.”
My dad is an artist, and a pretty good one—if you consider close-ups of my dog Philo’s toenails “pretty good.” He has a studio in the backyard—a converted garden shed, actually, but he likes it. He can spend days at a time out there painting and be perfectly happy. I’ll never understand why a gallery is interested in his WACKY PORTRAITS, but I’m proud of him anyway.
I think Mom is thinking the same thing I am because she starts to laugh, which makes me laugh. In a few seconds we’re both roaring to the point of tears, imagining Dad at an art gallery showing fancy art-lovers some portraits of Philo’s butt!
“So what’s going on over at Spy Academy?” I ask when I stop laughing long enough to catch my breath. “How’s Agent Paul?”
Agent Paul is my mom’s partner on her spy missions. And oh yeah, he just happens to be an octopus.
“He’s doing SWIMMINGL
Y,” Mom replies, chuckling at her own silly joke, one I’m sure she’s made a hundred times before.
“But seriously,” she continues, “I’ve been keeping a very close eye on Drew. So far, at least, he seems to be behaving. He even helped us catch another online scam artist.”
I frown at the mention of Drew. At Spy Academy I became very close friends with him, but then Manny found out my new friend was actually the nephew of Sure Things, Inc.’s arch nemesis, Alistair Swiped, CEO of Swiped Stuff, Inc. That wouldn’t have been a problem, except Drew was trying to sabotage my inventions the whole time! Like uncle, like nephew, I guess. I let Mom know, but she thought it was best for Drew to stay at Spy Academy. Maybe some of his EVIL GENIUS can be tamed under careful supervision.
Now that I stop to think about it, it really is amazing how much has gone on in the couple of weeks since I got back. Just talking about all of it makes me tired . . . which reminds me that I’ve got a busy day of school and inventing ahead tomorrow.
“I think I’m going to go to sleep, Mom,” I say. “Lots to do tomorrow. We’ve really got to get this hovercraft out ASAP.”
“Okay, honey, get some sleep. I love you.”
“I love you too, Mom,” I say.
My monitor goes blank.
I’m always a little sad at the end of a video chat with Mom, but somehow, knowing the truth about her makes it all a bit easier. My mom is off saving people. And that’s pretty cool.
Attack of the Monstrous Ladybugs!
THE NEXT MORNING I slide into my chair at the breakfast table. Emily is already sitting at the table, sulking, her face buried in her phone. Dad stands at the griddle, flipping something round, red, and gooey. No way can those gooey things be pancakes.
“It’s a PANCAKE MORNING,” Dad announces, sliding a stack off the griddle and onto a big platter. I guess I was wrong. “Tomato pancakes to be exact.”
Emily groans but doesn’t say anything. My dad isn’t exactly a world-class chef, but he thinks he is. He’s always coming up with crazy meals and making us force them down. He’s actually more like a mad scientist of food, and his dishes are his monsters!
I do eat tomatoes in omelets sometimes, so maybe tomatoes in pancakes won’t be too bad. Still, I glance over at the Gross-to-Good Powder in the salt shaker on the table, glad that it’s always there.
“Pancakes, not waffles, huh?” I say to Dad. “I guess this means that Mom isn’t coming home anytime soon.”
One of the many things I learned during my time at Spy Academy was that some of Dad’s crazy food concoctions are actually SECRET CODED MESSAGES from my mom. Because she’s a spy, her e-mails are always in danger of being hacked, so she and Dad worked out a system. For example, waffles mean that Mom will be coming home soon, and different ingredients in the waffles stand for other information. Dad doesn’t have to make the dishes, but he usually does anyway. Tomato pancakes mean . . . well, I’m not exactly sure what tomato pancakes mean.
“Nope, your mother is off on assignment,” Dad says, confirming what I thought. “I picked pancakes to make, specifically tomato pancakes, because I thought they’d make an excellent subject for my next painting.”
“Of course Mom’s not coming home,” Emily chimes in, finally taking her eyes off of her phone. “Why should she come home? After all, if my fifteenth birthday wasn’t important enough to come home for, why should she come home now?”
I want to remind Emily that she and Mom video-chatted on her birthday, but I think better of it. We’re probably going to have to hear about how Mom didn’t come home for Emily’s fifteenth birthday all the way up until she turns sixteen. And worse, she’s just getting started.
“Not only didn’t I get a visit, but I’m not getting a BIRTHDAY BEACH TRIP,” Emily continues as Dad places a stack of tomato pancakes on the table.
I consider bringing up the point once again that I didn’t exactly get a birthday beach vacation either. And that my “vacation” was working, going to school, and foiling a dastardly plot by an evil genius. But if there’s anything I know about my older sister, it’s that talking to her when she’s GRUMPY leads to bad news. I shove a pancake into my mouth and pretend to concentrate really hard on chewing.
Glug! Uh-oh. I should not have crammed the entire pancake into my mouth. Now it’s too late to sprinkle Gross-to-Good Powder on it, and let’s just say: tomato pancakes? Not delicious.
“And to top it all off, you won’t teach me to drive!” Emily says now, glaring right at Dad.
Poor Dad, I think.
“I never said that I wouldn’t teach you,” Dad replies, dropping a few more blobs of pancake batter onto the griddle. I think one of them has a tomato stem in it. “I just said that now is not the right time.”
And then Emily goes silent. She realizes that having this conversation for the FIVE-HUNDREDTH time this week is getting her nowhere. She reaches over and grabs a pancake, dropping it onto her plate.
As Emily’s hand passes my face, I notice that she is wearing some weird black gloves. This is odd—I mean, who wears gloves to eat breakfast? This is likely Emily’s new “thing.” Emily always has a thing that she’s into for a few weeks, and then it mysteriously disappears. One time it was wearing glasses with no lenses in them. Another time it was speaking only in a British accent.
Speaking of speaking, we eat the rest of breakfast in silence. I’m thinking about when the winged parts will come in for the hovercraft. Dad is probably thinking about his art gallery. And Emily? Who knows what goes on in her brain.
When I’m done eating, I head out for school.
• • •
“Hey, Sure, I still don’t see any TAN on you,” Peter MacHale says to me as I rush to class. “Who goes to the beach and doesn’t come home with a tan?”
Okay, first of all, that’s about the tenth time Peter MacHale has said that to me since I’ve been back. (Peter is one of those kids who is really chatty in the hallways, but is pretty quiet in class.) Secondly, it’s been two weeks since I returned from “the beach,” and any tan I might have had would be long gone anyway.
“That because of my newest invention—PERMANENT SUNSCREEN,” I reply, forcing a smile. “See ya.”
I mean, Permanent Sunscreen isn’t a terrible idea. It’s just not the Next Big Thing.
After school I pick up Philo and head over to the World Headquarters of Sure Things, Inc., which is very conveniently located in Manny’s garage.
Even though I’ve been back at work for a few weeks, I still get a thrill at the sight of my own workspace. Everything about the Sure Things, Inc. office is perfect. Especially our pizza machine, which makes pizza with any toppings you want! I help myself to a slice with pepperoni and peanut butter, which actually tastes really good.
But of course, working at the office isn’t just eating pizza with your best friend. It’s also about business. Which means working on the hovercraft.
Right now, the hovercraft is just a hulking work-in-progress mess in the middle of the room. I can’t really do much until we get the parts in.
I look over at Manny. He’s staring at his laptop screen, rubbing his forehead.
“Hey, Manny, how’s it going?” I ask. Manny’s been in such a good mood since my return, I hate to push him on stuff.
Still, Manny would be the first one to say “business is business,” and the business of the moment is getting this hovercraft to fly.
“Hmmm,” Manny mumbles in reply—a typical signal that he is deep in thought.
He turns to me. “I’m stuck. Here’s what I’ve come up with: THE HAPPY HOVERCRAFT? Or THE HOVER PAL? Or maybe THE FLYING FRIEND? Weak, right?”
That’s my partner, obsessing over choosing the right name for an invention that I haven’t even invented yet. Although it can a bit frustrating at times, Manny’s laser focus on the marketing end of things is reason #612 why I’m glad he’s my business partner.
“They’re all terrible, right?” Manny asks. “You can tell me.”
I agree that they are terrible names, but I would never just come right out and say that to him.
“Manny, let’s just focus on the hovercraft itself for now,” I suggest.
“Hmm . . . maybe you’re right, Billy,” he says. “I’ve just never been this stumped before on a name.”
I decide that this is not the best time to bring up the fact that Manny’s original suggestion for the name of the All Ball was the “Ball Ball Ball Ball Ball.” Yup, five balls—like the five balls each model of the All Ball turns into. Somehow I don’t think that product would have been as successful.
Right then there’s a knock at the door. Manny heads off to get it and comes back with a package.
“Look what just came in!” Manny hollers, holding up a box. “It’s the parts we ordered!”
Yes! Finally! The hovercraft prototype looks a little sad without any parts to help fly it. I could probably use some materials we already have, but Manny was adamant on ordering these quality winged materials. Maybe we can finally get somewhere!
Zip! We open the box together. Manny removes the packaging tape neatly. And, oh no . . .
The parts we ordered aren’t in this box.
Instead, there are hundreds of ladybugs in the box!
“What are we going to do with all of these—” but before Manny can finish, the ladybugs zoom out and fly all around the office!
“Quick! Get the doors!” I shout, and soon we’re opening all the windows.
“Shoo! Shoo!” Manny yells at a cluster of the ladybugs. Some of them zoom out the window . . .
And some of them land on Philo’s nose.
Which is how I learn that Philo really, really doesn’t like ladybugs.
“A-rooo! A-woof! A-woooooof!” Philo howls. He stomps around, trying to scare the ladybugs away, and rams buttfirst into my prototype!
“Philo!” I call out, but it’s too late. The prototype crashes into many pieces . . . and now it’s got a sizeable print of a dog butt.
