Students in the hall groaned in pain for Gavin and me.
‘C’mon,’ Gavin said, sitting back on his knees. ‘Jake’s gainin’ on us!’
‘But,’ I said, clutching at my stomach. ‘My organs! All of my organs!’
Jake turned the corner with ease, steering his cart like it was nothing. As he ran by, he laughed.
Pulling the cart away from the wall, I shoved it forward again, doing my best to gain speed with long strides.
‘Okay,’ Gavin said. ‘I see Brayden and the bucket of baked beans just up ahead. Start slowin’ down now!’
This time I took Gavin’s advice. I slowed myself down to a jog and then to a speed walk until we finally came to a complete stop.
Brayden helped Gavin out of the cart. ‘Okay, get the apple! Sophia’s over by her bucket still trying to grab it! You guys can pull ahead right now!’
Gavin looked at me. ‘Go ahead, you got this!’
I stared at the bucket of cold baked beans, horrified. A thick bubble formed at the centre of the slop, and then popped, splashing some of the cold baked bean juice on my clothes. ‘Sick, man! That thing just burped! I’m not putting my face in that! You do it!’
‘Absolutely not,’ Gavin said, upset. ‘Ain’t no way I’m snatchin’ an apple from there.’
‘One of you has to do it!’ Brayden said frantically. ‘If you don’t, then we’ll lose the race for sure!’
Gavin tightened his lips and looked me in the eye. Holding his fist in the air, he spoke. ‘Best outta three?’
Kids cheered in the hallway. Sophia was standing by the side of her slop bucket, her hair and face dripping with baked beans as she held an apple between her teeth. The only clean parts of her face were the whites of her eyes as she blinked. She looked like a monster.
‘Fine!’ I said, punching my open palm with my other fist.
‘Rock, paper, scissors!’ Gavin and I said at the same time.
Gavin threw rock while I threw scissors.
‘No!’ I shouted.
I heard Jake laugh loudly from behind me. His teammate had grabbed the apple from the bucket of beans.
Again, Gavin and I slammed our fists into our palms. ‘Rock, paper, scissors!’
Gavin threw rock again. I threw paper.
‘Ha!’ I shouted, slapping Gavin’s rock with my open hand.
For a third time, Gavin and I chanted together, ‘Rock, paper, scissors!’
‘Booya!’ I said, cutting Gavin’s flat hand with my finger-scissors.
Gavin grunted but didn’t waste any time. He clutched the sides of the bucket and splashed his face into the baked beans, making a nasty splorch sound.
I looked back down the hall we had come from, trying to see where Wyatt was, but he was so far behind that he hadn’t even turned the corner yet.
Gavin pulled his face from the beans, took a deep breath, and plunged back into the glorious mess of syrupy goodness. I’m not gonna lie – it was pretty funny to watch.
Finally, Gavin stood up straight, holding an apple in his mouth. Round beans fell back into the bucket as he wiped them from his eyes.
‘Go!’ Brayden shouted. ‘You can wipe them off when you’re done!’
I jumped into the trolley since it was Gavin’s turn to push.
Shaking his head like a dog, Gavin managed to get enough of the baked beans off his face to see clearly. Then he grabbed the handlebars and pushed forward so hard that I fell against the back of the cart.
The ceiling tiles flew by as I watched them from the bottom of the cart.
It was actually kind of nice.
After the second turn, I saw Faith standing at the end of the hallway next to a desk that had three balloons floating above it.
‘There!’ I said.
Gavin turned the cart sideways and slid it to a stop like a car in an action movie. It was almost like he had done it before.
After fumbling out of the cart, I ran to the desk. Each balloon had shaving cream smeared on it. ‘Okay,’ I said to Faith. ‘What do I do?’
Faith handed me a plastic scraper. ‘Use this as a razor and shave the balloon without popping it. You get three shots.’
‘What happens if I pop all three?’ I asked, taking the scraper from Faith.
‘Then our team gets a ten second penalty in the race,’ Faith explained. ‘So ten seconds is added to our finishing time.’
‘Got it,’ I said, lowering my body into more of a horse stance. Holding the scraper in my right hand, I took the balloon in my left and turned it slightly.
‘Are you sure you got it?’ Faith said, cocking an eyebrow.
‘Of course!’ I replied. ‘I’ve seen my dad do this a million times. How hard could it be?’ I said confidently as slid the plastic scraper down the side of the balloon’s face.
The sound of stretched rubber bounced around the hallway as little beads of sweat formed on my forehead. The hand holding the balloon started shaking as my other hand cramped up around the scraper. I guess I was more nervous than I thought. I could be wrong, but it felt like shaving a balloon was just as hard as disarming a bomb.
Jake had already left the balloon checkpoint. I had no doubt that his team was going to finish first.
Sophia was nearly finished shaving her balloon as her hipster friends cheered her on from the sidelines.
Carlyle and his pirate team were just catching up to us.
Wyatt was still nowhere to be seen, which didn’t actually make me feel better. The entire race had been so distracting that it was possible he passed Gavin and me without us noticing.
Ever so carefully, I wiped the scraper off on the edge of the desk, and went in again. There was only one strip I had cleaned off, but nearly thirty seconds had already passed.
‘Careful,’ I whispered, touching the scraper to the balloon. ‘Caaaaaareful …’
POP!
Shaving cream splattered across my front and my life flashed before my eyes. It wasn’t very long, and that was kind of depressing.
Everyone laughed, covering their faces and flinching for me.
I stood there shocked. He was trying to hide it, but I could hear Gavin snickering behind me.
‘C’mon, dude!’ Faith said, slapping my shoulder and bringing me back to the competition. ‘Round two! Go!’
I stared at the other balloons with shaving cream on them, already stressed and shaky at the thought of doing it again. Instead, I took the scraper and jabbed the other two balloons, popping them.
Faith squealed a laugh as she covered her face with her arms.
Gavin pushed the trolley back up to me. ‘That’s one way of doing it!’ he said. ‘Now get in! Carlyle’s right behind us!’
I jumped in, scanning the hall ahead of us. Jake was already gone, probably at the finish line. Sophia’s cart was turning the last corner. Wyatt’s cart was still out of the picture. And Carlyle was quickly scraping his balloon clean.
There was a short path ahead of us where the hallway narrowed. It was just wide enough to get our trolleys through.
I clutched the front of the shopping trolley as Gavin ploughed forward into the narrow passage. There wasn’t any time to wipe myself clean from the shaving cream, and Gavin was still dripping with baked bean juice. It was the most random, disgusting adventure I had ever been part of, and I was loving every second of it.
Until Gavin caught his shoulder in the super narrow hallway.
Falling forward, Gavin turned the grocery cart and pushed the handlebar one last time, launching me at a hundred kays an hour down the final stretch of the race.
The cart shook uncontrollably underneath me as I did my best to steer the steel death trap from inside by leaning left and right.
Like a mighty Spartan warrior, I roared. At least, that’s how I wanted to sound. Pretty sure I sounded like a frightened three-year old.
Students dove aside as my cart barrelled past them.
‘Gangway!’ I shouted, trying to come up with a plan to stop th
e cart once I crossed the finish line. ‘Get outta the way!’
I was so close I could taste the victory, or at least the only victory my team could achieve at that point, which would be not coming in dead last. It tasted a lot like shaving cream.
There was only about fifteen metres between my cart and where Zoe was standing waving a black-and-white chequered flag.
Jake was standing with the rest of his team behind my cousin. Sophia was also there, wiping her face clean of the baked-bean slop.
And there, with a goofy grin on his face, was Wyatt and the rest of his team. I was right – he must’ve got ahead of Gavin and me when we were distracted by the checkpoint challenges.
It was only down to Carlyle and me, and I could hear him shouting.
‘Yar, matey!’ Carlyle growled.
He was only about five metres behind me, waving a pirate flag as he rode in the metal cage of his grocery cart. The shortest member of his team was furiously sprinting down the hall, pushing the cart.
‘Outta the way, ya landlubber!’ Carlyle shouted over the sound of metal grocery carts clashing. ‘This victory be in the palm of me fist! Ye already lost, Cooper!’
The finish line was coming up fast as I sailed forwards. I could still beat this pirate poser! All I had to do was keep my grocery cart from falling over.
Which is exactly what happened next, as my cart caught something hard in the carpet. You ever hit a rock with a skateboard? The entire world stops moving for that split second as you fly through the air, waiting to scrape your palms on the ground.
Like a ragdoll, I tumbled out of my grocery cart, rolling to a stop right in front of the finish line. Carlyle’s cart rolled past, securing their place in the rest of the games.
I crawled over the finish line dead last. That was it. My team was done, and we were going to be eliminated with no chance at keeping Wyatt from winning the Spirit Week grand prize.
I could tell by the expression on Zoe’s face that she was disappointed as she helped me off the ground.
Sebastian was already on the microphone announcing the winners of the race. Apparently Wyatt’s team had come in first place.
As I wrung out the shaving cream at the bottom of my hoodie, Wyatt came up to gloat, already wearing the first place bright blue ribbon. He was in the middle of slurping a spoonful of cereal that he got from who knows where. From the smell, I could tell it was Cookie Dough Delight.
For the record, I hate Cookie Dough Delight. It was crispy rice cereal with little balls of dried out cookie dough. Trust me – it wasn’t as awesomesauce as it sounded.
‘Nice effort,’ Wyatt said. ‘I would give that performance a D minus. Not quite an F, but not far from it.’
‘How’d you come in first?’ I said, feeling the weight of utter defeat press down on my shoulders.
‘I raced a good race,’ Wyatt replied, shovelling another spoonful of cereal into his mouth. ‘You and Gavin must’ve been sidetracked somewhere along the race.’
The rock, paper, scissors games must’ve been where Wyatt took the lead. Gavin and I were so wrapped up that a car could’ve crashed into the building and we wouldn’t have noticed.
‘And we crossed the finish line way before anyone else did,’ Wyatt said. He waved his hand at someone nearby to get their attention. ‘Was that awesome? I mean, we did our best and totes came first, but I’m pretty sure we could’ve done better.’
Gross. Watching Wyatt fish for compliments was enough to make me gag.
‘All’s well that ends well though,’ Wyatt sneered. ‘At least for me and my team!’
Suddenly, everyone in the lobby gasped. Wyatt spun around so fast that some of his cereal splashed onto the floor.
Principal Davis raised his hands into the air to try and calm everyone down. ‘Students, please!’ he said sternly. ‘Please back away and give us some room.’
Standing on my tippy toes, I tried to see over everyone, but there were too many people in front of me.
‘Please!’ Principal Davis said again. ‘Calm down and take two steps back!’
The students in the lobby did as he ordered and pushed backward.
After squeezing myself past a few of the taller kids, I could finally see what everyone had been shocked by.
Carlyle was standing with his arms folded behind Principal Davis. One of the students on his team was on the other side of the principal. It was the shorter kid from earlier that I didn’t recognise and now I understood why.
It was because it wasn’t a student! It was the janitor!
‘Ms Chen-Jung,’ Principal Davis said. ‘You’re retiring this year, and this is the legacy you want to leave behind?’
Ms Chen-Jung scrunched her face, making it look like a black hole appeared in the middle of her face. ‘Pirates forever, yo!’
Carlyle stood silently on the other side of the principal.
‘You know what this means, right?’ Principal Davis asked Carlyle.
‘That Ms Chen-Jung is fired?’ Carlyle asked.
‘No,’ he said. ‘Ms Chen-Jung is going to be fine. She shouldn’t have played in the games with you, but there’s no way I’m going to discipline a sixty-five-year-old woman for a silly act like that. You and your team, on the other hand, are disqualified.’
Zoe stepped forward with a glint in her eye. ‘Which means Chase and his team are still in!’
Principal Davis nodded.
I heard Wyatt crunch down on his cereal. Without looking at me, he said, ‘You’re lucky, but luck won’t help you next time.’
Faith came out of nowhere and nearly tackled me to the floor with a hug. ‘You did it! You failed miserably, but still managed to not entirely lose!’
‘Yaaay,’ I sang sarcastically as I twirled my finger in the air.
Gavin joined us, cleaning his face off with a towel. Brayden was behind him, walking with Dani.
‘Man, that was a close one,’ Brayden said.
‘At least you’re not out,’ Dani said with a smile, staring at Brayden.
‘I just can’t believe Wyatt got first place,’ Gavin said. ‘You guys think he cheated somehow?’
Dani looked at Gavin. ‘Oh no,’ she said. ‘I watched him turn that last corner. Wyatt ran across the finish line fair and square. Everyone else saw him do it too.’
Gavin pouted, embarrassed.
I took a deep breath and watched Wyatt celebrate with the other members of his team. I couldn’t believe we had come in last place because it’s not like we didn’t try. Carlyle had an old lady on his team, and they still managed to beat us fair and square.
This whole thing was going to be tougher than I thought.
Brayden and I were in the middle of a conversation when we stepped into the cafeteria, which was bustling with activity. Since the grocery cart race ended early, kids were told to ‘hang loose’ in the cafeteria. At least that’s what Principal Davis said, but I think he meant ‘hang out’.
Brayden and I stopped right inside the cafeteria doors. Melvin, Gidget and Slug were sitting at a table at the far end of the other room.
I sighed. ‘I can’t believe the ninja clan is down to a handful of kids.’
‘Why not?’ Brayden asked. ‘I think it’s better this way.’
‘Wouldn’t it be better if it were the size of the red ninja clan?’
‘There’s, like, a hundred kids in that clan,’ Brayden said. ‘It won’t be long before it comes crashing in on itself. At some point, someone will think they can do a better job of running it than Wyatt, and once that happens, the whole thing will crumble.’
‘I dunno, man. Wyatt seems to be keeping them together pretty well,’ I said, feeling sorry for myself. ‘He might just be a better leader than I am.’
Brayden paused, and I regretted saying something that had to do with feelings. Finally, he said, ‘Why go big? That didn’t work last time. What if you kept it small? Like a tightly balled fist? Less is more, right? Don’t you think a smaller band of ninjas is more effec
tive than an army of a hundred?’
I shrugged.
After weaving through the crowd, we sat with the new members of my ninja clan.
Slug leaned his head against one of his hands, struggling to keep his eyes open. Gidget still had her face pointed at the screen on her phone. And Melvin was scribbling some chicken scratch in a small notebook.
‘So why aren’t we training in the wrestling room?’ Gidget asked from behind her phone.
‘Because being a ninja is about more than how many punches and kicks you’ve thrown,’ I said, dropping my book bag on the lunch table.
Gidget stuffed her phone into the small pocket of her book bag and hoisted the strap over her shoulder. ‘Later, guys. It’s been a blast, and by ‘a blast’, I mean it’s been supes boring. I’ve got better things to do with my time.’
Great. Another ninja quits my clan. It must be what all the cool kids are doing.
‘What better things do you have to do?’ Slug asked.
‘I dunno,’ Gidget replied. ‘Deal with it.’
Gidget walked to the front of the cafeteria and joined a table of other kids who were hypnotised by their phones.
‘Being a twin must be hard work,’ Melvin said to Slug.
‘It’s easy,’ Slug said, frowning. ‘Gidget might have a chip on her shoulder, but she’s still my sister.’
Melvin nodded. He turned back to me. ‘So Wyatt came in first,’ he stated.
‘He did,’ I said, still unsure about the whole race. ‘But did you see him cross the finish line?’
I was hoping that Melvin had some kind of proof that Wyatt had bypassed the race and just appeared at the finish line, but he didn’t. ‘Yeah. I watched him and his buddy cross the line.’
I sighed.
‘Tell ya what,’ Melvin said. ‘I’ll ask around and see what others say about the race.’
‘You’d do that?’ Brayden asked.
‘Of course,’ Melvin said. ‘I’m a reporter. Asking questions is what I’m best at.’
After that, we were mostly quiet. After Gidget left the clan, I didn’t really feel like talking about honour and strength and stuff, because honestly, I was beginning to think I didn’t understand it as well I thought I did.
Spirit Week Shenanigans Page 5
