Mack lifts his leg and fishes around with his foot.
“Higher. Higher. A little left. There!” The employee is actually helpful.
“Got it.”
“Adjust your weight to that foot. Then reach up with your left hand to the green ledge—”
“Can’t see.”
“Sorry. Reach up over your left ear. There’s a two-inch ledge.”
Mack grabs hold. The employee continues to give directions, and Mack follows along. He moves foot, hand, foot, hand. In a few minutes, he’s halfway up the wall.
“Maybe he is Spider-Man,” Londyn says to me.
“It is annoying that he thinks anything is possible.” Except the asteroid.
“You two have been friends forever, right?” she asks.
“Since kindergarten. So, basically, yes.”
“You’re lucky.” She flicks the black off one of her nails.
“Well, he makes it easy. He’s not a jerk most of the time.” I watch him scamper up the wall like he’s invincible.
“More happened with Hannah and them.”
“Oh?” I look at Londyn, but she avoids my eyes.
“After they told the world about my parents’ epic fight…I mean, they actually recorded parts of it and shared it with everyone. I sorta got revenge.” She clears her throat. “I figured if they shared my secrets, I’d share theirs.”
“What did you do?”
“I told Ethan that Megan had a major crush on him. I told Dominic that Hannah thought he was gross, but she actually liked him. And I told everyone that Jesse only made the soccer team because her mom was dating the coach.”
“Was that true?”
“They went out once. I think.” She shrugs. “And I posted an embarrassing picture of Arya that I’d promised never to show anyone.”
I try to imagine what it could be.
“It wasn’t that bad,” Londyn says. “It looks like she’s picking her nose.”
A bell rings. It’s Mack. He’s made it to the top. Londyn and I clap.
“So you got your revenge?” I ask, my voice rising to a higher pitch. Londyn is a friend, but she’s not exactly the “good guy” of this story.
She turns and gets close to my face. “I know I was a jerk. I tried to apologize. But it was too late. They said a thousand worse things about me. Every day for the first two months of school, they weren’t happy unless they could make me cry.”
I remember Londyn in gym class the day she tried to knock my head off with a basketball. Maybe it wasn’t about me and my lack of dribbling skills.
“That stinks,” I mumble, not sure what to say. “I’m sorry.”
“Well…in a few weeks, none of this will matter.” She steps back.
“I think asteroids have a way of wiping out middle school drama. It’s one of the plus sides of the world ending.”
“I guess.” Londyn smiles slowly. “Asteroids also have a way of scaring the crap out of people. Hopefully.”
Mack leans back in his harness, and the employee lowers him to the ground.
His dad comes over and hugs him. “Great job, Mack. I texted your mom and your grandparents a photo.”
“Cool. Who’s next?” Mack wipes his chalky hands on his pants.
“No thanks,” Londyn says.
“I’ll try the beginner wall.” I look over to where the five-year-olds are climbing.
Mack takes off his helmet. “What! Dudes, you can totally do this. Give it a try.”
Londyn looks at me and then at the towering wall Mack just scaled. It doesn’t matter if we make it to the top. An attempt is enough to cross it off our bucket list.
“Okay.” I twist my paracord bracelet. “But I’m only doing this because you’re not a jerk.”
“What?” Mack seems confused.
Londyn flashes me a smile.
“I’ll do it too,” she says. “Because you’re both not jerks.”
DOOMSDAY EXPRESS—SIXTH EDITION
April
The asteroid 2010PL7 crashes into Brazil. It’s like 100 nuclear bombs going off at once. Millions die, but no one knows the exact number. A cloud of dirt and rock is thrown into the sky. Some rocks even leave the atmosphere and go into orbit. The rest of the debris falls back to the earth, and not just in Brazil. It rains dirt and rock across the hemisphere. The falling sediment burns and causes massive fires and destruction. The smoke blocks out the sun. Some of the homes in your neighborhood are destroyed.
Electricity and phone service is knocked out almost everywhere, including in Hamilton. You don’t go to school. People rush to the grocery store to buy food and bottles of water. Shelves are emptied quickly. They think this is temporary, like after a tornado. They are wrong.
The Next Week
At first, neighbors are helpful, and you support each other. You hang out and have big indoor picnics, because you need to eat all the meat and other stuff in the freezer before it goes bad. School is still not open. Your parents don’t go to work. Gasoline for cars is scarce because gas stations are emptied. Banks and ATMs are closed and getting cash is almost impossible. Some people get sick because the water in the houses is not safe. They don’t know to treat it. It’s harder to tell night from day, and the air smells like it’s burning. Everything is gray, like you’re watching an old black-and-white movie.
A Month Later
You stay in your house with the doors locked and the windows boarded up. Someone keeps a lookout all the time. Your neighbors steal from each other, because everyone is desperate for food and water. You cannot call the police. The cell phones don’t work, and cops aren’t around. Your family collects rainwater in a large barrel, but it’s still full of dust and dirt from impact. The calendar says May, but it’s cold. There’s frost almost every night. You cannot plant vegetables. This is the beginning of impact winter.
Six Months After
Sickness is everywhere. A small cut leads to terrible infection. The flu and stomach bugs become deadly. Only a few people are capable of helping. You take a relative to a nurse down the street. She gives you some medicine, but it costs your family a week’s worth of food. You work with other people in your community for protection, forming a mutual aid group. You don’t let anyone else join unless they have something to offer. It could be skills like hunting or resources like weapons.
A Year Later
You eat once a day, or sometimes once every other day. The streets are filled with garbage and rodents. If you don’t have a skill, you are assigned trash collection. The sun peeks through on occasion. Your community will try to plant vegetables this year. The hunters and fishermen have to go farther and farther from your base to find meat, and you worry they won’t make it back. You have to believe things will get easier, but you just don’t know when.
Five Years Later
Small community schools are open, but only the youngest kids go. Older kids and adults work, doing the farming, trading, security, and medical stuff. You hear on the shortwave radio that a few cities have electricity, water, and even sewage again, but this could be rumors. Your area has solar-generated power for a few hours a week, but it’s not reliable. People talk about things getting “back to normal” in a few more years. But you know things will never be exactly like they were. Not after impact.
“This is the best thing you’ve ever written.” Londyn gives me a small stack of paper. She has printed out our newsletter about the future at her house because Grandpa Joe didn’t have time to take me to make copies.
“Thanks.” I open my locker. We still have ten minutes before homeroom. Plenty of time to put them in our usual distribution spots.
“I could only make thirty copies. My aunt didn’t have much paper.”
“Great, our demand is going up, and we have less supply.” We learned about supply
and demand in social studies, but I can’t remember if this is the situation that should be making us rich.
“Relax, Norie. People can share. And I made an email version.” She flips her hair over her shoulder and does her best evil smile.
“What?” I glare at her, and her smile falls. “We said nothing goes online. It’s too easy to track. Everything online leaves a trail.” Now I sound like my dad.
“Don’t worry. I created a fake Gmail account. And if they wanted to track us, they would have already. They could have gotten our fingerprints off the first newsletter.”
“We’re not dealing with the FBI. A middle school principal doesn’t know how to run fingerprints. And that only works if you’re already in the system. You have to be arrested for something else first.”
“Whatever. You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Who did you send the email to?” I ask.
“Everyone.” She flashes me her evil smile again.
I hold up my hands. “What does that even mean?”
“In the beginning of the school year, the principal accidentally sent out an email that had everyone’s email addresses copied on it.”
“She did?”
“Yeah, it was like a welcome-back-to-school, you-need-to-buy-a-hundred-notebooks email.”
I kind of remember that. Dad printed it out, and we took it with us to Target.
“Wait!” Panic hits my chest first, then my brain. “That email went to parents.”
“Really?” She plays with a piece of her hair and avoids looking at me.
“Yes! You sent an email to all the parents in the school!”
“I must have been in my mom’s email account. How was I supposed to know that?”
“You weren’t supposed to email ANYONE!” I clench my fists.
“Calm down. No one is going to know it’s us.”
“My dad will.”
“Maybe he won’t read it,” she says.
“He reads anything you put in front of him! Ugh. You’ve ruined everything!”
“Shut up. I did not!” She pokes me in the chest with one finger.
“What is wrong with you, Londyn!”
“Calm down.” She leans forward. Her red face is an inch from mine.
“We agreed to print it.” I wave the newsletters. “You did your own thing. You didn’t ask me. This is why no one likes you. You can’t be trusted.” I don’t know what I’m saying. I just want to yell.
“No one likes you either. You have a stupid haircut, and you freak out all the time. Like right now! I’m done.” She throws her newsletters in the air, then stomps off like the brat she is.
“Good. I’m done too! Don’t ever talk to me again. Jerk!” I stand in the hallway, surrounded by the evidence. Tears are threatening to spill out. But I’m not sad. I’m angry—angrier than I’ve ever been.
“Hey.” A kid I don’t know stops me. “Is that the Doomsday paper?”
“Yeah.” I give him my whole stack and slam my locker closed.
When I see Mack in homeroom five minutes later, he already knows about my fight with Londyn.
“I have enhanced hearing,” he says when I ask how he knew.
“That’s not true.”
“Spencer told me he saw you screaming and throwing things.”
“She was throwing things,” I correct him. “Papers.”
“What did she do?” he asks.
“She emailed the newsletter to all the parents.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know. She wants to make everyone’s life miserable. Especially mine.” I collapse into my chair. “Do your parents read their emails?”
“My mom is the PTA treasurer, and Dad is on the book fair committee. They know about everything that’s happening at school before I do.”
“My dad is going to kill me.”
“My parents are going to know you’re behind this. Your secret is out, Batman.” He uses his deepest voice.
“This isn’t funny.” I turn toward the front of the room, done talking.
I make it through morning announcements and the first two classes without any mention of the newsletter. But in third period, I’m called to the office.
I expect to see my dad or Londyn, but it’s only the vice principal, Mr. Young. He’s an Asian guy, with a neat black goatee and round glasses. He wears a light-green shirt and a tie with shamrocks on it, even though St. Patrick’s Day is a week away.
“I don’t think we’ve met.” He introduces himself and motions for me to sit. He has three of our six newsletters lying on his desk.
“Do you know anything about these?” He waves a hand over the papers.
I shrug.
“Did you contribute to these?”
I shrug again.
“Did you hand them out to students? And don’t shrug. Answer the questions.”
“Do I need a lawyer?” I mean it as a joke. But I’m so nervous it sounds like a kid’s terrified request.
“No. We can call your parents if you want.”
“What do you want to know? Um…I wrote it. I handed them out. I want everyone to be prepared.” I don’t mention Londyn. I’m not sure why not. I should take her down with me.
“Did you also send an email this morning?”
I give half a nod. “Am I being kicked out of school?”
“No, you’re not being suspended. But we need this Doomsday Express to stop immediately. It’s not appropriate for school. It’s not appropriate in general. I believe Ms. Richmond has spoken to all classes about credible sources. Correct?”
“Yes. In the media center.”
“This site you reference is not a credible source. The author is not reliable, and his motivations are questionable.”
I keep my mouth closed. If Mr. Young doesn’t think a Harvard astrophysicist is credible, he’s not going to care at all about what a seventh grader with a C-plus average has to say. And I can’t think of any better motivation than saving humankind.
“I don’t want to see another one of these at school. Is that understood?”
“Yes, sir.”
“You will also refrain from using that email list for any purpose. That was not supposed to be available, and you’ve taken advantage of someone else’s mistake. That’s not appropriate Hamilton Hawk behavior.”
“It won’t happen again.” Now I’m making promises for Londyn. Who knows what she’ll do next? And who cares as long as she leaves me out of it?
“Thank you, Eleanor. I wish we’d met under better circumstances.” He scribbles something on a pink form. Then he hands it to me.
Across the top it reads Disciplinary Record Sheet.
“You’ll need to have a parent sign this and return it to me in the morning.” He smiles like he’s given me an award, not a prison sentence.
“Why do you need this?”
“Because if it happens again—and I’m certain it won’t—we’ll have a record that you were warned and understood the consequences.”
He really makes it sound like I need a lawyer.
“Okay. Can I go?” The room feels hot, and his smiling is too weird.
“Not quite.”
Mr. Young leaves his office, and a second later, Mrs. Walsh walks in.
“Hello, Eleanor.” She takes a seat next to me and turns so our knees are practically touching.
“You wrote the Doomsday Express?” her voice is barely above a whisper.
I nod and don’t look at her.
“I thought so.” She takes a loud breath. “And the Nature Club? Is that part of this doomsday plan too?”
“Yes,” I whisper, twisting my paracord bracelet around and around.
“I see. Did Mack help with the newsletter?”
I shake my head.
“What’s wrong, Eleanor? What makes you think the world is ending?” she asks.
“The website.” I look up quickly and see her shrug.
“I haven’t read it.”
So I tell her everything about finding the website, learning about prepping from my grandfather, and starting the club to help others get ready.
“Oh, Eleanor.” She touches my shoulder and I cover my face. I shouldn’t cry, not in front of a teacher.
“And I’m not going to ask you if you believe me. My dad doesn’t. If you…I just don’t want to think about it.”
She doesn’t say anything until my eyes meet hers. “Thank you for telling me. That was brave of you. I know you care about me and the kids in your club. You’re a good person.”
I wait for a but—like how most adults talk to me. It doesn’t come.
“I’m scared,” I whisper. Months ago, I didn’t care about anyone but Mack and my family, but now I feel responsible. “What if we’re not ready? I don’t want anyone to be hurt or worse.”
“That’s understandable.” She nods. “These are big questions for anyone. Scientists know of at least five major extinctions.”
I nod. “I read the book you gave me.”
“That’s right.” She snaps her fingers, remembering. “So you know it has happened before, and it may happen again. I’ve read arguments that say we’re experiencing a sixth extinction now. Our climate is warming, and our oceans are becoming increasingly acidic.”
“Jade talks about this a lot,” I say.
“I like that kids are concerned for our planet. Gives me hope. There may be time to turn things around.”
“I don’t think we can turn the asteroid around.” I grab a tissue off the desk and blow my nose.
She gives me a sad grin.
“What do you need me to do, Eleanor?” I don’t think an adult has ever asked me this question before. They’re always telling me what they need me to do. Not the other way around.
The World Ends in April Page 16
