Worse Than Weird

by Jody J. Little

  “Hey, kids, try my pizzas!” A white-haired man yells at us from the window of the trailer. “I make them fresh, right in front of you. Delizioso! Check out my topping selection.” He talks fast with his flour-covered hands and motions to another chalkboard hanging inside. It’s an impressive setup. A real stone oven inside a trailer.

  “Okay,” Willa says. “I’ll take one with pepperoni and olives. And also a lemonade.”

  “I’ll have cheese and mushrooms,” Brie says. “And just water to drink.”

  “And you?” The man points at me.

  I had my mind set on a bacon burger, but the smell coming from this guy’s oven is amazing. It’s worth a try.

  “I’ll take the meat combo.” And then, remembering that Willa has money to cover the tab, I add, “And a Coke, please.”

  The man freezes for just a moment, but then gives me a wink.

  “If you like my pizzas, you tell your friends and family, okay? My name’s Lorenzo.” He tosses a ball of dough in the air and catches it, forming a cloud of flour in front of his face. He slathers garlicky olive oil all over the pizzas and generously piles on the cheese.

  Willa, Brie, and I step back and slurp on our drinks while we wait. I see a stray dime on the ground, and I scoop it up and pocket it. Every coin counts when it comes to bringing in money. Brie moans about her summer swim schedule and her upcoming meet. Willa’s phone buzzes with incoming texts, and she responds to each one. I wonder who she’s texting, but before I can ask, we hear a timer ding, and we move back toward Lorenzo’s window. He lines three paper plates with checkered tissue paper and slides the mini-pizzas on top.

  “Enjoy, new friends!” he says and quickly helps the next customers in line.

  We carry our pizzas to the rows of picnic tables in the center of the cart pod and start chowing down. I practically inhale my first bite of sausage and cheese.

  “Hey, look.” Brie points at my paper plate. “Lorenzo left you a note.”

  I lift the red-checkered tissue paper. There is a note, scribbled in black ink.

  Got a chip on your shoulder? Put a hat on instead.

  It may feel a bit grey, but upstairs you’ll be fed.

  Chapter Seven

  The Missing Mysterious Note

  “What is this?”

  I shove the tissue paper toward Willa. She reads it, mumbling the words, “‘but upstairs you’ll be fed.’” She shrugs and hands it to Brie.

  “Do you think Lorenzo wrote this?” Brie asks.

  “Probably. He was the only one in his cart.” I take the tissue paper from Brie and read it again.

  “I think it’s a riddle.” I love riddles. They remind me of writing computer programs. You break them down into parts to make sense of the whole. When you get an ERROR message, you just try again. It’s beautiful, logical problem-solving.

  Willa tears a piece of crust off her pizza, chews it, then speaks. “Maybe. But maybe it’s nothing.”

  I continue to stare at the note, reading it and rereading. I’m startled by the loud clang of a metal travel mug hitting the picnic table next to me. I turn to my left to see a gray shirt and a pale face.

  Joey Marino.

  Just four or five feet away from me.

  I cough a bit on the pizza crumbs lingering in my throat. Where in the world did he come from?

  Joey gives me a flicker of a glance, but then he eyes the tissue paper with the mysterious note.

  I look up at Willa and Brie sitting across from me and jerk my head to the left to get them to turn, to see Joey.

  But when my friends look, Joey’s no longer there. He’s moved to a different picnic table, one farther away from us.

  He lifts his combat boots over the bench and sits across from an old woman at the end of the table. I think she’s homeless. I’ve seen her wandering around these carts before, messy gray bun, stocking cap, and layers and layers of clothes.

  “It’s Joey Marino, you guys,” I whisper.

  “It is?” Willa squints toward him. “Hey, did you guys know he had done all that stuff at school?”

  “I knew about the water fountains, but not the other projects,” Brie says.

  Joey hands the woman his travel mug. She reaches for it and cradles it in her palms. Her hands quiver as she lifts the mug to her mouth.

  “Do you think he knows her?” I ask.

  “Maybe he’s working on a new community project,” Willa says. “Something to help homeless people.”

  Joey pulls his phone out of his pocket. He taps the screen and shows the woman. She points and gestures. I wonder what he’s showing her.

  Willa and Brie return to eating their pizza, and I pretend not to be interested in Joey Marino and his conversation, but I keep sneaking glances.

  The woman pushes the mug back to Joey and touches his hand. Then she rises from the bench. He waves at her.

  “Are you both done?” Willa asks. “Let’s take a long route home.”

  I shove the last bit of pizza crust into my mouth and stand up. We take our plates and napkins to the trash cans and dump them.

  “Before we go, I want to ask Lorenzo about that note,” I say. “I want to know what it means.”

  “Where is the note?” Brie asks.

  My hands are empty. Did I throw it away? I whip back toward the garbage can when I spy Joey Marino again, back at the table we were sitting at. He’s folding the red-checkered tissue paper with the strange riddle. He tucks it into his pocket and walks away.

  “Did you guys see that? Joey has my note.” I wave my finger as Joey leaves the Hawthorne cart pod.

  Brie links my elbow. “Forget about it, Mac. I’m sure it meant nothing.”

  But I’m not so sure, and I want it back. I want to program Joey Marino to spin around, to give back that note. Turn left 180 degrees. Forward 500 steps.

  But Joey has already vanished.

  Willa links my other elbow. “Sorry, Mac. Mystery here one moment. Mystery gone the next.”

  “Come on.” Brie pulls on my arm. “It’s only four thirty, and it’s the first afternoon of summer.”

  I don’t budge. The message on the checkered paper loops in my brain: Got a chip on your shoulder? Put a hat on instead. It may feel a bit grey, but upstairs you’ll be fed. It doesn’t matter that Joey Marino has the note because I won’t forget what’s on it. I know those words mean something. I have to find out what it is.

  “I’m going back.”

  “Oh, come on,” Willa whines. “Let it go. Time for some summer dancing.” She throws her arms out wide and shimmies.

  But I ignore Willa and return to the pizza cart.

  “Hey! Lorenzo?”

  “Oh! My best new customer. You liked my pizza so much you returned.” He kisses his flour-coated fingers, then throws the kiss in the air. “Eccellente!”

  “Your pizzas were great, but I didn’t come back for more. I wanted to ask about the note you gave me—”

  “And which pizza do you want this time? How about Classico? Fresh mozzarella with basil and tomato.” His flour-dusted lips smile at me.

  “No, I don’t want another pizza. Sorry, but—”

  “Oh, I’m sorry too.” He turns away and grabs some dough.

  “Can I ask you about that note?” I try again.

  “I don’t know what you mean.” Lorenzo keeps his head down. “Do you want another pizza?”

  This stinks. I’m going to have to buy his information.

  I shove my hands into my jeans pockets and feel my new, yet ancient, flipper phone, some lint, and the single dime I picked up off the ground earlier.

  “Hey, Lorenzo.” It’s Willa’s voice. She and Brie are back. “We’ll take one of those Classicos.”

  Willa holds up a five-dollar bill for the pizza.

  Thank you, I mouth.

  “One Classico coming up,” Lorenzo announces.

  I tap my fingers on Lorenzo’s window counter for a few moments, pondering how to broach the subject of the mys
terious message again. “So, about that note? You wrote it, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “What does it mean, exactly? Why’d you give it to me?”

  Brie and Willa lean in closer now to the cart window.

  Lorenzo spirals the dough in the air and catches it on his fist, lowering it to the work surface. “You ordered the right pizza, so you got the note.”

  I turn to Brie and lift an eyebrow.

  She shrugs.

  “Is it a riddle?” I ask.

  “Of course it’s a riddle.” He tosses some leafy stuff on the dough. “And it’s a clue to the hunt.”

  “What hunt?”

  “The Portland Food Cart Association Treasure Hunt. You visit the right carts around the city. You order the right foods, then you get clues. Collect all the clues, and you win the prize. Semplice.”

  “What’s the prize?” Willa asks.

  Lorenzo places tomatoes on the leafy stuff. “Two thousand dollars.”

  Wait.

  Two. Thousand. Dollars?

  For collecting all the clues?

  “Are you making this up?” I blurt.

  “No. It’s a real hunt and a real prize.” Lorenzo moves to his window and begins whispering to us, even though no one else is near. “Food Cart Association put out ten clues at ten carts. First person to turn in all the clues at the right time and the right cart wins the prize.”

  “Why are you whispering?” Brie asks.

  “It’s a secret hunt. The association wants to see how well it gets around without any social media or advertisements.” Lorenzo winks.

  “When did it start?” I ask.

  “June twelfth.”

  That’s five days ago. I wonder how many people already know? “When does it end?”

  “June twenty-sixth.” Lorenzo scoops up the pizza with a huge wooden spatula and slides it into his stone oven.

  “If I find all the clues, when and where do I turn them in?”

  “Can’t tell you that. Check out the website.” Lorenzo waves us away with his fingers before grabbing another ball of dough. “Your Classico is ready in five minutes. Oh, and tell your friends about my new cart!”

  Chapter Eight

  Plea Bargaining

  I’m practically levitating as we wait for the pizza.

  Ten clues.

  Collect them all.

  Win two thousand dollars!

  That much money will buy me the coding camp, and I’d have enough left to buy a laptop and an actual smart phone!

  Eight weeks of coding camp means less time with the chickens and Coral’s vegetables. I could avoid almost the entire ridiculous Mother Earth Festival. This is all so perfectly perfect.

  I jump in front of my friends. “You guys! Let’s do the hunt.”

  “Seriously, Mac.” Brie laughs a little. “There are probably hundreds of people already looking for those clues.”

  “But maybe not. He said it was secret. Don’t you see? Winning this money would get me to coding camp. It’s my exit from Hank and Coral’s world to the real world.”

  I hold my mouth open, waiting for a response.

  “Yeah, I don’t know,” Willa says. “I’m not so sure about this.” She steps to Lorenzo’s to grab our steaming-hot pizza.

  “Think about it.” I motion for Willa and Brie to follow me back to a picnic table. We all sit down. “If we do it together, we can split the prize.” I calculate quickly in my head. “That’s six hundred sixty-six dollars for each of us. And sixty-six cents!” Still plenty of money for the coding camp.

  Willa shakes her head. She pulls out her phone and reads a text.

  “Willa, what else could you possibly have to do in the next few days?” I ask.

  She tucks her phone back into her front pocket. “I have a few things going on.”

  I let out a heavy sigh.

  “Mac,” Brie says, “my parents wouldn’t be happy with me wandering all over the city, looking for clues at food carts. They’d say it’s a waste of time.”

  “But your dad’s a chef. He loves all the food carts. Besides, they don’t need to know what you’re really doing. We’ll come up with a good story. We’ll say we’re doing some research, like a summer study. Parents eat that stuff up.” I smile at Brie and punch her lightly on the forearm.

  She laughs. “It kind of does sound fun. And I like food, and it involves eating.”

  “And our free city bus passes last through June, so we don’t have to pay for transportation,” I add. “Come on, you guys. The hunt ends on June twenty-sixth. That’s only nine days. It isn’t like it goes all summer.”

  Brie turns to Willa. “What do you say?”

  Willa’s zoned out, her eyes glassy. It’s the same look she wore earlier at the park, sitting between her parents. She’s tearing a napkin into tiny little pieces.

  “Willa? What’s up with you?” I ask.

  “What?” She finally looks at me.

  “Are you in?” I say.

  “In what?” She turns her face toward me and then Brie.

  “In the hunt with us,” Brie says.

  I sneak a glance at Brie that says Is she okay?

  “Come on.” I try to encourage Willa. “It’s a two-thousand-dollar prize! We need you.”

  Willa opens her mouth like she’s going to say something, but nothing comes out. And then, a switch in her brain seems to flick on. Her eyes open wide, and she gets off the bench and does a little shuffling box step. “Okay,” she says. “But if I’m in, I’m in to win.”

  Now that’s more like it. I grin at my friend, watching her box step some more.

  I reach my hand out, palm down. Brie puts hers on top. Willa follows. “In to win!” we yell at the same time, throwing our arms up.

  Chapter Nine

  Summer Plans for All

  One thing I know for sure is that the internet will be my friend for this food cart hunt, but my little flipper phone doesn’t offer that. Neither does my technology-free household. The public libraries are my only option, and lucky for me, the Belmont Library is close by and stays open until eight p.m. most nights. I walk there after Brie, Willa, and I leave the Hawthorne carts. I tap out a short text to Hank and Coral letting them know where I am. I’m not completely convinced that they know how to read texts yet, but at least I can say I contacted them. Then I write down the clue on a bookmark while it’s still in my head.

  Got a chip on your shoulder? Put a hat on instead.

  It may feel a bit grey, but upstairs you’ll be fed.

  I spot an open computer and log on. I need to find that website that Lorenzo mentioned. Right away I find one called Portland Food Cart Association, and another called Portland Food Carts and Friends. I comb around for info on the hunt, but just like Lorenzo said, there’s no advertisements or announcements. I guess it’s good that it’s a secret hunt. The fewer people who know, the better chance I have! I scroll through the newsfeed on the association’s website, but it seems to just be a listing of new carts and times. I do discover a list of food types and the carts that serve those styles all around the city. That will be helpful. I highlight the information and show my student ID card to the librarian, so I can print the cart lists for free.

  Tonight, I’ll study the clue and the list of carts. I know I can figure this out. I’ll just go word by word, step by step, like writing a code. Simple!

  In the morning, I stare at the poster Mrs. Naberhaus gave me, Girls Are Supercoders, that I hung on the wall above my head. I reach up and put my whole palm on the poster, whispering the words. Today, on the first day of summer, with the food cart hunt ahead of me, I believe these words. I have to be a supercoder to find all these clues.

  Emptying an old folder from school, I place the list of carts, the clue, and some blank paper inside, then tuck the folder in my shoulder bag before heading outside to confront the three leghorns and the illegal Poppy.

  Back in the kitchen with the four eggs, my brain spins with the clue.


  Chip, hat, grey, upstairs. I know those words are key.

  What type of food is it referring to?

  And even if I know the type of food, what specifically do I order?

  “Happy summer, Mac!” Hank enters the kitchen and slaps my back. “Gather the eggs already?”

  “Done.”

  Hank lifts one of the brown eggs out of the basket and sniffs it. “I never get tired of fresh eggs.”

  “I’ve noticed.”

  “Add kale, please!” Coral yells from the living room, probably just beginning her morning yoga.

  “Mac, are you ready to hear my plans for our summer?”

  “Is it about your festival?”

  “It’s preparation for the festival.” Hank cracks an egg and separates the shell, letting the insides ooze into a bowl. “Today, you and I and Coho are going to start building a fence around Coral’s garden. Mr. Z said we could take down his old fence and use that lumber. That’s our first step.” Hank grins at me.

  “Why does Coral need a fence?”

  “Oh, Coral doesn’t need a fence—her vegetables do.” Hank whips his eggs with a fork.

  “What?” I feel wary about this project already.

  “Her vegetables will need protection.”

  “Protection? How many people have you and Coral invited to your festival?”

  Hank laughs. “I’m not talking about protection from people, I’m talking about protection from the—”

  “Hank, wait!” Coral hurries into the kitchen and grabs Hank’s elbow. She whispers into his ear.

  Hank pulls back. “You think?”

  Coral leans in and whispers something else.

  “I see your point,” Hank finally says. “I’ll wait.”

  “You’ll wait for what?” I ask.

  “For the summer plan reveal. It’s going to be epic!” Hank drums the countertops, ba-dum-dum. “Believe me.”

  I do not believe him, but I push my shoulders back and state, “I have a plan to reveal this summer too.”

  Coral pulls up a chair and peers at me. “Ooh, tell us.”

  “I’m going to be doing some research on the food carts of Portland.” It’s the same line I told Brie to use on her parents.