Izzy Newton and the S.M.A.R.T. Squad

by Valerie Tripp

  Izzy, Allie, and Charlie found three seats together in the back of the auditorium and plunked themselves down just as the principal, Mr. Delmonico, began to speak to the 300 new sixth graders. He was a beanpole, but his voice was big and booming as he said, “All right, let’s settle down now.” The noise didn’t decrease at all, so Mr. Delmonico tried again. “Students! Atom Middle School sixth graders! Your attention, please!” When that didn’t work, the principal resorted to flicking the lights on and off and bellowing, “Quiet!”

  Finally, with lots of rustling, whispers, and squeaking seats, the room quieted.

  “Thank you,” said the principal. “I’m Mr. Delmonico. I’m new here at Atom Middle School, too, so you and I will begin together. Let’s get off to a good start.”

  “Why’s it so cold?” someone yelled, and everyone cheered and whistled in support of the question. “It’s cold outside, but it’s freeeeezing in here!”

  Mr. Delmonico shook his head. “I know,” he said. He shivered. “I’m cold, too. Maintenance is working on it. This is an old building, and we’ve had some trouble with the air-conditioning unit. It’s like the thing’s got a mind of its own. But never fear, technicians are in my office today checking out the thermostat. We should be back to normal in no time.”

  At that, someone started a wave that swept across the auditorium, with kids standing up, waving their hands in the air, and saying, “Brrrr!” This was met with gales of laughter.

  “Let’s keep it down to a dull roar, folks!” said Mr. Delmonico, though he had a chuckle in his voice. When the laughter died down, he continued, saying, “The purpose of this morning’s assembly is to welcome you to Atom Middle School and to go over the school rules and expectations. There’s really only one rule: Be kind. And I have only one expectation: Follow the rule. Now, you’ve been assigned to homerooms alphabetically by last name. Your homeroom teachers will hand out your schedules, locker assignments, and combinations.”

  Nervous murmurs rippled through the auditorium.

  Mr. Delmonico spoke over the anxious muttering. “I know that lockers and locker combinations are new for most of you. But you’ll get used to them. Stay cool.”

  “Cool?” shouted out a girl. “We’re frozen.”

  “What’s our school mascot?” called out a kid. “Polar bears? Arctic wolves?”

  Someone howled like a wolf, and everyone laughed.

  Izzy felt sorry for Mr. Delmonico. He seemed like a nice guy. He was new at Atom Middle School, just like all the sixth graders were. And it wasn’t his fault the school was too cold for comfort.

  Mr. Delmonico waited for the laugher to subside. Then he said patiently, “No. Our teams are the Atomics. Speaking of, teams and clubs will have sign-up sheets at tables in the cafeteria tomorrow at lunchtime. Check with team captains and club leaders for tryout schedules.”

  “Tryouts!” Izzy whispered to Charlie, making a worried face. “So soon.”

  Charlie nodded, but kept silent.

  Mr. Delmonico went on. “If you want to start a club, bring a sign-up sheet to the cafeteria tomorrow. Okay, it’s time to head to your homerooms. Teachers, hold up your posters. Students, go stand by the teacher whose poster has the first letter of your last name on it.”

  The auditorium erupted in chaos as 300 students jumped up from their seats and stampeded toward the teachers. Mr. Delmonico shouted, “Walk, please!” But no one did. Allie and Charlie waved to Izzy as they headed off in one direction toward the teacher holding the D-E-F poster and Izzy headed in the other direction toward the teacher with the N-O-P poster. Allie pointed to herself and Charlie, and then to Izzy, and mimed eating, which Izzy interpreted to mean: See you at lunch. Izzy nodded vigorously to show her agreement. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw both Marie and the new girl heading toward the teacher with the A-B-C poster. Their heads were bent close together, and they were laughing and talking to one another as if, thought Izzy with a small silent sigh, they were the only two girls in the world.

  Izzy felt dizzy.

  When her homeroom teacher handed out their schedules, Izzy saw that classes were on a block schedule. That meant that some classes met Monday, Wednesday, and Friday and others met Tuesday and Thursday—unless it was a half day, in which case all bets were off and for some reason the Monday schedule went into effect but classes met for only 20 minutes each. Also, students were assigned to something called electives, which was weird because no one elected what elective to take. The electives had names like “Humanities,” “Creative Expression,” and “Art History.” Izzy was happy to see that she had been assigned to an elective called “Forensics” that met Tuesdays and Thursdays. Forensics sounded right up her alley: She loved the idea of using the scientific method to solve crimes. She knew that’s what Forensics meant because she’d seen lots of TV shows about it.

  When homeroom was over, Izzy braced herself, hunched her shoulders, and burrowed her way through the crowded hallway, afraid she’d be late for her first class, which was Math. But when she arrived at the classroom, she saw that the teacher wasn’t there yet. Izzy was glad to see Allie in the classroom. There was no seat open near Allie, and as Izzy hesitated by the door, a gangly boy smiled at her and pointed to the empty seat in front of him.

  “Here’s a seat,” he said.

  “Thanks,” said Izzy.

  As she sat, the boy said, “I’m Trevor. I just moved here, and—”

  But just then, Allie shouted, “Izzy! Watch this!”

  Allie stood up in front of her desk. “It’s COLD in here!” she said. Her big eyes sparkled and her zingy hair bounced. Allie flung one arm wide and pretended that her thermos was a microphone that she held in front of her mouth. At top volume, she began singing the song from the movie Frozen except she changed the words to “Let it snow, let it snow…” And then Allie tossed a handful of white paper torn into confetti over her head so that it snowed down on her.

  Oh, Allie! Izzy squirmed with embarrassment. This wasn’t the first time Izzy wished that Allie wasn’t an aspiring stand-up comedian. Izzy was relieved when everyone clapped, stamped, and cheered. A boy had started to sing the old song “Walking in a Winter Wonderland” when the teacher, Ms. Tattinger, walked in.

  Luckily, Ms. Tattinger had a sense of humor. “It is awfully cold outside and also in this building,” she said. “But not quite cold enough to snow, outside or inside. Anyway, we’re here to do math. Pick up the confetti paper, and let’s begin.”

  As Ms. Tattinger wrote math problems on the board, Izzy felt a wonderful sense of calm come over her. Math was neat and tidy. It made sense. It wasn’t about messy stuff like hurt feelings and old friendships. Izzy might not solve the math problems as fast as Allie did, and she was way, way too shy to shout out the answers like Allie did, but she was sure of what she was doing, and she loved the quiet satisfaction of finding the correct solution. When Ms. Tattinger called on Izzy to solve an especially tricky problem and Izzy was able to find the right answer, Trevor leaned forward and whispered, “Nice.”

  Izzy looked down shyly, but she grinned happily, too!

  * * *

  On the way to lunch, the halls were even more crowded than before because mechanics had set up ladders at various places in the corridors. They were inspecting the overhead ducts, the wall vents, and the pipes that ran under the floors. Students whistled “Jingle Bells” and chanted “Snow day! Snow day!” as they slalomed their way around the construction.

  “The whole cafeteria is as cold as a refrigerator,” joked Izzy as she, Charlie, and Allie sat down at a table together. “I don’t know why they bother keeping the milk in a cooler. They should just keep a cow outside in the parking lot, or in here. I mean, look around. Everyone’s so frostbitten that they look like they’re on a field trip to an ice floe in Antarctica.”

  “I don’t know why they can’t figure out what’s wrong with the heating in this place,” said Allie, waving her sandwich around so that the tomatoes slipped out. �
�Why is it such a mystery?”

  “That’s not the only mystery,” said Charlie, who was unpacking her lunch from a grocery bag. She rolled her eyes right, to draw Izzy’s and Allie’s attention to where Marie and the new girl sat huddled together at a table far away.

  “Humpf,” scoffed Allie, her mouth full of sandwich. “Didn’t I tell you guys this yesterday? To Marie, we’re nothing. She made that crystal clear at the assembly this morning! Mystery, shmyshtery.”

  “Hey!” said Izzy, “speaking of mysteries, guess what? I really lucked out with my English elective. I got Forensics. I’m going to be just like all those crime-solving detectives on TV!”

  “Uh-oh,” said Allie. Now her face looked tragic.

  “Uh-oh what?” asked Izzy.

  “Oh, Izzy,” said Charlie sadly, “I hate to be the one to tell you this. But, well, in the case of the English elective, ‘forensics’ means making speeches and debating.”

  “Not collecting hairs and fingernails and doing DNA tests,” added Allie.

  “What?” gasped Izzy. There was nothing in the world she was more afraid of than standing up in front of people and making a speech! “How can I get out of that class?”

  “I don’t think you can,” said Charlie. “It would throw off your whole schedule.”

  “They call it an ‘elective,’ but I NEVER would have elected it!” wailed Izzy.

  “Maybe you could talk to your guidance counselor,” said Allie, “and ask to be transferred. But you’re going to have to take Forensics at some point this year. So you might as well get it over with.”

  “But,” Izzy sputtered, “I’m—”

  Izzy didn’t have a chance to finish her sentence because three kids came over to ask Allie for help. Word was already out that Allie could remember your locker combination and figure out ways to help you remember it, too.

  At the same time, a bunch of runners came over to make sure that Charlie was going to try out for the track and field team. Evidently, Charlie’s reputation for speed had followed her to middle school. As the boys in the group talked to Charlie, Izzy saw without surprise that they stumbled over their words and got kind of red in the face. Izzy had seen this happen many times before. Charlie was so beautiful—with her wide hazel eyes—that boys lost their train of thought and forgot what they were saying when they looked at her. Charlie herself was completely oblivious to the effect she had on people and stayed unruffled, no matter what. Right now, she listened to the boys, but Izzy could tell she was really paying more attention to her lunch, which resembled a small vegetable garden that had been planted in a bento box.

  No one came to talk to Izzy. But that was a good thing: She was so bummed out—and terrified—about Forensics that she wouldn’t have been able to talk anyway! She looked over at Marie and the new girl talking happily to one another. Izzy was filled with a sense of longing. In the old days, Marie would have known just what to say to calm Izzy and figure out what to do about the dreaded Forensics.

  But not now.

  Granddad had told Izzy about a phenomenon in physics called a black hole. He explained that if you shrink a large mass—like my friendship with Marie, thought Izzy—enough, it becomes a black hole that has so much mass that not even light can escape its warp. The center of a black hole was called a singularity. Izzy thought that “singularity” was the loneliest word she’d ever heard. And right now, even though she was sitting at a lunch table with her friends and was surrounded by noisy kids, somehow Izzy felt exactly like a singularity.

  The weather was still unseasonably cold the next day. But as Izzy, Allie, and Charlie walked into school, it felt colder inside the building than out! A boy behind them said in a deep announcer’s voice, “Welcome to Day Two of the Atom Middle School freeze-out crisis.” It was Trevor.

  Without thinking, Izzy came back with “Everyone’s wondering: How low can it go, temperature-wise?” At the same instant, she and Trevor both said, “Absolute zero!”

  “Good one!” Allie howled. “You two should put on a comedy show or something! Go on the road! Together!”

  Eeek, shrieked Izzy inside her head. She went hot with embarrassment.

  But Trevor just grinned and waved and walked away saying, “See you later.”

  With her elbow, Allie nudged Izzy so hard that Izzy was thrown off balance. “That boy is cute,” she said. “And he’s interested in y-o-u, Isabelle Newton, my friend.”

  Izzy blushed. “No, no—he’s nice to everyone,” she said.

  “Mm-hmm, sure,” said Allie, “but mostly he’s nice to you.”

  “Too far, too fast, Al,” said Charlie. “You’re making Izzy uncomfortable, can’t you see?”

  “Sorrr-eee,” said Allie, miffed.

  “Come on, Miss Matchmaker,” Izzy teased. She linked her arm through Allie’s. “We’d better get a move on or we’ll be late.”

  “This whole middle-school thing about switching classes and getting to class on time is hard,” said Charlie. She and Izzy and Allie were so squeezed together in the center of the crowd of students clogging the hallway that they could hardly breathe. “I feel like we’re some sort of six-legged, six-armed, three-headed monster creature.”

  Allie nodded. “Three and a half minutes is not enough time to get from one classroom to another,” she said.

  “Not for this volume of bodies in motion,” added Izzy.

  “Especially on the stairs,” added Charlie. One kid was trying to slide down the banister so as to avoid the herd on the stairs. The stairs were another middle-school thing. Unlike their all-on-one-floor elementary school, Atom Middle School had three levels: basement, first floor, and second floor. Today the traffic jam on both staircases was significantly worse than the day before because kids had wised up about how cold it was in the building. They were wearing puffy winter coats, and so they took up even more space. Students weren’t supposed to wear coats and jackets in class, but it was so cold in the school that teachers had made an exception.

  “After someone solves the mystery of why the school is cold, someone should solve the problem of the stairs,” said Charlie.

  “I wish somebody would,” agreed Allie, “and soon, before we’re all squashed flat.”

  “Well,” Izzy admitted, “today’s the first day of Forensics, so I’d love to be squashed flat; that sounds like more fun than making speeches.”

  “Oh, Izzy!” Allie exclaimed. “I’m sorry. I forgot. You must be nervous.”

  “You’ll do just fine,” Charlie reassured her. “I’m sure.”

  “Me too,” said Izzy with a twisted grin. “Not.”

  The girls parted, and then Charlie called out to Izzy, “Want a snack to calm your nerves?”

  “No, thanks!” Izzy called back. She was so jittery that the last thing she could do was scarf down some kale chips; she’d choke! Izzy slunk into the Forensics classroom and took a seat in the back. I told Granddad I was worried I might be invisible, she thought. Now I wish I were.

  It turned out that Forensics was not as bad as Izzy had expected it to be. It was worse. First, she had to stand up and say her name and tell what elementary school she was from, which made her totally nervous. She knew she sounded very Dizzy Izzy-ish as she stumbled along, mumbling, “I’m Izzy, I mean Isabelle Longview, I mean Newton from Elementary School, I mean Longview.”

  Everyone snickered.

  Ms. Martinez, the teacher, just said, “Okay! Next?” But Izzy saw her make a note in her attendance book.

  Probably: “Worst Speaker Ever,” Izzy thought.

  “The first rule of Forensics is: Have something you want to say,” said Ms. Martinez. “You can’t speak with conviction unless you care about your topic. So today, I want you to make a list of topics you’ll research and then prepare and deliver a speech about.” Izzy felt as though she had swallowed a stone. Oh, help! she thought miserably. She opened her notebook, took out a piece of paper, and stared at the blank page. All around her other students were scribbling
madly, churning out ideas.

  Ms. Martinez walked up and down the aisles looking at the students’ papers and chatting briefly with them about what they had written. When she came to Izzy and saw that Izzy had written nothing, Ms. Martinez tapped Izzy’s paper. “Come on, Izzy,” she said. “Your paper is empty, but I’m sure that your brain isn’t. I’m not asking for a long list. Just one idea that you feel strongly about and have something to say about will do.”

  “Okay,” Izzy croaked. Ms. Martinez moved on. One idea? thought Izzy. Sure, I do have one idea I feel strongly about and have something to say—in fact, shout—about. It’s the same idea I had before: Isn’t there ANY way I can get out of this class?

  * * *

  If Izzy was hoping for a calm time after Forensics, lunchtime was not it. The scene in the cafeteria was wild. Seventh and eighth graders recruiting for teams and clubs had taken over. They had taped labels to tables with the names of their clubs and teams. They stood on chairs shouting out encouragement to the sixth graders, saying, “Line up to sign up!” Members of the French Club wore paper berets and handed out French fries. Rock climbers demoed their gear, yoga clubbers twisted themselves into pretzels, and the volleyball team was tossing mini volleyballs to one another across the cafeteria. A few members of the Marching Band had set up in the corner and were playing and dancing to the Atom Middle School’s fight song, which was, of course, “The Electric Slide.”

  Several teachers and Mr. Delmonico roamed the room keeping an eye on everybody. In the throng, Izzy spotted Charlie eating an energy bar and doing warm-up stretches with the track team at their table. Allie bounced from the Homecoming Committee table to the tables for Math Club, Pep Squad, Orchestra, Jazz Dance, and Chorus—far too many activities to handle. Although if any human being could do it, that person would be Allie, thought Izzy, watching her energetic friend.