Sal and Gabi Fix the Universe

by Carlos Hernandez

  When in doubt, Sal, check your pockets.

  It was a tight fit, but I managed to squirm a hand into my right front pocket. And what do you know? It was absolutely brimming with ideas.

  I pulled out a handful of “ideas,” maneuvered my hand over to the hole in the universe, shoved it through, and let drop everything it had been holding.

  I heard many screams coming from many different chicken workers’ mouths. They all started speaking very loudly, all at once, but one person very distinctly yelled, “¡Está lloviendo cucarachas!” Another person confirmed, shouting, “¡Cucarachas infernales!”

  Since I’d dropped a handful of fake roaches, hopefully on the head of the chicken worker coming for me, their shouting made sense. And I can’t say I didn’t laugh when they called them “cockroaches from hell.”

  But if the woman pursuing me said anything, I couldn’t hear it over the exclamations of horror and wonder coming from everybody else. What I did hear, after a few seconds’ delay, is that she started making her way up the ladder again, plodding, plotting her revenge.

  “Welcome, everyone, to the Yasmany Robles Show!” Yasmany said just outside the locker door, nice and loud, so everybody in the hallway (and everybody stuffed inside lockers) could hear him. “Now a lot of you were standing right here, in this very spot, a few weeks ago, when Sal Vidón pulled a magic trick on me. He made me look like the biggest sandwich in the history of sandwiches in front of the whole school. I swore I’d get revenge on him. But how?”

  “So, are you planning to beat him up, like a worthless bully would?” asked Gabi. She was a solid actor, but I think she went a little heavy-handed there. But to her credit, she had created this show in, like, twenty seconds. She’d had zero time for rehearsal.

  “No, Gabi!” said Yasmany. “I’m a changed chacho! No more bullying for me! Yeah, sure, I want my revenge, ¿cómo que no? But I want to get it the Sal Vidón way.”

  I have to admit, that was pretty good. Yasmany was a better actor than I thought he’d be. He was clearly saying lines Gabi had written for him, but he’d memorized them in, like, two seconds and was delivering them as well as Gabi was delivering hers.

  It sounded fun. I wish I could have just focused all my attention on enjoying the show.

  But since that terrifying chicken worker was still climbing up the ladder, more than half of my attention was devoted to desperately reaching into my pocket for more “ideas” to slow her down. I grabbed the next batch of “inspiration” and dropped it into the poultry-verse.

  More screaming, even louder than before. “¡Arañas pelu’as!” said many traumatized chicken workers. “¡Arañas venenosas! ¡Cuida’o, Ydania! ¡Si te muerden, te mueres!”

  Well, the tarantulas I’d lobbed were not in fact venomous, since they were fake. But there was no denying they were hairier than a barber’s floor. That part they got right.

  Also, thanks to their yelling, I was able to figure out that the relentless woman coming to get me was named Ydania, since that was the person everybody was warning to watch out for falling spiders. Not sure how that information could possibly help me, but you never know. I tucked that little factoid away for future use.

  And I didn’t hear any ladder noises for a good long time. That was good news and bad news. The good news was that Ydania wasn’t getting any closer. The bad news was that she wasn’t climbing down the ladder, either. She was deciding what to do.

  “And then,” said Yasmany, “it came to me. To get my revenge, I would have to think like the enemy. Become the enemy. So I went to the library—”

  Everybody laughed.

  “Shut up! I tol’ you, I’m a changed man! I went to the library and researched how I could become”—he paused for effect—“an hechicero.”

  “A what?” asked Gabi, sounding very much like the plant she was.

  “An hechicero. You know, a brujo, like Sal. A witch boy.”

  The crowd said “ooh” like cows say moo. Yasmany had them right where he wanted them. He was giving a great performance! I wished I could be seeing it, and not just hearing it from the inside of his locker. But then again, this show would never be taking place if I weren’t in the locker, so…

  I was enjoying the act so much, I almost forgot that Ydania wanted to make my devil buns her lunch. But when I heard footsteps on the ladder again, getting closer, I remembered all the way down to the center of my bones.

  Fear made me angry, and anger made me determined. This had to end, now.

  I reached into my pocket yet again, but this time, I knew what I wanted. I burrowed all the way to the bottom, past all the other gags I had in there, and pulled out what I’d been looking for: an egg. It was a plastic one like the kind they put candy in at Easter time, except a little bigger than average, and more realistic-looking—off-white with brown speckles. And it wasn’t filled with candy.

  It was filled with green slime.

  I love slime. I don’t know why, exactly, but I do. I love to make it, to carry it with me, to make people hold it, and to hold it myself. I look for any possible opportunity to share it with others. Sadly, daily life isn’t exactly full of occasions when slime is useful.

  Never had I needed the power of slime more than I did in that moment. Egg in hand, I reached through the rip in spacetime, pulled the egg halves apart with my thumb and index finger, and whip-flicked out the slime as hard as I could.

  A chorus of horror resounded from the poultry-verse. “Aiiiieeee!” squealed Ydania, who had gotten close enough to me that I could clearly hear her peal of disgust above everybody else’s. “¡Mocos del diablo!”

  She could handle cockroaches, she could endure tarantulas, but devil snot was too much for even her to take.

  Fast, heavy footfalls landed on ladder rungs as Ydania scampered down. Advice about how to get the devil boogers off her rose like a riot from the other chicken workers. “¡Agua bendita!” “¡Ajo y sal!” “¡Ponte mi escapulario!” “¡Corre a la ducha!” “¡Llama al sacerdote!”

  Like they would know. I mean, how many of them had been slimed by a devil before? People sure do like to pretend like they know what they’re talking about.

  Oh, right. Yasmany’s show must be getting close to the end.

  “—taken me weeks of studying,” he was saying, “but finally, I have become a real hechicero. And to prove it, I am going to pull a chicken out of my locker before your very eyes, just like Sal did. All I have to do is remove my lock”—I heard him spinning the lock, left twenty-three, right fourteen, left six (Gabi and I were in Yasmany’s locker almost every day, so I knew his combination better than I knew my own)—“remove it like so, and then say the magic words:

  “Gallo, gallo, please appear

  In my locker, now and here,

  If you do, seré un héroe:

  Culeco’s favorite hechicero!”

  The door flew open. My legs sprang out of the locker like peanut-can snakes. A hall filled with theater kids gasped for real. I squinted, my eyes needing to adjust to the light.

  “Well,” said Yasmany, overacting his surprise, “I promised you all a chicken, but I think I’ve outdone myself! What do you think, Sal?”

  I started working the rest of my cramped self out of the locker; Yasmany carefully helped me out and down. Once I’d waited two beats to kick some blood back into my feet and stretch a little, I handed him the egg I’d been holding.

  “What do I think?” I said to the audience, in the showmanniest way I knew how. “Abracadabra, chicken pluckers.”

  Gabi hopped between Yasmany and me and, while holding hands, the three of us had to take four bows before the audience would even consider ending their applause.

  They might have kept going, too, except someone was slow-clapping louder than everybody else. Sarcastically. It soured the whole ovation. People stopped putting their hands together to see who was ruining the moment.

  It was Aventura. Her White Rabbit bunny paws were like two pillows hitting each other,
if two pillows could hit each other with a snide, derisive thump. “Bravo,” she said, her voice dripping with poison. “Oh, bravo, Sal. I suppose you think this is what a show should be like, instead of the mess you think Rompenoche is.”

  I felt suddenly like I was drowning: dying so quietly, no one would even realize I needed help. Nobody in the hallway moved. I didn’t know what to say.

  Aventura walked up to me. Gabi and Yasmany both took a step away. Cowards.

  “Well,” said Aventura, “you’re right. And you’re going to fix it.”

  Then she grabbed me by the ear and dragged me off.

  “WELCOME BACK, MR. VIDÓN,” said Principal Torres from across her desk, her tone as dry as dry ice, and three times as cold. “It’s been a whole twenty-four hours since I’ve seen you in my office, hasn’t it?”

  Once more in solidarity with the students of Culeco, Principal Torres was dressed as a character from the Alice books. This time, it was the Duchess. Her hat was wider than my chair and covered with fake fur and gilt. She wore a gold-on-gold cloak over a green gown. None of these things truly identified her as the Duchess, however. What really nailed down her character was that she had a doll of a baby boy that, if you pulled the baby gown it was wearing over its head, turned into a pig.

  “Maybe a few more than twenty-four,” I answered glumly, still rubbing my ear.

  “A few more…” she repeated, polishing her glasses, then slipping them back on. They made her eyes gigantic and her glaring that much more effective. I’m pretty sure the Duchess didn’t have glasses, but honestly, I think it helped the costume.

  “Quite a show you put on for us this morning. Quite a merry chase you led us on.”

  “Oh, good!” I said, acting as cheery as I could. “I was worried you were going to be mad. I’m so glad you thought it was merry!”

  She frowned. “I did not find it merry, Sal. That was sarcasm. In truth, I found it exceedingly un-merry. Why, I’d say it was one of my top-five unmerriest moments of the school year so far.” The sarcasm fell away; she became serious and sad. “Do you have any idea how frightening it was when Mr. Milagros opened the door to the bathroom and we discovered you weren’t in there anymore?”

  I watched my feet kick the legs of the tiny chair I was sitting in. “Yes. No. Kind of ? I’m sorry. I just…”

  I stopped talking.

  “Yes?” she prompted.

  I looked up at her. “I don’t want to make excuses, Principal Torres.”

  “So don’t. Tell me the truth.”

  Since she didn’t specify which truth—and there were so many to choose from—I picked one. “The truth is, I was coming out of the bathroom. But then I saw Aventura. And I just couldn’t face her then.”

  “Well, you’re facing me now, aren’t you?” asked Aventura, who was sitting next to me in an equally tiny chair. She was, without a doubt, the angriest bunny this side of Wonderland.

  I thought this visit to the principal’s office was going to be a nonstop Sal bash. So I was caught off guard when Principal Torres turned her controlled, professional ferocity on Aventura. “Ms. Rios, you will be silent until spoken to. Or do you think I’ve already forgiven you for committing an act of violence against Sal?”

  Aventura grimaced with surprise. “Act of violence? What?”

  “From the moment you pulled him into my office, Sal hasn’t stopped rubbing his ear.”

  I stopped rubbing my ear. “Oh. It’s okay, Principal Torres. I gave my enthusiastic consent for Aventura to yank me around the school by the ear.” I almost didn’t say the next thing, but when I thought about not saying it, I found I couldn’t. “We all know I deserved it.”

  Principal Torres leaned forward and folded her hands on the desk. “Actually, Sal, you didn’t. Nobody deserves to be hurt by someone else. And even if you gave consent, I did not. Students don’t hurt other students at my school. Do you understand me, Aventura?”

  Aventura somehow looked fierce and apologetic at the same time. “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Good. Before we move on to Sal, then, tell me: What do you think would be an appropriate punishment for you?”

  Aventura sat up, took in a calming breath, and straightened her bunny ears to their full and upright position. “What I did was very wrong, so it must be a big punishment. I think you should remove me as the director of Rompenoche. You should make Sal the director instead. He’s good at shows.”

  Principal Torres fell back into her office chair in contemplation. With a slight smile on her face, she touched her nose and looked at the wall to her right. She decided something. Her eyes twinkled.

  “No,” she said, swiveling back to look at Aventura. “No, that’s not happening.”

  “Oh,” said Aventura, sounding…disappointed?

  “Because you’d like it if I removed you as director of Rompenoche, wouldn’t you?”

  Aventura’s head fell and bounced heavily on her neck, making her ears flap and flop. “Yus.”

  “What?!” I asked. Because, what?!

  Aventura turned murderously on me. “Nee nee nee! Don’t you ‘what’ me, cacaseca boy. You’re the one who said Rompenoche was the worst show you’d ever seen.”

  I faced her. It was hard, but I did it. “I’m really sorry. I didn’t see you when I said that. I never would have said that if I knew you were standing right there.”

  She leaned back, folded her arms. “So, you would have lied to my face if you knew I was there? Lied to me like everyone else has been lying to me?”

  Man, I just couldn’t say the right thing. “No! I mean, not lied. I just would have been…less rude. I could have given you constructive criticism, like Señorx Cosquillas says.”

  “Señorx?” mused bemused Principal Torres.

  But before I could change the subject and explain, Aventura laid into me. “Nee nee nee, Sal. You would have lied to my face, like everyone else in this school.” Aventura stood up, stomping as she paced. “Why is Culeco full of two-faced liars? Why can’t anybody just give me a straight answer? How am I supposed to work under these conditions? I’m sorry, Principal Torres, but given the circumstances, I’m sure you’ll understand why I must resign as director of Rompenoche.”

  This tantrum was nothing I ever would have expected out of Aventura. She’d always been so cool and sly and in control. I didn’t think there was anything that could have made her have a meltdown this nuclear.

  Quietly, patiently, speaking into her tented hands, Principal Torres said to her, “Are you finished, Ms. Rios?”

  Dang, son. That was harsh. Aventura cast her eyes around the room, her bunny ears bent like broken stalks of corn. She sat down quickly, shaken, stunned. “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Let’s look at some facts, Aventura, shall we? You are the best costume maker in the school—”

  Aventura put up her hands defensively. “Oh, I don’t—”

  “You’ve had your say, Ms. Rios. Now I will have mine.” Principal Torres was joking when she said that. But low-key not. “Everybody knows you’re the best. Yet you’ve had the entire school helping you make costumes. Some of us have been working on them since the summer. If you’re the best, why didn’t you just make them all yourself ?”

  Aventura squashed her eyebrows together into sideways question marks. “Because there’s no way I could do it by myself ? It would have taken me a million years.”

  “It would have taken you a million years to make them all perfect,” Principal Torres corrected, standing up and walking over to Aventura. “But pretend that you absolutely had to do all the costumes yourself, and you had to finish them in ten weeks. What would happen to the quality?”

  “There wouldn’t be any quality. The costumes would be trash.”

  “Right. And that’s coming from the number one seamstress in the school. So, how many people helped you write the script for Rompenoche?”

  Aventura made a big, comic clown frown and looked away. “I kinda didn’t care about the script? Because I
just wanted to make some fancy costumes? Which is why I just used Lewis Carroll stuff ? So I could just kinda throw something together?”

  Principal Torres grabbed her shoulders. “You get it now, sí? Art is mostly effort. You put your time in places other than the script. And, according to Sal and you, your lack of effort in the script department is showing.”

  Aventura squirmed free. “Okay, but hold up. I gave you the script two weeks ago. Why didn’t you tell me it was a catbox, Principal Torres?”

  “Because,” Principal Torres replied, strolling around her office like a lawyer giving closing statements, “it doesn’t matter! The parents are gonna love it no matter what! When they see their little darling dressed up as a playing card, or a mock turtle, or a Cheshire Hamster or whatever, they’ll go bonkers! You have to understand, Aventura: These poor, benighted parents have spent years going to their kids’ terrible recorder recitals, their boring soccer games, and their mind-numbing plays. I promise you, as bad as you think your play is, it’s far better than anything they’ve ever seen their kids do at school. And the costumes, Aventura! They are truly—” She finished the sentence with a chef ’s kiss.

  Only then did she notice Aventura giving her a cacaseca face. She pretended to get defensive. “Look, missy, I’m a busy woman. I have to pick my battles. So the play’s not perfect. So what? If you want to put on a show that’s mostly about the costumes, that’s fine with me! It’s plenty good enough for parent-teacher conference night. I am prepared to go forward with it as is, no questions asked. I mean”—she looked expectantly at Aventura over her shoulder—“unless you really want to change it at this point.”

  Oh, man. The way Principal Torres fluttered her eyelids, there was no way Aventura could have missed that hint. But she didn’t need the hint anyway. She was straight-spined now, yet relaxed, in control again, back to her sly, wry self. “Principal Torres, I would really like to change Rompenoche. Get some people to help me make it a not-terrible show.”