Spin the Golden Light Bulb

by Jackie Yeager

  After dinner, they suggest we go to the mechanics room on the fifth floor. We’re mixed in with the teams from Hawaii, Georgia, and New Mexico, but with so many instructors and materials, we get our questions answered. We play with the metal gears for a while and eventually figure out a way to make our box open and close, and rotate in both directions.

  While we’re cleaning up our materials, a girl from Hawaii walks over to our table. Her eyes are very brown, and her smile is friendly. “Hi, guys! I’m Kolleane.”

  Jillian looks up. “Hi, I’m Jillian. You’re from Hawaii!”

  Kolleane laughs. “Yes, I am.”

  “You’re so lucky,” says Ander. “Do you surf and climb volcanoes and stuff?”

  “Well, I do surf—sometimes. And I have hiked up a volcano before, but only once.”

  “I want to visit there so badly!” says Jillian. “And wear grass skirts!”

  “Me too,” I say. “And go to a luau!”

  “Well, I want to visit New York City,” she replies. “Do any of you live there?”

  “No, we all live about six hours away,” says Mare. “It is amazing though. If you like shopping.”

  “Oh, I like shopping!”

  “There are other things to do there besides shop,” says Ander.

  “That’s why I want to go,” says Kolleane. “I want to be an artist. I’d love to see all the museums.”

  Jax clears his throat. “It’s kind of cold in the winter.”

  “I wouldn’t mind. I’ve never even seen snow!”

  “We have lots of it in New York,” I say.

  “Hmm—maybe someday . . . Well, I better catch up with my team now; we have a lot of work to do tonight.” She walks out of the mechanics room, waving. “See ya later!”

  “See ya!” calls Jillian.

  “She was so nice,” I say.

  “Yeah, she was,” says Ander. “Really nice.”

  I punch him on his shoulder.

  “What? I was just admiring the beauty of Hawaiian culture, wasn’t I, Jax?”

  Jax shrugs. “I guess so.”

  “Well her team is going to be working hard tonight. She said it herself. Maybe we should too.”

  “I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that,” says Mare. “Besides, I heard they’re delivering special snacks to our bedchambers tonight. I don’t want to miss it.”

  THE PERFECT PLAN

  When the girls and I get back to our bedchamber after lunch the next day, I stare at the calendar. How can we finish so many things in three weeks? We haven’t even started the original language yet. I bite on my poor pinky nail but quickly tuck it into my fist. That’s not helping me figure this out.

  I think back to the weeks before the Piedmont Challenge. How did I get ready for so many tasks all at once? I know—Grandma Kitty and I made a schedule. I worked on one hundred practice problems in each category during the months of April and May, and I think that’s what it took for me to win. That’s it. I need to make a plan. But Grandma Kitty isn’t here. Who can help me this time?

  Jillian is sprawled on the floor adding more cobwebs to Mare’s costume. She’s in her own world, like she always is when she’s creating something. She hums some song, and her head tips from side to side. I don’t think she realizes she’s doing it.

  Mare is sitting inside the closet organizing her clothes cubby. She has arranged her shirts and shorts into separate piles. Then she organizes them by color. She uses a ruler to measure her T-shirts after she folds them. By the time she finishes, her piles are perfect.

  Mare. That’s it. She’s perfect. She’s organized, and she doesn’t want to look like an idiot in front of everyone. But . . . she’s Mare. I don’t want to ask her for help. Ugh! I let out a huge breath and pick up a pencil. “Mare, can you come here?”

  “Huh?”

  “I need help.”

  She crawls out of the cubby and sits down next to me. “What?”

  “Okay, so we have twenty-one days until we do our play for the judges.”

  “So?”

  “And we have a lot of things left to do, like draw and paint and learn our lines and make up our new language—”

  “Why are you panicking? We have three weeks.”

  “I don’t want to make a fool of myself in front of the judges.”

  Her eyes narrow. “Me neither.”

  “Well, we can’t start rehearsing until all these things are done, and don’t you want to have enough time to rehearse?”

  “We better have enough time. That’s the only way I agreed to do a play in the first place. All of you promised me.”

  “That’s why I need your help.”

  “What do you need?”

  “I need someone to make a schedule for the next twenty-one days. We have to get everything done so we have enough time left to practice. You’re so organized; you can help all of us stay on track. Ander wants to take a break every five minutes; Jax wants to work on the movable set or research stuff on his computer; and Jillian is off in her own world with our costumes. See? Look at her.”

  Jillian is still singing to herself and stuffing more padding into Ander’s vest.

  “Will you help me make a schedule so we have enough time to rehearse?”

  “I guess. I don’t want to make a fool of myself, so sure, I’ll help you.”

  “Yes! Thank you. Here’s the calendar. What should we do?”

  “Let me see that.” She turns the calendar her way. “I think we should work backwards. Which day is the competition?”

  How does she not know that? “It’s a two-day competition. July 28th and July 29th.”

  “How many days do you think we need to rehearse?”

  “At least a week.”

  “You said we have twenty-one days left, but look. One of those days is today and one is the first day of the competition, so we actually only have nineteen days.

  I tap my pencil on the table. “That’s worse than I thought.”

  “We’ll make it work.” She twists her hair into a ponytail. “Let’s start rehearsals on July 19th. That gives us a full week and a few extra days right before the competition starts—just in case.”

  “Just in case what?”

  “In case we need extra practice time. We are not going to make fools of ourselves up on that stage, remember?” She smiles and I do too. She doesn’t look so mean for once.

  “That means we have all these other days to finish the work.”

  My stomach churns. “That’s nine days.”

  “Yes. Nine.”

  “That’s not a lot.” I turn to a new page in my notebook. “Okay, let’s make a list. You write. I’ll dictate.”

  When we’re done, this is our list:

  -Finish script

  -Sketch pictures onto box

  -Paint box.

  -Build mechanical pieces for box.

  -Attach box to mechanical pieces.

  -Finish costumes.

  -Make up language.

  -Add language to script.

  -Decide how each category is used in our solution.

  -Create document that shows how we used each category.

  -Learn lines.

  -Rehearse.

  Gulp. This list is really long.

  We divide up the jobs and close the notebook.

  “Thanks, Mare. At least we have a plan.”

  “We just have to work hard for the next nine days.”

  “Work hard? I can definitely do that.”

  ***

  At 7:00 p.m. the next night, we meet up with the team from Nevada for Round Two of Nacho Cheese Ball. Several other teams have gathered on the sidelines to watch. Five boys stand across from us in the neutral zone. This is not good. What chance do we have against them? A boy with black ha
ir crosses his arms in front of him. “Ready to get smashed with cheese?” His grin is huge. His teeth are crooked. I consider grabbing my teammates and making a run for it. We could sprint back to our bedchambers and work on our solution. Instead, I look Crooked Teeth straight in the eye. I’m not a quitter. I clutch my bucket and plant my feet.

  The whistle blows and I run. These boys won’t expect me to be fast. Ander has the same idea. We dodge them, and as we get within throwing range, we scoop up cheese balls and fire off shot after shot. 58, 22, 22, 46, 10 points! The scoreboard lights up. 222 points from just Ander and me. But my victory is short lived. Splat! Cheese smacks me in the neck and oozes down my back. Gross! Crooked teeth runs for our target but not before I whip him in the foot. But I must have a target on my back. One, two, three globs hit me and I wipe out on the slippery grass.

  By the time the cheese war is over, I’m covered in orange goo, and I’m sure we’ve gotten creamed. My team gathers underneath the scoreboard but I see I was wrong. We’ve beaten team Nevada by fourteen points and advanced to Round Three—the Semi-Finals!

  NINE DAYS

  Mare and I sketch pictures on each side of the wooden box while Ander and Jax connect the pieces to hold it up. Jillian has just finished our costumes when Seraphina brings us five clear bags with our names written on them. Mare folds the costumes perfectly and tucks them inside. We find a safe spot—in an old cabinet in the back of the shed—and hide them away.

  On day two, Jillian begins inventing the new language. She has a plan so we leave her alone. Mare and I paint the pictures on the box, and we actually make a good team. She’s careful when she paints and even though we don’t talk a lot, I get the feeling that she doesn’t mind working with me too much.

  On day three, all but one of the sides are painted. The five of us lift the box and turn it so we can paint the last side—the Ghost Gallery.

  “I want to paint today—can I?” Ander asks. “I haven’t gotten to paint at all.”

  “Well, if Ander’s going to paint, can Mare help me with the language? I need someone else to practice it with,” Jillian says.

  “I’m sick of painting anyway,” says Mare. “No offense, Kia.”

  I shrug. As long as we stay on schedule, I don’t care where she works. I turn to Jax. He’s winding a crank on the base machine.

  “Jax, do you need help?”

  “Nah, I’m fine. I’ll start working on the platform.”

  So Ander and I paint while Jax goes to the corner of the shed, and Mare and Jillian leave to work outside.

  “So, KK, what should I paint first?”

  “Why don’t you paint the letters to Ghost Gallery, and I’ll paint the pictures?”

  “Cool. Does it matter what colors I paint them? Wait. I got it. They need to be gray and black, but not painted perfectly. They should be smeared and then dripping in red—red blood.”

  “That’s great!”

  “Yes! I like when that happens.”

  “When what happens?”

  “Have you ever had a lot of stuff going on in your head? You know, like an awesome idea?”

  “Yeah.”

  “No, I mean a really awesome idea, like you just can’t wait to get it out of your head. The only trouble is, sometimes it’s small and you don’t know how to turn it into something bigger.”

  I laugh. “Yeah, I get that—all the time. Only sometimes I have so many ideas at once that they get jumbled. It’s like they want to swirl around free until they can get bigger but they can’t until I can find a way to untangle them. It’s really frustrating when I can’t. I’m happier when they can just swirl in my head.”

  Ander stares at me.

  Great. I’ve done it again. He’s definitely going to think I’m weird, if he doesn’t already.

  “Wow.”

  “Wow, what?”

  “I’ve never heard anyone explain it like that before. I totally get what you’re talking about.”

  I stare back. “You do?”

  He walks in a circle around the box. I’m not sure where he’s going. “So your ideas just get in the way of each other sometimes?”

  “Yes.”

  “You must have a lot of ideas.” I feel my face turn red.

  “Yeah.”

  “And they swirl around?”

  Now I’m sure he can see my face burning. “Pretty much.”

  “Well, I don’t have too many ideas—and they definitely don’t swirl. I usually have one idea at a time and it’s like torture waiting for it to make sense. But when it does, when it turns into a full blown amazing idea, I feel this thing— this spark.”

  “A spark?”

  “Yeah, like kaboom! It explodes in my head, and I suddenly figure out what it means. I feel a spark.”

  “That’s pretty cool.”

  “Yeah—like the letters. I knew we had to find a way to make the letters seem ghostlike, and so I felt that spark when I thought of the dripping blood idea.”

  I shake my head. “I get it now.”

  “So where’s the red paint? I’ll start with the drips.”

  We paint and I realize that it’s easy talking to Ander. I don’t have to hide what I’m thinking. “Do you like going to school at Crimson?” I ask him.

  “That’s a random question.”

  “Well, do you?”

  “I don’t know. I never thought about it before. It’s not like we have another choice for school.”

  “Yeah, I know.”

  “Don’t you like it there?”

  “It’s okay.”

  “I don’t remember seeing you around at school. Who are some of your other friends?”

  “My other friends?”

  “Yeah, like who do you hang out with?”

  “Oh, a bunch of kids. You probably don’t know them.”

  “Oh.”

  “I mean I have friends. Well, I had a best friend, but she doesn’t like listening to my invention ideas anymore, and she told me to be best friends with someone who does. I just haven’t found anyone yet.”

  “Oh.”

  “Plus, it’s so big at Crimson. I hate that everyone calls each other by their number instead of their name.”

  “I hate that too. I like nicknames better.”

  “Do you give all your friends nicknames?”

  “Nope. You’re the first one.”

  I don’t know what to say to that. My stomach feels all flippy inside again. “Um, thanks.”

  “Yup.”

  “I don’t actually think I’ve ever had a real friend before.”

  He looks up from his red drips. I’m such an idiot. Why did I tell him that?

  He laughs. Not at me, but like I said something funny. “Well, now you do, KK. Real friend at your service.”

  At about two o’clock, Jillian and Mare come back to the shed, and Ander announces it’s time for all of us to take a break.

  “Why now?” asks Jillian. “Seraphina and Gregor will be here to check in with us in ten minutes.”

  “Exactly. I need a break before Gregor comes. He’s always watching me, and staring at every crank I attach and hole I drill. I need to mentally prepare myself for his check in.”

  We lean against paint cans where the cement floor is so cold it chills my bare legs. Jax pulls his computer out of his backpack. This doesn’t surprise me though. He does this during break time.

  Mare watches him. “What are you doing on that thing all the time anyway?”

  “Research.”

  “For what?”

  “App stuff.”

  “What do you mean, app stuff?”

  “I’ve been researching how to make computer apps.”

  “Why?” asks Jillian.

  “I want to make one.”

  “That’s co
ol,” says Ander. “But don’t you want to relax for a minute?”

  He doesn’t have a chance to answer. Gregor barges into the shed, looking stern as ever. We jump to our feet. “Break time? You must feel very confident in your solution if you’re allowing yourselves to slow down.”

  Uh oh.

  Seraphina strolls in behind him. “Oh, hush, Mr. Serious. Everyone deserves a break, especially with cupcakes. There’s one for each of you in all of your favorite colors.” She holds out a box of multi-colored cupcakes. We attack them like vultures. I take yellow, Jillian takes pink, Mare takes light blue, Ander takes midnight blue, and Jax takes green.

  “How did you know these were our favorite colors?” Jillian asks.

  Seraphina smiles. “You’re my team. Of course I know important things like that. And Gregor, you should take notes. Not only do children need fresh air to be creative, they need snacks.”

  “Very well, then while you eat, tell me the status of your solution.”

  We look at each other but no one says anything. They’re such wimps. One time I won’t answer and they’ll have to.

  “Well,” I say, “our rotating object is almost painted. Then all we have to do is attach it to the platform over in that corner. That’s the mechanical part that’ll make it move.”

  Gregor doesn’t say anything.

  “Um, and we finished our script. We just have to add the language.”

  “I see.”

  “And our costumes are done too!” Jillian says.

  “And have you incorporated all six categories into your solution?”

  “No,” I say, “But we have five days until we have to rehearse. And we have a schedule that we’re following, so we’ll definitely get it done.”

  He doesn’t look convinced.

  “So what do you think?” I ask.

  “It looks great,” says Seraphina. “I can tell you’ve been working really hard.”

  “We have,” says Mare. “Very hard.”

  Gregor walks around our wooden box. “So, your team is sure that this Ghost Gallery is the best way to solve this problem?”