I Am Fartacus

by Mark Maciejewski

  Cheating must not be the only way Mace can win. He has to have some sort of skill to have made it to the last table at a legitimate tournament. Mace has the largest pile of chips, Archer’s is half the size of Mace’s, and Moby’s is smaller still. It isn’t time to panic yet. Moby is still in it, and Mace can’t cheat here.

  I have to believe Moby can do it.

  Stacks of chips grow and shrink, and one by one players leave the table shaking their heads, until finally just the Arch, Mace, and Moby are left.

  For the plan to work, the Arch has to walk out empty-handed. It’s all up to Moby now.

  The room goes quiet as the dealer hands each player two cards and the players study them. Then all three players toss chips into the middle. This is the first bet they all have to make if they want to see the next three cards.

  The dealer will flip three of the five cards in front of her, and then the players get to mix her cards with the two secret ones they are holding. If they think their combination is good enough to beat everyone else’s, they’ll stay in and try to get the other players to bet all their money so they can take it.

  Moby sinks in his chair little by little as the dealer flips each new card. His shoulders sag almost to the floor when she turns over the third one. I can’t be sure from this far away, but it looks like he might cry. I can’t blame him. If there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that sometimes you can do everything right and still get dealt the wrong cards. He’s given it his best effort for the cadre and he’s come up a little short.

  The dealer motions to Moby. He taps the table and in his fake deep voice says, “Check.” It means he wants to see what the other guys do before he bets. I think he’s stalling because he knows it’s over.

  A sharky grin is plastered across the Arch’s face. He sees the same thing in Moby’s body language that I do—his cards aren’t good enough to win. The Arch licks his lips, probably tasting the victory that’s just one bet away.

  Mace bets next. He frowns at his cards too, but he has enough chips that he doesn’t have to worry about losing them all this hand. He counts out the same amount of chips from his own pile that the Arch has in his and pushes them to the center of the table. Then he slouches back in his chair and waits to see if his bet will pay off. If the Arch wants to stay in the game, he needs to push his entire pile into the middle of the table.

  The Arch has done the math just like I have. With Moby about to lose, second place is guaranteed. Without a moment’s hesitation the Arch shoves his entire pile of chips into the center, and the crowd lets out a gasp.

  “All in,” someone next to me whispers. When the Arch wins this hand, he will have enough chips to sit back and wait for a great hand to take Moby out. After he wins this hand, it will be over.

  Moby’s hunched over, his suit even more wrinkled than it already was. I wish I could go stand by him right now, but I can’t.

  The Arch leans forward, folds his arms on the table, and glares a challenge at Moby. Every eye in the place is on Moby, waiting to see what he will do. He flips some of his chips back and forth on the felt.

  “C’mon, Moby!” I say under my breath, hoping against hope there is some way to rescue this.

  The entire room waits to see what he will do. The Arch and Mace both sit taller.

  When it’s clear Moby isn’t going to act without prodding, the dealer says, “Your bet, sir.”

  Moby shakes his head in defeat. The Arch lets out a cocky chuckle as he waits for his plot to work out just like he planned.

  I suspect Moby is trying to figure out a way to pull one of his famous escapes in front of a ballroom full of people, when he looks up at the dealer. “Huh?”

  The Arch snorts and Mace rolls his eyes.

  The dealer sighs. “Your bet, Mr. Montana.”

  Mace chimes in, “Yeah, Chi Chi. What have you got?”

  Suddenly Moby sits up straight in his chair, the defeated posture gone.

  The Arch shifts nervously in his seat. All of his chips are already in the pot.

  “Go, Roos,” Moby says, winking at the Arch.

  The confidence flushes from the Arch’s face as he suddenly realizes who Chi Chi Montana actually is.

  What the heck is happening? Is this the moment I’ve been dreaming about since second grade?

  The Arch looks like he’s been kicked in the nuts as Moby shoves all of his chips into the middle of the table.

  “It’s called a bluff!” Moby says. We’re under the bleachers now that it’s all over.

  I’m still trying to understand what he’s just done. “You tricked him into betting it all and losing!”

  “That was the plan, right?” he says.

  I shake my head. “That was exactly the plan!”

  Moby holds up the second-place prize, a gaudy gold-plated bracelet, admiring it like a new species of frog he’s just discovered. “I’ve never won anything before.”

  I don’t want to crush his moment, so I let him admire his prize. “You know, Mobe, no one can ever know about that thing.”

  “You know,” he says, flipping it into a trash can and pulling out an envelope of prize money. “Check this out.” He hands it to me. It’s a lot heavier than the last one, and my eyes bulge at the sight of all those hundred-dollar bills.

  We wait under the bleachers while Mace collects his winnings and talks to a reporter. The place is deserted when he finally walks by us. Moby and I step out of the shadows and block his way.

  He nods at Moby. “Nice play, guy. Too bad it was only good for second place.”

  “That’s okay. I lost on purpose,” Moby says matter-of-factly.

  Mace raises an eyebrow, unable to comprehend why someone would do that.

  “It’s a long story,” Moby says.

  “Make sure you bring that prize money to my next game,” Mace says with a wink.

  “Yeah, that won’t be happening,” I say, pulling out the envelope and flipping through the bills. “In fact, the money is kind of what I want to talk to you about.”

  CHAPTER 24

  I’m at school early on Monday to get to the Arch before he has a chance to do anything. I hide in a hollow between two banks of lockers and wait. When the Arch opens his locker, I run over and stand behind the open door to do that cool thing where he shuts the door and I’m all of a sudden standing there. I smile when he jumps at the sight of me.

  His eyes are red and puffy like a pair of meatballs. He clearly hasn’t slept since the tournament, probably wondering when Mace would come to collect what he’s owed.

  “What do you want?” he sneers.

  “I hear track isn’t panning out, so I wanted to invite you to drama club.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  I take a step closer to him. Being seen with me in the halls makes him uncomfortable, and I still want him to squirm a little bit. “It means today’s the day you vote to give the money back to the clubs, tell everyone about the donated uniforms, and stop pretending to be something you’re not.”

  “It’s not that simple.” He leans his head against his locker.

  “I think it’s exactly that simple. It’s time you stopped pretending to be who people expect you to be, Archer. You actually aren’t that good at it.”

  “That’s not what I mean. I owe Mace a ton of money. I could’ve beaten him in a straight-up game and paid him off, but you and your little minion screwed it all up.” He shakes his head. “Now I’m in bigger trouble than ever.”

  He knows there are no more moves he can make. The game is over and he lost.

  Who has checkmate now?

  The Arch whispers something under his breath.

  “What was that?” I say.

  He head-butts his locker and kicks the door. “I said . . . I’m sorry.”

  “You will be when Mace gets ahold of you. He—”

  He cuts me off. “Not for that.”

  “What, then?”

  He rubs his eyes hard with one hand, t
hen jams it back into his pocket. “I wish I’d never walked out of the basement that day. None of this would’ve happened if . . . I guess I just wish we’d never stopped being friends.”

  I’m stunned by the words he just said. This is all I ever wanted to hear but absolutely the last thing I expected him to say to my face. We stand in silence for a minute or more. I think we’re both afraid to speak.

  “Why did you walk out on me like that?” I say.

  He wipes his nose on his sleeve. “I don’t know. I guess I panicked when I saw what happened to your hair. Then the next day you went from being just some kid to being the kid who gave the whole school lice. I saw how everyone looked at you, and I knew I couldn’t take them looking at me the same way. After that there was no going back.”

  “Things don’t have to be the way they’ve been,” I say. “It’s up to us.”

  “Your hair isn’t going to grow back.”

  My scalp gets warm and I run a hand over it.

  “Everybody thinks I’m the Arch. There’s nothing I can do about it anymore.”

  I shake my head.

  The truth is I’m tired of fighting with the Arch. And if the path I’ve been on ends with me running a crooked poker league in the basement of a bowling alley? Count me out.

  If my dad decides to sentence me to hard labor, so be it. I’ll dig those potatoes. Then I’ll come home and watch League of Honor on the Colonel’s Blu-ray player and go back to school next year as a normal student with his very own cadre.

  The Arch twists on the hook long enough. I fish in my pocket and pull out a handwritten note.

  “Call another vote today. Fund the clubs,” I say.

  “But Mace will kill me.”

  I hand him the note.

  “What’s this?” He unfolds the piece of paper and reads. “Who’s . . . Mason Finklebein?”

  “That’s a receipt from Mace showing your debt to him is paid in full.”

  I watch as it slowly sinks in what he’s holding.

  He stares at the note in disbelief. “You paid my debt to Mace?”

  “Welllll, technically Moby did, since it was his money. Consider it a gift from the cadre.”

  “The who?”

  “Never mind.” I still have some business to clear up before the first bell, and I need to get going. “You’re out. It’s over.” Then I turn and walk away.

  “Thank you,” he says in a small voice.

  I stop and turn back around. “You can thank me by doing the right thing when you meet today.” I want it to be the last word, but I can tell he has something else on his mind.

  He finally looks me in the eye. “I don’t know if I can stop being him.”

  I think about it for a second. “The Arch isn’t much without a nemesis,” I say. “So if you want to keep pretending to be some sort of hero, you’ll have to find somebody else to play the villain.”

  I walk away knowing the cadre and I have done the last thing anyone would’ve expected a bunch of outcasts to do. We’ve helped our enemy when he needed it most. Hopefully, in the process, we’ve put out the light known as the Arch.

  I know I’m done living in the shadows.

  Mrs. Osborne can’t hide her surprise when I ask to see Mr. Mayer. Usually when I end up in the office, he’s already expecting me. As the Colonel would say, he looks like a can of smashed buttholes when I walk into his office.

  I hand him the envelope with his own note from Mace, then walk out without saying a word.

  I have one more envelope in my pocket and only a few minutes until the first bell. I go outside to where the janitor’s office is and slip the last envelope under the door. After the debts were paid, lots of money was left over. The cadre agreed it would be best used to buy a new kangaroo costume so Mr. Kraley doesn’t have to put on the purple-stained BO suit anymore. The guy has been through enough already. I hope he’s happy when he opens the envelope and sees the receipt for the new one that an anonymous athletic supporter ordered for him.

  Maybe I’ve had a little growth spurt while I’ve been busy plotting against the Arch, or maybe it’s the fact that the weight of the world is off my shoulders, but I swear I feel a few inches taller as I walk out from between the Dumpsters today. I stop in the parking lot and fill my lungs with air. The old school doesn’t look as menacing now that I’m enemy-free.

  For the first time I can remember, I push open the doors excited about what waits for me inside.

  I find Moby in the hall, looking lost as usual. He probably doesn’t remember me telling him I would meet him at school instead of the regular spot. He has a pained look on his face, which I immediately recognize. He’s missed his morning sit-down.

  “Hey, Mobe,” I say.

  “Hey, Chub. I was looking all over for you. Where were you?”

  “I was taking care of all the stuff we talked about yesterday,” I explain.

  “Oh, right.” He winces.

  “Did you miss your toilet session?”

  He nods glumly.

  “You can probably—” The first bell rings and a tide of kids start toward their homerooms. There isn’t time before the final bell to release a mud weasel back into the wild.

  We climb the stairs to Mr. Funk’s room. When we get there, everyone is already sitting down. The spokes-McQueen tips the hat in salute and the other two nod. Shelby and Sizzler have saved two seats for Moby and me.

  Shelby leans forward. “How did it go?”

  I shrug. It’s out of my hands now. “I guess we’ll find out after their meeting.”

  The McQueens lounge in their seats, radiating pride over Saturday’s events.

  “Cherry bombs in the toilet?” I ask.

  The hat gives me a gleeful grin. “We always wanted to try it. Worked, didn’t it?” The other two smile like hyenas.

  Mr. Funk comes into the room as the bell rings, and dumps his usual armload of papers on his desk. “All right. Everybody calm down,” he says, even though no one is even talking.

  Then a sound pierces the silence. It starts like a high note on a violin. After a few seconds it becomes a cello, and after a few more seconds it morphs into a sound like a trumpet being played by someone who’s getting punched in the stomach. By the time the sound of the blast fades, the whole classroom, including the teacher, is staring at Moby and me.

  Someone at the front of the room calls, “Sweet fancy Moses,” which gets a laugh or two.

  Then someone yells, “Who cut the cheese?” and everyone laughs.

  I look at Moby. He’s about to raise his hand and admit to the fart.

  Before he can, I shoot my hand into the air first and yell, “It was me!”

  Some more kids start laughing. I scan their faces, looking as many of them straight in the eye as I can. Most of them stop laughing when my eyes meet theirs.

  Then the giggling stops completely and the classroom goes silent.

  I breathe through my mouth to avoid gagging as I keep my hand proudly in the air. When I turn back around to reassure Moby, I see why the room is quiet.

  The entire cadre—my cadre—has their hands in the air too.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Most people think writers work alone.

  Most people couldn’t be more wrong.

  This book owes its life to many people.

  First I want to thank the most amazing adopted family anyone could ask for, my critique group, the Papercuts. Angie, Cindy, David, Donna, Jason, Kayla: Without each of your honest (and occasionally brutal) critiques, Chub would not exist. I love you guys even more than I love bacon pancakes.

  Melissa Koosman, not only were you one of the first to take a scalpel to this manuscript, but you introduced me to the love of my life as well. I owe you more than I can ever repay, so let’s just call it even?

  My agent, the indefatigable Sarah Davies. You took me in and showed me the way. You are my Yoda. Hopefully, we can travel a long way in this canoe.

  Marissa Graff, you helped me polish
this turd before we sent it out on submission. You’ve become a great friend. I hear your voice in my ear every time I touch the keyboard.

  My editor, Amy Cloud. You got what I was going for from the beginning. I couldn’t have asked for a better person to guide me through my first work adventure into the world of publishing. You have been an absolute dream to work with. Thank you for giving Fartacus a home at Aladdin.

  Rob, you remind me every day that I’m a writer. I couldn’t have done this without you gently cattle-prodding me along.

  My fourth-grade teacher, Mr. Tivnan. You introduced me to Bilbo, Smaug, and company, and showed me that you don’t hae to be a kid to think stories are awesome.

  G-Money. Thank you for making sure I didn’t embarrass myself in the card game scenes.

  My dad, for being the best example I ever had.

  I want to thank everyone at SCBWI Western Washington and the Pacific Northwest Writer’s Association for helping me make the connections that ultimately turned my dream of being an author into a reality.

  The thing that makes any of this worth doing is my family. My first readers, Bethany and Sophia, you let me know when my jokes didn’t quite land the way I’d hoped. Max and Elena, you guys didn’t directly impede my progress; thanks for that, I guess.

  My amazing partner in writing and in life, Donna, you help me every day to become not only a better writer, but a better man as well. This book wouldn’t exist if it weren’t for you. Thank you for sharing this experience with me. I love you.

  I also want to thank my publisher, Mara Anastas, and all the people at Aladdin who made this book happen. Cover illustrator Dan Widdowson, designer Laura Lyn DiSiena, production editor Kerry Johnson, copy editor Erica Stahler, the marketing team of Tara Grieco and Carolyn Swerdloff, the fantastic sales force, and countless others who’ve done the real work of bringing Fartacus into the world.

  Finally, I need to thank God for all the blessings I’ve been given. Seeing my name on a real live book is at the very top of the list.