by John J. Bonk
LMNOP gets to miss the first six weeks of school because she’s going with her parents to New England to study endangered whales. Lucky dog! Anyway, my aunt Birdie volunteered to pet-sit her cat while they’re away, without clearing it with me first – even though she knows I’m not a big fan of cats. (Notice how you never hear anyone say “lucky cat”?)
“Yep, my dad’s finally gonna be living out his fantasy, even if it’s just for a little while,” LMNOP went on. I was bouncing the screen door open with my rear end, waiting for her to stop yammering. “The only body of water we’ve got within a fifty-mile radius is Buttermilk Creek, and it’s half dried up. That can’t be easy for a marine biology professor.”
“Talk about a fish out of water! That’s as bad as trying to be a stand-up comedian in this town.”
“I know, right? Hey, I could send you postcards if you want. Or even e-mail you, like, digital photos of humpbacks – if you’re interested.”
I didn’t answer because that wasn’t really a question, even though it sounded like it. To be honest, a complete break from her would be better. Without any pictures of lumpy fish as reminders.
“I’ll send postcards. It’s not a problem, really.”
“Whatever. Okay, I have to take a shower now,” I lied, “to beat the morning rush. Have a nice trip.”
“G’night, Dustin Grubbs. Don’t let the bedbugs bite.”
As soon as the screen door slammed behind me, that shower seemed like a good idea for real. After the attic and the yard, I was living up to my name – dusty and grubby.
I stepped into our shower upstairs wearing my swim trunks with the palm trees and coconut design. This was my usual drill ever since Mom accidentally painted over the lock on the bathroom door. See, I was strongly against public displays of nudity (especially my own) and with a bum lock and a crazy family, I wasn’t taking any chances. I had lathered, rinsed, and was about to repeat when I got to thinking about fate. First the tap shoes appear; then abracadabra, the coupon! First Dad disappears; then, bibitty-bobitty-boo, he’s back in the picture again. Literally.
I didn’t know what the heck was going on, but there was one thing I was suddenly dead sure of: You get great tap sounds in the shower! Just bare feet on wet tub. Discovering it was a complete accident, but I couldn’t resist belting out “Singin’ in the Rain” at the top of my lungs and doing a splashy pretend tap routine. Stand back, world, I’m a triple threat! After my showstopping finish, I whipped open the shower curtain to take my bow and –
“Hey!”
My mutant teenage brother, Gordy, was standing there with a camcorder aimed right at me! I went for the curtain again quick, but my feet slipped. Flailing arms… fistfuls of slick plastic… curtain rings shooting…
Yelping!
Twisting!
Popping!
Falling!
Next thing I know I’m lining the tub, wound in yards of bright yellow vinyl. My horoscope was right: It was proving to be an accident-prone day.
“Are you all right, dweeb?” Gordy reached out to help me with one hand, but kept the camera steady with the other. Oh, yeah – he was busting a gut the whole time.
“No! Yes. I’ll live.” The jerk jerked me to my feet. “It’s not funny, freakazoid! I could’ve cracked my skull and it would’ve been all your fault.”
“You look like a wet banana.”
“Turn that thing off,” I yelled. “Cut! Cut!” (Don’t get me wrong. I’m usually a big ham when it comes to being in front of a camera, but I definitely wasn’t ready for my close-up.) “Come on, beat it, loser! I can’t stand here forever wrapped in plastic like a salami. I’ll get all pruney.”
But Gordy, being Gordy, ignored me and sat on the toilet seat, cracking up at the playback on the camcorder. “Dad sent us this thing so we could tape junk like this and send it to him,” he said. “I’m just following orders.”
“He wants us to capture special family moments – not ugly accidents.”
“You are an ugly accident.”
I hurled the loofah sponge at him, but it veered to the right and skimmed Aunt Birdie’s headful of curlers poking through the open door.
“Knock-knock. Are you decent?” she asked breathlessly with her eyes closed tight. “I ran up as fast as I could. Is everybody all right?”
“Yeah, c’mon in,” Gordy said, without looking up. “The more the merrier.”
“Are you sure?” Aunt Birdie was peeking through one eye and pumping the top of her polka-dotted housedress for the breeze. “What was that big commotion? I could’ve sworn I heard Dustin singing and then –”
“You call this singing?” Gordy turned up the volume on the camcorder. “Dustin couldn’t carry a tune if it came with handles and a shoulder strap.”
Even though I was laminated, I managed to grab the soap-on-a-rope and fling it at Gordy. He flung it right back. Followed by the toilet plunger.
“I told you kids not to play so rough!” Granny growled, shuffling into the bathroom. “And turn down that radio – you’ll wake the dead.” She was in her flannel nightgown, holding a glass filled with fizzy water and false teeth. “Is Dustin putting on another one of his little skits?”
“No,” I muttered, unclogging a waterlogged ear. “And last time I checked you had your own bathroom downstairs. Jeez, can’t a guy get a little privacy around here?”
“Man, too bad my thumb got in the way, ‘cause this is some killer footage,” Gordy said. He turned down the volume on the camcorder, but was still studying the playback on the LCD screen. “Funnier than that stuff they have on that TV show – you know, the one where they dish out big money to losers who send in videotapes of themselves crashing headfirst into wedding cakes.”
“America’s Goofiest Slips and Trips,” I offered.
“Yeah.”
Aunt Birdie, who’d taken to doing a complete inventory of our medicine cabinet, mumbled something about loving that show. “It’s the only TV program that makes me laugh out loud.”
“Okay, everybody, party’s over,” I announced. “Thanks for coming, but mildew is starting to grow under this shower curtain and I really should –”
“Here you all are,” a voice said from the hallway.
I could not believe it. LMNOP and her big, orange blob of a cat were joining the crowd. Some nerve!
“Oh, I don’t think so!” I warned, but she barged in anyway.
“Cinnamon just wants to say “Thank you very much for cat-sitting me, Miss Grubbs,’” LMNOP cooed in a sickening baby voice, bouncing her cat in front of her face like an overstuffed puppet. “‘And I promise to be on my most purrrfect behavior.’”
Gag me! Aunt Birdie just encouraged her by shaking its paw and fawning over the thing. “Well, aren’t you a sweet kitty boo? Such a fluffy, muffy, scruffy boo.”
“Hello!” I snapped. “Teeth chattering. Goose bumps sprouting.”
“Alrighty then, I guess I’ll see you guys when we get back from Gloucester, Mass.,” LMNOP said. “In six weeks or thereabout. And, Dustin Grubbs, I brought you that dance-class coupon just in case. Oh, and you really should give me your e-mail address so I could –”
“Get out!” I roared. “Everybody, ouuut!”
If this were a scene in a movie, there’d be a reverb sound effect with footage of pigeons flying out of trees and paint curling off walls. Nobody usually listened when I gave orders, but mission accomplished! I had barely begun to unwind myself out of the shower curtain when Gordy barged back in with the camcorder still alive and blinking.
“I’m gonna count to five,” I warned through tight lips. “One, one thousand –”
“Don’t get your panties in a bunch,” he said, setting the camcorder on the hamper. He bent down and scooped up a fingerful of plastic rings from the shaggy rug. “Just lemme help ya get the curtain back up, okay? So Mom doesn’t flip out.”
“Oh.” I switched to my calm voice. “Thanks, Gord.”
“Then hop back into the
shower, soap up, and we’ll take the whole thing from the top!”
Chapter 3
Clean Slate
I was up at the crack, way before my alarm clock went off. But I figured I might as well stay awake and take the extra time getting prepped for my first day as a seventh-grader. Yep, I was now officially an upperclassman. In some towns they’re shipped off to a separate school called junior high, but I was still stuck in Buttermilk Falls Elementary – not that big a deal. But big enough. So I splashed on some of Dad’s old Aqua Velva aftershave and gelled my hair into a magnificent work of art.
The hordes of kids heading toward school looked like they’d been dipped in new. Unmarked shoes and unmarked notebooks. Clean fingernails, clean slates. And tired old BMF Elementary somehow looked welcoming and full of possibilities. The spotless hallways even smelled like the first day of school – like pressed corduroy and freshly sharpened pencils. And Aqua Velva.
My new teacher sure was a change from my Southern-peach-of-a-teach from sixth grade, Miss Honeywell. His name was Mr. Lynch, and just like LMNOP had reported, he was wearing a bow tie – with red checks. His wrinkled brown suit was loose and crooked (as Aunt Birdie would say, “he was swimming in it”) and he had a real pinched-nose-sounding voice. But other than that he seemed all right.
“Welcome to seventh grade,” he declared, writing his name across the chalkboard in impossibly perfect cursives. “I know my reputation precedes me, but I’m really not the stick-in-the-mud that some people think. However, I do have a few ground rules. I won’t tolerate gum chewing in my class, or foodstuffs of any kind.”
Darlene asked if cough drops would be considered “foodstuffs” if they were being used strictly for medicinal purposes. Mr. Lynch seemed thrown, but he okayed it. “There will be no whispering,” he droned on, settling at his desk, “no tardiness. And note passing is strictly taboo.”
“Did he just say no tattoos?” my best friend, Wally, whispered to me, pulling tiny earphone plugs out of his ears. He’d disappeared for half the summer – it was great knowing I’d see him again on a daily basis.
“No, Wal, but he did say no whispering.”
“The young man in the second row with the unkempt hair,” Lynch said, snapping his fingers at me. “Button your lip.”
“Sorry,” I mumbled. Unkempt? Why, I oughta…
“Now I realize some teachers let their students sit wherever they wish, but I prefer to do it in alphabetical order.” He flipped open his long, green ledger. “It’s easier that way, so bear with me. When I call out your name, collect your belongings and park yourself at your newly assigned desk. Michael Alvarez…”
Wally and I had been sitting next to each other in class since second grade. But if this guy was going to do it in alphabetical order, that meant Wally Dorkin would be nowhere near –
“Dustin Grubbs…” Mr. Lynch paused after he got to my name, tugging at his collar. “That name sounds – (gulp) – familiar.”
Uh-oh, here it comes. The lightbulb going off; the look of horror. I’d been through this routine with every teacher at BMFE.
“You’re not Gordon Grubbs’s brother, are you?”
It’s not exactly something you can lie about, but I didn’t want him thinking I was a carbon copy of that troublemaker either.
“Only by birth. But don’t worry, sir – all we have in common is excessive earwax. It’s genetic.”
Mr. Lynch closed his eyes and took a deep, cleansing breath. How could he not know who I am? Does he live under a rock? Didn’t he even see the play last year?
The desk I ended up with was right in the middle of the third row and had graffiti on it – a bad sketch of a World War II fighter jet bombing a mutant octopus. Plus, hardened glue was filling the pencil groove. My pencils will be rolling off the desk all year! Sixteen and a half minutes into seventh grade and I wanted to call it quits.
“Oh, shoot, shoot, shoot!” came from the desk in front of mine. Candice Garboni was frantically digging through her purse and stuff was dropping out everywhere. I waited for Lynch to turn his back before retrieving a tiny jar of goop that had landed on my sneaker.
“My Midnight Madness lip-plumping gloss,” she gasped when I handed it to her. “That’s what I was looking for!”
Speaking of maturing – Candice, aka Candy, was a girl I’d moved up through the ranks with since first grade, but I hadn’t even recognized her until Lynch had assigned her desk. She’d always been quiet and nondescript except for her trademark straight, black hair that hung halfway to the floor. She was still sporting that mane but, yowza, the rest of her sure had blossomed over the summer! It was as if she’d been an empty coloring-book outline of herself all those years, and suddenly she was all filled in.
“Thanks, Dust,” Candy’s shiny mouth muttered as she hung her purse strap over her chair.
“You’re welcome. I like your new look. Not everyone can pull off purple lips.”
“We can all wait until Mr. Grubbs finishes his conversation,” Mr. Lynch barked. Candy whipped her head back around so fast, her hair spilled all over my desk. It smelled like fresh strawberries. “That’s two strikes against you already. And I believe strike three means you’re out.”
“That depends if you’re talking baseball or bowling.”
The class giggled, but Mr. Lynch, obviously having been born without a sense of humor, did not. Still, I gave myself points for coming up with a sports joke.
“All right, ladies and gentlemen,” Lynch said, striding over to the chalkboard and grabbing a fat chunk of chalk, “onto our next order of business. On September twenty-third, our class along with Mrs. Sedgwick’s eighth-graders will be going on an all-day field trip to the Shedd Aquarium. Truly, truly a fascinating place.” There were murmurs of excitement as he wrote the info on the board. Stewy Ziggler was creeping down the aisle, copying every word into his notebook. The kid was no bigger than a popcorn shrimp. “Now we thought it best to send permission slips home with everyone today, because – well, getting them signed and returned on time is usually like pulling teeth. So please get this cemented in your brains, people: no slip, no trip.”
I swear, right on the word trip somebody tripped Stewy. He landed hard – flat on his face right next to me. The class was in hysterics, but Lynch looked outraged.
“Don’t you dare laugh!” he scolded. “Are you okay, Stewart?”
“Fine, sir.” Stewy scrambled to his feet and rushed back to his seat. “Except – uh, I’m having a real problem seeing the board from my desk. Maggie’s hair is too poofy.”
Rustling filled the air and the class turned around in a single motion to gawk at Maggie Wathom, who’d been assigned the desk in front of Stewy. He was right. It looked as if she’d been struck by lightning in a wind tunnel – while flossing with electrical cords.
“Eeew, check out the bad perm!” Candy whispered. “Hello, 1980! I heard her mom’s practicing to get her beautician’s license and uses Maggie as a guinea pig.”
“I can appreciate your dilemma, Stewart,” Mr. Lynch said dryly, referring back to his ledger. “Miss Wathom, why don’t you switch places with him for today – until we can find a permanent solution.”
“A permanent solution caused her problem in the first place!” I blurted out.
Why do I do it?
The whole class busted out laughing again, even Maggie. But Mr. Lynch’s bow tie was twitching from the surge of anger rushing to his face. Just when I thought he was going to hang me by my thumbs for my outburst, the classroom loudspeaker crackled and burped, and Principal Futterman’s voice broke through.
“Welcome back, students! I trust you’ve all had an exciting summer and are eager to dive headfirst into the three Rs: reading, writing, and arithmetic.”
Mr. Lynch stood at attention staring up at the loudspeaker, as if Futterman was the President of the United States.
“Wait, that’s actually only two Rs. Am I right, Judith?” Futterman mumbled.
“Th
at’s right, Dan, because you read it wrong,” we heard his secretary say. “It’s rithmetic, not arithmetic. It’s a time-worn saying.”
“Rithmetic? That’s not even a real word. What kind of example are we setting?”
“With all due respect, next time write your own darn speech!”
You tell him, Judith. I couldn’t help cracking up.
“Anyway, students,” Futterman said over the sound of crumpling paper, “we’ve got a super year ahead of us with plenty of exciting things planned. But right now Miss Van Rye, head of the newly sanctioned Arts Committee, is chomping at the bit with some news to share.”
“Good mor –!!” Miss Van Rye’s booming voice rattled the speaker. “Oh, too close? Sorry. How about now? Testing, testing. She sells seashells by the seashore, she sells –”
“While I’m still young,” Futterman interrupted.
“Too late,” his secretary called out in the background.
“Good morning, munchkins,” Miss Van Rye said. “After the smashing success of last year’s play, The Castle of the Crooked Crowns, it’s clear that Buttermilk Fallians are culture-starved and hungry for more, more, more. So this year we have something truly exciting planned: a big, splashy Broadway musical! But that’s not all. The Fenton High drama club, woefully overlooked for years, is hitching their wagon to our star. That’s right, kiddles – we’ll be teaming up for a theatrical extravaganza, the likes of which this town has never seen! Oooh, it’s so thrilling I can hardly stand it!”
My thoughts exactly! Darlene’s too, I’m guessing – she screamed full out.
“Performances will be at the high school in December, but the jury is still out as to which musical will be chosen. One thing we know for sure: We’re going to need plenty of triple threats. So all you supertalents out there, now’s your chance to strut your stuff! The sign-up sheet will be posted outside the main office at the beginning of next week. Back to you, Dan – err, Principal Futterman.”
Microphone fumbling… grumbling… rumbling. Then back to the Head Honcho.