Quinny & Hopper: Partners in Slime

by Adriana Brad Schanen

  She asks questions and people raise their hands, but my head still feels swollen with shock, so I just stare down at my sheet. Then I grab my pencil, and by the BEAUTIFUL BUT POISONOUS part, I write, JUST LIKE VICTORIA.

  I trace my words, over and over, until they’re the darkest ones on the page. This feels good, like I’m telling the truth. We’re supposed to tell the truth in life, aren’t we?

  But then a wave of guilty yuck ruins that truthy feeling, and I’m not so sure.

  I flip my pencil around and erase what I wrote, super quick, so no one sees it.

  At recess, my courage finally grows bigger than my shock. Victoria can’t just steal my how-to topic and get away with it. I decide to walk over to her and stand up for myself.

  But when I do, she is already in the middle of talking to a bunch of other girls and won’t let me interrupt her. So I poke her, very politely.

  “Excuse me, Victoria, but why did you steal my chickens?”

  Victoria ignores me and keeps talking to the others.

  “Excuse me again, Victoria, but you don’t even know how to take care of my chickens. Plus I told you I was doing them as a topic first.”

  She turns to me. “The chickens live at my aunt’s house. They’re my family chickens.”

  “But I’m the one who takes care of them!”

  “Look, I don’t have time for this,” snaps Victoria. “I’ve got a party to plan—”

  “A party?” I perk up a little. I love parties.

  “If you’re done being rude, I was going to tell you all about it. It’s an animal costume party, to raise money for the animal shelter, and it’s on Sunday, October twenty-fourth, in three weeks.”

  Three weeks? Sunday afternoon? That’s the same time as Hopper’s birthday. And I already got tickets to go with him to the Brain Expo in New York City. Victoria can’t have her animal costume party at the exact same time.

  “Victoria, wait, I really need to talk to you.”

  “We’re making the guest list. And planning the invitations and food and decorations. We’re asking guests to donate pet food or supplies or money for the shelter. I might even let people bring their own pets to the party, too.”

  I can’t take it anymore. Victoria stole my how-to idea without even saying sorry. And now she’s planning an amazing party I can’t go to. Even if I could go, I don’t have a pet to take. And that’s too many sour things happening all at once. Where is Hopper when I need him? Why did he have to pick today to have his tonsils out? I wait until the yard guard isn’t looking, and then I sneak back inside the building and run to my classroom.

  That’s where Ms. Yoon eats her lunch while we’re at recess. Sometimes she lets me hang out with her. I only ask if I’m really, truly, absolutely desperate. Like today.

  “Ms. Yoon?”

  She usually sits at her desk eating a sandwich, but someone else is there now. I gasp—it’s that other yard-guard lady from recess last week, the mean one who said I tripped Victoria when I really didn’t. Then she tattled on me to Ms. Yoon. I don’t know her name.

  “I’m…sorry. I was just looking for my teacher?”

  The yard-guard lady puts down her fork and makes a chilly, impatient face. She has the straightest part in her hair and the straightest posture in her back that I’ve ever seen.

  “Her name is Ms. Yoon. Do you know where she went?”

  “Ms. Yoon is gone. I’ve been assigned to substitute for her.”

  “But she was just here a minute ago. What happened? When is she coming back?”

  “I have no idea when she’s coming back. When or if, for that matter.”

  “What do you mean, if?”

  “Do you have a hall pass, young lady?”

  “Where did Ms. Yoon go? Please, I need to talk to her.”

  “You can’t just wander the halls without permission.”

  “Is she mad about all the lice? Is that baby in her belly okay? Did she quit her job because she just can’t take it anymore?”

  “Ms. Yoon’s personal circumstances are her own business. Now, please go back to where you belong, and don’t let me catch you wandering without a hall pass again.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  I run to ask Nurse Mira—she’ll know where Ms. Yoon is. She knows everything.

  On the way, I get lucky. Principal Ramsey walks by. “Principal Ramsey! You’re just the person I was looking for! I have some terrible news—Ms. Yoon is gone!”

  “Quinny, hello there. Aren’t you supposed to be at recess?”

  “Please tell her to come back! I promise not to talk or wiggle or bicker with Victoria. I promise not to bother her at lunch if she wants to eat her sandwich in peace! Can you tell her? Maybe you should write this down so you don’t forget? My parents are always forgetting things. Or I can type it for you. I know how to type now. Hopper is teaching me—”

  “Quinny, please calm your engine down—”

  “That’s exactly why I wanted to go find Ms. Yoon. She helps me do that!”

  “When there’s news to share about Ms. Yoon, believe me, you’ll be the first to hear.”

  “Okay, but did you know that substitute lady sitting in Ms. Yoon’s chair is very cranky? Isn’t there another one you can find who likes children in the first place?”

  “Quinny, I’m afraid I can’t take requests for substitute teachers. Try your best to get along with whoever is in charge. Give them a chance and make good choices, okay?”

  “Okay, but—”

  “Ah-ah—no buts.”

  “I mean, yes, Principal Ramsey, okay.”

  After recess, the substitute tells us that her name is Mrs. Flavio and she used to teach math to middle schoolers. She looks at us with very strict eyes and says we’re all going to get along fine as long as we can follow a few simple rules.

  For example: Raise your hand and wait to be called on before speaking, keep your hands to yourself, respect other people’s personal space, keep your desk neat and orderly, no running in class, no chatting. No doing anything interesting at all, I guess.

  Then Mrs. Flavio calls out our names from Ms. Yoon’s official teacher book so she can figure out who we are. When she gets to me, she calls out “Eleanor Quinston Bumble.”

  “That’s me!” I wave both my hands. “But my real name is Quinny.”

  “Well, it says Eleanor right here.” She blows a loud breath and scribbles something.

  When Mrs. Flavio gets to Victoria, she calls out “Victoria Rose Porridge,” and Victoria sits up straight and raises her hand and says “present” in this perfect little voice that matches her perfect pink name. And Mrs. Flavio gives her a look, like Maybe the world isn’t such a horrible place with lovely proper children like you in it.

  After she runs out of names to call, Mrs. Flavio hands out work sheets for cursive.

  But when I pull out my crayons to color the dancing aardvark at the top of my sheet, she says, “Put your crayons away. It’s time to practice cursive.”

  “Ms. Yoon always lets me color in the animals on my cursive sheet.”

  “Well, I’m in charge now, and there’s no coloring in cursive. Put away your crayons.”

  I think Put away your crayons must be the saddest sentence in the whole English language. But I obey that sad, sad sentence.

  Victoria leans over and whispers to me, “Coloring is for babies.”

  But Mrs. Flavio doesn’t even hear that mean whisper! She just looks past me and compliments Victoria’s cursive, even though mine is just as neat (well, almost).

  Later, she calls on Victoria to take a note to the main office, even though my hand is stretching higher and waving ten times faster.

  She orders Alex to settle down and focus on his work.

  She reminds Xander to keep his hands to himself.

  She tells me to stop wiggling and chatting.

  I am trying so hard not to wiggle and chat. I am trying so so sooooooo hard to give Mrs. Flavio a chance, like Principal Ramsey
said. But she is not giving me a chance.

  She snaps at me to push my chair in as she walks by my table. Then she snaps that all four legs of my chair have to be on the floor at all times, which means I can’t rock back and forth, which helps me to calm my engine down.

  She even picks on my reading log when I turn it in because I’ve been reading other things this week instead of a book book.

  “Is this some kind of joke? You read a vacuum cleaner manual? And billboards?”

  “It was a really cool vacuum cleaner,” I inform her. “It even vacuums upside down. And the manual was in three languages! Plus I read billboards in the car on the way to visit my cousins. Ms. Yoon doesn’t care what we read as long as it’s words, and twenty minutes a day.”

  “Well, I’m in charge now. From now on, please read an actual book.”

  Later, during math, she shushes me when I lean over to ask Silas what his favorite kind of cupcake is. And also when I turn around to share a cupcake doodle with Amanda. I point out to Mrs. Flavio that there’s a word problem on my sheet that’s about cupcakes, which is what made me think of cupcakes. She shushes me for pointing that out, too.

  Dessert in your lunch = delicious.

  Dessert in your math = distracting.

  Basically, Mrs. Flavio hates it when I talk, or move, or scratch an itch. She wants straight, silent rows of frozen robot children.

  I don’t stand a chance.

  During social studies, our last subject of the day, she says, “Eleanor, if I catch you chatting one more time, you’ll get recess detention. Is that clear?”

  Recess detention is when you lose recess. It’s serious stuff. Ms. Yoon never even does that. But I can tell Mrs. Flavio really means it, so I bite my tongue to keep it quiet. I sit on my hands to keep them still. I scrunch my eyes shut to keep my personality from showing. (Which is really hard. I don’t know how Hopper does it!)

  But a few minutes later, Mrs. Flavio catches me chatting again. And boom, she takes away my recess. For Monday and Tuesday, too. “But, Mrs. Flavio, that’s not fair,” I say. “I didn’t chat two more times, so why are you taking away two recesses?”

  She looks startled that I’m actually having a conversation with her.

  “Plus did you know Ms. Yoon never takes away recess, not even from the real baddies? She puts them on a private island, or she gives them an errand to run—”

  “Eleanor, that’s enough!”

  “She never yells, either, by the way. She whispers, and then we all quiet down to hear what she’s saying—you may want to give that a try.”

  Mrs. Flavio’s lips press together into a line as straight as the part in her hair. Then her voice booms, “Not one more word, Eleanor—do you hear me? Not one single word!”

  Everyone stares at me. Victoria snickers a smile. My name is Quinny, I don’t say, since that would be four more words. I bite my tongue and sit there, without Ms. Yoon, without Hopper. Without my precious recess for two whole days. It feels like I’m trapped in a cage and that meanie sub just threw away the key.

  Mrs. Meanie Sub. That’s her new name.

  The world is dark and blurry. It gets lighter. It tilts and wobbles.

  “Hopper, sweetheart…”

  My eyes open some more. Everything feels crooked. Where am I?

  “Hopper, it’s Mommy. We’re all done—your tonsils are out.”

  And then I remember: I’m at the hospital. I had an operation.

  I am still alive. But I don’t feel so great. There’s a gentle hand on my back. A bucket at my chin. I throw up into it.

  Mom wipes my mouth and hugs me. Dad is here, and Ty and Trevor, too. Everyone hugs me. Gently, all at once, and for a long time. Dad never cries, but he has tears in his eyes now. This kind of hugging never happens at home.

  “Why is everyone here?” I try to say, but most of the sentence doesn’t come out.

  “Shhhh,” Mom says. “Remember, Dr. Merkle said your throat will be a bit sore afterward. The twins left school early to come here. And Dad didn’t go to work at all.”

  “Why?”

  “What a silly question, Hopper—because we love you. We love you so very much.”

  But I’m not used to feeling so important. I start crying and it feels like going down a slide—it’s hard to stop once you start.

  Then I notice a long, thin tube sticking out of my arm. That must be the IV that Dr. Parva told me about. It doesn’t hurt, but I don’t like it, so I try to pull it out.

  “Whoa, there,” says Nurse Chuck, who’s suddenly back. “Gotta keep that in a little while longer, buddy.”

  Dr. Merkle comes in.

  “Job well done, Hopper,” he says. “That wasn’t so bad, was it?”

  It wasn’t so fantastic, either. He says I have to rest now because the medicine they used to make me sleep during the operation is wearing off, and that’s why my stomach feels weird and my head is groggy. I don’t even care about Popsicles or ice cream.

  A few minutes later, I’m crying again.

  “Hopper, oh, sweetie.” Mom hugs me again. “What’s wrong?”

  I don’t know. The operation is over. I woke up, like Dr. Parva said. I did a good job, like Dr. Merkle said. My whole family is here and they love me.

  Maybe I’m crying because it’s over. I was trying so hard not to be scared. I held it all in. But now it all comes out, right into Mom’s arms.

  After I’m empty, I close my eyes. I just want to sleep.

  On the way home, my brothers sit on both sides of me, in the back of the minivan. No one pounds or pushes me. I lean on a shoulder, then another shoulder. They put my blanket over me gently. I wish I felt like this with Trevor and Ty more often.

  The van stops, and Dad carries me inside and upstairs to my bed. My very own comfy bed. I wrap my arms around him so I don’t fall. He puts me down slowly.

  I try to sleep, but my stomach is still not happy. There’s a weird taste in my mouth. Did I eat something weird in my sleep? My head still feels funny, too. I don’t want anyone to bother me. I need some water. I’m not thirsty at all. I feel like gagging.

  I want Mom to sit on the edge of my bed and rub my back. I want her to go away.

  I don’t know what I want.

  “It’s okay, honey,” she says. “You’ll start to feel better soon. And then, Popsicles!”

  I wish soon meant right now. Having my tonsils out was supposed to make me feel better, but it actually made me feel worse. I feel worse now than I’ve ever felt in my whole life. I wonder if Dr. Merkle made a giant mistake.

  “Hopper, Hopper, Hopper!”

  I see his dad carrying him into his house, so I run as fast as I can from the bus stop. But, phooey—the edge of his blanket disappears through his front door before I get there.

  “Hopper, come back out here.” I knock on his door. “How are your tonsils? Did they get ’em all out? I had a really bad day. How are you? Did you know Ms. Yoon is gone and now we have a grumpy sub who hates my crayons, and, by the way, how was the hospital? I made you a card, plus a word search full of ice-cream flavors!”

  Hopper’s mom comes out and smiles at me, all patient.

  “Quinny, Hopper needs to sleep—he’s still a little woozy from the operation.”

  But he slept during his operation, so I don’t see why he needs to sleep more now. “Mrs. Grey, I’m really good at perking Hopper up. Just give me five minutes—I promise he’ll feel better.”

  “Honey, as soon as he’s able to play, we’ll let you know.”

  “But I made him a word search—”

  “That’s great, but he needs to rest now. And I need you to respect that, okay?”

  Okay, fine, I can take a hint.

  Piper is away on a playdate and Cleo is still napping, so I’ll just go find something else to do. I’m sure those chickens would be thrilled to see me, for example.

  A soccer ball flies past my head as I walk over to Mrs. Porridge’s house.

  “Hey, watch
it!” I yell as the bully twins come running after the ball. I run after it, too, and I catch up with it and kick it. I run and kick and run and kick, and the boys are about to catch up to me and steal that ball away when I KICK IT FOR REAL, and the ball goes flying…up, up, and away! Over our heads and through the sky and through the trees…

  And then—poof—it’s gone.

  “Holy moly,” grunts Trevor/Ty.

  “Are you bionic?” snarls Ty/Trevor.

  “As you know, kicking is one of my strengths,” I inform them, and then I run after that ball before they can get to it first.

  My throat hurts.

  Mom offers me a Popsicle. Some water. A back rub.

  Nothing really works.

  Not even pistachio ice cream, my favorite.

  I think Dr. Merkle definitely made a mistake taking out my tonsils. A huge mistake.

  “Hopper, sweetie, try to sleep,” says Mom.

  I’m sleepy, but I can’t fall asleep.

  There’s noise from outside. Light leaks in through my closed window shade. I roll over and pull at the shade to peek out, and I realize I must already be asleep.

  Because Quinny would never be out there, kicking a soccer ball with my brothers, in real life. Never in a million years.

  I must be dreaming.

  I race those bully twins for that soccer ball! I twist around trees, hop a giant rock, and dodge some lawn chairs. I zoom as fast as I can, but still they get to the ball first.

  But then they freeze. And back up slowly, their eyes huge with fear.

  Disco and Cha-Cha are hopping toward them now, flapping and brrrr-ing.

  Those bully twins are shaking. Because Disco and Cha-Cha’s mother (whose name is Freya, but that’s another story) used to live around here, and she once attacked those twins so bad that they’re scared of all chickens now.

  Even these two scrawny, mini ones, who don’t even know how to lay eggs yet.

  “Brrrrip,” says Disco, tilting a tiny beady eye. “SCREEEE-bup.”

  “Bip buup,” says Cha-Cha, shaking her baldish feathery bottom.