by Mo O’Hara
“Good to have you back, Frankie,” I said, patting him gently on his top fin. “We just need your help with one more thing,” I added, before Pradeep and I whispered the next stage of our plan.
We tied Sanj in the mosquito netting too and let Frankie zombify him and Mark so they wouldn’t try to escape. Then we went down to the basement and Frankie re-zombied the BBEDLAM-stunned zombies, so that they were under his control. He made them all go to the assembly hall, including the lunch ladies and Mrs. Kumar. Pradeep and I wrote a message on the whiteboard that said: “Welcome to the Lunch Lady Appreciation Assembly.”
Frankie released everyone from his control and they all blinked to life. The zombie-stares had vanished.
“It’s like they’ve been rebooted,” Pradeep said.
On cue, Pradeep and Sami and I started singing, “For they are jolly good ladies, for they are jolly good ladies, for they are jolly good ladies, which nobody can deny!” And everyone just kind of joined in. The lunch ladies looked surprised and some of them even blushed. Gladys smiled bigger than ever.
Mrs. Prentice looked confused to find herself standing at the microphone at the front of the assembly hall. She read the whiteboard and looked over at the beaming faces of the lunch ladies and said, “Yes, um, of course, the school couldn’t function without the dedication of our much-valued catering staff.”
“Three cheers for the lunch ladies!” I shouted.
The whole hall replied, “Hip, hip, hooray! Hip, hip, hooray! Hip, hip, hooray!”
When the assembly was over, we told Mrs. Prentice that we had found the purple-traitors (even though neither of them was wearing purple) of the false fire alarm and computer prank and that they were in the science lab. Pradeep and I ran ahead, and Pradeep wiped the virus off Sanj’s laptop just in time.
Mark and Sanj were still tied up when Mrs. Prentice and Mrs. Kumar walked in.
“Stupid moron, letting a fish crack your code!” Mark shouted.
“No, you are the stupid moron for not catching the fish in the first place!” Sanj shouted back.
“You are so not evil enough to be in my gang,” Mark said.
“And you are far too intellectually inferior to be in my gang,” Sanj replied.
Mark’s face looked like his brain was trying to figure out what Sanj just said, then he gave up and thumped Sanj instead. “Whatever!” he grunted.
Mrs. Prentice leaned over Sanj and Mark. “I’ve spoken to the principal at the middle school, so you can add truancy to your list of other misdemeanors, like tampering with the fire alarm and hacking the school computer.”
Basically, Mrs. Prentice was telling them that they were busted.
“I think you boys have a lot of explaining to do,” she said.
She led the boys toward her office, with Pradeep’s mom tutting at Sanj. Then Mrs. Kumar stopped and turned around. “Samina,” she called. Sami skipped out of the science lab, carrying Pradeep’s lunchbox.
“Oh, thank you, Samina. Here’s your lunch, Pradeep.” She paused for a second. “Oh, I nearly forgot the way you like it.” She gave the lunchbox a shake before handing it to Pradeep.
Pradeep gave me a look that said, “I bet you know why she did that, but I won’t ask you now.” And I knew exactly what his look meant.
Sami waved as she trotted off after her mom. “Bye, swishy shaky fishy,” she giggled.
Pradeep opened the lunchbox—and there was Frankie in the plastic bag that I had put him in after the lunch-lady assembly. The goldfish’s eyeballs were spinning around in their bulging sockets.
“Poor Frankie,” I said. “I don’t think he’s going to want to come to school with me again.”
“Hey, Frankie, let’s go and see the lunch ladies,” Pradeep said.
“Yeah, I bet they could find you something green to eat,” I added.
Frankie swished his tail and it even looked like he gave us a fins-up sign with his left fin.
In the cafeteria Gladys said that she would keep our secret about Frankie.
“He’s the cutest little zombie fish really,” she said. I think Frankie blushed, but it was hard to tell through his fish scales. “Besides, it’s the most exciting day at work I’ve ever had,” she carried on, “and don’t worry, next time you’re in the food line, I’ll give you an extra egg.” She nudged my arm with her spatula and smiled.
My stomach lurched at the thought, but Frankie thrashed around in excitement. I guess I could always take it home as a treat for him. ’Cause, from now on, Frankie’s safer staying at home. I never realized how dangerous school can be. Luckily, we’ve got a big fat zombie goldfish to help out when things get rough. I wonder how good he is at times tables…?
NOTE
Chapter 4
The Rise of BBEDLAM
1 Pradeep looked up “purple-traitor” later online and told me that the word is actually “perpetrator,” which apparently has nothing to do with being purple or being a traitor. How boring is that?
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I have so many people to thank for taking My Big Fat Zombie Goldfish by the fin and leading it to publication.
First I have to thank the volunteers and members of SCBWI (Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators). I would never have written this book without the support that SCBWI has given me over the years. I wrote My Big Fat Zombie Goldfish for a SCBWI contest run by Sara Grant and Sarah Manson. So thank you so much to both of them.
I also want to thank my friends in my fantastic critique group, Sue Hyams, Paolo Romeo, and Liz De Jager, for cheering me on and cheering me up when I most needed it and for helping my manuscript along its journey.
I want to thank Brady the goldfish (who lives with my amazing agent Gemma Cooper). It’s because of Brady that Gemma asked to see the manuscript of My Big Fat Zombie Goldfish when we met at an SCBWI conference last year. I of course have to thank Gemma for being everything I could possibly ask for in an agent and a friend and for working with me on the manuscript and making it as strong as it could be before we sent it out to the wide world, where it was hooked by Emma Young and Sam Swinnerton at Macmillan UK and Jean Feiwel at Feiwel and Friends.
I especially have to thank Ruth, Emma, Sam, and the UK team at Macmillan for everything they have done and Jean, Holly, and the team at Feiwel and Friends for encouraging, editing, promoting, and throwing the best Zombie Goldfish suprise party ever.
Lastly, thank you to my friends for believing in me and thank you to my fiancé, Guy, and my kids, Daniel and Charlotte, who have made what could have been a very difficult few years so much fun. Thanks for the coffees and the cuddles.
What happens when a Big Fat Zombie Goldfish meets the Evil Eel of Eel Bay? This is one family vacation that is bound to be . . . electrifying!
Read on for a sneak peek of
Pradeep looked even greener than Frankie’s zombie goldfish eyes as we sat in the back of my dad’s car. And every time Dad screeched round another bend, Pradeep turned a deeper shade of green. We were on our way to the vacation place that Dad had booked. Usually only Dad, my Evil Scientist big brother Mark, Pradeep’s dad and his evil computer-genius big brother Sanj went on the Big Summer Weekend. But this year Sanj was at computer camp, and for the first time Dad said me and Pradeep were old enough to come. Nothing was going to wreck this weekend!
Not Pradeep, who was just about to hurl for the fifth time in four hours (I could tell because he had that surprised look on his face again). Not Sami, Pradeep’s three-year-old sister, who had to come with us because as soon as our moms heard Pradeep and I were going away too, they booked themselves on a Massage and Mud Pack weekend. (Which I didn’t understand at all. Moms hate mud on your shoes. They really hate mud on the living-room carpet. But apparently they love it on their faces. Who knew?) This weekend wouldn’t even be ruined by Mark not saying a word to me since he found out that Pradeep, Sami, and I were coming. If only he wouldn’t thump me too, then it would be perfect.
“Bag,” P
radeep mumbled as we went over a bump in the road.
“Bag,” I said to Sami as she bounced in her car seat next to me. She passed me one of the stack of airplane sick bags that Pradeep’s mom had packed for him for the journey. I unfolded it and passed it to Pradeep. Pradeep’s mom gets these super-strong sick bags off the Internet because they can hold loads without breaking. They make the best splat bombs ever ’cause they never burst until they hit their target. It seemed a shame to waste them on actual car sickness. But a kid’s gotta do what a kid’s gotta do.
“Bleeech!” Pradeep filled the sick bag and then stared out the window.
“Are we there yet? Are we there yet?” Sami sang from her seat.
Dad looked straight ahead at the winding road. “About twenty minutes maybe,” he said.
Pradeep’s dad was looking at his smartphone. “It’s 13.2 miles exactly to the destination.” Pradeep’s dad could get a job as one of those GPS things in cars. He’s got the perfect voice for it. You would totally believe that he knew where he was going, even if he didn’t. I don’t think he would fit on the dashboard though.
“If you look toward the sea, you can see the lighthouse from here,” Dad said.
Pradeep, Sami, and I all craned our necks to look. The lighthouse was tall and white like a swirly whipped vanilla ice-cream cone sticking up out of the sea. That is, if swirly whipped vanilla ice-cream cones had giant lights at the top of them. It jutted out into the bay so the water lapped against it.
Mark sat slumped in the back of the car behind us, flicking through Evil Scientist magazine. This month’s cover feature was called “How to Take Over the World in Ten Easy Steps.” He had his earbuds in and didn’t even look up when Dad spoke.
“It’s awesome, Mark. An actual lighthouse,” I said to him.
Mark shot me an evil glare. “There is nothing awesome about this moron-fest vacation.” He pulled his hood up over his head. “You losers have made this the lamest trip ever.”
The cooler that was under Sami’s feet started shaking. I lifted the lid to investigate. The eyes of Frankie, my zombie goldfish, glowed green as he batted cans of Coke against the sides of the cooler with his fins. He must have heard Mark’s voice and gone all zombie mega-thrash fish. He still held a grudge against my brother for trying to murder him with his Evil Scientist toxic gunk. Luckily, Pradeep and I shocked Frankie back to life with a battery, and ever since, he’s been our friend and fishy bodyguard. I hoped Frankie would calm down soon.
“Swishy fish!” Sami shouted.
I put my finger to my lips and turned to Sami. “Shhhhhh!”
“What was that, precious?” asked Pradeep’s dad.
“Uh, I think she’s just excited about seeing fish in the sea,” I said, covering for her.
Sami giggled and I carefully closed the lid of the cooler. Safe for now.
As Pradeep and I looked out the window, we saw a thick layer of fog hanging over the lighthouse, wrapping itself around a barely visible sign. I squinted to read it. WELCOME TO EEL BAY, it said in big letters, and then in smaller print that looked like it was painted on just yesterday, DON’T FEED THE EELS! ESPECIALLY THE EVIL ONE!
A FEIWEL AND FRIENDS BOOK
An Imprint of Macmillan
MY BIG FAT ZOMBIE GOLDFISH. Text copyright © 2013 by Mo O’Hara. Illustrations copyright © 2013 by Marek Jagucki. All rights reserved. For information, address Feiwel and Friends, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN: 978-1-250-02919-5 (hardcover)/978-1-250-04241-5 (ebook)
Feiwel and Friends logo designed by Filomena Tuosto
Originally published in the UK by Macmillan Children’s Books, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited.
First published in the United States by Feiwel and Friends, an imprint of Macmillan.
First U.S. Edition: 2013
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eISBN 9781250042415
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