The Case of the Exploding Loo

by Rachel Hamilton

  “You are abnormally photogenic,” I say. “I want to measure your face to see if it matches the rules of proportion.”

  Someone sniggers behind me and a paper aeroplane lands in my lap. I unfold it and find a leaflet advertising LOSERS, with Porter’s face plastered across it. No wonder the other Remarkable Students are avoiding him – Porter is LOSERS’ poster boy.

  Porter screws up the leaflet.

  “Abnormally photogenic?” He pulls a curl, which immediately springs back into place. “Not with this hair.”

  “The hair’s part of it. It makes you look like Michelangelo’s statue of David.” Crossed with a toilet, I think, but I manage not to say that bit out loud. “With clothes on, of course. It would be weird otherwise. Plus, he had a very small . . .”

  The sniggers get louder. This might be a good time to stop talking.

  No one says much for the rest of the journey. The other Remarkable Students are probably quiet because they’re thinking remarkable thoughts. I’m quiet because I can’t think of anything remarkable to say and I don’t want to continue the naked-statue conversation.

  As we scramble out of the minibus, I notice the name tag on Porter’s bag: “Porter Grimm”. Grimm? I thought he was Porter Lewis?

  Porter catches me staring. “Not such a Greek statue any more?”

  “Greek statue?” Going into Know-All mode helps me stay calm. “Michelangelo’s David isn’t a Greek statue. It was sculpted during the Renaissance. Surely the Face of LOSERS should know something like that?”

  Disturbed by the hurt expression on Porter’s face, I walk straight into the huge grey statue. “Oof!”

  Ms Grimm looks even grimmer in the twilight, up there on her pedestal, glaring down at me.

  “Watch out for Mother,” Porter warns.

  “Mother?! Copernicus!” This is worse than I thought.

  “Copper . . . whats?”

  “Renaissance mathematician and astronomer who proposed that the Earth moves round the sun,” I mutter absently. “Ms Grimm’s your mother? Seriously?”

  Porter nods and does an impressive impersonation of Ms Grimm. “‘I’m so proud of my school, I even enrolled my son.’”

  As if on cue, the huge double doors swing open, revealing the Grimm Reaper (Holly’s new name for her) in all her gory glory. I scan her face for similarities to Porter and find none. Where Porter is all symmetry and toilet-bowl curves, Ms Grimm is sharp and pointy with protruding eyeballs that make her look as though someone’s tried to strangle her with the tassels of her ugly velvet cloak. The dark cape and chalky-white skin give the impression she’s just walked off the set of a Halloween movie and is simply counting the hours before returning to the undead.

  She pulls out a box labelled MOBILES and demands our phones.

  Before I put mine inside, I send a quick text to Holly: U wont BLEv dis. TGR iz Porters mum!

  16

  Picking Sides

  “You lied about your surname,” I hiss at Porter. “On top of everything else I’m going to have to delete you from my database.”

  “I didn’t lie – Lewis was my dad’s name,” Porter hisses back as Ms Grimm leads us down a long turquoise corridor.

  “Whatever.”

  “He’s dead now.”

  I feel bad about the “whatever”. “Sorry,” I mumble.

  “Don’t be. I never met him.”

  “Oh.” I’m not sure what to say so I stare at the walls. The internet says turquoise has a calming effect. The internet lies. I grow less calm with every step.

  Turquoise Curry in a Hurry boxes, turquoise Kazinsky Electronics vans, turquoise iPods, turquoise-bracelet-wearing taxi drivers and now turquoise LOSERS. Surely there has to be a connection. Dad says it’s not paranoia if they really are out to get you.

  I stare at the non-calming turquoise walls and realise:

  CLUE 20

  The quotes on LOSERS’ walls have the same winning theme as the ramblings of Dad’s (now squished) shoes.

  I read the quotations as we pass. Some make me feel ready to take on the world:

  Only a man who knows what it is like to be defeated can reach down to the bottom of his soul and come up with the extra ounce of power it takes to win when the match is even.

  Muhammad Ali

  Some make me laugh:

  If winning isn’t important, why keep score?

  Star Trek: The Next Generation

  And some are probably supposed to make me laugh, but don’t:

  There’s nothing to winning, really. That is, if you happen to be blessed with a keen eye, an agile mind, and no scruples whatsoever.

  Alfred Hitchcock

  I don’t like that one. Without scruples to tell us the right things to do, people would be murdering, stealing and talking with their mouths full all over the place.

  Ms Grimm leads us past glass doors showing book-lined classrooms and whiteboards covered in equations. We march along yet more turquoise corridors where open doors reveal smaller, cosier rooms equipped with tablet computers, Smart Boards and the latest gadgets. At the end of a final walkway we reach the dormitory block: girls on the ground floor, boys on the floor above, staff up at the top.

  There’s a huge sitting room next to the girls’ dorms on the ground floor. It’s a Know-All’s paradise: sleek, modern and full of computing equipment. I count fifteen laptops and nine games consoles hooked up to plasma screens. The tables are piled high with gadgets and techy magazines.

  Ms Grimm stops just inside the door and rests her hands on Porter’s shoulders. She’s scarier than a sabre-toothed spider, but the gesture reminds me of pre-explosion Mum and makes my throat scratchy. She introduces me to the other Remarkable Students and everyone mumbles a quick “hello”.

  Ms Grimm seizes the opportunity for a motivational speech. “As you all know, you’ve been selected as the brightest young people in this area. Your only limits are those you place on yourself. We are here to help you remove these limits and achieve your full potential. I am so confident of what my school can achieve, I even enrolled my son.”

  She sounds so much like Porter’s impression that I start to laugh. Unfortunately, the noise that comes out of my mouth sounds more like a donkey being strangled. Ms Grimm glares at me and I chew through my cheeks trying to keep my face straight. Porter comes to my rescue, slapping me on the back and telling everyone I must be choking with excitement at the thought of achieving my full potential.

  Ms Grimm reduces her glare to half-power.

  “I didn’t know you had a son, Ms Grimm,” I say afterwards, as the other girls escape to the dormitory.

  Porter stiffens. Interesting.

  Ms Grimm puts a bony arm around his shoulder. “Porter, meet Hawkins. Hawkins, meet my son, Porter.”

  “Oh, we’ve already met. I just didn’t realise he was your son.”

  The Grimm Reaper’s bulgy eyes bulge further. Porter steps on my toe. Hard. So he doesn’t want his mother to know he came to see us? Even more interesting.

  “We were sitting next to each other on the bus,” I explain. “We had a fascinating conversation about portable toilets.”

  Porter’s shoulders relax. Ms Grimm turns away, losing interest. With a grateful smile, Porter heads for the stairs. I pick up my bags and carry them through to the dormitory.

  It’s a big room – ten beds on one side, ten on the other. Behind the headboard of each bed is a small cubicle containing a desk, a chest of drawers and a wardrobe. I poke the mattress. Nice and firm. Shame about the turquoise duvet cover.

  I’d expected a room full of teenage girls to be plastered with pictures of half-naked, floppy-haired boy celebrities I’m supposed to recognise. To my relief, the dorm walls are covered in astronomy charts and Higgs boson posters. Einstein smiles down from several of my dorm-mates’ walls.

  Ms Grimm’s school is clearly doing well. Every cubicle is occupied.

  Except mine.

  “Has this bed always been empty?” I a
sk the girl beside me.

  Her eyes flit around the room as though they’re tracking a distressed moth. She doesn’t answer.

  I remember Holly’s advice about not firing questions at people until we’ve built a rapport. I’m not sure what a rapport is, but I try a smile. It feels wonky.

  I plough on. “Hello, my name’s Noelle. What’s yours?”

  “Aisha,” the girl says softly.

  That went well. What am I supposed to say next? Archimedes! This is a social minefield. What’s wrong with asking questions anyway?

  “So Aisha, has this bed always been empty?”

  Aisha points to a piece of A4 paper stuck on the wall behind me.

  THE GREAT LEADER’S GOLDEN RULES

  1. Shake off your limits and be the best you can be

  2. Take pride in the school

  3. Do not question the Great Leader

  4. Do not indulge in idle chit-chat

  5. Insert text here

  “‘Do not indulge in idle chit-chat’,” Aisha says. “Golden Rule number four.”

  “I like rule number five best.”

  The Great Leader clearly needs help with the Golden Rules template.

  “Would you like to discuss Einstein’s Theory of Relativity instead?” Aisha asks politely.

  “Er. Not right now. Maybe later. So who’s this Great Leader?”

  “Do not question the Great Leader. Golden Rule number three.”

  “I’m not questioning the Great Leader. I’m questioning you about the Great Leader. That’s different.”

  Aisha looks like she’s about to cry.

  “Forget it.” I retreat into the cubicle and hang up my clothes. So much for rapport.

  “Her name was Gemma.” Aisha’s whisper carries through a small hole in the back of the wardrobe. “The girl here before you. Gemma Gold. They say she went home last week. But her comfort blanket’s still here and she can’t sleep without it.”

  “Do you think—?”

  A bell rings in the distance and Aisha flees, leaving me staring at the grubby bit of blue cloth tied round my bed frame. Is this the comfort blanket she was talking about? Ugh. If it’s a clue, it’s a heavily sucked one.

  So who is this Great Leader? Is that what Ms Grimm calls herself here? I look at the Golden Rules poster.

  I don’t like number one: Shake off your limits.

  Limits, like scruples, are a good thing. I tried to explain this to Vigil-Aunty when we got pulled over for speeding. If the traffic police couldn’t punish her for breaking the speed limit then they’d have to follow her around until she caused a proper accident (which was inevitable given the way she was driving). I think Vigil-Aunty got the point – we haven’t been pulled over since. Although, come to think of it, she hasn’t given me a lift since.

  What worries me is that if someone with no limits has kidnapped Dad, there’s no saying what they might do to him.

  17

  LOSERS’ Routine

  7:45

  Run up and down stairs five times

  because exercise enhances brain function by increasing blood flow to the brain.

  (If it doesn’t kill you first.)

  8:00

  Breakfast: herrings and green leafy vegetables

  because oily fish contain Omega-3 fatty acids that improve the performance of brain cell membranes.

  (So why are there no penguins on Mastermind?)

  8:30

  Chess Hour

  because chess encourages you to use both sides of your brain, improving critical thinking and visualisation skills.

  (Not when your opponent has herring breath.)

  9:30

  Math Hour

  because solving math puzzles improves your ability to learn, concentrate and reason.

  (Not when some of your classmates are still crying about losing chess.)

  10:30

  Music Hour

  because studies show music lessons in childhood lead to better exam results later.

  (Because parents who force their children to learn instruments also force their children to revise for exams.)

  11:30

  iPod Hour

  because listening to classical music enhances the ability to focus and sustain attention.

  (It also drowns the sound of sobbing chess LOSERS.)

  12:30

  Lunch: tuna, wholegrain rice and green leafy vegetables

  because (see Breakfast above).

  (Fish is the food of the devil. And sharks. No wonder they’re so aggressive.)

  13:30

  Building Mental Muscle Hour

  because keeping your brain cells active prevents deterioration.

  (Er, brains don’t contain muscles.)

  14:30

  Positive Thinking Hour

  because positive thoughts rewire your, brain, strengthening the areas that stimulate positive feelings.

  (Whatever.)

  15:30

  Double Science Hour

  because teaching by observation, evidence collection and analysis, science helps sharpen your thinking about everyday ideas and events.

  (But you’re not allowed to ‘chit-chat’.)

  17:30

  Tea: trout and green leafy vegetables

  because (see Breakfast above).

  (Curses on fish and green leafy vegetables.)

  118:30

  Reading Hour

  (Too busy burping up trout to read.)

  19:30

  Three-minute phonecall to parent or guardian.

  (Possibly more enjoyable for students whose mothers remove their earphones and speak to them.)

  20:30

  Bedtime.

  18

  Guinea Pigs

  “What is this?” Ms Grimm stands in front of my bed, holding my defaced LOSERS’ routine between her thumb and forefinger as if it might carry something contagious. Uh-oh.

  The other girls flee the dorm to begin morning exercises.

  “It’s my, um, routine sheet.”

  “Your ‘um routine sheet’?”

  I nod, my body tense.

  “Think you’re a comedian, Hawkins?” Ms Grimm asks.

  I hate questions with no good answers. “Not sure.”

  “You think this is funny?” Ms Grimm reads from the sheet in a voice that would kill any joke. “‘Run up and down stairs five times because exercise enhances brain function by increasing blood flow to the brain . . . if it doesn’t kill you first.’ Is that funny?”

  “No.” Not any more. “Sorry.”

  “You will be. If you don’t want to run up and down the stairs five times, let’s see how you feel about doing it twenty times.”

  “Twenty?” She must be joking.

  I look at her face. She’s not joking. Twenty trips up those huge staircases? On these puny legs?

  The first trip up and down isn’t too bad, but then everything blurs into a long run of “Owww!” and “I-can’t-breathe!”

  Somewhere around the fourteenth run up and down, I have to swerve to avoid a girl who staggers out of a room on the top floor. A woman in a nurse’s uniform grabs her and drags her back into the room. The girl doesn’t look like a LOSERS’ student. Her hair’s all over the place and she’s wearing pyjamas in the middle of the day.

  I wonder for a moment if she might have been a clue, but decide she’s just a sick person in need of a good hairbrush. Either that or an illusion caused by too much exercise.

  “Stop!” Ms Grimm barks from the bottom of the stairwell five minutes later.

  “Willingly.” I collapse, wheezing.

  “The Great Leader has requested an audience with you, later this week.” Ms Grimm is breathing heavily. I don’t know why. It’s not like she’s been pounding up and down the stairs. “You are a lucky, lucky girl. Such a wonderful man.”

  A man? So Ms Grimm isn’t the Great Leader. I look at her closely. Is she dribbling? The pupils of her eyes are huge and her face is sweaty. I f
lick through the unusual facial expressions stored in my memory and decide she’s over-excited.

  During breakfast, I’m so busy trying to picture a man who could make Ms Grimm dribble that I accidentally eat a herring. As the salty tail brushes my tonsils, yesterday’s fish reappear in my throat and it’s a struggle not to empty my stomach all over the dining table.

  I can still taste herring in Chess Hour. I let Remarkable Student Aisha win because I can’t bear the thought of her crying through Maths Hour when I feel this sick. The sickness fades slightly when Ms Grimm announces we’re having double Maths instead of Music. After yesterday’s scree-chathon, violins have shot up to second place (below fish) in my list of Things I Hate Most in the Whole World.

  Ms Grimm hands out turquoise iPods during today’s maths test. I immediately think of Mum’s Curry in a Hurry freebie.

  CLUE 21

  The colour turquoise connects LOSERS, Curry in a Hurry, Kazinsky Electronics, the cab driver and now these iPods.

  I put in the earphones. The music helps me focus and the test answers come easily as I whizz through the paper. Behind me, one Remarkable Student rushes out of the room with a nosebleed and another complains of a headache and has to be taken to the nurse.

  Is this what people mean by exam nerves? For Fermat’s sake, it’s only a maths test.

  We return the iPods and mark our own papers under the watchful eye of Mr Kumar (Maths Teacher). I can’t stop staring at him.

  CLUE 22

  Mr Kumar (maths teacher) is the spitting image of Curry in a Hurry Man.

  I think they have the same surname too. I was going to add that to my clue list until Remarkable Student Sandeep told me that over forty million people in India have the name Kumar. It didn’t seem such a good clue after that.

  I glance up in surprise as Mr Kumar hands me a shiny new iPod.

  “Every student whose test score has increased by more than five per cent since yesterday gets their own personal media player,” he explains.