by Amy Ignatow
“Oh . . .” Jay said lightly, “this and that.” Nick frowned at him and he let out a soft laugh. “Look, you old minotaur, I’m fine. Really. I just have to sort out some thoughts that she put into my head.”
“What kinds of thoughts?”
“She made it clear to me that some of the things that I say can be insensitive. Things that I’d always thought were okay. Flattering, even. I never meant to hurt her. Or anyone!” Jay looked at Nick. “Nick, do I ever hurt your feelings with my words?”
“What, like when you just called me an old minotaur?”
“Did that injure you? I’m so sorry, Nick.”
“No, no, it’s fine, stop.” Nick laughed. “I don’t mind being called a mythical maze-dwelling beast.”
“A MIGHTY mythical maze-dwelling beast. I really did mean it as a compliment.” Jay looked worried.
“And that’s fine. I don’t care. But it’s basically nonsense.”
“GASP.”
“Did you just say the word ‘gasp’ instead of actually gasping?”
“It’s something I’m working on. I can’t believe you called my beautiful words nonsensical.”
Nick turned to Jay. “When you call me a minotaur I’m not going to care. When you point out, constantly, that Cookie is black by talking about her skin tone you’re singling her out as being different.” Jay started to say something but Nick kept talking. “Even if you mean it as a compliment. Don’t you think that she knows she’s the only black girl in the school? Do you think she needs you constantly reminding her?”
“She definitely made it clear that she doesn’t,” Jay admitted. “And now I’m wondering if everything that comes out of my mouth hurts people the way I hurt her. I felt it, Nick. She made me feel how much I’d hurt her.” Jay stopped walking and looked stricken. “Maybe this is my superpower. I can hurt people with my words.”
“Nah, most people don’t pay that much attention to anything you say,” Nick said.
“Owchies, Nicholas, you saucepan. That wounds.”
“See? Anyone can hurt with their words.” They’d reached Nick’s house. The door was, unsurprisingly, still locked, so they headed into the backyard.
Jay looked around to see if any of the neighbors were around. The coast was clear. “Okay, try thinking about your bedroom. No, your kitchen, that’s closer to the back door, so you can let me in. Think! Think with all your minotaur might.”
Nick closed his eyes and pictured his kitchen. The table that his mother was always trying and failing to keep clear of bills and notices and old To-Do lists. The fridge with faded photos of Nick as a fat baby and toddler Jay dressed as a ladybug for Halloween. The ultrasound of Jilly’s baby. The sink where he’d been not an hour before, splashing cold water onto his face. He opened his eyes.
He was still in the backyard standing next to Jay. “I don’t think that worked.”
“Interesting. Were you thinking of the kitchen?”
“Of course I was. I pictured the whole room in my mind.”
“Same as the last time?” Jay asked.
“No, the last time I was thinking about being in my basement, and that’s where I ended up.”
“Why ever were you thinking about being in the basement?”
“I was thinking about how I wanted to use my old bicycle.”
“AHA.”
“Aha?”
“Yes, aha. It’s not about the thinking,” Jay said, jabbing Nick’s forehead with his finger. “It’s about the wanting.” He poked the same finger at Nick’s chest. “You weren’t thinking about the basement. You were wanting your bicycle. And you weren’t thinking about my room, you were wanting to talk to me.”
“Gasp.”
“Exactly. We just have to think of what you really want and—”
Jay had stopped talking. No, Jay may have still been talking, but Jay was no longer anywhere to be seen. Neither was Nick’s backyard.
Nick felt the lump in his throat and he dropped to his knees in front of his father’s gravestone. “Hi, Dad,” he said softly. “I really need to talk with you.”
“Toodles?” Cookie asked Martina. “When during our How to Be Normal tutorials did I ever utter the word toodles?”
Martina shrugged. “I like the sound of it. It rhymes with noodles.”
Cookie sighed. “Come on, Toodles, let’s get to class.”
“I didn’t mean for it to be my name . . .”
“Yeah, yeah.”
They walked into Mrs. Whitaker’s class and took seats next to Addison and Claire. Cookie could see Claire shooting Addison a look and didn’t need her power to know what that look meant: Why is Cookie hanging out with that weird girl all of a sudden?
Whatever. They’d been through a major accident together; of course she was hanging out with Martina. Claire and Addison would just have to deal with it.
“It’s cool that you guys are friends now, after the accident,” Addison said to them, and looked confused. “I mean,” she continued, “I guess you guys have been through a lot together.”
Martina looked at Cookie, her gray eyes wide. I didn’t mean to put that thought in her head! Cookie thought at her.
Be careful, Martina thought back.
Cookie smiled at Addison. “Yeah, and Martina’s cool. She’s a really good artist.”
“Cool,” Addison said.
“Cool!” Claire said.
“Yes,” Martina said, “cool.”
“Okay!” Mrs. Whitaker said, clapping her hands together once to silence the chattering class. “Are we missing anyone today?” She looked at her attendance book. “Where are Eric Mathes and Michael Donovan? And has anyone seen Nick Gross?”
Cookie looked around the classroom. Nick wasn’t there. She looked at Martina, who gave an almost imperceptible nod—Eric Mathes and Michael Donovan were two of the Company Kids who had high test scores.
“Okay, guys, let’s all pick partners and talk about DNA while looking at our fingers,” Mrs. Whitaker said as she handed out worksheets. “Who has mid-digital hair?”
For the next five minutes Cookie and Martina worked together to answer the worksheet questions. Were they male or female? Did they have mid-digital hair? Were they able to curl their tongues? What color eyes did they have? (Martina answered “brown” just to be on the safe side.)
“Now we’re going to pretend that each pair is going to have an offspring,” Mrs. Whitaker told the class.
“Oh, Addison, we’re going to make the most beautiful babies!” Claire joked, causing everyone to giggle.
Mrs. Whitaker rolled her eyes. “And we’re going to see if we can predict what sort of genetic traits the imaginary offspring will have . . . Well hello, Mr. Mathes, Mr. Donovan, how nice of you to finally join us. Do you have late passes?”
Eric and Michael swaggered into the room, completely ignoring Mrs. Whitaker and heading to the back of the lab where she kept the class hamster. Cookie had known them for as long as she’d been in Muellersville. Eric and Michael had never been very bright, but they weren’t usually rude. Maybe to someone like Jay Carpenter, but not to one of their teachers.
“Boys,” Mrs. Whitaker said in a stern voice, “if you don’t have late passes you can’t come in here. You know the rules.”
Eric looked back at the teacher for a moment with a mean smile on his face before lifting up the hamster cage from the windowsill.
“Put that down this instant!” Mrs. Whitaker cried out, alarmed, as Michael let out a short, sharp bark of a laugh.
“I tell you what,” Eric sneered, “I’ll put down Neil deGrasse Hamster if you put down your little attendance book.” He held out the cage. “Or we could just do some Galileo gravity tests.” He let go of the cage and quickly caught it again. Someone in the class gasped. Michael laughed. Neil deGrasse Hamster let out a little rodent shriek.
“MR. MATHES!” Mrs. Whitaker roared.
Put the hamster cage down and GET OUT OF THIS CLASSROOM.
Eric
put the cage down, and lurched back across the room to the door. “Dude,” Michael asked, “where are you going?”
AND PINCH MICHAEL’S BUTT.
Eric’s hand began to reach for Michael’s pants. “Wait, what?” he muttered, snatching his hand away.
“Dude, what are you doing?”
“I don’t . . .”
“BOTH OF YOU, OUT.” Mrs. Whitaker shoved two disciplinary passes into their hands. “I expect better from kids who test so well. Maybe you can explain to Principal Jacobs why you think it’s okay to come into my class late and threaten the life of Neil deGrasse Hamster. OUT.”
Eric muttered something nasty and took a step toward Mrs. Whitaker.
OUT.
Eric and Michael left the room. “Back to your questionnaires,” Mrs. Whitaker said, her voice a little shaky. She picked up the class phone to call the front office.
Martina picked up the hamster cage and put it back on the windowsill. She came back to the lab table and looked at Cookie with a raised eyebrow. Cookie smiled a little and shrugged.
She could get used to this.
“Did you hear that Eric almost killed Neil deGrasse Hamster?”
“Seriously?”
Farshad pretended to look for something in his locker while the two girls next to him continued their conversation. He’d gotten good at that over the years—making himself invisible, or as invisible as a really tall brown-skinned guy could be at Deborah Read Middle School. Ever since he got the name “Terror Boy” he had learned to deflect attention. The girls kept talking as if he weren’t there.
“Eric’s such a jerk,” the first one went on. “He was just holding the hamster cage up like he was going to drop it and smash it if Mrs. Whitaker didn’t, like, do his bidding.”
“Like she was going to be all ‘Sure, threaten the life of my pet and get what you want’? What is his problem?”
“I don’t even know. All those high scorers are acting like they own the school.”
“Gross.”
“Super gross.”
“Totally gross.”
“It’s so gross.”
Maybe if Cookie were here she could use her powers to tell them to get to the point already. Farshad rolled his eyes.
“What’s your problem?” the first girl asked. She was white with short curly hair and a freckled face.
Farshad felt his cheeks turning red. “Excuse me?” he stammered.
“Was our conversation not to your liking?”
“What . . . I . . .”
“Ugh, let’s go,” the freckled girl’s blond friend said, dragging her away and giggling down the hall at what a freak he was. Farshad knew he’d be replaying the embarrassing scene over and over again in his mind for roughly the next fifty years.
“That looked very bad, young peppercorn.” Jay Carpenter sidled up to him.
“That did not feel good,” Farshad admitted, choosing not to ask why he’d just been referred to as a peppercorn. Or what a peppercorn even was. Nick always seemed to just ignore Jay when he was being bizarre, and Farshad was beginning to see the wisdom in that approach. He looked down at Jay, wondering for a moment if he’d recovered from his encounter with Cookie.
“What did you say to those lovely young women to make them turn on you in such a dramatic fashion?”
“It wasn’t that dramatic,” Farshad muttered.
“Certainly it was, you seem most put-out.” Jay looked at the girls, and then to Eric Mathes and Mike Donovan, who were headed down the hall in their direction. “You know, I don’t think those gentlemen went to the principal’s office after all. Mrs. Whitaker is going to be apoplectic.”
“Were you in the class with the hamster thing?” Farshad asked.
“Oh, yes,” Jay said, “it was looking touch-and-go for Neil deGrasse Hamster for a moment there. But he’s a stalwart rodent . . .” Jay’s voice trailed off and they both watched as Eric and Mike hovered near Kaylee Schmitt, who was clutching her backpack. She did not look happy.
Kaylee was a Farm Kid. Farshad didn’t know too much about her besides that; as a Farm Kid she had to get up extra early to take the small bus to school, she hung out with the other Farm Kids, and she did Farm Kid stuff (Farshad had no idea what that meant—he assumed it entailed lifting bales of hay, maybe? Milking cows? Whatever). Even though Farshad had never had any classes with Kaylee she was almost as tall as he was and hard to ignore. And now she looked trapped. “That doesn’t look friendly,” Farshad said.
“It most certainly does not,” Jay agreed.
Mike leaned forward and said something to Kaylee in a low voice. She shoved him away and he grabbed her arm, and before Farshad could register what was happening Jay was bounding over to the tense trio.
“You have got to be kidding me,” Farshad muttered to himself, and looked around for Nick. Nick was the only one who ever seemed to be able to control that little lunatic (well, and now Cookie, although she was nowhere to be seen, either).
“GOOD SIRS!” Jay yelped, inserting himself between Mike and Kaylee. “It appears that you are bothering this exquisite creature.” He looked up at Kaylee, who appeared completely bewildered by his intrusion. “Do you mind if I call you an exquisite creature? I really do mean it as a compliment—” Mike’s hand shot out and he grabbed Jay by the neck, slamming him into the row of lockers.
A small crowd gathered to watch Jay claw at Mike’s hand around his neck. “STOP IT!” Kaylee screamed, punching Mike in the ear. He let go of Jay, who crumpled to the ground, and shoved Kaylee away. He raised his fist to hit her. “YOU BI—AAAAUUGH!”
Jay had bit him on the ankle. Farshad then heard the sickening sound of Mike’s foot connecting with the smaller boy’s stomach, and before he knew it he was running forward to save the valiant little biter. He grabbed Mike, pulled him away, and shoved him. Mike Donovan went flying fifteen feet down the hall, knocking over several other kids like bowling pins.
“TAKE THAT, YOU BRIGAND!” Jay yelped from his spot on the floor.
Farshad felt the wind getting knocked out of him as Eric tackled him. He managed to stay upright, but Eric had Farshad’s arms pinned to his sides. Eric was strong. Farshad found himself having trouble getting oxygen to his lungs, and Eric slammed him into a wall. Farshad saw stars.
“GET OFFA HIM!” Kaylee jumped on Eric’s back and wrapped her arms around his neck. Eric let go of Farshad, who stumbled backward. He tried to find a way to get to Eric without also hurting Kaylee, but she was riding the bully like an actual bucking bull.
It was pandemonium. Kids were screaming, Eric was lurching, Kaylee was holding on for dear life, and out of the corner of his eye Farshad could see Jay, still on the floor, looking for some way to bite Eric.
“THAT’S ENOUGH!” Farshad looked up to see Ms. Zelle making her way through the crowd. Eric threw Kaylee off his back and stared at the teacher, panting and heaving with a wild look in his eye. “Enough,” Ms. Zelle said again. “You’re coming with me. NOW. And you, too.”
“But I didn’t do nothing!” Kaylee yelled.
“Not you, him,” Ms. Zelle said icily, looking at Mike, who lowered his head and came forward. “You. With me. NOW.” She grabbed both Company boys by the arms and led them away. The crowd began to disperse.
“Well, that was invigorating,” Jay wheezed from his spot on the floor, not even bothering to try to get up.
Farshad bent over and put his head between his knees. “Everything hurts.”
“Pshaw, you did great. Did you see how far Mike went?”
“That was crazy,” Kaylee chimed in. “Thanks for helping me.”
“All in a day’s work, you glorious Amazon warrior,” Jay told her. Farshad couldn’t help but laugh. The little bug was starting to grow on him. “And how about my stupendous friend? You are truly a Sultan of Strength. Wait. Was that offensive?”
“Kind of, yes.”
“I have so much to learn.”
“You threw that jerk, like, r
eally far,” Kaylee pointed out. Farshad shrugged. “Well, thanks,” Kaylee added quietly as she picked up her backpack and walked away.
“Very interesting,” Jay said. “Very, very interesting.”
“What, Kaylee?” Farshad asked.
“No, she’s not that interesting. I mean, if you’re into her I can see why. She is magnificent in battle,” Jay said. “I’m saying it’s interesting that Ms. Zelle was able to control Eric and Mike the way that she did.”
“Huh,” Farshad said. Jay was right. The Company Kids had seemed so unhinged until Ms. Zelle’s arrival.
“Also,” Jay went on, “it’s pretty interesting that she took them in the opposite direction of the principal’s office.”
Farshad looked down the hallway where Ms. Zelle had taken Eric and Mike.
“Right toward the teachers’ parking lot,” he murmured. “Where’s Nick?”
Nick hadn’t asked his mom if he could skip school—he just didn’t go. As far as he was concerned he’d earned the right to take a day off without having to pretend that he was sick.
He’d spent about fifteen minutes at his father’s grave. He wasn’t quite sure what he was supposed to do there. Talking seemed silly, because he knew that his dad was dead and couldn’t hear him, and on the off-chance that his dad was somehow watching over Nick then he already knew everything that was going on so there was no need to go over it, right? When his father was in the hospital and he knew that he was dying he’d never said anything like “I will be with you and watching over you always, so feel free to come to me with your problems.”
No, he’d just said, “Your mom knows me better than anyone else in the world, so if you ever need to talk to me, you can talk to her and she’ll know what to do, okay?”
He probably hadn’t predicted that Nick would have questions about what to do with the sudden ability to teleport. Because Nick was pretty sure his mother didn’t have a clue as to what his father would have thought of this particular scenario.
Instead of talking, Nick spent the time cleaning up his dad’s grave. It was pretty clean to begin with, but he cleared away some dead leaves and pulled a few dandelions out by the base of the gravestone. Once it was clean he headed back to his aunts’ place, where Jilly was complaining loudly about false labor pains (seemed real to Nick, but what did he know) and everyone was too preoccupied debating what to do about that to pay attention to Nick. He sent a quick email to Jay to let him know that he hadn’t completely vanished from existence and then went to bed without dinner.