The Next Great Paulie Fink

by Ali Benjamin

  It’s like my grandma says: “Get out that big pink piggy bank, girl. Change is coming fast.”

  Interview: Fiona

  CAITLYN:

  You were pretty upset that first day. About Paulie not being here. It was almost like you couldn’t focus on anything else.

  FIONA:

  Heck yeah, I was upset! Paulie was the only kid at this school who ever got in more trouble than I did.

  You don’t understand, Caitlyn. My whole life, my mom always said that I needed to listen for my name. If I heard it more than three times in a class period, it meant it was a big-trouble kind of day. And let me tell you, I heard my name a LOT. Fiona, sit still. Fiona, don’t draw on books. Fiona, don’t scoop the sand out of the sand table. Fiona, don’t you dare leap off the slide just to see what it feels like to fly. Fiona, honey, now you’re getting blood everywhere. Fiona Fiona Fiona Fiona.

  Back in third grade when we learned about tally marks, we all had to pick something in our lives to tally, so I tallied the number of times an adult called out my name in one day. Guess how many tally marks I made that day?

  CAITLYN:

  I don’t know. Ten? Fifteen?

  FIONA:

  Fifty-seven! In a single day! I used to feel sort of bad about all the trouble I got into. And then I heard that expression Well-behaved women seldom make history.

  Well. Let’s just say I’ve always been on the fast track to make history. And when I do, I’m going to move to a big city, and once in a blue moon I’ll come home to Mitchell in a limousine and everyone will be all, Remember when you used to get in trouble all the time? And I’ll be like, No. I really don’t.

  CAITLYN:

  Fiona, we were talking about Paulie Fink, remember?

  FIONA:

  I am talking about Paulie Fink! ’Cause guess what? One day in fourth grade, I counted again, and I only heard my name twenty-two times. To be honest, I don’t think this is because I was any better behaved. It’s because that was the year Paulie moved to town. All the teachers were so busy saying his name, they didn’t have time to say mine. I guess you could say that Paulie launched my upswing.

  CAITLYN:

  So you’re saying… that first day, you thought you kind of needed Paulie?

  FIONA:

  Well, I mean, it’s not just me. Doesn’t everybody need a little Paulie Fink in their life?

  Dance Party

  The whole first morning feels like a slow-moving, not-so-great dream. Mitchell vaguely resembles school—there are classes and kids and stuff—but only in the same way your own reflection looks when you stare into a fun-house mirror. Everything is distorted, the proportions all wrong. It gives me a dizzy, seasick sort of feeling.

  Also, there’s so much to figure out. First of all, there are my new classmates. In addition to Soccer Boy Diego, Pantsuit Girl Fiona, Pink Hair Yumi, Nice One Gabby, and Know-It-All Henry, I learn that the camouflage twins are Timothy and Thomas, and the threesome with the pom-pom ears are Lydia (frizzy red hair), Willow (wispy yoga girl), and Sam (buzz cut). I also learn that those pom-poms are actually supposed to be dragon ears, because they adore some stupid role-playing game involving mythical creatures.

  But knowing their names doesn’t tell me where they fit. Take Fiona, for example: Either that red suit is some kind of costume, or she’s a total misfit, like Anna Spang. And if she’s an Anna, then why does everyone else, even Diego, who’s cute and sporty, keep talking to her? Don’t they know about clusters here?

  Then there are the million other ways that this school is different from my old one. Like, the Mitchell School is so small that we’re going to spend the whole day moving back and forth between two main teachers: Mags and Mr. Farabi, who teaches math and science, but who also happens to be the gym teacher and soccer coach.

  And when Mags tells us we’re supposed to meet Mr. Farabi by the soccer field for science class—I check, and the schedule definitely says science—everyone acts like it’s totally normal.

  I follow the other kids through a maze of dim, dusty, wallpaper-covered hallways until we reach some French doors, and everyone bursts outside.

  I expect to see the soccer field out there. Instead, I’m looking at a lawn full of broken statues, all these figures in draping robes. Most are missing limbs, or parts of their faces. A stone footpath winds its way through the statues, and the lawn is flanked on both sides by looming dark pines and drooping willows. I swear, if this were a movie and a bunch of people were gathering at a property like this, you just know that at any second, they’d start getting chased by mummies or something like that.

  But this is where everything gets weirder. As everyone heads down the path, Fiona calls out, “Dance party! Do the Diego!”

  All of a sudden, the whole class is swaying their shoulders back and forth, arms loose. Then Diego shouts, “Do the Yumi!” and everyone begins twirling their arms in random circular motions above their heads. Yumi hollers, “Do the Fiona!” and they all start hopping up and down really fast, like hyperactive bunnies.

  I turn to Gabby. The nice one. “What’s happening?”

  Gabby explains that everyone in the class has a signature dance. “When your name gets called, everyone does your dance. Then you get to pick the next name, see? Don’t worry, you’ll get your own move soon enough. In the meantime, just follow along.”

  I don’t follow along. Instead, I think about the rules in my pocket. Don’t do anything humiliating. Except they don’t seem humiliated at all. They look like they’re having fun.

  Fiona shouts “Paulie!” Next thing I know, each kid is doing something different at the same time. Gabby explains that Paulie kept changing his dance, so his name means everyone can dance however they feel. Finally, Fiona says, “Never mind, I forgot he wasn’t even here. How about… Timothy!” And then everyone’s moving their arms like a sprinkler.

  “We didn’t do… this… back in New York,” I say to Gabby.

  She stops mid-sprinkle. “You’re from New York? As in New York City?”

  Actually, no. Mom and I lived pretty far from the city, and I’ve only visited Manhattan a couple of times in my life. But I find myself nodding. “Yeah,” I say casually. Then I add, “The city,” just to hear how that sounds.

  “Did you ever see Jadelicious there?”

  “Who?”

  “You know, Jadelicious? The Search for the Next Great Megastar? The television show?”

  “Never heard of it.” This makes the second lie I’ve told in almost as many sentences. Of course I’ve heard of Megastar—it’s one of the most popular reality-television shows of all time. Even though it’s been off the air for a couple of years, I’ve watched a bunch of old episodes online. But I don’t want to let Gabby know that.

  “Never heard of it?” Gabby squawks. “Oh, you have to see it. It’s a great show! Season two was the best one of all time. That’s the season that Jadelicious won—nobody had ever even heard of Jadelicious before Megastar, and now she’s got her own perfume and clothing lines, and her picture is in all the magazines.”

  Then she starts telling me about her favorite episodes. “I think my favorite is the one where Jadelicious is told she has to sing for the toughest audience in the world, and she thinks it’s going to be some superstar, but instead she’s brought into an auditorium filled with crying toddlers. My grandma’s favorite episode is where Jadelicious finally stands up to her archenemy, Rexx Rowdy. He’s the worst.”

  While she’s talking, I watch Fiona and Diego. They’re cracking each other up as they dance. “Hey,” I interrupt. “What’s the deal with those two? Are they friends or enemies or what?”

  Gabby tells me that they’ve been best friends since they were little, but they also fight all the time. “They’re like, you know, frenemies, but in a good way.”

  “And what’s with Fiona’s weird suit?” I ask. A little too loudly, apparently.

  “Hey, Fiona,” shouts one of the twins. “The new kid wants to know
what’s up with your weird suit.”

  Fiona whirls around, puts her hands on her hips, and glares at me. “What do you mean, weird suit?”

  “I mean—is it some sort of dare?”

  Fiona stands up a little straighter. “Why would it be a dare? I dress this way because I am a strong and powerful woman.”

  Diego elbows her. “A strong and powerful woman who gets in trouble all the time.”

  She turns to Diego. “I keep trying to explain this to you, Diego. Well-behaved women seldom make history.” Then she returns her focus to me. “And for the record, my suit is fierce.” She says it with such confidence that I wonder if it’s possible that she’s the silver dollar.

  When in doubt, stay quiet. I don’t say anything else—not when everyone starts dancing again, not as we pass a playground filled with younger kids, not when that playground gives way to what looks like a toy junkyard. There’s a truck with a missing wheel, a plastic pail with a broken handle, and the base of an old basketball hoop.

  “Hey!” Fiona shouts, her voice suddenly bright, like she wasn’t furious with me two seconds ago. She points to the far end of a scraggly soccer field. “There they are!”

  I look where she’s pointing, and that’s when I remember Ms. Glebus’s joke, the one that I assumed was a play on the word kid. I spent much of the morning helping settle the goats.

  I guess it wasn’t a joke. Because that’s exactly what Fiona’s pointing toward: a pen full of goats.

  Real, live goats.

  My New Archenemy

  “Goats!” my classmates chant as they head toward the pen. “Goats! Goats! Goats!”

  There’s a man waiting next to the goat pen with a bucket in his hand. He’s got a neat beard, a flannel shirt with a bow tie, pants the color of ketchup, and mud-crusted work boots. Lumberjack meets professor. Paul Bunyan meets golf pro. Like the rest of this place, it’s hard to categorize him exactly. So this is Mr. Farabi.

  He introduces himself to me quickly, then spreads his arms wide. “Welcome, Originals, to seventh-grade science!” Behind him, a dozen or so goats run all over the place bleating wildly behind a flimsy-looking portable fence. “Before I talk to you about science, or about these magnificent creatures making a ruckus behind me,” Mr. Farabi says, “I want to talk about the annual soccer game we play against Devlinshire Hills.”

  The whole class starts to boo. Fiona mutters, “Those snoots!”

  “As most of you know,” Mr. Farabi continues, “your soccer field has been shrinking each year, thanks to an ever-expanding population of buckthorn and honeysuckle bushes. Every year, we cut them back. And every single year, without fail, they respond to our efforts by growing back stronger and thicker. Last year, as you surely recall, it got to the point that our biggest—well, to be fair, our only—rivals refused to play on our field.”

  Everyone boos again, and Fiona leans over to me. “They demanded that we play on their fancy field instead,” she says. “Said they didn’t want to risk the injuries.”

  “Who?” I whisper back.

  “Devlinshire Hills. They’re snobs, and we hate them.” Then, to the rest of the class, Fiona yells, “Don’t we hate Devlinshire, guys?”

  “Excuse me, but we don’t hate anyone,” says Mr. Farabi. He gives Fiona a hard look. “But this year, I would very much like to return the game to our home turf. I happen to know a little secret, too: Goats are nature’s best bulldozers. Estimates are that a dozen goats—which is what we have here—can go through half an acre a month. We’re scheduled to play Devlinshire on October 27. That’s about two months away, which means if my calculations are correct, our hairy little friends here should have the edges of this field cleared just in time for you to take on Devlinshire right here at home. Who knows… maybe we’ll finally win the game!”

  He tells us that every few days we’ll move the goat pen to a new spot, until the edges of the field are cleared. “Even after the game, the goats will stick around for the rest of the year,” Mr. Farabi continues. “They offer a chance to learn not only about ecosystems and habitats, but also one of my favorite words: responsibility. Because you, as the oldest Mitchell students, are officially in charge of caring for these goats. We’re going to supplement their diet with grain pellets, and you’ll be the ones to feed them. Every weekday. All year long. You ready to learn how?”

  As we move toward the goat pen, I learn something new: Goats stink. They smell like unwashed human hair, mixed with the scent of the soft white cheese my mom sometimes spreads on crackers.

  Still, I have to admit, they’re kind of cute. The babies are, anyway. The little ones play like puppies, leaping and jumping, ramming their heads together, and chasing one another. Most of the older goats just stand around, bleating and chewing.

  At the far edge of the pen, there’s one big, very grumpy-looking goat. His hair falls in long tangles, and he’s got huge horns that spiral back on his head like snail shells. This big old goat stares right at me—like, right in my eyes—then utters one low bleat, his tongue sticking out. Like he’s saying, I want you out of here. Yes, you specifically.

  I stare right back at him, thinking, Yeah, you and me both, big guy.

  Mr. Farabi lifts a bucket of pellets, steps into the goat pen, and moves toward four empty bowls. Immediately, the animals swarm him. Wherever he turns, the goats go, too. They shove one another out of the way, each trying to get as close to the food as possible.

  “See this?” he says, laughing. “You’ll never get to their food bowls if they see you coming. That’s why at each feeding, most of you are going to distract the goats, while one brave Original will sneak in to fill their bowls.”

  “Aw, Paulie would love this,” says Diego.

  “He’d do something ridiculous, too,” says Yumi. “Like one day we’d show up to school and the goats would be missing from the pen…”

  “…because he put them all in Ms. Glebus’s office!” finishes Sam.

  My mind wanders to the texts I’ll send my friends back home about this. I swear, I’ll tell them. Actual goats.

  While I’m thinking about home, I fail to notice that one of the goats—the big ugly guy—is moving across the pen, toward us. The goat walks at first, then breaks into a jog.

  Then he’s running, his head lowered.

  By the time I realize what’s happening, it’s too late. Through the fence, he rams his spiral-horned head into my legs. I stumble backward, lose my footing.

  With everyone watching, I land squarely on my butt.

  I Make a Decision

  “Did you see that?” Fiona asks. “She flew back like ten whole feet!”

  I keep my eyes on my sneakers. Don’t blink. Don’t blink.

  I take one of those deep cleansing breaths, and I try to find the hard stone inside, the one that protects me. But my butt hurts where it hit the ground, and my eyes sting, and those awful goats are still bleating away, and it’s hard to tell where the bleating of the goats meets the laughter of the other kids.

  From inside the pen, Mr. Farabi calls, “Can somebody give Caitlyn a hand?”

  Henry, the know-it-all glasses kid, comes over. He extends his arm, ready to help me up from the ground.

  “I’m fine,” I snap.

  He lowers his arm, but he doesn’t leave. “Did you know that goats have four stomachs?”

  I stand, brush myself off, and smooth down my hair, trying to regain a little dignity. “Technically,” Henry adds, “they have one stomach. But it has four separate chambers. Cows are the same way. And interestingly, giraffes, too.”

  “So?” I ask. My voice is hard, but it’s better than crying. It’s almost like mad beats sad, the way rock beats scissors, and paper beats rock.

  Henry pushes his glasses up on his nose. “So that makes them all ruminants. Also, goats have 340-degree vision.” He just stands there and blinks at me, as if he’s helped somehow.

  After science, as we head back inside, Henry keeps spouting new goat facts.
This is the point where I start vaguely worrying about who I’m going to sit with at lunchtime. Will I have to sit with Henry and listen to him blab about goats or whatever? I know I shouldn’t try to sit with the pom-pom kids—threesomes never, ever have room for a fourth. Yumi’s a little too out there for me, and Fiona’s too intense and confusing. And of course there’s no way I’d ever try to sit with a boy. So that leaves pretty much one person: Gabby.

  By lunchtime, no one has invited me to join them, and eating alone is the worst option of all. As I follow everyone toward the cafeteria, I turn to Gabby and ask, my words coming a little too fast, if I can sit with her.

  “No,” she says. But you’re the nice one, I think. My look must give me away, because Gabby smiles. “I mean, I’d sit with you if I could, Caitlyn. But I can’t.”

  Sam, walking ahead of us, turns around. “It’s because our Minis need us.”

  “Our… what?”

  “The little kids!” says Gabby. “See, every table has at least one kid from every grade. The idea is that everyone gets to know each other. And since we’re the oldest at the school, we’re in charge of looking after the youngest kids. We’re officially their buddies.”

  By now we’ve reached the cafeteria—which, naturally, isn’t a cafeteria at all, it’s more like an atrium, with more windows than walls.

  “See, you check that list over there,” Gabby says, pointing to a poster on the wall. “The list tells you your table for the next couple of months. Then you go up to Mr. Twilling, who’s the kindergarten teacher, and you tell him your table number. He’ll introduce you to the Mini who’s assigned to that table. It’s your job to sit with them, help them out.”

  “So we’re like… free babysitters?” I ask.

  Yumi rolls her eyes. “I guess that’s one way to look at it.”