I tried to raise my hand to protest, but my arm was kind of stuck to the stupid leather of the chair. My eyes started to itch.
“But this weekend I have to—”
“Your reflection time is this Saturday, May 4.” Headmaster Nurbin’s voice was stern, like my mom’s when she’s really, really done arguing.
“Yes, sir,” I said.
While Headmaster Nurbin typed up a letter about my Saturday Service Reflection, I sank down in the ugly leather chair and thought about how everything would be ruined when Mom got this letter. Now Brain and I definitely wouldn’t have enough money for our tickets. Which meant I would never know how Tito the Bonecrusher would help me rescue my dad. Which meant I wouldn’t be able to rescue him. Which meant nobody would.
Headmaster Nurbin handed me the letter, a tissue, and a pass back to class. “Stop in the restroom on your way back,” he advised me in a much nicer voice, “and splash some water on your face so no one can see you’ve been crying.”
“I’m not crying,” I told him.
I left his office and headed straight to the boys’ bathroom.
8
THE WRATH OF BLANKY
By the time I got back to class, there were only about five minutes left before dismissal. Then it was time for another nearly silent ride with our bus driver, Mrs. Blanky.
Mrs. Blanky is the meanest grown-up I know. She’s meaner than Fists O’Blarney and John Rancid combined.
She has been driving a bus for about two hundred years, and even though she’s totally horrible, the parents love her. They think she’s this sweet old lady. At the end of my second week at Haselton Academy, my mom made me give Mrs. Blanky a box of homemade cookies, a gift certificate to Starbucks, and a handwritten card. Here’s what I had to write:
Dear Mrs. Blanky,
Thank you for welcoming me onto bus 179! You are the world’s greatest bus driver. I appreciate that you safely drive me to and from school each day.
Sincerely, Oliver Jones
Here’s what I wanted to write:
Dear Mrs. Blanky,
You are DEFINITELY NOT the world’s greatest bus driver. Every night I get down on my knees and pray that you win the lottery so you will retire and I no longer have to deal with your outrageous bus rules. You are truly disturbed.
Sincerely,
Spaghetti-O
Mrs. Blanky has a long list of her super-strict rules posted at the front of the bus. Most of them are about how you have to sit. If you break the rules, you will catch the Wrath of Blanky.
Fortunately, Brain taught me all about the Wrath of Blanky while we waited for the bus on my first few days. She told me the story of how one year a girl named Penny broke the rule that you can’t put your window down while the bus is moving, so Mrs. Blanky drove the bus through a car wash so that Penny and all the kids sitting around her got soaked. One version of the story is that it was the middle of winter, so the kids were frozen into human icicles, but Brain said she’s not convinced of that part.
Brain also told me the story of a boy named Wesley. Wesley broke Mrs. Blanky’s rules over and over, and one day Mrs. Blanky had had enough, so Mrs. Blanky let him out at the side of the road and he had to walk all the way home. Another version of the story is that Mrs. Blanky waited until all the other riders got off the bus, and then she drove Wesley all the way to the West Virginia state line and let him out there, but Brain isn’t convinced of that one, either.
Brain also told the Mrs. Blanky stories to this kindergartner, Joey Muffaletta. It wasn’t pretty. When Brain told the story of Penny, Joey started to cry, and he cried straight through to the end of the story of West Virginia Wesley. But you better believe that little Joey Muffaletta has followed every single one of Mrs. Blanky’s rules, and he hasn’t caught the Wrath of Blanky. He can thank Brain for that.
Here are some of Mrs. Blanky’s rules:
• You must sit with your spine pressed up against the back of the bus seat or you will catch the Wrath of Blanky.
• You must keep your knees together, and under no circumstances can you put a knee or foot into the aisle or you will catch the Wrath of Blanky.
• If you want to talk, forget it. You can’t even talk to your seatmate. Since you have to keep your spine pressed up against the back of the seat, you can’t really turn your head to look at your seatmate, but eventually you kind of get used to whispering while you’re staring straight ahead. If you lean all the way forward or if your voice goes above a whisper, you will catch the … Well, you know.
Louisa says I’m a gullible sucker for believing the legends about the Wrath of Blanky. Just because I believed in the tooth fairy until I was in the fourth grade, Louisa says I’ll believe anything. But she doesn’t have to ride bus 179, so she doesn’t understand that you can never be too careful.
And anyway, sometimes you have to let yourself believe stuff even if deep down you’re afraid it’s impossible. If that makes me gullible, then I’m okay with it.
Brain and I are assigned to seat twelve on bus 179, and a kid named Popcorn Robards sits between us. Brain, Popcorn, and I are the only kids who have to sit three to a seat. That’s because Brain and I are on the small side for fifth grade, but we’re going to hit our growth spurts any day now, and Popcorn is the smallest of all. Popcorn will probably hit his growth spurt when he’s twenty-five, if he hits it at all. That’s why he goes by Popcorn—because he looks like a popcorn shrimp.
Popcorn will never catch the Wrath of Blanky because he never says a word. I mean, he says “Hi” to us when he gets on the bus and “See ya” when we get off the bus, but for the rest of the ride he’s silent. When he told us his nickname at the beginning of the year, I thought we might become friends, because it’s not every day that you meet another person who’s nicknamed for a food. But Popcorn prefers to keep to himself, so he sits silently while Brain and I whisper back and forth. (I think the quiet helps our minds work better; Brain and I worked out most of the signature moves on the bus.) I think Popcorn is especially terrified of Mrs. Blanky because he’s so small and she could crush him like Tito crushed the mastermind behind the robot technology in Time Crusher 2: Out of Time.
Earlier this year, Mrs. Blanky took a corner too fast, ran into a mailbox, and came screeching to a halt. Everyone on the bus screamed, and Sharon Dunston fainted. We all had to get out of the bus and stand around in some guy’s yard while the police came and wrote some kind of report. The guy wasn’t too happy about having a busload full of schoolkids trampling his grass, and he was extra cranky because he had just bought a new mailbox.
Even through that whole wild afternoon, Popcorn didn’t open his mouth one time.
So other than the fact that we were both new at Haselton Academy, I didn’t know very much about Popcorn. It was Brain who told me that Popcorn’s dad was this famous writer who writes long, serious books for grown-ups and is always on those boring public television interview shows. One of his books won some kind of prize that I had never heard of.
Anyway, on the way home that day, I had to tell Brain the news. “I got detention—I mean, Saturday Service Reflection—from Nurbin,” I whispered, staring straight ahead. “So I can’t shoot the commercial.”
There was a long pause. As usual, Popcorn didn’t say a word, and the whole bus was nearly silent.
“There is no way I’m doing this without you,” Brain whispered back. “I didn’t want to do it in the first place. Besides, we won’t have enough money without your hundred bucks.”
“Obviously,” I hissed. I was being a little bit mean, even though it wasn’t Brain’s fault.
Brain was too focused to notice. “We have to think,” she whispered. “What would Tito do?”
“I have no idea.” I really didn’t. “Tito hasn’t gotten detention in any of his movies.”
“I bet Tito would use a decoy,” Brain replied, “like in Time Crusher 2.”
That was probably right. In Time Crusher 2: Out of Time, Tito�
��s character, Lance Knightfox, gets some guy who kind of looks like him—tall and dark-skinned, with super-beefy muscles—to wear his clothes and a spare mask and take some of Senator Corruptron’s henchmen on a wild-goose chase. Meanwhile, Lance Knightfox breaks into the space dungeon and rescues his uncle, who also happens to be the president of Earth.
The bus pulled up to the corner of Culverton and Main.
“Mr. Jiggly Fluff!” I heard little Joey Muffaletta say excitedly and much too loudly from the seat in front of us.
“SEAT ELEVEN,” Mrs. Blanky’s voice boomed from the front of the bus. “NO TALKING. YOU ARE IN VIOLATION OF RULE SEVEN. THIS IS YOUR FIRST AND LAST WARNING.”
“Mr. Jiggly Fluff,” little Joey whispered mournfully.
Then I heard quiet sniffles. If Mrs. Blanky yells at a kindergartner or first grader, the kid always cries. Guaranteed.
I took the risk of turning my head to look out the window. Sure enough, there was Mr. Jiggly Fluff, or rather, an employee of the Fluff Cream Dairy Dessert Shop dressed in the giant inflatable Mr. Jiggly Fluff costume. Mr. Jiggly Fluff was standing on the corner and holding a sign that said ONE BUCK WEDNESDAYS … ALL SMALL FLUFFS JUST $1! The sign had a picture of a cone with a swirl of soft-serve Fluff Cream on the top. Fluff Cream doesn’t look or taste any different from regular soft-serve ice cream, but little kids go wild for Fluff Cream because they all love Mr. Jiggly Fluff. They think he’s their best friend or something.
I like Fluff Cream fine, but I definitely didn’t think Mr. Jiggly Fluff was anybody to get all excited about. Especially since Mr. Jiggly Fluff stands on the corner of Culverton and Main at least three days a week.
Thanks to little Joey’s outburst, Mrs. Blanky was sure to have her eye on our corner of the bus, so it wasn’t worth the risk to continue talking to Brain. I would have to wait until we got to her house to figure out how to never quit trying.
The bus rolled along for another block or two until I heard a little whoosh, like someone letting air out of a balloon or a tire, or like when the wind blows through the trees in a cheesy Disney cartoon movie that you watched only because you were bored, not because you were obsessed with it or anything.
“What was that?” I whispered to Brain.
Brain ignored me. I knew she didn’t want to risk getting in trouble. Brain had priors.
I heard the air-whooshing sound again, but this time it sounded like words, as though the wind was saying I’ll do it. I shook my head. I figured I was hallucinating from not having enough sleep before the science test.
About thirty seconds later, the bus slammed to a stop. The door screeched open and Mrs. Blanky said flatly, as she does every day, “Seats eleven, twelve, and thirteen: Your stop. Get out.”
My seatmates and I shuffled off the bus. I was last. My shoes had barely touched the pavement before the door shut, Mrs. Blanky floored the gas pedal, and the bus was gone.
I turned to Brain. “We better get going,” I said.
“See ya, Popcorn,” Brain said, giving Popcorn and the kids from seats eleven and thirteen a half wave as she and I started walking.
“I’ll do it,” Popcorn said.
9
THE DECOY
Brain and I stopped walking and stared at Popcorn. He stared back.
I blinked. “Do what?” I asked.
“I’ll take your place in Saturday Service Reflection,” Popcorn said, “but I need to make a deal with you. Signature move number five.”
I was stunned. Since Popcorn never talked, it hadn’t occurred to me that he would have been listening to Brain and me figuring out the signature moves. I’d almost been thinking of him as a statue, like a less creepy version of the old-fashioned children made of stone that Granny Janet has scattered around her fancy garden.
“You know the signature MOVES?” I asked Popcorn.
Popcorn’s answer didn’t make any sense. “My dad says a writer has two tasks: observing the world, and writing the essential truths of what has been observed.”
“Um, okay,” I said.
Brain looked sharply at the kids from seat thirteen, including Sharon Dunston, who were still hanging around the bus stop. “Beat it,” she commanded. They all hustled away, except for Sharon, who crossed her arms and huffed.
“Let’s take this conversation inside, boys,” Brain muttered to Popcorn and me. “The walls have ears, you know.” She raised her eyebrows like we were supposed to know what that meant, and Popcorn nodded.
We hustled up the sidewalk to Brain’s front door. There was no time to waste, except the time we needed to spend gathering snacks. We walked past Brain’s mom and into the kitchen. Mrs. Gregory was so wrapped up in her favorite reality show, Fancy Wives of Male Models, that she didn’t seem to notice that we’d brought an extra kid home.
The Gregorys’ pantry shelves are LINED with junk food that I never get at home. Brain grabbed two bags of potato chips, and I took a box of this amazing cereal called KidzNuggets that glows in the dark. We headed farther down the hall to Brain’s rec room. When my mom was the Gregorys’ housekeeper, it used to drive her bonkers that there were crumbs wedged everywhere in the rec room furniture.
We settled in on the L-shaped couch with our snacks. Brain handed a bag of potato chips to Popcorn.
“So what’s the deal, Popcorn?” Brain said with a mouth full of chips.
“I, um, I could be Oliver’s decoy,” Popcorn said. He was looking down at the potato chip bag as he crinkled it in his hands. “I don’t look like him, but I think it would work out.”
“We’re listening,” Brain said carefully.
Popcorn laid out a plan: Since he and I were both in our first year at Haselton Academy, the teacher in charge of Saturday Service Reflection didn’t know either of us. So Popcorn could show up at detention and claim to be Oliver Jones. Meanwhile, I would be at the commercial shoot pretending to love my corduroy pants or whatever I was wearing from Apparel Warehouse.
I almost hollered Sure! This was a great plan. No detention! But I glanced at Brain, who gave her head a slight back-and-forth shake, and I realized that we needed to hear the other end of the deal.
“What do you want from us?” I asked.
“I want to meet Tito,” Popcorn said.
Well, that was a problem. We would have only two tickets to the gala. Obviously I needed mine the most because I had to find out from Tito how to rescue my dad, but Brain deserved the other one because it was almost all her money that we were going to be spending on the tickets.
I turned to Brain, who was expressionless.
“I need to consult with Oliver,” she said to Popcorn.
He nodded, and then he hopped up and scooted toward the door. “I’ll be in the hall,” he said.
As soon as he was out the door, I looked at Brain. “This is weird, right?” I said. “That he would offer to do this? How well do you know this kid?”
“Not much better than you do,” Brain said. Popcorn had moved to the neighborhood just before I did, and in case I didn’t already mention it, the kid really kept to himself. “But I think he’ll hold up his end of the deal.”
“It’s not a good deal,” I argued.
“Eh, I think we go for it,” Brain said. “I mean, better for one of us to go than neither of us.”
Brain hadn’t specified who would be the “one of us” to go, her or me. “So when you said ‘one of us,’ did you—”
“Obviously it should be you, Spaghetti-O.” Brain rolled her eyes. “It’s your dad we are trying to save.”
I wondered what was in it for Brain now. We were using all her money, and she wasn’t even going to get to go. But I didn’t want to ask. I didn’t want to poke any holes in the plan, or I might cause Brain to change her mind.
“YOU CAN COME BACK NOW, POPCORN,” I called.
Popcorn scooted into the room.
“You can have my ticket to the Number One Fan Foundation Gala,” Brain offered casually, leaning back against the couch as
if it were no big sacrifice, “if you get through the detention without getting caught.”
“Why do you want to meet Tito so much?” I asked Popcorn.
“I just do,” Popcorn said. “Why do you want to meet Tito so much?”
“I just do,” I told him.
* * *
That evening, the phone rang at exactly 7:00—Dad’s usual call time—and I ran to Mom and Carl’s room. But when I picked up the receiver, I heard someone else already on the line: Louisa.
I should have hung up, but I didn’t. As far as I knew, this was the first time Louisa had spoken to Dad since he’d had to go to jail.
“This is Louisa Jones.”
“This is the Federal Correctional Institution, South Florida. Please hold for Daniel Jones.”
Click.
“Hello?”
“Hi.”
Dad’s voice immediately sounded shaky. “Oh, Louisa. Hi. I’m so glad it’s you.”
What was that supposed to mean? I replayed it in my head. I’m so glad it’s you. I was the one who had been willing to talk to Dad since the first night we found out about his sentence, whereas Louisa was being kind of dramatic about it, really. And I was the ONLY PERSON who was trying to help him. I’m so glad it’s you. He had never said that to me.
But Dad would feel differently after I was the one who rescued him. I made myself refocus on the plan and the signature moves. I imagined every step, from earning the rest of the money to buying the gala tickets to actually meeting Tito and figuring out how to rescue Dad. I started to feel better again.
“Yeah, I just…,” Louisa responded. “You know what, I actually can’t do this. I’ll get Oliver.”
Thinking about the plan had helped me push the bad feelings back down. I had been starting to feel better for a second. Or at least, I was feeling nothing, which was better than feeling bad. So when Louisa hollered for me to pick up the phone and talk to Dad, I pretended I didn’t hear her.
Tito the Bonecrusher Page 6