Revenge of the Teacher's Pets

by Jennifer Ziegler

  Mr. Plunkett was about our dad’s age. Unlike our dad, he had hair on the top of his head and wore gold wire-rimmed glasses that he was always taking off and putting back on.

  I couldn’t say that we liked Mr. Plunkett, but we didn’t dislike him, either. We knew he was important in the school, but thought about him the same way we thought about the doorknobs — by which I mean hardly ever. Plus, Mr. Plunkett had one of those blank faces that didn’t really smile or frown, so it was hard to know what to make of him.

  When we walked into his office, he turned away from his computer and looked at the three of us standing in a row on the other side of his desk.

  “How can I help you?” he asked, taking off his glasses.

  Darby and I glanced over at Dawn. She’s almost always the one who talks to the grown-ups for us. Mainly because she thinks she is one.

  “Hello. We’re Dawn, Darby, and Delaney Brewster. Thank you for seeing us,” she said. Her voice was all sticky-sweet, like the lady on the Honeysuckle Honey commercial.

  “Yes? What seems to be the matter?” Mr. Plunkett asked.

  “Uh … well …” Dawn cleared her throat and took a deep breath. I could tell she was trying hard not to get riled. “We received our schedules in the mail today, and it appears that they are all … botched up.”

  Mr. Plunkett’s eyebrows rose up under his hair. “How so?”

  “Well, first off, we always have most of our classes together. That’s how it’s always been, and that’s how we like it. But for some reason, that’s not the case this time. This year we’re all separated.”

  “That is true,” he said, nodding.

  Dawn tilted her head. “You know about this?”

  “Yes, I was the one who created your schedules.”

  “Well then.” Dawn seemed confused. “I do appreciate your coming right out and admitting your mistake, but if you could just —”

  “There was no mistake,” he said.

  Dawn, Darby, and I traded shocked glances.

  “But why?” I asked him. “Why would you want to bust up a happy family?”

  Mr. Plunkett put his glasses back on. “I am not trying to hurt your family, I assure you. Studies show that siblings do best when they are separated. Our school was too small and just didn’t have enough teachers to put all three of you in different classes. But this year we’ve expanded enough that we can.”

  “But we’ve been doing great so far.” Dawn opened her arms to gesture at all three of us. “Look at the results. We’re highly intelligent, responsible, and … and …”

  “Polite,” Darby added.

  “And clean,” I added.

  “Yes,” Mr. Plunkett said. “You three are model students.”

  “Then why separate us? Why mess with something that isn’t broken?” Dawn’s talking was high and fast, like a squirrel’s. She seemed to realize she was losing her grown-up disguise and paused to take a breath. “The thing is,” she added more calmly, “we just always go together. Like a team.”

  “I understand,” Mr. Plunkett said. I thought he might bristle at Dawn’s complaining, but he didn’t sound upset at all. In fact, his face looked softer — as if he were smiling without a smile. “However, I’m afraid that the decision has been made,” he went on, “and I think you three should give it an honest try. If by midyear you still feel it’s a big mistake, we can meet and discuss other options. But give it a chance. That’s fair of us to ask, isn’t it?”

  Darby nodded sadly. She’s all about being fair — even if it means we don’t get our way. It can be annoying, but it’s also what will make her a great chief justice of the Supreme Court someday. Dawn scowled, but didn’t say anything further. I think she knew Mr. Plunkett was being reasonable and felt she couldn’t argue with him. Or she hadn’t thought of a good opposing theory yet.

  Meanwhile I just wiggled my toes nervously inside my sneakers. Even though I thought he was making a good point, it was still weird and scary to think of us being in different classes all day long.

  “Well then, it sounds like we have an agreement.” This time, an actual smile appeared on Mr. Plunkett’s face.

  “I guess. For now anyway,” Dawn said with an exasperated sigh. “But we’ve got another problem. You put us in Cheer Squad when we didn’t even sign up for it.” She held up our schedules in her right hand.

  “It’s true,” Darby said in a quiet voice. “We signed up for Color Guard.”

  “Yeah!” I said, bouncing even higher on my toes. “We’ve been practicing and practicing. We’re probably the best ones. Only now we aren’t even going to be doing it. It’s a tragedy for the whole school.”

  Mr. Plunkett was the one to look confused. “Let me see those.” He reached for our schedules and, after glancing at them, typed on his computer for a bit. Then he pulled a light green paper out of a drawer, ran his finger down the middle of it, and set it down on his desk near us. “See here?” he said, tapping the page with his fingertip. “This is a sign-up sheet for the class. And those are your names, right?”

  We all gathered around the paper. Sure enough, our names were there, all in a row. At the very top of the page was a bit of small text:

  Want to lead the Patriots to victory and boost school spirit?

  Sign up today to be on Cheer Squad!

  “Wait a minute,” Dawn said. “How did our names get on the Cheer Squad sheet without us realizing it?”

  Darby shrugged.

  I stared hard at the celery-colored form. Something about it seemed familiar. I closed my eyes and tried to remember … Suddenly it came to me.

  “Corny dogs!” I cried. “Remember the last day of sixth grade when they had the booster festival on the school lawn and we wanted corn dogs?”

  Dawn frowned. “Delaney, you’re making no sense. What does that have to do with our schedules?”

  “They had a sign-up sheet at the table with the corn dogs. I figured you had to sign if you wanted to eat, so I added all our names.”

  “Can I see that, please?” Dawn reached for the paper and Mr. Plunkett handed it over. Darby and I leaned in to examine it. “That’s Delaney’s handwriting, all right. Well, what do you know? Foiled by our own sister.”

  “I’m sorry! I was hungry and didn’t read the fine print.”

  “So … we actually did register for Cheer Squad?” Darby mumbled.

  Mr. Plunkett took his glasses off and started cleaning them. “I’m afraid so,” he said, nodding. “In fact, Delaney signed twice.”

  I thought for a moment. “Oh yeah. I went back for second corn dog.”

  “But it’s trickery!” Dawn’s honey voice was gone. Now she was in full-on angry squirrel mode. “Those charlatans lured us with deep-fried goodness! Isn’t that grounds for a schedule change?”

  “I understand it was unintentional, but Color Guard is completely full. I could get you into other elective classes, though.” Mr. Plunkett put his glasses back on and started typing at the computer again. “Let’s see … One of you could join choir, another could …”

  “Can’t you put all three of us into another class?” I asked.

  “Sorry,” he said, glancing back up at us. He really did look sorry. “None of them have three openings, so I’m afraid not.”

  “What do we do now?” Darby asked, turning about to face Dawn and me.

  “Cheer Squad is the only class we have together,” I pointed out.

  Dawn scowled. “I don’t want to take Cheer Squad, but I like the idea of us having zero classes together even less.”

  “Same here,” I said.

  Darby nodded.

  “I guess it’s unanimous.” Dawn looked defeated — a rare and worrisome sight. “Mr. Plunkett, we’ve officially voted to stay in Cheer Squad until you can get all of us into Color Guard. Although I will be checking with you pretty regularly to see if there are any changes.”

  “I understand, and I admire you girls for being willing to give it a try.” Mr. Plunkett did t
hat thing again where his eyes smiled even though his mouth didn’t. “I feel confident that each of you will do well regardless. And remember, if you ever want to come by and talk to me about this, my door is always open.”

  “You might need to get another chair,” I said, glancing around.

  “No, I meant you in the singular. I would want to talk with you one-on-one.”

  I noticed the perplexed looks on Dawn’s and Darby’s faces and knew they felt the same way I did — that the thought of having a meeting without our other sisters around was too weird to comprehend. Why was the school so determined to break us up?

  “Thanks for being open-minded.” Mr. Plunkett put his glasses back on. “I have other students to see, so let’s end it here.”

  We mumbled our sad-sounding good-byes and filed out of his office, all slumpy and defeated.

  “This is not how I thought our seventh grade would start,” I grumbled as we trudged down the echoey hallway toward the exit.

  “Me either,” Dawn said.

  “At least we tried our best,” Darby said. “We just have to accept it and move on.”

  “Maybe not.” Dawn stopped in the middle of the corridor and gazed into the distance.

  I recognized the expression on her face. That ten-mile stare … Her eyebrows pushing together over her nose … Her index finger tapping against the side of her chin … Yep, she was formulating plans, all right. And her plans usually involved all three of us — and possibly shenanigans.

  Summer fun was officially over.

  For the last time” — Mom sighed, her eyes closed, and rubbed the bridge of her nose — “I am not hiring a lawyer.”

  We were starting our second hour of discussion after she’d picked us up from school. I knew she had work to do, and I knew I should go eat my grilled cheese sandwich, even though it had gone cold on the kitchen table. Darby and Delaney had already eaten their lunch and wandered off to do other things. Darby was upstairs, probably reading, and I occasionally caught glimpses of Delaney through the window, bouncing and playing with Mynah. Meanwhile, I was still arguing our case, determined to get Mom to see things my way. For some reason, though, she was being stubborn.

  “But, Mom! It’s wrong what they’re doing to us. It’s tyrannical! It’s undemocratic!”

  “Schools are not democracies.”

  “Why not? They’re part of a democracy, so everyone there should get a say in what happens to them. There should be checks and balances and clear paths to justice. No taxation without representation! Or … no surprise schedule changes.”

  Mom just looked at me. Her eyes were more weary-looking than angry. After a long moment, she reached out and gave me a big hug. It was both nice and confusing. I don’t know why, but tears came to my eyes. Not that I was crying — I wasn’t.

  As she held me, Mom said, “I can’t help you with this one, Dawn. I’m sorry.” Then she let go and took a step back, again fixing me with that hard-to-read expression. “It’s not that I don’t want to, it’s that I can’t. But also, I have to say on the record, I don’t think this is a bad thing. You three can’t always do everything together.”

  “Of course we can,” I grumbled. “Why not?”

  Mom reached out and brushed my hair away from my face. “Because that’s not how the world works. That’s not even how democracies work. Please try to accept it. Try to give this new schedule a chance.”

  She was wrong. Mr. Plunkett was wrong. The whole school system was wrong! My sisters and I needed each other. The Brewster triplets were one for all and all for one, and we fought together for truth, justice, and the American way. Busting up our union would be like dividing the country. We just wouldn’t be as good — or as powerful — on our own. And yet everyone refused to acknowledge this.

  More wetness came into my eyes; it still wasn’t tears, though. I was just surprised and disappointed that our own mom was siding with the enemy.

  Over her shoulder, I could see a framed photo on her desk — Mom sitting on the porch swing with Delaney and me on either side of her and Darby on her lap. It was from only about three years ago, but I was surprised at how much we’d grown since then. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d sat on Mom’s lap, or Dad’s. Why did everything feel so different all of a sudden?

  I pursed my lips together and tried to bully the frustration-wetness back into my ducts. Only it didn’t work. Just as the drops came rolling down, I turned and stomped out of there.

  * * *

  “I call this emergency meeting to order,” I said, pounding my fist on my wooden headboard.

  After I got nowhere with Mom, I rounded everyone up for some official business in the Triangular Office, which is what we call our attic bedroom. I balanced cross-legged on my bed, Delaney sat — or rather, bounced — on her bed, and Darby took her usual spot at the desk we shared, so she could type up the official minutes.

  “Our situation is dire,” I went on. “Mom has turned traitor and refused to help, no matter how hard I tried to make her see the light. And I want it officially noted that I was by myself in those efforts.”

  Darby stopped typing and looked at me. “Hey, we tried for the first half hour.”

  “After she said no for the twelfth time, I figured she meant no and went outside,” Delaney said with a shrug.

  “The point is,” I said kind of loudly, “we’re on our own — at least for now. When Dad gets back in town, we’ll see where he stands on all this. Until then, it’s up to us.”

  “But what can we do? Tomorrow is the first day of school.” Delaney was bouncing higher and higher, making her voice all quivery.

  I tapped my finger against my chin. “I know! We could write letters to the superintendent and the school board.”

  “Yeah, but … remember? They stopped answering our letters,” Delaney said. “We haven’t gotten a response from them in, like, two years.”

  “Then we go to the press! The local paper would be interested in knowing that three honor students are being picked on by the establishment.”

  “Um … won’t we need some sort of evidence of wrongdoing?” Darby asked. “The only documentation that exists is a green piece of paper we signed. One of us, anyway.”

  “Plus, we already ate the corn dogs,” Delaney said. “That evidence is gone.”

  I shut my eyes and leaned my head back against the wall, waiting for one of my brilliant ideas to pop into my brain — but nothing came. “You’re right,” I said finally. “I hate to say it, but we’re going to have to go into stealth mode. Watch, wait, and learn. Spy if you have to. And we need allies, so see if you can turn any powerful people against the school.”

  Darby and Delaney exchanged nervous glances.

  “But also,” I added, “be model students. We can’t start even a hint of trouble because we have to prove that we deserve Color Guard — and to be in the same classes together.”

  I waited for them to reply, but they just sat there, glum as mud. Delaney had even stopped bouncing.

  “Come on, troops. This is our call to arms, our finest hour. It could be the worst thing we’ve ever faced.” I hopped off my bed and stood before them, hands on hips. “But we’ll be ready. The school, the town — heck, the whole world — will know better than to mess with the Brewster triplets again.”

  On the first day of school there were butterflies in my stomach. Actually, they felt less like butterflies and more like giant winged creatures. Bald eagles, maybe?

  We stood in the school foyer not saying anything. All around us kids were walking past, clutching their schedules. In some ways, it was just like any other first day of school. Everyone had on new-looking backpacks and their best clothes. School supplies were neat and colorful, the walls and floors were shiny clean, and the teachers were actually smiling. But this day was different.

  This day we wouldn’t march down the hall as a unit as we usually did, with Delaney slightly in front and me slightly in back and Dawn in the middle. We wouldn’t
hold brief meetings to decide where to sit in class. We wouldn’t say the Pledge of Allegiance together, our three voices combining to be the loudest and proudest in the class — maybe even the whole school.

  Nope. Instead of heading off to our first class together, Dawn would go to the science wing, Delaney would skip off to her Spanish class, and I would search for room 207 to take Mrs. Champion’s history class.

  “Mrs. Champion is a great name,” Delaney said when she noticed my face. I was trying not to have big scared eyes or worry squiggles on my forehead, but when you’re a triplet, it’s just not possible to fool your sisters.

  “Yeah, it’s a good sign,” Dawn said, patting my shoulder. “You’ll do great.”

  I nodded and tried to look brave. Just then the warning bell rang. We had five minutes to get to class or we’d get marked tardy.

  “Okay, there’s the bell! Gotta go! Bye!” Delaney said, and raced off toward the north hallway.

  “Good luck,” Dawn said. She gave me a reassuring smile and headed down the center hallway where all the science labs were.

  “Bye,” I said — only no sound came out. Just air.

  Everyone was rushing all around while I stayed in place, like I was in slow motion and they were in fast motion. It reminded me of when I was learning to go off the high dive at the local pool. I had the same twisty feeling in my stomach — part excitement and part terror — and the same awareness that I was being watched. I knew I had to muster my nerve, take a deep breath, and … leap. Just get through the first day, I told myself. It will all get better after that. And remember — you love the high dive now.