Ninjas, Piranhas, and Galileo

by Greg Leitich Smith

  The only other people in the computer lab were Goliath Reed and Andrea Shaw, Goliath’s girlfriend since last year. They were sitting in front of computers at the far corner of the lab, whispering back and forth.

  Andrea’s on the Student Court. She’s got this short red hair that’s a shade she calls “titian,” she’s usually a bit too perky, and she could probably do better than Goliath Reed.

  I clicked on an e-mail that was titled “Admirer.”

  “Oh,” I said, after I’d read the message.

  “What is it?” Eli looked over from his computer.

  “Nothing,” I said, looking around my monitor at Goliath and Andrea. He smirked at me and turned away as soon as I glanced at him.

  Eli was silent, reading the e-mail.

  “I have a secret admirer. How scary is that?” I whispered. “I think it’s Goliath Reed. I wouldn’t have thought he’d be such a wuss.”

  “Goliath?” Eli said, too loudly.

  Goliath and Andrea were both staring now, frowning. I turned the monitor so Eli could read the rest of the message.

  “Are you sure it’s Goliath Reed?” Eli asked. “It seems a bit primitive, even for him.”

  I shook my head, pointing to the last line. “That’s definitely a Goliath Reed-level metaphor.” I’d heard one too many of them during Student Court. Usually they involved “balancing the scales of justice toward public safety,” or some such. And he was looking at me when I read the message. “Who else could it be?”

  Eli shook his head and got up, saying, “I just remembered, I have to go.”

  Elias

  Go beat someone up, that is. Okay, I didn’t explicitly tell Shohei not to send anything to Honoria, but I had deleted what I’d written. And it wasn’t even a letter, anyway. And if he’d had to do it, he could’ve come up with something decent. I know I couldn’t come up with anything of my own, but at least I knew better than to try.

  But I wasn’t able to find Shohei — he wasn’t at his locker between classes. I’m almost sure he was trying to hide from me. He didn’t say a word during soccer practice, either, so when he got the ball during scrimmage, I stole it from him in what might have been an illegal tackle. Hard.

  Shohei was on his feet in an instant. “What is wrong with you?” he yelled.

  I was standing a moment later and grabbed his shirt in both hands. “She thinks Goliath Reed is the admirer!” Then I pushed him away.

  Shohei’s face was blank a moment. “What? Why?”

  “Maybe because you can’t write love letters?”

  He ran a hand through his hair. “Huh. Well, I can fix it. Trust me.”

  “You’d better,” I told him.

  8

  The Easy Way Out

  Elias

  I’d set up my end of the science project on the worktable in the Archives room. Every night, after piano practice, I checked the CD players to see that they were still running. I took photos of the plants next to a measuring tape. I measured the heights of the stalks, counted the number of leaves and blossoms, and gave them exactly the same amounts of distilled water. It was the way you were supposed to do a science project.

  That night I sat in the dark with a set of headphones and listened with the plants to Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No. 6 in B flat major, BWV 1051. Okay, I probably shouldn’t have tackled Shohei. The reason I was mad at him for the letter, though, was that now I couldn’t tell Honoria how I felt about her, at least not anytime soon.

  She was creeped out enough with the idea that Goliath Reed was her secret admirer. If I told her it had been me, and I’d been too chicken to tell her, she’d think I was nuts. Or some sort of freak. Probably both. Definitely both.

  Shohei

  The thing about science projects is that they’re a big pain. You have to do the same thing night after night at the same time and in the same amounts. Water. Feed. Photograph. Measure. Record.

  So I got an idea. I figured that if I used our digital camera to take a video every day at the same time I could get a video record with a time stamp. That way, I could go back and use it later for the observations. I could even download the video to my computer for displaying during the judging. That left watering, but I had that figured out, too.

  “Tim,” I called. No answer.

  “Tim-san,” I called.

  “No yelling in the house!” yelled my mom from the kitchen.

  A moment later, Tim showed up in the guest room. “I am here, sensei.” He bowed. I have to say, the whole ninja act was getting on my nerves. Not that as the only Japanese American O’Leary I owned all things Japanese, but Tim seemed way too into it.

  I made him wait a moment.

  “I need these plants taken care of,” I said. “They need to be watered every night at six o’clock. Starting tomorrow.” I showed him how much water to give each plant. “It’s very important. The honor of the family depends on it.”

  Tim pulled his cape around him. “You can count on me, sensei.” He bowed low again and dashed off.

  Piece of cake.

  Elias

  The day before the next chem exam, Honoria and I got together in the Grob Library to study. We arranged ourselves at opposite sides of her mother’s antique library table, books and papers spread in front of us.

  “I have got to ace this exam,” I said to Honoria. “I’ve already blown my lab grade.” It counted for twenty-five percent of the total semester grade, and since I was probably running at about seventy percent in lab, depending on the curve, that meant I had almost no leeway if I wanted to get an A in the course.

  “You didn’t blow your lab grade,” Honoria replied, drinking iced tea.

  “Mr. Eden said he was taking points off my final grade for the goggles,” I said. “My parents will freak if I get a B.”

  Okay, really, I’d freak if I got a B. But Dad probably would, too. I’d never brought home a B in a science class before. Mom and Dad would probably make me get counseling, or test me for drugs, or something infinitely worse.

  Honoria and I spent the next hour or so studying stuff like what happens if you mix a carboxylic acid and an ester. At least, Honoria did. I spent most of it sneaking glances at her, and didn’t do much concentrating on the text.

  “Study break!” Honoria said, after a while. “I’ve got to show you something. Wait a sec.” She jumped up from her chair and left the room for a minute only to return with some paper towels and a plate of her cut-up bananas and beef hearts.

  “Watch,” Honoria said, plopping one of the combos into the tank. As it sank, Spot circled and swallowed it in one gulp.

  “Congrats,” I said. “You’ve done it.”

  Honoria shook her head. “This is just phase one. And, it turns out, they are, in fact, Pygocentrus nattereri. I think. Which means they’re known to eat some fruit anyway. I still need to see if I can get them to choose the banana over the hamburger.”

  She dropped one meat chunk and one banana chunk into the tank. Spot immediately clamped onto the heart, but even Fluffy ignored the sinking banana.

  “See?” she said with a grimace. “Nothing.” Honoria wiped her fingers on a paper towel. “How’s your project going?”

  “It’s not,” I replied. “The music’s supposed to make the plants grow faster. But it’s not working. All my plants are growing at the same rate.” I’d even sent an e-mail to big brother Johann Christoph, hoping he had some ideas about what might be wrong, but so far, no response. I knew he was busy after quitting his postdoc in England for his new Internet start-up, but it was still annoying.

  Honoria opened her mouth to reply when her mother walked in. Mrs. Grob walked over to one of the bookcases and tilted her head to read the titles on the spines. Every now and then, she’d pull a book out partway, then shove it back.

  “Mother, leave,” Honoria said, drumming her fingers on the tabletop. “It’s just Eli.”

  Mrs. Grob pulled a book from the shelf, then turned and smiled at Honoria. “I ha
d to grab this.” She brandished the book, then left, carefully leaving the door open a crack.

  “What was all that about?” I asked Honoria, my voice low.

  Honoria grimaced. “All of a sudden Mother’s all concerned about me being alone with a boy. I think it’s some sort of parental pre-dating complex. But I keep telling her it’s not like that. It’s just you.” Honoria took a sip of iced tea, then went back to her chemistry book.

  In the fourth grade, I climbed up on a neighbor’s garage to retrieve a softball. I fell off and broke my leg. I blacked out from the pain.

  This felt worse.

  9

  Test Anxiety

  Honoria

  If I hadn’t been absolutely certain who the admirer was, I would never have responded to the e-mail. At least not this way:

  I am not your dearest. I wish nothing to do with you. Your attempt to hide your identity is lame and stupid. Bother someone else.

  Because I wanted him to know that I knew who he was, I didn’t hit “Reply.” Instead, I addressed it directly to Goliath Reed’s Peshtigo School e-mail account.

  Shohei

  “Shoot me now,” Elias said the next day as we dodged the hallway crowd after the chem exam. “I have never bombed a test that bad.”

  “You didn’t bomb the test,” I replied, leaning against my locker. “You always over-study anyway, Mr. Wolf.” As in “Boy Who Cried.” Elias always complains after an exam that he’s bombed it. Usually, he sets the curve. It gets annoying.

  He shook his head. “I overslept and didn’t get there until twenty minutes into class.”

  That actually got my attention, but before I could follow up, Freddie M-K and the Murchettes stepped in front of us. They were wearing head-to-toe black, including dolphin-safe lipstick and nail polish. They kind of smelled, too, from their protest against animal fat in soap.

  “Sign this pledge,” Freddie said, shoving a clipboard at Elias. The notebook paper had about ten signatures on it, including Goliath Reed’s.

  I read over Elias’s shoulder.

  We, the undersigned, are opposed to animal experimentation in all forms whatsoever and, as participants in the Gloriana Biddulph Memorial Science Fair, do hereby pledge that we will not, under any circumstances whatsoever, take part in such acts of barbarism and cruelty.

  “This is the most insanely stupid thing I’ve ever heard of,” Elias told Freddie, thrusting the clipboard back at her.

  Freddie opened a folder and held up a photo.

  “This is what the cosmetics companies do to bunnies!” she exclaimed. She held up another. “This is what the auto companies do to monkeys!” A third. “This is what jet engine manufacturers do to geese!”

  A couple of passers-by made faces but bolted before Freddie could get to them. That’s when Elias lost it.

  “I like animal experiments,” he said, spitting out the words. “I like mascara testing on rabbits. I like crash-testing rhesus monkeys. And I love the goose cannon!”

  “As long as you thaw them first,” I said, grinning. Freddie and Elias both stared. “The geese,” I said. “They’re, like, already dead, right?”

  Freddie sniffed. “Monsters!” she called, then swept away with her group.

  “I like veal, too!” Elias called after her. “And steak! Especially chicken-fried steak!”

  The flow of students gave us a little extra space after that. We were both silent a moment, while Elias glared after Freddie.

  “I thought chicken-fried steak made you gag,” I said finally, not sure what had gotten into Elias.

  Elias threw his backpack into his locker. “Let me put it to you this way: We are not going to sign anything that accuses Honoria of murder for trying to find out if you can make a piranha become a vegetarian. The save-the-animals people should applaud her efforts. Besides, do you think Honoria would really do anything to hurt Spot and Fluffy? Especially after what her house sitter did to Barbie and Skipper?”

  “Oh, yeah,” I said. Honoria had been upset for weeks. Until she got the piranhas, anyway. “Hadn’t thought about that.” I shrugged. “Freddie’s kind of cute, though, don’t you think?”

  Elias gave me a kind of glare but just said, “Yeah, well, the black lipstick’s creepy.” Then he slammed his locker door shut and stalked off.

  Honoria

  The sole item on the Office of the Public Defender’s agenda for the day was whether to drop Josh Patel from the Office because of the incident in the Garden with the root beer, or whether we should merely censure him.

  “Anything else?” I asked, looking around the conference room, after forty-five minutes of indecision. Two of the other student defense attorneys shook their heads, or said no, and exited. The only good thing about the meeting was that we had managed to grab the best conference room — the one on the southwest corner of the building with the view over the old pier terminal mall toward Ogden Slip and downtown.

  Andrea Shaw didn’t follow the others out. She wasn’t that bad, despite the Goliath Reed relationship. She performed adequately as a student defender and had a fairly good record. “Stay away from my boyfriend,” she said. She said it calmly, as if it was a matter of only minor importance.

  “I’m not interested in your boyfriend,” I replied, as I felt my face turn red.

  “That’s exactly what you’d say if you were,” Andrea said, marching off.

  Elias

  Shohei and I were at the back of the team bus after our soccer game in Evanston. Shohei had scored a goal, giving him the best scoring percentage on the team. We’d only lost by three this time, which meant that we’d only been outscored, on average, 4.5 to 1, per game. Coach Swindler’s postgame pep talk still echoed in the bus, but my mind wasn’t really on the game.

  “Have you figured out yet what to do about the e-mail to Honoria?” I asked.

  “I’m working on it,” Shohei replied.

  That was Shohei-ese for “I have no idea, but maybe something will come to me.”

  It meant, though, that I had a little while before I needed to worry about what he was going to do next, so I went on to the second thing.

  Shohei had refused to take my live conduct-the-experiment calls after the first week. Then, it hadn’t really mattered, because I had my brother Christoph’s results and I expected mine to show the same thing: that the baroque music would cause the plants to grow better. But that still wasn’t happening. So now, it was looking like Shohei’s results might make a difference. What’s more, I hadn’t gotten a reply from Christoph in over a week and the science fair was only three weeks away.

  “How’s your project?” I asked.

  Shohei leaned back against the seat. “Fine,” he said.

  “How much of a growth differential are you seeing? Any reaction to the bagpipes? What about the control group?”

  “Chill,” Shohei said, raising his voice above the din of the Nerf ball game going on in the front of the bus. “It’s just a science fair.”

  “Yeah,” I said, “but we’ve still got to do it right.”

  “Why are you so uptight?” Shohei asked. “You didn’t even want to do it.”

  “As long as we’re doing it,” I answered, “we should do it right.”

  He stared at me. “And?”

  “And if I get a B my dad will kill me.”

  “No, he won’t,” Shohei said. “Last year Jake got a C in calculus, and he lived.”

  “I am not Jake,” I said. Okay, I was expected to get A’s but it wasn’t demanded. But I could just see it: my dad would propose a test of his own to determine if I actually knew the subject (which was what he would say actually mattered) and make sure there wasn’t some statistical aberration in the questions or grading curve. My mom, on the other hand, would tell me that it was okay, and that she had succeeded quite nicely and had a fulfilling career, thank you very much, without knowing anything at all about the Second Law of Thermodynamics. Then she would ask me if I had finished my piano practice for the d
ay.

  The thing was, unlike Shohei, I liked being one of the Smart Ones. I liked always doing well and getting A’s. And I hated looking stupid.

  The stray Nerf ball shot our way, and Shohei snagged it. “The experiment’s fine. The plants don’t like the bagpipes, they don’t care about the waterfall, and they love the harpsichord.” He threw the ball back up front. “Happy now?”

  I answered, “Yeah.” But really, I wasn’t.

  10

  E-mail

  Elias

  That evening, I sent another e-mail to Number One Son, Johann Christoph, still in England, but this time, to his new e-mail address at the start-up:

  Earth to Christoph —

  Still no growth differential. Shohei’s running the same experiment, though, and says his results match yours. What gives?

  — Elias

  11

  Oops

  Honoria

  “It’s not going to work,” Goliath Reed told me the next day after yet another administrative meeting for Student Court. We were the only ones left in the library conference room.

  I was going to have to get out of these meetings earlier, I decided.

  “What’s not going to work?” I asked, having no idea what he was talking about and not really caring that much, either.

  “That e-mail,” he said.

  I froze. I did not want to have this conversation with Goliath Reed.