King Khufu scowled. He was certain Eddie was trying to trick him or confuse him to get out of being cursed. Then he thought of something and snapped his dusty fingers, causing the tip of his thumb to break off. “Tell me—ow, my thumb—do you have any proof that you don’t exist, Mr. Bookman?”
“Yes, I do.”
The class leaned in with interest.
“What do I look like?” Eddie asked.
Everyone in the class looked at one another, not sure of how to answer. Even King Khufu seemed flummoxed. Khufu stammered, “You look like…like…um…”
Eddie had a thick flattop of black hair; pale, freckly skin; and was wearing a green striped shirt with brown shorts and hiking shoes.
“Ah, I know exactly what you look like,” said Khufu. “You have a thick flattop of black hair; pale, freckly skin; and you are wearing a green striped shirt with brown shorts and hiking shoes.”
“See! Why did it take you so long to answer me? It’s because whoever’s writing this had no idea what I looked like thirty seconds ago. He just pulled it out of thin air.”
“That’s ridiculous,” said Khufu. “We can all see what you look like.”
“But I don’t even know what I look like,” Eddie exclaimed, rising from his chair. “For all I know you could be lying to me, ’cause I’ve never looked in a mirror!”
Eddie had looked in a mirror that morning and had thought that he looked particularly handsome.
“Okay, never mind,” said Eddie. “I did look in a mirror this morning, but I swear I didn’t know that until two seconds ago.”
Once again the class broke out into laughter. Even Tanya Tarantula rolled onto her back and wiggled her fangs at Eddie’s nuttiness. Princess Zogette exclaimed, “You aren’t anywhere near as handsome as my Charles!” then she flew across the room and gave Charles a big kiss on the cheek. The slobber stuck to his face for the rest of the day.
“It’s a good try, Eddie,” said Khufu. “But I’m afraid I have no choice but to curse you for not doing your homework.”
“Whatever,” said Eddie. “I think I’m already cursed.”
By lunchtime, word had spread fast about Eddie’s behavior in class.
As he walked through the lunch hall, everyone was pointing and laughing at him. Even the zombie waiters were laughing so hard that their jaws fell off. The school had been desperately searching for something to laugh about to take their minds off the thousands of karate monsters on their way to attack them.
Lebok, a big, mean troll in the sixth grade, walked up to Eddie and socked him in the arm.
“Ow,” said Eddie. “Why’d you do that?”
“Hey, if you no exist, you should no have hurt, right?”
Lebok started laughing, and everyone in the lunch hall laughed along with him. Even dumb trolls were scoring points off Eddie.
Then Eddie walked by a table of fifth-grade girls. They began throwing their food at him, creating a disgusting mess all over his clothes.
“Why’d you do that?” Eddie asked them.
“What do you care? If you don’t exist, then it’s impossible to look stupid, right?”
That was the last straw. Eddie jumped onto a table-top and screamed, “I AM JUST A CHARACTER IN A BOOK! AND GUESS WHAT? ALL OF YOU PROBABLY ARE TOO! As soon as I find a way to prove it, I’ll show you!”
Then all the kids in the lunch hall started throwing their food at poor Eddie. None of them felt bad about it, because if Eddie didn’t exist, that meant he didn’t have any feelings.
He could only wonder why the writer of this story disliked him so much that he should have to go through all this anguish.
While Eddie was eating all by himself, three sisters named Sarah, Lily, and Mia, each born one year apart and all with long black hair, approached Eddie and gave him some advice.
“If what you say is true,” said Sarah, “then the one to talk to is Derek the Ghost.”
Lily piped in, “He’s writing a book about Scary School, so if you really are just a character in a book, he would have created you.”
Mia added, “I just saw him floating around by the quicksand box. If you hurry, you might catch him before he goes into his haunted house.”
Sarah, Lily, and Mia thought Eddie’s theory might be true because, aside from Petunia, they were the only kids at Scary School who had read the first Scary School book.
“Thanks,” said Eddie to the sisters. “I’ll do that.”
Eddie abandoned his lunch and ran as fast as he could to the quicksand box. I was sitting there building a castle. One of the advantages of being a ghost is that I have no weight, so I couldn’t sink into the quicksand.
“Hey, are you Derek the Ghost?” Eddie asked.
“Yes,” I said.
“So…” Eddie hesitated, knowing the question he wanted to ask, but unsure if he actually wanted to hear the answer. “Do I…I mean…am I just a character in your book?”
“Of course you are,” I said. “I float around writing about everything and everyone at the school. That’s my job. I certainly wouldn’t leave you out.”
“I know that. But I mean, do I actually exist or did you just make me up?”
I floated out of the sandbox and hovered next to Eddie.
“Listen,” I said, “you already seem sure that you don’t exist, so why are you even asking me?”
“You’re right,” he said. “I am sure. So why did you curse me to be the only kid at the school who realizes it?”
“To be honest, I thought you’d enjoy your life more if you knew the big secret.”
“Enjoy it? I’m miserable because nobody believes me.”
“Ah, so you want proof to show the other kids.”
“Yes! Exactly. That would be fantastic.”
“There’s only one way to prove your nonexistence for a fact.”
I pointed to a glowing blue circle on the ground.
“You have a choice. You can either go on living your life from this point forward with the sole knowledge that you don’t actually exist. Or, you can gather all the kids out here and stand on that circle. Then, you’ll have your proof.”
“Great!” said Eddie. “I’ll get the kids out here right away.”
Eddie ran back into the lunch hall and brought everyone out to the playground. He had promised he had proof that he was right and they were wrong.
The students and teachers all watched intently as Eddie walked toward the glowing blue circle on the ground. Grinning with excitement, he stepped toward the circle. Everyone held their breath.
As soon as he stepped inside the circle…he was gone. Vanished. Not only from his physical form, but also from everyone’s thoughts and memories.
Eddie Bookman had never existed.
The students began asking one another, “Why are we out here?”
“I don’t know. Let’s go back into the lunch hall.”
The students made their way back into the lunch hall, and now none of them could dispute the fact that Eddie Bookman did not exist, because none of them had ever heard of him.
Eddie Bookman was proven right. Except, he never got the chance to gloat about it because he had never existed.
15
Skeletons in the Closet
As Marvin the ogre wheeled his mop bucket down the hallway, he kept hearing strange noises behind him.
Kids were shouting, “Whoa!”, “Yah!”, and “Whoops!”
He turned around and noticed a trail of red-tinted mop water that led straight to his bucket. The kids walking down the hallway didn’t see the water and were slipping and sliding down the hallway.
Marvin was the Scary School janitor. As such, his mop bucket was usually filled with blood from mopping up the daily carnage.
Marvin was not very smart, even for an ogre. His bottom jaw stuck way out, his teeth seemed to jut in all directions, his nose was flat and twisted, his brow hung over his eyes, and he had lumpy greenish skin on his bald head.
Marvin inspect
ed the bucket and said to himself, “Uh-oh. There’s a hole in my bucket.”
Marvin scratched his lumpy head for several minutes trying to think of what to do about it.
With what shall I fix it? thought Marvin. I could get some straw, but the straw is too long. I would have to cut it. But with what would I cut it? I know. A blade. But the blade is too dry.
Marvin realized this line of thinking could possibly go on forever, so he just decided, Ah, the heck with it. I’ll get a new bucket.
Marvin went to the supply closet where he kept all his spare buckets. Despite being the Scary School janitor for over ten years, this was the first time he had needed a new bucket. Thus, this was his first time entering the spare-bucket supply closet.
Marvin took out a big ring of keys. He had trouble remembering which key opened the door. Eventually, he opened it, and his big ogre jaw dropped to his chest in fright. He quickly shut the door and relocked it.
Marvin lumbered into Principal Headcrusher’s office. She was busy doing paperwork.
“Boss,” said Marvin in his slow voice, “skeletons in the closet.”
Without looking up, Principal Headcrusher replied, “Yes, Marvin, we all have skeletons in our closets.”
“But boss…uh…skeletons in the closet. Real skeletons. Bones. Buckets. Uhhh…bones.”
Principal Headcrusher exhaled, realizing Marvin was not going to leave her alone until she saw what the problem was. She followed him to the supply closet, and Marvin opened the door again.
This time, as soon as the door opened, three skeletons, each no bigger than an eleven-year-old kid, leaped out of the closet into the hallway shouting, “We’re free! We’re free!” They danced a frenetic skeleton dance. It looked like they were being controlled by bad puppeteers. Their teeth clanked and their bones rattled as they hopped about.
“Who are you three?” inquired Principal Headcrusher.
“I’m Skeletony!”
“I’m Skeletammy!”
“And I’m Skeletommy!”
“Wait a second,” said Principal Headcrusher. “Tony Malto, Tammy Gerber, and Tommy Stubbs? You three went missing over five years ago.”
“I know,” said Skeletony. “We were being chased by the gargoyles and hid in the closet for safety. But it was locked from the outside and nobody heard us banging and calling for help.”
“That makes sense,” said Principal Headcrusher. “All the doors are soundproof, otherwise it would be very hard to hear your teachers over the screaming.”
Skeletammy continued, “Eventually we died and turned into skeletons.”
“We learned a very important life lesson about not hiding in strange closets,” said Skeletommy.
“Once we became skeletons, we renamed ourselves Skeletony, Skeletammy, and Skeletommy,” said Skeletony.
“Coming up with those names kept us busy for the last three years,” said Skeletommy.
“We didn’t always get along, though,” said Skeletammy.
“Yeah, we always had a bone to pick with one another,” said Skeletony.
The three skeletons cackled at the joke they were far too proud of.
“Well,” said Principal Headcrusher, “you’re free to go off into the world and live your skeletal lives now. I’m sure you’ll be able to find jobs hanging in high school biology classrooms.”
“No!” Skeletammy chattered. “We decided that if we ever got out, we would stay at Scary School and finish our education. Since we’re Scary kids now, we get to attend for free, right?”
“Um…,” said Principal Headcrusher awkwardly. “That would be possible. If you were actually Scary kids.”
“What?” exclaimed Skeletony. “We’re skeletons! What’s scarier than that?”
“Everything?” replied Principal Headcrusher.
“That’s ridiculous,” said Skeletommy. “We’ll prove to you right now that we’re scary. Come on, guys, let’s go scare some kids.”
The skeletons went to a classroom, accompanied by Principal Headcrusher.
Oh, and by the way, after Marvin got his new mop bucket from the supply closet, he happily went back to his mopping, and that’s where his part in this story comes to an end.
The first classroom the skeletons went to was King Khufu’s. The skeletons burst into the room right in the middle of King Khufu’s lecture on why cats should be worshipped as gods. They cackled their skeleton laugh and rattled their skeleton bones.
King Khufu and his students stared at them blankly. Not even Steven Kingsley was afraid.
“King Khufu, is this part of the cwass?” asked Cindy Chan.
“No, it isn’t,” answered Khufu. “I’ll handle this.” He turned to the three skeletons and hissed, “Who dares disturb the peace of my class?”
Still cackling and rattling their bones, the three skeletons replied, “We’re the scary skeletons! Kneel before us in fear!”
Nobody knelt.
“Come on!” the skeletons urged. “We’re the living dead!”
“And how long have you been dead for?” asked King Khufu.
“About five years,” they replied.
“Five years? Ha! That’s hardly dead at all. I’ve been dead over four thousand, five hundred years. Now, that’s dead. Begone from here.”
The three skeletons hung their bony heads and clopped out of the room, but they weren’t ready to give up. Next they burst into Ms. Fangs’s fifth-grade class.
It went about the same.
“You’ve only been dead for five years?” Ms. Fangs laughed. “I’ve been dead over eight hundred and fifty years. I may not be as dead as King Khufu, but I’m much more dead than you.”
They decided to try one last classroom, Mr. Grump’s. At least he was still alive. They ran up and down the aisles, but because they no longer had any muscles, they ended up tripping every few strides. The class was laughing at them.
“Stop laughing!” pleaded Skeletammy. “We’re not funny. We’re scary.”
The three skeletons collapsed in a heap, utterly confused and exhausted.
“Sorry, but there’s nothing scary about you,” said Wendy Crumkin.
“Yeah. You don’t have big strong muscles, like me,” said Johnny the Sasquatch. Johnny flexed his muscles and roared. Everyone jumped back in fright.
“And you don’t have sharp teeth like me,” said Peter the Wolf, baring his teeth and snarling, making everyone jump again.
“And I bet your bones don’t even come off like mine do,” said Ramon the Zombie, ripping off his left arm, causing several students to pass out in shock.
“I don’t understand. Haven’t skeletons always been considered scary?” asked Skeletommy.
Petunia replied, “Skeletons are only scary when you find them someplace they’re not supposed to be. We expect to see skeletons at Scary School, so you’re not scary here.”
The skeletons realized Petunia was right. They left the room with their skulls hanging low.
“You see?” said Principal Headcrusher. “You’re just not as scary as the thought of the ten thousand monsters that will attack the school next month.”
The skeletons decided there was no use hanging around somewhere where they weren’t appreciated. They ventured off in search of a place that didn’t have any zombies, vampires, or mummies.
Eventually they came to a quaint-looking town and peered over a fence to where a young lady was planting flowers in her backyard garden.
When the lady went inside for a drink of water, the skeletons dived into the soil. When the lady resumed her shoveling, she hit Skeletony in the head with her shovel. When she uncovered the three skeletons grinning at her, she screamed in fright and ran back into the house.
The three skeletons high-fived and exclaimed, “All right! We still got it!”
16
Thanksgiving with the Dark Lord
It was Thanksgiving break.
All the Scary School students were at home with their families, enjoying what was sure t
o be their last holiday together. Nobody was expecting to survive the monster attack, which was on schedule to take place in just three weeks.
To mark the occasion, Princess Zogette joined Charles Nukid’s family for dinner. I crashed the dinner uninvited just for your sakes, my loyal readers.
Zogette was very excited to participate in the human tradition of Thanksgiving. Her love for Charles was matched only by her love for food. She couldn’t wait for the grandest of human feasting days. Charles’s parents, Clarence and Wanda Nukid, were also excited that Zogette would be joining them for Thanksgiving. They were elated that Charles had fallen in love with a real-life princess and they pictured themselves living in a faraway castle with throngs of servants.
One of the rules Charles followed at home was to never speak poorly of another person, so he found himself unable to tell his family that he didn’t really like Zogette. The dinner went very well until they brought out the turkey. As the guest of honor, Zogette had the privilege of cutting the first piece, but she thought the whole turkey was being offered to her. She swallowed the entire twenty-pound bird in one gulp.
And so it became a vegetarian Thanksgiving at the Nukid house.
Principal Headcrusher was using the time off to pay a visit to an orphanage in a remote village by the sea. While on vacation, Principal Headcrusher preferred to go by her given name of Meredith Headcrusher.
The orphanage was rumored to house a ten-year-old boy with extraordinary powers named Tim Puzzle. Meredith thought that his powers could help defeat King Zog’s army. But she would need to convince him to attend Scary School first.
When Meredith arrived at the village (driving her car with a special oversized steering wheel to fit her hands), she had a good deal of trouble finding the orphanage because oddly there were no street signs. She ended up circling the streets for hours before finding the building.
Once there, she placed her enormous compact mirror in her enormous hand and finished applying her makeup. Then she placed her hands in her enormous pants pockets so as not to scare anyone as she headed inside the orphanage to meet with the matron.
Monsters on the March Page 8