“I—uh—erg,” I finally managed to say back.
It wasn’t my fault. Emma Quinn possessed the most powerful superpower in all of Wheaton: the superhuman ability to jam all signals to and from a person’s mind, rendering their brain cells completely useless.
The cash register binged.
Emma swept her glistening gaze toward the front counter.
“Oh, hey, Wesley,” she said.
Wesley gave her a casual tip of his chin. “Hey.”
The register churned and spit out a receipt, and before I could do a thing about it, Jessica slipped the receipt into a plastic sack along with the helmet.
Wesley snatched it up and turned toward the door.
“See ya, Tut,” he said as he blew past, out the door and into the cold, the Bottenfield’s bag swinging from his wrist.
Three
I stomped into the Batcave, a.k.a. my bedroom, and chucked my coat onto the bed. I paced the creaky floorboards in front of my desk.
What was wrong with me? I couldn’t even go shopping—shopping—without turning into a big fat loser—in front of the shiniest girl in Wheaton, Kansas.
I strode back toward my bed. Thought about kicking my desk chair, but that would only bring my mom down the hall, determined to find out what was wrong.
I heaved myself into my chair instead. A sheet of smooth, white Bristol board stared up at me. Mrs. Frazee had asked everyone in Art Club to create something artistic for the club’s bulletin board over winter break. I’d started sketching out a poster.
I didn’t even want to look at it now.
But the drawing just sat there on my desk, staring at me. Before I knew what I was doing, I popped the cap off my permanent black marker and started inking in the details of Beanboy’s stretchy crime-fighting costume.
It wasn’t just a school art contest, no matter what Jessica or the Flapjack waitresses or the guy at the laundromat thought. It was a prestigious, national contest. I’d gotten the winning letter right before winter break, and ever since then, since that day, I’d felt like some kind of small-town superhero. A ruler-wielding superhero with a pencil grip of steel.
I’d strutted around my house feeling like a superhero. I hung with Noah at Caveman Comics feeling like a superhero (especially since the last time we trekked in there, Caveman himself had glanced up from his graphic novel and uttered two entire words—“Dude. Intense.”—before burying his shaggy head in his novel again and completely ignoring me). I felt like I could be a superhero anywhere in Wheaton, anywhere in Kansas, anywhere in the universe (if, you know, I actually went places).
And then I’d walked into Bottenfield’s.
My marker squeaked as I blackened Beanboy’s mask.
It was the classic dilemma. Superman: one kick-butt superhero. Alter ego, Clark Kent: nice guy, decent reporter, never going to kick anything, butt or otherwise.
Tucker MacBean, Comic Book Genius, felt like a superhero.
Tucker MacBean, Real Live Person? Not even close.
The afternoon sun flung its weak yellow rays against my second-floor window. The winter wind skittered over the glass, searching for a way in.
But the Batcave was my fortress, my watchtower, where nothing from the outside could touch me. As the tip of my marker glided over the smooth surface of the Bristol board, inking the perfect curve of Beanboy’s cape, that superhero feeling washed over me again. The rest of the world fell away, till it was just me, my marker, and the Bristol board, pulling the comic book vision in my head onto the blank white paper on my desk.
I sat back in my chair and studied my drawing.
It was probably the same feeling baseball players get when they knock one over the fence. They know it’s out of the park the instant they hit it, just from the feel of the impact, from the crack of the bat.
The difference was, comic book artists didn’t have bleachers of fans leaping to their feet to cheer or mobs of teammates carrying them off the field on their shoulders.
I absently spun the marker between my fingers. It was something I’d done my whole life, whenever I was drawing. Between my fingers. Around my thumb. Mostly I never thought about it.
But I thought about it now. I thought about Jessica spinning the pink soccer ball. I thought about me spinning my marker. And I thought about how the world sees those two things. Spinning a ball—amazing! Spinning a pencil—lame.
But who made that rule? I mean it. Who decided that balls are cool and drawing pencils are boring? That muscles are impressive, but excellent manual dexterity (like mine), not so much? That ball players like Wesley Banks would be the all-star major leaguers of middle school, while comic book geniuses like me would forever ride the pine?
I capped my marker (carefully—it was a professional model my mom had given me for Christmas, and I didn’t want it to dry out) and rummaged through my closet. I dug through shoes and old Halloween costumes and my science fair project from fifth grade and finally wrestled out the basketball my dad had sent me two years ago.
I measured the heft of it between my hands. It was just a dang ball. I could spin it as well as anyone. I held my finger up, balanced the ball, and gave it a spin. It wobbled off, bounced across the floor, and banged into my desk chair.
“Tucker?” Mom’s voice echoed down the hallway. “Is everything okay?”
“Fine,” I hollered back.
“Good.”
I waited for a minute. I was pretty sure she wasn’t done.
I was right.
“Don’t forget your resolution,” she called out.
Case File: Mom
Status: Superhero. (Okay, so it’s kind of dorky to call your own mother a superhero, but she puts up with Beecher every day and somehow manages to stay cheerful—most of the time, anyway. I doubt even H2O has enough strength for that.)
Base: MacBean Family Apartment.
Superpower: Mind reading (completely handy when she uses it on Beecher, completely unnecessary when she uses it on me).
Superweapon: She has a complete arsenal at her disposal: mom-powered super-detecting eyebrow (when she cocks that sucker, you can’t hide anything); mom-powered supersonic hearing (picks up any sound, no matter how carefully disguised, within the MacBean Family Apartment); mom-powered x-ray vision (allows her to see through walls and holler things like “Tucker, put your comic book away and finish your math homework” from the kitchen, even when you’re in your room at the other end of the apartment with the door closed).
Real Name: Heather MacBean
I sighed. Mom was big on New Year’s resolutions. She called them a “once-a-year opportunity to become a better person and a more respectable human being.” She made all three of us write down our resolutions.
I had to help Beech with his resolution, which was the same every year. He told me what to write and then he drew a picture so he’d remember what he’d said.
Mom always stuck our resolutions under magnets on the refrigerator so we could look at them for encouragement. (Beech didn’t really need any more encouragement. He already practiced flying around the MacBean Family Apartment nonstop, his pillowcase cape flapping behind him, usually flapping his incredibly patient older brother in the face.)
And I have to admit, I usually liked our resolutions. It was something we did every year, a family tradition, which the MacBeans were sorely in need of now that a major chunk of us—Dad—lived halfway across the country.
Plus, who doesn’t want to be a more respectable human being?
But this year, even though it was almost New Year’s Eve, I hadn’t even thought about a resolution. I mean, hadn’t I just won a (prestigious! national!) comic book contest? Resolution-wise, how do you top that?
I crawled under my desk to retrieve the basketball. I thought about trying to spin it again but shoved it back into my closet instead.
I definitely needed a resolution.
Four
Noah and I squeaked down the empty hallway of Amelia M. Earhart M
iddle School, battered lockers standing at attention at either side, early January slush dripping from our sneakers. My bookbag banged along against my back. Noah’s faithful companion—his bassoon case—banged along against his. It was our first day back from winter break, and I’d talked Noah into getting here early so he could help me.
Case File: The Spoonster
Status: Sidekick.
Base: Basically, the Earhart Middle School band room.
Superpower: Preventive action. (Noah always arrives early; always carries Kleenex; keeps four quarters, two spare pencils, an extra pair of gym shorts, and a tiny screwdriver—to fix his glasses and jimmy open my locker—in his bassoon case; and never leaves his homework till the last minue. Preventive action comes in handy more often than you’d think.)
Superweapon: His huge brain. (Noah is, like, the smartest kid ever. It’s not his fault. His parents don’t allow him to be stupid. They’ve enrolled him in every extracurricular activity invented, from music lessons to anthropology camp. Now he knows everything, including how to play ancient Korean folk songs on the bassoon. Which goes over big in the seventh grade.)
Real Name: Noah Spooner
Now he held my first poster, reading.
I didn’t want to look like I was watching him, so I acted fascinated by the flyers taped to the walls announcing sign-ups for the school carnival and the Last Player Standing tournament, plus marker drawn signs plastered all over the lockers, little cut-outs with peppy sayings like Win!, Rebound!, Go, Kaley!, We’re #1!
“Excellent beginning,” Noah said finally. “Let’s see the others.”
I stopped long enough to shuffle the first poster to the back and hand him the next. We squeaked along once more.
I flicked a covert look at Noah. Poster #2 was where things started to get good.
I kept acting all fascinated by the school hallway, even though it looked exactly the same as it always did. A little cleaner, probably, since the janitor had all of winter break to scrape up gunk from the floor. Plus outside the math room, somebody had tied a pair of sneakers together and tossed them over one of the fluorescent light fixtures on the ceiling. I felt sorry for whoever had thrown them up there. They’d be spending some quality time in Mr. Petrucelli’s office soon.
Noah handed me poster #2. I handed him #3, the last one.
Noah handed me the last poster after reading it. “Extreme,” he said.
I looked at him. “Really?”
He nodded and gave me an encouraging fist bump.
Wow. “Extreme” was Noah’s best compliment. Usually only Mozart, Stan Lee, and whoever invented the wireless game controller rated as extreme. And now Beanboy. This was big.
But would anybody else at Earhart Middle think so? Or even notice?
I straightened the posters into a neat stack and slipped them back into their all-weather watertight carrying case (a.k.a. the trash bag I had swiped from our kitchen cupboard).
Noah had already reached the end of the hallway. I trotted to catch up.
We rounded the corner to the art room—
—and stopped dead.
“Oh, no.” I closed my eyes.
Noah stared straight ahead. “Why is she here so early? And what is she doing?”
I shook my head. When it came to Sam Zawicki, I hardly ever knew what she was doing.
Five
Sam had plastered herself against the bulletin board.
The Art Club bulletin board.
Her arms were splayed across the smooth red paper Mrs. Frazee had stapled over the cork, her army jacket flapping, her eyes burning a Zawicki Hole of Fury through the Kaleys—Kaley Timbrough and Kaley Crumm.
They stood side by side in their matching basketball warm-ups. Kaley C. shielded a cardboard cutout of the Fighting Aviator, school mascot, from Sam’s glare. Kaley T. cradled an armful of photos against her chest. Mrs. Frazee’s neat cutout letters had been ripped from the bulletin board and were scattered across the floor at their feet:
A, R, T, C, L, U, B, A, C, H, I, E, V, E, M, E, N, T, S.
And then my eyes lit on someone else.
I froze.
She was crouched among the letters, scrambling to retrieve them. Her shiny hair shimmered as she reached for a bent letter C. Her shiny pink nails glimmered as she shuffled the letters into a pile. Her shiny personality glistened through the early-morning gray of the Amelia M. Earhart Middle School hallway.
Emma.
For a minute I just stood there, bag of posters clamped so tight, my fingers had formed two solid dents in the Bristol board.
“It’s not yours.”
Sam’s low snarl snapped me back to the known universe.
“You already own everything else in the stupid school,” said Sam. “Keep your hands off this.”
I blinked. What was she talking about?
The Kaleys shot each other a look that very clearly said, “Well, yeah. We’re supposed to own the school.”
Kaley C. gave Sam a sneery smile. “It is ours. Mr. Petrucelli gave it to us. Although we’re going to have to do something about that.” She pointed to a bent part of the metal frame that twanged cockeyed off the bulletin board. “Maybe we can cover it up with a banner.”
I stared at her. That was our bulletin board. Bent and cockeyed maybe, but ours.
“It’s not Mr. Petrucelli’s to give.” Sam narrowed her eyes. Her hair, crackling with static from rubbing up against the bulletin board, practically stood on end.
“It belongs to Art Club,” said Sam.
“Oh, please. Art Club.” Kaley T. rolled her eyes. “Like that’s even a real thing.”
“It is a real thing.” Emma looked up from smoothing out a bent letter H. “It’s a very important real thing to some people.”
She flashed her half-dimple smile at me. I passed out temporarily.
I was quickly revived by a voice booming down the hall: “What is going on here?”
We turned to see Mr. Petrucelli striding toward us, serious principal face clenched in a serious principal frown, serious principal tie flapping with each step he took, seriously polished principal shoes clicking across the floor tiles.
He clicked to a stop in front of the bulletin board. “May I remind you that this is a place of learning?”
“No kidding.” Sam took aim with her pointy chin. “We were just learning that the girls’ basketball team is stealing the Art Club bulletin board.”
“Art Club?” Mr. Petrucelli’s serious principal forehead wrinkled into a frown. “We still have that?”
“Yes, we still have that,” said Sam. “Ask him.”
She jerked her chin toward me this time, and everyone turned to look.
At me, Tucker MacBean, undercover national contest winner.
The hum of the overhead lights buzzed in my ears. Their glare blurred my vision. The hall began to spin, and suddenly I was back in Bottenfield’s: Sporty athletic people had stolen something, and now they were staring me down, daring me to get it back. While Emma Quinn watched.
I couldn’t trust my mouth to say anything helpful. The best it had come up with last time was “I—uh—erg.” So I did the only thing I could think of: produce evidence. I bent down to tug mangled cutouts from beneath Mr. Petrucelli’s foot.
I held up three letters.
Mr. Petrucelli looked at them, confused.
“It’s all this big misunderstanding,” said Emma. “When we asked for a bulletin board, we didn’t know you had to take it away from Art Club.”
“Yes. Well.” Mr. Petrucelli cleared his throat. “I didn’t realize, either. But what’s done is done.”
Done? I stared at him. It couldn’t be done. I had posters.
“You know what’s done?” said Sam. “Basketball. They finished playing before winter break.” She flung an arm toward the Kaleys. “They’ve already got the whole Athletic Department bulletin board by the front door. And a trophy case. Why do they need this board?”
Kaley T. r
olled her eyes for about the hundredth time. “To commemorate our season. Duh.”
Sam skewered her with a glare. “You won two whole games. You want to commemorate that?”
“Yes. Well.” Mr. Petrucelli cleared his throat again. “The girls worked hard, no matter what their record turned out to be, and we need to allocate bulletin board space to accommodate the greatest number of students.”
Noah had been watching the whole time. Now he wrinkled his forehead in a confused frown. “So . . . they get the bulletin board because there are more of them?”
That was my friend, Noah Spooner: always ready with the math.
“Well, I wouldn’t put it quite that way.” Mr. Petrucelli straightened his tie. “But more students do participate in athletics.”
Sam narrowed her eyes. “Fine,” she said. “How many people do they need?”
Mr. Petrucelli was still fiddling with his tie. Now he stopped and pulled his chin back, like a rooster caught in midcluck. “What?”
Sam let out a breath. “You said Art Club doesn’t have enough members. So how many do they need to get their bulletin board back?”
“I—no—it’s not like that,” said Mr. Petrucelli. “I don’t have a figure—”
Sam turned to Emma. “How many girls on the basketball team?”
“Both seventh and eighth grade?” said Emma. “Nineteen.”
Sam turned back to Mr. Petrucelli. “So if Art Club gets nineteen members, they get their bulletin board back.”
Kaley T. rolled her eyes again. “Like that’s going to happen.”
Kaley C. let out a snort. “Nobody’s even heard of Art Club.”
Cool Beans Page 2