by Dan Gutman
At that moment, something even more unexpected happened. Our school lunch lady, Ms. LaGrange, came into the classroom. She’s from France. Ms. LaGrange was wheeling a cart with a big block of ice on it.
“Bonjour!” said Ms. LaGrange. “Did somebody ask for a big block of ice?”
“Yes, leave it right there,” Mr. Jack told her.
“What’s the big block of ice for?” asked Alexia.
“To defend yourself, you need to be tough,” Mr. Jack said. “And to show you how tough I am, I will now break this block of ice in half . . . with my head.”
WHAT?!
Mr. Jack stood in front of the big block of ice.
“Why would you want to do that, Mr. Jack?” asked Alexia.
“Yeah,” I said. “What did that big block of ice ever do to you?”
But Mr. Jack wasn’t listening. He was concentrating on the big block of ice.
“Kids, don’t try this at home,” he told us. “I’m a professional. I just hope I don’t mess up my hair.”
Mr. Jack took a few deep breaths. Then he closed his eyes.
“Don’t do it!” Andrea shouted. “You’ll get hurt!”
“Yes, don’t do it, Mr. Jack!” shouted Emily.
“Do you all want me to do it?” asked Mr. Jack.
“No!” shouted all the girls.
“Yes!” shouted all the boys. Breaking stuff is cool. Especially when you break stuff with your head.
It was exciting. There was electricity in the air.
Well, not really. If there had been electricity in the air, we all would have been electrocuted. But we were all glued to our seats.
Well, not exactly. It would be weird to be glued to a seat. Why would anybody do a dumb thing like that? How would you get the glue off?
“Okay, I’m going to do it,” Mr. Jack said. “One . . . two . . .”
But Mr. Jack didn’t get the chance to break the big block of ice with his head. Because the most amazing thing in the history of the world happened.
We got called down to the gym.
Well, that’s not the amazing part, because we get called down to the gym all the time. The amazing part was what happened when we were in the gym.
But I’m not going to tell you what it was.
Okay, okay, I’ll tell you.
But you have to read the next chapter. So nah-nah-nah boo-boo on you.
10
The Emergency
We had to walk a million hundred miles with Mr. Jack. I didn’t have to be the line leader or the door holder because Mr. Klutz had already named me door closer of the day.
The whole school was in the gym. Mr. Granite made us sit boy-girl-boy-girl. So I had to sit between annoying Andrea and crybaby Emily. Ugh, disgusting!
Mr. Jack went up to the front of the gym, where Mr. Klutz, Dr. Brad, and our vice principal, Mrs. Jafee, were standing. They all held up their hands and made shut-up peace signs. We all stopped talking.
“Mr. Jack told me you kids did a great job today,” Mr. Klutz announced. “So each of you will receive this self-defense certificate. Remember, the skills you learned are only to be used in case of an emergency.”
“Zat’s right,” said Dr. Brad. “Vee try to avoid fighting and talk zings out venever possible.”
That’s when the most amazing thing in the history of the world happened.
A big, black bear walked into the gym!
Everybody started laughing, because we figured the bear was just a couple of teachers wearing a bear suit.
“Very funny,” said Mrs. Jafee. “Okay, which of the teachers dressed up like a bear?”
That’s when the bear got up on its hind legs.
“Rooooaaaarrrr!” roared the bear.
It wasn’t some teachers wearing a bear suit. It was a real bear! The thing must have been ten feet tall, and it had razor-sharp claws and killer jaws!
“Ahhhhhhhhhhhh!” everybody screamed.
I thought I was gonna die. We all thought we were gonna die.
Andrea and Emily and I were all holding on to each other. There was no place to go. The bear was in front of the door.
“Somebody call nine-one-one!” a teacher shouted.
“Run for your lives!” yelled Neil the nude kid.
“No!” shouted Dr. Brad. “Everyvun remain calm! If vee leave it alone, zuh bear von’t bother us! Don’t make any sudden moves!”
Everybody stopped moving. Everybody stopped talking. We all stared at the bear. The bear stared back at us. You could have heard a pin drop.
Actually, I wish I’d had a pin. I could have used it against the bear.
“Hey,” Mrs. Jafee said. “The bear walked right through the door. Who was door closer for the day?”
Everybody looked at me. I tried to make myself as small as possible.
“Let’s not play zuh blame game,” said Dr. Brad. “Let me handle zis. At Ella Mentry School, vee alvays try to talk zings out. I vill try to reason vis zuh bear.”
Dr. Brad went over to the bear.
“Now, let’s be reasonable, bear,” he said. “Zees is our school. You live in zuh voods. So zuh logical zing vould be for you to go back to zuh voods and us to—”
But Dr. Brad didn’t get the chance to finish his sentence, because the bear suddenly picked him up and threw him across the gym!
Wow, that was the second time in a day that somebody had picked up Dr. Brad and thrown him. That had to be a record.
It was amazing! You should have been there. We got to see it live and in person.
“Ooof!” said Dr. Brad when he landed on some foam pads near the bleachers. He seemed to be okay.
The bear was looking around, like he was trying to decide who to mess with next.
“What are we going to do now?” somebody yelled.
“Mr. Klutz, you should take care of it,” said Ryan. “You’re the principal.”
“What am I supposed to do?” asked Mr. Klutz, who looked as scared as anybody. “Send the bear to the principal’s office?”
“You could give the bear detention,” I said.
“Wave a red cloth in front of the bear,” suggested Alexia. “I saw that on TV once.”
“They do that with bulls, dumbhead,” said Andrea. “Not bears!”
That’s when we realized we had a real black-belt self-defense expert right there in front of us.
“Get him, Mr. Jack!” shouted Michael. “This is just the kind of emergency you were telling us about.”
“Yeah, you know karate and stuff,” I said. “You can break a block of ice with your head. Show him how tough you are, Mr. Jack!”
“Yeah!” everybody yelled. “Get him, Mr. Jack!”
“Who, me?” asked Mr. Jack, taking a step backward. “I don’t know how to . . . I . . . uh . . . it’s a bear!”
Mr. Jack looked like he was going to cry.
“You told us to expect the unexpected!” shouted Andrea. “Well, this is unexpected! Do something!”
“Yeah,” said Mr. Jack, “but when I told you to expect the unexpected, I wasn’t expecting this.”
“Too bad the bear doesn’t have a glue stick,” I said. “Then Mr. Jack would know what to do.”
“Why don’t you break a big block of ice over the bear’s head?” Ryan shouted.
“I’m afraid of bears!” Mr. Jack was whimpering and sobbing.
“Come on, Mr. Jack!” said Mr. Klutz. “Man up! Go get him! You’re our only hope!”
“I can’t,” Mr. Jack said, blubbering. “The bear will mess up my hair!”
11
Teamwork
The bear got up on its hind legs and let out another roar. Everybody was frozen.
Well, everybody wasn’t really frozen. If everybody had been frozen, we would have been made out of ice cubes.
“We’re all going to die!” whispered Emily. I’m sure she would have run out of the gym if the bear wasn’t blocking the door.
That’s when Andrea whispered in my ear.
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“We’ve got to do something, Arlo!”
“We? Like what?” I whispered back. “What are we going to do? Leave me out of this.”
“Come on!”
Andrea grabbed my hand and pulled me up. We went running over to the bear.
“We’ve got to intimidate the bear,” Andrea told me.
“How are we gonna do that?”
“Eeee-yah!” she screamed. Then Andrea jumped up and karate-chopped the bear right in his stomach!
Well, the bear must not have expected that. He turned around angrily and took a swipe at me with his razor-sharp claws. I dove out of the way. He missed me by inches!
“We’ve got to make ourselves look bigger!” shouted Andrea.
She raised her hands in the air and spread her legs apart. Then she started stomping around and waving her jacket and whistling.
The bear looked at Andrea for a moment. Then it took another swipe at me. I dodged out of the way.
“Hey!” I shouted. “What are you attacking me for? She’s the one who’s bothering you!”
“The bear must think you’re both crazy!” shouted Michael.
“They are crazy!” said Neil the nude kid. The bear started swiping his claws at me over and over again, like he was swatting flies.
I dove to my left. I dove to my right. I jumped up in the air. I wasn’t going to let that bear get me.
“Duck! Dive! Dip! Dodge!” everyone was shouting at me.
“Eeee-yah!” screamed Andrea. Then she gave the bear another karate chop on his leg.
The bear must have been getting tired, because he suddenly sat down on the floor.
“I think the bear is intimidated!” Alexia shouted. “Eeee-yah!”
Then the whole school got up, raised their hands in the air, and spread their legs apart. Then they started stomping around and waving their jackets and whistling.
“Eeee-yah!” everybody shrieked their heads off.
The bear whimpered once, and then he got up and lumbered out the door. I ran over and closed it behind him.
For a moment, there was silence. Nobody moved or said a word. Then everybody started hooting and hollering and cheering their heads off.
“Hooray for Andrea and A.J.!” Ryan shouted. “They intimidated the bear!”
“That’s teamwork!” said Andrea.
Suddenly, Andrea did something that was even more intimidating than scaring away the bear.
She gave me a kiss!
Ugh, disgusting!
12
The First Rule of Being a Kid
Right after the bear ran out of the gym, the three-o’clock bell rang. Yippee! Time to go home! We all rushed back to our classrooms to get our backpacks.
Usually I take the bus home, but I had a dentist appointment, so my mom came to pick me up.
“What did you learn in school today, A.J.?” she asked when I got in the car.
“Nothing,” I said.
Whenever your mom asks you what you learned at school today, always say “Nothing.” That’s the first rule of being a kid.
“Oh, come on, A.J.,” my mom said. “You must have learned something at school today.”
“We learned how to fight bears,” I told her.
“Very funny. What did you learn in math class?”
“We didn’t have math class.”
“What did you learn in science class?”
“We didn’t have science class.”
“What did you learn in social studies class?”
“We didn’t have social studies class.”
“Well, if you didn’t have math, science, or social studies class,” my mom asked, “what class did you have?”
“Bear-fighting class,” I told her.
My mom rubbed her forehead with her fingers. After that, she stopped asking me what I learned in school.
Well, that’s pretty much what happened. Maybe Mr. Jack will man up and stop combing his hair in slow motion. Maybe I’ll get to throw a watermelon off a ten-story building. Maybe somebody else will pick up Dr. Brad and throw him somewhere. Maybe Mr. Jack will break a block of ice in half with his head. Maybe Dr. Brad will stop trying to reason with bears. Maybe Andrea will take a class to learn how to clip her toenails better. Maybe Mr. Jack will stop shooting Ping-Pong balls at kids and attacking them with glue sticks. Maybe Mr. Klutz will put the bear in detention. Maybe they’ll invent a cream so grown-ups won’t have itchy foreheads anymore. Maybe Mr. Jack will stop killing cows and wearing them. Maybe they’ll figure out how to put TVs inside our eyelids.
But it won’t be easy!
About the Author and Illustrator
Photo by Howard Wolf
DAN GUTMAN has written many weird books for kids. He lives in New Jersey (a very weird place) with his weird wife and two weird children. You can visit him on his weird website at www.dangutman.com.
JIM PAILLOT lives in Arizona (another weird place) with his weird wife and two weird children. Isn’t that weird? You can visit him on his weird website at www.jimpaillot.com.
Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins authors and artists.
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Credits
Cover art © 2014 by Jim Paillot
Copyright
MY WEIRDER SCHOOL #10: MR. JACK IS A MANIAC! Text copyright © 2014 by Dan Gutman. Illustrations copyright © 2014 by Jim Paillot. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
www.harpercollinschildrens.com
ISBN 978-0-06-219841-9 (pbk. bdg.)—ISBN 978-0-06-219842-6 (lib. bdg)
EPub Edition December 2013 ISBN 9780062198433
13 14 15 16 17 OPM 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
FIRST EDITION
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* Dr. Brad talks funny. If you read this book out loud, make him sound like a crazy German mad scientist.
* Well, not really. You pour stuff out of a pitcher, not out of a school.
* That is, if anyone had a pin and dropped it.
* Or whatever part of the sky was right over our heads.
* If one person dresses up in crazy clothes, it’s weird. But if everybody dresses up in crazy clothes, it’s fashion.
* Hey, if “intimidate” and “scare” mean the same thing, why do we need two words?
* Watch this:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=piWCBOsJr-w
ks on Archive.