Things I Normally Take to School
1) My backpack and my books.
What I Was Taking Today
1) My backpack and my books.
2) A chart that showed the things I knew about Mr. Lee.
3) A one-paragraph report about why plankton is important.
Sometimes when something is hard to explain, pictures and words work better than if you just used words all by themselves.
A lot of unusual things have happened since Lewis moved to town, and most of them have to do with Mr. Lee. Here's how those things happened.
My Report About Plankton
Plankton are tiny living creatures that live in the sea. There are two kinds of plankton: phytoplankton, which are plants, and zooplankton, which are animals. Phytoplankton are really important because they help make oxygen, and without oxygen people would die. Half of all the oxygen on Earth is made from phytoplankton. Zooplankton eats phytoplankton, and fish and whales eat zooplankton. Phytoplankton is the start of the food chain. If there were no plankton, Earth would still be here but all the people and animals would probably be dead. We should save plankton.
Why I Had to Write a One-Paragraph Report About Plankton
Mr. Lee asked me to write it. I have no idea why. Mr. Lee is not the kind of person you say no to, so I did it. I think it was a good paragraph. This is the letter he put in my mailbox.
Dear Morgan and Lewis,
When you come over on Friday, please bring a one-paragraph report on the importance of plankton. You each have to do your own.
Your friend,
Mr. Lee
I'm not quite sure if Mr. Lee is really our friend, but I guess he thinks he is. If a friend can be bossy, sneaky, and super mysterious, then Mr. Lee is that kind of friend.
What Is Hard and Not Fair
Going back to school on a Thursday after more than two weeks off! Thursday is only two days away from the weekend. Why couldn't we just start next Monday? I knew exactly who had thought of this-Mrs. Prigma, our principal. I wrote an acrostic about her, because sometimes that's just the fastest way to explain someone.
PROBABLY WORKS ON THE WEEKENDS
REALLY LIKES TO TORTURE KIDS
IS KIND OF SCARY TO STAND NEXT TO
GETS JOY OUT OF LONG, BORING SPEECHES
MAYBE EVEN DREAMS ABOUT SCHOOL
ALWAYS SAYS, "LEARNING COMES FIRST!"
I like acrostics. I make them up when I'm nervous, upset, or bored, and usually after making one, I feel better. But not today. When I finished "Prigma," I felt exactly the same as when I'd started it. Every part of my brain and body still wanted to stay home.
Mom could tell something was up, because normally she doesn't come outside and watch me walk to school, but today she did. She stood on the sidewalk and waved until I turned the corner. She was right to be worried, because what I really wanted to do was sneak back home and hide in the basement.
HOW TO GET INTO THE HOUSE WITH NO ONE SEEING YOU
What I Should Have Been Excited About
1) Lewis was going to be in class with me at school-AWESOME!
2) Everyone was going to be freaking out that Lewis and I had seen a real, live Sasquatch.
3) Mrs. Shipley, my teacher, was probably going to be nicer to me because I'd been in the newspaper, and she loves the news.
But instead of being excited about any of that, I was thinking about Marcus Wolver. If people could be things, Marcus would be a giant dark cloud of rain that always showed up to ruin something fun that was about to happen.
I was glad when I ran into Carla Minkel a block later. She's not a good friend or anything, but she likes to talk, and listening to her was better than being in my brain with Marcus Wolver.
When she saw me, the first thing she said was, "Look, you got glasses."
I was going to hear a lot of that today. I thought of a funny comeback, but I didn't say it.
Carla is pretty serious about stuff, and she's not very good with jokes. Sometimes she kind of reminds me of my sister, Betty, but Carla's not as weird. Or as strong-there's no way she'd be able to hold me in a headlock.
Of course she'd heard about the alien/Sasquatch thing. I thought she'd ask all sorts of ques tions, but mostly she just wanted to know what kind of tortilla chips the Sasquatch had taken.
She said, "I don't want to be a Sasquatch magnet."
I didn't know how to answer her, so I just nodded like I was agreeing. She was grumpy that I couldn't remember the exact brand of the chips, but I did a good job of describing the package, so really she shouldn't have been complaining.
As soon as we got to the playground, we could tell something was going on. Normally kids are screaming and running all over, but today everyone was clumped together in a huge group in front of the slide. Was somebody hurt? Was it a fight? I left Carla and ran over to look.
The Surprise on the Slide
It wasn't a fight. It was Lewis, and everyone was crowded around listening to him! It was like he was famous or something. And then my mouth fell open, because standing right next to him, with a giant smile on his face, was Marcus Wolver. Were Lewis and Marcus friends? When had that happened? Today? I wanted to turn around and leave, but before I could move, Lewis spotted me.
No way! I was not going up there.
I shook my head and took a few steps back.
Some people might think it's fun to stand on top of a slide in front of thirty people, but I'm not one of those people. I'm more of an I'm-OK-here-near-the-back-of-the-crowd-as-long-as-I-have-a-good-view kind of person. I don't know why, but there's something different between standing in front of thirty people at the playground and standing in front of thirty people in the classroom. The classroom isn't as scary.
I moved backwards-mostly for safety, because Lewis doesn't always understand head shaking, and sometimes he doesn't even understand the word no. It was easy to imagine him charging down, grabbing my arm, and dragging me up the slide, but luckily that didn't have a chance to happen because two seconds later the bell rang.
Lewis patted Marcus on the shoulder, waved at me to wait, and slid down the slide. I was worried that Marcus was coming too, but he just stood there looking down at us, slowly losing his smile until he looked the same as he always did-scowling and grumpy.
What I Had to Ask
"How come you're hanging out with Marcus Wolver?"
Lewis punched me in the arm and grinned. "Why? Are you jealous?"
Instantly my face was hot. I knew why. I was blushing! Really? This had to happen now? I looked at the ground and hoped that Lewis hadn't noticed. The blushing was all Mom's fault.
"Just kidding!" said Lewis, and he punched me again. "Marcus is part of the plan."
I nodded like I knew what he was talking about, but I didn't have a clue. Lewis is the king of plans. He's always thinking of something new, but why include Marcus Wolver? Lewis followed me up the steps and into school. Three minutes later we were outside Room 401, Mrs. Shipley's class.
Lewis was excited. This was his big day-new school, new class, new teacher, new kids-and anything could happen. I didn't want to ruin it for him, but he was wrong about the "anything could happen" part. Once he got his new books and his new desk, the fun would be over. Nothing exciting ever happened in Room 401.
What Was Not Good
My face was still red. I could feel it.
You'd think that a family of blushers would have come up with some way to control unwanted blushing, but Mom said there was no cure. No medicine. No tricks. No nothing. You just had to wait for it to go away. I kept my head down. Hiding it was all I could do.
Suddenly two giant feet were in front of me, then a hand grabbed my shoulder-Mrs. Shipley!
"Well, well, what have we here? Chin up."
When I looked at her, she scrunched her nose and snorted, then patted my shoulder.
"No need to be embarrassed. I'll be expecting your full attention now that you can see." Then she winked and touched her own glasses. "Welcome to the club."
It was instant embarrassment plus! I could feel my face turn even redder. In a club with Mrs. Shipley? Not good news! Hopefully no one had heard her. I left Lewis at the door and escaped to my desk. He didn't need me. Lewis could take care of himself.
As soon as I sat down, I made up an acrostic.
SOMETIMES MAKES ME NERVOUS
HAS EYES IN THE BACK OF HER HEAD
IS GOOD AT CATCHING ANYONE FOOLING AROUND
PROBABLY LOVES GRADING TESTS
LETS PEOPLE GO TO THE BATHROOM WHEN THEY ASK
EVEN GIVES TESTS ON FRIDAY AFTERNOONS
YELLS WHEN SHE IS REALLY MAD
It helped, but only for a little bit.
What I Was Right About
After Lewis was introduced, got his books, and sat down, nothing else fun happened for the rest of the morning. It was a relief when the bell rang for lunch. Lewis was waiting for me in the hall. He looked disappointed.
"This school isn't as fun as my old school," he said.
I nodded. "I know. I told you so."
Lunch
By the time we got to the lunchroom, Lewis was over being upset. He was excited again, this time about the cafeteria. Friends shouldn't let friends eat UFL-Unidentified Food Lumps-so I warned him.
I pointed to the lunch display. "Look, it's probably not even real food. You can have half of my lunch from home."
Lewis put his hand up. "Thanks, but no thanks. I'm sick of real food. I need a break from seeds, nuts, and vegetables. Do you know how hard it was to get Sage to let me eat at school?"
I shook my head.
Lewis was quiet for a few seconds, then added, "Well, it was really hard."
Lewis's mom is a health nut. If she knew what he was about to eat, she'd flip out. Lewis picked up a tray and marched toward the food line. It wasn't long, because every day more and more kids brought their lunches from home. I followed Lewis, but only to watch.
Lewis pointed to the lumpy mounds, and the lunch ladies piled them onto his plate. He even asked for some of a greenish mound. I wasn't the only one surprised by that.
HOW THE LUNCH LADY LOOKS IF YOU ASK FOR THE GREEN STUFF
What Was a Surprise to Everyone at Our Table
Lewis ate every single thing on his plate.
All of it! Even the green stuff! And after the las t bite, he said, "Do you think I can get more of that green one?"
Nobody answered. We were all too shocked and disgusted.
After we were done eating, the number one thing everyone wanted to talk about was us seeing the Sasquatch. Lewis and I took turns telling the story, but he was a lot better at it than me. At the Lewis parts, everyone laughed, but when I told my parts, people just smiled.
KID LISTENING TO LEWIS
Marcus Wolver was sitting two tables away with his usual gang. Some of those kids like Lee and Trevor are actually kind of nice, so it's a mystery why they like him. I was glad that Lewis's plan didn't include Marcus sitting with us.
Watching Lewis eat school food was hard enough. Adding Marcus Wolver to the mix would have totally killed my appetite.
After lunch, Lewis and I went outside to discuss his plan. A few kids followed us out, but Lewis told them we had to be private to talk about secret Sasquatch business. I was a little surprised that no one laughed at that.
We walked all the way to the school fence, so no one could hear us.
As soon as we got there, Lewis said, "OK, let's see the note."
I pulled out both notes and held them up. "Which one?" I asked. Lewis pointed, and I put the plankton note back in my pocket. Even though we'd read them both about twenty times already, it was still exciting.
Dear Morgan and Lewis,
Please use the enclosed key to open my side garage door. Come at 2 p.m. on Friday. Do not let anyone follow you. I need to talk to you about my Sasquatch.
Your friend,
Mr. Lee
I pointed to the 2 p.m. part. "That won't work. School isn't over until three."
Lewis nodded. "It's OK. We'll just be a little late."
An hour seemed more than a little late, but I didn't argue. We could waste time on that later. Right now there were two things I needed to know. Why was Marcus Wolver in Lewis's plan? And had Lewis written his paragraph about plankton? But before I could ask anything, Lewis pointed to the note, put his finger on the word my, and nodded his head.
"Right there. That's the most interesting word in this whole note. Do you know why?"
I smiled. That was easy. A second later, Lewis said the exact words that I was thinking.
Before Lewis could start talking about anything else, I asked him about the plankton paragraph. Had he done it? He shook his head, then promised he'd have it for tomorrow. I hoped so. Mr. Lee was the kind of person who would say, "No plankton paragraph equals no Sasquatch robot." And I didn't want anything to go wrong.
Lewis's Big Plan
Let Marcus Wolver see the Sasquatch.
The plan was only six words long, but it filled my brain with questions.
"How? Why? Where? When?"
Instead of answering, Lewis just smiled. Now I was nervous.
I shook my head. "I'm not wearing that costume!"
Lewis nodded.
"You're right, no dressing up. This time it has to be the real thing."
Conversations with Lewis are not easy. He never answers questions in the order that you ask them.
"You're going to love this," said Lewis. "Guess who is Marcus's dad?"
Classic Lewis: answer a question with a question! I gave up. Fine, he could have it his way. But I wasn't going to make it easy. I pretended to be thinking hard and then said, "Darth Vader."
Lewis nodded. "Pretty close. He's evil and he wears a uniform, but he doesn't have a theme song."
I shrugged.
Lewis leaned in close. "It's Officer Gary, that mean police officer guy we met."
MY MIND BEING BLOWN
"Officer Gary is Marcus's dad? Officer Gary is Marcus's dad?" I had to say it a couple of times to get my brain to believe it.
Lewis nodded. "I know. Perfect, right?"
Officer Gary was the police officer we'd met when we reported our alien sighting. You'd think he would've been interested in keeping the community safe, but no. He just thought we were wackos. He didn't make fun of us, but we'd left the police station knowing exactly what he thought of our story.
My brain matched them up side by side, Officer Gary and Marcus Wolver. Of course they were related. They had the same personality-grumpy and unlikable. Wait! What was Lewis talking about? What was perfect? I looked back at him.
Lewis was watching me like he was waiting for my brain to catch up. Lewis was smarter than me, I knew that, but still it was annoying. No one likes to be slow. It was probably all the seeds and nuts his mom made him eat, but still, I wasn't going to eat his mom's muffins. Nothing was worth that.
Why Lewis's Plan Was Perfect
There was one surprisingly good reason.
1) People believe police officers.
After we saw the Sasquatch, Lewis's parents' motel got a ton of customers. Everyone wanted to see the Sasquatch, but now it wasn't as busy anymore.
"We need to get more business," complained Lewis. He looked worried. Lewis never got worried. Something was up.
"We need another Sasquatch sighting," said Lewis. "Only this time it can't be us seeing the Sasquatch. That'd be too suspicious. But if Marcus saw the Sasquatch, that'd be perfect."
Lewis took a step back so he could wave his arms around without hitting me. Big ideas need arm movements.
Lewis put his hands up and continued. "If Marcus sees the Sasquatch, he'll tell his dad, and then his dad, Mr. Police Officer, will tell the world."
If Lewis were a villain, he would have thrown in an evil laugh like MWAHAHAHAHA. But he wasn't, so he just stood there and smiled.
"We just need to get Mr. Lee to march his Sasquatch around so Marcus can see it." Lewis took a deep breath. "It would solve everything, because if this motel business fails, we'll probably have to move away."
The Two Words That Surprised Me
Move away?
What was he talking about?
Lewis shook his head. "I know, but it's what we do. When things don't work out, we move, and right now the motel business is not awesome."
Lewis had never said anything about this before. How many times had he moved? Before I could ask the question, he answered it.
"We've moved twenty-five times since I was two."
I couldn't believe it. "But that's more than once a year! And you'd move again, so soon?"
Lewis shrugged. "I don't know. Maybe. Probably. But I don't want to, and neither does Red. So we have to do something. Something so we can stay."
What I Didn't Say
"You're the coolest friend I've ever had. I don't want you to move away!"
What I Did Say
"You're right. We have to do something!"
The One Giant, Impossible Problem with Lewis's Plan
Mr. Lee.
Just thinking about it made me shake my head. "Mr. Lee won't do it."
Lewis was the opposite of me. He was nodding. "He will if we find his weak spot. We have to find a way to make him say yes."
As we walked back toward the school, I had two more questions.
"Why was Marcus Wolver standing next to you, and why was he smiling?"
"I promised him something," said Lewis. He looked down at the ground and then mumbled the answer.
I couldn't believe it, but it made sense. Marcus was an expert rumor-ruiner. I don't know why people believed him, but they did.
What Lewis Didn't Want Marcus to Say
Lewis had stopped him before he could start. That was good thinking.
How I Knew Lewis Was Really Serious About Being Worried
If Lewis's worry about having to move was bigger than his love for his dragon costume, then this was serious, because up until today, the one thing Lewis loved more than anything else in the whole world was his dragon costume.
THE DRAGON COSTUME
When the bell rang for us to go back inside, Lewis and I still hadn't thought of a way to get Mr. Lee to help us. Walking back into school felt like marching toward doom. My feet were moving forward, but the rest of my body wasn't happy about it.
It didn't help that we knew what we'd be doing all afternoon: reading tests. Sometimes if you make fun of something you don't want to do, it can make you feel better about it, but I couldn't think of one single joke to make about having to do reading tests.
How I Feel About Reading Tests
I hate them. Mostly it's because of the bad stories. Who writes those things? Sammy Loses a Tooth, A Beaver Makes a Home, Let's Help Dad Fix the Sink. It's always the kind of thing you'd never read unless a teacher made you. Then there was the flipping the pages back and forth a million times to find the answers to the questions. The whole thing was one hundred percent NOT fun.
What Happened in the Afternoon That Was Interesting
Nothing.
I couldn't wait for the day to end. There's a clock on the wall behind me, but I could only look at it every couple of minutes because if Mrs. Shipley catches you turning around a lot, she gets mad.
WHAT MRS. SHIPLEY WOULD SAY IF SHE CAUGHT ME
The minute the bell rang, I was out the door. Almost. A hand grabbed my shoulder and held me back. It was Mrs. Shipley.
"So, Mr. Henry, is it true? Did you really see it?"
For a second, I was confused. Was she asking about the clock or the Sasquatch? I nodded, hoping not to get in trouble. Then Mrs. Shipley surprised me. She leaned in close and whispered, "Me too. I saw the Sasquatch, but it was just a glimpse."
Suddenly I was in the hallway. Someone had pushed me from behind. When I looked back, Mrs. Shipley was talking to someone else.
Copyright © 2015 by Charise Mericle Harper