As it turned out, Cat is pretty touchy about things getting stuck to her glasses. For a second it looked like she was going to brain me. But then I showed her Boris’s revolting gum and told her that it had landed in my mouth, and she cheered right up.
Mr. Hooper wasn’t so happy, though. “Bummer! Looks like this box is full of duds.” Then he took Cat’s glasses in the kitchen to scrape off the gum for her.
We all stared at Cat. Without her glasses she looked like Master Shifu from Kung Fu Panda.
“What are you looking at?” she asked us.
Perry and I had enough sense to keep our mouths shut, but of course Boris didn’t.
“You know who you look like without your glasses?” Boris said.
“Who?” Cat said.
Perry and I looked around the room for something to hide behind.
“You look like my cousin, Brenda,” Boris said.
We breathed a sigh of relief.
“And a little like Master Shifu from Kung Fu Panda,” Boris added.
We waited for things to start flying. But Cat just rolled her eyes and said, “Anyway. I have good news, guys. I found the perfect old guy for our homework.”
“What homework?” I asked.
Like I said, once I leave school all memory of what happened inside those walls is completely erased.
“Our homework to interview an old person about their career. Sheesh!” Cat said. “Mr. K said that we could interview someone as a group, so I thought we could all go talk to Mr. Rollo on the fourteenth floor.”
The thought of sitting in some old guy’s house while he clipped his yellow toenails gave me the jim-jams. Which is worse than the heebie-jeebies.
Cat must have seen my expression because she added, “Mr. Rollo used to be a New York City police officer.”
Well, that sounded better. If you have to watch an old guy clip his toenails, there might as well be a few car chases and bank robberies thrown in.
Even Perry wanted to come along, and he didn’t even have ANY homework. His dad homeschools him.
I once suggested to Mom that she homeschool me.
Her reply was, “How do you expect me to teach you long division when it took me five years to teach you not to pee in the pool?”
* * *
When Mr. Rollo opened the door, I was glad to see that he wasn’t too crusty. And he kept his shoes on the whole time we interviewed him, which was a big relief, toenail-wise.
It turned out that Mr. Rollo had been a cop for only one day. That was disappointing. But on the positive side, there was this big bank robbery on that one day and Mr. Rollo was right in the middle of it.
“Those robbers came running out of the bank, shooting their pistols. Bullets were flying all over the place! One flew right by my left ear. Another flew over my head. I tell you, I’ve never been so scared in my life. I quit the police force that day. I still have nightmares about the whole thing.”
Mr. Rollo looked all shook up just telling us the story.
“So that’s why I became a ladies’ shoe salesman,” he said.
Then he started telling us all about ladies’ feet. No kidding. He told us about different sorts of lumps on ladies’ feet, and a woman with feet the size of a loaf of bread and another woman who had a miniature foot growing right on top of her big toe. It was all so disgusting that I started to get this weird feeling in my belly. I looked over at Perry. He looked like he was feeling the same way. Even Boris had this strange expression on his face.
Then I realized that it wasn’t ladies’ feet that were making me feel funny.
It was the Belly Button Popper. The thing was starting to vibrate in my belly button.
I glanced over at Perry. He looked back at me, his eyes wide. Then he pointed at his belly.
I know, I mouthed.
“Dudes!” Boris shouted. “I’m vibrating!” He yanked up his shirt. I thought he was just being dramatic, until I saw Perry yank up his shirt, also. Then I remembered. That’s what you were supposed to do when the Belly Button Popper started to vibrate. So I yanked up my shirt, too.
“What are you doing!?” Cat shrieked at us.
Mr. Rollo just looked confused.
Perry’s Belly Button Popper went off first. It started with a loud tsssssss sound, then a BANG! And it shot straight out of his belly button and flew right over Mr. Rollo’s head, leaving behind a trail of smoke.
My popper shot out next. Maybe because my belly button is so deep, my popper had a little extra oomph. Tsssss … ba-ba-BA-BANG!! It zoomed right by Mr. Rollo’s left ear. He screamed and covered his head with his arms.
“Cut that out!” Cat demanded.
But it was too late. Boris’s popper started the tsssss noise and then it burst out of his belly button. BANG! It didn’t shoot straight out like ours did. His flew high up in the air, almost to the ceiling. Then it started to plunge back down, with smoke trailing behind it. The really awful thing was that it was headed directly for Mr. Rollo. And the really, really awful thing was that it was covered in Boris’s belly-button hair.
“Hit the deck, Mr. Rollo!” Cat yelled.
But Mr. Rollo was such a wreck that he just froze. It must have brought back all those memories of his day as a police officer. So Cat launched herself out of her seat and caught the hairy popper while it was in midair. It was pretty impressive. Mostly because she actually touched the thing.
After that, Mr. Rollo had to go lie down on the couch with a cold washcloth over his face.