Chapter Ten
The Best Lunch Ever

You probably think lunch at Scary School is a grotesque buffet of gross stuff like worms and maggots and gruel and guts.

If that’s what you think, then you are wrong. In fact, you couldn’t be more wrong.

Lunch at Scary School is amazing. I mean, it’s ridiculously good. Can you guess why? Okay, go ahead, I’ll read your mind. . . .

Nope. That’s not it. I’ll just tell you, or we could be here all day. The reason is because every lunch a student eats at Scary School may very well be his or her last meal. Imagine what you would choose if you could eat anything in the world for your last meal—that’s how good lunch is at Scary School.

There is no lunch bell. Everyday at noon sharp, Mrs. T, the T. rex in a blue dress, gets hungry and she lets out an earthshaking roar, causing everyone for miles to cover their ears. At that point, she either eats whatever kid is still stuck in detention, or she goes on a hunt in Scary Forest, but more about that later.

A couple months into the school year, autumn had slowly crept into the surroundings. The trees had turned deep shades of orange and red, reminding everyone that Halloween was fast approaching. On this day, right after Mrs. T’s lunch roar, all the classes lined up together at the lunch hall and waited to be seated by the zombie waiters. The newly renovated lunch hall had just reopened and it looked like the inside of the fanciest restaurant you’ve ever seen.

The ceiling was at least thirty feet tall, with enormous candlelit chandeliers hanging down over each class’s table. To promote school unity for the Ghoul Games, every class now sat together at their own big table. Every grade, third through sixth, had two classes of thirty kids to start off the year, so in total there were eight round tables, which seated thirty kids each.

Ms. Fang’s table was the only one that had each seat occupied. Every other table had at least two or three empty chairs due to students who had made an early exit from their state of being. Dr. Dragonbreath’s table had only poor Charles Nukid and Cindy Chan, sitting all by themselves.

Once everyone was seated, the zombie waiters handed every kid their own menu.

“For today’s special,” moaned the zombie waiters, “we highly recommend the brains. The brraaaaaainnnnns!” Sure enough, on the menu was a dish called shark-brains ravioli with sage and lemon. Most of the boys ordered that. The three Rachels ordered the steamed wild salmon with chili oil, ginger, baby bok choy, snap peas, and jasmine rice. Lindsey ordered the roast Maine lobster with potato purée, chanterelles, edamame, and tarragon. Benny Porter, the vampire kid, ordered the blood sausage with apples and baby squash.

The zombie waiters lurched into the kitchen and handed all the orders to the chef. The chef only had twenty minutes to prepare every meal for the hundreds of kids so they would have enough time to eat, play, and be back to class in an hour. Plus, the chef made everything to order so it would be at its freshest. Nothing was ever cold or stale. How was the chef able to accomplish this, you ask? Because the chef was a giant octopus named Sue.

At the end of each of Sue’s eight long arms was either a pot, a pan, a spatula, a mixer, a knife, a bowl, a measuring spoon, or a strainer. What made it all the more amazing was that she did all her cooking from inside a giant water tank with holes punched in the walls for her arms to fit through. Plus, there were wheels on the bottom of her tank so that she could move around wherever she needed to go.

The kids called her Sue the Amazing Octo-Chef. She had trained with the world’s scariest and best chefs, including WereWolfgang Puck, Mario Bat-Ali, and Scary Danko. Her philosophy was, “Fresh food makes for fresh minds.” All the fruits and vegetables she cooked with were grown right down the hill on the Scary School Farm. All the fish were caught fresh in nearby Gremlin River, and the meat was freshly hunted and caught by Scary School teachers. Everything was local, seasonal, and delicious.

At home, most of the kids wouldn’t touch the vegetables on their plates, but at Scary School, the veggies were so perfectly cooked that the kids gobbled up greens like they were candy. When the shark-brains ravioli came out, the boys were a bit disappointed that it didn’t taste stranger. The brains were very soft and mild-tasting; it was like eating marshmallow mushrooms. But the best part of lunch was dessert.

On this day, when everyone had cleared their plates and eaten all their vegetables, the zombies dragged out the biggest pumpkin anyone had ever seen. It was so big, you could probably fit every kid from Ms. Fang’s class inside it. The hall erupted with cheers when they saw it.

Sue the Amazing Octo-Chef wheeled herself out into the dining area. She held a microphone up to the tank and said, “Fall marks the start of pumpkin season, so using some special Scary School magic, we’ve grown the biggest pumpkin in history! I’m sure you are all familiar with the idea of catching your dinner, but have you ever had to catch your dessert?”

Everyone shook their heads and looked at one another with excitement.

“Well then,” continued Sue, “this is your chance. Jason, will you please do the honors.”

Jason climbed to the very top of the pumpkin. Using his chainsaw, he cut a big hole at the top, and he tugged on the stem with all his might until it popped off. There will be more about Jason soon.

All of sudden, hundreds of jack-o’-lanterns hopped out of the giant pumpkin and started bouncing all over the room.

“Catch a pumpkin to catch your dessert!” Sue exclaimed.

Every kid at Scary School jumped out of their seat and started running to try to catch the bouncing pumpkins. They were bounding all over the room like crazy balls, laughing through their jack-o’-lantern grins. The pumpkins were covered in pumpkin slime that made them very slippery and tough to hold on to. Whenever a kid grabbed one, it slipped right through their hands a second later.

“Come on!” exclaimed Sue. “Your strength and agility won’t help you in the Ghoul Games against all the monsters you’ll be facing. You’re going to have to learn to use your brains in order to win!”

For nearly the rest of lunchtime, nobody could figure out how to catch any of the pumpkins. They were just too slippery. Then, Charles Nukid had an idea.

He went back to his seat at the big empty table and sat down. Soon, a bouncing pumpkin landed right in his lap. He didn’t try to touch it or grab it. He just looked at the pumpkin, and the pumpkin looked back at him as he patted his head to make sure no hairs were out of place.

“Aren’t you going to try to catch me?” asked the pumpkin.

“No,” said Charles. “I know that your whole purpose in life is to be eaten, and I want to eat you for my nourishment. So, since we’re helping each other out, the least I can do is let you choose when you want to be eaten.”

“Thank you,” said the pumpkin. “I think now is a good time.”

The pumpkin popped off its top for Charles, and inside was a smooth, creamy pumpkin custard. Charles started eating the custard and he thought it was the best thing he had ever tasted.

Soon, everyone noticed that Charles was eating his pumpkin and said, “Look! The new kid caught a pumpkin! How did you do it?”

Charles told everyone how to catch a pumpkin, and the kids ran back to their seats and let the pumpkins come to them. Soon they were all enjoying their delicious pumpkin custard, and Charles became the new school hero.

After that lunch, everyone called him Charles instead of “new kid.” Charles thought it was weird that everyone suddenly started calling him by his first name instead of his last name, but he was happy to be called any name other than Toothpick.