“I know you’re in there. Wake up!” I shout as I pound on the front door with my fists.
It’s 9:00 Saturday morning and I’m knocking on doors as promised. But at this particular house, it’s not to sell someone on sticking a yard sign in their front lawn. It’s to wake Bo Tauber up so he can help. His mom works and his grandmother volunteers on Saturday mornings, so if I can’t get Bo to answer the door, I’m stuck canvassing on my own—again.
“Bo, you promised!” He probably stayed up late last night playing poker or video games with his soccer buddies, and now he figures that pounding noise is just a part of his dream, or nightmare.
I walk around to the back of the house. I know exactly which window is his. Snapping off a long branch from the overgrown forsythia bush underneath it, I tap against the screen and shout, “Bo, you’re not ditching me. Wake up!”
Two little neighbor kids in protective bubble helmets are riding their bicycles up and down the short driveway next to Bo’s house. They stop and stare at the crazy girl scratching on windows with twigs. I try to ignore them.
“Bo’s sleeping,” they call over to me.
I wave and mumble, “Not for long.” Why is it that when we were little kids, we used to get up at daybreak, and now that we’re teenagers, some of us can hardly drag our butts out of bed before noon? If had my own cell phone, like half the kids at school, then I could call Bo and wake him. But, “No,” my mother says, “an eighth grader doesn’t need a cell phone.”
I need one now.
“He’s asleep!” they shout. The shorter of the two gets off her pink bicycle and stamps her blinking light-up sneakers on the ground in frustration at my stubborn stupidity.
“Listen,” I walk over. “I need your help getting Bo out of bed for a really important job. Could one of you go inside your house and call his phone number, and the other go to his front door and ring the doorbell, while I stay here and shout by the window?”
They stare at me wide-eyed, probably thinking that if this is what teenagers do for fun on a Saturday morning, they’ll opt for the perpetual primary-school plan.
“If we all work together, we can wake him!” I try to sound enthusiastic, hoping they’ll think it’s a game.
“He’ll get mad,” says the one with the loose chin strap and runny nose.
“No, he won’t,” I lie. “He’ll think it’s a great joke.”
You can’t fool little kids these days. They’re a suspicious bunch. When I was little, my brothers told me that I was adopted; that a killer possum lived underneath our wooden deck; and that if I drank milk through a straw stuck up my nose, it would taste like a vanilla shake. I believed every word, totally blinded by devotion and envy.
“Okay.” I hit ’em with the truth—sort of. “You’re right, maybe Bo won’t like our wake-up call, but he promised this morning he’d help with something really important. He’d want to keep his promise—right? It wouldn’t be fair if he didn’t.”
Now, I’m talking their language. Fair is a concept that rules their world. Especially since “It’s not fair!” is the rallying cry in any home with more than one child. Which explains Bo’s sometime lack of understanding in this area, as an only child.
The plan works, and within ten minutes, Bo’s slamming his front door, still dressed in his pajama bottoms and T-shirt, as he ties a red bandana around his mane of wild hair.
“Are you crazy, Tess!” he grumpily complains and curses while rubbing the sleep from his eyes. “Why couldn’t you sign people up yourself? You know Saturday’s my only day to sleep in. My grandmother will have me up tomorrow by seven to get ready for church!”
“Sorry.” I try to hide my smile behind the clipboard.
The bobble-headed bikers stare at us as we walk in front of their driveway. Bo playfully raps the tops of their bike helmets with his knuckles and teases, “I’ll get you two later.”
They point their fingers at me. “She made us!”
I make a face. “Thanks a lot.”
“Yeah, I know. I’ll take care of her, too. How about a little seven a.m. wake-up call tomorrow, Tess? Better yet, why don’t you come to church with Gram and me? Two and a half hours in the morning, then back again that afternoon for a potluck dinner and more preaching, praying, and singing.”
I hand him the empty clipboard. Not one single person signed up.
He looks at it and whistles. “On second thought, maybe we better skip church on Sunday. Gram always says the Lord helps those who help themselves, and if we don’t get some advertising up for this levy, we don’t have a prayer of playing sports next season.”
* * *
By Monday morning, I’m so psyched, I practically dance through the school hallways! Bo and I signed up close to forty houses over the weekend to display levy signs. We made a game of it. He took the odd side of the street and I took the even. Because I looked at it as a race, it kept me moving along so I didn’t waste time chatting with the neighbors when I should be focusing on the goal—signing people up.
There was only one thing that ruined the weekend. Sunday afternoon, when we were almost finished and heading to my house for a snack, we see Jillian O’Hanlon outside. This time, she’s not cartwheeling across her front lawn half-naked or walking her yappy poodles. This time, she’s talking to a tall boy with sandy blond hair wearing a faded blue Abercrombie and Fitch T-shirt. I recognize the shirt immediately because I told him he was crazy for spending so much money on one shirt. But, of course, Mark never listens to me.
“What’s he doing?” I asked Bo.
“Staring at her chest?”
“Stop!” I punched his arm. “Why would he be talking to her after I told him she slammed the door in my face?”
“Slipped his mind?”
“What mind?” I mumbled as I made my way toward them.
I overheard my brother saying, “Yeah, so just tell your parents that I’d be happy to mow their lawn, and in the winter, I’ll even shovel your walk and driveway. I’m trying to save money for college.”
Has the world gone insane? Mark Munro in the lawn care/snow removal business? The O’Hanlons would have to be blind to hire him. Besides, I thought he wanted to save money to buy his own car. I heard him complaining the other night at dinner after Dad banned him from driving the car for a few days because Mark smashed the mailbox at the end of our driveway and tried to hide it in the bushes on the side of the house.
Jillian smiled. “I’ll let my parents know. Thanks a lot, Mark, for helping catch Maribelle.” She holds the dog up in front of her and makes kiss-kiss sounds near the poodle’s mouth.
Gross!
The dog remembers me and begins to squirm and growl in her arms. At least the pooch hasn’t had his brains sucked out his ears, like my brother and Jillian. But I figured I better take advantage of the moment and press my case. I looked her straight in the eye. “Have you had a chance to ask your parents about that yard sign, yet?”
Jillian looked past me and said, “Hey, Bo,” giving him a little wave with her painted nails.
“Hi, Jillian.” Bo flashed his perfect smile.
I had a strong urge to whack him in the head with the clipboard, but then that would totally justify Jillian’s opinion of me.
She struggled with the killer poodle in her arms and gave me a canine smile and said, “Oops, forgot to tell them that you stopped by. Why don’t you check back sometime this week? They’re usually home evenings.”
Later, as Bo and I were walking into my house, he said, “Maybe she’s not so bad after all.”
“Sure,” I said, “and maybe that was her evil twin the other day and the day before that, but today the nice Jillian is allowed out for some fresh air. Yeah, maybe!”
* * *
Fingers flying over the keyboard in Discovery Tech, I’m thinking about all the yard signs and hoping that Ibby will have good news for me today on the haunted house. I’m in the zone, so I practically jump out of my seat when Mrs. Bustamonte says, “I’ve had enough of this, class. This has got to stop!”
We stop typing.
“What’s her problem?” Bo asks.
I shrug.
“Who? Who?” She looks and sounds like a tiny screech owl. “Who keeps stealing the mouse balls?” she demands.
“Not again,” everyone groans.
We definitely have a mouse problem at Clarkstown Middle School.
Mrs. Bustamonte isn’t upset over furry mouse balls. It’s the missing gray rubber ones that have her in an uproar. Apparently, kids pry them out of the computer mouse and steal them just for kicks. Later, they reappear, rolling around the school hallways, flying over our heads on the bus, or bouncing off the walls in Phys Ed.
“If you act like kleptomaniacs, you leave me no option but to treat you as such! From now on, at the end of every class, I’ll check everyone’s balls to make sure they’re in place.”
Bo glances at me—eyebrows shooting off the top of his forehead. But Mrs. Bustamonte is very old and very upset, so he wisely keeps his mouth shut.
“Five minutes before the bell rings, you’ll turn over your mouse.” She sniffs. “If it’s missing, you will pay to replace it, face possible suspension for theft of school property, and I’ll send a note home to your parents!”
“Hey, yo,” Bo leans over and whispers in a Mafia voice, “messa with Bustamonte’s balls and she busta you face!”
I try to suppress my laughter, but it’s no use. Mrs. B. is totally oblivious to a cardinal rule for teaching middle schoolers: Never say the word balls in class and expect us not to crack up.
“You find this amusing, Miss Munro?”
“No.” I glare at Bo, who wears an angelic expression and says, “Give her a detention, Mrs. B. Send her to the office!”
She ignores him. “Ninety-nine cents a ball,” she says, looking down her nose at me through her tortoiseshell glasses. “Add it up, and over the course of a year, your parents—hardworking taxpayers—are underwriting this senseless theft. I—I will not tolerate it anymore.”
Suddenly, I feel sorry for her. My mom says Mrs. B. taught her Typing Skills class when she attended this very same middle school over thirty years ago.
Mrs. B. takes off her glasses and cleans them on her wool skirt. She sighs and says, “There will be a period of amnesty, of course. If you know of anyone who has missing balls in their locker, or you see any rolling around the school, please return them to my mailbox in the office. No questions asked.”
We stifle our laughter and solemnly go back to work. That is, until five minutes later, when Bo holds up a mouse with its cord detached from the computer and says, “Hey, Mrs. B., someone castrated my mouse.”
* * *
“Tess! She said yes!” I hear Ibby calling from down the hall on my way to Language Arts.
“Your mom said yes? We can have the haunted house at your place? I can’t believe it!”
Ibby nods her head, breathless and laughing. “Why? You’re the one who told me to try!”
“Yeah, but I didn’t think that they’d actually say yes! Does she know real live people will be coming through your house—wearing shoes?”
“It was perfect timing, Tess. My dad’s been after my mom for being so strict and fussy. He’s encouraging her to lighten up a bit. This is the perfect opportunity—the perfect test.”
“Awesome!”
“She’s even agreed to help decorate and dress up for the event. She’s written about twenty lists already—everything from decorations to levy slogans and theme music.”
I hug Ibby. “We’re going to have the best haunted house this school has ever seen! Wait until Olivia Fletcher hears this!”
“Girls, get to class,” warns the hall monitor.
We make it in the door just as the bell rings, but not in time to avoid Mr. Chen’s reproachful look as he reminds us, “In your seats by the bell, ladies, and honor the brief time we have together.”
Mr. Chen’s big into honoring things. Whenever we begin a new novel, he presents it likes it’s a holy gift or something. I swear he gets half the kids—who would normally cheat by reading Cliff’s Notes or going online for summaries—to actually read the book just because they wonder what Chen is making such a big deal about.
Ibby passes me a note.
I try to open it underneath the desk so Chen won’t get upset that I’m not paying attention to the discussion of To Kill a Mockingbird. But even if he did catch me, I’m confident that I’d be able to answer any questions on the book. I found it in Luke’s room last summer and read it on my own. I told my mom that if I ever practiced law like she does, I’d like to be a lawyer like Atticus Finch.
Ibby folded her note into an origami flower and wrote Tess Munro in different-color gel pens on all the petals. It takes me a minute or two to open it.
Hey Tesser!
So psyched about the haunted house!!! Let’s make plans. Mom wants me to be a medieval princess for Halloween. Nooo way! I wanna be Raggedy Ann. You be Andy?
Luv ya lots – Ibs
I write back:
Ibs-
Nice flower, girl! I’m psyched too!!! Can’t meet after school. Have another Olivia torture meeting! Tomorrow away soccer game against Ramapo. We’ll kick their butts!! Go Lions! Wanna sleep over Friday?
Lions Rule!!
Tess #12
P.S. Gonna be a ghost - Boooo Radley!
I reshape the note into a football and punt it across my desk with my finger. It goes wide and hits Olivia Fletcher on the arm and lands on the floor between her desk and Ibby’s.
“Hey!” she says.
I frantically signal Ibby.
“Is there a problem, ladies?” asks Mr. Chen, who stops reading out loud an excerpt from the novel—one of my favorite parts when Scout and Jem find the carved soap figurines in the knot hole in the tree.
Before Ibby can pick up the note, it disappears underneath Olivia’s Birkenstock shoe. She slowly slides it underneath her desk.
“There was a bug crawling across the floor,” says Olivia.
Mr. Chen goes back to reading out loud and Olivia makes a face at Ibby and whispers, “Ibby Bloom bug.”
“Give it back,” whispers Ibby.
Ignoring her, Olivia pretends to follow along with Mr. Chen in her book.
I’ve got to get that note back before Olivia reads it! It’s one thing to be a total pain in the butt; it’s another to actually see it written in print. What if she shows Ms. Harper the note and they kick me off the levy committee? And after all the work Bo and I did this weekend and finally getting Ibby’s parents to say yes to the haunted house!
I can’t take my eyes off the corner of the note sticking out from underneath Olivia’s suede shoes. Leaning as far over the front of my desk as I dare, I whisper to the back of Olivia’s streaked blond hair, “Give it back!”
Ever so slightly, she shakes her head, no.
It’s my own fault for mispunting. That’s my problem—everything’s a game. Until, suddenly it’s not.
One more try. “Pass it to Ibby, then, please.”
Swish-swoosh goes the hair—no!
This calls for desperate measures. A definite plan of attack. A slide tackle?
Mr. Chen’s back is to us as he writes on the board a list of all the things Scout and Jem discover in the tree over the course of the novel.
I raise my hand and contribute, “An old broken pocket watch.”
“Good, Tess.” The minute he turns to write on the board, I lunge out of my seat, kicking Olivia’s shoe with my foot and snatching the exposed note—score! I would have made it back to my seat, too, if Olivia hadn’t pushed me in frustration at having been outmaneuvered.
“Young ladies!” says Mr. Chen in a shocked voice.
Definitely not honoring our time together.
“She attacked my foot, Mr. Chen—on purpose!” Olivia cries.
“Tess?”
I clench the note in my hand and frantically try to come up with a plausible excuse. “I … leg cramp?” And I rub my shin for effect.
Ibby to the rescue. “It’s my fault!”
I give her a desperate what-did-you-do-that-for look?
She continues, “Mr. Chen, I was so excited because my parents agreed to host the haunted house for the levy fundraiser, so I wrote Tess a note and she wrote back and when she tried to pass it to me—well, actually, she punted it and missed and it hit Olivia by accident and Olivia stepped on the note and refused to—”
“Please!” Mr. Chen’s hands are in the air. “Who has the note now?”
“I do.”
“Please bring it up here, Tess.”
My face feels like it’s on fire as I walk up to the front of the classroom and place the note on Mr. Chen’s Bob Dylan calendar. Returning to my seat, I figure that I’ve probably earned detentions for the rest of the week.
He picks up my tightly folded paper. “Football?” asks Mr. Chen with a twinkle in his eye.
I stare at my desk, feeling ashamed for having disrupted his lesson, but not for having kicked Olivia’s shoe. I wish I’d missed and nailed her in the shin. I wait for the punishment.
“Human beings can’t resist communication,” Mr. Chen says, holding the note in his hand. “Sometimes the urge to reach out to one another is so powerful that we’re willing to take risks.”
I look up.
Ibby turns around and gives me an encouraging smile.
“Boo Radley takes a chance when he reaches out to Scout and Jem. He tries to communicate with them through the various objects he hides in the tree, and in spite of his isolation and loneliness, he takes a chance on friendship, understanding, and hope.”
With a sigh of relief, I take out another piece of paper. I don’t fold it into a flower or a football. This time, I’ll use it to take notes instead of writing one. As I listen and write, I offer a silent thank-you to Mr. Chen, Harper Lee, and my brave friend, Isabelle Bloom. I’m not exactly sure what happened here just now, but it feels a lot like forgiveness.
And besides, teachers are always telling us that we have to learn to write the important stuff down.