CHAPTER 5

Frankie and Ashley went into my room to look for parts for Stanley’s body. I went into Emily’s room to see what I could find. I found a box of princess Legos that someone had given her for her birthday. She had never even opened the box. Emily is not the kind of person who wants to build a pink princess castle. Now, if it had been a lizard Lego kit, she would have built it in two seconds.

“What do you think you’re doing?” a voice from behind me said. I’m sure you already guessed that it was Emily’s voice. Even though she and Katherine had returned from the bathroom, Katherine’s teeth seemed as yellow as ever.

“I really need this box of Legos to build my robot,” I begged.

“They belong to me.”

“I know, but you’ve never even taken the ribbon off. Come on, Emily. You’re not ever going to use these Legos.”

“What are you going to give me for them?”

“I’m giving you the wonderful feeling of getting to help your older brother.”

“Three nights of you doing the dishes,” she fired back. “That’s the deal.”

Normally, I would not have made that deal, but I was running out of time.

“Fine,” I said, tucking the Lego box under my arm and bolting for the living room.

Frankie and Ashley were waiting for me with a pile of things they had gathered.

“We got some cool stuff,” Frankie said. “Look, here’s some pencils and rubber bands.”

“What are those for?” I asked. “Stanley’s not going to write anything.”

“The pencils are going to make his arms longer,” Ashley said. “If they aren’t long enough, he won’t be able to scoop up the socks.”

“And look at this,” Frankie went on. “We also took the remote control and a motor from your old yellow front loader truck. I hope you don’t mind if it never runs again.”

“That’s okay,” I said. “Cheerio chewed off the digging bucket, anyway. What good is a front loader without a bucket? It’s like hot chocolate without the chocolate.”

“We also took two wheels off your old monster truck,” Ashley said.

“How come only two? Stanley needs four wheels.”

“The front wheels were missing in action,” Frankie said. “But we could get the other two wheels off your cement mixer.”

“I love that truck,” I said. “Every time I got sick and stayed home from school, Mr. Cement Mixer always made me feel better. I can’t take him apart, not even for Stanley.”

“Well, we need to find something that’s round and rolls,” Ashley said. “Anyone have a bright idea?”

“Golf balls?” Frankie suggested.

I shook my head. “We don’t have any. My dad says golf gives him a rash. I never asked him where.”

“Some parent things you just don’t want to know,” Frankie said with a nod.

“How about pizza cutters?” Ashley said. “They’re round.”

“Too sharp,” I answered. “Besides, we only have one of them.”

“Think, guys,” Ashley said. “What’s round and rolls?”

“Meatballs,” Frankie said. “A Frisbee. Marbles. Doughnuts. A sandwich roll.”

“Or toilet paper rolls,” I said, joining in the list.

“Are those strong enough to hold Stanley?” Ashley asked.

“Legos aren’t that heavy,” I answered. “And besides, we only need Stanley to work for a few minutes. It’s not like he’s got to roll all the way across the Brooklyn Bridge.”

“Let’s try it,” Frankie said. “It’s the best idea we have.”

We all jumped up and raced to the bathroom.

“What we need is the cardboard tube inside the roll of toilet paper,” I said. “We’ll cut it in two pieces, wrap the pieces in Scotch tape to make them stronger, and presto, Stanley will have himself two front wheels. Okay, team. Let’s start unrolling.”

“Wait a minute,” Ashley said. “What are we going to do with all the toilet paper we take off the roll? We can’t waste it. Some poor tree gave its life for this.”

“How about if we tear it into little squares and pile it up on the back of the toilet?” Frankie asked.

“Great idea,” I said. “Frankie and I will make the squares, and Ashley, you make a sign that says: Attention, all Zipzers, get your toilet paper here. I’d do it, but I don’t know how to spell toilet. Or attention.”

When we were finished, we took the cardboard toilet paper tube back into the living room, cut it in two even pieces, and wound a lot of Scotch tape around them. If you closed your eyes, you’d have thought they were wheels. Sort of. Then we sat down in a circle.

“Okay,” I said. “Project Build a Robot, Part 2, is officially starting. Ready, set, go!”

We began with the pink Legos. Using a big flat piece of the castle floor as the platform for Stanley’s body, we built up his stomach and chest with lots of square blocks. Then we attached his spoon and fork arms. It was amazing to see Stanley take shape right in front of our very eyes. Too bad he was still missing a head.

“We could use a head from one of the Lego people,” Ashley suggested. “This set comes with a princess, a knight, and some unicorns. I vote for the unicorn.”

“You don’t think Stanley will be embarrassed having a sparkly horn coming out of his head?” I asked.

“Embarrassed?” Ashley exclaimed. “Of course not. Don’t you know that unicorns are the symbol of success?”

“In that case,” I said, “let’s give him two horns. Or maybe even three.”

Frankie dug through all the Lego pieces and came up with two unicorn heads.

“Okay,” I said. “Let’s tape them on. One thing is for sure. No one else in the contest is going to have a two-headed unicorn sock-picker-upper robot.”

Now that Stanley had heads, he needed wheels. Putting wheels under his platform was a little bit hard. We had to attach the monster truck wheels to the ends of a pencil, and tape the pencil onto the back of his platform. Then we did the same with the toilet roll wheels. We taped them and their pencil to the front of Stanley’s platform. That gave him wheels to roll on.

From the waist down, Stanley looked like a very weird steamroller. From the waist up, he looked like a crazy two-headed, two-horned unicorn. But I wasn’t going to tell him.

“Now we have to attach the motor,” I said.

“And figure out how it’s going to make the wheels turn and the arms lift,” Frankie added quickly.

“That sounds like it’s going to take a while,” Ashley said, pushing her glasses up on her nose.

“Wait a minute,” Frankie said. “Anyone know what time it is? I have to be home for dinner at five thirty. Tonight’s my night to set the table.”

We checked the clock, and the news wasn’t good. It was almost five thirty.

“We better hurry,” Ashley said. “Because I have to be home for dinner, too.”

I picked up the motor and the remote control and just stared at them as if they were aliens from another planet.

“What are you waiting for, Zip?” Frankie asked.

“I don’t have a clue what to do with this motor.”

“Neither do I,” Ashley said.

“Me either,” Frankie said.

There was a lot of silence. Suddenly, it seemed like Project Stanley was doomed. What good is a robot that can’t move?