Team Operation Food Fight stood in the alcove under the basket in the gym. In a moment, we’d head into the cafeteria for the first mission.
“We’re bringing back the Lunch Bunch!” Avery said. She leaned back, popped a wheelie, and did a three-sixty.
“Oh, yeah.” Red hopped.
“You sure you remember how to turn the camera on?” Diego asked Avery.
“Ask me that one more time, and I’m going to rip that penguin hat off your head and—”
“No need for violence.” He held up his hands. “Just making sure.”
“You know where to be?” Avery asked Tiki.
“Yeppers,” she said. “I’m sitting with Mr. Noble’s second graders.”
Avery turned to Red. “You know what to do?”
“I know what to do, Avery Goodman.”
She picked her book bag off the floor and held it out to me.
“Hook this to my chair. I would, but I don’t want to accidentally touch the camera. Diego might explode.”
Diego made an exploding sound and stumbled backward all the way to the foul line. Then he charged back over and rested his arm on my shoulder. “It’s time to make some noise at RJE!”
“It is,” I said.
“Are you nervous, Rip?” Tiki asked.
“No, Tiki, I’m not.”
“You haven’t said a word. I thought you—”
“I’m not nervous.”
Furious was more like it.
For the rest of the weekend, I hadn’t done much of anything. I’d spent most of yesterday by myself in my basement. This morning, when Red and I got to school, instead of going to Room 208, I waited in the bathroom until the other kids were allowed in.
“I’m so glad Ramadan is earlier this year,” Tiki said.
“Where did that come from?” Diego asked.
“When I was little, Ramadan seemed to always fall in August.” Tiki pressed her hands to her cheeks and shook her face. “That was the worst-ist-ist. You couldn’t eat or drink during the day, and it was so hot.”
“You fasted for Ramadan?” Diego asked.
“Kinda sorta.” She snort-laughed. “Not like other people in my family. My pop says that not drinking water while fasting is the most essential part, but—”
“Why are we talking about this?” I asked.
“Why does Ramadan move?” Diego asked.
“It doesn’t,” Tiki said. “It’s based on the lunar calendar, not the January-February-March-April calendar.”
“How do you go a whole month without eating or drinking?” Diego asked. He checked the camera clamp on Avery’s chair. “The only time I ever had to fast was before surgery. Now the only time I can go more than a few hours without food is when I’m sleeping!”
“You’re allowed to eat and drink after sundown,” Tiki said. “Do you know what everyone says at the end of Ramadan?”
I rolled my eyes. “I bet you’re going to tell us.”
“Eid Muburak,” Tiki said. “That means ‘blessed festival.’”
“Eid,” Red said. “Like your last name, Takara Eid.”
“Ding, ding, ding.” She pointed her index fingers at Red and shifted her arms back and forth. “Everyone says my name. How awesome-sauce is that?”
“Why are we still talking about this?” I asked.
“Because this is just like an old baseball movie my pop loves,” Tiki said. “In this one scene, all the players are standing around the pitcher’s mound talking about jammed eyelids, live roosters, cursed gloves, and what to get someone for a wedding gift. Then the manager comes up and says candlesticks always make a nice gift.”
We all stared.
“Okilee-dokilee.” Tiki snort-laughed again. “I’m just trying to keep the team loose.” She dropped her arms to her sides and shook them. “Like on the basketball court.”
I chomped on my lip. If she said anything else about basketball, I was going to erupt like a volcano.
“When we’re loose and relaxed,” Tiki said, “we’re more focused. We’re on our game.” She looked at me. “No one on Team Operation Food Fight should be scared or—”
“I’m not scared!” I snapped.
“I’m just—”
“Stop!” Avery interrupted. “You two are ridiculous.” She pointed to the cafeteria. “Diego and I are going. Then me and Rip.” She looked around the group. “Let’s do this.”
I checked Red. “You ready?”
“Ready as I’ll ever be, Mason Irving.”
* * *
“Someone’s in a mood,” Avery said. “What did Tiki do this time?”
“Nothing,” I said.
We were on the lunch line approaching the entrance to the service area. As part of the plan, we were supposed to be in the middle of a conversation when we walked in, but Tiki was the last thing I wanted to be talking about.
I checked the cafeteria. The new first-grade teacher, Ms. Dunwoody, was eating lunch with her class and not paying much mind to the other students. Mr. Noble was standing near the exit to the service area grading papers. No, it wasn’t exactly the best place for him to be, but I knew the only time he looked up was when someone came over.
I glanced at Tiki, sitting at the end of a second-grade table and facing the service area. The little kid next to her was practically in her lap. I so wanted that little booger to dump his beans and fruit all over her.
Red and Diego were at our booth. Diego had already gone through the line. I stared at his penguin hat. The eyes were too close together. They weren’t just looking at me; they were looking through me. Were other eyes watching? All of a sudden, my thoughts jumped to Mom and Suzanne (Red’s mom) and Principal Darling and …
“Stop!” Avery said.
I flinched. “What am I doing?”
“That freak-out face of yours,” she said. “It’s making me nervous.” She rammed her chair into my leg.
“Ow,” I said. “I can’t stand when you do that.”
“I can’t stand when you do your freak-out face.” She pointed. “Now focus, fart boy.”
“Not funny.”
She laughed. “I thought it was. Relax, dude.” She motioned for me to go in. “Let’s do this.”
I entered the service area and grabbed a tray.
All four lunch ladies were there: one was serving the food, one was working the register, and the other two were in the back—one by the refrigerators, the other by the sinks.
I stepped to the counter. The lunch lady grabbed my tray and looked up. She motioned to the food with her gloved hand.
“I’ll have the hamburger, please.”
“Beans?” she grumbled.
Before I could say “No, thanks,” she dumped a spoonful onto the tray. Then she grabbed some sweet potato fries, which looked like soggy shoelaces, and dropped them next to the beans.
I glanced back at Avery. The tiny red light behind her ear was on. The camera was recording everything.
Everything.
“Fresh fruit?” the lunch lady asked.
“Yes, please,” I said.
She dunked her ladle into the metal basin, scooped out some syrup-soaked pears, and poured them onto my tray. Then she placed the tray on top of the counter and looked to Avery.
“Didn’t you just come through a minute ago?” she growled.
I swallowed.
“Yeah,” Avery said. “I didn’t get anything, remember? I said I—”
“Hamburger or ham-and-cheese wrap?” the lunch lady interrupted.
“I’ll take the wrap,” Avery said. “And everything that comes with it. Thanks.”
The lunch lady dropped the food-like substances onto her tray.
We worked our way down the line. When we reached the register, the lunch lady there motioned for me to swipe my card. Like the other lunch lady, she didn’t greet me or say a word. Same with Avery. She just pointed her to the card reader and moved on to the next kid.
“Told you it would go fine, dude,” Avery said as we exited the service area. She bumped the back of my leg with her chair. “Piece of cake.”
“Piece of cake,” I said, smiling and not minding the chair-knock.
* * *
“That was tight,” Diego said, strumming the table and swinging his hat strings.
“It’s all on video,” Avery said. “The way they looked at us, the way they treated us, the food—everything.”
The Operation Food Fight team was back at the booth.
“Sweet,” Diego said. “Well done, crew.”
Tiki shook her fingers like a cheerleader. “I just love it when a plan comes together.”
Avery flicked the orange mush in the corner of her tray. “What is this?” she asked.
“I think that’s the pineapple push-up,” I said.
“No friggin’ way,” she said. “There’s no way that’s pineapple.”
“I think it’s a pear,” I said.
“I think it’s baby barf,” Diego said.
“That’s nasty,” Red said, spinning his spork on the table. “If we do another That’s Nasty project in Room 208, you have your topic, Avery Goodman.”
I laughed. “Nice one, Red.” I held out my fist.
He tapped it with his.
It was the first time I ever heard Red try to be funny or make a joke in front of anyone other than me.
“Yo, when we went through the line,” Diego said, “the other lunch lady came up and dumped the corn out of this huge bucket into the serving tray. It looked like one giant yellow glob of alien boogers.”
“Puke city!” Tiki said, sticking a finger into her mouth and making a throw-up face.
“Dude, you call this a wrap?” Avery swatted her ham-and-cheese.
“It looks like an unwrap!” Tiki snort-laughed.
“A flame-broiled hamburger on a whole wheat bun?” I said, jabbing my finger at my tray. “No way. That’s a boiled burger on bread.” I turned to Red again. “How did things go for you, Lookout?”
“Spindiddly,” Tiki answered first.
I shot her a glare. “I was talking to Red.”
“It went great, Mason Irving,” Red said. “Ms. Dunwoody didn’t notice a thing. Mr. Noble didn’t notice a thing. Ms.—”
“BTW,” Tiki interrupted, “spindiddly isn’t my word. It’s a word from a book I really, really like.” She raised her fist. “I hereby declare our first mission a boom-boom-booming success!”
“I second that,” Diego said, whipping around his hat strings.
“You know what would be amaze-balls?” Tiki said. “If Clifton United’s first game of the season tomorrow was a boom-boom-booming success, too!”
“Oh, yeah, Takara Eid,” Red said.
“Don’t you think so?” Tiki patted my shoulder.
I shrugged off her hand.