Chapter Nineteen

Tolver

“We need . . .” Tolver listened as Mason listed tools and Sam wrote them down using one of Bella’s crayons. “A bunch of safety equipment—goggles and gloves, and one of those traps they put ghosts in . . .”

“Proton packs and ecto-containment boxes! Yes!” Sam cheered.

“No electricity.” Anita shook her head. “It’s too dangerous.”

Mason groaned. “The Ghostbusters didn’t think so, and they weren’t even trying to catch goblins!”

“Only some goblins,” Tolver whispered. He hoped the humans would only trap some, anyway.

“What do you need us to do?” Sam’s dad said.

That was hopeful. “Give us your vacuum and your leaf blower?” Tolver asked.

“No,” both Sam’s parents said at the same time.

Adults were kind of no fun, Tolver thought.

“For the community meeting, are you going to be up on the stage at school? When?” Sam tried again.

“Yes. At four p.m. I thought we could show some posters up there, of the scoreboard and things like that,” Mr. Culver said.

Tolver snapped his fingers. “Sam said Ms. Malloy had wondered if we could build a goblin trap at the school. Maybe the auditorium could even be the goblin trap!”

“That’s a great idea,” Sam said. “Dad, can we help you set up for the meeting? So we can build the trap there? And as a way to make up for all the trouble?” Sam looked apologetic.

His dad’s forehead wrinkled, but when he saw Anita smiling, he sighed. “I expect you can, son.”

Nana reached out for a crayon. Ms. Malloy looked at her and at the small oak tree branch the boglin had tucked into her bag.

“Are these two staying?” Ms. Malloy twisted a piece of paper between her fingers.

“They’ve helped us a lot, Ms. Malloy,” Mason said.

She nodded sadly. “I’m going to go back and work on the library, then. It’s hard for me to be here. I’m not sure I can explain.” Her eyes were red.

Tolver realized they’d been red for some time.

“Are you sure?” Sam’s dad asked.

“I think it would be best, yes.” The teacher got up from the table and pushed the kitchen door open. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Sam.”

As Sam watched her go, his stepmom knelt down to eye level with him. Tolver knew this was serious. Adults-and-eye-level serious.

“Sam,” she said. “Ms. Malloy’s been your biggest advocate through this. I think she can help you now. But you’ve got to help her too.”

Sam nodded. “There’s definitely something Ms. Malloy needs to say.”

He pushed back from the breakfast nook and caught her on the porch. “Ms. Malloy, wait! Please stay.”

Tolver followed them, feeling worried. What if she yelled at Nana or at him? He tried to stand in front of his grandmother, just in case.

But behind Tolver, Nana spoke. “Wait, please.”

Ms. Malloy froze on the stairs, her cane clutched tight.

Nana stepped in front of Tolver. “Maybe I have some apologizing to do first, before anyone else.” She held out a very old-looking ribbon. “This is yours. It was my first word. I didn’t want to give it up. We told Sam I’d given it away, but it was something I was both proud of and very embarrassed by getting so wrong. So much so that I never used it.”

Ms. Malloy’s voice shook. “Do you know how hard it’s been without this word?”

“We do, yes,” Nana said. She glanced at Tolver, until he agreed with a nod. “We’re going to try to figure out how we can avoid taking so many, or only when they’re being really badly used. We’ll work with the other boglins too. We don’t want to hurt you.”

Gilfillan made a loud snort of agreement.

“And the pookahs—we’ll train them differently. Once we’ve stopped the prospectors.” Nana held out the ribbon. Only Tolver could see her hand shake. The ribbon’s edges were frayed, and it only sparkled a little, but he could hear it whispering. “Will you accept this? With my apologies for all the hurt I’ve caused?”

Ms. Malloy reached out a hand and touched the ribbon and lifted it from Nana’s palms. She put it to her lips, then ate the whole thing in a few bites.

“What happens now?”

“You wait. Sometimes old words can take longer to come back,” Nana said.

“Will you stay and help us, Ms. Malloy?” Sam asked.

Mason stood behind Sam, watching. “Please?” she said.

“Yes, thank you all. I think I will.” Her eyes snapped wide open. “Thank you! Oh my goodness.” She grabbed Nana and hugged her until the goblin grumbled in protest.

Tolver and Sam both blinked. So those were the words Nana had taken: Thank you.

Ms. Malloy came back inside. Mr. Culver made them fresh lemonade.

“What we need to do,” Tolver said, “is make sure the goblins can’t fuel up the ships by stealing more words.”

“But to make a big enough trap, we’re going to need a whole lot of math,” Mason added.

Tolver’s eyes grew wide when she pulled a protractor, two rulers, and a compass from her backpack. “What magic do those do?”

“Ships?” Sam’s dad was still having trouble absorbing basic word-stealing goblin stuff.

Tolver sighed. This was going to take a while. “One’s in the crepe myrtle tree in the park. The big one. And one’s in the oak near the Lockhearts.’ So is the—”

Mr. Culver got up and made himself another cup of coffee. “Ships in trees. Next you’re going to tell me that pigs can fly.”

Sam stepped on Tolver’s foot to stop his glee. Ouch! “Well, actually . . .”

“The big pigs can. The metal ones!” Bella shrieked. “And Tham got to fly one!”

Now all the adults stared at the goblins again. Not in a nice way.

“It wasn’t . . . that . . . dangerous . . . not all the goblins are dangerous!” Tolver smiled in what he hoped was a nonscary way.

Mason held up her drawings. “They won’t be dangerous if we find them and trap them in the school.”

“And put them in boxthes!” Bella said.

“Not all of them, right?” Tolver said, a little louder.

“Just the prospectors.” Nana leaned in, eyes sparkling. “And then we take them back home.”

Sam nodded at Nana and Tolver. “Mason, what do you think?”

“I have a few questions and ideas so far.” Mason laid out her drawings. She’d sketched pictures of goblins in nets hanging above the stage and pictures of goblins below the stage.

“What about a catapult?” Tolver asked. He liked the idea of a catapult, as long as he wasn’t in one.

“A catapult would just make a mess,” Mason said. “What we need is a way for all the goblins to fall into something.”

“We could shove them off the stage into a box?” Sam pushed his hair out of his eyes, trying to concentrate.

“They’d be really hard to shove,” Tolver reminded them. “Some of them are pretty big. And there are a lot of them.”

“What about the trapdoors on the stage?” Anita asked.

“There are trapdoors?” Mason yelled. “Why didn’t anyone tell me!” She put a big red line through her sketches and began drawing again.

“The parents’ committee had them installed so sets could be raised up from below the stage when you all do your big sixth-grade musical next year,” said Sam’s stepmom. She wiggled her eyebrows. “I helped make sure the stage was sturdy enough for students.”

“But not for goblins!” Bella said.

“What if this goblin trap doesn’t work? Every plan I’ve tried so far has made everything worse,” Sam said.

“Sometimes things don’t work when you’re first learning,” Anita said. She tilted her head and smiled. “We keep trying, right?”

Tolver looked at Nana, thinking about the mistakes he’d made with the compass. To his relief, she was smiling too. “We keep trying, and we keep learning.”

Sam got his Lego set from the closet and put it on the table next to Mason. “Let’s test some of your ideas.”

“How big are the goblins?” Anita asked. “We can set the floor doors to open if all of them add up to a certain weight.”

“They’re not always very big, but there are a lot of them,” Sam said. “Two whole ships, thanks to us.” Tolver felt himself fading with embarrassment.

“And how many hypothetical goblins is that?” Sam’s dad still had questions too.

“We should plan for eighteen?” Mason said, counting on her fingers. “I think we’re going to need a really big box to hold them— more than a shoebox for sure.” She was teasing Sam.

Tolver remembered the morning when he’d taken Sam’s words and how much teasing had bothered the boy then. He fidgeted, nervous. But Sam wasn’t upset. He was smiling.

Then Ms. Malloy said, “Mason’s right. If we knew their average size and number, we could multiply the two and have a pretty good idea of how much space they’ll take up.”

“This is just like school,” Sam laughed.

“Cool.” Mason grinned. “Good thinking, Ms. Malloy.” She began to build a Lego stage with a trapdoor. Tolver picked up a Lego, but then put it right back when Mason shook her head. “Sam’s going to help me with this, okay?”

Tolver didn’t mind one bit. He hadn’t been interested in the Lego. His fingers had twitched at the way Mason had said “cool,” like it almost didn’t matter. But he looked up to find the teacher frowning at him as if she was very disappointed. He disappeared and then reappeared. “Sorry, Ms. Malloy. A habit I’m trying to break.”

“Well.” She smiled tightly. “At least you can say it.”

“Tham can say thorry too.” Bella said from the other side of the table. “He’s just frightened.”

“I am not!”

Everyone in the room stared at Sam.

“What do you mean? I thought you said you couldn’t get the words back, Sam?” His dad said. “What was all that at the baseball game today?”

Sam drew slow circles on his paper. “I couldn’t get all the words back. I got Bella’s and mine. But I lost one again today, and I don’t want to lose any more. Not with the prospectors loose. I’m not sure I can get my words back again. I couldn’t even get your words back by myself, Ms. Malloy.” He sounded ashamed.

Ms. Malloy’s eyes softened. “First, Sam, Nana wouldn’t have returned my words without you doing everything you did. So you did get my words back. Second, I’m not going to force you to say anything you’re not ready to. But I hope you’ll find a way soon.”

She really understands him, Tolver thought.

But Mason stared at Sam, shaking her head. “Why are you like this?”

“Like what?”

“You’re so stubborn. Just say it and get it over with. In front of Dr. Vane.”

“I tried!” Sam crumpled a piece of paper in frustration. “Besides, what if that’s the last time I can ever say it? I want it to count. And not because Dr. Vane is making me.”

Mason stared hard at her drawings, blinking. Even Tolver understood she was wrestling with something. “You want me to tell him that you did apologize?”

Sam shook his head. “Mason—I don’t want you to lie.” Tolver noticed Sam had twisted the corner of his shirt into a ball. The boglin realized he’d done the same.

“I know, Sam. I don’t want to lie, either. But you being in trouble is a huge pain. If you can’t risk saying it, it’s almost like not being able to say it.”

Tolver took a deep breath so noisily that everyone stared at him. “Sam, I want to give you my apology—maybe that way you’ll feel like you have two, kind of like a spare.” He laughed uncomfortably. Nana frowned at him.

“What do you mean?” Sam looked confused.

“I didn’t tell you the truth, back in the marshbogs. I had your words then, and I didn’t give them to you because I was afraid I would need them more.” The words came out in a rush and Tolver felt himself going invisible. “But what I needed was you guys,” he whispered.

“Thanks, Tolver,” Sam said. He elbowed his friend. “That really helps. I accept your ____. Once we trap some of the not-good goblins, I won’t be so worried.”

They borrowed Sam’s parents’ bathroom scale and figured out how much an average goblin weighed (forty-one pounds, give or take, without the pig).

“So,” Mason did the math in her head, “Seven hundred thirty-eight pounds? How are we going to get them all in the same spot?”

Tolver snapped his fingers. “You need bait.”

“The community meeting’s going to be filled with people misusing words. That should tempt them,” Anita said.

“Exactly, but I don’t think random words are going to get them all the way into the trap onstage. We need to make sure we have their attention,” Mason said.

“What would the best bait be?” Sam mused out loud. “Beef jerky and peanut butter? Old student notebooks? Maybe there are still paper copies somewhere?”

Ms. Malloy’s face lit up. “I think I know where to find something good,” she said. “But it has to wait for tomorrow at school.”

“Ugh,” Sam said. “I don’t want to go see Dr. Vane.”

“At least it gives us a good excuse to be at the school,” Mason said.

“We?” Sam’s face looked hopeful.

“Yup,” Mason said, elbowing Tolver and winking at Nana. “Definitely. Those bad goblins aren’t going to catch themselves.”

Maybe Mason still isn’t my friend, Tolver thought, but this is pretty close. And she’s definitely Sam’s friend again.