LASER-BEAM EYES

The only real silver lining to this out-of-control Frankenstein scenario was the reaction of Kell Weathers.

The very second Kell glimpsed the bunyip, he dropped his glass, let out a scream almost as high-pitched as Bradley’s, and hurled Mom toward the creature before turning on his heel and sprinting for the exit.

Mom bounced off the bunyip and came to rest on the soaking-wet lobby floor, her face a picture of anger and disgust as she watched Kell carve a path of yellow-bellied destruction through the screaming crowd.

I wasn’t happy that my mom had been treated so badly, but I was kind of glad that she finally got to see Kell for what he really was. If I was going to get in trouble for this (and something told me I was going to get in more trouble for this than for anything I had ever done in my life), then Mom seeing Kell’s cowardly streak would make it all worthwhile. She really did deserve better than him.

As if reading my thoughts, she swiveled her head toward me (I swear it rotated 180 degrees), and although it was absolutely impossible for her to have spotted me in the shadows behind the curtains, she zapped a full-strength laser-beam Mom Stare in my direction.

In that split second, I had no doubt at all that she knew.

How do they do that? Moms, I mean. How do they just figure things out so quickly? Is there a special training school?A secret set of mom skills handed to them when you’re born?

I sank back into the shadows as Mom got to her feet. This was it. I was about to start a life sentence of being grounded.

But just as I began to trudge toward her to confess that the whole disaster had been my idea, Mom suddenly turned and sighed tiredly, then stalked out of the lobby without a second glance.

I let out a long breath that I didn’t know I was holding in. I felt like I’d dodged a bullet, but one thing was for sure—if Mom ever found out for certain that I was the mastermind behind all of this, I was toast. And not the kind with Vegemite.