Sometimes a night starts out one way and ends up a whole different way.
Last night started out TERRIBLE. Yeah, it really stunk. Chloe decided she did want that ride to school, so Sam showed up with the sled after dinner.
But Chloe was HEAVY. Especially when we were pulling her uphill. Was that girl hiding blocks of obsidian in her shoes or what?
I made Sam help me pull. I figured since we were sharing ownership of the sled, we should share the work too. (I mean, it’s only fair.)
But Chloe treated us like a couple of horses. “Faster!” she kept saying.
Then Bones and his gang showed up, like they always do at the WORST possible times. Bones pulled a carrot out of his backpack and stuck it in front of our noses. I didn’t know what was up with that—until he started SNORTING.
“Oink, oink, little piggies,” he said, as if we were a couple of those pigs you can tame with a carrot on a fishing rod. GREAT.
Well, that pretty much did it. Bones’s bony buddies started OINKing and SNORTing too. Which meant that every kid we passed stopped and stared. Every. Single. One.
So you know, if you ever want to REALLY draw attention to yourself, I can give you a few pointers.
But it all ended the second that Bones and his buddies turned on Chloe.
See, my Evil Twin can dish out the insults, but she sure can’t take them. All Bones had to do was call her a Zombie Pig Girl.
Well, I’ve been called WAY worse than that. But Chloe’s green skin must be really thin. She blew sky high before Bones was even done laughing. It was like, “Bah, ha, ha—”
BOOM!!!
Luckily, Chloe had rolled off the sled by then. And the girl DOES know how to make a dramatic exit. Bones and his buddies got blown back a few feet, and Sam and I made our getaway in a cloud of gunpowder.
I thought we’d have to go through the whole thing again on the way HOME from school, but like I said, sometimes nights have a way of turning around.
See, for starters, Chloe had to go to Strategic Explosions class after school, so we didn’t have to worry about dragging her highness, the Zombie Pig Princess, back home.
The sled felt a THOUSAND tons lighter without her, even with our backpacks piled onto it. And we were making pretty good time back to Sam’s house.
Then Willow showed up and cracked some dumb joke, like, “Hey, if it isn’t Santa and his sleigh!” Sam laughed his slimy green head off at that, acting like it was WAY funnier than it was. (Sometimes I swear Willow is using a love potion on him or something.)
But her dumb little joke reminded me of something. It reminded me of Zoe’s puny green face, asking why Santa never came to see her.
So I told Sam and Willow what I’d been thinking. I told them about how there were all these little mobs who didn’t get a visit from Santa on Christmas. And how unfair that was. And how maybe we could HELP Santa do a better job—and hey, maybe even make a few emeralds doing it!
“You could wear my Santa suit,” Sam offered. Which I guess meant he was done being Santa, and I was on my own this time.
Well, I’ve SEEN his Santa suit, and you could fit about twelve of me in it.
So I told him that my sister Cate, the Fashion Queen, could probably whip up some kind of Santa suit for me from all the things in her messy closet.
“But do you think parents would PAY to have Santa visit their kids on Christmas?” I asked Sam and Willow. I really wanted to know if my plan could work.
Sam nodded his wiggly head up and down so hard, he almost fell over. “I’d pay emeralds for Santa to come visit my little brothers,” he said.
“Really?” I asked. “Would you pay EIGHTEEN emeralds? Six for each brother?” I don’t know where that number even came from. I guess numbers and business stuff just come easy for me. Kind of like rap songs.
Sam said he didn’t know—that he’d sure have to do a lot of babysitting to earn that many emeralds. But he said he’d try.
Willow said she knew a witch with FIVE little sisters, and that she would ask her about a Santa visit. “But no promises,” she said.
By then, we’d caught up to Ziggy Zombie. (Zombies aren’t exactly known for their speed.) And when we told him the plan, he said he was pretty sure he could come up with six emeralds for me to come visit Zoe.
WOO-HOO!
My head was spinning with emeralds all night long. I couldn’t concentrate in class, and I could barely eat at lunchtime.
(And it wasn’t just because Ziggy’s rotten-flesh fajitas stunk up the whole lunchroom.)
At this rate, I figured I’d have enough emeralds to buy gifts for my family. Enough emeralds to keep Chloe quiet for FOREVER about the sled. (Or, at least, until after Creeper’s Eve.) Oh, and even enough emeralds to buy fireworks for ME for the new year.
So like I said, the night started off pretty rough. But Mom says when life hands you mushrooms, you should make mushroom stew.
And let me tell you, I can smell that stew already.
