Homeroom Headhunters (4 page)

ou want gravy with that?” A loose lock of gray spilled from the cafeteria lady's hairnet. “Don't take it unless you're gonna eat it.”

“Are we in the middle of a famine or something?”

“We got a cafeteria bandit on our hands again. Somebody's always snitching food, no different this year.”

Why anyone would pilfer potatoes and gravy from the lunch ladies was beyond me.

Making my way through the cafeteria with my tray, I could hear the faint snarls of whispering werekids behind my back:

“That's him! That's the newbie.…”

“Did you hear? He just attacked the assistant principal.…”

“What a freak.…”

I conjured up another conversation with Sully:

SULLY:
So—how's the whole loner thing working out for you,
Spence?

ME:
Not that good, to be completely honest. Nobody's going to
believe me about what I saw in Mrs. Withersponge's class—or
in the hall.

SULLY:
Maybe you should lay off the smart-aleck shtick for a bit,
see if that helps.

ME:
And ruin the amazing reputation I'm making for myself?
Never
.…

“Mr. Simms.” Assistant Principal Pritchard's voice sputtered out over the intercom. “Please come to Mrs. Witherspoon's class. We have a busted pipe. Busted pipe in Mrs. Witherspoon's classroom.…”

I shuffled to the nearest empty seat and took it. All I wanted was to eat in peace.

“Wrong table,
Spazzma
.…”

Turns out I had landed at Riley Callahan's table. He and his cloned Cro-Magnon cronies waltzed up with their lunches, looking none too happy about my company.

“You've got ten seconds to find another place to eat,” he said. “Or we escort you to another table by your tongue.”

“Look—I'm sorry for macing you in the face with my inhaler yesterday, okay?”

“Ten.”

“Can we start over again? Clean slate?”

“Nine.”

“I'm really not that bad of a guy once you get to know me.…”

“Eight.”

“Please.” I took a quick swig of my milk. “All I want is to eat my lunch and—”

I choked. Milk flooded out of my nostrils.

There, staring at me from the back of my milk carton—was her.

Not just any her.

Her.

Sully.
Sully Tulliver
was on my milk carton. Same black-and-white yearbook picture.

“Who's that?” Riley leaned forward.

I covered the carton with my hand before he could get a good look at the picture. “Nobody.”

Riley guffawed. “That your girlfriend or something?”

“She's not my girlfriend.”

“Check it out!” Riley laughed as he brought his sandwich up for a bite. “Spazzma found himself a girlfriend on the back of his milk carton!”

Beaming at his own putdown, Riley took a toothy chomp out of his sandwich and…

SNAP!

Both slices of bread disintegrated into crumbs, and the crusts fell away from his fingers. Riley's eyes grew into gulfs of panic as they stared down at the spring-loaded bar pinching his lower lip.

“Be careful.” I reached for the dangling mouse trap. “Don't touch it.…”

Riley slapped my hands away, whimpering like a puppy. The skin around his lip was quickly turning a deep purple. He scooted backward and off his seat, nearly falling to the floor.

Automatically, I peered up. The panel above our table was pulled back.

“Look!” I yelled. “Everybody—look up!”

Everyone's eyes remained on me.

Skeptical eyes.

“We're not alone! Don't you see? There are people in the ceiling! In the walls!
They're everywhere!
”

A panel over the next table pulled itself back.

I needed to act fast if I was going to get people to believe me. To see what I saw.

But how?

Looking down, I noticed the perfectly round mound of processed potatoes on my tray.

Mashed potatoes. The most perfect weapon of mass consumption ever:

1. Slightly larger than a tennis ball, perfect for the palm of your hand.
   
2. Soft but not mushy, and thick enough to retain structural integrity.
   
3. Has an outer layer of gravy, perfect for a spitball pitch.
   
4. When it hits its target—and it most definitely always hits its target—that round mound of gravy-layered softness explodes into a paste of creamy napalm.
   

I stood on top of my table and threw a handful of mashed potatoes at the open space in the ceiling.

“Take that!”

I swear I had been aiming for the ceiling.

The mushy missile was well on its way to hitting its intended target, arcing up toward the shifting ceiling tiles, only to lose its momentum somewhere along the way and begin a descent back to the ground.

In retrospect, I can see how it might've looked like I was actually pitching my potatoes into the face of Sarah Haversand, who was sitting three tables over.

Sarah was merely the victim of food-fight friendly fire.

Cafeteria collateral damage.

As soon as her tennis whites disappeared beneath a splatter pattern of mushy spuds, she started screaming, while Riley—mousetrap still dangling from his lower lip—took this opportunity to pick up his lunch tray and swing it at my kneecaps.

Still standing on top of our table, I leapt.

A quick description of our lunch tables, or “mobile stool units,” as they are called in the cafeteria equipment catalogue: each rectangular table has a hinge in the middle, allowing for easy storage. The flat plastic seats are mounted along the sides. If there aren't enough people weighing the table down to the floor, and an improper balance of mass is suddenly placed on one end, the entire table can spring closed on itself—like a reverse bear trap.

When I came careering down, landing at the edge of our lunch table—the impact sent the unit bending upward, instantly turning itself into a spring-loaded catapult.

Whatever food had been on our table was slung in all directions.

For the people sitting to our right, a tidal wave of gravy washed over them.

For the people sitting to our left, a face full of cafeteria shrapnel: potatoes, green beans, carrot sticks, pizza slices, bologna.

You name it. Completely battered, smothered, and covered.

And it was looking like it was all my fault.

Again.

In the dawn of every seventh grader's life, there comes a point where he must decide:

To food-fight—or not to food-fight?

That, my friends, was the question.

And since I was already in detention, the answer was obvious.

Leaping to my feet, I gave the battle cry:

“FOOOOOOD FIGHT!”

A blur of edible mortar shells flew through the air as each student lobbed his or her own projectile of mashed potatoes.

Clothes were covered.

Walls were splattered.

Gravy dripped.

For a few glorious seconds, it looked like it was snowing inside the cafeteria.

This was going to get me into history books:

Spence Pendleton. Food revolutionary.

Cafeteria freedom fighter.

ried mashed potato doesn't come out of your clothes all that easily.

Or your hair. Or your textbooks.

Or anything else.

Surprise.

The goo congealed
fast
, crusting into a white shell, encasing everything it came into contact with.

That included around seventy werekids, and they all wanted to see me strung up from one of the gym's basketball nets.

So the food fight might've been a bad idea.

And I was only halfway through my second day at Greenfield.

Instead of letting those stained students out of school early—as I had suggested, to wash up and slip into something clean—Assistant Principal Pritchard made us change into gym uniforms. Everybody who had taken part in the infamous Mashed Potato Middle School Massacre was now sporting red short shorts and gray tees with
GREENFIELD
emblazoned across the chest.

Very
fashionable.

• • •

The cafeteria itself was covered. The ceiling had potato icicles dangling down. There was even a mashed potato snow angel from where some poor kid must have slipped and fell, then fanned his or her arms and legs over the floor.

Now it was cleanup time, and guess who got volunteered?

“Sure made a mess of this place, didn't you?”

Mr. Simms was the janitor at Greenfield. He took one look at the crusty chaos covering the cafeteria and shook his head.

“I didn't mean for it to get this messy,” I said. “I swear I'll clean it all up.”

“If you tried cleaning this by yourself,” he chuckled, “you'd be here till Christmas. And from the looks of it—
it's already
snowed!
”

Mr. Simms slapped his hip so hard, all the keys on the retractable chain attached to his belt jangled. As long as he was laughing, I figured I wasn't in such big trouble.

“I've never seen so many confused students in my life,” he wheezed, then bent over, placing his hands on his knees. His lungs had a wet sound to them.

Sounded like an asthma attack.

I pulled the string with My Little Friend over my head.

“Here,” I said. “Take a puff of this.”

Mr. Simms took a quick hit, and his breathing eased back to normal.

“Much obliged.”

“I'm really sorry, Mr. Simms,” I said. And I was. Wasn't his fault, you know? Janitors get dumped on by just about everybody here; the last thing I wanted was to pile on.

“Don't worry about it.” Mr. Simms plopped his mop onto the floor. “Let's get cleaning.”

Thirty-two tables. All covered in white scabs.

First I tried wetting down the dried potatoes, but that just turned the gunk into a messy paste. Mr. Simms handed me a putty knife and advised me to scrape the potato away like it was old paint.

“We'll be done in no time,” he said.

“I'll have graduated from college before we're finished.”

I chiseled away a chunk of potato, about six inches long, only for something to catch my eye underneath.

There, carved into the cafeteria table, was the stick figure holding a spear.

“Ever seen this?” I asked.

“Looks like graffiti to me.” Simms shrugged. “Why don't you clean that mashed crap up from the hallway?”

“It got in the hallway?”

“Boy—it got
everywhere
.”

• • •

Wandering around school after dark was about as end-of-the-world as it gets. I could hear my steps echoing as I walked from one end of the hall to the other.

It felt like being the last person on the planet.

I called out—“Hey!”

Only to hear my voice bounce back at me:

Hey!

Hey.

Hey…

Assistant Principal Pritchard had informed me that I wouldn't be going home until the entire building was utterly spud-free. I had already called Mom to tell her I'd be late.

“Hey, Mom,” I had said. “I'm thinking about sticking around after school today. Catch up on some studying.”

“Let me guess: you're in detention?”

“Yep—you got it.”

“What did you do this time?”

“Can I tell you when I get home?”

“Can't wait,” she sighed. “Call when you need me to pick you up.”

It was seven o'clock now. Mr. Simms and I had been the only people in the building for a while.

It was a pretty safe bet there'd be no potato-based smears in the library, but Mr. Simms told me to check, so here I was.

“…Hello? Anybody in here?”

The hum of the florescent lights filled the room, and I ambled down a corridor of books, running my finger across a row of hardbacks.

What have we got here?

Fiddlers of the Civil War.

Stimulating.

I pulled it off the shelf, and discovered a pair of eyes blinking back at me from the neighboring aisle.

“Aaaah!”

I am not proud to admit that I screamed, lost my balance, and stumbled onto the bookcase behind me. I tried grabbing hold of any book that would keep me from falling but took a whole shelf to the floor instead.

Somebody was here.

In the next aisle.

“Kill the pig
.…
”

The voice barely rose above a raspy whisper, like gravel at the back of somebody's throat.

“Cut his throat
.…
”

I turned the corner, quick—but nobody was there. I spun back, half expecting to find my mysterious library companion creeping up behind me.

“Who is that? Who's there?”

“Spill his bloooood
.…
”

I stood. Waiting. Counting the seconds in my head:

Five, six, seven, eight
—

Something whisked past my face and struck the spine of a copy of
European Fur-Trading: 1811
. My eyes refocused on a long slender spear jabbed into the book right in front of my nose.

Wait.
This was no ordinary spear.

This was a
ruler
. A yardstick, actually.

Somebody had made a harpoon by strapping a run-of-the-mill, right-out-of-geometry-class drafting compass to the tip.

“We're coming for you,” the voice whispered.
“And we're get
ting closer
.…
”

Before I could blink, another spear whizzed past—nicking the lower lobe of my ear before impaling a copy of
Muskrats of
South America
.

Yeeeeeow—
that
hurt
!

I cupped my palm over the lobe to make sure it was still attached to my head. It felt wet. Bringing my hand up to my face, I could see I was bleeding.

This is not how I want to get my ears pierced.

As soon as I saw blood, dizziness took full effect. The room started to spin.

I was under attack. I had no idea who was doing it.

But I wasn't going to stick around and find out.

I booked it.

Ha—get it?
Booked it
? Even in trying times, it's good to have a sense of humor.

I ran so fast, I almost missed the silhouette racing alongside me in the next aisle.

Turning to my right, I saw another silhouette.

There were
two
of them.

That's when it dawned on me. These two were going to try to cut me off. I had to get to the exit before they did.

I pumped my legs harder, and the burning started in my chest.

Asthma.
It felt like I'd been kicked in the lungs by a bucking bronchospasm.

Hey, airways, now's really not the time for an attack. Work with
me here!

Forget about breathing. If I didn't get out of the library, I wasn't going to inhale oxygen ever again.

I felt a sharp sting at the back of my neck. I swatted to find a paper clip—
a paper clip?
—sticking out of my skin.

There was a sputtering behind me, followed by another sting on my shoulder.

Darts made from unfolded paper clips?

Whoever these library predators were, they were turning regular school supplies into artillery.

“Kill the pig!”
one of them yelled.
“Cut his throat! Spill his
blood!”

They were close. I could almost feel their breath against my neck.

Only three steps away from the exit. My throat tightened, cutting off the air to my lungs.

One step…

Two steps…

Three…

I was about to clear the aisle, one leap between me and freedom, only…

Something snagged my foot.

I went down,
hard
, face-first to the floor.

Panicked, I flipped over. A jump rope was strung between separate bookshelves.

A trip wire.

Just as quickly as I saw it, the rope slackened and disappeared between books.
Gone.

Trapped, I pinched my eyes shut and a hand grabbed my shoulder.

I screamed.

Again.

“What's wrong?” I opened my eyes to discover Mr. Simms leaning over me.

“They're after me! They're after me!”

“Who?”

“
Them.
They're right behind me.…”

Mr. Simms looked as startled as I felt. He peered down the aisle. “I don't see anybody.”

I got up, refusing to believe him.

“Your ear's bleeding.”

The library was completely empty. Silent except for the hum of florescent lights.

“They were here just a second ago.…”

“Ain't nobody here, son.”