Lunch Money (5 page)

But business can be a lot like life—full of unexpected events. And thirty-three minutes later, standing in the hallway next to the music room, Greg and his new company got a shock.

There were two minutes left before sixth-grade chorus, and Greg was making the most of his time. He had just sold two copies of
Return of the Hunter
to Roy Jenkins when Ted came up and pressed something into his hand.

Greg glanced down and saw a minicomic. Then he noticed the expression on Ted's face. “What?” he asked. “Something wrong with this one?”

Ted nodded and said, “Take a look.”

Greg turned the little book over. Ted was right. Something was
very
wrong with this one. Because what Greg held in his hand was not one of his Chunky Comics.

A tiny banner on the front cover announced that this was “An Eentsy Beentsy Book.” The title was
The Lost Unicorn,
and the cutesy cover picture had been brightened up with colored pencil.

A deep scowl formed on Greg's face as he realized what he was holding. It was obvious: Some other kid was trying to cash in on
his
idea. And who was the person responsible for this . . . this sneak attack, this giant
rip-off
?

Greg didn't even have to look. He knew. Only one person would have dared to copy his idea like this. But Greg turned to the first page of the little book and looked anyway.

And there was the proof, in tiny, perfect cursive, just below the title: “Written and Illustrated by Maura Shaw.”

 

 

 

Greg Kenton had always lived on Maple Avenue. As a very young boy, Greg had sometimes noticed the girl across the street who helped her dad rake leaves, and sometimes he had seen her riding a tricycle around and around on her driveway. She looked like she was about his age, but she didn't go to his nursery school or his Sunday school. So Greg didn't know who she was—and he didn't care.

Greg's world was small back then, and that little blond girl wasn't part of it. Greg noticed the girl the way he noticed the neighborhood dogs, or the colors of the flowers growing next to the front walk, or the blinking yellow light at the corner. Even when they both started kindergarten at the same school, Greg went in the morning, and the girl went afternoons. It was like they lived on different continents. The concrete ocean between them was only
thirty-five feet wide, but young children never crossed it alone.

For his fifth birthday Greg got a Big Wheel, all blue and red and yellow with fat black tires. The hard plastic wheels made a huge rumbling sound, as loud as the trucks on Maple Avenue.

The first day he had it, Greg rode his Big Wheel for at least two hours. Over and over he rocketed down his driveway, yanked the handlebars to the right, and then roared along the sidewalk, his curly hair swept back from his high forehead. And when he noticed the girl across the street sitting on her front steps watching him, Greg poured on an extra burst of speed, and he smiled and waved as he went grinding by. The girl waved back, but she didn't smile.

Then late one afternoon about a week later, the little girl wasn't sitting on her steps when Greg went outside to ride. She was thundering around and around her driveway on a Big Wheel of her own—except hers was pink and green and white. And when Greg went speeding out of his driveway and zipped along the sidewalk, she did the same thing, a mirror image. And when Greg stopped at the corner of Tenth Street and headed back toward his
driveway, so did the girl across the street. When he sped up, so did she. When he jammed his feet to the ground and slammed to a stop, she did too.

Greg was annoyed, but he pretended to ignore her. He turned and slowly pedaled up toward the corner at Tenth Street again. He didn't look, but he could tell by the sounds that the girl was doing the same thing over on her own sidewalk.

Greg turned his Big Wheel around and put his feet on the pedals. Then he looked across the street. The girl had turned her Big Wheel around too, and she looked back at him, smiling. And when Greg nodded, they both took off.

In seconds Greg was zooming along at top speed, legs pumping, hands tight around the plastic grips. The sidewalk sloped slightly downhill, and as he neared his house, Greg started to ease up. He had never gone down the block past his driveway before. But he glanced over and he could see that the girl wasn't slowing down. So Greg kept going, flying toward the corner where the tall blue mailbox stood. In the places where tree roots had lifted the sidewalk, Greg bounced up off his seat, barely
able to keep control. At this speed, if he tried to turn the corner at Ninth Street, he'd flip over for sure. So at the last possible second, Greg dug his sneakers into the sidewalk and skidded to a full stop, his front wheel inches from the curb.

Looking quickly to the other side of Maple Avenue, Greg saw that the girl was stopped too, and also at the edge of the curb. And still smiling.

Greg shouted across the street, “It's a tie.”

The girl shook her head and shouted back, “
Almost
a tie.”

Greg frowned. “Want to race again?”

“Maybe tomorrow.”

“Because you're scared, “ Greg shouted.

The girl didn't answer him. She just kept smiling, turned her Big Wheel around, and started pedaling slowly up the street toward her driveway.

That was the first of many Big Wheel races, with each of them ending as a tie—or almost a tie.

And soon Greg had learned the name of the girl across the street: Maura Shaw.

 

 

 

Sometimes a disagreement between two kids stays that way—just between the kids themselves. But the clash between Greg and Maura had always been right out in the open, and it had deep historical roots. Their wrangling had been noticed by their parents, by their neighbors, by all their friends, and especially by every teacher who had ever had them in the same classroom.

“Greg and Maura squabble like cats and dogs all day long, always trying to outdo each
other. My classroom's not big enough with those two around.” That's how their first-grade teacher Mrs. Gibson had described the situation.

“Maura and Greg are both so headstrong. They have a definite personality conflict.” That's what their fourth-grade teacher Mrs. Haversock had said about it.

“They're like positive and negative numbers, always trying to cancel each other out.” That's how Mr. Zenotopoulous tried to explain it. Now that Greg and Maura were both in sixth grade, he was their math teacher.

And as Greg himself stood there outside the music room on Thursday afternoon, holding “An Eensty Beentsy Book,” his long, thin face drawn into a fierce scowl, how did he describe his problem with Maura?

“I hate her
guts
!”

Strong words. It was an expression Greg had picked up from watching old gangster movies. And it was also a stupid expression. Because if Maura Shaw's guts had come walking down the hall, Greg wouldn't have recognized them. The truth is, all guts are pretty much alike.

But Greg was not thinking logically at that
moment. And saying that he hated Maura's guts did not feel like too strong a statement. If anything, it wasn't strong enough. Because as far as Greg was concerned, Maura was no better than a common thief. She had always been a copycat, which would have been bad enough. But Greg couldn't stand it when she tried to weasel in on his moneymaking ideas. Maura had been a bother for years. And now,
this.

Greg stuffed Maura's book into his pocket just as the bell rang. He ducked into the music room and sat down. Mrs. Chalmers immediately began playing scales on the piano, and the class began singing warm-up exercises.

Greg had his mouth open, and his voice went “Oh-ee-oh-ee-oh-ee-oh-ee-ohhh” along with the others. But Greg's mind was elsewhere.

He had big plans for Chunky Comics—
huge
plans. And Maura was going to try to sell her stupid Eentsy Beentsy Books at school and try to steal his customers. Maura was going to eat into his profits, maybe even mess up everything.
Something
had to change—Maura, to be exact. And she had to change right away, like today.

But as Greg sifted through his past experiences with Maura, one particular incident jumped to mind, and it did not give him much reason to hope. . . .

***

Greg's first business outside his own home was a lemonade stand. He had sold his first cup of lemonade at the end of June during the summer after second grade, and he stuck with it every hot, sunny day all during July and August. The next summer he sold lemonade again, and his customers came back. The second summer he started using the honor system. People served themselves, and just dropped quarters through a slot in the lid of a glass jar. That left Greg free to make money doing something like mowing a lawn at the same time.

The first really hot day during the summer after fourth grade he set up shop once more. His new sign announced: