Mr. Sunny Is Funny! (5 page)

“Hey, look!” somebody shouted. “The judge for the sand castle contest is coming!”

A guy wearing a tuxedo and one of those tall Abraham Lincoln hats was looking at somebody's sand castle down the beach. He was taking pictures of it
and writing on a clipboard. We all ran over to Mr. Sunny.

“This is awesome,” I told Mr. Sunny. “You're sure to win the contest, dude.”

“I'm glad I put up this fence so nobody could damage my sanderpiece,” Mr. Sunny said.

At that moment, the most amazing thing in the history of the world happened.

“Look, up in the sky!” Andrea shouted.

“It's a bird!” Michael shouted.

“It's a plane!” Neil shouted.

“No, it's somebody parasailing!” I shouted.

“It's…Mr. Granite!” Ryan shouted.

Sure enough, that crazy, Australian,
long-distance swimming, sand monster zombie guy was flying through the air
with a parachute on his back. A boat in the water pulled him.

“He's flying pretty low,” Andrea said. “I hope he doesn't get hurt.”

Mr. Granite flew right over our heads.

“Help! Help!” he shouted. “I can't control this thing!”

Mr. Granite was swooping back and forth, up and down. It looked like he might slam into the beach.

“Watch out!” somebody yelled.

“Run for your lives!” shouted Neil the nude kid.

Suddenly, Mr. Granite started dive-bombing toward the ground.

He was right over our heads!

We dived to get out of the way.

“Oh no!” yelled Mr. Sunny. “He's going to hit—”

Mr. Sunny never got the chance to finish his sentence. Because at that moment Mr. Granite landed right on top of Mr. Sunny's sand castle!

BAM! Mr. Granite crushed it! I mean, it was totally flattened! Mr. Sunny's amazing sand castle looked like a big pile of sand again…with a pair of feet sticking out of the top.

“WOW!” everybody said, which is “MOM” upside down.

It was a real Kodak moment. And we got to see it live and in person.

“My sanderpiece is ruined!” Mr. Sunny screamed. “Now I can't go to France to study sand sculpture! My life is over!”

Mr. Sunny went running down the beach, shouting a bunch of French words that I didn't understand. He seemed pretty upset.

I couldn't blame him. I'd be upset too if a shark chased me around and I almost drowned and some nutty parasailor crushed my totally awesome sand castle.

But then, stuff like that happens all the time, you know.

We were standing in front of Mr. Sunny's pile of sand when the judge with the tall Abraham Lincoln hat came over.

“Excuse me,” he said, “I heard there is a really amazing sand castle around here. But I don't see it. Can you tell me where it is?”

The judge left, and we all helped Mr. Granite crawl out from the pile of sand.
He brushed off his pants.

“Are you okay?” we all asked.

“Yes, I believe I am okay,” Mr. Granite said. “I certainly am lucky this sand castle was here to cushion my fall.”

“Maybe you better go back to Australia,” I told him. “Mr. Sunny is really mad. He might try to beat you up.”

“I cannot leave,” Mr. Granite said. “I need to stay here for at least a year.”

“Why?” Ryan asked.

“I got a job in America, mate,” he replied.

“What do you do?” asked Andrea.

“I'm a teacher,” Mr. Granite said.

“Oh, really?” asked Andrea. “What grade?”

“I teach third grade,” Mr. Granite said.

“Hey, we're going into third grade in September!” Michael said.

“What school will you be teaching at?” asked Neil.

“It has an odd name,” Mr. Granite told us. “It's called Ella Mentry School.”

WHAT??????!!!!!!!

“That's our school!” I said. “You're going to be our teacher?”

“OH NO!” we all shouted.

 

Maybe Mr. Granite will be better at teaching than he is at parasailing. Maybe he'll stop popping up in weird places for no reason. Maybe Mr. Sunny will stop talking to sand and learn how to swim. Maybe he'll build a new sand castle. Maybe Andrea will stop talking that Shakespeare talk. Maybe she'll fall in love with some other lifeguard and stop
annoying me. Maybe that shark will come back to try and eat Andrea's pizza in her stomach. Maybe people will stop drowning so I won't have to give them mouth-to-mouth resuscitation anymore. Maybe the guys will stop teasing me about being in love with Andrea. Maybe I'll make it through the rest of the summer without any other weird things happening.

But it won't be easy!
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