Sasquatch in the Paint (11 page)

BRIAN
was late.

Brian was never late for lunch. Lunch was his reward for everything else he had to do at school. Sometimes he'd name his food after particularly annoying class incidents. Like his french fries would be called “Ms. Danbury's geography pop quiz,” and his ice-cream sandwich would be called “Ms. Collins's Indian-camp diorama assignment.” Then he'd eat them with a big smile, as if devouring his problems.

Theo was sitting at their usual lunch spot, anxiously looking all around. He'd just seen Brian at the school assembly, an intense hour about the horrors of bullying with a bunch of reformed bullies and formerly bullied recounting their experiences. One redheaded girl who had been cyber-bullied (a bunch of girls at her school had started a Facebook campaign to destroy her because she had red hair—they called her “Ginger-vitus”) actually broke into tears and had to be escorted from the podium. That got most of the students' attention.

One “former” bully recounted all the different ways he'd bullied kids, from stealing their backpacks to smacking them in the back of the head with a textbook. He acted all sorry, but there was something in his voice that made Theo think he was kind of bragging about it, too.

Theo had used the time to work on his algebra homework.

He wasn't being insensitive; it was just that Orangetree Middle School didn't really have any serious bullying. Unlike in all the movies about schools, here there were no swirlies in the toilets, kids shoved into lockers, or lunch-money holdups (most kids' lunches were prepaid by computer). Occasionally someone might make fun of a kid's shoes or hair or breath, and sometimes an ethnic slur was bounced off a kid's head. Once a year someone punched someone else, but for the most part it was a peaceful school. Some kids complained that it was
too
peaceful. Not the kids who'd been punched, though.

Theo didn't deny the seriousness of bullying in other places. It was just that he was falling further and further behind in his studies, and he needed every spare minute to just keep afloat.

Theo had scanned the entire auditorium looking for Rain, but he didn't spot her. She said she went to the school, but he had yet to see her. She always managed to find him, though. He couldn't decide whether that was creepy or flattering.

Theo took a bite of his egg-salad sandwich while looking over the lunch crowd for Brian. And Rain.

He'd barely slept last night knowing that today she was going to explain everything about Motorpsycho. Crazily, Theo wondered if Motorpsycho had kidnapped Brian. Kidnapping or alien abduction were the only possible explanations for him being late for food.

Another thing kept him awake last night: waiting for his dad to come home. His dad had finally snuck up to his bedroom at about 12:30
A.M
. His dad never stayed up that late. Even on weekends, when he and Theo would watch Netflix movies, his dad usually fell asleep by eleven at the latest.

This morning he'd acted like nothing had happened.

“How was your get-together last night?” Theo had asked.

“Good.” His dad plopped a waffle on the table for Theo.

“Just good? You were out pretty late for just ‘good.'”

Marcus didn't say anything. He shoved a piece of waffle into his mouth and shrugged.

Really? A shrug? Shrugging was Theo's specialty, not his dad's.

As Theo absentmindedly nibbled his sandwich while searching the lunch crowd, he was surprised by an unfamiliar voice.

“Hey, Theo,” she said. Jackie Leonard. She went to Brian's temple, though Brian said she'd never talked to him there, except to tell him his fly was down. Her dad was an attorney for some former child star who now only got small parts on crime shows like
CSI
and
Law & Order
. Usually he was the killer.

“Oh, hey, Jackie,” Theo said.

“My dad's taking a bunch of us to Disneyland next Saturday for my birthday. You wanna come?”

“Me?” That was all Theo could think to say. His first thought was that he was being punked. Jackie was very cute and bouncy in a Miranda Cosgrove way, and she had never talked to Theo before. He checked to see if his fly was down. Nope. So why now?

“Some of the other guys from the basketball team are going, and I thought you'd like to, too.”

“Yeah, sure. That'd be great. Thanks.” Theo thought his voice sounded pinched and wheezy, as if an elephant was standing on his chest.

“Great. Friend me on Facebook and I'll send you the details.”

“Okay. Thanks. Thanks.” He thanked her twice? How desperate was that?

Jackie walked off and was quickly joined by two other girls, because Jackie was the kind of girl who never had to go anywhere alone. Friends materialized out of thin air. If she ever got lost on a ski slope, she'd probably show up at the bottom with a couple of Yetis as her BFFs.

So why did she suddenly invite Theo to her party? Simply because he was on the basketball team? A warm sense of relief spread through his body. If that were true, then high school (which he had been secretly dreading for the past two years) would be easy. He would be popular, and not just the kid that others acknowledged to prove they were nice to minorities and the less fortunate.

“Dude,” Brian said as he slid into the seat across from Theo.

“You are never going to guess what just happened to me.” Theo told him about Jackie Leonard.

“This must be some alternate universe,” Brian said. “Up is down, down is up. Jackie invites a card-carrying nerd to Disneyland?” He shook his head. “Maybe they intend to abandon you there. Maroon you in the
Pirates of the
Caribbean
ride. Superglue your butt to the seat at Space Mountain. There has to be a catch.”

“I think it's because—wait for it—I'm on the basketball team.”

Brian shook his head. “Is this going to be one of those teen stories where the nerd suddenly becomes popular and then leaves all his nerdy friends behind?”

“Man, I hope so.”

Brian laughed. “Jerk.”

“Moron.”

“Loser.”

“Loser Plus.”

They laughed again. Then Theo noticed that Brian's tray wasn't the usual assortment of Fried Whatever and Fattening Goo. He had a paper bag from which he unpacked a banana, a granola bar, a carton of 2 percent milk, and a small box of raisins. He carefully laid them out on his tray. Then he picked up the banana, peeled it, and took a bite. Theo just stared, like an anthropologist who has discovered a strange, primitive tribe that eats skunks.

“Where'd you get that stuff?” he asked.

“Rain.” He took another bite of banana, and then shook some raisins into his palm. “She caught me coming out of physical science, handed me the bag, and said, ‘You don't always have to be such a pig, you know?'”

“What? She said that?”

Brian laughed. “Yeah, I know. Smooth talker. I almost threw the bag at her.” He ripped open the granola bar, took a bite. “Yum, peanut butter.”

Theo looked around the crowd to see if Rain was watching her handiwork, but he couldn't spot her anywhere. Why had she done this for Brian? Why were his eating habits suddenly her business? Brian's parents were always trying to get him to go on a diet. His mom had tried every diet in existence, and even took him along to some of her Weight Watchers meetings. But nothing had worked.

“I don't get it, dude. You've always made fun of the diets your parents put you on. Now all of a sudden some strange—and I mean
seriously
strange—girl hands you a bag of food and you're on a diet?”

Brian shrugged. “I guess so.”

“Why now? Why her? Do you
like
her?”

Brian chewed thoughtfully. “Yeah, she's cool and all, but that's not the only reason. I just keep thinking, she put all this effort into it. I mean, she assembled this lunch and carried it to school, waited outside my classroom to give it to me. Just for me. Why'd she even bother?”

Theo watched his friend devour the raisins, tearing apart the box so he could unstick the last one from the cardboard. He doubted this was the beginning of a new, improved Slim Brian. By tomorrow he'd be back to gorging on fries and shakes. But the thing that really bothered Theo was this: Why hadn't
he
been the one to hand him that bag? Why hadn't
he
made more of an effort to help his friend all these years?

“Maybe you liked having a fat sidekick,” Brian said.

“What?” Theo said, startled.

He laughed. “You're not exactly a closed book, dude. You've been watching me eat with the sad eyes usually found on basset hounds and toddlers with full diapers. You were wondering why you never encouraged me to go on a diet. Or to stick with one my parents were cramming down my throat instead of food.”

“Are you saying I wanted you to stay fat?”

“We fatties don't like that term. We prefer ‘horizontally challenged.' ‘Abdominally impaired.' Or ‘chublicious.'” He punched Theo in the arm lightly. “Ease up, man. I'm only kidding. I was the fat Jewish kid and you were the skinny black kid. A politically correct version of Laurel and Hardy. Neither of us wanted the formula to change. If I thought sitting on your head would have kept you from growing six inches, I'd still be perched there right now.”

But Theo had grown. And other things were changing, too. Things at home. Things at school. Things with Brian. The more Theo grew up, the more his world grew out of his control.

Speaking of things being out of control, he told Brian about his encounter with Motorpsycho and his shadowy pal.

Brian got angry. “Seriously, dude, does your flipping phone not work? And don't give me another blow-off about your dad's online dating life.”

“Yeah, about that.” And he told Brian about Miranda Sanjume and his dad's mysterious late-night meeting.

Brian just stared at him. “And you didn't think
that
was worth a call? This from the guy who talked to me for twenty minutes when he discovered his first chest hair?”

“I'm sorry I didn't call. I'm just trying to figure things out.”

“Forget about Marcus's love life for a moment. More important, a guy threatens you and your dad and you don't tell Marcus, let alone me? That's stupid.”

“I wanted to talk to Rain first. Hear her explanation.”

Brian grinned. “Oh, I get it now. You're afraid she's somehow mixed up in something bad and you might get her in trouble if you tell.”

Actually, he hadn't thought of that, but once Brian had said it aloud, he realized it was probably true. Which confused him even more. He didn't owe her anything.

“It's okay, man. You like her. It was bound to happen sooner or later.”

“I don't ‘like' her. I don't dislike her. She's…weird.”

“Yeah, but good weird. Like us.”

They ate in silence for a few minutes. Then they switched the subject from Rain to the Brain Train. They had a practice session after lunch and Theo really needed it to go well. He needed to focus, not think about Rain, or basketball, or his dad's dating, or Motorpsycho's threats. Just science.

“Want me to quiz you?” Brian offered.

“Yeah, thanks,” Theo said. “Want my apple?”

“Sure,” Brian said, and quickly snatched it from Theo's hand. “I'm starving.” He bit into it with a ravenous smile.

WHEN
Theo and Brian arrived at Mr. J's classroom for Brain Train practice, they were surprised to see Rain sitting in the second row next to Daryl and Tunes. (More than surprised. Surprised would be finding a human ear in your cereal bowl. This was much worse.)

Rain sat primly with her hands on top of the desk like she was Little Miss Sunshine instead of Wanted-by-Motorpsycho Crazy Girl. She wore a yellow T-shirt with small black letters spelling out
NO LOGO
.

“What are you doing here?” Theo blurted.

“It's a free country,” she said with a smile.

Theo scowled. Some things shouldn't be free. The Brain Train was his Fortress of Solitude, his escape from the rest of the world. The kids in this room might all be rats-gnawing-on-their-brains strange, but they were Theo's kind of strange. The predictable kind that he understood. They were all about facts, things that could be measured, recorded, and recited. Rain was about… He couldn't think of the right word. Maybe there was no word for what she was. Which is why she made him so crazy.

“Seriously,” he said, trying to stay calm, “why are you here?”

Mr. J appeared from his private office and answered for Rain. “Cerebral warriors, this is Rain Kadinski, a transfer student from Westlake. She's thinking of joining the Brain Train—”

Brooke's hand shot up like a rocket. “Mr. J!”

“—as a
junior alternate
,” Mr. J finished.

Brooke's hand went down.

Mr. J continued: “She just wants to see what the team is like first, so I invited her to watch you guys in action. Informative for her and good practice for you to have an audience. Win-win.”

Rain smiled brightly, like she was running for class president. “Thank you, Mr. J. You've been super helpful.”

Super helpful?
Who was she pretending to be now, Mary Poppins?

“I've got to grab the new supplements to your study manuals,” Mr. J said. “So keep it down till I get back.” He went to his private office, where he kept his personal computer and all the dangerous chemicals the students weren't allowed to handle without his supervision. (Rumor had it that he also had a Lucite paperweight in there that encased the severed finger of one of the students he'd blown to bits.)

Once Mr. J had disappeared through the door, Theo slid into the desk beside Rain's and demanded, “What are you doing here? You still stalking me?”

“It's not always about you, Theo,” she said. “I'm interested in joining the team, that's all. Make new friends, expand my mind.”

Theo leaned closer and whispered, “You said you'd tell me about Motorpsycho today. What does he want from you?”

“Not now,” she whispered back. She gestured at all the people around them. “It's not the right time.”

“When
will
it be the right time? When he's dragging our limp bodies down a gravel road behind his motorcycle?”

Suddenly Daryl slapped Theo on the back. “‘Pull yourself together, Teddy! Pull yourself together.'”

“What?” Theo said, annoyed.

Rain laughed and said, “‘It's the water. It's a lot of water.'
Shutter Island
, right? With Leo DiCaprio.”

Daryl and Tunes stared at Rain as if she'd just floated into the room on a cloud.

“You can quote Lord Leo?” Tunes asked, his voice soft with awe.

She nodded. “‘I know how to find secrets from your mind. I know all the tricks.' From
Inception
.”

“‘What's the most resilient parasite?'” Daryl quoted, challenging her.

“‘An idea,'” Rain responded.

Daryl and Tunes looked at her, at each other, then at her again. If Rain had wanted to start a cult in which followers wore bologna pants and worshipped snot, she had two willing, dues-paying members right in front of her.

“What's with the shirt?” Brian asked. “Yesterday it said ‘less.'”

“It's a good message, isn't it?” she said. “What most people want in life is ‘more.'” She used finger quotes. “More TVs, more cars, more money. More stuff. Instead of thinking about what they
want
, they should think about what they
need
. Which is less.”

“Oh, brother,” Brooke scoffed. “What a load of crap.”

“I think it's cool,” Daryl said.

“Yeah, cool,” Tunes concurred.

Of course, Rain could have said the world was flat as a pizza and revolved around a sun made of a tuna salad and fingernail clippings and they would have agreed. The boys were a little hypnotized by her.

Daryl pointed at Rain. “What's that one mean? ‘No logo.'”

“It's a protest against kids being brainwashed into consumerism. I got it from a book by Naomi Klein.”

Daryl and Tunes looked blank.

Rain explained, “Look, why should you pay to wear clothes that show the company's logo? You're paying them to advertise their product. But the companies have made the labels a status thing, so, like a bunch of mindless robots, we show off their labels. I think all labels should be removed from the outside of clothing.”

Tunes looked thoughtful. “I think I saw something about that book on Radiohead's website.”

“That's right,” Rain said. “They were going to call their
Kid A
album
No Logo
after the book.”

“Wow,” Daryl said. “Radiohead.”

“And rapper MC Lars has a song called ‘No Logo' after the book. People are getting the word.” Rain smiled.

“The word,” Brooke muttered with a sarcastic snort. The official snort judges would have given that one a 9.9.

“Where do you get them?” Tunes asked. “Urban Outfitters?”

“I make them. I think of them as one-word poems, but this time I used two words. Special case. I can make one for you if you want.”

“Cool,” Tunes said.

“You know,” Daryl said proudly, “I've been working on a project myself.”

Brian, Tunes, and Theo groaned in harmony.

“Shut up!” Daryl said to them. Then back to Rain, “It's a Taser cookbook. I'm trying to figure out recipes of foods you can cook using a Taser. Like hot dogs and stuff.”

“Why not use a microwave?”

Daryl frowned at her as if she'd just sneezed in his face. “Obviously, 'cuz Tasing food is more fun.”

“I can see that,” Rain said.

Daryl grinned sheepishly, as if she'd just kissed him on the cheek.

Unable to contain his impatience any longer, Theo jerked his head for Rain to follow him to the back of the room. He felt everyone watching them as they turned their backs and whispered.

“What's going on with that motorcycle guy? Tell me
right now
.”

Rain sighed and looked down. “Okay, okay. His name is Milos. Like I said before, he's my cousin from Lithuania. The Gypsy side of my family. He and the rest of his Gypsy family are here running a kidnapping ring. They want me to identify children who would bring a big ransom.” She nodded toward Brooke. “Like her. He wants my list of names.”

Theo's jaw must have thudded against his chest. “What? Gypsies kidnapping kids? Really?”

Rain laughed. “No, not really, you moron. That's the plot of some TV movie I saw once. Man, you are way too easy.” She returned to her seat just as Mr. J returned.

“Come and get 'em, hot off the griddle,” Mr. J said, passing out the study-guide supplements.

Brooke immediately began thumbing through her copy. Tunes and Daryl rolled theirs up and started sword-fighting with them.

“Okay, okay,” Mr. J said, “let's put them away and get down to the business of putting old heads on young shoulders.”

Brian raised his hand. “‘Old heads on young shoulders.' It's what Jean Brodie says about teaching in the novel
The
Prime of Miss Jean Brodie
by Scottish writer Muriel Spark, adapted into a 1969 film starring Maggie Smith, who played Professor McGonagall in the Harry Potter movies.” He grinned and looked around the room for acknowledgment of his brilliance.

All he got was Tunes pretend-coughing, “Show-off.”

Mr. J said, “And what does it mean to put old heads on young shoulders?”

“It means to put knowledge and wisdom into young kids' brains.”

“Very good, Brian,” Mr. J said, clapping his hands. “Now,
that
is how you answer a question. As you all know, the judges award one to ten points for each answer based on accuracy, thoroughness, and clarity. That, my friends, is a ten-point answer.”

Brian beamed and snapped his fingers at Tunes. “Booyah, bro.”

“Brooke,” Mr. J said, “what does
sic semper tyrannis
mean to you?”

Brooke rolled her eyes to show that the question was beneath her. “It's Latin. Means ‘thus ever to tyrants.' First used by Brutus when he assassinated Julius Caesar. Later spoken by John Wilkes Booth after assassinating President Lincoln on April fourteenth, 1865.” She smirked in triumph and waited for the praise to be heaped upon her like fairy dust.

Mr. J smiled. “Very impressive, Brooke. Adding the date of the assassination was a good touch. Just what the judges are looking for. In fact, you—”

“Excuse me, Mr. J,” Rain said, raising her hand.

Uh-oh, Theo thought. Cancel the fairy dust, pass out the helmets. Bombs were about to fall.

“Yes, Rain?” Mr. J said.

“I don't know if this is important, because I've never been to one of these Aca-lympic competitions, but how thorough does an answer have to be?”

“What do you mean?” Mr. J asked.

“Well, for example, regarding Brooke's answer…”

Brooke's head swiveled toward Rain, her eyes firing laser beams.

“Would it be relevant to say that
sic semper tyrannis
is also the state motto of Virginia? And that Timothy McVeigh, the guy convicted of setting off that bomb in Oklahoma, was wearing a T-shirt with a picture of Lincoln and
sic semper tyrannis
on it the day he was arrested?”

Mr. J smiled like a guy who's just found a hundred-dollar bill on the street. “Well, well, well, we might just have a serious contender here.”

Theo just stared at Rain. Who was this girl who knew so much and who had so many mysteries? At that moment, there was something so compelling about her that he couldn't take his eyes off of her. It wasn't just her looks (okay, twist his arm and he'd admit that she was cute), it wasn't just her knowledge (which he was starting to think might be even greater than his own), it was the fearlessness with which she spoke. Like she was daring anyone to disagree.

“I knew all that!” Brooke screeched, her face as red as a baboon's behind. “I just didn't think it was important.”

Mr. J ignored Brooke. “What subject is your specialty, Rain?”

Rain shrugged. “I don't know yet. Lots of stuff interests me.”

Yeah, like criminals on motorcycles, Theo thought.

“Ah, a Renaissance woman. Delightful.”

Brooke, unable to endure Rain being praised, burst out with, “Mr. J, I think my answer is much better than hers. The judges would have accepted it and awarded us ten points. In fact, they would have preferred its relevancy to the ramblings of our underdressed and overpraised guest.”

Mr. J (to Rain): “What's your response?”

Rain: “Sure, whatever. I'm just here to observe. ‘I wear the mask. It does not wear me.'”

Brooke: “What does that even mean?”

Daryl and Tunes giggled and high-fived.

Daryl: “It means she's awesome, Brooke. She just quoted Sir Leo as Philippe in
The Man in the Iron Mask
.”

Brooke (slightly hysterical): “This is ridiculous! I'm sitting here with a bunch of morons that want to talk about Leo DiCrappy-o and Taser cookbooks and homemade T-shirts that say absolutely nothing while an aging hippie teacher does nothing to stop it.”

Someone hit the pause button and the world froze.

Oh no, she di-n't! Theo thought.

Everyone turned to Mr. J to see what his reaction would be. Detention? Disbanding the Brain Train? Encase everyone in Lucite?

Instead, Mr. J just chuckled. “Now that was a good speech, Brooke. Very entertaining. Insulting, but still witty. I'd give that one a nine-point-eight.”

Everyone—including Brooke—sighed with relief that the giant meteor had passed without smashing into Earth and destroying their lives.

Suddenly Daryl raised his hand. Theo groaned inwardly. Sometimes when Daryl got a thought in his head he couldn't relax until he'd expressed it.

“Say, Mr. J,” Daryl asked, “
are
you a hippie?”

And the meteor turned around and headed straight for Earth again.

“Yes, Daryl, I am a hippie. I hug trees, even the ones that ask me not to. I resist clubbing baby seals whenever I see one, even the ones that deserve clubbing. I sleep in pajamas made entirely of flowers and good wishes.”