The Zucchini Warriors (2 page)

“Zucchini sticks for everybody!”
bellowed Mr. Carson, expecting the trucks to be mobbed by ecstatic students. Instead, an embarrassed hum went up.

“Zucchini sticks?”

“They want us to
eat
zucchini sticks?”

“Yeccch!”

“Do they come in chocolate?”

“What’s a zucchini?”

“Don’t be shy,” coaxed Mr. Carson. “First come, first served.”

Bruno was making his way through the crowd, dragging Boots with one arm and Elmer with the other.

“Aw, Bruno,” moaned Boots, “why do we have to eat those dumb zucchini sticks? No one else is.”

“Think of our rec hall,” said Bruno. “We can’t insult Hank the Tank.”

“Deep-fried foodstuffs are bad for the cardiovascular system,” complained Elmer. “And the nutritional value of the zucchini is greatly diminished by the frying process. The batter is dangerously high in cholesterol, and —”

“Stow it, Elm,” interrupted Bruno. “Where’s your school spirit?” He walked up to the nearest wagon and dutifully received a small plate piled high with batter-fried spears about eight centimetres long.

“Sweet-and-Sour Sauce, Blue Cheese or Hot Mustard?” inquired the vendor.

“Blue Cheese.” He accepted a small cup of dressing and handed it, along with the zucchini sticks, to Boots. “Eat,” he ordered.

“Me? Why me?”

“Eat.”

Miserably Boots dipped his first zucchini stick into the sauce just deep enough to leave a tiny speck of Blue Cheese dressing on the batter coating. He put it in his mouth and chewed gingerly, holding his breath to mask the taste.

“Hey, everybody,” Bruno announced. “Boots loves them! He says they taste like french fries, only a thousand times better!”

Instantly students began converging on the eight trucks, to the great delight of Bruno and Mr. Carson.

* * *

“Mildred, thirty years ago my least favourite student graduated from Macdonald Hall,” said Mr. Sturgeon to his wife over tea that afternoon. “And today he is back to haunt me by turning my entire school into a farm team for the Toronto Argonauts.”

“Yes, yes, you’ve been complaining about Henry Carson all summer,” she said.

The Headmaster took a long drink from his cup. “He was an obnoxious boy who has bloomed into an obnoxious man. Do you know what he had the nerve to do? He paraded in a convoy of those awful Mr. Zucchini wagons, and goaded our boys into tasting his wares.” He chuckled in spite of himself. “Poor O’Neal was the first to try one. I thought he was going to keel over dead.”

“Melvin!” Mrs. Sturgeon exclaimed, clasping her hands in front of her. “A lovely boy. His friend Bruno is back as well, I hope?”

“Walton’s here. And I might add that his timing is as good as ever. He interrupted Carson’s speech.”

“How rude! What happened?”

Mr. Sturgeon looked disgusted. “Carson promised the students the recreation hall they’ve been petitioning for if they go along with him and form a football team. It sounded suspiciously like a bribe to me.”

His wife sighed. “Dear, it’s been thirty years since Henry graduated. Isn’t it time to forgive and forget?”

“Never,” the Headmaster replied savagely. “He compromised my principles as a teacher. I passed that boy in algebra, even though he
failed
. I added marks to his score because he spelled his name right!”

“Well, that’s your flaw, not his,” she contended.

“I had no choice, Mildred. If I’d kept him from graduating, he’d have been
back
. I couldn’t have tolerated another year of Carson. I’d have given up teaching. If I’d failed him, I’d be a delicatessen man today, slicing bologna.”

“William, you’re getting all worked up about nothing.”

“Maybe,” he replied. “But I refuse to allow Henry Carson and his football to compromise the academic standards of Macdonald Hall!”

* * *

At a corner table in the dining hall, nine boys enjoyed their last dinner before the onset of classes the next morning.

“Boots, I’m pretty ticked off at you!” exclaimed Pete Anderson. “Those zucchini sticks aren’t better than french fries! I almost threw up!”

A babble of protest arose as each boy related his own opinion of Mr. Carson’s zucchini sticks. The votes were in at 9–0 against. Even Wilbur Hackenschleimer, Macdonald Hall’s champion eater, looked up from his meat loaf to make a sour face at the mention of Mr. Zucchini.

“It’s all for a good cause,” Bruno explained. “When our football team starts burning up the league, he’s going to fork over our rec hall.”

“Listen, Bruno,” said Boots. “None of us knows beans about football. We’ve never played in an organized game, with refs, and rules and all that stuff. Even if we turn out to be pretty good, you’ve seen the killers that play on high school and college teams. They’re fantastic!”

“But we won’t be going against high school and college killers. We’ll be playing against guys at our
level
. I want to see
everybody
at those tryouts tomorrow.”

“Not me,” mumbled big Wilbur from behind a mountain of mashed potatoes. “I’m not getting out on the field with a bunch of huge monster gorillas.”

“You’re a huge monster gorilla,” pointed out Larry Wilson, his roommate.

“Tell all the guys,” said Bruno. “I want to see every gram of talent we’ve got out on that field tomorrow.”

* * *

It was after three in the morning when Boots was awakened by a loud noise at the window of room 306 in Dormitory 3. He sat up in bed and looked over at Bruno, who was fast asleep, snoring full tilt.

Crack!

A rock the size of a hardball came sailing out of nowhere and hit the window loudly. Boots scrambled out of bed and looked outside, but could see nothing except two sizable cracks in the glass. Suddenly a familiar head bobbed into view. Boots opened the latch and helped in Cathy Burton and Diane Grant, old friends from Miss Scrimmage’s Finishing School for Young Ladies, located directly across the highway from Macdonald Hall.

After greetings were exchanged, Cathy examined her surroundings. “Same old room.” She motioned toward the snoring Bruno. “Same old buzz saw.” Casually she switched on the portable radio next to Bruno’s bed and turned the volume up to full.

Bruno shot bolt upright. “What? What?”

Boots dove for the off switch. “Cathy, are you crazy?” he hissed. “Do you want Mr. Fudge on our necks?”

In the hall, they heard the Housemaster’s door open, followed by Mr. Fudge’s footsteps. He paused and, finding all quiet, returned to his room.

“Sorry,” grinned Cathy. “I just figured you guys needed some liveliness around here. You know, we were expecting you to stop by tonight.”

Bruno shook his head. “We’re in training.”

“For what?” asked Diane.

“Football!” declared Bruno, as though the new Macdonald Hall team had been announced on
World News Tonight
and everyone should know about it.

“But you don’t have a football team,” Diane pointed out.

“Sure, not today. But tomorrow we will. I can hardly wait to get out there with the old hog’s hide.”

“Pigskin,” Cathy corrected.

“Whatever,” said Bruno. “Listen. Here’s the story.” He outlined the history of Mr. Carson’s endowment to the school and his promise regarding the rec hall.

“You’re planning to have a winning team in your first year?” Cathy asked incredulously.

“We’ve got one thing on our side,” said Boots sarcastically. “The pushiest guy in Ontario.” He pointed to Bruno.

“Cathy used to play a lot of football,” put in Diane. “With her three brothers. Right, Cathy?”

“Well,” Bruno chuckled, “football is really a man’s game — no offence, girls. You can be, you know, cheerleaders or something.”

Cathy wound up and swatted him on the side of the head.

“Hey!” bawled Bruno. “What was that for?”

“Come on, Diane,” said Cathy, opening the window. “Let’s get out of here.” The two girls exited in a huff.

“What’s eating them?” mused Boots.

Bruno shrugged. “That was weird.” He climbed back into bed, and was snoring again in seconds.

Brow knit, Boots lay down. It took him over an hour to get back to sleep.

On a flat section of roof atop Miss Scrimmage’s Finishing School for Young Ladies perched Cathy Burton and Diane Grant. Cathy was gazing through a pair of high-powered field binoculars, watching the Macdonald Hall football tryouts with great interest.

“Cathy, are you sure Miss Scrimmage didn’t see us sneak out of her ‘manners’ lecture?”

Cathy didn’t hear her. “They stink!” she exclaimed in disgust. “These guys know nothing about football! They’ve got Boots at quarterback. And look — Sidney Rampulsky at wide receiver!”

“It’s only the first day,” Diane argued lamely.

“Wait a minute! Sidney caught it! And look at him go! He can really run! Come on, Sidney — whoops!” She looked away from the binoculars. “That’s the first time I’ve ever seen someone trip over the 30-yard line!”

“Is he okay?” Diane asked.

Cathy peered through the glasses again. “I can’t tell. I guess so. Ah, wait a minute — Bruno’s going to kick a field goal.”

“I didn’t know he could kick,” said Diane.

Cathy snorted. “He can’t. He got it about a metre off the ground. It hit somebody in the stomach. Hey, it’s Wilbur Hackenschleimer! He’s chasing Bruno around the field. Bruno’s running — no, he’s hiding behind Boots. There’s a lot of pushing going on. Hold it. There’s a guy in a suit. It’s —” She looked at Diane. “Hey, wow. It’s Mr. Sturgeon.”

* * *

“We are instituting a football program,” lectured the Headmaster, “not an excuse to brawl. Walton, Hackenschleimer, what do you have to say for yourselves?”

Mr. Carson came to their aid. “The men are just high-spirited from the practice …” he began.

Mr. Sturgeon faced him with a fishy stare. “They will learn to control their high spirits, or there will be no more practices.”

“But the Board of Directors —”

“Expects me to maintain discipline at Macdonald Hall,” finished Mr. Sturgeon firmly.

Mr. Carson studied the grass. “Yes, Mr. Sturgeon.”

Bruno let his breath out as the Headmaster walked off in the direction of the Faculty Building. “Thanks a lot, Mr. Carson. You saved our lives!”

The former student smiled. “I know what it feels like to be chewed out by The Fish.”

Pete Anderson was awed. “You know about that? I mean that he’s —?”

“The Fish? Of course. Listen, I don’t want you men to think of me as a teacher. I want to be one of the guys. And together we’re going to build a great team. Although,” he added less enthusiastically, “we’re going to need a lot of work.”

“That bad, eh?” said Wilbur.

Mr. Carson nodded. “But I’ll have you men whipped into shape in no time.” He stepped back and cupped his hands to his mouth so that all the boys could hear. “All right, everybody! Thanks for coming out! The list of who made it will be posted outside the gym as soon as I make my decisions!” Coach Flynn shot him a dirty look, so he added, “And Mr. Flynn here, of course. But don’t hit the showers yet, because dinner’s on me!”

Bruno started to say, “Three cheers for Mr. Carson,” but then he heard bells.

“Zucchini sticks for everybody!” exclaimed Mr. Carson, as the wagons filed in behind the bleachers via a service driveway.

“This is cruel,” Sidney observed miserably.

“Look,” said Larry. “He’s a grown man. He’s not going to die if we don’t eat his zucchini sticks. He can take it.”

“No,” said Bruno firmly. “We can’t offend Hank the Tank.”

“Bruno, don’t you think it’s a little selfish to act phony to this guy just because we want a rec hall?” challenged Boots.

“It’s more than that,” said Bruno. “You saw how he defended me and Wilbur in front of The Fish. Hank the Tank is
us
in thirty years!”

“I don’t intend to have the pot-belly,” said Boots.

“I do,” put in Wilbur. “But it isn’t going to come from zucchini sticks. Peanut butter, yes — and maybe a little pasta …”

“The Tank is really keen on the honour of Macdonald Hall,” Bruno went on, the orator in him swinging into full gear. “Well, he’s right. We have to show the other schools in this province that we can take a sport we know nothing about and put together a great team. Okay, so today’s practice didn’t go so hot; okay, we have to gag down a few zucchini sticks — do we give up this easily on the honour of Macdonald Hall?”

“When you put it that way,” said Mark Davies slowly, “I guess we owe it to the Hall to do our best.”

“I’m with you,” said Larry.

The other boys present all murmured their assent.

Boots looked half amused and half disgusted. “All right, Bruno, you’ve done it again. You’ve convinced everybody. What do you want us to do first?”

Bruno smiled engagingly. “The first thing we do is get over to the wagons and pig out on those zucchini sticks!”

* * *

“I don’t get it,” said Boots, scrambling to keep up with Bruno, who was striding purposefully down the hallway of Dormitory 2. “Why do we have to see Elmer Drimsdale?”

“With Hank the Tank on our side, and the football team in motion and bound for greatness,” Bruno replied, “we’re going to be up for a rec hall soon. We can’t take any chances. We’re going to the smartest guy in the school to get the perfect layout.”

“Why do we have to submit a plan at all?” asked Boots.

“Because if we don’t tell them exactly what we want, they’ll build us the kind of thing
they
want us to have.” He rapped sharply at the door of room 201. “Hi, Elm. It’s us.”

Bruno kicked the door, and the two boys stepped inside. Both Bruno and Boots had once been roommates of Elmer’s, but each time they entered his living space there was cause to gawk afresh. Elmer was a one-man research and development team for everything, and the small dormitory room was completely cluttered with experiments and inventions. Books were piled everywhere, with rare potted plants on top of the stacks. A complete chemistry laboratory dominated the left side of the room, forcing Elmer’s formidable collection of computers and electronic gadgetry to the right. And tools, coils of wire, voltage meters, microscopes and crystals were piled in and around the ant farm and the fish tank. On the walls were various charts and graphs of ongoing experiments, and a large labelled diagram of the Pacific salmon, Elmer’s pride and joy.