Artifacts (3 page)

“Hot dangs, extra credit,” Crunch said, rubbing his hands together and all giggly.

“‘Hot dangs’ aside, who in their right mind likes extra credit?” Mouth asked.

“Hey come on,” Korie said. “Cut it out.”

As they settled down, I knew it was time to outline a plan.

“There’s nothing he can ask Crunch to do that we can’t get done,” I said.

“He can ask Crunch to run a mile in, like, under an hour,” Mouth said. “We’d never get
that
done.”

We all laughed … except Crunch.

“He could probably ask Crunch to be on time for his class for the rest of the year,” Korie said. “It’s only two weeks.”

Crunch heard that and griped. “Only two weeks! That’s horsefeathers. His class is the first one after lunch, and by the time I get done with going through the dessert line for the fifth time, there’s barely time to get there before the end of class, much less on time.”

As everybody exploded in laughter over Crunch and his need for dessert, I saw a kid slip into the cafeteria and glide across the floor on a skateboard. Smaller than Mouth, he wore clothes that looked a little more rag than tag … and moved so quietly it was as if he floated through the crowds of kids. After driving away the sixth graders at the table right across from us, he sat … and waited.

“Hey, who’s that …” I started to say.

Then there was another kid … and another.

Two more kids, all on skateboards, slipped into the cafeteria, moving unnoticed through the tons of kids jabbering throughout the room until they filled the table directly across from us.

“Have you guys ever seen any of those kids in school before?” I asked the others, pointing to the table.

They all took a quick look and shrugged.

“I’ve never seen
them
before, either,” Korie said, pointing to two monstrous kids stepping slowly through the doors.

Watching their movement, it seemed like it was in slow motion. They moved over, around, and through the rest of the kids in the cafeteria and didn’t even slow down. “Each one of them is almost as big as Tank.”

“They’re like twin Bigfoots,” Crunch said.

“Bigfeet,” Mouth corrected him. He couldn’t even let that one slip by.

After a minute, they took their seats with the others.

“Hey, Crunch.” I turned to Crunch and he was gone. Looking up, he was on his way over to the table.

“Where’s he going?” Mouth asked, watching him settle into the middle of them.

Crunch was talking a mile a minute. The mystery kids all wore big smiles, and since he wasn’t running for his life, they might be having a good time.

I couldn’t wait to hear what he had to say when he got back.

“What the heck is he doing?” Tank asked.

“I hope he’s making friends,” Korie said.

I cracked up. “Just as long as he’s not making enemies.”

“Hey, Mouth,” I said. “What are they saying?”

“Hmm,” Mouth said, squinting across the room. He started with Crunch’s voice. “
Hey, guys, I’m Crunch
,” he said. Crunch’s hands were moving as he talked. “
I flail my arms around like this all the time to either keep my balance or to see if I can fly
…
I can’t remember which one. Those guys staring at us are my friends. The guy and girl really loooove each other
…
”

“Cut it out!” I threatened, but he kept talking.

“The handsome one talking now is Mouth. He’s the coolest one of all
.” Crunch pointed over to us. “
Oh, yeah. That big, dopey-looking one is Tank, but he answers to knucklehead, lunkhead, blockhead
…
”

Tank grabbed Mouth and the narration stopped.

I saw Crunch wave good-bye to the kids at the table and he ran back over to us.

“What great guys,” Crunch said, sliding back into his seat next to Mouth.

“What are they doing here?” I asked.

“They just moved here,” Crunch said.

“All of them?” I asked.

“Yeah,” Crunch said. “Their parents know each other so they moved here together.”

“Where do they come from?” Korie asked.

“I have no idea,” Crunch said.

“What grade are they in?” I asked.

“I have no idea.”

“You were over there for, like, an hour and moving your hands like you were conducting an orchestra,” I said. “What were you talking about?”

“I was telling them how I got in trouble with that flapdoodle Bartholomew and have to do extra credit so I don’t have to go to summer school.”

Korie, Mouth, Tank, and I were shocked.

“Why would you tell all that to strangers?” I asked.

Crunch shrugged. “I don’t know. I wasn’t going to say anything, and then that one kid put his hand on my arm … and I couldn’t shut up.”

I laughed. “You haven’t shut up once since the day I met you.”

Crunch ignored me. “And they have the coolest names, too.” He pointed to the three smaller kids. “That’s Skylights. He loves being up high and can scramble up the side of a building in the blink of an eye.”

“How do you know that?” I asked.

“Grifter told me,” Crunch said, pointing to the next kid, sitting in the middle. “Man, he has some of the best stories.”

“And the last one?” I asked.

“That’s Touch,” Crunch said, running his hand over the place on his arm. “He’s the one who put his hand on my arm … and I told him everything that was in my head.”

Mouth laughed. “That was a short conversation.”

I ignored Mouth. “With those names, they sound like they’re in a Disney movie.”

“What about those two bigger kids?” Korie asked.

“Those are the Grumpkins,” Crunch said. “Twin brothers. They remind me a lot of the Wahoos in a Bigfeet kind of way …”

“Yeah, but neither one of them is a midget like Mouth.” Tank laughed.

“They don’t say much besides some really well-placed grunts …”

Mouth laughed. “Oh, now they remind me of Tank.”

Crunch finished his thought. “But you always kind of know what they’re thinking.”

“Do you know what I’m thinking?” Mouth asked.

Crunch closed his eyes and his brows furrowed. Then his eyes popped open. “Nope.”

“Don’t you think that’s a little strange?” Mouth asked.

“What’s a little strange?”

“That five new kids suddenly show up and nobody knew they were coming,” Mouth said. “Coach Butt-Kiss would be all over those Grumpkins for the football team.”

“How long have they been here?” Korie asked.

“They’ve been in town a few days,” Crunch said. “Today’s actually their first day
in
school.”

“We should go over and meet them,” Tank said. “Make them feel like they’re welcome.”

“Yeah, that sounds good,” I said.

When I looked over to the table, the Cafeteria Monitor, Mr. Smeethington, was leaning on the table, jabbering away. They were ignoring him completely.

I smiled. “Hey, I like them already.”

Smeethington has always kept an eye on us but left us alone.

A little man with an odd, hourglass-shaped head, shoulder-length white hair, although the top of his head is bald, and thick, black eyebrows. He is a bumbling, blustery man who seems to be afraid of nothing … except we found out one night that he
really
doesn’t like shadows.

“What could Smeethington be saying to them that takes this long?” I asked.

“I don’t know,” Korie said, “but they’re completely ignoring him.”

“He seems to be talking to them like they’re old friends,” Tank said.

“They’re not
that
old.” Mouth laughed.

“And Smeethington doesn’t have any friends,” I said.

We talked about it for a few more minutes, popping our heads up every so often to make sure they were still there.

Finally, they all stood up at once and dropped their skateboards to the floor, leaving Smeethington standing by himself. He watched silently as they glided out of the cafeteria.

“Did you just see them leave?” I asked.

“I barely saw them come in,” Mouth said, continuing to eat his lunch.

“How come they get to ride their skateboards in the cafeteria?” Tank said. “I tried to put mine in my locker one time and he had a fit. He called it a ‘rolling deathtrap.’”

“Yeah,” Mouth agreed. “He didn’t say a thing to them.”

“Did you see the clothes they were wearing?” Korie asked.

“It looked like their mom forgot what year we’re in.” Mouth laughed.

“Hey,” I said, defending them. “Crunch said they’re okay. That’s good enough for me.”

“Me, too,” Korie piped in.

“Of course, you too.” Mouth laughed. “It’s like you guys share the same brain.”

“You’re awful,” Korie said.

“Yeah, I agree,” Mouth said. “As far as those new kids are concerned, let’s keep an eye on them. If they’re hiding anything, it won’t be too long before something shows up … especially with those two giant Grumpkins.”

“Does that work for everybody else?” I asked.

“Works for me,” Crunch said.

I looked at Crunch. “You can’t spill your guts every time you see them.”

“It was one time,” Crunch defended himself. “Look, next time I won’t say a word …”

Mouth laughed. “Then they’ll think you’re just an idiot.”

“Nerts,” Crunch said and then stopped talking.

“If they’re just trying to fit in … then Crunch found himself some new friends,” Korie said. “If they’re trying to fit in—with intent—we need to know that, too.”

“Okay, then,” I said. “We’ll meet after school.”

We all went our separate ways for the rest of the afternoon.

By the time the last bell rang, we were ready to hear what Bartholomew had to say.

Classroom doors flung open and hundreds of kids spilled out into the hallway. Each of us stayed as close to the wall as we could, looking for either an opening or for the others. Tank and Mouth came like storm troopers down the hall with Tank flinging kids out of the way so he and Mouth had nothing or no one slowing them down.

Running as fast as I could, I skated around crowds of guys heading to practice, crowds of girls talking about nothing anybody ever cared about, and teachers who looked like they were about to collapse as they struggled to get to their cars.

Making a turn into the first hallway, I ran into Korie, who was trying her best to get through the crowd. But for every few feet she’d move up, she’d get dragged back twice as far.

That’s when I saw Mouth and Tank making the turn and heading directly for us.

“Hey, Mouth,” I yelled, waving my arms just as Korie got swept under the crowd.

“Duck behind him,” Mouth said to Korie, grabbing her arm and dragging her to safety. “It’s the only way to travel once that last bell rings.”

“Yeah,” Tank agreed, “and it’s a blast, too.”

As Mouth, Tank, Korie, and I moved, I could see Crunch being lifted up in the air and crowd surfing over the hundreds of hands holding him up. He was giving them directions as he moved, slowly making his way toward Bartholomew’s.

“Right turn up here,” he yelled. “Hang a left! Not so fast! Two classrooms down …
and straight on ‘til morning
.”

By the time we got to Bartholomew’s, Crunch was standing there, waiting for us.

“See,” he said, a broad smile on his face, “that wasn’t so hard.”

I laughed. “You’re lucky they didn’t crowd surf you out a window and into a dumpster.”

Walking into Bartholomew’s classroom, it had changed quite a bit since the last time we were there. Posters were tacked to the wall and stacked up around the room … hundreds of them. Each one was the picture of a separate fairy tale.

“Where are all the superheroes?” Tank asked, rifling through the posters.

“They’re not comic books, they’re fairy tales,” Mouth said. “Like the one you’re in.”

Tank looked confused. “The one I’m in?”

“Yeah,” Mouth said. “
The Wizard of Oz
. You’re like the Scarecrow … ”

“Why not the Lion?” Tank asked. “Just not cowardly.”

“Because the Lion has a brain,” Mouth said quickly and then ran across the room.

The five of us split up, walked around the classroom, taking our time, looking at all the stories. I glanced over at Korie and she looked really happy. Helping Crunch on this project seemed to be something she really liked.

I wonder what fairy tales had to do with Crunch’s mystery extra credit
.

“Good afternoon, lady and gentlemen,” Bartholomew said, sweeping into the classroom and taking his seat behind his desk. “As you can see, there are a number of magically amazing, awe-inspiring stories around you that have captured the hearts of children around the world.”

I never liked when he talked like that
.

“I have agreed to create a display at a local library,” Bartholomew continued. “It will be filled with ‘faux,’ fun, imagination-soaring artifacts matching many of the individual fairy tale characters you see before you. I am looking for imaginative examples that will allow us to take the various treasures you find and relate them directly to the stories. Fill those display cases for me and Crunch will pass English and run … amuck … with you this summer.”

It was an awesome idea, but I wanted to make sure we were on the same page.

“Do you have an example you can show us?” I asked.

Bartholomew reached down beside his chair, pulled out an old wooden bucket, and dropped it on the top of his desk with a resounding crash. It was old, a little worse for wear, but definitely had something special about it.

“And that would be?” Korie asked.

“The Witch-Melting Water Bucket from
The Wizard of Oz
.” Bartholomew said.

“Hey.” Mouth laughed. “We were just talking about that!”

“Frank L. Baum’s wife Maud was washing the floors when he needed a way to kill the witch,” Bartholomew continued, “and she handed him a bucket.”

“How many do you need?”

“All of them,” Bartholomew said. “I believe there are twenty-four.”

“But …”

“Seven stories are currently completed; therefore, you only have seventeen left to find and with which to astound me.”

“Only?” I said. “Why don’t you create
only
seven displays? That way we’d be done with your project and can have fun for the rest of the year.”