Gabby Duran and the Unsittables (12 page)

Her best bet was to act natural and attract as little attention as possible.

“Ew!” Madison Murray screamed. “What is that
thing
on your head?”

The entire cafeteria turned to stare. How could they not? Madison had actually jumped out of her chair, sending it plowing into poor Ellerbee who’d been sweeping the aisle behind her, and
her voice was almost shrill enough to crack the windows.

If Gabby couldn’t have anonymity, at least she could go for quiet dignity.

“Don’t you know?” she calmly asked Madison. “This hat is the latest. My mom catered a lunch for
Trend
magazine, and this was in the gift bag. I’m lucky to
have it.”

Gabby held her head high as she walked to the cafeteria line. Most people stopped staring, though some glanced at her with newly respectful eyes. Even Ellerbee seemed impressed by Gabby’s
brush with high fashion. He eyed her hat as she passed.

Madison wasn’t as impressed. She huffed something to her friends about top styles never looking right on certain people, but Gabby barely noticed. She concentrated on keeping her head
steady, so Wutt wouldn’t fall off as she grabbed her tray and checked out the entrée of the day. It was turkey tacos, with chocolate pudding for dessert. Normally, the combo was one of
Gabby’s favorites, but today she wasn’t sure. She looked around to make sure Mr. Lau wasn’t anywhere within earshot, then gently cleared her throat. “Excuse me,” she
asked one of the lunch ladies, “is that gloogen-free?”

The lunch lady stopped assembling tacos and leaned her girth over the counter. “
Gluten
-free?”

“Um…no.” Gabby again cast her eyes left and right.
“Gloogen.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, kid.”

From farther back in the cafeteria, the doughy form of Chef Ernie looked up from stirring a large vat of tortilla soup. “Gloogen-free?” he asked. “’Course it’s
gloogen-free.”

But he chuckled under his breath as he turned back to the soup. And did he just whip his tongue out to lick his own eye? Gabby thought he did.

“That’s okay,” she told the lunch lady. “I’ll just have peanut butter and jelly. Two please.” That choice was always available for kids who didn’t like
the hot food, and since Ernie had no hand in the sandwiches, Gabby thought it was a safer bet. Once they were on her tray she grabbed two apples, then left the kitchen area to head toward Satchel
and Zee, already at their regular table.

Gabby froze in her tracks as she realized her friends weren’t alone. Mr. Lau was kneeling between them. Gabby ducked back into the kitchen and watched. They looked like they were deep in
conversation.

“This isn’t good,” Gabby whispered up to her hat. Then she quickly looked around to make sure no one had noticed her talking to her headwear. It didn’t seem like anyone
had.

Gabby watched as Satchel, Zee, and Mr. Lau laughed like old friends. Then, with a flourish of his cape, Mr. Lau rose and strode away from the table. Gabby waited until he was sitting someplace
far away before she joined her friends at their table.

“You just missed Mr. Lau,” Zee said. “He’s weird, but he’s a really nice guy.”

Gabby snorted.

“He
is
,” Zee said. “He was all concerned after what happened in math class. He asked about you. He wanted to make sure you were okay.”

Gabby snorted again.

“Do you need a Kleenex?” Satchel asked. “I have lots. Lots of napkins, at least. Gotta protect the orchestra dress from Aunt Toni’s special preconcert meal.”
Satchel’s dress clothes were covered by a mountain of paper napkins. They were tucked into his collar, sleeves, belt, and even between the buttons of his shirt.

“I’m good,” Gabby said.

“You might want some napkins anyway,” Satchel said. “Aunt Toni said I should share with you. She thinks her food will bring you luck for getting the solo. Dig in.”

Satchel indicated the huge spread of food in front of him. His aunt Toni always made lunches for him and his five cousins out of extra food from the family restaurant. Today he had a giant
platter of penne with meat sauce, an antipasto salad, and several thick pieces of garlic bread.

“No thanks,” Gabby said. She felt a shiver on her head as her hat rocked from side to side. Wutt was hungry. Gabby quickly removed the hat and tucked it into her knapsack, which she
left unzipped on the floor next to her seat. Then she slipped one of the sandwiches off her plate and reached it inside. Wutt had clearly already changed back from hat form, because her tiny hands
grabbed the sandwich eagerly.

“Ew! Gabby Duran, did you just drop an entire sandwich into your backpack?” Madison Murray screeched from the next row of tables. She was far enough away that she never in a million
years should have noticed what Gabby was doing, but of course Madison noticed everything. Her high squeal got someone else’s attention, too: Mr. Lau whirled around in his seat, his eyes
laser-beaming for Gabby.

“Guess your mom’s catering isn’t so great if you have to sneak decent food home,” Madison snickered. “The Trend magazine people probably gave her that hat as a
joke.”

Madison’s friends all giggled appreciatively. Zee whipped around so quickly her braids took a moment to catch up.

“Hey, Madison,” she asked, “what’s it like to sit at a table so boring you have to spy on other people to make conversation?”

Madison opened her mouth to retort, but Zee shook her head. “Not interested. Over here talking to my friends. Minding our own business. You should try it sometime.” She turned back
to Gabby and leaned close, so Madison couldn’t eavesdrop. “So the math book thing—you gonna tell me what it’s all about?”

Gabby wasn’t sure she could lie to Zee anymore, especially when Zee just defended her like that. Instead she changed the subject. “Mmmm, Satch, that garlic bread smells really good.
Can I have a piece?”

“You’ll love it,” Satchel said, “but you have to try it with the spread. I know it looks like ectoplasm and smells like bug guts, but I swear it’s really
good.” He opened a small plastic container to reveal a toxic-smelling fluorescent green mush, which he smeared onto the bread. Gabby almost turned it away, but then she knew she’d be
back to the conversation about her math book. She held her breath and took a huge bite.

The spread was incredible.

“Wow! This is really great!”

“I know, right? Aunt Toni’s new recipe.”

From her knapsack, Gabby heard sniffs, then a high-pitched yelping sound, like a puppy begging for a treat.

“What’s that noise?” Zee asked.

“What noise?” Gabby asked. She gently nudged her bag with her foot, but the noise didn’t stop.

“Oh snap, I hear it, too,” Satchel said.

While her friends looked around for the source of the noise, Gabby quickly slipped the rest of her mush-spread bread into her knapsack. The whines stopped, replaced by a delighted
mmmmm
sound, so low Gabby was sure Zee and Satchel wouldn’t hear.

“Whoa, you already finished the bread!” Satchel said when he looked back at Gabby. “Cool, then I can tell you. You know the spread? It sounds totally gross, so I didn’t
want to say till you ate it, but you know what it is?
Broccolini pesto
.”

“WHAT?!” Gabby exploded. Then she quickly clamped her hand around the top of her knapsack, so Wutt wouldn’t jump out to her name.

“I know, right?” Satchel beamed.

Edwina’s words from earlier echoed in Gabby’s ears.
Don’t let her anywhere near broccolini
, she had said.
Hy-per
.

“Do you have any idea how much vitamin J is in broccolini?” Gabby wailed.

“Vitamins run A-B-C-D-E and K,” Zee pointed out. “There is no vitamin J.”

“I have to go,” Gabby said, pushing back from the table. “I have to…I have to practice.” She pulled up her knapsack from the clenched top, but it was shaking back and
forth so hard that she could only lift it an inch before it wrested itself out of her grip and clunked to the floor. Gabby dropped to her knees next to it and fought to grab the zipper.

“Gabby?” Zee asked. “What’s going on?”

“Nothing! What makes you think anything’s going on?”

She asked this as she knelt on the floor, outright wrestling with her knapsack, which was now shaking even more violently and had started emitting a sirenlike wail.

The zipper thing wasn’t going to happen. Gabby grabbed the knapsack around the middle and scooped it up. She ran to scoot it out of the cafeteria as fast as possible, but she only took two
steps before the wail reached a high crescendo and the whole cafeteria turned to stare at Gabby holding her struggling bag.

Then the wailing stopped. The bag went still. And in that second of absolute silence, Gabby thought everything would be okay.

Then a two-foot-tall fuzzy hot-pink hat shot out the top of the bag and landed in the middle of one of the lunch tables.

The good news: Wutt had been clever enough to change out of her regular form. Gabby could apologize to the startled diners and come up with a plausible reason for why her hat might have shot out
of her bag.

The bad news: in complete disregard for the way a hat was supposed to act, Wutt bounded up to a hanging light fixture, draped herself over it, swung the fixture back and forth until she gained
enough momentum, then sailed across the room and landed on the head of Principal Tate.

The impeccably coiffed principal screamed like a soprano. He jumped to his feet and shrieked, “Get it off! Get it off! Get it off!”

Mr. Lau leaped from his own chair to grab the hat. Gabby’s heart nearly stopped as he lunged for it, but Wutt was already on the move. She hopped from head to head around the room. Soon
the entire cafeteria was on its feet to watch. A bunch of kids cheered like Wutt was part of the coolest prank ever. Others couldn’t figure out
what
she was, and screamed and ducked
away any time the wild pink fuzziness got near them.

In the midst of all the chaos, Mr. Lau raced through the aisles, his cape flowing behind him. He vaulted onto some tables, then threw himself onto his belly to slide under others. He lunged for
the hat again and again, and would have caught it if Gabby hadn’t fought to keep him away. Every time he got close to Wutt, Gabby threw a chair, a tray of food, or in one case another student
into his path.

Unfortunately, Mr. Lau wasn’t the only danger. Ellerbee was chasing the hat with his broom, swatting at it like it was the world’s largest fly. Gabby knew that even a direct hit
wouldn’t hurt Wutt, but it
could
send her careening toward Mr. Lau, or anyone else who wanted to trap her.

“Ellerbee, no!” Gabby cried. “Don’t hit her! I mean…
it
! Don’t hit
it
!”

Ellerbee didn’t listen. He smashed Wutt in the side, and the fuzzy pink hat careened toward the one person in the room paying no attention to the chaos. Madison Murray considered herself
far above any drama started by Gabby Duran and sat pointedly eating her chocolate pudding as if nothing in the world were amiss. This is why she was particularly shocked when out of nowhere, a
hot-pink furry mass landed square on her pudding bowl, slingshotting the contents into her face and all over her white concert-dress blouse.

“GABBY DURAN!” she screamed as she jumped to her feet. Milk chocolate goodness dripped down her bangs.

“I didn’t do it!” Gabby shouted.

Seeing Madison coated in dessert inspired someone in the crowd. “Food fight!” he hollered, and immediately the air was filled with soaring tacos, sandwiches, and flying arcs of
chocolate pudding.

“Stop this at once!” Principal Tate tried to boom, but “booming” wasn’t really his forte even when things were calm. As Gabby ran past, she saw him standing on his
chair and screaming as loud as he could, but she doubted anyone else even knew he was there. Gabby’s only concern was Wutt, who was zipping down one of the aisles, zigzagging around table
legs, sliding along the food-slippery floor, and bouncing off shocked students’ and teachers’ heads, legs, and torsos. Gabby raced toward the alien girl, sure this time she’d
catch her…

…when Mr. Lau stepped into the other end of the aisle. His bulk seemed to fill the space, and as Wutt bounced ever closer to him, he whipped off his cape and held it out like a matador, ready
to snatch the hat inside.

“Here, hatty hatty! Here, hatty!”

The voice was Satchel’s, and as he called out he pulled something into Wutt’s path that Gabby knew the girl couldn’t resist: a tablecloth on which he’d arranged a giant
tower of Aunt Toni’s garlic bread, each slice spread thick with broccolini topping.

Gabby knew he was trying to help, but he’d made things even worse. Gabby’s heart thudded with wild panic as she imagined Wutt turning back into her regular form in front of everyone
to eat the food. “NOOOOO!” she cried.

Gabby lunged for the hat.

Mr. Lau lunged for the hat.

The hat lunged for the tablecloth. The second it landed on the pile of bread, the tablecloth folded itself together and snapped shut to make a small, closed sack around the hat.

At the exact same time, the fire bell rang.

If there was one thing everyone at Brensville Middle School instinctively knew, it was what to do when they heard that sound. Within moments the entire room had emptied as the whole student body
and faculty moved outside.

Almost
the whole student body and faculty.

Satchel lifted the closed, wiggling tablecloth sack and handed it to Gabby. “I got the idea from
Bloodsucker’s Revenge
,” he said. “Remember the way they trapped
the bloodsucker at the end? Zee rigged this out of some stuff in her pockets and a trigger mechanism from a mousetrap I found in the kitchen…which makes me really glad I bring lunch from
home.”

Gabby took the bag gratefully. “Thanks, Satch.”

“Yes, thank you, Satchel,” Principal Tate said, grabbing the bag from Gabby. “
I’ll
take this. And I very much look forward to hearing your explanation for what
just happened here.”