Pig City (3 page)

“That's the same as no,” said Laura.

“But I really don't know,” said Kristin.

“Then it's no,” Tiffany said coldly.

Kristin sighed.

The three girls turned their back on her and started to walk away.

“Wait,” said Kristin.

They turned around.

“Okay, yes.”

“Good,” said Laura. “Come to my house after school.”

“But what's the question?” asked Kristin.

“We'll tell you at my house,” said Laura. “Oh, and bring an extra pair of underpants with you.”

Kristin had no choice. She had already said yes.

Gabriel was standing inside the library. He had to stay in during recess and help put books away because he had goofed off the day before during library period. He could see out through the tinted windows, but nobody on the outside could see in.

He could see Laura, Tiffany, Allison, and Kristin. He could hear everything they said. He watched Kristin walk away.

“Whew,” said Tiffany.

“I thought she was going to say no for sure,” said Allison.

Laura smiled. “Pig City must be kept secret,” she said. “That's the most important thing.”

They brought their fists to their noses.

So did Gabriel.

Mr. Doyle was in the middle of teaching the class the difference between adjectives and adverbs. Gabriel understood the difference the first time it was explained.

He usually understood things the first time they were explained. That was one reason why he was always getting into trouble. He would get bored and have to find something else to do.

What is Pig City? he wondered. Why does Kristin have to bring an extra pair of underpants?

He looked at Laura. She sat three desks to the left of him. Her Pig City cap was pulled down tight over her long brown hair. He thought she had beautiful hair. He knew the story behind it, how she never told a lie. It made it even prettier to him. She was staring intently at Mr. Doyle, hanging on every word he said. Gabriel wished she would look at him like that someday.

If she asked me to answer yes or no, I'd say yes right away, he thought. I don't even care what the question is.

The problem was that whenever he tried to talk to her, his mind would go blank on him. He could never think of anything to say except for “Oink oink.” It was stupid. He knew it was stupid, yet he said it, anyway.

He opened his desk and took out a piece of paper and a pencil.

Dear Laura
, he wrote.

He chewed his eraser, then continued.

I know all about Pig City. Don't worry, I promise not to tell anybody.

He smiled. He hoped it would trick her into telling him what Pig City was. Plus, she'd like him for not telling anybody. They could share the secret together.

You have very pretty hair.

Love,
Gabriel

He read it over.

Dear Laura,

I know all about Pig City. Don't worry, I
promise not to tell anybody. You have very pretty hair.

Love,
Gabriel

It was terrible. I practically told her I loved her! he thought.

The eraser on his pencil was chewed and wet, so he got a clean eraser from his desk.

First, he erased
Dear
. His father called his mother “dear.” It was like calling her “darling” or “sweetiepie.” He wrote
Hey
in place of
Dear
. He erased the words
very pretty
and
love
, too.

He tried to think of what to write instead of
love
. He thought about “sincerely” or “yours truly,” but didn't like either of those.

He wrote
Your humble servant
. He had seen it in a book once and thought it was funny. Laura will think it's funny, too, he thought. It will show her how clever I am.

He read it again.

Hey Laura,

I know all about Pig City. Don't worry, I promise not to tell anybody. You have a lot of hair.

Your humble servant,

Gabriel

Much better.

He folded it into quarters and wrote Laura's name on the outside.

He waited until after school, until after Laura left the room, then put it in her desk.

Sheila sat behind Gabriel. She watched him write the note, although she couldn't see what it said. She watched him put it in Laura's desk.

She had guessed it would be for Laura. Gabriel was always staring at Laura. It made her sick.

She hated Laura. She hated her hair. She thought Laura was very conceited the way she swished it around when she walked, like she was a queen. She didn't believe that stuff about Laura never telling a lie, either.

Sheila had frizzy hair. She often lay awake at night and dreamed about setting Laura's hair on fire or sneaking into Laura's house and putting hair remover into her bottle of shampoo.

She waited for Gabriel to leave, then opened Laura's desk and removed the note.

Hey Laura,

I know all about Pig City. Don't worry, I
promise not to tell anybody. You have a lot of hair.

Your humble servant,

Gabriel

Sheila's blood boiled. It was so obvious he was in love with Laura.

She was about to rip up the note, then stopped. She smiled. She looked through Laura's desk for a pencil with a good eraser. She thought a moment, then erased the whole second sentence. In its place she wrote:

If you don't kiss me I will tell the whole school.

She laughed. She erased
a lot of
and wrote
ugly
. When she finished, the note looked like this:

Hey Laura,

I know all about Pig City. If you don't kiss me I will tell the whole school. You have ugly hair.

Your humble servant,

Gabriel

She folded it back along the original folds and returned it to Laura's desk. Then she broke Laura's pencil.

Laura, Allison, and Tiffany sat on the front step of Laura's house, sucking root beer popsicles while they waited for Kristin.

“She should get contacts,” said Allison. “She's cute, especially for a smart girl, but she'd look a lot better without those huge glasses of hers.”

Tiffany agreed.

Laura didn't say anything. She had accidentally bitten off a large chunk of her popsicle, and it was freezing the roof of her mouth. She suffered in silent agony as she waited for the chunk to melt down small enough to swallow. For the moment, it was all she cared about. Her eyes watered.

Kristin pedaled her blue ten-speed bicycle to a stop on the sidewalk in front of them. She was out of breath.

Laura swallowed what was left of her frozen chunk of root beer. Her mouth slowly warmed. “Did you bring it?” she asked.

Kristin nodded. “In my backpack.”

Tiffany looked around for a place to throw her popsicle stick, then finally stuck it in her shirt pocket. She walked behind Kristin and reached into her backpack with her sticky fingers. “Why'd you bring so many books?” she asked.

“Oh, you know Kristin,” said Allison, “always reading.”

Kristin hated to read. She brought the books because she needed something to cover up her underpants.

“Got 'em!” Tiffany exclaimed. She triumphantly held Kristin's underpants high in the air. They were white with a pink waistband.

“You don't have to show the whole world,” said Kristin. Her face was almost as red as her glasses.

“Take them to the clubhouse,” said Laura.

The four girls went through the gate to the backyard and on into the Dog House. There, Laura told Kristin the question that she had already answered: “Do you want to join Pig City?” She taught her the secret salute.

Kristin was greatly impressed.

“You can't tell anybody,” Allison warned, “even if they torture you or threaten to kill you.”

“I won't,” Kristin promised.

“Your underpants are your insurance,” said Laura. “If you tell anybody anything about Pig City, anything at all, we will take your underpants to school and show them to all the boys.”

Kristin gasped. “I won't ever tell, never!” She would rather have been tortured and killed than have her underpants shown to all the boys.

Tiffany got the treasure chest out from under the bed. Allison added Kristin's name to the list.

PIG CITY

Laura
—
President

Tiffany
—
Vice-President

Allison
—
Secretary

Kristin
—
underpants

Allison put the list and Kristin's underwear into the treasure chest, then Tiffany shoved it back under the bed.

They didn't show Kristin what they had each given as insurance. She wasn't allowed to know. There was a good reason for that. If Kristin broke her vow of secrecy, and they showed her underpants to the whole school, she might try to get revenge by telling everybody that Laura was in love with Mr. Doyle or Tiffany was ticklish or Allison liked to pose in the nude.

The four girls solemnly raised their fists to their noses.

“Welcome to Pig City,” said Laura.

Debbie was hanging upside-down on the monkey bars. Laura, Allison, Tiffany, and Kristin looked upside-down to her.

There were still ten minutes before school started. There was going to be a math test first thing. Debbie always hung upside-down before tests. She said that all her blood went to her head and helped her think better.

They gave her the same choice they had given Kristin. “Yes or no?” asked Tiffany.

“Yes,” Debbie answered right away. She was good at making quick decisions, especially when all her blood was in her head.

They told her to come to Laura's after school. “You forgot to tell her to bring an extra pair of underpants,” said Kristin as they walked away.

“Everybody has to have a different kind of insurance,” Laura explained.

“What will Debbie's be?” Kristin asked.

“You're not allowed to know,” said Tiffany. “That's why everybody's has to be different.”

“Don't worry,” said Allison. “Laura will think of something good for Debbie.”

Laura lifted her cap, shook her hair back, and put it back on.

The class lined up, then filed into Mr. Doyle's room. Everyone laughed. On the blackboard were the words:

Laura had sneaked in early again.

Mr. Doyle erased her message. He walked over to the side of the board and began to write something under the word DICTIONARY.

Immediately, everyone became very quiet. They waited to see whose name he'd put there. Whoever it was would have to stay after school and copy a dictionary page.

Laura wasn't worried. He can't possibly know it's me, not for sure.

Mr. Doyle stepped away from the board. Under the word DICTIONARY he had drawn a rectangle. Next to the rectangle he had written the number 2.

“When I find out who's been writing on the board,” he said, “I will put his or
her
name inside the box.” He
looked directly at Laura. “That person will have to copy two dictionary pages; one for yesterday and one for today.”

Laura smiled. You better make it three, she thought. There will be another one tomorrow.

Mr. Doyle told everyone to take out a pencil and paper for the math test. The class groaned. He handed a pile of tests to Linzy and asked her to please pass them out.

Laura opened her desk. She spotted the folded piece of paper with her name on it and smiled. She loved notes.

She made sure Mr. Doyle wasn't watching, then quickly unfolded it. Her smile disappeared.

Hey Laura
,

I know all about Pig City. If you don't kiss me I will tell the whole school. You have ugly hair
.

Your humble servant
,

Gabriel

She read it three times, then glanced at Gabriel.

He was looking at her and grinning from ear to ear. He touched his fist to his nose.

She looked away.

Linzy laid the math test on her desk.

Laura tried to stay calm. She knew Gabriel might still be watching her, so she didn't want to appear to be upset. She had to act like she was in control.

She saw her pencil had been broken. She wondered if Gabriel did that, too.

Since the test had already started, she couldn't ask to borrow another pencil from anyone. She used the broken one; one half for writing and one half for erasing.

The first question was a word problem: Question 1.
Count Dracula drank 7 gallons of blood every 2 weeks. How many quarts of blood did he drink a day?

Mr. Doyle always tried to make his test questions interesting. Laura usually appreciated his cleverness. This time, however, she had more important things on her mind.

If he thinks I have ugly hair, why does he want to kiss me? And how does he know about Pig City? He can't. It's impossible! she fumed. Except she knew it wasn't impossible, because he had written the note. He knew the secret salute, too. Okay, she thought, he probably saw me come out of the building yesterday morning, so he knows I wrote on the board. He must have seen me give the salute, too. And my cap says “Pig City,” so that's how he knows the name of the club.
Your humble servant???

No matter what, she decided, there was no way she would kiss him! She hated him.

She tried to concentrate on the test. I wish somebody would drink Gabriel's blood – 3 gallons a day – until he shriveled up like a prune! She wrote “2 gallons” as the answer to the first problem.

She couldn't tell Tiffany or Allison about the note. She felt she was somehow to blame. If she was, then Allison and Tiffany would have to show her Declaration of Love to everybody in the school, including Mr. Doyle.