Surprises According to Humphrey (4 page)

“Can you see it, Og?” I squeaked to my tablemate.

There was no answer.

“It’s a hamster ball. We can put Humphrey inside, and he can roll around the classroom. See, there are air holes in it. It’s good exercise,” Kirk explained. “Can we try it?”

The thought of rolling around the classroom during the day was so exciting, I climbed up on my ladder to get a closer look.

Mrs. Brisbane held the clear yellow ball in her hand. “Well,” she said. “I suppose it would be nice for Humphrey. But we have to be careful that we don’t step on him or that he doesn’t roll someplace dangerous.”

My friends all cheered, and I joined in. Og started splashing, so I knew he approved.

“
And,
we can’t let this interfere with our schoolwork. Testing is coming up, you know,” Mrs. Brisbane said with a frown.

Kirk had already opened my cage.

“Don’t hurt him,” said Golden-Miranda, who’s always looking out for me.

Kirk placed me in the ball, then snapped the top shut.

“Make sure it’s closed tightly, please,” Speak-Up-Sayeh said softly. She was shy, but she always looked out for me, too.

It was kind of weird being enclosed in a round object. Since it was yellow plastic, the world looked yellow to me, and Miranda was more golden than ever. I checked to see that there were holes in the plastic. YES-YES-YES! I wouldn’t have trouble breathing.

“Careful now,” warned Mrs. Brisbane as Kirk set the ball on the floor at the front of the classroom.

My fellow students crouched down to watch.

“Go on, Humphrey Dumpty,” said A.J. “Make the ball go.”

Let me tell you, it’s very strange to be inside a ball. For one thing, there’s nothing flat to stand on, like a floor. So even standing still, the ball felt wobbly.

“Run, Humphrey,” said Seth. “Get it moving!”

I hesitated for a little bit, but when I heard Og go “BOING!” I knew I had to move.

I went slowly at first, just taking tiny steps. My friends moved back to give me room to roll down the center aisle.

“Go, Humphrey, go!” said Kirk.

I jogged a little faster.

“Go, Humphrey, go!” the other students chanted. “Go, go, go!”

I liked the encouragement and I liked the feeling of going fast, so I began to run. It was like spinning my wheel, only this time, I was actually going somewhere!

Many times before, I’d scurried across the floor of the classroom, but never when the other students were there. As I zoomed down the aisle between the tables and chairs, my friends followed me.

The bell rang, which meant school had begun, but once I got rolling, I didn’t know how to stop. As much fun as the hamster ball was, it was SCARY-SCARY-SCARY, too, because I couldn’t control where I was going.

I heard Mrs. Brisbane say, “Class, we need to begin our work!” But I was on a roll, heading right for—eek!—the wall!

Someone gasped. I think it was Miranda. “He’ll crash!” she said. “Stop him!”

I tried to slow down, but it was too late. The ball bounced off the wall and shot back toward the aisle. I was now upside down, and before I could get back on my feet, I came to a stop that was so sudden, I did a double flip inside the ball. I looked up and saw a large foot in a sensible black shoe.

It was Mrs. Brisbane’s foot.

“Class, I want you all in your seats. Take out a sheet
of paper for the dictionary drill. I’ll take attendance while you get started.”

I was catching my breath when she leaned down over me. “And you, young man, will settle down.”

When Mrs. Brisbane talks like that, nobody argues with her, especially not a small golden hamster enclosed in a ball. Once she removed her foot, I cautiously headed back down the center aisle between the desks.

Mrs. Brisbane kept a close eye on me while my friends took the test. Usually, I took the test along with them, writing the answers in my notebook. But I was enjoying my freedom a little too much for that. I kept on jogging up and down the center aisle, but now, I was careful to slow to a stop before hitting a wall. That way, I just tapped it, rolled backward, then turned my body inside the ball and jogged toward the opposite wall again.

My friends wrote quietly while Mrs. Brisbane gave out the words. I tried not to make too much noise as I sailed past Mandy’s shiny red shoes, Art’s black high-tops and Garth’s scuffed white sneakers. Sit-Still-Seth’s feet TAP-TAP-TAPPED as he wrote.

I don’t know how many times I went back and forth, but it was getting a little boring. If only I could turn the thing! After the test papers were collected, Mrs. Brisbane said it was time to finish the Spring into Numbers project. I think my friends forgot about me while they cut and pasted, colored and stapled their papers.

By recess time, Room 26 looked completely different.
The bulletin board was covered with cutouts of flowers, rabbits and robins—but they all had math problems on them. Plus and minus numbers, multiplying and dividing problems peeked out from the leaves of the blossoms and ran up and down the rabbit ears and robin wings.

Tabitha and Richie made clouds in all kinds of shapes—even triangles and squares. Gail and Sayeh tacked a row of colorful flowers all around the chalkboard. There was a pattern to the colors, and it took me a while to figure it out. Garth and A.J. made a huge kite with a LONG-LONG-LONG tail that had a LONG-LONG-LONG problem on it.

I began to jog with joy. Spring was bright! Spring was happy! Spring was fun!

While Mrs. Brisbane helped hang the kite, I suddenly hit the leg of Seth’s desk and veered off toward the door, which was open to let in the spring breeze.

I sailed out of Room 26, and not one of my friends noticed.

“HELP-HELP-HELP!” I squeaked. In the distance, I heard Og’s “BOING!” but everything was completely silent in the hall. As I rolled out of Room 26, toward the side door, I wondered if I’d end up on the playground again. I frantically tried to guide the ball away from the door, but it wouldn’t turn quickly enough.

Luckily, the door was closed tightly, so I bounced off of it. Now I was heading toward another door. It was FAR-FAR-FAR away, past a long row of classrooms. Suddenly, I wished Aldo hadn’t polished the floor quite so
well. I also wished the hamster ball had brakes. The best I could do to slow it down was to stop moving my legs.

What an unsqueakably dangerous situation for a small hamster! At least my cage had that lock-that-doesn’t-lock. But there was no way for me to get out of the ball.

“Good-bye, Room 26!” I squeaked.

Suddenly I heard a piercingly loud noise. (Hamsters are very sensitive creatures, and we don’t appreciate loud noises.)

“Stop right there,” a voice firmly ordered me. The ball stopped abruptly, and this time I did a triple flip. But I recognized the voice…and the shrill sound. It was Mrs. Wright and her whistle. She was standing directly in front of me with one of her huge, white, puffy shoes resting on top of the ball.

Just for fun, I guess, she blew her whistle again.

“Mrs. Brisbane!” she bellowed.

Mrs. Brisbane rushed out into the hallway and hurried toward us. “What’s wrong, Mrs. Wright?”

That sounded funny, but I wasn’t in the mood to laugh. I was afraid Mrs. Wright might blow her whistle again.

“I just happened to be coming down the hall when I found your
rat
out here!”

“For goodness’ sake.” Mrs. Brisbane leaned down and picked up the ball. “How did you get out here?”

“You created a very dangerous situation,” said Mrs. Wright. “Someone could trip over him and get hurt.”

“Well, no one did,” said Mrs. Brisbane. “Don’t worry, it won’t happen again.”

Mrs. Wright sniffed loudly. “Still, I must report this to Mr. Morales.”

“Do whatever you think you should.” Mrs. Brisbane sounded a little snippy, and I was GLAD-GLAD-GLAD. “Come on, Humphrey.”

My classmates gathered at the door, waiting for my return.

“Back in your seats,” Mrs. Brisbane told them. “And you, Humphrey, are going back in your cage.”

I was so happy to be home, I took a long drink of water, then headed straight for my sleeping hut and a nice long doze.

W
ait-for-the-Bell-Garth!” Mrs. Brisbane’s words jolted me from my nap.

Garth always jumped out of his chair just before the bell rang for recess, lunch or the end of the day. When Mrs. Brisbane reminded him, he sat back down until the bell actually rang.

“Now you may go, class,” Mrs. Brisbane said.

Once the room was empty, she shuffled the papers on her desk. Then the door opened and in came Principal Morales.

“Got a second, Sue?” he asked.

“Of course,” Mrs. Brisbane greeted him. “What can I do for you?”

“Ruth Wright put in a complaint. It’s about…”

Mrs. Brisbane finished his sentence. “Humphrey.”

The principal smiled. “Yeah. Just try and keep him in the classroom.”

“I intend to,” said Mrs. Brisbane.

“Don’t worry.” Mr. Morales chuckled. “She also complained about the squeaky door in the cafeteria, some
fingerprints on the trophy case and the fact that the clocks are running thirty seconds slow.”

“Well, she teaches P.E. I guess rules are very important to her.”

Mr. Morales strolled over to my cage. “So Humphrey had a little adventure today? Maybe he has spring fever,” he said.

“I think the whole class does,” Mrs. Brisbane answered. “It happens every year. The weather turns nice and the class gets silly.”

The principal leaned in close to my cage. “Well, no more silliness from you, Humphrey. You stay put.”

“I will try because that Mrs. Wright is MEAN-MEAN-MEAN!” I squeaked.

Mr. Morales chuckled. “Aw, don’t let it bother you, Humphrey. Mrs. Wright likes to complain.”

Then he turned back to Mrs. Brisbane. “Don’t forget, deadline’s coming up, Sue.”

“Sorry. I forgot. I’ll write myself a note.”

Mr. Morales smiled. “Great.”

The bell rang again, and the principal excused himself. In seconds, my classmates came racing back into the room, pink-cheeked, out of breath and smiling. At least most of them were smiling.

“Good game, Tabby,” Seth told Tabitha. “We almost won.”

“Yeah, we would have if it wasn’t for you-know-who,” she answered.

Then she glanced at Garth, who was right behind her. He definitely wasn’t smiling.

“Take your seats, children,” Mrs. Brisbane said. “Get out your social studies books and turn to
page 112
.”

Sometimes being a classroom hamster is like being a detective. You hear little bits of conversation and try to figure out what’s going on. Like, what was that about Mrs. Brisbane forgetting something Mr. Morales wanted? She never forgets anything! And why did Tabitha say “you-know-who” instead of Garth’s name? And why wasn’t Garth happy, like everybody else?

I was sorting out my thoughts when something even more puzzling happened.

Rather than reading his social studies book, Garth was writing something in big letters on a piece of paper, but I couldn’t see what he wrote.

He kept the paper on his desk and read the book, but he stopped to look at the paper once in a while. Then he wrote another word next to it.

I climbed up my ladder to see if I could get a better look at it.

“Og?” I squeaked softly. “Can you see what Garth wrote on that paper?”

I heard some gentle splashing but no answer.

Mrs. Brisbane started writing questions on the board, and soon my friends were busily writing the answers. This went on until the lunch bell rang.

My classmates all got up and headed for the door. Garth pushed forward, clutching the paper in his hand.
He paused near A.J.’s desk and dropped the paper in front of his friend, then hurried toward the door. A.J. stared at the piece of paper, crumpled it into a ball and dropped it on the floor. (Uh-oh. Aldo wouldn’t like that!)