The Detention Club (18 page)

S
UNNY GOT DROPPED OFF AT
school early by Dad for band practice on Monday. The plan was that she'd meet me and Drew right before lunch by the gym. Drew and I walked to school together, and it took twice as long as usual because Drew was using one crutch for support. The rest of the morning passed by just as slowly. I felt like I was physically in pain, itching to get the mission over with. The bell for lunch rang, and Drew and Sunny and I met, as planned, over by the gym.

“Are you ready?” I asked Drew. “I mean, can you walk okay?”

“I'll be fine. I'm going to get in position.”

Sunny handed him the bag with the espresso machine in it.

“It's really heavy,” Drew said.

“Just make sure you don't go in if any teachers are in there. Look through the door window, and when you see them all rushing outside, you have maybe twenty seconds to safely do it. Don't mess around, put it on the counter by the sink, don't even plug it back in, and then get out of there, okay?” Sunny asked.

He nodded.

“I'm on it.”

“This is going to work!” I said, and me and Drew high-fived.

“No celebrating until it's over,” Sunny warned us. “Why do you always do that?”

“We don't often end up succeeding, so this way we still get to celebrate,” I explained.

“That's really sad,” she replied.

“Maybe you should try it—it might help you calm down about having to win everything all the time,” Drew suggested.

She rolled her eyes.

“Come on, let's get this over with,” she said.

Sunny and I made sure the gym teacher wasn't around before sneaking out the exit and booking it for the woods across the parking lot. We made it without being seen, and then we ran through the woods toward the hill. Our shoes got really dirty because the woods were muddy. We climbed up the hill and snuck over to the edge of the soccer field. Usually the sun glares off the windows of the school and you can't see inside, but it was cloudy out, and I could make out the shapes of heads moving around in the teachers' lounge. We pulled out the remaining stolen items and placed them on a dry patch of grass. I couldn't believe the stuff Sunny had stolen. In addition to the scarves, there was a wool sweater with holes in it, plastic hairclips, and a strange art project that looked like a tree with cotton balls for leaves. “What's that?” I asked.

“I don't know. I saw it in art class and grabbed it.”

“You're crazy.”

She shrugged her shoulders.

We had a bunch of bottle rockets, but Drew had come up with a good idea and added a Roman candle to really get the teachers' attention. It's this big stick that shoots colored fireballs out one end.

It was time. I gulped. I remembered that the reason me and Drew had all these fireworks in the first place was because back on the Fourth of July we'd been too scared to light them! I took a deep breath and managed with shaky hands to light the wick.

“Put your mask on,” she said.

“Just don't stand right behind me, in case I'm not holding the right end,” I told her. The wick fizzled and it reached the inside of the Roman candle and then it . . . stopped.

“Oh no,” I cried. “Is it a dud?”

“Tell me you brought another—,” she started saying when the first fireball shot out.

It was amazing. A bright red ball of flame shot out, maybe fifty feet in the air! There was a slight kick, and it felt like I was shooting a real laser gun.

“I wish my hands could do this on their own,” I said.

A second ball shot out a couple seconds later, this time bright green.

“Do you think they'll see this? It's daytime,” Sunny asked.

I hadn't considered this fact.

“Who cares, this is so cool!” I said.

“Let me try,” Sunny said, reaching for the Roman candle.

“Careful, it's not a toy!” I shouted.

“But it's halfway done, I want to feel what it's like, I never do stuff like this,” she said. I let her take it, but she got scared and let go, and the Roman candle fell to the ground.

Uh-oh.

“Hit the deck, it's out of control!” I shouted, and we ran in circles trying to dodge the next ball. It shot out and nearly smacked Sunny in the chest.

“Grab it!” she shouted.

“You grab it,” I replied. “You said you wanted to hold it!”

Suddenly three balls shot out one after another, all bright red, and unfortunately at this moment there was a pretty strong crosswind (we were in the middle of an open soccer field, after all). The Roman candle swiveled, shooting the last fireball directly at the pile, hitting the journals and scarves and the sweater and the cotton-ball tree thing. Almost immediately the duffel bag and the pile of stolen items caught fire. We gaped at each other for a moment.

“Well, that can't be good,” she said.

“Put it out!” I snapped, and I tried to step on the scarf, but the fire was spreading quickly. “Why'd you have to steal so many cotton scarves?”

“Look, they see the smoke!” Sunny said.

Black smoke (some plastic hairclips had started melting) curled up from the top of the pile, and the door to the teachers' lounge opened and three teachers charged out. “What are you doing up there?” I could barely hear one of the teachers shout up at us.

“Let's bolt!” I said, and me and Sunny took off for the woods.

We land-skied down the hill, faster than I'd ever land-skied before, and as we tore down the hill I thought—aside from the pile of stolen items being engulfed in flames—our plan was actually going pretty smoothly. There I was, land-skiing down the hill with Sunny, of all people, and I had to admit that it was . . . fun. I looked over at her and I could tell she was thinking the same thing.

We used the woods as cover and made it to the back entrance without being seen, where we ditched the masks and put on the other ones we'd had in our back pockets. The only hitch in our plan was that the metal door was locked. “I thought you said the back door was always unlocked?” I said, gasping for breath.

“I guess I was wrong,” she admitted. “We really could have planned this better.”

“Maybe you're not the smart one,” I replied.

The door opened. It was Mr. Tinsley.

“You two shouldn't be out here,” he said. “Why are your shoes covered in mud?”

“Um, I thought I saw a . . . horse . . . calculator, out in the parking lot,” I said lamely. I was suddenly worse than Drew at making up excuses on the fly.

“Horse calculator?” Mr. Tinsley said. “What the heck are you talking about?”

“Um, yeah, it's for horses, so it has these huge, hoof-shaped buttons, and—”

“Stop it, Peter,” Sunny said. “It's too late.”

“Tell your story to the principal,” he said, and yanked us inside.

As we were going in, I glanced over at the soccer field. The pile was still smoking.

“Let's just hope Drew got his end of the job done,” I whispered to Sunny.

The secretary said that Principal Curtis was checking on something in the academic wing, so we waited in the orange puffy chairs outside his office. For five minutes we just sat there, me and Sunny, not saying anything. We weren't mad at each other, there just wasn't anything to say at that moment. Finally Mr. Tinsley and Principal Curtis showed up, and they both looked really mad.

“Here they are. I'm not surprised about Peter, since he's in detention all the time. But you, Sunny?” Mr. Tinsley looked at the principal.

“You two are in a heap of trouble,” Principal Curtis said. “Setting fireworks off? Starting a fire on school property? What on earth were you two thinking?”

The principal stared at me, then at Sunny, then back at me. I wanted to just say “I don't know” like I always do with adults, but he looked like he was ready to bite my head off, so I said, “It's a long story.”

“I'm all ears,” he replied.

“Well, you see, this particular story has to do with a calculator, and, um, a horse—”

“Will you quit it with the horse calculator?” Sunny shouted, and Mr. Tinsley was about to say something when the door burst open a second time, and Ms. Schoonmaker dragged Drew into the office by his shirt collar. He was hopping on his one good leg just to keep up with her, but she didn't seem to notice.

“We just caught Drew trying to return my espresso machine,” she said. “He's the one who stole it last Tuesday.”

“Drew Newmark? You're the thief? But you're so quiet,” the principal said. He rubbed his temples. “Okay, I'm going to have a word with Drew, while you two wait here. I'll deal with you afterward.”

Drew hobbled toward the principal's office.

“Wait,” Sunny said, standing up.

Everyone looked at her.

“Drew, and Peter for that matter, were only trying to help me out. I stole the espresso maker,” she said, her face bright red.

“Sunny—,” I started, but she cut me off.

“These two shouldn't get in trouble. This is all my fault,” she went on.

“Why would you steal my espresso maker?” Ms. Schoonmaker asked.

Sunny didn't say anything. She looked down at her shoes.

“Okay, now you two have to wait outside.” Principal Curtis pointed at me and Drew. “I guess I now have to talk to Sunny about this mess.”

He patted his forehead with a balled-up napkin. This was seriously stressing him out. Suddenly I had an idea.

“Ms. Schoonmaker,” I said, “Sunny only borrowed it because she was trying to get her invention done on time.”

“What are you talking about?” she asked.

“She told me all about her invention. It's a home-security system called Mr. Home Security. The espresso machine is hooked up to the alarm system, so when the alarm gets tripped in the middle of the night, instead of an alarm going off, the espresso machine goes off in your bedroom, and you just lock the door and drink espresso while you wait for the police to arrive. That way you don't wake up all panicked and run the risk of having a heart attack. Instead of the blaring alarm, the amazing, delicious smell of espresso wakes you up, instead.”

“Is that true, you stole it for the inventors' fair?” Ms. Schoonmaker asked her.

She looked at me, and I nodded with my eyes, and—proof that we were no longer mortal enemies—she totally understood what my eyes were saying.

“Yes, but I couldn't figure out how to make it work, originally I was going to use my parents' coffee machine, but I broke it trying to make the prototype, and then I was going to make it last Friday at school. . . .” Her voice trailed off.

“Well, I guess we'll have to take that into consideration,” Ms. Schoonmaker said. “But that doesn't excuse stealing in the first place You should have talked to me, first. I might have been able to help.”

“Is it really only Monday? Okay, you two boys better wait out here,” the principal said, and then he closed the door to his office. Before the door shut, Sunny made eye contact with me.

At the very last second, she winked.

S
UNNY ENDED UP GETTING DETENTION
for the rest of the semester for stealing the espresso maker, while Drew also got detention for his involvement in the caper. I got an extra month added onto the detentions I'd already had left over, so for me it was like nothing changed. Oh, and Sally won the Halloween pageant, for being such a realistic-looking unicorn. And that's pretty much it. Almost. But I didn't tell any of this to Mom and Dad tonight, because, like I said at the beginning, there's no point to telling your parents the truth. They wouldn't understand it, which is why Sunny and I both played dumb when they tried to get answers out of us. Stealing, framing people, lying, setting massive fires on school property . . . they'd never be able to see things from our perspective, and they certainly would never believe that this afternoon's detention was actually a
good
thing, but it was.

I showed up late at room 12 this afternoon and was surprised to find that I was the only one there. The room seemed so cold and uninviting compared to back when I was framing students into detention. Mr. Tinsley showed up and rolled his eyes at me before sitting down at the front desk to grade some theme papers.

The door opened again a moment later, and it was Drew! It felt good to finally see my best buddy in detention with me, for once. He sat down next to me and immediately put his head down on his desk. “Why are you resting your head on the desk like that?” I asked.

“I've never been here before,” he said. “Aren't we supposed to put our heads on the desks and be quiet the entire time?”

“We're not in fifth grade anymore,” I explained. “Just sit normally, and we can even talk softly. Mr. Tinsley blasts his classical music the whole time, we just can't shout or else he'll yell at us.”

“Really?”

“And we can draw, and play notebook games and stuff,” I added.

“That doesn't sound all that bad, actually,” he said, opening up his book bag. He looked around the otherwise empty room. “Looks like we have the place to ourselves.”

Drew took out a pen and started intensely coloring in a page of his notebook so it was all blue (Drew's not that great a student, either) while I stared out the window, thinking about everything that had happened this fall.

Once upon a time, Drew and I were the kings of elementary school, and then when we got to Fenwick Middle we were suddenly considered losers, and so we did what we did to try to change things, and nothing worked, and we even broke up temporarily, and that was before things got really out of hand, but in the end we ended up right back where we started, losers at Fenwick Middle, but this time it didn't feel so bad.

In fact, maybe it even felt a little bit right.

The Sweet brothers showed up next, and Drew stiffened, but Hugh nodded wearily at both of us. “Hey, it's Street Magic and his assistant,” he said, shaking his head. “You guys are psychos.”

“I guess you were right about that detention theory,” he whispered to me.

“I told you,” I replied, before turning to Hugh. “Where's Trent and the rest of the gang?”

“Nobody else has been in here for days,” he replied sadly. “I guess they weren't lifers like us.”

Sunny showed up a moment later and sat down next to us. She looked nervous.

“I can't believe you stole the espresso machine from the teachers' lounge,” Hugh said. “Even I would never do something that crazy.”

“Crazy runs in the family,” I said, grinning at Sunny, but she was too stunned that the Sweet brothers didn't hate her to notice.

Even though I hated unicorns at this point, I started drawing one just because I now had at least thirty pictures of them in my notebooks, which I figured qualified as a decent-sized collection, but a moment later Sunny took my pencil away from me. “What do you think you're doing?” I asked.

“You're flunking out of sixth grade, remember?” she said. “I owe you one, so I'm going to help tutor you during detention so you pass your classes this semester. Take out your math homework.”

“How about we brainstorm inventions together instead?” I suggested. “Have I ever told you about my mini cats idea?”

Drew rolled his eyes and Sunny wouldn't budge.

“Math first,” Sunny said, crossing her arms.

Even though it was really nice of her to want to pay me back for helping her out, I hated doing homework. I mean, I'd never done it before, so technically I didn't know if I really hated it, but I had a good feeling that I would if I tried. Sunny stared at me until I sighed and took out my math folder.

“Try the first problem,” she said. “Do you understand how to do it?”

I shook my head.

“What exactly do you not understand?” she asked. “Now's the time to ask. I need to know exactly how much you know if you want me to help you.”

“Okay,” I said, squinting at the page as if I'd never even seen this stuff before. “Well, for one thing, why's there a line between these two numbers?”

“Are you serious?” she asked, and I nodded. “That's called a fraction.”

“I've heard of that!” I said.

I kept a straight face, and she gaped at me. At first it felt good to trick her, but then I felt insulted that she actually believed I didn't even know what a fraction was.

“You really don't think that highly of me, do you?” I said.

“Oh, brother.”

Brother
.

“Do you realize that might be the first time you've ever called me your brother in public?” I asked her.

“You know that's not how I meant it!”

“Close enough,” I said.

“You are so weird.”

After Sunny explained the basics, I started working on the first problem. I have to admit it felt really good to actually have a clue what I was doing, for once. Out of the corner of my eye I saw my sister gazing around the room.

“So this is detention, huh?” she finally asked me. “It's not so bad . . . kinda like our very own little club!”

I looked over at Drew—he was smiling at me. I turned back to Sunny.

“Something like that,” I told her.