The Fourth Stall Part III (12 page)

“B
ut that's impossible!” Vince yelled. Not at me, of course, just the situation. “Four grand in a week. I mean, we've never even come close to making
one
thousand in a week. Not even in our best ones! Plus, every kid's permanent record? I mean, we've never been able to crack that even without the Suits on our tails.”

“I know, Vince,” I conceded. “What other options did I have?”

He thought about this and then shrugged and plopped down onto the chair next to the desk in my room. Vince had come over as soon as his mom had gotten home from work and let him leave the house. It had taken me a while to explain my day because Vince kept asking so many questions. And I could hardly blame him. I mean, hearing the story come out of my own mouth made me realize just how surreal my day had been.

“And you're sure Staples doesn't know?” he asked.

I shook my head. “It sure didn't seem like it.”

Vince nodded. “Well, he is basically a professional liar.”

“He can't know about his sister's involvement. He would have said something to us. There'd be no benefit to him keeping it a secret.”

“What benefit is there from us keeping it a secret from him?” Vince asked.

I shrugged. “I was afraid he'd kill the messenger. After all, her running a giant crime ring was exactly what he'd said he didn't want.”

“Shoot the messenger,” Vince said.

“Huh?”

“Never mind. So what are we going to do, then?” Vince asked. “I mean, we have only like a little over a thousand dollars of our old Funds left. Assuming we even want to just donate all of our money to this mess, that still leaves us with around three thousand dollars to go!”

“We'll do the only thing we can do: earn the money and then pay back Kinko,” I said calmly. Even now a plan was brewing.

“But how?” Vince asked, pivoting the chair back and forth so that the sides hit my desk over and over in rhythm. “And what about the permanent records?”

“We'll call in every outstanding favor owed to us. Round up all of our former employees. We'll open up business again. Take donations. Put together a network of legitimate lemonade stands while it's still hot outside, which is a market we should have tapped into years ago. Basically we'll put together the most massive operation we ever have. It will be a whole empire squeezed into one week. I don't know yet about the permanent records, but we'll come up with something, right? We always do.”

Vince nodded slowly. I could see he was catching on to the thought that this just might work. That wasn't surprising; he was a genius, after all.

“Yeah,” he said, “we could also do bake sales during lunch, sell our old video games, arrange fights between bullies and sell tickets! We can even get our hands on the newest R-rated movies and M-rated video games and sell them at a markup to kids who aren't allowed to get them.”

“Now you're talking. That's genius! We'll do anything, everything we can. What have we got to lose?” I said.

“There is one major flaw to this plan, though, not to mention the dozens of smaller ones,” Vince said, being his usual logical self.

“What's that?” I asked, even though I knew what he was going to say.

“The Suits: they'll sniff us out in no time. We've got no chance to avoid detection with such a massive amount of stuff we'll be in charge of. And as you know, the permanent records are located in the administration offices. So there's that.”

“Oh, that,” I said. “We don't need to worry about the Suits for now. For that problem I've got a plan. It's probably the most insane plan I've ever had, but I think it just might work.”

T
he next morning at recess I made the spot behind the Shed the most dangerous place in the school. Only one other time before had our school seen such an epic gathering of bullies, punks, tough kids, and psychos. And I had been responsible for that incident as well. I was starting to feel like I was kind of like the school's favorite potato chips. Like, on the surface I was awesome and the school loved me, but in the end too much of me would eventually kill it.

But, anyways, both meetings of bullies felt necessary in their own way at the time. Except that this time I had to arrange the meeting much more secretively. The first thing I did at school that morning was to find Ears. Ears was the best gossiper in the school now that PrepSchool had transferred to some private academy a few hours away.

I told him to start a rumor that any bully or tough kid or anybody who just generally loved wreaking havoc should show up behind the Shed at the start of early recess. Anybody who came would get five dollars just for showing up.

It didn't take long for Ears's handiwork to pay off. By my second class that day I had overheard a few kids talking about it in the hallway. Sometimes you had to love the power of the Werk. The Werk was the name given to our school's web of gossip and rumors. You know, as in “network.” Why they'd decided to spell it with an E is a mystery, even to me. With gossips you never really can know for sure why they say or do anything that they do.

Anyways, at early recess that morning, the crowd of bullies that gathered was pretty impressive. In attendance were all of my occasional employees like Nubby, Great White, Little Paul, Kevin, Kitten, Snapper, and iBully, as well as several other bullies who I'd never worked with before.

Like Spitball Chad. Spitball Chad was this strange kid with curly red hair and ears that were small but still poked out of his hair like little antennae. It kind of made him look like a wombat. Anyways, as you might guess, Spitball Chad was known for always sitting in the back of the classroom and shooting spitballs at kids. He even had different-sized straws for different calibers of spitballs. His were especially soggy, too, which was as disgusting as it sounded. He always seemed to have saliva crusted around the corners of his mouth like dried frosting or something. Needless to say, we all assumed Spitball Chad would never find a girlfriend on account of being just kind of gross.

Then there was Dead Bolt, a fifth grader with a lightning bolt shaved into the side of his head. He was a big kid and pretty intimidating, but that's all he had. He was all talk and no walk, if you know what I mean. But the thing was most kids didn't know better. So when he threatened them, they just gave in and gave him their lunch money or whatever it was he was bullying them for. If anyone were ever to stand up to him, he always backed down.

Near the back of the crowd of kids was the Mantis. He was an eighth grader but was already like six feet five inches tall. The problem was that he weighed only like ninety pounds. Seriously, he was all angles. But he always had the leverage on you. And he was as mean as he was skinny. One time I had seen him using two fourth graders as crutches just for the heck of it. His signature move, though, was stealing kids' backpacks and shoes and cell phones and then sticking them in the rain gutters along the roof of the portables where no one else could reach them.

I passed out the five-dollar bills to everyone in attendance. Dead Bolt took his cash and started to walk away. I was annoyed, but this had been expected. I figured some kids would show just for the cash and then take off. I was actually pretty pleased that he was the only one.

But Great White charged after him.

“Hey, where do ya think you're running off to, ya git?” he said in his awesome British accent.

Dead Bolt turned and sized him up.

“I got what I came here for.”

“My chum here paid you that money for a spot of your time. Now you're going to listen to him or I'll have to take that fiver back and keep it for myself.”

Great White got right in his face. They were about the same height, but Dead Bolt easily had a good thirty pounds on him. I really did appreciate the gesture, especially coming from a kid like Great White who had never shown himself to be particularly chivalrous, but the last thing I needed was for a fight to break out. If one punch got thrown in front of a crowd like this, we'd have a full-scale prison-grade riot on our hands in less than thirty seconds.

Dead Bolt made a quick motion toward Great White as if trying to scare him, trying to get him to flinch. But Great White didn't budge an inch. Instead he smirked.

“That it?” he asked.

Dead Bolt paused, and for a second I didn't think he would back down. I could have smacked myself for being so reckless. Holding this kind of meeting was like taking a bath in a tub full of unstable sticks of dynamite.

But then Dead Bolt, true to form, shook his head and started walking back to the group.

“Fine. I'll listen to his stupid speech thing or whatever. But I'm keeping the money.”

Great White nodded, and they both rejoined the lineup and everybody turned back toward me. I started by taking out a roll of twenties, just like I had a year ago in the East Wing boys' bathroom.

They gathered around a little closer, their eyes wide like those of a pack of feral lions picking up the scent of blood in the air.

“How would you all like to get paid to wreak some havoc?” I asked.

The expected ripple of excitement passed, and then Great White, who I'd hired for a similar job a year ago asked, “Who are we targeting this time?”

“This time,” I said, “there is no target. I just need you all to create chaos here. Pull fire alarms, get into fights, pull pranks, graffiti the place, anything and everything you can do to get the full attention of the Suits. I want you to keep the principal so busy that he doesn't even have time to eat lunch every day.”

This time it was more than just a ripple. This time the group of bullies almost cheered like they were at a football game. I saw excited and scary grins as well as some knuckle-cracking.

“And definitely play to your strengths,” I continued. “Like you, iBully. Don't feel like you need to try and get into fights. Instead, you should hack the school mainframe. Delete important school files, kids' grade reports, attendance reports, whatever. Turn the school network into a piece of Swiss cheese.”

“What's in this for you?” Little Paul asked, not even trying to hide his suspicion.

“I just need the Suits' attention off of me while I try to make some money this week. It's for a good cause.”

“How much will we get paid?” Nubby asked. “I mean, we'll get detention for this stuff, probably a lot of it. Maybe even suspended.”

A few other bullies nodded in agreement.

“For one, most of you already get detention every week anyway, right? You might as well earn some free cash while you're at it.”

Many of them nodded reluctantly and grinned. Most bullies were proud of how much detention they got. Like, the more time served, the more bully-cred it earned you. Reputation was everything.

“But,” I continued, “you get two dollars for every confirmed distraction you create. That might not seem like a lot, but I'm paying you guys to do what you love to do. Stuff that you'll probably do anyway, eventually.”

I would've added that they would also be helping out the school and all the kids here in a major way, but this was probably the one crowd on which that argument was likely to backfire.

“When do we start?” Kitten asked.

Kitten was calm, quiet as usual. He normally almost never talked unless it was absolutely necessary. But beneath the calm question, I could see what was driving it; this was a dream assignment for him. He couldn't wait to unleash some frustration on this place.

“Right now,” I said, and smiled. “Operation Chaos commences immediately.”

O
nce I was sure that the massive fight I had staged among the group of bullies was out of control enough that the principal as well as both recess supervisors would need to help break it up and sort it all out, I snuck away to the East Wing. I had an office to reclaim.

Vince stood at the end of the hallway to keep watch for teachers or Suits. Yeah, we'd staged a massive diversion in the form of the largest school yard brawl in school history, but just the same, we still had to be careful.

Mitch tried to stop me from cutting in the line, which wasn't nearly as long as it had been the last time I had been there. Word was obviously getting out that Jimmy Two-Tone was starting to have problems following through.

“Wait, you can't just cut,” Mitch started.

I shoved his hand aside and walked through the door- way into the bathroom before he even had a chance to react.

“Hey!” Justin said.

“I need to see Jimmy,” I said.

“Well, he's busy.” Justin stepped in front of me with his arms crossed.

I was starting to calculate places I could strike first to catch him offguard. Places where my first blow would incapacitate him enough that the fight would be over right then and there. Because I probably had no chance in a fight against Justin if it lasted much longer than that. But then Jimmy must have heard me.

“It's okay, Justin. Jimmy has been expecting this dude,” Jimmy called out from the fourth stall from the high window.

Justin scowled at me, but he did step aside.

I entered the stall and sat down.

“Hey, Mac! Good to see you, bud,” Jimmy said.

“Hey, Jimmy,” I said. “So I talked to Kinko at Thief Valley Elementary.”

“What did he say, bro?”

“Well,
she
agreed to let us pay her back at a reduced rate, just as long as we do it within a week.”

Jimmy made a face like I had just told him we had to clean the faculty bathroom toilet, which every kid in school knew was probably the grossest in the state.

“How are we going to do that? I mean . . .”

“I think we can get the money together, but I need a home base. An office from which to conduct the operation.”

He nodded. “All right, you can have it back. But what about the Suits? Jimmy thought you couldn't come back here, dude?”

“Don't worry about the Suits. I've got that covered. I'm also going to want my own crew, as well. Can we move in during lunch?”

Jimmy nodded. “I think so, sure.”

I reached out and shook his hand like you're supposed to after a business deal. Well, two things down, just about four hundred eighteen million to go.

And just like that, we were back in business. Despite all my efforts to retire, to walk away, here we were once again in the fourth stall from the high window, working to make money and solve problems. Of course, things were a little different than they had been the last time we'd been open for business at the end of the last school year. For one thing Joe was in high school now, so I had a new strongman.

Nubby was a pretty reasonable kid for a bully. A lot of his bullying came as a result of avoiding being teased over his stubby mallet of a right hand. So he wasn't particularly mean, but at the same time he was big and strong and had just enough of an edge to keep kids in line. Plus, he was pretty smart. So I hired Nubby as my new strongman.

Fred, who used to keep the office records for us, instead was positioned near the end of the hallway to watch out for Suits. So far the bullies had already done a great job keeping their hands full, but we had to be extra careful anyway. All it took was one bully to squeal on me, and Dickerson would be marching down this way first thing. I hired a kid named Tanzeem, who had helped me in the past, to watch the East Wing entrance near my office, in case the Suits tried to flank us.

Another major difference with our business this time was that we took customers in three at a time. In the past we had only let one customer in at a time. But now with Vince having his own desk station in the corner by the sink and Jimmy setting up under the high window along the far wall, we were able to pull triple duty. That's right. For the first time ever Vince would be taking customers on his own. He was nervous about it because dealing with the customers directly had never been his strong suit, but I was confident he'd be fine. After all, he was the smartest kid in the school, hands down.

It didn't matter anyway; we had no choice. We had too much money to make and too little time to do it to worry about such things. We just had to get to work.

The next order of business was to hire a kid named Huston to oversee the implementation of our new lemonade stand venture. Huston was a good kid, if not a little odd. Growing up, most kids dream of playing sports . . . well, he'd always dreamed of someday becoming a referee for a professional sports league. By second grade he'd started wearing these homemade referee uniforms, which were white T-shirts with crude vertical black strips drawn on them with markers. And he had his whistle, of course, which all during recess he'd blow and then try to call penalties on kids for “unnecessary roughness on the teeter-totter, cherry bump with too much force” or “traveling, too much speed down the slide” or “illegal contact” when this one kid tried to playfully hug a girl that Huston had a crush on.

Anyways, he was perfect for the lemonade stand enterprise since it was a pretty large operation and it needed the leadership of someone who loved to order people around and could stick to a list of rules. They'd set up the stands behind the Shed and behind the skating rink warming house on school property during school hours. And then more stands would be all over the neighborhood in the early evenings and that weekend. Our business model would be simple: fresh, cold, quality lemonade, a premium product for a premium price. People would pay for quality.

Before Huston left my office that day at lunch, during which time we'd discussed business and drawn up the plans for the lemonade operation and everything, he blew his whistle.

“Unsportsmanlike conduct!” he shouted. “Number Mac of the offense. Being too good a businessman for the competition.”

At this he laughed uncontrollably. My guess was that if other umpires or referees would have been there, they'd have laughed, too. As for me, well, I politely faked it. Lame referee humor wasn't my thing, but I didn't want to insult my new Lemonade Stand Manager.

The next kid Nubby ushered into my office that day was the first regular customer of the day. Which made him the first postretirement customer of my career. And he turned out to be the sort of wacko that had partially pushed me into retirement in the first place.

He entered the stall and right away I smelled it. The smell of burned toast, or burned pizza, or camping. The smell of fire. His hands were black and dirty with soot, and one of his eyebrows was missing, presumably from some sort of fire mishap. A single match stuck out from the corner of his mouth like a toothpick.

“Have a seat,” I said to the kid, who was fidgeting nervously with an empty matchbox.

He sat down.

“Name?”

“People call me Matches,” he said.

“What can I do for you, Matches?” I asked, making notes in my Books.

“I want this new video game, but I can't get it because it's rated M and my parents won't let me get it.”

“Yeah, we got you covered, no problem,” I said. This was a pretty routine request. Easy money. “We'll need cash up front for the game itself plus a twenty-five-percent service charge for acquiring the game for you. Does that sound good?”

Matches nodded and pulled out a wad of crumpled cash. I never understood why so many kids kept their money balled up into little piles, but over the years I'd gotten used to it.

“Great,” I said, counting out the necessary cash. “Do you want to pick up the game here? Or do you want to pay another three dollars for locker-side delivery?”

“Delivery,” Matches said, practically salivating.

“Okay, what game title and platform are we getting for you?” I asked, stacking the money neatly on my desk and then making notes in my Books.

“It's called
Arsonist
,” he said. “I need it on Xbox 360.”

I stopped writing and gave him a look. Seriously? He just grinned at me, the match dancing on the corner of his lip.

“I'm afraid to even ask what the game is about,” I said.

“Basically, you're this arsonist, right? And it's an open-world format game like
GTA
or
Fallout
. So you just go around this city and set stuff on fire and then collect more tools of the trade along the way so you can set even bigger fires. And then, once you start burning buildings, you get bonus points for the more people that are inside them.”

“That's the sickest thing I've ever heard,” I said simply. I didn't think much more needed to be said.

“What?” Matches laughed. “You sound like my mom. I know the people aren't real! It's just a game.”

I shook my head. “All right, whatever, Matches. We'll deliver it to you Friday.”

He grinned again and got up. I watched the psycho leave, making sure he wasn't going to start my office on fire on the way out. Man, kids these days. I mean, I liked FPS and war games as much as the next guy, especially for multiplayer, but that game sounded like it was taking it a little too far. Then again, considering the things I'd seen and witnessed the past year while running my business, maybe that game wasn't all that ridiculous after all.

Part of me even considered hiring Matches. I mean, a kid like that could cause some massive diversions to attract the Suits' attention. But then my common sense got the better of me. I mean, there was a limit to the kind of activities I would let myself fund; I had to draw the line
somewhere.

So for the rest of that day we worked as hard as we ever had before. And with us pulling in three times the amount of customers as usual, we made a record profit. So we were off to a good start. But there was just one little problem: I still had no idea how to get the permanent records.

The next day at morning recess I met up with iBully in my office. I told him what I needed. He could hack into anything, so I was convinced he could get me into the school's servers. But turns out I was wrong.

“No can do,” he said.

“Why not? I thought you could hack into anything within the school's network?”

“Well, for one, there are a huge number of files. I don't think I could get enough uninterrupted time in the school's mainframe to download them all to my computer to save them to a drive. And also, they're kept on a separate server than everything else. They're only on the district's server, which can only be accessed through Dickerson's computer.”

I nodded. “No problem. We'll break into his office at night. We've done it before, broken into a principal's office. Easy.”

iBully shook his head again. “No, that won't work either. It'd be way too detectable and traceable, for one, because he will know he wasn't at his computer at night. And two, the system that houses the records shuts down for backup and program updates every evening. If we try to get the files once that process has started, we could crash the whole system and erase the files. No, the only way I could get them for you is if you got me into his office in the middle of the day for close to an hour without any interruptions.”

I sat back in my chair and sighed. That would be impossible. I mean, with the amount of bullies getting in trouble, Dickerson was spending tons of time in his office disciplining them, calling parents, and crying in frustration, probably.

“Okay,” I said. “We'll figure something out. I'll be in touch.”

I slid a five across my desk for his time. iBully picked it up and left.

At afternoon recess Vince and I took a quick break to discuss a few cases before we let in the first few customers. So far Vince had done pretty well for himself. Not that I was surprised. He knew the business as well as I did; he only thought he didn't.

It was nice to take a quick break to catch up. We'd been working nonstop for two days. The night before, we'd spent the whole evening helping to get the lemonade stands set up so they'd be ready for business after school the next day. We were even going to stock them with Rice Krispie treats. I couldn't believe how much money could be made on those. They were so cheap to make, especially when parents were footing the bill for ingredients.

So it had been a busy evening. Vince and I had even established a new after-hours office in the playground behind his trailer. The same playground that we'd first built our business in. We were open every night from five to seven thirty and had been telling kids all day to spread the word, not just to kids around here but to their friends and family at other schools, in other towns. Anybody who needed help could come and get it for a fee behind the slide in Vince's trailer park playground.