I am a Genius of Unspeakable Evil and I Want to be Your Class (14 page)

 

 

 

 

Traditionally, the most effective way to stop a pair of cats from mating
⁷⁹
is to turn a garden hose on them. It causes them no lasting harm, while ending the disgusting yowling they make while doing it. Plus, it ends the threat of unwanted kittens.

 

Kwame Kirkland and Cheri Munson are kissing in the hallway, and they couldn’t care less who sees them. Kwame is tall and almost old enough to shave. Cheri is short and could probably get pregnant. They’re in eighth grade, so I guess they think they’re grown-ups now. What they actually are is a repulsive two-person sound machine that makes a slurping noise you can hear from five feet away.

 

Once I’m safely past them, I mutter, “Sprinkler malfunction, sector fifteen.” The slurping instantly stops, replaced by the much more pleasant pitter-patter of water spraying from the ceiling and the squealing complaints of Kwame and Cheri. Animals and people—not so very different after all.

 

I’m brought up short by a sharp pain in my side. I look down for its cause and see a sharp brown elbow attached to a short brown girl. “Jeez, Jumbo,” says Tati. “How thick is your stomach, anyway? I had to poke you like five times to get your attention.”

 

“Mudlark,” I mutter.

 

“Mudlark, to you too,” says Tatiana. “Listen, I got good news. The campaign is in full swing.”

 

“I already won,” I tell her. “I’m the only one running.” Soon that won’t be true—but I’m the only one at school who knows that.

 

Tatiana wrinkles her perfect, pert nose and pushes her pink plastic bangles up her arm. “You can never be too careful,” she says. “Politics is tricky. But don’t worry, I’m getting out the vote for you. Look!”

 

She points down the hallway. Logan Michaels, her slave, stands by the cafeteria door, looking miserable. Liz Twombley, the ex-Most Popular Girl in School, stands next to her, looking delighted. They’re both wearing cheap white T-shirts that read TEAM TUBBY. Underneath these words is a drawing of a snowman—you know, three circles stuck on top of each other.

 

“Vote for Oliver,” says Logan, with real sadness in her voice, to the mob pushing its way into the lunchroom. “Vote for Oliver!” says Liz, all sunshine and light.

 

“You like?” says Tati. “I designed those shirts myself.”

 

“They’re pretty,” I say. Liz sees us and smiles. “Hi Oliver! Don’t die!”

 

“I won’t.”

 

Liz beams like I just gave her a pony. Up close, I can see that the snowman is supposed to be me. “Thanks, Tati,” I say.

 

“No, thank
you
,” she says. “This is the most fun I’ve ever had at school.” Then she pushes her way into the throng, taking french fries, cookies—whatever she wants—off of other peoples’ trays. Laws do not apply to Nature’s nobility.

 

Randy Sparks is sitting at my table, looking distracted. There’s a strawberry fruit roll-up hanging out of his mouth that he’s forgotten to finish eating.
⁸⁰
I sit down and pull out my fluffernutter, but he doesn’t notice I’m there.

 

I get it. He has a lot on his mind. His dad has a girlfriend, for one thing. That’s crazy. Especially because Verna is smart and beautiful and successful. Even weirder, she wants Randy to do the
craziest
thing.
⁸¹

 

And I know all this because I’m the one who’s paying Verna to date Randy’s dad. I’m the one who
really
wants him to do the crazy thing

 

“Hi, Randy.”

 

It takes him a second to process this—it’s the only time in our entire career as lunchmates I’ve ever said hello to him first. And one of the few times I haven’t acted completely terrified of him. But I want to get a gauge of his mental state.

 

“Oh. Hi, Ollie,” he says, finally. The fruit roll-up falls to the floor. He doesn’t notice.

 

“Randy, do you think they’ll let me be a policeman?”

 

“Who?” says Randy.

 

“When I grow up. Do you think they’ll let me be one?”

 

His hands fiddle nervously with his lunch bag. Randy’s pencil-thin forearms are covered with downy hair, and a lot of it. It’s like baby hair. “I guess so,” he says. “I don’t see why not. I didn’t know you wanted to be a policeman.”

 

“I don’t,” I say, “but they better let me.”

 

He doesn’t have anything to say to that.

“Randy, what do you want to be when you grow up?”

 

His hands get more nervous. “I don’t know,” he says. “My dad’s an accountant.”

 

I make my eyes as big and impressed as they can be. “Wow,” I say. “A Naccountant! Is he happy?”

 

Randy doesn’t say anything for a while. He looks inside his lunch bag and seems confused that it’s empty. “I don’t know,” he says. “Probably not.” Then he adds, quickly, “He has a girlfriend.”

 

“Wow!” I say. “Is she a policeman?”

 

Randy looks at me funny. I’m pushing the dumb act a little farther than usual, and he may be noticing. Then he shrugs and lets his eyes take a tour of the room. They linger on Pammy Quattlebaum, who’s telling a loud nerd story to her loud nerd friends. Then he looks at Jack Chapman, who sits nearby with his buddies, flicking paper “footballs” through one another’s fingers. They’re all laughing at some joke. He looks at Rashida Grant, who’s talking into a cell phone she snuck into school. Megan and Shiri are using their bodies to shield her from Coach Anicito, who’s on lunch duty today and’ll take the phone away if he sees it.

 

Randy looks back inside his paper bag, then he crumples it up and pushes it away. “When I grow up,” he says, “I guess . . . well . . . I just want to be
normal
.”