Miss Suki Is Kooky! (5 page)

“Sorry I missed the assembly,” he said. “What's going on here, Klutz? Why are you dressed up in that weird costume? Why is it that every time I visit this school, there's a disturbance?”

“No reason to be alarmed, sir,” said Mr. Klutz. “Just a minor problem with a raptor.”

“Raptor?!” exclaimed Dr. Carbles.
“Didn't one of them rip some guy's head off in
Jurassic Park
?”

“Be careful!” begged Miss Suki. “He's my baby!”

“You gave birth to a raptor?” asked Dr. Carbles.

Just then, Rappy came down from the ceiling and started swooping around the gym again. Everyone was ducking and screaming.

“Stand back!” shouted Mr. Klutz, as he waved the catcher's mitt around to attract Rappy's attention. “Come on, Rappy. Be a good boy. Come to Papa!”

I think Mr. Klutz was waving the catcher's mitt around a little too fast.
Because while he was waving it, Emily's mirror fell out. It hit the floor and broke into a million hundred little pieces.

“Oh, no!” everybody yelled.

Mr. Klutz looked at Miss Suki. Miss Suki looked at Miss Daisy. Miss Daisy looked at Mrs. Roopy. Mrs. Roopy looked at the photographer. Everybody was looking at everybody else.

Suddenly Rappy went really crazy and started flying even faster around the gym. Then he must have spotted the shiny letters on the Blueberry Award, because he dive-bombed straight toward Mr. Klutz!

Mr. Klutz didn't know what to say! He
didn't know what to do! He had to think fast!

Just before Rappy would have rammed into him, Mr. Klutz held up the Blueberry Award.

Wham!

Rappy slammed right into it and broke it in half! Oooooh, that had to hurt! Rappy got it right on the kisser!

It was awesome. A real Kodak moment. Luckily the photographer was snapping pictures the whole time.

“Hooray for Mr. Klutz!” we all shouted.

Everybody was cheering. Well, everybody except for Miss Suki, who was on her knees, sobbing. Rappy didn't look too happy either. In fact, it looked like he might be dead. He was on the floor with his legs in the air, twitching.

“Is that what Mr. Klutz meant by killing two birds with one stone?” Ryan asked.

“He's dead!” Miss Suki cried. “You killed my baby!”

“He's not dead,” Mr. Klutz assured her. “He's just…resting.”

“Does this mean that Rappy is still endangered?” asked Michael. “Or is he extinct now?”

“I don't know,” I said. “He smells fine to me.”

“You're a bunch of monsters!” Miss Suki shouted as she scooped Rappy off
the floor. “This is the worst day of my life!”

Then she ran out of the gym crying. She didn't even take the shattered pieces of her Blueberry Award with her.

“Does this mean you won't be signing any more autographs?” I asked Miss Suki. But I don't think she heard me. She was long gone.

All in all, I thought Miss Suki's visit was really cool, especially when Rappy went berserk and attacked Emily. I mean, we got to meet a famous author,
and
we got to see Mr. Klutz dress up like a catcher with a towel around his head. But best of all, we got to miss math.

I was thinking about it. Miss Suki won the Blueberry Award by writing about a raptor that flew into a window and nearly died. And then the
same
raptor flew into the Blueberry Award and nearly died! I guess the moral of the story is that you should never bring a raptor to school. Or a Blueberry Award.

Maybe Miss Suki will be able to nurse Rappy back to health again. Maybe Mrs. Cooney will be able to nurse
Emily
back to health again. Maybe Miss Lazar will be able to fix the Blueberry Award. Maybe Emily and Andrea will stop looking at themselves in the mirror all the time because you never know when you
might be attacked by a crazed raptor. Maybe we'll be able to talk Mr. Klutz into inviting another author to our school next year.

But it won't be easy!

Cover art © 2007 by Jim Paillot