Mrs. Lilly Is Silly! (3 page)

“
The Ella Mentry Sentry
needs to reach out and grab the reader's eyeballs,” Mrs. Lilly told us.

“Ouch!” I said. “I don't want anybody touching my eyeballs.”

“What I mean is that newspapers have to compete with the internet, TV, and video games,” Mrs. Lilly told us. “Our paper needs to have
exciting
stories.”

“I thought your article was wonderful, Andrea,” whispered Emily, who loves everything Andrea does.

“But our school is really boring,” said Michael. “I don't think we can make an exciting newspaper that will grab people's eyeballs.”

“Nothing interesting ever happens here,” said Ryan.

“Yeah,” said Neil the nude kid, “this school is boring. We don't have any good stories to tell.”

“Sure you do!” Mrs. Lilly said. “You've just got to dig for them.”

At that moment Mr. Klutz came into the classroom. He's our principal, and he has no hair at all. I mean none. His head looks like a lightbulb.
*

“We're making a newspaper all about the school,” said Mrs. Lilly. “Can we interview you, Mr. Klutz?”

“Certainly!” he replied. “A school newspaper is a great idea. What would you like to know about me?”

I thought Mrs. Lilly was going to ask Mr. Klutz what it was like to be a principal and boring stuff like that. But she didn't.

“Tell us, Mr. Klutz,” said Mrs. Lilly, “when did you lose your hair?”

Everybody gasped. Nobody had ever asked Mr. Klutz about his hair before.

“That's personal!” said Andrea. “We shouldn't ask people questions like that.”

“Oh, I don't mind,” Mr. Klutz said. “Let's see… I remember my wedding pictures. I had a full head of hair when I first got married. My hair started falling out around the time my wife and I got divorced. And by the time I got married again, I was totally bald.”

Mr. Klutz told us some more stuff about the good old days when he had hair and then he said he had to go.

“Do you have to go,” I asked, “or do you have to
go
?”

“I have to go,” he said.

Mr. Klutz left, and Mrs. Lilly went over to the whiteboard.

“So we're going to write an article about Mr. Klutz's hair?” asked Alexia.

“No, I have another idea,” said Mrs. Lilly. “Let me show you how I would handle this interview. It's a great human interest story. I can see the headline now…”

And then she wrote this on the whiteboard, with big letters…

MR. KLUTZ HAS TWO WIVES!

“Mr. Klutz has two wives?” asked Ryan.

“Sure!” Mrs. Lilly said. “He had one wife and then he got divorced and married somebody else. That's two wives.”

“But he didn't have two wives at the same time,” Andrea pointed out.

“I never said he did,” said Mrs. Lilly. “Now, what about the
other
grown-ups at Ella Mentry School? We need to dig up some dirt.”

“You should go out to the playground,” I suggested. “There's plenty of dirt there.”

“Not
that
kind of dirt!” said Mrs. Lilly. “We need some hot stories that will grab people's eyeballs. Alexia and Emily, I want you to work as a team. Go sneak into the teachers' lounge. See what
really
goes on in there.”

“Right, Chief!” said Emily.

“Ryan and Michael, you're a team, too,” said Mrs. Lilly. “Go through all the garbage cans in the school. Find out if any teachers throw away anything interesting.”

“We're on it!” said Michael.

“Neil,” said Mrs. Lilly. “I want you to put a tail on Mr. Macky, the reading specialist.”

“Why?” asked Neil. “People don't have tails.”

“Not
that
kind of a tail!” Mrs. Lilly said. “I want you to follow Mr. Macky around. See where he goes. See who he talks to. Then report back to us.”

“Got it, Chief!” said Neil.

“A.J. and Andrea, you're a team,” said Mrs. Lilly.

“Oooooh!”
Ryan said. “A.J. and Andrea are a team. They must be in
love
!”

“When are you gonna get married?” asked Michael.

If those guys weren't my best friends, I would hate them.

“I want you to interview as many teachers as you can,” Mrs. Lilly told Andrea and me. “Bring back some scoops.”

“Why do you need scoops?” I asked. “Did your dog go to the bathroom?”

“Not
those
kind of scoops!” Mrs. Lilly shouted.

“Scoops are stories, Arlo,” Andrea said, rolling her eyes.

“I knew that,” I lied.

“Dig up some secrets,” said Mrs. Lilly. “Get some information nobody else knows. You all have one hour. After that, report back here, and we'll put
The Ella Mentry Sentry
together on the computer. I can't wait to see how you make out.”

“Ewwwwwwwww, disgusting!” we all shouted. “Mrs. Lilly said ‘make out'!”

“What if we don't find any secrets?” Michael asked.

“Everybody has secrets,” Mrs. Lilly said. “Go out there and find them. Ask the teachers to tell you something about themselves that nobody knows. And make sure to get your facts right. That's very important.”

“But—”

“No buts! Go! Go! Go!”

We all giggled because Mrs. Lilly said “but,” which sounds just like “butt” except that it only has one
t
. But “butt” is a lot funnier than “but.” Nobody knows why.

Andrea grabbed her notebook and a pencil. Then we went slinking down the hallway like secret agents. It was cool.

“Isn't this exciting, Arlo?” said Andrea. “We're like real investigative reporters. I hope we get some good interviews!”

“I have an idea,” I said. “We should sneak out of school and go home. Then I could play video games for the rest of the day. Nobody would ever know we were gone.”

“Shhhhhhhh!”
Andrea said. “I think I hear somebody. Hold my hand.”

“I'm not holding hands with you,” I told her. “Reporters don't hold hands.”

“They do if they're in
love
,” she replied.

Ugh, disgusting! I thought I was gonna throw up.

We snuck around the corner, where I spotted an open door.

“The vomitorium!” we both said.

The vomitorium is where we eat lunch. It used to be called the cafetorium, but then one day some kid threw up in there, and it's been the vomitorium ever since.

The only person in the vomitorium was our lunch lady, Ms. LaGrange. She's from France, which is this country where they eat frogs' legs.

“Bonjour!” said Ms. LaGrange. (That's France talk for “hello.”) “Lunch will not be ready for an hour. What can I do for you kids?”

Andrea got her pad and pencil ready so she could take notes.

“We're here to dig up some dirt,” I told Ms. LaGrange.