The Fight for Kidsboro (57 page)

Valerie reached up and pulled off her earrings. “These are no longer a symbol of us!” she said, and threw the earrings into the grass behind her. Another girl joined her and started raising her own symbols in the air. She picked up a pair of pantyhose and threw them away. Another girl threw her purse about 30 feet. They'd obviously been told beforehand to bring all the symbols of girlhood because everyone seemed to have something to throw away—jewelry, acrylic nails, perfume, and makeup.

Patty raised up a can of hairspray and shot it out into the air, waving it to show the stream. Just then, Mark, head of Clean Up Kidsboro, flew out of a nearby bush. He had obviously been watching them to make sure they finished the bathroom. But now, I had a feeling he thought the feminists had gone too far.

“Hey! Stop that!” he yelled. Most of the girls ignored him, including Patty, who continued spraying. “Those are harmful chemicals!” he protested.

She continued to ignore him. “Stop spraying!” he yelled, jumping up and snatching the can from her hand. Some of the girls finally noticed that there was a boy present, and their frenzy came to an abrupt halt. “What are you people doing?” Mark shouted. “You're killing us! My organization is relying on you. You're supposed to be digging a latrine, not spraying deadly chemicals in the air!”

“We're just about to dig,” Patty said.

“Well, get started, then! You've only got 24 hours, or we lose our funding!”

“How about it, girls?” Valerie shouted, trying to regain the momentum.

“Yeah!” they shouted.

“Then let's go!” she shouted, raising her shovel in the air. Each girl grabbed her shovel. Like angry villagers ready to lynch somebody, they marched out to the latrine construction site, shouting as they went. Mark followed them to see that the job would actually be done this time. Scott and I went along too.

The feminists all circled around the spot where the bathroom was going to be built. “Let's make a toilet, girls!” They all cheered, but something about the words
toilet girls
hit them. A couple glanced around and could see that there were several boys in the distance, watching them carefully as they prepared to break ground. I think each of them had their own vision of walking down the halls of the school, with boys all around them pointing and saying, “There goes one of the toilet girls.” Some how this vision seemed to drain their enthusiasm. Valerie stood with her shovel poised above the ground, ready to strike down on the earth. Then she looked around and saw more boys watching her from across the creek. She scanned the faces of her followers and realized that they had lost their fervor. They suddenly wanted their makeup and hairspray back.

“Come on!” Mark said, noticing the sudden change of attitude. “Dig! Come on! It's only a hole!”

Valerie handed him the shovel. “Then you do it.”

“No way; that's disgusting.”

James marched over to where the animal rights group was busy trying to train their cats to rake leaves. One cat carried a small rake on its back like a plow horse.
This is animal rights?
I asked myself.

James was irate. “Your dogs are destroying our garden,” he shouted.

“How?”

“You've trained them to pick up rocks and take them to the creek, and now they're doing it to my unripe tomatoes!”

“Really?” one of them said with glee. They were excited that the dogs were using what they'd learned.

“Keep your dogs out of my garden.”

“Well, if you haven't noticed,” the animal lover replied, “we have laws now that say that animals can roam freely, just like humans. The dogs can go anywhere they want.”

“So, you're not gonna keep them out?”

“Nope.”

“All right, then.” James left. He walked away so quickly It was obvious that he had a plan. Scott and I followed quietly behind him.

He went to see the slingshotters. “I have a job for you,” he said.

Their eyes lit up. “What?”

“I want to keep the dogs out of our garden. I'll hire you to stand guard. If any of those dogs come near it, open fire.”

“Really?” the slingshotters said in unison. They huddled up. “This is our chance. We can show we're useful to the farmers.” They all nodded in agreement and broke the huddle.

“We'll do it,” they said. James smiled.

Later that day, the slingshotters had the garden surrounded, waiting for the dogs to make one false move. It was like a police stakeout. They sat there for an hour without a single animal in sight, their trigger fingers itching to fire away.

Suddenly, one of the slingshotters got hit. A stray nut from out of nowhere pelted him on the back of the head. He turned around. It was Melissa, holding a slingshot of her own.

“What are you doing?” the slingshotter asked, his buddies giving up their positions and gathering around him.

“How does that feel?” Melissa said. “What if the dogs just suddenly started shooting at you? Doesn't feel so good, does it?”

All at once, three more animal rights people appeared from behind the trees. They all had slingshots. Melissa signaled them forward. “It's hunting season, boys.” They advanced on the slingshotters with an entire arsenal of nuts and hard objects in their pockets. The slingshotters, who had left their weapons at their posts, backed away and started to run. The animal rights people ran after them, shooting at will. The slingshotters retreated into the woods until we couldn't see them any more.

9

TIME'S UP

A
MISCHIEVOUS GRIN CROSSED
my face as I headed into Kidsboro the next morning. The 72 hours was up for all the special-interest groups, and I could already tell that some of them were going to fall short. I passed the garden on my way to the office; the bugs and animals had destroyed it. It didn't even resemble a garden any more, it looked more like a greenhouse that had been bombed. One of the farmers was sitting beside it and waved sheepishly at me. He was caressing a perfect unripe tomato. Maybe it was the only one left.

Along the way, I saw that garbage was strewn everywhere, down the main street all the way across the creek and into Bettertown. Scott was noticing it as well.

“What happened here?” I asked him.

“Corey overslept, and the animals had a party.” This was the garbageman who had just gotten a raise because he thought he deserved as much money as the mayor and the chief of police.

The city council met in the meeting hall; we were all curious as to what we were going to see today.

The slingshotters came in first. They dropped three dead crickets and a snail on the table. Half-heartedly, Ben said, “We have to rid the woods of these.” He looked at us to see if there was even a hint that we were taking him seriously. He gave up in about five seconds. “Never mind. Let's go,” he said, and the others followed.

Clean Up Kidsboro was next. Mark stood in front of me with all the pride he could muster. The rest of his group stood behind him.

“Let's see here,” I said, reading over their contract. “You were supposed to make Kidsboro litter-free.”

Mark raised his eyebrows and chuckled under his breath. “It was the dogs.”

“Part of your job was to keep Kidsboro clean, despite dogs running around,” I said.

“Yeah. We know.” Mark turned and left.

Melissa and the animal rights people strolled in with just one dog.

“Melissa, we asked that you make sure these animals had jobs. Could you please show us what they're doing now?”

“Well, Bowzer here is going to show you how he can deliver things directly to someone's door.”

“Really?” I said, looking forward to this demonstration.

“Okay, boy,” she said to the basset hound, who lay prostrate on the ground. “Take this ball to Nelson's house.” She handed him a ball, but he failed to grab it. She dropped the ball on the ground in front of him. He sniffed it. It was obvious that he was one of the dogs that had gone through the garbage and had such a full stomach that he had no desire to get up.

“Come on, boy. Come on, Bowzer.” She glanced at me sheepishly. I tried to hide my grin. Bowzer burped and closed his eyes.

“They just need more training,” she said.

“I've been around dogs. I know dogs. Training a dog not to tear through garbage is like training a fish not to swim,” I said. Scott snickered, and Nelson elbowed him.

The farmers came in with the remains of a watermelon plant. It had been chewed through by beetles. “I could almost taste this watermelon,” James said and laid it down on the table in front of us.