The New Kid (3 page)

Weston unwrapped the straw, threw the plastic on the floor, poked the straw into the packet, and spritzed Cody.

Mr. Lipman put a check by
Weston Walker
on the board.

“I always have a cake made out of turkey for my birthday,” Wes announced.

He wiped his mouth with his sleeve. “I kid you not!”

“Use a napkin, Weston,” Mr. Lipman told him.

Yikes
, thought Carson.

A turkey cake?

That was going overboard on the not-overly-sweet-or-too-gooey guidelines.

“Put the napkin in the trash, Weston, not on my desk.”

“I’m just setting it there for a minute! I may need to wipe my mouth again. Or blow my nose.”

“Weston? Trash can. And if you want to apply for the Deputy Dustbuster position on the next jobs rotation, as you
say
you do, you’re going to have to demonstrate that you have the life skills required to make appropriate use of a trash can and recycle box.”

“Okay.”

“You’ve got to be responsible, hardworking, and willing to put in the extra time and effort needed to do a good job.”

“Fine, I will.”

Wes crumpled up the napkin, jumped up for the long shot, and threw it into the corner. It sailed across the room. “Eeeeeeee-yeah!” he shouted when it landed in the trash.

“Sorry,” he said.

Wes was pretty good at basketball.

That would have been a three-pointer.

Dustbusting didn’t require much talent, but it was a position of trust and responsibility. Chloe and Zoe were the current Co-deputy Dustbusters. And they were an extraordinary team, even taking extra time during Shape It Up to Shipshape to painstakingly dust things high up, low down, and way back—on the shelves and inside the cupboards.

Carson wouldn’t have wanted the position.

He wasn’t sure if he would want Nancy’s position on the next rotation, or qualify for it, either: Nancy was Numbers Deputy—in charge of all number-related things, such as counting, dividing kids into
equal teams, and helping Mr. Lipman correct math homework.

But Carson most definitely had his eye on Patrick’s job: Deputy Pet Care Giver. That would be his goal. He wasn’t sure if he would be ready to apply on the next jobs rotation, but maybe on a rotation after that.

Patrick knew a lot about caring for animals. His mom had founded the Wildlife Rescue Center. On Career Day, Patrick’s mom brought in a Cooper’s hawk named Coop. Coop had flown into a car windshield out by Green Gulch. After many weeks of rehabilitation, he had recovered from a broken wing and was almost ready to be released back into the wild.

Coop glared out from inside a pet carrier with his intense, beady orange eyes. He was zeroing in on something across the room.

Coop tipped his head, lifted his wings.

Then he screamed and everybody jumped.

Patrick’s mom handed her blue Wildlife Rescue Center jacket to Patrick, and he covered Mr. Nibblenose’s cage.

Mr. Nibblenose was a very reclusive, very wide, very well-fed, very glossy, somewhat socialized brown
and white rat with a pink nose, soft pink ears, and a long, scaly gray tail.

He, too, was new—a gift to the class from a neighbor of Mr. Lipman’s, a woman named Belinda who had moved to Belize.

Mr. Nibblenose was spending most of his time in his cage in an empty Fluff Puff tissue box with his tail sticking out of the hole. He was just getting used to the classroom, and the kids weren’t allowed to handle him yet.

Except Patrick.

Carson wasn’t sure how he felt about confining a rat to a cage for such a big part of every day. And he didn’t know if Mr. Nibblenose would ever learn to enjoy the attention and company of the children.

He seemed quite shy.

When Coop spied him, Coop fluffed his feathers, flapped, opened his beak, poked his tongue out, and screeched.

Carson wasn’t sure how Mr. Nibblenose felt about being cooped up in a cage, but he was 100 percent positive it freaked Mr. Nibblenose out to have a hawk scream at him.

Releasing Mr. Nibblenose into the wild, however, wouldn’t be an option. He wasn’t a wild rat—like a roof rat, jumping from roof to roof through the city with a group of rowdy rodent friends.

He wasn’t a pack rat, either. And he wouldn’t enjoy scuttling around in an automotive-repair garage, leering over the tops of empty cans, hoping to set up shop in an engine compartment.

He wasn’t a sly dump rat like Templeton in
Charlotte’s Web
, scavenging through garbage for stinky, rotten morsels of food, although Mr. Nibblenose certainly didn’t look like he’d skipped many meals.

He was a meek splotchy-brown and bright-white domesticated pet rat with no experience in the wild. If released and allowed to go free, he would be quickly pounced upon by a cat or spotted from above by a predatory bird such as a Cooper’s hawk. Being extremely hefty, Mr. Nibblenose would find it hard to scurry to safety.

When Carson was a veterinarian, he’d have to know how to evaluate and treat pet rats for various injuries and ailments, so he’d better get used to the idea of people having them for pets.

He would encourage his clients to create a Free-Range Roaming Rat Arena somewhere in their homes so rats could get out and about as much as possible.

Mr. Lipman must have noticed how interested Carson was in Mr. Nibblenose. And must also have guessed how much Carson wanted to make a new friend. So he suggested, “Why not be Patrick’s Assistant Deputy Pet Care Giver?”

Patrick showed Carson how to make entries in the Nibblenose Classroom Care Notebook. They skimmed through the
Caring for Your Pet Rat
book together.

At recess, Carson helped Patrick clean the cage. And Patrick demonstrated how a rat can come when called. He called Mr. Nibblenose’s name, and Mr. Nibblenose ran to his cage and squeezed back into his Fluff Puff hideout.

In the
Caring for Your Pet Rat
book, it showed examples of inexpensive and entertaining rat toys, such as the Birthday Prize in Disguise Surprise.

To make a Birthday Prize in Disguise Surprise, you had to individually wrap treats like yogurt drops, seeds,
nuts, and other edibles inside small pieces of paper towel or newspaper. One by one, you then dropped them into a paper-towel roll until the roll was stuffed with individually wrapped treats. The next step was to fold both ends closed and hang it from the top of the cage.

Let the fun begin!

An alternative birthday treat was a sock piñata filled with goodies.

Carson didn’t know when Mr. Nibblenose’s birthday was, or if he would be interested in opening any presents.

Right now, all he seemed interested in doing was hiding in the Fluff Puff hut, mostly backward, but sometimes frontward, with his pale pink nose protruding from the hole and trembling in the air.

Carson figured he’d up his chances of becoming Deputy Pet Care Giver if he demonstrated to Mr. Lipman that he was responsible, and a hard worker, and willing to put in extra time and effort.

He’d start by earning some extra credit.

He thumbed through the Extra-Credit Bonus-Bucks Booklet on the counter near Mr. Lipman’s
desk, looking for something that would demonstrate his interest in animals.

No thanks on that one.

Carson wasn’t good at talking in front of a class, but he wanted to get better at it. Bonus Bucks were an incentive.

Yay for Bonus Bucks!

When you earned a Bonus Buck, you could write your name on it and drop it into the slot in the top of the Bonus Bucks Box in the office.

Once a week there was a drawing; if your Bonus Buck was chosen, you got to spin the Bonus Bucks Wheel of Fortune and win a prize, such as a No-Homework Pass, which Carson would love to have.

The Wheel of Fortune was a handmade contraption, constructed of plywood and nails, banged together by the office manager, Mrs. Sweetow.

Last week Weston Walker had been awarded one Bonus Buck from Mr. Lipman for leaving Mr. Nibblenose completely alone.

And last week, with just one buck in the box, Wes was the Spinner Winner!

But something unfortunate happened to the Wheel of Fortune. Wes whirled the wheel so fast and hard the base toppled off the table and flopped onto the floor, and the wheel broke into several pieces.

Fortunately, the marker was intact. It pointed to a free Valley Oak sweatshirt.

Mrs. Sweetow reluctantly gave Wes his prize.

Wes told her that squirrels gave him the heebie-jeebies. But Mrs. Sweetow wouldn’t trade for the acorn one because she was mad.

Carson wasn’t sure if she’d repaired the wheel yet, or if it was even fixable, for that matter. But he decided on Whiz Quiz poem.

Hmmmmm. What animal would it be?

Carson stood there thinking.

“Carson?” said Mr. Lipman. “Math time.”

Oops!

The rest of the kids had already lined up.

Three days a week, Carson switched classes for math. Carson, Patrick, Nancy, and some others trooped over to Ms. Parker’s class, and some of Ms. Parker’s kids went to Mr. Lipman’s class.

Carson knew that there were yays and boos about
every situation, including being the New Kid at Valley Oak School.

And he had to say it: the biggest, fattest number-one boo was for Math Switcheroo. Ms. Parker herself was great.

One problem, though: she was overly neat.

In fact, a Neat Freak.

She had recently held a classroom event called Clean Out That Backpack, Dagnabbit! Day.

That wasn’t a problem for Carson, first because he wasn’t in her regular class, and second because his pack hadn’t had the chance to accumulate debris.

However, because he had her for Switcheroo, he was subjected to a different Neat Freak issue: her Select Reject Button.

Ms. Parker’s Select Reject Button was a cardboard picture of an apple with a bucktoothed worm poking its head out, and the apple was pushpinned to the wall just above the recycle bin.

If you turned in a math paper that was a rumpled or smudged mess, or if the problems were written with uneven columns, she’d just press the apple and say
Beeeep!

Beeeep!
meant place your paper in the bin below and begin again. Three
beeeep
s on the same assignment got you a blue slip: recess confined to a Blue Box.

The Blue Boxes were number two on the Boos List.

They were big, flat, bright blue squares painted on the asphalt on the playground.

And while Carson was on the topic of Boxes to Boo About: a big, fat, resounding boo on the June Box.

The June Box was a cardboard box decorated with colorful yarn that sat on the counter right next to Mr. Lipman’s desk. Anybody who brought in candy or a toy and got caught with it had to put it into the June Box. At the moment, a fish was in there. It was a rubber bass screwed onto an oval wooden plaque with its mouth wide open and a fake fishing fly hanging off its lower lip.

There it would stay, cooped up till the end of the year, along with a fluorescent green light-up yo-yo, a package of peppermint pink Teenie-Weenie Jelly Beanies, and a trail of ants.

When Carson and his dad emailed the folks in Pasadena, Carson tried to report more yays than boos. He had to think awhile to come up with yays. But he wanted to think positively and make the best of his new situation.

So, yay for Bonus Bucks.

Yay for PE. He could have skipped the Hula-Hooping, but at least he was improving.

Yay for Career Day. He hoped a veterinarian would show up.

Yay for the Classroom Campout, which was just around the corner. Moose wouldn’t be invited along on that one.

Carson heard the tinkly sound of Mr. Lipman’s Chill-Time Chimes and looked up from his book.

“Class? I have completed a new Hello Bingo card, in honor of Carson. Sound good? Golf clap,” he reminded the students.

They quietly clapped.

Wes whistled through his teeth.

Carson wished he could do that.

Mr. Lipman wrote
Weston Walker
on the board, and then slowly walked around the room, giving each student a sheet of paper with a bingo grid on it. Every box in the grid had an activity in it.

“Carson?” said Mr. Lipman. “So here’s the dealio: Each person can sign their name in one box per card. Just one. You can also sign your own card. But just once.

“How the game works,” continued Mr. Lipman, “is this: You try to fill the whole card with signatures. It’s called Hello Bingo, and it’s worth twenty Bonus Bucks.

“You all walk around and q-u-i-e-t-l-y interview other students, to get signatures on your card. So if Patrick, for example, rode a horse recently, he would sign
Patrick Tapp
in the ‘Rode a horse’ box.”

“Did you, Patrick?” asked Shelly.

“Not me.” Patrick shook his head. “No way.”

“Why not?”

“Why not? Clues: summer camp, horse in a hurry, low branch, blackberry brambles, and beehive.”

Whoa!

“No one on earth is getting me on horseback again.”

Wes swaggered over to Carson.

“Gimme your card,” he told Carson. “I rode horses all last summer. At my aunt Boo and uncle Hunk’s quarter-horse farm in Cleveland.”

He reached for Carson’s card.

“Don’t believe him,” Cody warned. “He’s a complete and total l-i-a-r.”

Carson pulled it back. “No thanks, Wes. But thanks anyway.”