Dingus Page 3

  9

  Max noticed right away. He was standing by the school doors with everyone from the chess club. I’d walked to school by myself because Max had to be at school early for the First Annual Chess Champions’ End of Year Breakfast Party.

  “Where’d you get those?” he said, pointing at my new running shoes.

  “My dad got them for me,” I said. “Why?”

  “I hate to tell you this, Henry,” he said. “But those shoes are fake. You’ve been faked out.”

  “Checkmate!” said Jamal, looking up from his Rubik’s Cube.

  “For your information, I haven’t been faked out,” I said. “There’s no difference between these running shoes and real Chads.” I was repeating what my dad had said. It was my only defense. “They’re probably made in the same factory. It’s just that they don’t come from the same store. They come from the Dollar Shack instead of some overpriced shoe store. It’s the people who buy the same shoes at expensive stores who are being faked out. Not me! You guys should check your facts before you open your yaps.”

  “The pawn’s a poet,” said Gretchen Thorn. She was wearing a red T-shirt and green shorts. She looked at me and smiled. “I wonder if he knows it!”

  I ignored her.

  “These shoes are pretty much exactly the same as Chads,” I said, turning to Max. “The only thing that’s different is one letter. It’s Faker instead of Baker.”

  “Exactly,” said Max. “Just like I said. They’re fake.”

  “Faked out!” said Youssef.

  “Shut up!” I said.

  “People get cheap batteries and weird snacks at the Dollar Shack,” said Max, talking to me like I was some little kid who didn’t know anything. “No one gets running shoes at the Dollar Shack. They go to Duke’s or some place like that.”

  “Well,” I said, getting frustrated, “my dad buys running shoes at the Dollar Shack, and according to him they’re perfectly good. What do you want me to do?”

  “I’d die if my parents got my running shoes at the Dollar Shack,” said Max, shaking his head.

  I could feel my face getting hotter and hotter. I felt like I was about to explode.

  “You’re a jerk, Max!” I said. “I was fine with these shoes until you started yapping. Thanks, Mr. Jerkface.”

  “Don’t call me a jerkface,” said Max.

  “I didn’t,” I said. “I called you Mr. Jerkface.”

  “Whatever,” he said. “I’m just saying …”

  “You’re just saying what?” I said. “You have no idea what it’s like, Max. You always get everything you want because both your parents work. My dad volunteers to stay at home, and I have to wear Fakers instead of Bakers because he doesn’t even know the difference between the Dollar Shack and Duke’s. It sucks.”

  “Stop freaking out,” said Max.

  “Freaking out?” I said. “What do you expect? You’re the one who said you’d die if you had to wear these. Can you imagine if your parents got your glasses from one of those racks at the Dollar Shack? Then you’d know how I feel. Then you’d look like even more of a dweeb.”

  “Dweeb!?!” he said. “Who are you calling a dweeb?”

  “Sorry,” I said. “I meant to call you Mr. Dweeb. Why don’t you just keep hanging out with your chess club friends and leave me alone. They laugh at all your jokes. They think you’re cool. They don’t know what a dweeb you are behind your stupid glasses.”

  “Stop calling me a dweeb!” Max said.

  “Sorry,” I said. “I meant to call you a jerk.”

  “It’s just a pair of shoes, Henry,” said Max. “Can’t you take a little joke?”

  “A little joke?” I said. “You’re the biggest joke at school.”

  I was so mad I was afraid I was going to cry. And I didn’t want to cry in front of those jerks, especially not on the last day of school.

  I walked away, staring at the ground, and concentrated on not crying. I stood by the fence and waited for the bell to ring. I was mad at Max. I was mad at his new friends. I was mad at my dad for getting me Chad Fakers instead of Chad Bakers. I was mad at myself for being so mad.

  My life officially sucked.

  I was mad at that, too.

  10

  I’ve known Max since the first day of kindergarten. We’ve been best friends ever since. We used to pretend we were brothers. I used to imagine how great it would be to live with Max. We could hang out all the time, and I’d get to live in a huge house. We stopped pretending we were brothers after Sam was born. I guess it would have been kind of strange to keep pretending when I had a real brother.

  In some ways Max and I are the same. That’s probably why we’ve been friends for so long. In other ways, though, we’re different. Like, for instance, I live in an apartment. Max lives in a house. He lives on the same street as Poppy, my grandpa, on the other side of the park. Poppy’s house is old and small, but it has a big backyard. Max’s house is newer and way bigger than Poppy’s. Max has a huge bedroom with a big-screen television that he uses for gaming. His basement is almost as big as my whole apartment.

  It was after the Fifth Grade Spring Chess Challenge that I really started to wonder if we were still best friends. We walked to school together, but once we got there, Max would take off to hang out with his friends from the chess club. I’d stand around and wait for the bell to ring. Sometimes I played four square with some of the other guys. A lot of times I’d watch Max hanging out with his chess friends and wonder what was so great about them.

  Max and I used to do everything together. We rode our bikes and read comics and drew and played on the computer. Now it seems we don’t like the same things anymore. Max is all about chess, and I’m not really sure what I’m all about. Maybe I’m about collecting old books. I don’t know.

  I came across a box of old Hardy Boys books in Poppy’s basement last summer when we were sorting through some stuff. He said I could have them. The oldest one I have is volume four, The Missing Chums. My copy is a first edition. It’s from 1928. It’s worth money. I saw another first edition for sale online for $450. I love the way it smells. The other Hardy Boys books I have are newer than The Missing Chums, but they’re still old. I’ve collected a few other old books, too. I have an old atlas that I bought with Poppy at a secondhand bookshop. I used some of my allowance money for it. It’s big and heavy, and some of the countries on the maps don’t even exist anymore. I also have a cool book about space exploration from the 1960s. They thought we’d have colonies on Mars by now.

  But other than my new old books, I was the same as I’d always been. It felt like Max was the one who was changing, and that was what was different. I tried to explain the whole thing to my dad one day. He suggested I join the chess club or find some new friends. He said there was no point in being mad. He said it was like getting mad at the seasons for changing. He wasn’t much help.

  I tried to explain it to my mom. I tried to tell her how sometimes it felt like Max and I weren’t best friends anymore. She seemed to understand exactly how I felt. She said it was good to talk about my feelings. She told me about what happened with her best friend when she was my age. They went through a rough patch, she said, and for a while they didn’t talk to each other. Then, one day, they went back to being best friends again. There was no particular reason. It’s just the way friendship is sometimes. It changes. She suggested that I talk to Max. She said he might even feel the same way I did.

  “Do you ever wish things were still the way they used to be?” I asked Max a few days after the whole Egg Man incident.

  “What do you mean?” he said.

  “It used to seem like it was just you and me,” I said. “Remember how we used to pretend we were brothers?”

  “Now you have a real brother,” said Max, matter-of-factly.

  “And now you’re hanging out with Jamal, a
nd Youssef, and Gretchen, and everyone else in the chess club,” I said.

  “You know, you could join the chess club anytime you want,” he suggested. “You could hang out with us, and then we’d get to see each other more.”

  “It’s not that,” I said, knowing it was partly that. “I don’t want to join the chess club. It’s weird. It’s hard to explain.”

  “I know,” he said. “It is weird.”

  “I guess things just change,” I said.

  “I guess,” he agreed.

  “Remember that movie we saw in health and phys ed with Mr. Cameron?” I said. “Remember how it said puberty makes you change and act kind of weird?”

  “Yeah, but I’m pretty sure we’re not going through puberty,” said Max. “We’re only eleven.”

  “Oh, right,” I said. “Good. I don’t know if I could handle it.”

  “Me neither,” said Max.

  Talking didn’t really fix anything, but at least now I knew that I wasn’t the only one who thought things were getting a little weird. I guess that was good.

  But it sucks.

  It sucks that things have to change.

  11

  The bell finally rang and it was time to start the last day of fifth grade. I slipped into line with one of the other classes and headed into school. I didn’t want to line up with Max and everyone else after they all made such a big deal about my stupid “fake” running shoes.

  I stared out the classroom window, waiting for the announcements. Everyone around me was talking, but I didn’t say anything to anyone. After the announcements Mr. Buntrock stood at the front of the room and took a long look at the class.

  “It’s time for the word of the day,” he said, finally. “I’ve spent some time considering a suitable word for our last day together. I wanted a word that captures a sense of where we’ve been and that looks forward to where we’ll be going.”

  “I’m going to Egypt!” said Youssef. “I’m going to visit my relatives. I’m not coming back until school starts again in September.”

  “Well,” said Mr. Buntrock. “That sounds like quite an adventure.”

  “And I’m going to Mumbai,” said Jude.

  “Wonderful,” said Mr. Buntrock.

  “I’m going to camp,” added Max.

  “I’m starting a dog-walking business,” said Gretchen Thorn. “I’m going to save all the money I make for university because I want to go to university in England, and my parents told me I better start saving now.”

  “Maybe I’ll hire you during the summer to help take care of my dog,” said Mr. Buntrock.

  “That would be so awesome, Mr. Buntrock!” said Gretchen. “You’d be my first customer. I’ll give you a flyer. I made some to put up around the neighborhood. I don’t just walk dogs. I play with them and I talk to them and I take them to different parks so they can visit with other dogs.”

  “I’m going to work on getting my Rubik’s Cube time under thirty-five seconds,” said Jamal. “It might take me the whole summer, but I’m going to do it.”

  “Hmmm,” said Mr. Buntrock. “I’m sure you will. You sound very determined.”

  Everybody was excited about their summer. Everyone but me. I had nothing to say. I could feel myself being pulled by the gravitational force of nothingness. I had read about it in one of my Gravity Man comic books. The truth is, I didn’t want summer to start. I wasn’t ready. I had nothing to do.

  “Let’s get back to the word of the day,” Mr. Buntrock said. “The word I chose is freedom. When you leave school today, you’ll have the freedom to do all the things that you aren’t able to do during the school year. Whatever you do, I hope you all have an excellent summer.”

  “I’m not doing anything this summer,” I blurted out.

  Someone at the back of the class snickered.

  “Well, Henry, even doing nothing is something. It’s one of my favorite things to do,” said Mr. Buntrock. “Now, let’s do some laughter yoga, my friends. And remember, laughter yoga is something you can do by yourself anytime. You don’t need me. You don’t even need a partner. Just let it out.”

  I was still mad at Max. There was nothing to laugh about. I was mad, and I wanted to stay mad. But then the others in the class started to laugh, and I couldn’t help it. I laughed at how mad I was. I laughed at my stupid fake shoes. I laughed at the nothing summer ahead. I laughed at everything.

  12

  Near the end of the day Mr. Buntrock said he had one final lesson for us.

  “Line up and follow me,” he said. “We’re going outside.”

  Mr. Buntrock led us to the patch of grass near the teachers’ parking lot. There was a table set up. Something was on the table, but whatever it was, it was covered up with a red tablecloth. It was meant to be a surprise.

  “This has been a good year,” said Mr. Buntrock. “We’ve come a long way together. We’ve grown as a group. I want you all to leave fifth grade knowing you can do anything you want to do. If you dream of being a dog-walker, you can do it. If you dream of solving a Rubik’s Cube in record time, you can do it. If you dream of being a rocket scientist, you can be a rocket scientist. Does anyone know what a rocket scientist does?”

  “Do you mean an aerospace engineer?” asked Selena.

  “A rocket scientist is an aerospace engineer,” said Max. “They make rockets.”

  “Max is correct. A rocket scientist — or aerospace engineer, thank you, Selena — makes rockets,” said Mr. Buntrock. “But that’s not all they do. A rocket scientist shoots for the moon. A rocket scientist is someone who isn’t afraid to try. They’re not afraid to make mistakes. They’re not afraid to fail. I want you all to put your hands over your hearts. I want you to make me a promise.”

  We all put our hands over our hearts.

  “Repeat after me,” he said. “I promise I will make mistakes.”

  There were giggles and snickers all around. We make mistakes all the time. Why were we promising to keep doing what we were already doing? Shouldn’t we be promising not to make mistakes?

  “I promise I will make mistakes,” we repeated.

  “I promise I will make amazing mistakes,” he said.

  “I promise I will make amazing mistakes,” we said.

  “I promise I will learn from them,” he said.

  “I promise I will learn from them,” we said.

  “When I leave this class I will shoot for the moon,” he said.

  “When I leave this class I will shoot for the moon,” we said.

  Then, with a single wave of his hand and a flick of his wrist, Mr. Buntrock pulled the red tablecloth. It fluttered away in a big red flurry. There, sitting on the table, were big bottles of diet cola and little rolls of breath mints.

  Mr. Buntrock called us up, one by one. He gave each of us our own bottle of diet cola and our own roll of breath mints. It felt like he was giving us our diplomas.

  He told us to open the bottles of soda and pour some of it onto the grass.

  “These breath mints have the power to turn this plain old diet cola into rocket fuel,” he explained. “I had you pour some of it out so there’ll be room in the bottle for the reaction that will take place when you add the mints.”

  We carefully stood our open bottles of soda on the grass, making sure they didn’t tip over. Mr. Buntrock told us that, when it was our turn, we were to drop three breath mints into our bottles and then take a few steps back.

  “In scientific terms, the mints will trigger a rapid expulsion of copious quantities of carbon dioxide from the diet cola,” he explained. “In simple terms, we’re making bottle rockets. We’re all rocket scientists today. Let’s shoot for the moon.”

  Jamal went first.

  One at a time, he dropped the mints into his bottle.

  He jumped back.

  BO
OM!

  PPPPPFFFFFFFFFFFSSsssssssst!

  “Awesome!” exclaimed Jamal, drenched in the foamy cola that sprayed into the air. “That’s totally awesome!”

  Emmett, Eli and Rowan went next.

  BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

  PPPPPFFFFFFFFFFFSSsssssssst!

  “Wicked!!”

  Then Declan, Selena and Jude went.

  BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

  PPPPPFFFFFFFFFFFSSsssssssst!

  Soda was spraying everywhere! Fizz hung in the air like some sort of weird mist. My T-shirt was soaked. My new running shoes, too! I didn’t care.

  Gretchen Thorn went.

  She laughed as the soda sprayed her.

  Youssef went.

  Charlie and Sophie went.

  Then Max.

  BOOM!

  PPPPPFFFFFFFFFFFSSsssssssst!

  His glasses were dripping.

  “That was wicked!” he said. “I want to do that at home.”

  Finally, it was my turn.

  I dropped the mints in, one at a time.

  My wet Chads squeaked as I stepped back, and then …

  Boom!

  Pppffffffssttt!

  Fifth grade ended with a bang.

  13

  I emailed my mom as soon as I got home.

  from: Henry <9999Henry9999@jmail.com>

  to: Mom

  subject: Hello from your son

  Dear Mom,

  How are you? Are you in Las Vegas yet? What’s your hotel room like? Is it nice?

  The day started out good. After you left Dad gave me a present. He gave me a new pair of running shoes. I thought they were Chad Bakers, but they’re really Chad Fakers. They’re fake. Dad got them from the Dollar Shack.

  I liked them until Max started making fun of them. His friends all laughed at me. It was horrible. Did you know Dad got me fake shoes? Max says the Dollar Shack is only good for cheap batteries and weird snacks. I wish I had real Chads. I wish Max wasn’t such a jerk sometimes.