Cheesie Mack Is Not a Genius or Anything (20 page)

I nodded. “A coin collector.”

She took a scrapbook sort of thing off a shelf next to her and put it in my lap. There were about ten other books just like it on the shelf. She opened it. It was a collection of Lincoln Head cents with every hole filled.

“My sister sent me that coin for two reasons. I told you only the emotional one. The other reason was that I needed it to complete my collection. When I lost it, I purchased another to replace it.” She pointed at a coin with “1909-S VDB” printed under it, then held the one we found right next to it.

“But I think I’d prefer the coin my sister sent me.” She removed the 1909-S VDB coin from her coin book and replaced it with the one from Georgie’s basement.

She reached for my hand and put the penny from
the coin book in my palm next to the three-dollar coin. Her skin was thin and dry and very soft.

“You did a very good thing today, Mr. Cheesie Mack. Now, do me a favor and take that coin to Mr. Whelan, and then go find Mr. Sinkoff and convince him to be friends again.”

I shook my head. “He’s too mad at me.”

“That will change sooner than you think.”

I shook my head harder.

Her on-off-on-off smile returned and she nodded her head several times. “Best friends are forever. I am convinced of it.”

She walked with me to the front door. I was so depressed that without even trying, I walked just as slowly as she did. As she opened the door, she put a hand on my shoulder. “There’s one thing more, Mr. Cheesie Mack. I am not poor. Actually, I am quite rich. My mother left me this home and quite an ample sum of money that I have wisely invested. You needn’t worry about me.”

Then she gave me a hug. She smelled like baby powder and flowers.

I walked outside, stuck the coins in my pocket, and trudged to my bike. I had left it plopped on the sidewalk, but someone had picked it up and propped it against the fence.

“Cheesie?”

I turned around. Georgie was straddling his bike.

“How’s it going?” he asked.

I didn’t know what to say. “Okay, I guess.”

There was a long pause. I didn’t look at Georgie, and I’m pretty sure he wasn’t looking at me. Finally he said, “Umm, did you give her the penny?”

“Uh-huh. She had another just like it. She wants me to sell that one for her.”

There was another long pause. There didn’t seem to be anything else for either of us to say.

Georgie broke the silence. “Yeah, well, I’ve been riding around thinking, and I think you were right and I was wrong, and I’m sorry I made fun of how much your ears stick out.”

“You didn’t make fun of my ears.”

“I know, but I thought about them.” He reached out and flicked my ear and grinned.

I grinned back, and we rode to Mr. Whelan’s and gave him the coin, and we were best friends again. Maybe, like Ms. Prott said, “forever.”

On the way home, I told Georgie everything that happened while I was inside The Toad.

(I’ve changed my mind. Even though it’s Ms. Prott’s house and not haunted, it still seems like The Toad to me.)

He was really surprised when I told him that Ms. Prott was rich.

“Look, I apologized and I meant it, but I think it stinks that she didn’t give us even a tiny reward.”

I hadn’t thought of that. “We still have the other coin as a souvenir.”

“Yippee. It’s worth three bucks. Big shmeal.”

“We did the right thing, Georgie.”

He shrugged. “I know. But I can still be a little bit angry.”

I gave him a super-stern look. “If you’re angry, I’m irritated.”

“If you’re irritated, I’m aggravated.”

“If you’re aggravated, I’m infuriated.”

“If you’re infuriated, I’m transpaxulated,” Georgie said.

I smiled and gave Georgie a thumbs-up sign. This is another game he and I play. The rule is that you have to use a bigger or harder word each time. Since I have a larger vocabulary, Georgie mostly wins the game by making up a super-big word.

(There’s a word game kind of like this on my website.)

When we got back to my house for lunch, Goon was reading a book, Granpa was watching golf on TV (he has never played, but he thinks he knows exactly what the players should do at each hole), and Mom was in Dad’s office doing something with his computer. I made BLART sandwiches for Georgie and me, and a BLT for Mom. I was feeling so good, I even made a sandwich for Goon. Granpa likes to make his own lunch.

While I was pouring drinks, I had an idea. “Georgie, let’s build a tree house this summer.”

“We did that two summers ago.”

“That was just some planks nailed to a branch, and
it was only ten feet up. I’m talking about walls and a roof and building it in the tree outside your attic window with an extension cord for electricity. We could rig up a pulley to get the boards and stuff up there. And nail about thirty boards onto the trunk to make a ladder.”

It was a great plan. We were both grinning when I set Goon’s sandwich down next to her.

“What’s this?” she asked.

“A LART sandwich.”

“For what?”

“For you.”

“Why?”

“Just because.”

“Don’t expect me to make one for you tomorrow just because.”

I shrugged and walked away.

“But thanks anyway,” Goon said to my back as I carried Mom’s sandwich into Dad’s office.

Georgie took a bite of his BLART while he was following me and had to pull his plate up to his face to catch the drippiness that glorped out on his face and
everywhere else. “For that tree house, my dad has some old rug pieces in the garage,” he said. “We could nail those down and bring up sleeping bags and my TV and play video—” He didn’t finish his sentence because he took another super-dribbly bite.

Mom seemed very frustrated with her computer stuff.

“I wish your father kept better track of the checks he writes. Hey, thanks for the sandwich.” She took a bite. “How did it go with the lady you were helping?”

“Huh?”

“You had to return an envelope?”

“Oh, that. Fine.”

“Actually, she called a little while ago. Found our number in the book. She’d like you boys to do some yard work this weekend.”

“Yard work?”

“Sure. Cut the grass, weeding … jobs like that.”

Georgie looked confused. I am completely sure that I did, too.

“You are helping her, aren’t you? Ms. Prott, right?” Mom continued.

“Well, kind of, I guess. We were. I mean, we did.”

“She’d like you to come over every week, starting this weekend. And in the winter, she’d like you to shovel her walks.”

Georgie’s lips and chin were white with ranch dressing. “Is she going to pay us for our slave labor?”

“Me too,” I murbled into my sandwich.

Mom dipped her BLT into some of the ranch dressing on my plate and took a bite. “She is. In fact, she said she’d like to pay you for the whole next year in advance. And she understands that you won’t be able to work during the summer when you two are away.”

Both Georgie and I had sandwiches poised in midair. I had just taken a huge chomp, but I was too confused to chew.

“Away? Huh?” I grunted through the BLART bite.

“Ms. Prott told me what you boys did about that coin.” Mom took another bite of her sandwich and made us wait while she chewed and chewed and finally swallowed. “I am so proud of you both. I’ve already told your father, Georgie. Ms. Prott has given you a reward. She’s paid for your camp this summer!”

We screamed.

We jumped.

We dropped our sandwiches on the rug and made a huge BLART mess.

Mom didn’t care.

The End

I
lied.

About two million pages ago, I explained that I wrote
Chapter 0
last. But then lots of things happened in the summer, so I am writing this chapter absolutely last.

I promise.

A chapter like this is called an epilogue, but that is not a word kids use very often. It means the place where you put the moral of the story or what happens after the story ends. So here goes.

Three weeks after we dropped our sandwiches, two weeks after the pizza party, and one week after we did Ms. Prott’s yard work—it was easy—Georgie and I were on the bus with all our old friends and a bunch of maybe new ones. We were out of Massachusetts,
past New Hampshire, and on the Maine Turnpike heading north to what would become the greatest summer camp experience of our lives.

Here’s what happened at camp:

1. Anticipation
   
2. Disaster
   
3. A Big Decision
   
4. Big Problems
   
5. Amazingly Great Fun
   
6. Huge Disaster that culminated (This is the last big word in this book. It means “ended.”) in …
   
7. A Surprise Conclusion that even I was amazed at … and I was there!
   

It’s all in my next book, which I’m going to begin writing immediately after I finish this epilogue and go to the bathroom. I haven’t figured out what the title will be (because I haven’t written the book yet), but by the time you read this, the title will be on my website.

This really is the last chapter of this book. If you liked it, please tell your friends because Mom says if lots of people buy my books:

1. I’ll have enough money to pay for college on my own.
   
2. My parents can retire.
   
3. Mom can grow her hair long and do pottery like she always wanted to.
   
4. Dad might finally fix up his motorcycle (which has been broken in our basement since before I was born and has a totally excellent sidecar that I’ve never ridden in), so that he and Mom could travel together from Alaska to the bottom of South America before they get too old for their own adventures.
   

BTW, Mrs. Crespo convinced Georgie and Lana Shen to combine their pizza parties so no one would be left out, so with eighty dollars to spend, Georgie was able to have his pizza-eating contest after all, and Lana Shen tried to sit next to me, but I got a bellyache from eating too fast or something, so I sort of stood behind Georgie and watched him eat eight slices and win.

Double-BTW, Georgie and I did not build a tree house. We did not have time.

Triple-BTW, I never did figure out about the mysterious
Eureka
word. I think it had something to do with Eureka Avenue, but why was it dented into the paper that was wrapped around the 1909-S VDB Lincoln cent and the heart necklace? I guess I could ask Glenora Jean Prott, but I’d rather ask you. If you have a theory, please go to my website and tell me.

And that’s what happened at the end of fifth grade.

So … finally … at last … and in conclusion,
Cheesie Mack Is Not a Genius or Anything
culminates with this epilogue.

This is the third-to-last sentence.

I hope you liked this book.

Go to my website.

Signed: