Ellray Jakes Walks the Plank (9 page)

“Before lunch,” Alfie says, dribbling some more pink cereal milk down her chin. “Mommy’s gonna go get her.”

I hand Alfie a clean napkin. “Well, you guys have to stay out of my room this time,” I tell her. “Because I’m going to be over at Corey’s. Or Kevin’s,” I say, correcting myself when I remember that Corey probably has a swim meet this weekend—or, at the very least, practice. Swimming is the only thing Corey ever does in his spare time. I think his parents need him to be best at something. More than Corey needs to be the best, I mean.

“But me and Suzette were gonna make a pretend store in the backyard,” Alfie says, her spoon drooping. “And I wanted you to come buy stuff, EllWay.”

“I’ll give you a quarter,” I tell her fast. “And you can buy some things for me, okay? And put them outside my room. But pretend there’s an invisible lock on the door.”

“
Is
there?” Alfie asks, her eyes huge.

“Not really,” I admit, because for some reason, I don’t like to lie to my little sister. It’s too easy, for one thing. What would be the point? “But pretend there’s a lock, okay, Alfie? Because there’s such a thing as privacy.”

“Okay,” Alfie says. “Hey,” she says, looking at her imaginary wristwatch and smiling again, “it’s almost time for our cartoons to start!”

“Yeah,” I say. “Go turn on the TV, but not too loud. I’ll rinse our bowls.”

“Okay,” Alfie says, and
POOF
. She’s gone.

The next Friday, just before lunch, we are supposed to be finishing up and turning in our
Treasure Island
art projects—which are supposed to be either maps of the island or pirate flags, but not just skulls and crossbones—while Ms. Sanchez takes some important papers to the office and talks with the principal. I am standing next to Ms. Sanchez’s desk at the same time as Cynthia and Heather.

Almost everyone else in class has already handed in their maps and flags. They are now doing Sustained Silent Reading—or goofing around. But
silently
.

Cynthia slaps her fancy pirate flag onto Ms. Sanchez’s desk. She did it on pink construction paper. It has palm trees and glitter coconuts on each side of the rainbow in the middle, and it doesn’t look
very pirate-y to me. But maybe girl pirates love glitter and rainbows, I don’t know.

Heather is holding the stars-and-stripes USA flag she made for the pirates. She is probably hoping that Ms. Sanchez will figure this project is so patriotic that she won’t be able to say anything bad about it.

Heather likes to play things safe.

I made a map of what I think Treasure Island looks like, and it came out pretty good, in my opinion. I drew the Spy-glass hill and the North Inlet and the stockade. Everything. And I put pistols and knives all around the edges, which Mom helped me tear perfectly to make my map look old. I wanted to burn the edges a little, too, so it would look like my map was pulled out of a pirate ship fire, but Mom
said playing with fire was asking for trouble.

Listen. I will never need to
ask
for trouble, not when trouble seems to find me so easily.

Heather slides her flag under Cynthia’s, but just as I put my map on top, Cynthia swats it away. “Mine gets to be on top,” she whispers. “I want Ms. Sanchez to see it first. That’s why I waited to turn it in. Duh.”

“Watch
out
,” I whisper back. “You almost ripped my map.” I examine it carefully for damage.

“Oh, like you could
tell
,” Cynthia says, laughing. And she nudges Heather until she laughs, too. “It’s not like EllRay’s map isn’t already all ripped up,” Cynthia says. “Look at it!”

“Yeah,” Heather agrees. But I can tell she wishes she
weren’t trapped in the middle of this.

“I tore the edges on purpose,” I inform Cynthia.

All three of us are trying to keep our voices low, but a few kids—Emma, Annie Pat, and Kevin, especially—are looking up to see what’s going on.

“It looks old, all right,” Cynthia says, barely giving my excellent map a glance. “My palm tree flag goes on top, and that’s final. I don’t want my glitter coconuts getting all ruined.”

And then she shoves me for no reason.

I stumble back a couple of steps, and two or three kids laugh. They sound a little nervous, but they laugh.

Okay. I know that a boy is never supposed to hit a girl, even when she’s way bigger than he is, so I don’t. But I nudge Cynthia with my shoulder when I try again to put my map on top of the pile of
Treasure Island
art projects.

“
OW
,” Cynthia yells, clutching her arm like I just slugged it.

By now, everyone is watching us.

So much for Sustained Silent Reading. Now, it’s Sustained Silent Staring.

“EllRay hit me,” Cynthia announces to the class.

“He did not,” Emma says, amazed. “We just saw the whole thing, Cynthia!”

“Yeah,” Kevin, Corey, and Annie Pat agree, nodding their heads.

“Mind your own business,” Cynthia tells them. She’s really mad.

Cynthia turns her back to the class, and Heather crowds in close.

And I still haven’t turned in my art project yet!

“I
am
putting my map on top of that pile, and you guys are not gonna stop me,” I tell Cynthia and Heather.

“Put it under mine,” Cynthia says.

“Why should I?” I ask.

“Just do it,” Heather urges me, sounding nervous. “Just
do
it, EllRay. Please?”

And I am just about to shrug and give in, because this is such a stupid fight, when Cynthia shoves me again.

And so I shove her back.

Okay
. One thing that I haven’t mentioned yet is that right next to the pile of maps and flags is Ms. Sanchez’s very important attendance notebook—and her water bottle, which she usually carries
with her everywhere she goes for some reason. But she doesn’t have it with her right now.

Inside her attendance notebook, Ms. Sanchez keeps very neat score each day of who is in class and who isn’t. Then that becomes part of our permanent record. And it’s written in secret code! She showed us once. For example, there are different marks for being in school, for being absent with no excuse, and for being absent with an excuse. And probably codes for other stuff, too, for all I know. Ms. Sanchez says the attendance notebook is her work of art.

We’re not allowed to touch that notebook
ever
, it’s so important.

“Quit shoving,” Cynthia says, shoving me again.

“You quit shoving,” I say, shoving her back.

“I’m gonna sock you one,” Cynthia says.

She’s going to
sock
me? Cynthia Harbison, whose hair and clothes and fingernails are always so tidy and clean? Cynthia, who likes to brag about her grades and her perfect record, and how dainty she is?

I don’t
think
so!

If she actually does hit me, though,
I will not
hit her back
, I decide right then and there. But I will defend myself—and my pirate map—from her Fist of Doom, which is like the one in my video game
Die, Creature, Die
, only bigger.

I will figure out how to do this when the time comes.

“C’mon, Cynthia,” Heather says, trying to pull her away from the desk. “Who cares if his stupid pirate map goes on top or not?”

“I care,” Cynthia says, and she swings her straight arm toward me like it’s a bat, and we’re playing T-ball, and my head is the ball.

This is a dumb way to hit anything, which is probably why it doesn’t work now, because I duck out of the way. But—over goes Ms. Sanchez’s water bottle, right onto the famous secret code attendance notebook.

Frozen in horror, Cynthia, Heather, and I watch the water
GLUG, GLUG, GLUG
three times onto the very important notebook before any of us can move. But I’m the one who finally picks the bottle up—just as Ms. Sanchez walks in the door.

Naturally
.

“Oh, no! Look what EllRay did, Ms. Sanchez,”
Cynthia cries out. “Your poor official attendance notebook! Your work of art! He threw water
all over it
. On purpose!”

“My notebook,” Ms. Sanchez says, sprinting over to her desk, grabbing the notebook, and shaking it twice. She wipes the wet pages with the corner of her sweater.

“It’s all EllRay’s fault,” Cynthia says, sounding almost scared.

“We’ll discuss this later,” Ms. Sanchez says, still dabbing at the notebook. “Later,” she says again, as if she is too upset to talk about it right now.

“Come over to the drinking fountain,” Cynthia says a few minutes later, grabbing at my shirt in the crowded hallway when me and my friends are headed outside to eat lunch and play. “I have to talk to you.”

“
TOUGH
,” I say, yanking my arm away. “I never want to talk to you again, Cynthia Harbison. You liar.”

“Yeah,” Kevin says, scowling at Cynthia. “Liar. I don’t think Ms. Sanchez even believed you when you tried to explain.”

“C’mon, EllRay,” Cynthia says, not looking at him. “It’s important.”

“So is telling the truth,” I say. “Talk to me outside with my friends, if you have the guts.”

“At the
boys’
table?” Cynthia says, like I just asked her to meet me inside the nearest garbage can.