Superheroes Don't Eat Veggie Burgers (16 page)

I read it again.

A sixth-grade female honors student …

Was it Dolores? No, that's crazy. She'd never pull a fire alarm. But she was the only one missing yesterday, and she definitely qualifies as an “honors student.” And what about the eighth-grade males? Could they be talking about Boomer and his buffoons? Did something happen to put them in the hospital?

I think about yesterday, and suddenly the words I wrote in my journal come back to me.

The toxins will eat your flesh …

Did
I
put those guys in the hospital?

I stuff the paper back in the trash can right as my dad walks into the kitchen again.

“Ready for a couple more pancakes?”

I glance over at Lucy, her hair sticking to her face. “I don't think so,” I tell him, heading toward the stairs. “I've got to take care of something first.”

 

CHAPTER

30

I beg. I plead. I try to strike a deal.

“I'll be in and out of the school in less than ten minutes, Mom.”

“No, Charlie.” She crosses her arms. “And that's final.”

When I went upstairs to get dressed, I could see from my bedroom window that the snow wasn't even sticking to the road. I figured I could bike to Gatehouse, grab my journal, and be home before anyone even noticed I was gone. Sledding at Grant's was clearly out.

But when I came back downstairs, my mom was standing in the hallway, pulling a black stocking cap onto her head.

“I forgot my hat,” she explained. “It's freezing outside.”

Now, standing in front of her, I hold my hands together like I'm praying. “Please, Mom, look,” I tell her, unzipping my jacket. “I even put on two sweaters. I planned ahead, see?”

“You are not biking to that school, Charlie. Or anywhere, for that matter.”

“I need my science journal, Mom.”

She shakes her head. “The homework can wait.”

“But—”

She sighs. “Charlie, even if I said yes, it wouldn't matter. The school is locked.”

“There must be a janitor or—”

“Charles, you don't understand.”

“Understand what, Mom?” Now I cross my arms too. “How can I understand if you don't tell me what's going on?”

She hooks her thumbs into her belt loops, then looks around like she's about to let me in on a national secret.

“Four students from Gatehouse were hospitalized last night. No one knows exactly why, but the doctors have reason to believe they may have contracted meningococcal meningitis.”

“Meni-what?”

“Meningococcal meningitis. It's a bacterial infection that can spread quite easily among people who have had close contact with one another.” She plays with the clip on her belt. “If left untreated, it can make a person very sick—in some cases it's even fatal.”

“Fatal? As in, dead?”

She nods.

“But how do they know that's what they have?” I ask her. “I mean, it could be lots of things, right?”

She bites at her thumbnail. “All four boys showed up in the emergency room last night with rashes that are very specific to this particular infection. Until the tests come back, the kids will stay in the hospital, and the school will remain closed. We don't want an outbreak on our hands.”

I feel like someone just punched me in the gut. “The rash … Do you know what it looks like?”

She gives me a strange look. “Why?” She reaches for the bottom of my sweater. “Are you showing signs of—”

“I'm fine, Mom,” I tell her, moving out of her reach. “I was just curious is all.”

She pulls her hat lower and reaches for the door handle. “Well, I'll know more after I go to the precinct.” She starts to open the door but then turns back to me. “Promise me you won't go anywhere near Gatehouse or any of your classmates until we have more information.”

“But, Mom…”

“Meningococcal meningitis is not something to mess with. If you are found anywhere near that school, you will be quarantined until those tests come back, do you understand?”

I nod. “I understand.”

“Thank you, Charlie.” Her eyes soften. “What you said yesterday in the car about not being a little kid anymore … You're right. You are growing up. And I'm proud of you.”

She walks out the door. My feet feel like bricks as I turn and drag them back up the stairs, which seem steeper than they did before.

Back in my room, I sit down at my computer and type. Right away, results pop up on to the screen.

Meningococcal meningitis is an aggressive infection that attacks the lining of the brain. Even with rapid identification and treatment, it can cause death.

I scroll farther until I get to the list of symptoms: high fever, neck stiffness, pain in different joints …

I stop, and my eyes wander back up.
Neck stiffness?
I think back to the journal entry. After Bloogfer got shot with the Exterminizer, didn't he say he couldn't move his neck?

I keep reading until I find what I'm looking for. It's even typed in bold.

A red or purple skin rash
may indicate blood poisoning, in which case you should seek medical attention immediately.

My whole body starts to shake. The goo that Dude shot at Boomer and the others was purple.

Did Dude give those guys this disease?

Are they going to die because of me?

*   *   *

Pickles picks up on the first ring.

“Yeah?” She says it fast, like she was expecting my call.

“Pickles, it's me, Charlie.”

“Did you work everything out?”

I push my door closed with my foot. “Just the opposite,” I say, my voice cracking. “I've made a mess of everything.”

“Tell me,” she says.

So I do. I tell her about Dude and turning Lucy into a dog, and the dance, and how Mr. P thinks I might be something called a bully buster. I tell her about Coach losing his voice and our winning the game. And then I tell her about chess club and the fire alarm and how my journal is gone and the school is closed and how Boomer and his friends might have meningococcal meningitis and if they die, it's because of me.

She clears her throat. “Meni-what?”

“Meni—oh, never mind. That's not important. What's important is, I've got to figure out how to get my journal and fix the mess I've made. I just want everything to go back to the way it was. I want everything to be normal again.”

“Slow down,” she says. “First of all, how do you know those kids in the hospital are the same bozos who showed up at your chess club?”

I think about this for a minute. Maybe she's right.… Maybe it's all just a coincidence. The paper said it was four eighth-grade males, but that was all. There are lots of eighth-grade males at Gatehouse. And, even if it is Boomer and his bozos, maybe their infection has nothing to do with me. The article I read said the rash could be red or purple. Until I know more details, this could have nothing at all to do with Dude Explodius or his last adventure.

“I've got to go to the hospital, Pickles,” I say. “I've got to see if it's Boomer, and if it is, if his rash is purple.”

“And if it is?”

“Then I've got to find that journal and fix this. Before it's too late.”

I hear a chime in the background, signaling a customer coming into the store. “I've got to go, Charlie,” she says, her voice low. “If you need me…”

“Pickles?”

“Yeah?”

I grip the phone tighter. “Do you think Gramps was a bully buster?”

For a minute, she doesn't say anything. When she finally does, her voice is heavy.

“I don't know, Charlie. Like I told you before, I didn't understand a lot of what he was doing in that lab, and to be honest, I didn't ask a lot of questions. But I know one thing for sure.”

“What's that?”

“He wanted to make a difference.” She sighs. “And he was willing to risk everything to make that happen.”

I hang up, knowing what I have to do.

*   *   *

Twenty minutes later, I'm leaning my bike against a
RESERVED FOR PHYSICIANS ONLY
sign and staring across the parking lot at Cape Ann Medical Center. Even though most of the snow has already melted, patches of it linger on the grass and bushes around me.

I look down at the watch I grabbed off my dad's dresser. I feel bad that I lied to him, but it was the only way he'd let me leave the house without making a stink about it.

“Dad, I'm going to Anthony's!” I hollered, heading down the stairs and scooting toward the front door.

“Anthony Gargotti?” He wandered out of the kitchen, holding a plate of homemade muffins. “I thought your mom told you to stay put.”

I was prepared for him to say something like this. “She said I had to stay away from anyone who goes to Gatehouse. Anthony goes to a different school, remember?”

He handed me a muffin. “I don't know, Charlie. Anthony is…”

I was prepared for this, too. “Come on, Dad. We're just going to play video games, not steal a car.”

He laughed at that, and then said fine, I could go, as long as I was home before dinner and didn't try any funny business. Now, staring up at the hospital, I can't think of anything less funny than what I'm about to do.

A gust of cold air smacks me in the face. “Stop being a baby, Burger,” I mutter, and hurry across the sidewalk and into the building. “You can do this. You can.”

The lobby is glossy and white and reminds me of last winter when my dad and I brought Franki here after she'd fallen while skating at Mill Pond. She had to wear a cast up to her elbow for six weeks, but it smelled like foot fungus after four.

Thinking about Franki makes me feel better. I wish she could have seen the way I handled things yesterday after the fire alarm went off. Maybe she would have finally realized I did have guts. A lot of them, in fact.

I walk across the white tiles to a desk that sits smack in the middle of the room. An
INFORMATION
sign hangs above it. A woman watches as I approach, but she doesn't move the cell phone from her ear.

“You just wouldn't believe what's going on, Eugene,” she's saying into the phone. “The switchboard lit up as soon as the paper came out this morning, reporters wanting updates and parents wondering if their own children need to be tested. What? Have I seen them?” She rolls her eyes like this is the craziest thing ever. “Honey, I didn't fall off the turnip truck yesterday. Until they figure out what's wrong with those boys, I'm not stepping foot anywhere near the third floor.” She lowers her voice a little. “From what I hear, they're not doing too good.”

My insides flip over. I cough, hoping that will get her attention. I don't cover my mouth.

“I've got to go,” she says. “Yes, I'll call. The second I know more…” She turns off the phone, drops it into a bag on the floor, and then swivels around to her computer.

“Name?” she says to the screen.

“Charlie.”

She inspects a long fingernail, then another. Finally, she looks up at me, her eyelids heavy.

“Of the patient.”

“Oh—uh…” I think for a second but realize I don't even know what Boomer's real name is. Nobody would actually name their kid Boomer, would they?

“Bodbreath. I'm wondering if Mr. Bodbreath is here.”

Her fingers quit typing.

“Only immediate family members are allowed in the quarantine area.”

A chill runs down my spine. So, he
is
here. “Well, I am,” I say, thinking fast. “An immediate family member, that is.”

She narrows her eyes at me.

“We're cousins. Close cousins.” I cross my fingers. “We're like this. Tight.”

“Of course you are,” she says, holding out her hand. “I just need to see your identification and then I'll call security.”

“Security?”

She points to a pile of bright-orange badges that sit on her desk.
CLEARED FOR VISITATION
is stamped across the front of each one. “Security must sign off before I can give you one of those.” She glares at me. “It's the only way you're getting to the third floor.”

We stare at each other for a minute, neither of us backing down. Finally, I reach into my back pocket, pretending to dig for my wallet. A light on the switchboard starts blinking.

She points a skinny finger at me. “Don't move.”

Right away, her voice changes. “Cape Ann Medical Center,” she singsongs. “How may I—” Her eyes double in size. “Channel Three News!” Swiveling away from me, she pats her hair. “An interview?” She giggles like a schoolgirl. “Well, sure. I'd be more than happy to … Yes, I'll hold.”

Bending over, she starts to rifle through her bag, and I see my chance. Reaching down, I snag one of the security passes off her desk. The bank of elevators is in front of me, and I make a run for it. As the doors slide open, I look back.

Cradling the hospital phone on one ear, she holds her cell phone up to the other. “Oh, Eugene!” I can hear her say. “You will not believe this! Guess who's going to be on the five-o'clock news!”

Seconds later, I step out onto the third floor. A nurses' station is in front of me. Two women sit behind it, their heads bent down. Next to them, a machine lets out tiny beeps.

“May I help you?”

I practically jump out of my skin. I look up and see a tiny woman, dressed in white, standing next to me.

“Uh…” Now I have to pee. Maybe I should rethink my plan. Isn't it enough that I know he's here? Do I have to see him, too?

I shoot what I hope is a convincing smile at the lady. “Wrong floor,” I say, turning around and jabbing the down button on the wall. The doors slide open, and I step on, relieved.