Ten (16 page)

That's right: ME, a true Atlanta insider, who nonetheless wasn't afraid to be an outsider when the mood struck.

I got so wrapped up in my insider-outsider thoughts—and with wanting that boy's shirt—that I almost got left behind when the other fifth graders exited the lobby. Amanda had to grab my elbow and say, “Winnie, snap out of it. It's time to go in search of the secret formula!”

“Huh?”

She dragged me up the stairs to the second level, where the whole grade was filing into a theater. A sign at the door said, “Embark on a quest to uncover the mysterious secret formula for Coca-Cola! But beware: You're in for a bumpy ride!”

Chantelle and Maxine were ahead of us, accepting 3-D glasses from a man with wild hair who was dressed in a white lab coat. We fell in behind them and got our own pairs. They had the Coke logo on them. I immediately put mine on.

“I am a
ma-a-a-ad
scientist!” I said in a mad scientist voice. I waved my hands around madly. “I will find the secret formula or die trying!”

A girl named Mindy looked at me not as if I was a mad scientist, but as if I was a nutcase who deserved to be locked up. I didn't know Mindy very well, because she was new to Trinity this year, and plus she was in the other fifth grade class. Still, I dropped my mad scientist act and grinned at her. She didn't grin back.

The theater went dark once everyone was inside, and the movie started. It was about this weird guy named Professor Rigsby who was trying to figure out why Coke was so good, and maybe it was kind of dumb, but I loved it anyway. There was a ferret that leaped out at us, and floating fruits, and when Professor Rigsby went to visit the Coke factory, he traveled there in a giant rumbling Coke can. And when the can on the screen rumbled, our seats rumbled!

I was
not
expecting that, and I squealed and grabbed my armrests. Amanda squealed and grabbed me. Our seats moved other times, too, lurching us forward and shaking us up and tilting us from side to side. I guess that's what the sign meant by telling us we were in for a bumpy ride.

At one point, Professor Rigsby took us to see the water filtration system, and
real water
misted up from under our seats. We squealed again. I leaned over to see if there were hoses down there, but it was too dark for me to see. We got misted again when the movie showed a giant water fountain, but that time we were more prepared. We also got wind blown in our faces and jostled a lot more. It was awesome.

After the movie, we were allowed to wander around on our own. Amanda, Chantelle, and I stuck together, and we learned lots of freaky facts about Coke. Like, in Japan, they sell
soup
in Coke cans, and that when Coke first came out, it cost five cents a glass.

“Oh, oh!” I said, spotting the part of the museum I'd been looking for since we got there. “The tasting room! Come on!”

We rushed inside and saw most of our class already in there. The whole room was one big soda fountain, pretty much, only instead of six drinks to choose from, we had
sixty
. Sixty different soft drinks, from all over the world! Sugar sugar sugar! And
caffeine
!

“Oh my God,” I overheard Ms. Meyers say to Mrs. Tompkins after Alex Plotkin burped so loudly that a security guard had to tell him to quiet down. “
Whose
idea was this?”

My favorite drink was Spar-berry, from Zimbabwe. It was like sparkling berries of delight. My least favorite was from Italy. It was called Beverly, and it was . . . it was . . .
blegh
. It was awful, and why anyone would drink it on purpose was a mystery I doubted anyone could figure out, even Professor Rigsby.

We ended our tour by filing in with a big group of tourists to view a second movie. This one was peaceful and relaxing, and the seats didn't move. Basically it was one big commercial made up of all the squillions of Coke commercials that had ever existed. I liked it, especially one commercial about an adorable baby polar bear, and another commercial where tons of people got together and sang, “I'd Like to Buy the World a Coke.”

It made me realize that really, the entire World of Coke was one big commercial. But I didn't care. I loved the World of Coke. I loved everything about it.

Something
moved
on my armrest, and I jumped and cried out.

“What?” Amanda said. “Did your seat move?”

“Not fair!” Chantelle said. “Mine didn't!”

“Girls.
Shhhh
,” Ms. Meyers said, giving us a stern look from way down at the end of the aisle.

I zipped my lips and did some dramatic pointing. I unzipped them just enough to whisper, “My seat did not move. My seat has a
toe
on it!”

I was sitting in between Amanda and Chantelle, and they both leaned in to check my armrest. Propped up on it was
a real live human toe
, probably female because of the chipped red polish, and in desperate need of lotion.

“Ew!”
Amanda whispered.

“I know!” I bent over and looked beneath my seat, where I spotted two
empty
sandals. In Atlanta, you could wear sandals in November, because it rarely got cold. I sat back up straight. Jerking my thumb over my shoulder, I whispered, “It belongs to the lady behind me.”

“You think?” Chantelle said.

“Well, it better!” I huffed. If it didn't,
omigosh
. I imagined the headline: Disembodied Toe Floats through World of Coke, Terrorizing Small Children!
Ahhhhhh!

“Make her move it,” I told Chantelle.

“Excuse me?
You
make her move it,” Chantelle said.

“Why me?”

“Because it's
your
toe!”

“It is not
my
toe, and I am
terribly
offended!” I folded my arms over my chest. “The only way to make it up to me is if you move it.”

She rolled her eyes.

“Fine,” I grumbled. I turned to Amanda, resting my head on her shoulder and batting my eyelashes. “Amanda? Will you move it?” Pwease?”

“No way,” Amanda said. She giggled. “Just . . . poke it.”

“Or tell the lady to move it,” Chantelle said. She peeked behind us, then dropped back with a plop. “Except never mind. I think she's asleep.”

Asleep
? When she was supposed to be appreciating Atlanta by watching Coke commercials?! What kind of horrible tourist was she?!

I looked at the toe. The toe looked back. It was one
ugly
toe. What if it had a fungus? Its bad-lady owner clearly didn't take good care of it. What if it had a flesh-eating toe fungus, and it spread to me, and when the Coke movie ended, all that would remain in my seat was a pile of skin flakes and a
telltale chip of red toenail polish
?

“A girl's got to do what a girl's got to do,” I said under my breath.

So I leaned over, fished around in my backpack, and sat up with my hot pink Hello Kitty gel pen.

“No!” Amanda said, her eyes wide with horror, delight, or both.

“Ready, Kitty?”
I whispered.

The Hello Kitty charm at the top of the pen bobbled her head. “Ready!” she said in a high-pitched kitty voice.

I gave that toe a quick, fast jab, and Chantelle and Amanda gasped. But the toe? The toe didn't move. The toe didn't even flinch!

I. Was. Shocked.

I poked it again. It didn't move
again
.

“Well, folks, I'm sorry it's come to this, but it has,” I said.

“Winnie?” Amanda said nervously.

I couldn't let her distract me, so I pretended she was a moth.

“Winnie,”
Chantelle said.

I turned her into a moth, too.

I twisted sideways, uncapped my gel pen, and drew two eyes on that toe. The toe didn't move, so I added a scowl, two angry eyebrows, and a pointy nose. Then freckles. Then zigzaggy electrified hair.

The toe moved
. I quick sucked in my breath. I froze all my body parts except for my eyes, which searched for a place to hide my pen.

Amanda's lap! Yes! I placed the pen on her jeans, then folded my hands in my lap like a good little Coke girl.

“Winnie, no!” Amanda whisper-squealed, flicking it off her.

“Girls,”
Ms. Meyers said, bending forward at the waist and shooting us a sternier stern look than her first stern look.

“Sorry!” I mouthed. I pointed at Amanda, but above Amanda's head so Amanda couldn't see. I waggled my eyebrows to say,
She's a wild one, I know, but I'll calm her down.

You better,
Ms. Meyers said with a head tilt.

I gave her a thumb's-up, and then I settled back in my seat. I looked at the toe and smiled, imagining what its owner would think when she saw. If she saw, even. People didn't always examine the bottoms of their own toes.

If she did see, I hoped she'd be amazed. Amazed and
thankful,
because without even asking, she'd received a genuine autograph from a genuine girl from Atlanta. Not just any girl, but a girl who was, frankly, a pretty big deal. A girl who was me.

E
eeeeee!
I
loved
Christmas. I loved it and wanted to marry it, and I would never spell it that bad way with the “X” plus the “mas.” One night about a week before school let out for Christmas break, I gave a stirring speech during dinner about that very subject. About how spelling it like that really did take
Christ
out of
Christmas
, only instead of applauding, dumb bunny Sandra jumped in and tried to show off how smart
she
was and how un-smart
I
was.

“What about people who don't believe in Christ?” she said. “What about Jewish people and Muslims and”—her eyes scrunched, then widened—“Rastafarians? Really, Winnie. Have you ever stopped to think about the Rastafarians?”

I pointed at her with a green bean. “First of all, I don't know what a Rastafarian is. And second of all, I'm not talking about them. I'm talking about me. I, Winnie Perry, refuse to take Christ out of Christmas, and the Rasta-whatever-ians can either like it or lump it. But for the record, I am more than happy to share Christmas with everyone.”

“Great, but not everyone wants to share Christmas with you,” she said. “How do you think all the non-Christians feel when you go trotting around saying, ‘La la la! I'm so special because I'm a
Christian
!'”

“I don't say that.”

“You are right now.”

I smiled triumphantly. “Ahhhh-
HA
! And that is where the cookie crumbles, because I'm not standing on the street with a foghorn, now am I?”

“Bullhorn,” Dad said.

“Bullhorn,” I said. “Nope, I'm simply having a lovely conversation with my family as we enjoy a lovely dinner.” I turned to Mom. “And Mother?
Thank you
for this delicious meal.”

“You're welcome,” she said. “Thank you for saying thank you.”

“Thank
you
for saying thank you for saying thank you.”

“Oh good grief,” Sandra said.

I turned back to her. “Anyway, God is God is God whether you're a Jewish person or a Muslim or a Rasta-whatever-ian. That's what I think, and so does Maxine, who
just happens
to be Jewish. And last week, her mom came in and taught us all about Judaism and made us potato latkes.”

I called up the potato latkes' salty, crispy deliciousness and said, “
Mmmm
. Do you know how to make potato latkes, Mom?”

“Sorry,” she said. “I can make a mean red velvet cake, though.”

“Could you
learn
to make potato latkes?”

“I'll look into it,” she said. “So Maxine's mom talked to your class about Judaism? That's great.”

“She does that
every
year, Mom. Dreidel, gelt, menorahs . . .” I put down my green bean, because I didn't like green beans. Tearing off some bread for myself, I said, “I'm practically Jewish myself by now.”

Sandra snorted.

I gave her a haughty look. “And for the record, Maxine and her family celebrate Christmas
and
Hanukkah. Unlike some people I know, they do want to share the joyful story of how baby Jesus came to be born.”

Sandra gestured at my plate. “My, oh my. You certainly have a long way to go on your green beans, don't you?”

I stuck my tongue out at her. She stuck her tongue out at me.

“Girls,” Dad said.

“How
was
baby Jesus born?” Ty asked, sticking a green bean up each nostril. He hated green beans even more than me.

Ooo, excellent question,
I thought. Not to brag, but just as I was an expert on Judaism, I knew quite a lot about “the birds and the bees,” as adults liked to put it. My specialty was conjoined twins. I'd seen a Discovery Channel show about two sisters whose heads were connected, and it was quite eye-opening.

Not that baby Jesus was a conjoined twin.

“Do you mean just Jesus, or how babies are made in general ?” I asked.

“Both,” Ty said.

Dad opened his mouth, then closed it. I opened
my
mouth, but Mom jumped in before I could say anything.

“Ok-a-a-ay,” she said. “No more talking. Just eating. And all three of you better eat every single bean on your plates, or those beans are what you'll find waiting for you under the Christmas tree.”

Ty started cramming beans into his mouth like a crazy person. His chipmunk cheeks went up and down as he chewed.

“Ty's eating his beans!” I exclaimed. “Beans, beans, the musical fruit. The more you eat, the more you—”