The Fat Boy Chronicles (4 page)

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Paul and I hung out today. At first my parents were reluctant to let me go to his house, because of the murder, but I promised I wouldn't do anything stupid. Besides, the police are pretty sure it was the boyfriend, probably an argument or something, and he just freaked. It's really kinda sad, because the kid's a good baseball player and the scouts have been watching him for the last year. He doesn't look like the violent type. Even though he's the number one suspect, I feel sorry for him.

The murder site was all roped off with yellow tape, so Paul and I couldn't even get close to it. A few police were there. They had on
suits and were walking around with notepads. We walked along the ravine across from the site and looked for stuff the murderer might have dropped. All we found were a few cigarette butts and an empty beer can. We hid in the old shed behind Paul's house and took turns watching out the window with binoculars for the murderer, but no one showed up and we got bored. Paul's mom ordered pizza for us, and we added some more stuff to our fake MySpace. Paul had the bright idea of making Starr real slutty. Paul thought it would be cool if she talked about tongue kissing and how big her boobs are. I think it's kind of cheesy, but Paul says we're desperate. We need to find the murderer before Kimberly's boyfriend gets fried in the electric chair. Paul found a model with big breasts and Photoshopped them onto my sister's picture. I thought it was a dumb idea to change the picture right in the middle of everything. Paul said it was for the new guys clicking in.

Friday, 9–29

I've never been to a pep rally before and since everyone else was excited about it, I was too. In our last–period class, the assistant principal called us to the gym by grades. Of course, the freshmen were last and so by the time we got there, most of the seats were taken. Teachers were yelling at us to go sit down but it was just a big wad of students, which was mostly us freshmen not knowing what to do. “Hurry, sit down, we need to start,” they kept hollering at us. I don't know what the problem was, but I got caught in a bunch of people at the top of the steps and then everyone behind me pushed forward.
My feet got hung on the person in front of me and I tripped. So, if you saw all the commotion over in the freshmen section, that was me knocking about ten people over. I couldn't help it but they all got mad at me anyway. I told them someone pushed me. And I bruised my leg on the bleachers. The teachers in the area tried to restore order but it didn't work. One of them said for me to watch what I was doing, I could hurt someone. It was pointless to respond so I just said, “Yes, ma'am,” and sat down.

What I got to see of the pep rally was fun. They blindfolded a senior and had him crawl around on the gym floor trying to find $10 and $20 bills. Every time he got close to one, the whole place would scream and he'd get all frantic and go right by the money. It was really funny. Then the cheerleaders did a cheer and threw candy to the class that yelled the loudest. When it was our turn to yell, all of us freshmen just sat there while the rest of the school booed. It's like we're not even part of the school, like we're only there for other students to make fun of. It's going to be a long year.

Then the football players ran out of the locker room and jumped around and bumped chests together. We all cheered. Right in the middle of them was Robb Thuman. In case you really aren't reading my turned down pages, Robb's in my PE class and I sit next to him in the locker room. Even though he's a senior, he talks with me sometimes, along with some of his buddies. I hope they win tonight so he'll be in a good mood on Monday.

About five minutes before we were supposed to leave, a bunch of students got up and started walking out of the gym. No matter what the teachers said, it became a flood of people; nothing could've
stopped everyone from leaving. The band was still playing and the football players were still talking on the microphone about the game that night. I had to catch the bus, so I got in the middle of the crowd and headed up the stairs. Some kid I knew in 6th grade and who is good friends with Nate saw me. He had a big smile on his face. He said, “Nice going, Winterpock. Saw you bowl over half the ninth grade.” He and his buddies had a good laugh.

We just finished dinner and Mom asked me if I was going to the game. It's at home and we play the Eagles from Academy. I told her I didn't feel too good and that I'd go to the next home game. Besides, I have to practice my sax.

Monday, 10–2

I have tests in almost all my classes this Friday. I don't know why every teacher thinks they have to give tests on Friday. Why not Tuesday or Wednesday sometimes? It's like they think, “Ooops, it's Friday, I better give a test, because everybody else is giving one.” Talk about peer pressure.

Oh, I forgot to tell you: Spencer made the first cut for the JV fall soccer team, which is great for a freshman. Especially a new kid. He was all excited about it on the bus ride home. He starts practice tomorrow, so he won't be on the bus with us until the season's over. I noticed the kids don't pick on Allen and me as much because of Spencer. Everyone thinks he's really cool. Even Whitney. He's so lucky to have the hottest girl chasing him. I feel proud that someone
like him hangs out with Allen and me; Spencer has a lot of courage. Allen complains about him though. He says it's been taking Spencer longer and longer to get to our lunch table—he spends a lot of time hanging out with the jocks and some of the cheerleaders. I hope he doesn't become one of them, but if he does, I don't blame him. If he hangs around with Allen and me, he might catch whatever disease we have, which I guess is the “laughed at” disease.

It's funny how you can be in the middle of several hundred people and feel like you're lost in some kind of a jungle. Kind of like it's Survivor—The Lunch Room.

We got a couple of new students in math class this week. Whenever we get another new kid in class, the teachers get all freaked and act like it's the worst thing in the world to add another name in their grade book. I guess I don't blame them. In some classes we're up to thirty–five students. The teachers miss half of what's going on, and kids cheat like crazy. Mr. L still doesn't know my name, and it's been way over two weeks since school's started. If that's not enough, the teacher ran out of books in social studies. Welcome to high school.

Friday, 10–6

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My sister came home all upset today. She was crying and screaming that her life is ruined, and she can never face her friends again. Which, by the way, isn't true. Her friends have been calling her non–stop. You'd think they'd get sick of listening to her boo–hoo about her stupid life. When I asked Mom about it, she stared at me so hard I could actually feel the heat.

“What?” I asked.

“You better not have had anything to do with this,” she said.

“Do with what? Somebody clue me in, please.”

“This!” my sister screamed as she slammed down the phone, holding up a piece of printer paper.

When I saw what was on it, I almost gagged on my Little Debbie. There was Starr with her super–sized chest. At that moment I wanted to murder Paul. Why did he have to make them so freaking big?

“Someone found this on the Internet, and now there are copies all around school.”

“How could I have missed that?” I said.

“Because you're a brainless idiot!” she screamed. She grabbed a soda out of the refrigerator and then shoved the door closed. “I will kill the asshole who did this to me! I'll claw out his eyes!”

“Watch your language, young lady,” Mom said, as she took the picture from Jessica. “Who would do this?” She cut her eyes at me.

I leaned over Mom's shoulder, pretending I had never seen the picture. “Pretty good likeness, I think.”

Jessica punched me in the arm, really hard. “You don't understand, Mom. The jerk who did this wrote things about me. Now everyone knows about Chad…” Jessica caught herself.

“Chad?” Mom raised her left eyebrow.

“Oh, nothing! Just nothing!” Then she screamed like a cave woman. “Auuuuugh! I'm going to find out who did this. And when I do…Just wait!”

“How do you know it's a ‘he'?” I asked. “Could be one of your loser girlfriends.”

“Mom! Make him shut up!” she hollered as she ran upstairs, no doubt to get on the phone and talk about it for another two hours.

“What makes you think you can catch the person?” I yelled up at her.

She stopped and turned around. “Because Danny Miller broke into the school board's website last year. And he said he'd find out who did this, and when he does, I'll make sure the jerk pays big time.” Then she started crying again. “Every time someone passes me in the hall, I wonder, ‘Is that who did this to me?' It's awful, I can't trust anyone.”

“Gee, that's tough,” I said. “I'm really sorry.” She had no idea how sorry I was. “Let me know if I can help.”

“Where are you going?” Mom eyed me suspiciously as I slunk up the stairs.

“I'm swamped with homework.”

Mom directed her attention to Jessica. “Well, honey, I'm sure whoever did this knows how bad you feel, and how much trouble they're in now. This is probably the end of all this nonsense. I'm sure that awful site will disappear. In fact, I'm sure it will be gone by tomorrow.”

I couldn't get up the stairs fast enough. I had the weird feeling Mom knew I had something to do with Jessica's enhanced photo. As soon as I got to my room, I called Paul and told him the whole thing.

“No kidding, she found out?”

“We're such idiots,” I said. “Why didn't we realize that someone she knew would recognize her picture?”

“Does that mean we need to delete the site?”

“Well, duh,” I said.

“Well, you might want to think twice about getting rid of it. At least right away. We're starting to get tons of requests and the blog's really taking off. She's getting some good e–mails. Let's stay with it for a few more weeks. I just know we're getting close.”

“Okay, but if we don't get something in two weeks, we're closing it down. My sister has a friend who's a really good hacker. If she ever finds out, there'll be another body in the woods. Mine.”

“Don't worry, no one's that good.”

Tuesday, 10–10

I have Mr. Mackey for Physical Science. He thinks he's funny but mostly he's goofy. He does show us some cool things in lab every now and then. Today, he asked Jeff Murray to help him with a demonstration. Mr. M took a rubber hose and attached it to the gas jets and stuck a small funnel in the other end of the hose. He had a tray of liquid soap, like for making bubbles, and he dipped the funnel in it. Then he turned on the gas and blew a bubble. Lying on the counter was a yardstick with a lit candle taped to one end. What he did next was pretty cool. He twisted the funnel with a bubble on the end of it so that the bubble came off and floated in the air. The bubble was full of gas and he grabbed the candle on the stick and poked the bubble.
A big whoosh of flame went off in the middle of the room. It was sweet! We all hollered for him to do it again. That's when he got Jeff up there to help. Jeff is always messing up things, and I think Mr. M thought he could do the candle–stick part and look good in front of the class. How hard could it be? Mr. Mackey told him to wait until the bubble was up in the air but Jeff couldn't wait. He got so excited that he pushed the candle into the funnel before the bubble even got shook off of it. Our teacher jumped back when the ball of flame covered his hands, and he yelled “Holy crap!” right in front of us. Some people in class laughed but stopped when they saw the hair burned off of Mr. Mackey's forearm. It stunk too. I don't think Jeff will be in any more demos.

After that craziness I went to math class. Mr. L had promised to tell us the answer to the riddle about the twenty–six sheep and how many were left. He made us guess again but he still shook his head at our answers. I'm pretty good at math and I had to know. He said that we might be in the wrong class if we can't do simple subtraction like this. When he told us that it was nineteen, I couldn't believe it. “How?” we all screamed. Then he said, “Well, if there were twenty and they were all sick and one died, wouldn't that be nineteen? You know, twenty
sick
sheep.”

We felt like a big bunch of suckers. He just laughed at his joke the rest of the period.

After that, the day was pretty normal. As normal goes for me. We lost the game Friday, so PE was about the same. Robb, the one football player that I sit near in the locker room, said his little brother got knocked down by some big goof at the pep rally. He said it better not have been me. I wanted to say, “Nice game Friday,” but I didn't. I'm not that stupid.

Wednesday, 10–11

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At Youth Group tonight, Paul pulled me aside to talk about our undercover operations. A few kids started to walk toward us, so Paul and I slunk out of the room and down the hall near the restroom. After we looked around the corner to make sure the coast was clear, Paul filled me in on the latest website hits.

“That guy who's been e–mailing Starr wrote today saying he wants to meet her. He says he lives in Hanover! Jimmy, it could be him, the killer! ‘Starr' agreed to meet him after school tomorrow— at Starbucks by the mall. The one in Barnes and Noble. Around 4:00.”

“No way, man.” Suddenly all this detective work made me queasy. “We're going to get caught, or be arrested or worse.”

“Or catch the murderer. He won't know it's us. Remember, he's looking for some girl. Your sister, but with big hooters.”