The Seventh Most Important Thing (8 page)

A
rthur had no idea what the silver toaster knob was supposed to mean or why Mr. Hampton had given it to his little sister. He thought he might get some answers when he went back for his first Saturday of probation in January, but nothing had changed. He arrived at Mr. Hampton's garage on January 4 and found the same list and the same cart. Nobody around. No other notes.

Arthur figured maybe it had just been a coincidence—maybe the guy happened to be taking a stroll past their house and had the toaster knob in his pocket, so he decided to give it to Barbara.

But then something happened at school that made Arthur begin to wonder even more about the connections between his work for Mr. Hampton and his life.

It all started when Arthur forgot his earth science textbook in his locker. It was a couple of days after they got back to school from the Christmas holiday. They were having an open-book quiz. He needed the book.

Normally, he tried to avoid going to his locker to get anything during lunch, when the ninth-grade varsity football players liked to hang around in the gym hallway and goof off. A lot of them were the size of Slash from juvie. Or bigger. Arthur knew it would only be a matter of time before they'd try to test the brick-throwing “juvie kid” for fun. Just to see how tough he really was.

He didn't want them to find out he wasn't very tough at all.

But he knew it would be an instant detention if he didn't have the textbook. And he didn't like disappointing Mr. C. So he ate his lunch quickly, tossed his trash in the garbage, and headed to his locker, hoping to get there before the jocks.

His locker was halfway down the gym hall, just past the water fountains. As he came around the corner, he noticed a big group of guys gathered at the end of the hall. They were huddled around something.

“Crap,” he said under his breath.

He considered turning around and going back to the cafeteria. He'd just blow off the quiz, he told himself. Who cared?

But the group had already spotted him. If he didn't want to look like a total wimp, he had to keep walking toward his locker.

He tried to seem preoccupied with what was outside the hallway windows—as if he wasn't paying attention to the jocks and didn't care what bad stuff they were doing. He'd just go to his locker, get his book, and leave. They could do whatever they wanted. It wasn't his problem.

It was the laughter that forced Arthur to take another look. He'd heard that kind of raucous laughter before. In juvie, it always meant trouble.

In the middle of the jocks' huddle at the end of the hallway, he noticed one of the big gray trash cans from the cafeteria. As he watched, one guy reached behind his back for a basketball and suddenly whipped the ball at the side of the can. It hit pretty hard. The can wobbled and the ball ricocheted down the hall.

More wild laughter erupted from the group.

Arthur couldn't figure out why a cafeteria garbage can would be sitting in the hallway. Or why the jocks would be gathered around it, laughing and whipping basketballs at it.

Until he saw the top of somebody's head appear.

A
rthur couldn't remember exactly what he'd yelled at the group. He thought it was something like “Stop it, what are you doing?” with maybe a couple of swearwords added in.

It was called a fight, but it really wasn't.

The jocks said Arthur threw his books as he ran toward them. They said he tried to kill them with his
Great Works of Literature
textbook and with the large and deadly U.S. history textbooks he was carrying, which could kill just about anyone.

This was not true.

Arthur did not throw his books. He dropped them as he got closer because he wanted to have his hands free to defend himself. He had learned a few things in juvie.

He might have dropped the textbooks with more force than he needed to because he thought the slam of the books would get the guys' attention and make them take off. (In hindsight, a pretty idiotic idea.) But he wasn't dumb enough to throw anything at anybody again.

Arthur ran toward the guys with only one thought in mind, really: Saving whoever was in the garbage can. Or at least getting the person out.

Normally, Arthur wasn't the saving type. He wasn't sure why this scene bothered him as much as it did. If it hadn't been for his probation sentence, maybe he wouldn't have noticed the kid in the garbage can at all. Or maybe it was some leftover guilt about what he'd done to the Junk Man still hanging around.

Whatever the reason, this weird burst of anger came over Arthur when he saw what was happening. Did the jocks think it was funny to throw someone in a trash can? Was it some kind of prank?

Without thinking much about the consequences, he rushed toward the group. His long legs churned up the distance. He was a decent runner when he was angry.

“Look out for the juvie freak!” the jocks laughed as they backed toward the sides of the hallway, leaving the garbage can behind like an abandoned island in the middle of the hall.

Stupidly, Arthur didn't pay much attention to where the guys went. All he cared about was that they'd left the person inside the garbage can alone. When he got to it, he peered into the shadowy depths, not knowing what to expect.

A pale, round face surrounded by a lot of other round faces stared up at him.

It took Arthur a minute to realize that only one round face was a kid's. The others were basketballs. The kid had been dumped into one of the big trash cans of balls from the gym.

“Want to play some ball?” the kid said, trying to smile as he looked up.

Arthur could tell he'd been crying. He had smeary square glasses that looked way too fragile and professor-like. Glasses that seemed to say
Please beat me up.

“What are you doing in there?” Arthur snapped. As if the kid had a choice.

“I don't know.” The boy's eyes blinked fast behind his glasses.

“Well, stand up and I'll help you get out,” Arthur said, feeling more irritated as time went on. He was mad at everything—the nerdy kid, the jocks, himself for getting involved.

Because the trash can was so big, it was a struggle to get the short kid over the side and onto the floor again. Finally, Arthur had to half lift him out by his armpits, which was embarrassing—especially since he was pretty sure the boy was a seventh grader like he was.

Once the kid's feet were safely on the ground—feet that were wearing polished brown loafers, by the way—Arthur couldn't help shoving the trash can toward the wall where some of the jocks were standing. Just to pay them back. Because brown-loafer, gold-glasses kid probably never would.

This was a mistake.

Of course, the can tipped over and basketballs went rolling everywhere. And one of the jocks behind Arthur took the opportunity created by the chaos to ram him into the wall of lockers. (Arthur didn't see what happened to gold-glasses kid.)

And of course, this was the moment when the varsity coaches and various other official people arrived.

Nobody needed to tackle Arthur, because he was already sprawled on the linoleum. Without asking him why he was there, or letting him explain anything, they hauled him away to the office, one red-faced, huffing coach on each side.

Arthur figured Officer Billie would probably count this as messing up. Big-time.

T
he kid was called Squeak.

Arthur remembered that as he sat in the office. Squeak had been in one of his classes back in elementary school. He couldn't recall the kid's real name. Arthur figured everybody called him Squeak because of his size, but he wasn't sure. He knew he'd never talked to him before.

Why had he gotten involved?

Arthur shook his head, more annoyed with himself than anyone else. He already had enough problems.

The door of the vice principal's office opened up on Arthur's left. He forced himself not to look. Let Vice make the first move. Let Vice speak to him first.

Squeak came out of the office and passed Arthur. He could hear the faint creak of his leather loafers and a snuffling sound that he assumed was the tail end of the kid's crying. He was a real shrimp for a seventh grader, Arthur noticed again, feeling bad for his nonexistent hormones.

Squeak didn't say anything to Arthur. He slipped into the noisy hall like some kind of invisible spirit.

“Mr. Owens.” Vice stood in the doorway of his office, arms folded. “You're next.”

Vice's small, windowless office smelled of stale coffee and body odor.

“Sit down, Mr. Owens.” Vice pointed to one of the leather chairs by his desk. Arthur slid into it, careful not to make eye contact with Vice, careful not to think the chairs were nice.

“Well,” Vice said. “We've had quite a day today, haven't we, Mr. Owens?”

Arthur shrugged and mumbled, “Guess so.”

Vice leaned back, twisting and untwisting a paper clip with his fingers. “Although I find this very hard to believe, Reginald says you were not one of the instigators today. Is that correct?”

The kid's real name was
Reginald
?

Jeez. Arthur tried not to shake his head at the bad luck the kid had. Abnormally short. Gold glasses. And a name like Reginald.

“I'm waiting on an answer,” Vice said. “Spit it out. I don't have all day.”

“I was just trying to help,” Arthur replied sullenly, still looking down at the floor. “That's all.”

“And by ‘help' you mean what?”

Arthur shrugged again. “Just getting him out of the trash can. What else?”

“So you go around
helping
people all the time, do you?” Vice said sarcastically.

“Maybe,” Arthur retorted.

Vice tossed the deformed paper clip onto his desk. Arthur heard the tiny ping of it landing. “Here's what I have a problem with, Mr. Owens: You are a convicted felon. You've been in jail….”

Arthur kept his eyes on the office floor. He pictured all of the layers of cement, dirt, rocks, magma, and continental plates below his feet as Vice went on talking. He couldn't be bothered to correct the vice principal's lies. It didn't matter, he told himself. Let people believe what they wanted.

“From what I can gather, Reginald is the only one who says you were helping him,” Vice continued. “Every other person in the hallway says they saw you tormenting him—putting him in the garbage can and throwing balls at him.”

Arthur's eyes shot upward. “Well, they're wrong.”

“Here's what I think.” Vice leaned forward. “I think Reginald is afraid of you and is afraid to give me the truth. And let me tell you.” Vice pointed at Arthur. “If I see you lay one finger on him again—one finger—I'm calling your probation officer and you are out of this school for good. You stay away from Reginald. Do you understand me?”

“Yes,” Arthur said. In his head, he replied,
Loud and clear.

He left Vice's office and went back to class.

But apparently nobody gave Squeak the message about staying away from Arthur, because the next day at lunch, Squeak sat down next to him.

“
W
hat are you doing?” Arthur said when Squeak pulled out the chair next to him.

“Can I sit at your table?” the kid asked, his eyes blinking nervously behind his old-man glasses. He was wearing a plaid shirt and a bow tie. He carried a carton of white milk and a neatly folded lunch bag.

Are you kidding me?
Arthur thought.

“No,” he replied, shaking his head. “You can't. Find somewhere else.”

“Why?”

“Because Vice says I'm dangerous and I'm supposed to stay away from you. So take off and find another table.”

“Good,” the kid said, sliding into the seat next to Arthur. “Dangerous is good.” He reached out his hand as if they were at a formal event. “Hello, I'm Reggie, but everybody calls me Squeak. Pleased to meet you.”

Arthur ignored the pale, outstretched hand and went back to scarfing down the soggy hamburger on his tray. “Seriously, you need to sit somewhere else,” he repeated. “I'm not going through all that crap with Vice again.”

“There's no law against sitting where you want in the cafeteria,” the kid insisted.

Arthur snorted. “Right. Vice says there is.”

“Well, he's wrong. And if he says anything about it, I'll tell him he's wrong.” Squeak pulled his seat closer to the table and seemed determined not to move, no matter what. “So your name is Arthur Owens?” he asked, changing the subject.

“Yeah.”

“You're in seventh grade too?”

“Yeah.” Arthur tried to say as little as possible, in the hopes that Squeak would get the hint and leave.

“Well, I want to thank you for what you did yesterday,” Squeak continued in his polite, professor-like voice. “I'm sorry you had to get into a fight like that.”

“It wasn't a fight. I just scared the guys off. No big deal.” Arthur shoved the rest of his hamburger into his mouth and began to clean up his spot at the table. He didn't owe Squeak anything. If he wanted to stay there and sit at the table by himself, fine.

It was Squeak's lunch that made him stop.

Squeak had just opened his brown bag and started to set his lunch on the table. What caught Arthur's attention wasn't what he had brought for lunch; it was the fact that everything Squeak pulled out of his bag—except the white paper napkin—was precisely and perfectly wrapped in Most Important Thing #2.

Foil.

“My mother likes everything to be neat,” Squeak said, noticing Arthur's stare as he unwrapped each item. A sandwich, an apple, and a roll of vanilla creme cookies. “What can I say?” He gave an embarrassed smile. “She still makes my lunch.”

Arthur didn't know what to think. The connection with Mr. Hampton's list was too bizarre.

“I know it's weird,” Squeak said sheepishly. “I know I should make my own lunch. Maybe I'll start doing that.” He took a small bite of his sandwich and glanced nervously at Arthur. “Are you upset about something else?”

Arthur hesitated before saying, “No, it's just—well, I work for this guy who sometimes collects foil.”

Squeak pushed the clump of discarded foil pieces toward Arthur. “Well, here, you can give him a gift from me. And there's lots more where that came from, don't worry.” He gave one of his goofy, too-wide grins. “I bring the same lunch to school every day: A ham and cheese sandwich. One apple or orange. And six cookies—usually vanilla cremes, sometimes Oreos. Always wrapped in foil. Hasn't changed since kindergarten.”

The bell rang before Squeak finished the last of his cookies.

He shoved the rest inside his lunch bag. “So tomorrow, I'll be here again, okay?” Squeak said quickly as he jumped up. “You'll be here too, right?” He gave Arthur a worried look.

“Sure,” Arthur replied, because he was still kind of stunned.

“Okay, see you tomorrow.” Squeak waved and scurried away.