The Trouble with Mark Hopper (11 page)

“What? Look it up,” Mark said. He glared harder at the Mastermind pamphlet, as though he could intimidate it into changing its content. “I'm busy.”

Mark frowned. “Are you having a bad day?” he asked.

Mark softened a bit. No one had ever really asked him how his day was going before. “I just don't have time for this. It was going to be bad enough preparing for the Mastermind tournament without them changing the rules.”

“Oh! That's the thing Mr. Rocco was talking about, right? What is it all about?”

“What is it
about
? It's about being the best.” In one long, impassioned rant, Mark explained the history of the tournament and the fact that his father had won it three years in a row. He told Mark how long he'd been preparing, how
moronic
it was that they changed the rules (though he was sure to win anyway), and how big a trophy the winner got. He told him everything except the part about having more than one artistic ability.

“Wow. That sounds really hard.”

“Oh, it takes a lot of planning, but it's not
hard
.”

Mark doodled a trophy on a piece of loose-leaf paper. Then, with just a few tiny strokes of his pencil, he made it look as though the trophy was glistening in the sun. “Maybe I'll enter it,” he said. How impressed his family would be if he won something like that for being smart! It would be like the day he found out he was in all honors classes, only ten times more exciting.

“Ha,” Mark said with his you-couldn't-beat-me-if-you-tried look. “I mean,” he added, “you
could
. But it's really a
lot
of work. So if you don't think you could win in every single part—the
good grades
and the
essay
and everything—it's really not worth it.” He had to make sure there weren't any other report cards or essays with the name Mark Hopper on them. And that there wasn't another drawing with that name, either.

“Yeah, I guess,” Mark said. His face twisted into a half frown. “But that new teamwork part sounds fun. I like when you have to do something as a group. Like in gym when you have to hold hands with a big group and tangle yourselves up and then find a way out of it. We did that at my old school.”

“Whatever,” said Mark, not knowing what Mark was talking about and thinking that it didn't sound remotely fun. Holding hands in gym? Come on.

“You never did that?” Mark asked. He didn't say it, but he figured that was probably for the best. He couldn't picture Mark as much of a team player. He watched as Mark read the Mastermind rules as though they were his last chance of surviving all alone on a desert island. He was determined; he had to give him that. And when he stopped caring so much about being the best, he could even be kind of fun to talk to. It isn't that I
like
the other Mark, Mark thought, but some people might if he'd just give them a reason to. Mark thought all of this while absentmindedly sketching a miniature version of his portrait of Grandpa Murray. After a few minutes, he caught the other Mark studying
him
from the corner of his eye. “Sorry,” he said, feeling his ears turn red. “I just really like drawing. I want to work on this drawing over the weekend, and my art teacher says we're allowed to take them home if we want, but it's just hard because my dad only comes to Greenburgh on weekends.”

“Your dad doesn't live with you?” Mark asked, surprised.

Mark shook his head. “Not right now.”

Mark eyed Mark curiously. He wanted to ask a lot of questions, but he didn't want Mark to ask any of him in return. He also kind of wanted to pat the other Mark on the back, but he didn't do that, either. What he did do was put the Mastermind rules aside and say, “We'd better do the math before Miss Payley comes in.”

“You know,” Mark said carefully after he had finished all of the math homework. “I can tell you about all of the teamwork stuff we did at my old school. You know, the rules and things, and what the teachers were looking for when we did it. Maybe some of it will be the same at the tournament.” He stole a quick glance at Mark's face—he didn't know if Mark would take his offer as a statement that he wasn't good enough to win the tournament on his own—and then went back to packing up his backpack. When he was finished packing up and the other Mark still hadn't said anything, Mark looked up to find him staring at him with his eyebrows raised.

“Why would you do that for me?” Mark asked.

Mark shrugged. “Why not? You're really helping me with the math. And I've done that sort of thing before, so that's something I can help you with . . . maybe, if you want. Besides, since I'm not entering the tournament, I might as well help someone named Mark Hopper win.” He chanced a smile.

Mark crossed his arms. “All right.”

Mark widened his eyes in surprise. He nodded excitedly.

“Not that I couldn't do it on my own,” Mark added quickly, “but it never hurts to be overprepared. And since we
have
to meet anyway . . . Maybe next week after we do the math we can start preparing?”

Mark kept nodding, like his head was on a spring. “Sure,” he said. “I'll think about it and try to remember everything about it from last year. Cool! This'll be fun. See you later.”

“Wait,” Mark called. “Um, it's pretty stupid how you are so scared to talk to teachers and stuff”—he wrinkled his forehead—“I mean, you need to not be so scared to say what you think all the time. Even argue sometimes . . . not necessarily as much as me, but, you know . . .” He sighed. It was so hard to say what he wanted to say when he was trying to be nice about it. “Anyway, if you want, I can help you with that, too.”

“All right,” Mark said. “How about next Wednesday we talk about that, too?”

“Okay.”

“Okay.”

They looked at each other awkwardly.

“All right.”

“Okay. See you later.”

“Oh, yeah. Have fun seeing your dad this weekend.”

Mark laughed. “Thanks,” he said. “But I'll see you tomorrow in homeroom.”

“Let's see . . .” Grandpa Murray rubbed his hands together and lifted his eyebrows a few times. He eyed the fruit aisle.

Mark mimicked Grandpa Murray's motion. “Yes, let's see . . .” he said before letting out a sinister laugh. When Grandpa Murray offered to do the grocery shopping, Mark had turned off the television, jumped up, and volunteered to go with him. He told his mom that he just wanted to help out, but really he wanted to go because Grandpa Murray was great to food-shop with. He'd put anything Mark asked for in the cart. In fact, he'd put anything at all in the cart as long as it looked tasty or interesting—beef jerky, sixteen-inch king crab legs, freeze-dried enchiladas, sugarcoated cheese curls covered in chocolate. One time he bought a box of cat food because the box boasted a large gold medal from
Cat Care
magazine, even though the Hoppers didn't have a cat. Mrs. Hopper must have suspected Mark's reason for wanting to go along—he never “wanted to help out” when
she
went to the supermarket—so she sent Beth along to keep the other two in line.

“Why don't we split up this list by category,” Beth said, scanning the long list of mostly boring, healthy foods her mother had insisted they follow, “and meet up at the register with the shortest line in twenty minutes.”

“Bah,” said Grandpa Murray. “I'll never remember what I'm supposed to get or where to meet. But I guess if you don't want to”—Grandpa Murray let out a loud, fake sniffle—“spend time with your grandfather, who only wants to”—
sniff
—“love you, then that's”—
sniff
—“just fine.”

Mark sniffed loudly. “I'll stay with you, Grandpa! Don't cry.”

“What about you, Beth?” Grandpa Murray said with a large frown.

Beth looked around and rolled her eyes. “Yes, okay, we'll all stay together.”

“Yippee!” Grandpa Murray said.

Beth looked around again. “You're embarrassing me,” she whispered. “Let's just start shopping.”

“Does this embarrass you?” Mark asked. He picked up a bunch of grapes and balanced it on his head while humming circus music.

“Yes, it does,” Beth said. She grabbed the grapes, threw them in a plastic bag, and put them in the cart. “And now we have to buy those because they were on your head.”

“Does this embarrass you?” Mark asked. He reached toward a pile of cantaloupes.

Beth moved to block him. “Whatever you were going to do, yes, it does,” she said. “And I don't want to have to buy cantaloupe.”

“How about kiwis?” Grandpa Murray asked. He held up a couple of hairy brown fruits.

“Not on the list . . .” Beth said.

Grandpa Murray placed the kiwis in the cart. “List schmist,” he said.

“How about this?” Mark asked. He held up a big, whole pineapple.

“I don't know how we're going to cut that,” Grandpa Murray said, “but why not. I'm a sucker for fruit with spikes on it.”

Beth laughed and put the list in her pocket. She picked up a two-pound mesh bag of strangely shaped objects that was labeled IMPORTED. “Can we get this?” she asked.

Grandpa Murray said, “That's the spirit!” He signaled for her to put it in the cart.

They continued through the supermarket filling up the shopping cart with everything unusual or intriguing they passed, plus lettuce for Beth's earthworms and most of the items Leslie Hopper had requested. Mark studied Grandpa Murray as he moved through the aisles picking up items and squinting sharply to examine them. He was almost ready to redraw his portrait of Grandpa Murray on canvas and begin painting. He wanted to make sure he got every detail right and that he captured the whole of his grandpa's character. It would be best to work on the portrait in the same room as his grandpa so that he could look at him as he went along, but he wanted the painting to be a surprise. Maybe even a birthday present.

“Grandpa?” Mark said as he placed a package of string cheese into the cart. “When is your birthday?”

“November thirty-second,” Grandpa Murray said.

“Really?”

“I think so.”

“Come on, Mark,” Beth said. She bopped him on the head with a package of cheese cubes. “There is no November thirty-second. There's not even a November thirty-first.”

Mark thought a moment. “Hey! No month has a thirty-second.”

Grandpa Murray thought a moment. “No?” he said. “I guess that makes my birthday December second.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

Mark tried to hide his excitement by comparing wild cherry with exotic berry yogurt. December 2 was perfect timing. Even though the painting was due toward the end of October, he had just found out that the selected portraits would be displayed in the library starting on December 2! Then he would just have to figure out a way to get Grandpa Murray to go with him to library—he'd have to make something up, which might be kind of tricky, but he had time—and he could show him the portrait right on his birthday. What a present that would be!

“The gears in your head are spinning,” Grandpa Murray said. “What are you planning on doing with that yogurt?”

Mark shrugged and placed a container of exotic berry yogurt in the cart. “Oh, nothing,” he said. “I'm just thinking that I have a really, really good birthday present for you.”

Grandpa Murray raised his eyebrows. “I do like yogurt,” Grandpa Murray said, “but this might go bad by December.”

Mark laughed and said that the gift wasn't yogurt, but he wouldn't give away any other clues. The three shoppers turned into the snacks aisle, and Mark's eyes became round at the sight of all of the cookies, cakes, and treats that Grandpa Murray would probably let them buy.

“You're Mark, right?”

Mark turned to see a girl his age. She had long blond hair in a long blond ponytail, and her T-shirt said IVY ROAD ROADRUNNERS with a picture of the school's mascot in the center. “Yeah,” Mark said. “Is that shirt from Ivy Road Middle School?” he asked. Then he felt his ears turn red as he realized what a stupid question it was.

“Yep,” said the girl. She started chewing on one of her fingernails. “You're in sixth grade, right? And you're friends with Jasmina, right?”

“Yeah,” Mark said. At least he thought they were friends. He hoped this girl wouldn't ask Jasmina. Maybe she didn't really consider them friends. He had never been to her house after school or anything. At least he knew he was definitely in sixth grade . . . right?

“I'm Laurie,” the girl said.

Mark tried to think of a question to ask her or anything to say that wouldn't sound stupid. Luckily, since the best he could come with was “So, you're food shopping,” a woman toward the end of the aisle called Laurie over.

“That's my mom,” Laurie said. “But maybe I'll see you around school. And,” she continued, “my birthday's coming up, and I'm having a big party at my house. So what's your last name so I can give you an invitation?”

“Hopper,” Mark said, his ears turning even redder.

“Mark Hopper. Got it.” She smiled. “See you around!”

“Yeah.” Mark turned to face Grandpa Murray and Beth, who were both grinning. Beth tousled his hair, and Mark smoothed it back down.

“Oh, I'm sorry,” Beth teased. “Does that embarrass you?”

“No,” Mark lied.

“What if I talked about all of the earthworms we have at home
really
loudly? Would that embarrass you?”