The Fix-It Friends--Sticks and Stones Page 3

  Chapter 8

  Monster Dress itched me and choked me all day at school, but lots of people said nice things about it.

  Miss Mabel said, “Veronica! You look absolutely faboo!” That meant a lot because not only is she my favorite teacher of all time, but she also has the best outfits of any grown-up I have ever met.

  Miss Tibbs said, “Miss Conti, the dress suits you nicely.”

  And Minnie spun me around and said, “Linda!”

  I said, “I didn’t change my name, for crying out loud.”

  “No,” she laughed. “It means ‘pretty’ in Spanish.”

  Then I said, “¡Cuidado! ¡No se pare en esa caca del dragón!” and we laughed because dragon poop is just plain funny.

  Not everyone was nice, of course.

  “If you ask me,” said Matthew Sawyer, “you look like an enormous bubble gum bubble with black ants stuck on you. I can almost hear them screaming, ‘Help! Freeeeeee us!’”

  “Well, good thing I didn’t ask you!” I said.

  After school, Dad picked up me and Jude—and Cora and Ezra, too. He let us play in the yard like he always does, but he said we could only play for a few minutes because a problem had come up at his job and he had to take care of it.

  My dad’s a super, which means he fixes stuff that breaks in people’s apartments. He works in a tall building near our school called the Monroe. When he goes to work, he has to carry a jumbo key ring that has about a hundred keys on it. If there are old keys that don’t work anymore, he gives them to me. Now I have a whole collection of my own. You never know what locks they might open!

  On the days when Dad picks us up, he is usually all done with his super work for the day. But every so often, there are emergencies in the Monroe and he has to stop by and take a look. Once, someone’s refrigerator door fell off. Another time, a whole bunch of crickets that were supposed to be food for a bearded dragon escaped. They were jumping all over the tenth floor and chirping like crazy!

  “What’s the emergency this time, Dad?” I asked him. “Can we come?”

  “Yeah, you guys can tag along if you promise to stay out of trouble,” Dad said. “It’s just Mr. Luntzgarten’s heater again. He says it’s making a racket.”

  Mr. Luntzgarten is the Grinch-iest, grouch-iest grump in the Monroe. He also has the biggest eyebrows of any human being I have ever seen. Maybe they itch him and that’s what makes him so cranky. He is always complaining about everything, including:

  1.  The elevator beeping too loud.

  2.  His doorbell ringing too loud.

  3.  His neighbor’s dog barking too loud.

  4.  Me being too loud.

  “Hey, we can hang out at my apartment while you fix the heater,” said Ezra. “I’ll go ask my mom for the key.”

  One of the best parts of the Monroe is that Ezra lives there with his mom, who is the principal of our school. Principal Powell is really nice. She has a sign in her office that says, NOBODY’S PERFECT. THAT’S WHY PENCILS HAVE ERASERS. I know that because I have been sent to her office a few times, but all the times were because of accidents.

  Dad said okay, so Ezra and Jude ran to get the key from Principal Powell. Cora and I went to get Noah so we could play tag for a few minutes.

  I was a little nervous about running into J.J. again, but at least he couldn’t make fun of my dirty jeans anymore, because I was wearing Monster Dress. And besides, Noah might need our help.

  Cora spotted Noah by the climbing wall. Right next to him was J.J. Taylor. Noah was turned away from him, looking down at the ground, and J.J. was tapping his shoulder.

  “Come on, Shorty!” J.J. was saying. “It’ll be fun!”

  “Why don’t you pick on somebody your own size?” I shouted as I ran over.

  J.J. looked confused for a few seconds, like he didn’t recognize us. Then he said, “Is that you, Uncle Ronny?”

  “It’s VERONICA!” I hollered.

  I got so mad, so fast. I was about to put on my Tough Guy Face, but then I remembered Jude’s poker face and thought I should try that instead.

  “What’s the matter with you?” Cora whispered when she saw my face.

  “Nothing,” I said. “This is my Nothing-Is-the-Matter Face.”

  “I think it needs some work,” she whispered politely. “Right now it seems like your I-Am-Choking-on-a-Fish-Bone Face.”

  I made my eyebrows go down, and then I made them go up again and I puffed my cheeks out, but I just got so confused, I didn’t know what to do with my face.

  The whole time, J.J. was looking at me funny.

  “You look different,” said J.J. “Doesn’t she, Shorty?”

  Noah glowered at him.

  “You don’t look like my uncle Ronny anymore,” said J.J.

  “See?” Cora whispered to me. “The makeover worked!”

  “Now you look like Uncle Ronny’s baby, Jojo! She has a big poofy dress just like that,” said J.J., laughing.

  “I DO NOT look like BABY JOJO!” I yelled. I didn’t know what Baby Jojo looked like, but I knew I did not want to look like her.

  “Can’t you take a joke?” J.J. asked. He was laughing so hard, he was doubled over. His laugh wasn’t a little giggle or even a medium-sized chuckle. It was a huge, gigantic guffaw. Miss Mabel taught us that word. She said it’s when you’re laughing so hard, you are howling and slapping your knees. And that’s what J.J. was doing—right at me!

  I got so mad, I growled, “At least I don’t look like a big, juicy Florida orange!”

  He stopped laughing and scowled. “Hey, I like Florida.”

  I was so mad, I felt like a bull staring at a red cape. Noah and Cora noticed that I was about to charge, so they each grabbed one of my arms and led me away.

  “What are we going to do?” asked Cora. She was pulling on her corkscrew curls, which is what she does when she’s nervous. “He can’t just keep teasing you guys!”

  “Oh, he won’t,” I promised. “Noah, ask Ivy if you can come to Ezra’s house. We’re making a plan. And we’re calling backup.”

  “What does that mean?” asked Noah.

  “It means, the Fix-It Friends are on the case!”

  Chapter 9

  Ivy said Noah could come over, and she offered to watch us while Dad fixed the heater. So all of us walked together to the Monroe, where we had a big meeting at Ezra’s apartment.

  The first thing I did at Ezra’s house was visit Ziggy, Ezra’s guinea pig. I am absolutely dying to get a pet, but my dad is allergic to pretty much any animal with fur, especially dogs, which are my favorite. I would settle for a snake, but Mom says they give her the heebie-jeebies. So for now, I have to play with other people’s pets. Ziggy is one of my favorites.

  He’s a real furball. His brown fur is so long that his face is kind of hidden underneath it all. Ziggy is so smart that when you call his name, he runs right over to you. And he can do tricks!

  I asked Ivy if I could borrow one of her big hoop earrings, and guess what? Ziggy jumped right through it!

  “That guinea pig is a rock star,” said Ivy.

  After we played with Ziggy, I asked for iced tea, which Ezra always has in his fridge. Not regular old iced tea but hibiscus tea, which is made from flowers! Ezra says it’s what he and his mom drink in Jamaica. He goes there every summer because that’s where his mom was born and where his grandma and grandpa live. He says that in Jamaica, the ocean is as warm as a bubble bath and you can catch little lizards and eat coconuts that fall off trees.

  Ezra also says you can eat green bananas there. I saw some at his house once, and I said, “Ummm, Ez? I think you should throw those out. They’re completely green.” But then he explained that they were special bananas called plantains and they are supposed to be green. You learn something new every day, as my dad would say.

  After school, I asked Ezra for some hibiscus tea, and also for potato chips. Ivy had a snack with us, and then she said she had to study for a big chem
istry test.

  “What’s chemistry?” I asked.

  “It’s a kind of science where you mix chemicals and sometimes blow up stuff,” she explained. “It’s kind of awesome.”

  Then she put these enormous headphones on her ears and turned on some super-loud music. I thought it was weird that she could listen to such loud music and study at the same time, but like I said, teenagers are very strange, and Ivy is the strangest one of all.

  While Ivy studied in the kitchen, the rest of us went into the living room. Cora and Noah and I acted out the whole story about J.J. Taylor for Jude and Ezra. I am a great actor, so I played J.J. and laughed a lot like a big baboon. Cora played me doing my great Tough Guy Face and awful poker face. Noah played himself, nodding a lot.

  When we were done, Jude said, “Noah, you should tell Ivy or your parents.”

  Noah shook his head.

  “Jude’s right,” said Ezra. “Or you could tell my mom. My mom deals with stuff like this all the time.”

  Noah shook his head really fast then.

  “You could tell J.J.’s mom,” said Cora. “Or I could tell her. Grown-ups love me.”

  “It’s true,” I agreed. “She puts them under a magic spell of cuteness. They are powerless to resist!”

  Cora giggled.

  “But his mom isn’t there after school,” said Noah. “Just his dad. And he’s even more scary than J.J. He’s ten feet tall. I saw him walk through the red doors at school once, and he had to bend down so he didn’t hit the doorway.”

  “That doesn’t mean he’s mean,” I pointed out. “My dad’s tall, and he’s an old softy.”

  But Noah just shook his head.

  “Let me help you talk to J.J.,” said Jude. Just because he’s been a recess mediator for a few years, he thinks he can always save the day.

  “It won’t work,” said Noah. “I’ll just ignore him.”

  “Yeah, that’s what I did with Gary Grotowski last year,” said Ezra, cracking his knuckles. “He kept saying stupid stuff about my braces and calling me Metal Mouth—”

  I couldn’t help interrupting him: “Why would he tease you about braces? They are so cool! I can’t wait to get some. Then I’ll be half robot.”

  “Oh, people can tease you about anything,” said Ezra very fast. “Kids are always getting sent down to my mom’s office for teasing, and she says she’s heard kids called names for everything. For their clothes or their hair or their voices or their glasses or their grades or whatever. Even for stuff that’s great, like being too smart or too pretty or too nice.”

  “Can a person be too nice?” squeaked Cora. I could tell she was worried.

  “No, of course not!” I laughed.

  “So last year, Gary Grotowski kept calling me Metal Mouth, and I just had to use my all-star, Grade A poker face. You know what my secret is? I imagined his stupid words bouncing off me like foam balls. Bounce! Bounce! Bounce!”

  “Yeah, they’re just words,” agreed Noah. “It’s not like he’s hurting me.”

  Jude was shaking his head. “Sometimes words do hurt you. A poker face is great and all, but sometimes it’s not enough.”

  For once in my life, I totally agreed with him.

  “You know what I think?” I said. “I think we should stand up to that J.J. Taylor!”

  “Absolutely!” squeaked Cora. She nodded her head, and her curls bounced like crazy.

  “Give him a taste of his own medicine!” I cried.

  “Positively!” Cora chirped.

  “Do kung fu on him!”

  “What?” screeched Cora.

  “What?” asked the others.

  I jumped up to my feet and did some kicks.

  “Kung fu!” I repeated. “We won’t actually attack him. We’ll just show him we know how, and then he’ll never bother us again!”

  “Ummm, yeah, I get what you’re saying, but no, I don’t think so,” said Ezra.

  “That’s probably the worst idea I’ve ever heard,” said Jude.

  “We don’t even know kung fu,” said Noah.

  So I had to give one of my special speeches.

  I am very good at speeches that convince people I’m right. Dad says I should be a lawyer.

  “Aren’t you tired of being teased?” I asked everyone. “Aren’t you sick of feeling embarrassed? Well, here’s our answer! It’s KUNG FU!!!”

  Then I raised my fist in the air and hollered, “Who’s with me?”

  No one was with me—at first. But I kept on giving speeches like that until Jude said, “Okay, okay, okay! If we help a little, will you stop talking?” and I said, “Sure.”

  Ezra put on a record from his mom’s collection, which played a very jazzy tune all about kung fu fighting. Then Ezra found a website about kung fu that showed some super-cool moves. They were all named after animals, like the dragon, the tiger, the snake, the leopard, and the crane.

  The crane kick was the easiest one, so I chose that. Here’s how you do it:

  1.  Put your arms up straight and high, to make a V shape above your head.

  2.  Stand on one leg, on tiptoe.

  3.  Bend the other leg and lift it off the ground.

  Now, that last part sounds easy, but it is not. I tried it ten times, and every time, I fell. On the last time, not only did I fall, I fell right on top of Ezra’s spectacular Lego skyscraper.

  “Oh no!” I yelped.

  I raised my hands really fast to cover my eyes. When I did that, I heard a loud riiiiiiiip.

  Then I felt coldness on my back.

  “Oops,” I whispered.

  “My dress!” Cora shrieked. “There’s a big humongous rip in the back!”

  It had been feeling a bit tight.

  After that, we stopped doing kung fu and started cleaning up one million Legos. I said sorry to Ezra and Cora a hundred times. I told them I’d give them all my allowance. I told them I’d be their servant for life! But they were both really nice about it.

  You know who wasn’t nice about it? Guess.

  “Do you have a magnet inside you that attracts trouble?” asked Jude.

  “It was an accident!” I scowled at him. “Both things!”

  Then I remembered the sign in Principal Powell’s office.

  “Nobody’s perfect!” I cried. “That’s why pencils have erasers.”

  “Well, your pencil needs an extra big eraser,” said Jude. “Maybe even two.”

  Chapter 10

  The next day, I decided to wear my favorite jeans. Mom had washed them, so they were nice and clean. Boy, did it feel great not to have a collar choking me and an army of spiders scratching my legs.

  I felt bad about ripping Monster Dress, but Nana said she’d fix it. She used to be a seamstress, and she can sew anything!

  “Don’ worry-a,” she said. “I will-a darn it!”

  “Nana,” I scolded. “You don’t have to curse!”

  She laughed and told me that to darn a hole means to sew it up. I love it when one word means two things. Like the word calf. If you said, “My calf is killing me!” you could mean that your leg muscle hurts a lot, but you could also mean your baby cow is attacking you. How cool is that?

  Sure enough, Nana had Monster Dress all darned and folded in a bag for Cora when she came to pick me up from school.

  Nana picks us up sometimes when Mom and Dad are working. My grandpa, Nonno, usually stays home and works in his garden or paints a picture. He says too many children give him a headache. When he says that, Nana always calls him a “grump-pa,” which cracks me up.

  I like it when Nana picks us up because she always lets us play in the yard and always brings us sweet treats, like licorice or cookies or gummi bears. Dad says she spoils us rotten, but Nana says that’s her job.

  Pearl was with Nana because she goes to day care only three days a week, the lucky dog. The other two days, she probably lies on Nana and Nonno’s couch gobbling chocolate bars and watching TV while I’m taking spelling tests and
adding a million numbers and meditating!

  Pearl was still dressed in her Rat Princess outfit. She loved it so much, she had even slept in it! She’d wanted to wear it in the bath, too, but Mom said, “Now, that is where I draw the line,” and made her take it off. Pearl was also wearing my old tiara, which was bent and missing most of its rhinestones. And Mom had drawn the three black whiskers on her face again.

  “Pearl!” gushed Cora. “You look marvelous! Are you a cat princess?”

  Pearl made a disgusted face. She doesn’t like cats very much.

  “No!” she cried. “A wat!”

  “Would the Rat Princess like a gummi bear?” I asked her.

  “Wats eat twash,” she said very seriously. But then she grabbed the gummi bear out of my hand. “And gummis!!”

  After Cora and I had eaten a whole bunch of gummi bears—heads first, of course—we told Nana we had to do something important.

  We got Ezra and Jude, and then we all ran over to where Noah was waiting for Ivy by the climbing wall. J.J. was bothering him, as usual. It was easy to spot them because J.J. was wearing his orange jacket and an orange knit hat, too. I looked around for J.J.’s ten-foot-tall dad, but I didn’t see anyone that tall anywhere.

  “Aw, come on, Shorty,” J.J. was saying. “Just one game of soccer? Please?”

  Noah shook his head.

  “Wanna play baseball instead?” asked J.J. “Hey, I know! You could play shortstop! Get it? Get it?”

  Then J.J. howled with laughter. That did it!

  “Get in formation!” I whispered to the others. We had decided to make a semicircle, but they didn’t do such a great job. It looked more like a squiggly worm shape than a semicircle.

  “Good afternoon,” said Cora. “May we speak with you, please?”

  “No manners!” I whispered to her.

  J.J. laughed. “Ronny, why do you look so mad?”

  “I look mad,” I said, “because I am mad. I’m steaming mad. I’m blazing mad.” With every word, I walked a little closer to him. Cora, Minnie, Ezra, and Jude shuffled along next to me.

  Then I stared at him reeeeeally hard and I said, “And you know what else, J.J. Taylor?”