Just then, the bus stopped in front of the school and Tristan and his band of merry men walked like royalty, out of the bus, while all the other kids waited for them to leave.
“Jerk,” Amy muttered, grabbing her stuff and heading through the school doors.
Once inside she made her way to the ladies room, where she tried getting the gum out of her hair. She doused it with cold water, and pulled on bits and pieces of it until it became even more of a mess.
“This is just great,” she huffed, exiting the ladies room, and heading down the hallway. She paused and stood looking at a classroom door, trying to decide if that’s where she was suppose to go.
“Hello?” Amy felt a tap on her shoulder. She turned around to see a boy about her age, that was very, very, tall, almost too tall. His pants looked too short for his long legs. He had sandy-blond hair, a cheerful countenance, and kind brown eyes that looked full of amusement. He held out a cup of ice to her. “I think ice would help.”
“Ice?” Amy wondered.
“I read somewhere,” the boy said, “that if you put ice on gum, it freezes it. Then you can scrape the gum out with a knife.”
Amy smiled. “Really? “Smart thinking. Thanks.”
The boy placed an ice cube on Amy’s hair, and broke off bits of the gum. “Got most of it. Other bits you’ll have to chop out. Is that okay?”
“Yeah, thanks.”
The boy’s face clouded over. “What a jerk. He has terrorized everyone here longer than I can remember. Trained them. Around here he lives like a king, and everybody else are his subjects.”
Amy shook her head. “Wow. I guess he is an outlaw after all. This school won’t be boring, at least.”
The boy smiled, showing off a mouthful of braces. “No. This school is not boring. There are too many weird teachers. It’s like the drinking water has something in it to turn people strange.”
“Ew, really?” Amy said. “Maybe I should only drink bottled water.”
“Not a bad idea.” The boy looked at his watch. “If we don’t hurry we’re going to be late to our first class. My first class is science. What class do you have?
“I have science too. Do you think you could show me where the room is?”
“Yeah, sure. Ole’ Brier will show you the lay of the land.”
“Brier? Is that your name?”
“Yep. Brier Patch. My dad thought it would be funny. But I guess he didn’t think about me having to live through a name like that in school. So, what’s your name? It’s got to be better than mine.”
“Amy.”
“Amy, what?”
“Just Amy.”
“Everybody has a last name.”
“My mother left me in a Lost And Found box, on the side of the road, along with a bunch of puppies, when I was three. Since then, I don’t go by my real last name, for personal reasons. So until I find a family that actually wants me---which probably won’t happen, or until I get married, which probably won’t happen either, I’ll just go by Amy.”
“Okay, I’m good with that. I mean, it’s kind of cool---makes you seem like a wild card, you know. I mean, if you ever wanted to, you could be a Washington for a day, or somebody else famous.”
Amy shrugged. “Yeah. I guess.”
“YOU TWO, GET OVER HERE THIS INSTANT!” a voice behind them shouted.
“Oh my gosh,” Brier breathed. “We’ve been caught.”
Amy looked confused. “Caught?”
“Yeah, just follow me and don’t say anything. Every word you say will be used against you.
“Who is he?” Amy asked, glancing at the formidable looking man.
“It’s the vice principle, Mr. Grouchazit!”
“What are you whispering about?” The man thundered.
“I was just telling her your name, sir,” Brier said, trying to sound confident as he walked up to the man.
“Shouldn’t she already know my name?”
“No, sir, she’s new.”
“All the more reason for her to know it.” Mr. Grouchazit stared at Amy, and sniffed. He had brown hair planted in sparse rows over his head, like a salt grass lawn.
“What are you two doing in the halls?” he asked, “The late bell rang five minutes ago.”
“Mister,” Amy said, “I got some gum stuck in my hair, and Brier was helping me remove it. Couldn’t get it all out though. It was a big piece of gum.”
The vice principal squinted, looked at the remnants of gum left in Amy’s hair, and shook his head in disapproval.
“You know the rule about chewing gum in school. It seems that divine justice has helped you remember that rule.”
“No,” Amy retorted. “I wasn’t aware of the rule. And I wasn’t chewing gum either.”
Mr. Grouchazit’s face turned bright red. He shook his finger at Amy. “Don’t back talk, young lady. Now, what class are you two suppose to be in?”
“Science,” Brier said.
“Then go!” The principal thundered, pointing to the door of Miss Rackbith's class. “Now.”
As they walked through the classroom doors, Amy got her first glimpse of the infamous teacher, Miss Rackbith. The woman was a strangely-extraordinary, weird-looking woman. She had short, red, frizzy hair that looked as if someone had just rubbed a balloon over it, magnetizing it until it stood straight up. She had a long pointy, thin nose that reminded Amy of a razor blade. Strangest of all, Miss Rackbith had one brown eye and one bright green eye. Her eyes wouldn’t have scared Amy all that much—but her green eye seemed always to wander from side to side as if she was surveying the class with that eye, while reading text books with her other eye.
Miss Rackbith used her green eye as she watched Amy and Brier walk into the stale, dusty classroom.
“You two are overdue,” Miss Rackbith snapped. “Not only that, you're slow. And on top of that, you're late!”
Miss Rackbith didn’t even acknowledge that Amy was a new student. The teacher just ran her fingers through her messy hair, scratching out the dandruff with her long fingernails. Her passion was to make kids squirm. Besides which, she hated teaching. She wished she had been a botanist instead of a teacher. Instead of caring for beautiful flowers, she got the dreary honors of trying to weed out stupid children, fertilize and water the smart ones, and help the late bloomers.
“Don’t you know the new rule?” Miss Rackbith asked Amy.
Amy shook her head, and sighed. “No I don’t.”
“Then, I will inform you of it. The school board now decrees that tardiness must be paid for. You two will have to pay a fine of twenty-five dollars, each. Also, you must stay after class to clean desks.”
Amy stared at the woman, dumbfounded. Miss Rackbith seemed more like a freakish librarian than a teacher. It seemed as if she viewed her students like books. If they weren’t in their proper desk shelves on time---just fine them into the ground.
“Now,” Miss Rackbith said, “Where were we? Oh, now I remember.” She made her way to the chalkboard, and resumed making a diagram of the anatomy of dairy cows. She droned on and on as if the class had never heard of cows before.
“Somebody put a sock in her mouth, already,” Tristan groaned loud enough for Miss Rackbith to hear.
“What did you say?” Miss Rackbith asked, pausing, chalk still in hand.
“Nothing,” Tristan murmured.
“You said something, and I want to hear it!” Miss Rackbith walked over to Tristan’s desk, and lowered her head so she could look at him with both of her weird eyes. “Tell me, WHAT DID YOU SAY?”
“I said,” Tristan, said, smiling, “you’re boring the heck out of me.”
Miss Rackbith’s freakish eyes lit up with wrath, as she grabbed Tristan behind the ears, and pulled hard. “Are you bored now?”
“Oh. Ouch. No. Miss RackBUT. Not bored anymore.”
The class roared with laughter.
“Why, I ought to...to…yank your ears right out of your head.” Miss Rackbith was so ang
ry now, her eyes bulged, and you could hear her grinding her teeth. She pulled Tristan up from his chair by his ears, and dragged him to the front of the class.
“Hold out your arms, young man!” she snapped.
Tristan looked perturbed. “Why?”
“Just do it!” She went to the back of her desk and pulled out something.
“They won’t let you beat me,” Tristan warned. “I’ll report you for child abuse. You know I will.”
“Yes,” Miss Rackbith said. “I know. Now hold out your arms.”
Tristan shrugged, and held out his arms.
“Now, be a dear,” Miss Rackbith said, “and hold these for me.” She plopped a pile of dictionaries into his open arms.
Tristan tucked the books to his chest so they were easier to hold, but Miss Rackbith yanked his arms back out. “No. You must hold your arms outstretched. Builds more muscle. And character.”
“This is child abuse,” Tristan complained.
“No,” Miss Rackbith murmured, piling more dictionaries onto Tristan’s arms. “It’s justice. Perhaps this way, you will actually learn something. One can learn many things just by being close to books.”
“This is stupid,” Tristan said, sweat starting to trickle down his forehead. “I’m going to drop them on your feet.”
“Do that,” Miss Rackbith shot back, “and I will tell the head warden of the boy’s home you live in, and you will be restricted indefinitely.”
Tristan stared daggers at Miss Rackbith, thinking vengeful thoughts.
Miss Rackbith smiled at Tristan’s pained face, and turned to the chalkboard. Just as she was about to proceed, Mr. Grouchazit poked his head into the classroom and motioned for Miss Rackbith. They stood in the doorway for a few minutes conversing in whispers. Then, when they were done, Mr. Grouchazit left, and Miss Rackbith walked curtly to Amy’s desk.
“Young lady,” she said, in a very solemn tone.
“Yes?” Amy asked.
“Mr. Grouchazit just informed me that you were chewing gum in school. It’s against the rules, and he wants me to make an example of people who disobey such rules. It seems that wads of gum have been showing up everywhere in the school. It’s very disgusting.”
“I didn’t chew gum, Miss Rackbith,” Amy protested.
“Of course you didn't!” Miss Rackbith thundered, “that’s how you didn’t get it stuck in your hair.”
Miss Rackbith held a sharp pair of scissors menacingly over Amy’s hair. “Don’t worry---I’ll just take the chunk out that has gum still in it. She grabbed one of Amy’s brown locks, and opened the scissors wide.
Amy could feel the heat rising to her face. She couldn’t believe this teacher. In a matter of minutes Amy was going to be bald. This teacher really must have thought she was something, dubbing herself executioner, librarian, teacher, and barber, all in the same day.
Just as Miss Rackbith opened her scissors to snip off a lock of Amy’s hair, the bell rang.
Amy jumped up from her seat and rushed out of the room, glancing behind her just in time to see Miss Rackbith cry out in rage as Tristan dropped the pile of dictionaries onto her feet.
Chapter Five
---The Key To Failure---
Why is it that people only notice when toilets are dirty? Or when lawns are brown, or when the vacuum cleaner bag needs changing, or when the dishes need to be done, or when homework is unfinished? The reason must be, Amy thought, as she scrubbed down a dirty desk, that looking for the bad things is a lot easier than looking for clean toilets, and green lawns and noticing when people finish homework.
“Cleaning chairs for being late to class,” Amy said, as she scrubbed a dirty desk, “is just the school’s way of cutting back on janitorial costs. It’s nothing but child labor, for free!”
“Yeah,” Brier agreed. “We should protest or something.”
“Protest against all people being allowed to chew gum,” Amy said. “I’ve found enough gum underneath these desks to feed the starving people of China.”
“I wonder how nourishing that would be,” Brier laughed. “Pretty gross, sending chewed gum to save people from starvation.”
“Yeah, pretty gross.” Amy said, giggling.
Brier stopped scrubbing and looked up. “This has been your double bubble day, Amy. First, gum in your hair, and now cleaning petrified gum under chairs.”
“Yeah it has,” Amy said. “I’m just glad that you helped me figure out how to get that gum out of my hair.”
Brier smiled faintly. “I’m just glad you have some hair left. It looked as if you were pretty close to loosing it today. Miss Rackbith wields a scary pair of scissors.”
Amy ran her fingers through her hair, gratefully. “Yeah. That lady is a witch. I’m beginning to think that your school is possessed or something. Freaky teachers. Freaky students. Tristan’s pretty scary. Then when I think it’s safe, he and his “merry” band of men wait at the lunchroom doors and take our money. What’s wrong with your school, anyway?”
Brier shook his head. “I don’t know. When I find out, I’ll tell you.”
“Good,” Amy said. “I’ll hold you to that promise.”
“I only said, “if” I find out. That’s a big IF. Plus, I’m not that good at finding things. I can spend all day looking for something, when it’s right in front of my nose. See what I mean, I can’t find where I put the spray soap stuff.”
“Don’t worry.” Amy smiled, looked around for a second and came back holding the spray bottle. “Here it is. I’m good at finding things, so we just might make an ironic duo.”
“Yeah,” Brier agreed, taking the soap. “Like the Lost and Found duo.”
“Sure,” Amy said, glancing down at the desk she had been cleaning. “Speaking of finding things. Would you look at that?”
Brier peered beneath the desk, and whistled. Stuck to every inch of the desk were wads of gum in every color and size. In one particular spot there was a five-inch wad of gum amalgamated into a big glob. “Must be Tristan’s desk. Gum is his trademark. He leaves it wherever he commits a crime. Must have committed quite a few crimes just by sitting here. Kind of stupid, if you ask me. I mean, if the cops were smart enough, they could take the gum and use his saliva as evidence.”
Amy shook her head, and laughed. “Chewing gum must be Tristan’s only hobby.”
“No,” Brier said, “I think he has one more hobby---spitting it out.”
“Did somebody say my name?” Tristan’s voice unexpectedly echoed through the classroom behind them. He walked over to Brier and Amy, with his band of merry men following closely behind.
“No,” Brier lied. “We were most definitely not talking about you, Tristan. What are you still doing here anyway?”
Tristan grabbed Brier by the collar. “As if you didn’t know. Miss RackBUTT had all of us in detention, for personal reasons, of course.”
“Bummer,” Brier murmured, looking frightened.
Tristan smiled. “Yeah, isn’t it? Luckily, my time wasn’t entirely wasted. I stole a little time on the computer to see what I could find about Amy, here. It seems we have a prodigy amongst us.”
Brier looked confused. “What do you mean?”
“Tell him, Amy,” Tristan snapped. “Tell him about your abilities.’
Amy shook her head. “Tell him what?”
“Tell him, that your face is everywhere on the internet, and in the news.”
Brier’s eyes widened. “Really? Why?”
Tristan smiled smugly. “Because she’s a natural-born Seeker and Finder. Do you know how many Finders, and Seekers, have existed on the earth at one time?”
“No,” Brier retorted. “How many?”
“Only a very small handful.”
“So,” Brier said, “do you know how many losers like you have ever existed on the earth at one time? How many people, as low, mean, and selfish, who never have enough because they lose it all the time, have existed? Don’t know? Well I’ll tell you. Thousands. M
illions.”
Tristan let out an angry cry and pressed Brier against the classroom window. “You’ll be the one losing something, say…your teeth, if you don’t shut up.
“Let him go!” Amy commanded.
“Only if you find something for me,” Tristan said, preparing to slug Brier in the stomach.
“Wait! No! Don’t hurt him! What do you want me to find?”
“The key to Mrs. Rackbith’s house.”
“Why would you want the key to her house? Why would she even leave her house key in the school?”
“Doesn’t matter. Just find it. I know you can. So don’t play dumb. I’ve read all the articles about you finding missing persons. The rescues. The missing wallets, even library books. Now go and get it. After finding missing kids, a key has to be a cinch.”
Amy’s face clouded over with anger. “What if I won’t do it for you? What if I don’t find it?”
Tristan slammed Brier more firmly against the window. “Then Brier, here, will end up being tossed through the window. And you’ll be the one picking the glass out of his broken skin.”
Amy gazed at Tristan, in disgust. How had he found out her secret in such a short time? Things were getting complicated, way too fast.
“Fine,” she sighed. “I’ll do it. But you have to promise not to hurt anyone.”
Tristan smiled. “I promise, on my mother’s grave, that I won’t hurt anyone.”
“Fine, I’ll find your stupid key,” Amy agreed. “Just give me a sec.”
Brier, Tristan, and his merry band of followers, watched with amazed curiosity as Amy paused for a second, closed her eyes, got a mental picture of where the item was located, and walked to the front of the classroom. There she stopped and scanned the wall. She could feel her skin growing warm. She knew it had to be somewhere very near. Her gaze rested on the clock. Something was odd about it. Its batteries appeared to be dead because its hands never moved.
“Ah,” Amy said, tiptoeing and taking the clock off the wall. “Found it.”
“Found it?” Tristan growled. “What do you mean?”
Amy took the plastic sheet off the clock and yanked out the big hand, and placed it in Tristan’s palm.
“The key,” Tristan said, truly awed by Amy’s skill. “How very clever. All this time I’ve been staring at it.”