It took me a second to catch her drift. Jeanne and I looked at each other at the exact same time.
“Hang on,” I said. “You’re giving her detention and not me?”
Stricker shrugged. “Rafe, I don’t think for a moment that you’re blameless in all of this,” she said. “But the fact is, it’s not against the rules for a boy to be in the boys’ bathroom. I’m sorry, Jeanne, but my hands are tied.”
Then the fifth-period bell rang, and Stricker stood up. This conversation was over. She even took us out to the hall, to make sure we’d go straight to class.
Jeanne and I walked away like a couple of zombies.
“I’m really sorry about this,” I told her.
“It’s not your fault,” she said.
“But it kind of is,” I said. “If I hadn’t gone into that bathroom in the first place, this never would have happened.”
“Well, there’s nothing we can do about it now,” Jeanne said—but again, I wasn’t so sure.
In fact, I could think of at least one thing I could do.
I looked back to make sure Stricker was still there in the hall, and waved my arms to get her attention.
“Hey, Sergeant Stricker!”
“What are you doing?” Jeanne said, but I ignored her.
“Hide-and-seek! You’re it!” I yelled, as loudly as I could, and then ran straight for the nearest girls’ bathroom.
GAME OVER
So I got that detention to go along with Jeanne’s, but guess what? It didn’t make any difference.
Once I thought about it some more, I realized I could have gotten a hundred detentions and it wouldn’t change the fact that Jeanne had gotten hers���all because of me.
Bottom line? I’d broken my own No-Hurt Rule, big-time, and I didn’t need Leo to tell me what that meant: I’d just lost my third and final life in Operation R.A.F.E. The game was over. As far as the mission was concerned, I was now officially dead.
So not only was I flunking out of middle school, and not only had I hurt everyone who’d been nice to me along the way, but I’d also just crashed and burned—in my very own game.
End of story, right? Rafe Khatchadorian equals total loser. Nothing more to tell.
SOMETHING ELSE
Except—you’re not stupid. There are obviously still some pages left in this book. It’s like when the guy in the movie goes off a cliff, and you’re supposed to think he’s dead, but you also know it can’t be over yet. Something else still has to happen.
And something else did, but I’m going to let Leo tell that part.
THOU SHALT (NOT) VANDALIZE
The next morning, I left a note for Mom saying that I had to go to school extra early to work on a project, which was basically true. I just left out the part about how early meant four in the morning and project meant highly illegal activity.
“You’re not going to regret this,” Leo kept telling me. The way he saw it, the whole point of Operation R.A.F.E. was about breaking rules, so why should I let a little thing like losing the game stop me from doing the part I’d been looking forward to the most?
Like I said before—genius.
When I got to school, I rode around behind the gym and parked my bike. There’s a big empty wall back there, where we play dodgeball when Mr. Lattimore doesn’t feel like torturing us himself. Before all of this, I would have just seen a wall. Now I saw a giant canvas.
I unpacked my new fat black marker, a big old camping flashlight, and some of my latest practice sketches. I’d drawn these ones on graph paper, which is kind of like a brick wall, to show me how big everything would need to be.
But Leo was feeling impatient. “You don’t need those anymore,” he said. “The clock’s ticking. Stop thinking so much and just go.”
So I did. I set up the flashlight on a rock so that it was shining right at the wall. Then I picked up my marker and started.
It was kind of slow-moving at the beginning. I wasn’t sure what to draw first, or what order to do things in. But the more I kept going, the more I got into it, and then somewhere along the way everything started to flow.
“That’s it,” Leo said. “Put some more of that over there” and “Make this bigger” and “Try it like this” and “No—bigger. BIGGER!”
He said that a lot. After a while I was running around like crazy, working over here, working over there, and getting up on an old trash can to reach the higher parts when I needed to. The whole thing started to get so big that I felt like I was inside it, even while I was still drawing. It was like Leo had said—I wasn’t thinking anymore. I was just doing it, like the marker was just another part of me, and the lines and shapes and pictures were coming right out of my hand. It was an amazing feeling.
I totally lost track of time too. All of a sudden, the sun was coming up, and I was putting my finishing touches on everything. My arm was so tired that it felt like it was ready to fall off, but my brain was still buzzing like crazy. I felt like I’d never go to sleep again in my life.
In fact, I was so into it, I never even heard the police car coming.
It pulled around the corner of the school, and the red and blue flashers came on right away. The car stopped short. Doors opened on both sides, and not one but two policemen got out.
I froze. I didn’t know if I was supposed to drop my pen, put my hands up, or what.
But the police weren’t even looking at me. They were both just standing there now, staring at my wall.
“Holy smokes, kid,” one of them said. “Did you really do all this?”
TWO MINUTES LATER…
TIME OUT (AGAIN)
Did you notice something there? Just me and Leo in the back of that police car?
Way back at the beginning of this book, I showed you a picture of me, Leo, and Georgia in a Hills Village Police Department cruiser, and I said we’d get back to that part.
No, I’m not messing with you. Yes, that part’s still coming. We just haven’t gotten there yet.
Let me put it this way: Everything that happened that morning, with the mural and getting arrested, was just the beginning of the best and worst day of my life, all in one. There’s still plenty more to tell.
So stick with me.
HOUSE ARREST
As long as I’m at it, here’s a pop quiz to see if you’ve been paying attention:
What do you suppose Bear did when the Hills Village Police brought me home just after sunrise that morning?
1. He bribed the cops to go away and forget this ever happened.
2. He took me out for a delicious breakfast.
3. He went ballistic and started chasing me all over the house until I locked myself in the bathroom and Mom told him to calm down or she was going to call the police back herself.
Answer: Let’s just say it’s a good thing I’m fast on my feet.
I stayed away from Bear after that, which wasn’t hard, since Mom sent me to my room “until further notice.” It was kind of like getting an in-school suspension, without the school. I just sat there on my bed for hours, wishing I were somewhere else.
Or someone else. Like maybe someone who wasn’t a full-time disappointment to his own mother.
“You’ve got to focus on the positive,” Leo told me. “That was a major masterpiece you pulled off today. Nobody’s going to forget this one.”
“Yeah, including Mr. Dwight and Mrs. Stricker,” I said. “They’re probably going to kick me out of school.”
A day earlier I might have even thought that was a good thing. Now all I knew for sure was that I didn’t want to feel this way anymore—like no matter what I did, good or bad, and no matter how hard I tried, I just ended up back in the same place. Maybe Mrs. Stricker was right. Maybe I really was headed for the federal penitentiary someday—the ultimate detention.
Around lunchtime, Mom came back in to talk to me.
“I went to the school,” she said, “and I told Mr. Dwight you’ll be painting over that mural this weeken
d. It’s a shame, really. Anywhere else and I would have been impressed.”
“Are they going to kick me out?” I asked.
Mom sighed. She seemed really sad—because of me, of course. Again.
“I don’t know,” she said. “We have a conference at school first thing tomorrow morning. Until then you’re staying right here.”
As she started to leave the room, I told Mom I was really sorry, but all she said was, “I know you are, Rafe.” And then she closed the door.
The only other person I saw that afternoon was Georgia. She brought me a pudding cup when she got home from school, but I think that was just so I’d tell her what had happened.
I didn’t yell at her, but I did tell her to get out and stay out. I just wanted to be alone with my thoughts.
For the rest of the day it was quiet. Nothing else happened until just after dark. I heard the TV come on in the living room, and I could smell onions cooking from the kitchen. That’s when the doorbell rang, and everything went from really, really bad…
… to really, really worse.
THE VERY WORST PART
I stuck my head out into the hall to listen.
“I’ve got it,” Mom said.
The front door opened, but then nothing happened.
“That’s weird,” Mom said. “There’s no one here—oh, wait. What’s this?”
I heard Bear grunt the way he does when he rolls off the couch.
“What’ve you got there?” he said a second later. They were out on the porch now.
“I’m not sure,” Mom said. Her voice was all faraway, like she was thinking about something else. I heard papers rustling.
“Not sure?” Bear said. He was getting crabby all over again. “Just look at this stuff! I’m telling you, that kid’s nothing but a little hoodlum.”
“Don’t talk about him that way,” Mom said, “and lower your voice.”
“Are you kidding me?” Bear said. “Listen, if you’re not going to do something about this, I will. In fact, I’m going to get him right now.”
“No, you’re not. Not like this,” Mom said.
The front door slammed, and they started arguing outside. I couldn’t understand what they were saying anymore, but it was obviously about me. My blood started to pump.
The next thing I heard was Bear roaring. “DON’T TELL ME WHAT TO DO!”
Then Mom said something I couldn’t hear.
Then, “SHUT UP, JULES! JUST SHUT UP!”
I heard Mom yell, and then it got quiet��but not in a good way. I started running down the hall, and as soon as I did, I practically slammed into Georgia coming the other way. She looked really scared, and she was crying too.
“Rafe! Come help Mom, quick!”
THE FAMOUS POLICE CAR INCIDENT
As soon as I saw that Mom had fallen down the front steps, I told Georgia to call 911.
“But—”
“NOW,” I told her, and closed the front door behind me when I went outside.
Bear was standing next to Mom, trying to help her up, but she wouldn’t let him.
“Just get away from me!” Mom was saying.
“Jules, I’m sorry. It was an accident. It was just an accident—”
“I know that,” Mom said. “And I don’t care. Just back off, Carl!”
It wasn’t until then that I noticed all the pages, and the big envelope with MRS. K. written on the front. They were scattered all over the porch, like somebody had dropped them there. And they weren’t just any pages either. I recognized the handwriting, the drawings, all of it. They were photocopies of my Operation R.A.F.E. notebook—including a copy of every page I’d ever bought back from Miller, as far as I could tell.
But I had bigger problems to deal with right now.
I jumped off the porch and pushed Bear away from Mom as hard as I could.
“Get out of here!” I yelled at him. His mouth was hanging open, and his eyes were kind of blank, like he wasn’t even there. I’d never seen him like that before. He just backed away without a fight and stood in the driveway, not leaving, but not coming any closer either.
“It’s okay,” Mom told me when I went to help her up. “It was just a push. He didn’t mean to hurt me.”
Still, I stayed right there until the police came, with two cruisers and an ambulance. They put Bear in the back of one car. Another policeman started asking me and Georgia questions about what we’d seen, while the ambulance guys looked at Mom’s wrist. Georgia was crying the whole time, and I held on to her hand, which, believe me, is not something I usually do. The whole scene was crazy. It was totally insane!
“I’m okay,” I kept hearing Mom say. “I’m fine.” Still, they wanted to take her to the hospital for some X-rays, so she got into the back of the ambulance while Georgia and I watched. We weren’t allowed to ride along, but the policeman said he’d take us.
“I’ll see you there,” Mom called out.
“We’ll be right behind you,” the policeman told her.
“And I’m right here too,” Leo whispered, which was kind of a big deal for him, since he hardly ever talks when other people are around. But I appreciated it.
And by the way, if you’re still wondering:
M M
Mom was okay. They put an Ace bandage on her at the hospital and then called a taxi for us to get home again. She sat in the back with her arms around us the whole way, even with her hurt wrist and everything.
When we got home, the first thing I saw was that someone had put all those pages back into the envelope and left it on the porch. I wasn’t too happy about it, but Mom didn’t say anything. She just took the envelope into the house with her, and I didn’t see it again after that.
Inside, there were a couple of messages from Bear on the machine, saying how sorry he was, and thank you for not pressing charges, and how he was going to be staying at a buddy’s house for the time being.
“Jules, call me,” he said. “Here’s the number. Five-two-four—”
Mom hit the ERASE button before he could even finish. It made me want to cheer.
“Come sit,” Mom told us. “I want to have a talk.”
So we all sat down at the kitchen table, with one empty chair where Bear usually ate.
“Things are going to change around here,” Mom said. “Bear’s not going to be living with us anymore, and hopefully that means I can afford to stop working double shifts at the diner too.”
Now we did cheer. This was the best news I’d heard in forever.
But, of course, the cheering didn’t last long.
“As for you, Rafe,” Mom said, “there’s still a lot we have to deal with.”
“I know,” I said. “And Mom? I’m really sorry.” It felt like I’d been saying that a lot lately. Too much, in fact. Mom reached over and put a hand on my shoulder, but seeing that bandage on her wrist just made me feel worse. “What happened tonight… this was all my fault. I just… I, um—”
I didn’t even know I was about to start crying. It just kind of started on its own. All of a sudden, there were tears coming out of my eyes, and my face was all scrunched up, and I was bawling like a baby. The weirdest part was that I wasn’t even embarrassed. Not even with Georgia sitting there gawking at me.
“This wasn’t your fault,” Mom said. “Not even close.”
“I’ll bet you wish you could just have a normal kid sometimes,” I said, wiping my nose on the paper towel she gave me.
“I’m normal!” Georgia said.
“That’s not how I think about it,” Mom said. “It’s true, Rafe, you’ve made some bad choices for too long now. But I’ve made some bad choices too, haven’t I?”
I knew she meant Bear, but I didn’t say anything.
“In any case, we’ll worry about all this in the morning, okay?” Mom said. Then she leaned over to whisper in my ear. “And I think normal’s a little boring, don’t you?”
“Hey, no whispering!” Georgia whined.
&nbs
p; “That’s what Leo says,” I whispered back, and Mom smiled a kind of happy-sad smile.
“Where do you think he got it?” she said.
“Where who got it?” Georgia said. “Got what? What are we talking about?”
And even though I knew Leo wasn’t actually there and that he couldn’t really give me a thumbs-up from across the table, that’s exactly what he did, anyway.
IT HAD TO HAPPEN SOMETIME
When Mom brought me to school the next morning, everyone—and I mean everyone—was staring. I guess that meant they’d all seen my mural, which I guess was a good thing since, it was going to be gone by that weekend. A lot of people were whispering and pointing, and one guy even took a picture, but nobody said a single word to me.
With one exception.
Miller was leaning against the trophy case, watching when I came in. He had that same stupid smile on his face as always, like a giant baby who just made a good poop in his diaper.
“Hey, Khatchadorian!” he yelled over. “You get my package?”
Now, believe it or not, I’d almost forgotten about that envelope. I’d spent the whole night blaming myself for what had happened. I hadn’t stopped to remember how it all had kicked off with that ring of the doorbell—just before Mom and Bear started arguing…
… and Georgia couldn’t stop crying…
… and Mom ended up at the hospital.
I pulled away from Mom and ran right at Miller, just like the last time, except now we were face-to-face. I didn’t even slow down until my fist plowed into his gut at full speed.
Miller looked totally shocked, but that didn’t stop him from swinging back and smashing me in the nose. I felt the blood almost right away. I started to go down, but I grabbed on and twisted him around until we were both on the floor, rolling and throwing punches wherever we could. He nailed me, hard, in the stomach. I got him, kind of, in the eye—