Wonkenstein

  Janae was sitting near the front of the bus, reading a book and pretending people like me didn’t exist. I tried to say something to her, but she wouldn’t listen. Trevor told me that he had heard from his mom, who had heard from Janae’s mother, who had heard from Janae’s sister, who had heard from Janae, that I had burped in her face. I told Trevor that it was Wonkenstein, but he didn’t believe me.

  I told Trevor about the Awful House and Mr. Pang and Ogre, but he just plugged his ears and said I should stop making things up. I felt pretty bad that even he didn’t believe me.

  When we got to school, I woke up Jack and asked him why he was so tired. He said his mom had gotten really mad because she couldn’t find his little sister’s dance costume and some of her good necklaces. He also said they were awake all night searching the house. When I reminded Jack that he had put those things on Wonkenstein, and that I had left them in Ogre’s room, he seemed surprised.

  The school morning was long, and the clock seemed to be going backward. It got even worse when Principal Smelt pulled me aside in the hall and asked me if I had given up burping.

  The cafeteria served meat loaf and cooked carrots for lunch. The meal left such a greasy feeling in my mouth that I had to drink two sodas to get rid of the taste. Then I really had to burp. I was so scared about getting caught that I went out back during the end of lunch to belch in private. I had just positioned myself to let one rip when I heard Jack’s big brother, Harry, talking to someone behind the Dumpster by the high school parking lot:

  The high school was almost two blocks away, but their overflow parking lot was right next to our bike racks. Only the kids who were late ever parked there. So occasionally groups of long-haired teenagers would hang out in the parking lot and laugh at us.

  Jack’s brother stepped out from behind the Dumpster, and I could see he was talking to Ogre. Things didn’t look right, but there was no way I was going to say anything to a couple of bigger kids who were talking angrily. Last time a kid from my school had talked to someone in the overflow parking lot, it hadn’t ended well.

  After lunch period, I walked through the doors to go to my next class and ran into Principal Smelt again. I tried to just pass by, but he stopped to congratulate me on signing up to recite a poem during the assembly. I wanted to tell him that it was all a mistake and that I wasn’t going to recite anything, but I was too scared to open my mouth. I hadn’t been able to burp because of Jack’s brother and Ogre being there, and I was worried that if I even cracked my lips, something unknown would slip out.

  Just so you know, I’m not one of those kids who likes to belch in public—I definitely don’t want that reputation. There are enough things I feel awkward about already. I just stood there with my mouth closed as Principal Smelt told me about all the character I was going to gain by reading a dramatic poem. I got away before he sang a song about it.

  I couldn’t figure out what was wrong with me. I felt bad about a lot of the things going on, and the problem kept coming back to Wonkenstein. I knew there was no way I could keep bringing him to school in my backpack and pretending everything was fine. I had never talked to Principal Smelt before, and now I had talked to him three times in the last two days. Trevor was staying away from me. Janae couldn’t even look at me. My parents were disappointed in me and filling my free time with chores. Plus, I was expected to recite a dramatic poem in front of my entire school in a couple of weeks.

  In my last class of the day, Wonkenstein kept whispering things to me from inside of the backpack.

  I tried to whisper to him to be quiet, but after the tenth time, my teacher stopped me.

  I wanted to tell them that they should all look away, but I was too embarrassed. Besides, I was still trying not to belch. My stomach was turning and gurgling as I sat there. I could feel my face getting warm, and Wonkenstein was shifting uncomfortably in my backpack and digging one of his small elbows into my spine. I was actually about to pass out when Scott Millford saved me. Scott was sitting three rows away, and apparently the greasy lunch wasn’t sitting well with him either. But while it was making me want to burp, it made him fart.

  Poor Scott just sat there with his face bright red while everyone scooted away. I felt bad, but I was happy for the distraction. My teacher never came back to me, and the bell rang five minutes later. I made sure to thank Scott on the way out, but I don’t think he thought I was being serious.

  On the bus ride home, Janae still ignored me, and Trevor sat by Jack. I had to sit down by Overfriendly Todd. Todd was always friendly, but he had just eaten two cupcakes, so he was really amped up.

  I ignored Todd while Wonkenstein whispered to me the ingredients for making a candy that would temporarily change the color of a person’s eyes. He then grunted twice and started to whimper while whispering the name Justine. I knew from reading Frankenstein that he was just worried about a girl he liked. It kind of made me feel a little better to know that we were both having girl trouble. It didn’t fix everything, but it helped.

  CHAPTER 13

  FROM BAD TO WORSE

  The last few weeks have been weird, painful, and weird again. Every day, I’ve stuffed Wonk in my backpack and taken him to school. He’s learned to stay perfectly quiet and my back’s gotten stronger, but aside from that, things are at an all-time low.

  I’ve needed Trevor’s help to figure out what to do with Wonkenstein and to understand why he’s even here, but Trevor’s not up for it. Janae still won’t talk to me. I guess the burp and the fake dancing on the bus were enough for her to write me off completely. My biggest problem is trying to keep Wonk hidden. It’s not easy to find new places to hide him.

  While I like being with Wonk, I can’t figure out what I’m going to do with him for the rest of my life. I’ve thought about starting a circus and having him be the star, but the only other acts I could think of were lame.

  I kind of want to tell my parents about Wonk, but they’re still pretty mad at me. I thought it would wear off after the first week, but they are sticking to their disappointment. Twice I’ve broken down and almost told them, but both times they interrupted me and gave me more chores.

  I tried to apologize to Mr. Pang, but every time I started walking over to his house, I would chicken out and go a different direction. I always ended up somewhere completely unrelated.

  Wonk and I spent a lot of time alone, hanging out in my room and reading. We finally finished Frankenstein. The green part of Wonk really got into it. I thought it was long and full of hard words, but I still liked it. The only bad part was that I now felt like the monster in the book—nobody understood or wanted to be around me.

  To make matters worse, today over the intercom Principal Smelt announced that the dramatic poetry contest is tomorrow. He even read off the names of the seven participants. To my horror, I was still one of them. I had been too embarrassed to talk to Janae and tell her to cross my name off the list.

  Also, when I got off the bus, I couldn’t help but notice the cop car in front of the Awful House. Its motor was running, and its lights were flashing. There were two cops out front, talking to Mr. Pang and Ogre. I needed to find out what was going on. I ran into my house, tossed my backpack on my bed, and unzipped it. Wonkenstein crawled out and began to stretch. I told him to stay put and opened my window. I would have climbed out, but my mom hollered at me through my bedroom door. It kind of sounded like my door was haunted and speaking to me. Of course, I don’t think any truly haunted door would ever say anything like …

  I was spooked, but it was only because I hated unloading the dishwasher. I raced to the kitchen and put the dishes away in record time. I was going so fast, I accidentally smacked Libby on the head with a plastic bowl.

  She yelled at me as I slammed the dishwasher closed and ran out to the rock island. The cop car was still there, and my friends were hunched down behind the bushes, watching.

  Teddy started talking faster than I could listen. He said something about Jack’s broth
er, Harry, catching Ogre with some stolen necklace. And Jack’s mother had called the police, and Mr. Pang had gotten into a fight with the cops. Now Ogre was going to a prison where he would have to break up rocks with a pickax for the rest of his life.

  The cops got into their car and pulled away. Rourk was cheering, and Aaron was making siren noises, but I was worried. Ogre didn’t steal any necklace. It was kind of Wonkenstein’s fault, and for some reason Wonkenstein was my fault. I had to make things right. The problem was that I was too chicken to do anything.

  I slowly shuffled back to my house. Libby was still in the kitchen, whining about how I had ruined her beautiful hairstyle. I couldn’t take it anymore and I went to my room. Wonkenstein sat on my pillow and sang me a song while patting me on the head. It didn’t make me feel any better.

  I wanted to fall asleep and wake up feeling less guilty. I thought about all my problems. I thought about the poetry competition and began to think up ways I could get out of going to school tomorrow. I couldn’t come up with a good disease to use.

  I tested my closet door again, but it was still locked, and Beardy had his eyes closed.

  Tuffin came into my room, smiling.

  I picked Wonkenstein up off my bed and put him on the floor. I then gave them one of my blankets.

  They both seemed excited to get a blanket to play with. I lay back down on my bed. I was going to close my eyes and think of other sicknesses I could fake when a thought hit me. It was a scary thought, so I shoved it away in my mind. But it kept popping back up.

  I argued with myself for a while before I finally gave in to my brain. I wasn’t happy about it, but I knew what I had to do. If nobody would listen to me, it was the only way. I reluctantly walked out of my room, and before my mom could tell me to do more jobs, I invited her to come hear my poem tomorrow.

  My mom was so shocked she had to close her book and take a breather. I went to my room and kicked Tuffin out. I got Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, sat on the floor, and flipped through it with Wonk. I showed him kind of what I wanted to write, and he smiled.

  CHAPTER 14

  DRAMA

  A couple of years ago, I had a speaking part in my school’s Thanksgiving play. I was supposed to walk out onstage dressed as a corncob and say …

  Then the crowd would laugh, and I was supposed to walk over and join the rest of the fruits and vegetables in the huge cornucopia. But I was nervous, and when I walked out onto the stage, I froze. I just stood there until a large gourd came over and ushered me off. Right before I reached the edge of the stage, I screamed out …

  Ever since then, I’ve been more than just a little bit scared to speak in public. The very idea makes my heart race wildly.

  Now not only was I going to have to speak in public, but unless I did a good job, I was going to end up in more trouble than I was in already. Wonkenstein kept telling me that I would do well. To be honest, though, I don’t think he really understood what was at stake. We had stayed up late working, but I knew that didn’t guarantee success.

  Right after my first class, I ran into Teddy. He knew today was the day I was going to recite a poem at the assembly, and he wanted to make fun of me before anyone else did.

  Teddy was the first to make fun of me, but he wasn’t the last. People I didn’t even know started to tease me. It wasn’t too late to get out of it. I knew I could just go to the nurse and tell her I had lost my voice or that I could no longer walk. But I also knew that this was my best chance to make a few things right.

  Nelson Spillbrick cornered me near the broken drinking fountain and demanded to know what I was doing. He was one of the other participants in the poetry contest, and apparently he took this stuff seriously.

  I was going to point out that most normal people don’t wear capes, but I thought about my Thumb Buddies and figured I should just keep my mouth shut.

  The assembly was during the last hour of the school day. I was growing more and more sure that my plan had no chance of working. When I got to the auditorium, Janae, Nelson, and the four other participants were practicing backstage.

  I was about to say something witty to Janae when Mr. Cartel, the drama teacher, came up to me singing …

  Mr. Cartel told me I couldn’t wear my backpack while performing. I told him I needed it and that it was kind of like my security blanket. Janae looked embarrassed to even know me. Mr. Cartel said there was no security in dramatic poetry readings. I panicked for a second, knowing I needed to have Wonkenstein nearby. Luckily, I thought of a solution:

  Mr. Cartel took off his odd hat and put seven small pieces of paper in it. We then drew numbers to see what order we would perform in. I got number … .

  I could hear hundreds of kids coming into the auditorium, and when I looked out of the curtains, I almost threw up. The worst part was that Teddy, Aaron, Trevor, Rourk, and Jack were all sitting in the front row. I could also see my parents seated with Tuffin. This was a terrible idea.

  I walked to the far back corner and took off my backpack. I set it on the floor and unzipped the top just a bit.

  I wished us good luck and then put my backpack back on. The other participants and I walked out in front of the curtain and sat on chairs next to a podium. Principal Smelt started the assembly by singing a song about being respectful during assemblies. I don’t think most people were paying attention.

  There were three judges sitting at a table. Either they were all Oompa-Loompas or the table was too tall, because I could barely see their heads.

  Nelson went first and dramatically recited a poem about a kid who loved horses better than people.

  I couldn’t believe this was Nelson’s moment. I guess the judges were liking it because I think they gave him a pretty good score. I couldn’t tell for sure, though, because they all seemed to be using a different grade scale.

  The next guy only said eleven words, but he said them so slowly and with such long pauses between each word that it felt longer. He also kept hugging himself.

  He then bowed about twenty times. His score was a little vaguer than the last.

  The first girl acted out a dramatic poem about a kid who wanted to be president but settled for being a dentist. I couldn’t understand where they were getting these awful poems to recite. The next girl performed a poem about a seed that grew up to be a tree that got chopped down and made into a table. A boy named Peter Hill acted out a made-up Star Wars scene with a weird happy ending. He was wearing a robe, and for some reason, he stood on a chair. The Star Wars scene was embarrassing, but at least he was talking about a movie I knew.

  His score was a little better than the first four contestants’.

  Janae was fantastic, of course. She recited a poem about a horse that was sick. By the end of it, I felt for the poor horse. I think her score was the best so far.

  When she sat back down, I just stared at her. Eventually Principal Smelt fake coughed and brought me out of my trance. I glanced around, and the whole audience was looking at me. My mom had her hand over her eyes, and Rourk was making a face. This was crazy. My idea seemed good last night, but now I thought drawing inspiration from a book might have been a bad idea.

  The three judges were already scribbling things down. I stood up slowly and walked to the podium. I sniffed twice and announced the name of my poem.

  I’d thought people would clap, but it was so quiet I could actually hear the crickets that were in an empty aquarium in the science room.

  I looked out at the crowd again and tried to count all the people who would beat me up later for doing this. I thought about just standing there until someone pushed me off the stage, but Wonkenstein pinched me through the backpack and jolted me out of my silence. I cleared my throat, and the microphone screeched.

  I waited until everyone stopped screaming and then started my poem again.

  Misunderstandings.

  Dear friends, we surely all must say

  misunderstandings block the way

  of oth
ers knowing what you mean

  or parents seeing what you’ve seen …

  Like so many times in my life, my mind froze.

  I had written the poem in the style of the Oompa-Loompa songs, but now I couldn’t remember the words. I stared at the audience, wishing they would have the courtesy to just get up and leave. Right then I could hear something over my right shoulder. It was Wonk whispering my next line from the backpack.

  … about a thing the other day.

  I might have made my parents sad,

  and woke my sleeping mom and dad,

  but if they knew the day I had,

  they probably wouldn’t be so mad.

  I looked at my mom and dad, and to my surprise, they were both smiling.

  I looked at Janae, gulped, and continued.

  Or say somebody thought you belched,

  but it wasn’t you; t’was someone else.

  How do you tell a next-door friend

  it wasn’t you who broke mouth wind?

  Janae was laughing. I couldn’t believe it. In fact, most of the audience was beginning to laugh as well.