The Birthday Party of No Return!

  At home, I hurried upstairs to my room. My foot felt better now. Or maybe I was getting used to the pain. But each step on the broken toe reminded me about my bad luck.

  I knew I had to change my luck — right away. I didn’t want to get hurt again. I didn’t want to see claws everywhere I looked.

  I knew what I had to do.

  I had to get rid of the vulture claw.

  I grabbed the rope pendant and tugged it off my neck. I held it up and studied the ugly thing.

  It had changed from good luck to bad. And I just realized why.

  I tugged at the torn talon. Arfy did this. It was all that big dumb dog’s fault.

  He took it from me and chewed on it. He got dog saliva all over it. That’s when it changed. Arfy ruined it.

  I wrapped the rope around it and stuffed the claw into my T-shirt drawer. I pushed it down under all the T-shirts. I didn’t want to see it again. I didn’t want to think about it.

  I’ll make my own good luck from now on.

  That’s what I was thinking when Mom stepped into my room. She was carrying a stack of neatly folded socks and underwear. “These are clean,” she said. “You can put them away.”

  “No problem,” I said.

  She dumped them on my bed. “How was the bowling thing?” she said.

  “Don’t ask,” I replied.

  “That bad?”

  “Worse,” I said. “I dropped the ball on my foot.”

  She squinted at me. “You’re supposed to throw it, not drop it.”

  “Ha-ha,” I said. “You’re funny, Mom.”

  “Did Cory win?” she asked.

  I shook my head. “No. Laura. But Cory got a free ice-cream sundae.”

  “Lucky,” Mom said.

  The magic word.

  “That reminds me,” Mom said. “We need a birthday gift for Cory. His party is next Saturday. What do you think we should get him?”

  I shrugged. “I don’t know. He thinks he’s getting a Wii from his parents. Maybe we could buy him a game.”

  “Well … you think about it,” Mom said. She turned and headed downstairs.

  I didn’t think about it at all. I had homework to do and other things to think about.

  Cory was a hard person to buy presents for. Because his parents always bought him everything he wanted. Lucky, right?

  Later that night, it was time to change into my pajamas and go to sleep. I pulled pajamas from the dresser drawer. I guess I wasn’t paying attention because I slammed the drawer on my hand.

  “YEOOWWWWWW.”

  I shook my hand frantically. The pain just wouldn’t quit!

  Were my fingers broken? Did I crack my wrist?

  “That stupid claw!” I cried out loud. “It has to go. I’m going to have bad luck until I get rid of it.”

  I grabbed the claw. I pulled it out from beneath the T-shirts.

  Squeezing it in my fist, I held it in front of me and strode to the open bedroom window.

  “Good-bye, claw,” I muttered. “Good-bye and good riddance.”

  I raised it high. Pulled back my arm. And prepared to toss it out the window, toss it as far as I could.

  But I stopped with my arm raised high.

  I stopped, suddenly frozen like a statue. My mind was spinning.

  I lowered my arm. My heart thudded. I took a deep breath.

  I gazed at the black, feathery claw.

  “Perfect,” I murmured. “It’s perfect. The perfect birthday gift for Cory.”

  I laughed. What a totally sweet idea.

  “Here you go, Cory. I brought you a really nifty good-luck charm.”

  Ha-ha.

  “Happy birthday, Lucky Duck.”

  I kissed the claw good-bye. Then I found a small box, tucked the claw inside, and wrapped a red ribbon around it.

  On Saturday, Dad dropped me off at Cory’s house for the birthday party. As I carried the claw to Cory’s house, I felt a little bad. I knew it was a dirty trick to give him the bad-luck charm.

  But Cory had all the good luck for too long. Why couldn’t it be my turn for a while?

  I knew that giving Cory a little bad luck was the only way I could win that Sports Camp scholarship. I gazed at the nicely wrapped package in my hand.

  It’s the Birthday Party of No Return for Cory, I thought.

  This is where everything changes.

  But I had a funny feeling in my stomach as I rang the doorbell. I just hope Cory’s bad luck isn’t TOO bad, I told myself.

  Mrs. Duckworth opened the door. Cory looks a lot like his mom. The same blond hair and blue eyes. And she has the dimple on her chin, too.

  “Hi, Lee.” She stepped aside so I could walk in. “Everyone is downstairs. Just follow the noise.”

  Cory’s basement is a giant playroom. That’s where the family hangs out. They have a huge flat screen TV down there and shelves of books and board games and every toy Cory ever owned in his life. Tables and a bar with a real soda dispenser that has about six different kinds of soda pop. Lots of stereo equipment and a real karaoke machine.

  I mean, it’s everything you’d want all in one huge room.

  And it was packed with kids now. I recognized just about every kid from school, and some cousins of Cory’s I’d met before, and I saw a bunch of kids I didn’t know.

  “Hey, how’s it going, Lee?” Cory greeted me. We bumped knuckles. He was wearing faded cargo jeans and a red and black T-shirt that said BIRTHDAY DUDE in big letters.

  “Happy birthday,” I said. I waved my present in front of him.

  “Just add it to the pile,” Cory said. He pointed to a card table stacked high with brightly wrapped presents.

  I dropped my present on the pile. I had that funny feeling in my stomach again. Stop thinking about it, I scolded myself. He deserves a little bad luck.

  I turned and gazed around the room. Kids were having a great time. Music thundered. I spotted Laura with some other girls, all carrying plates with pizza slices.

  “My parents gave me a Wii,” Cory said. “Check it out.” He pointed to the big TV against the wall.

  A bunch of kids were huddled around it. Gray Haddox was playing tennis. He was swinging the controller hard, killing each serve.

  A tall blue and white iced birthday cake, loaded with candles, stood beside the food table. I walked over and grabbed a handful of tortilla chips.

  “Awesome party,” I told Cory, shouting over the music.

  Some guys had found a soccer ball and were batting it back and forth across the room. A few girls had turned on the karaoke machine. But you couldn’t hear them over the roaring music.

  I hung out with some guys for a while, just goofing and talking about stuff. There was a huge bouquet of balloons floating near the stairway. Some guys thought it was funny to pop them and make kids scream.

  Suddenly, the music stopped. Mrs. Duckworth strode across the room. “Time for Cory to open his presents,” she announced.

  She dragged a big trash can up to the table. “Put the wrapping paper in here,” she told Cory. “Everyone gather around.”

  We all huddled in front of the gift table, dropping onto the couches, chairs, and the floor. A few kids kept playing Wii. The sounds of the game rang off the low ceiling.

  With his mom watching from the side, Cory began opening presents. He wasn’t careful with the wrapping paper or anything. He just ripped the packages open with both hands.

  “Sweet! Sweet!” he kept exclaiming, holding up each present.

  He got a lot of books and funny T-shirts and Wii games. Someone gave him a huge box of Starburst candy, his favorite.

  He was about halfway through the presents when he picked mine up.

  “Is this from you, Lee?” he asked.

  I nodded. “Yeah.”

  I suddenly felt really nervous. My hands went cold and I could feel my neck muscles tighten.

  I held my breath as Cory ripped away the red ribbon, then the wrapping paper. Then he jerked open t
he box.

  He pulled out the vulture claw and lifted it high for everyone to see.

  “Sweet!” he cried. “Check it out. A good-luck charm.”

  He turned to me with a smile on his face. “Thanks a lot, Lee,” he said. “But I already have one of these.”

  “Huh?” I let out a loud gasp.

  Cory set down the vulture claw. He reached under his BIRTHDAY DUDE T-shirt. And he pulled up a vulture claw he had around his neck.

  “See?” he said. “Why do you think I’ve been even luckier than usual?” He waved the claw at me. “This thing really works.”

  He tucked his claw back under his shirt. Then he picked up my claw and tossed it back to me.

  I was totally in shock. But somehow I caught it in both hands. I shoved it in my pocket.

  Cory walked over to me. “You keep it, dude,” he said. “You need good luck, too.” He gave me a playful punch in the side. “But thanks anyway for such an awesome gift. You’re a great friend.”

  Before I could say anything, he walked back to the table and started to rip open more presents.

  I’m a great friend?

  What’s up with this? This is supposed to be the Birthday Party of No Return for Cory.

  But it turns out he has his own good-luck claw. And now I have my unlucky one back.

  I had no choice. I had to take it back.

  I couldn’t concentrate on the rest of the gifts. My head was spinning. I could only think about the two claws.

  Why was Cory’s claw lucky and my claw unlucky? Was it really Arfy’s fault? How could I make the claw lucky again?

  Could I buy another one? I didn’t have a clue about where this one came from.

  I shut my eyes. I had to force myself to stop thinking about the claws. I wanted to enjoy the party.

  I walked over to the Wii game. About ten or twelve kids were gathered in front of the big TV. They were still playing the tennis game.

  I waited my turn. Then I took the controller.

  “I hope this is easy,” I said. “I haven’t played this before.”

  I gripped the controller tightly. Stared at the screen. Readied myself…

  The serve came at me. I swung hard.

  I gasped as the controller slid from my hand and sailed toward the TV screen.

  “Nooo!” I moaned over the crash. “Oh, no. Oh, no.”

  I raised my hands to the sides of my face. “It was an accident!” I cried. “An accident!”

  The controller shot into the center of the TV screen. A deafening crash. The glass shattered into dozens of jagged cracks. Like a spiderweb over the screen. Then shards of glass dropped to the floor.

  Kids cried out and jumped back. Everyone turned to stare at me.

  “An accident!” I cried. “It … slipped!”

  I didn’t like their angry stares. They were upset they wouldn’t get to play the Wii anymore. I’d ruined their fun.

  I saw Mrs. Duckworth hurrying across the room. “What happened?” she cried. “What was that crash?”

  I just wanted to shrink into the floor. I knew my face was burning red.

  I backed away. I wanted to get as far away as I could.

  I should have watched where I was going.

  I felt a bump on my back. It startled me, and I stumbled backward.

  “Oh, noooo,” I moaned.

  I backed into the food table. I felt it jolt. I turned in time to see the table tilt — and tumble onto its side.

  Plates and bowls and platters and glasses slid to the floor. Pizza slices made a sick plop. Glasses shattered. Chips flew everywhere. Spilled soda formed a lake under the overturned table.

  “No! No way! No way!” Mrs. Duckworth shouted.

  I tried to step away from the mess. But my legs were acting crazy.

  I slipped on a pizza slice. My hands flew up as I fell back —

  — and landed on the birthday cake.

  “Whoooaaa.” A cry escaped my throat as I fell on top of the cake. Crashed to the floor. Sprawled on my back. Helpless with the gooey cake beneath me.

  I rolled off the cake with a groan. Blue and white icing stuck to my shirt and the back of my pants.

  I tried to wipe it off, but clumps of icing stuck to my hands. My face itched. I tried to scratch it and icing smeared my cheeks.

  I glimpsed myself in the wall mirror. Blue and white icing covered my hair.

  Everyone in the room was going nuts. Kids were shouting and shrieking and running around. Cory stood in the broken glass from the TV screen, staring at the mess from the fallen food table. Staring. Just staring.

  I tried to brush icing off my pants. I felt someone grab my shoulder. Hard.

  I looked up to see Mrs. Duckworth. Her face was red. She had her jaw clenched. I swear I could see fire shooting from her eyes.

  She squeezed my shoulder until I cried out. “Come with me, Lee,” she said through gritted teeth.

  Across the room, a girl slipped on the sticky spilled soda and fell onto a pile of pizza slices. Kids were still shouting and shaking their heads in disbelief.

  Mrs. Duckworth led me up the basement stairs, away from the party. “Don’t touch anything,” she said. “I’m warning you — don’t touch anything. I don’t want icing all over my house.”

  “S-sorry,” I stammered.

  We reached the kitchen. She let go of my shoulder and turned to face me. She studied me from head to foot. “Are you okay, Lee? You’re not hurt?”

  “I — I’m okay, I guess,” I murmured. I brushed a lump of icing off my cheek. But then I didn’t know where to put it. So I wiped it on my jeans.

  “I’m calling your parents,” Mrs. Duckworth said. “To come pick you up.”

  “Okay,” I said softly.

  “You ruined Cory’s party,” she said, squinting hard at me. “You didn’t do all that to be funny — did you?”

  I swallowed. My throat was suddenly very dry. “Funny?” I squeaked. “No. I —”

  “So it wasn’t deliberate?” she asked.

  I shook my head. “No way. It was an accident. Really.”

  “It was a lot of accidents,” she said. She made a face. Like she had just bitten into a really sour lemon.

  “I — I’m sorry,” I stuttered.

  “I mean, it’s hard to destroy a TV, knock over a heavy food table, and sit on a birthday cake,” she said. “Very hard to do all that.”

  I nodded. “Just bad luck,” I muttered. I didn’t know what else to say. Then I added, “I didn’t sit on the cake. I fell on it.”

  She made a hmpf sound. Then she picked up a phone and called my house.

  I sighed. How could she think I did all that on purpose?

  Cory is my friend. I would never deliberately ruin his birthday party. Never.

  My mom pulled up in the car five minutes later. She let out a cry when she saw me. I told her I was okay. I said I had an accident with the cake. I said I’d explain later.

  Mom apologized at least twenty times to Mrs. Duckworth.

  “It was quite unusual,” Mrs. Duckworth said. She kept using the word unusual. Then she excused herself. “I have a lot of cleaning up to do.”

  Cory came upstairs to say good-bye. I told him I was sorry that I wrecked his party.

  I pulled him into the front hall. “It’s the claw,” I said. I whispered so my mom wouldn’t hear. She was still in the kitchen. She was on her phone, calling Dad.

  Cory stared hard at me. “What about the claw?”

  “Mine is different from yours,” I said. “Something bad happened to it. Now it’s bad luck all the time.”

  I sighed. “Everything that just happened downstairs? The mess I made? All because of the claw. It gives me bad luck instead of good.”

  Cory shook his head. “Lee — didn’t you read the instructions?”

  Instructions?

  I had a sudden flash. I remembered opening the box the claw came in. And I pictured the small, square sheet of paper that fluttered out of th
e box.

  Arfy grabbed it and ran away with it.

  Were those the instructions?

  “Come with me,” Cory said. He started to grab my sleeve. But he pulled his hand away when he saw the sleeve was smeared with cake icing.

  I followed him to his bedroom. He had rock posters all over his walls, from floor to ceiling. Some of them belonged to his parents and went all the way back to the 1970s. Very cool.

  “I think I still have the instruction sheet that came with my claw,” Cory said. He began pawing through a desk drawer.

  “Yes. Here.” He pulled out a square white sheet of paper and handed it to me. “You didn’t read this?” he asked.

  I shook my head. “No. My dog took it and ate it.”

  My eyes scanned the page of small type. There weren’t many instructions. But I gasped when I found the one important rule:

  “This rare vulture claw will bring you good luck forever,” I read. “But you must follow one rule. You must never KISS the claw. Kissing it is forbidden.”

  “Oh, wow,” I murmured. “Oh, wow.”

  I stared at those words. I read them again. My heart started to pound like crazy. I suddenly felt cold all over.

  I kept reading:

  “If you kiss the claw, your luck will turn bad. And you will have very bad dreams, and your whole life will turn into a nightmare.”

  The instruction sheet trembled in my hand. I shut my eyes. I pictured myself kissing the claw. Many times.

  When I opened my eyes, Cory was staring hard at me. “You kissed your claw — didn’t you?” he said.

  I nodded. “A lot,” I muttered.

  “Bad luck,” Cory said.

  “Yeah. Bad luck,” I said. “Bad luck all the time.” I sighed again. “Where did you get your claw?”

  He shrugged. “Beats me. It just came in the mail.”

  “Me, too,” I said. “Wish I’d read the instructions.”

  “Lee? Where are you?” Mom called from the kitchen. “We have to go!”

  “Coming!” I shouted. I started toward the bedroom door. But Cory grabbed my arm.

  “I just want to ask you one more question,” he said.

  I turned and waited for him to ask it.

  “Why did you give your claw to me as a birthday present?” he asked. “To give me bad luck?”