My Weirder-est School #12 Read online




  Dedication

  To Emma

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Dedication

  1. The Truth about Page Twenty-Three

  2. All the Good Ones Are Dead

  3. A Face in the Woods

  4. Mrs. Stoker Is a Joker

  5. The Happy Little Clam

  6. Fourth Grade Is Scary

  7. Blah Blah Blah . . .

  8. Lil Mouse Is in the House!

  9. Our New Teacher Will Be . . .

  About the Author and Illustrator

  Back Ad

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  My name is A.J. and I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking about clams. Because that’s what I’m thinking about.

  The other day my mom said I looked like I was happy as a clam. What?! How does she know that clams are happy? I bet there are a lot of sad clams out there. I know that if I was a clam, I’d be sad. Who wants to sit around in the mud all day waiting for some walrus to eat you?

  The point is, it was June 1, and you know what that means. It means the next day would be June 2! June 1 also means that school is almost over for the year. And that means third grade is almost over.

  YAY!*

  Boy, third grade sure took a long time! I feel like I’ve been in third grade for fourteen years.

  I had just put my backpack in my cubby when our teacher, Mr. Cooper, came flying into the room. And I do mean flying. Mr. Cooper thinks he’s a superhero, and he wears a cape. That’s weird. As usual, he tripped over somebody’s umbrella, fell down, and almost took out a row of desks.

  “I’m fine!” Mr. Cooper said as he brushed the dirt off his pants.

  Then, like every day, we pledged the allegiance and did Word of the Day.

  “Okay,” said Mr. Cooper, “turn to page twenty-three in your math books.”

  Ugh. I hate math. Why do we need math when we have calculators?

  I didn’t bother getting out my math book or turning to page twenty-three. Why should I? Every time Mr. Cooper tells us to turn to page twenty-three in our math books, there’s some interruption. It’s always an announcement over the loudspeaker telling us to go to the all-porpoise room or the playground for a surprise assembly.

  Mr. Cooper has been trying to teach us page twenty-three all year. I’m sure it’s some really hard math problem. So I just sat there while everybody else got out their math books.

  “A.J.,” said Mr. Cooper, “why aren’t you taking out your math book?”

  “What’s the point?” I replied. “There’s gonna be an announcement. You’ll see.”

  I looked at the loudspeaker on the wall. There was no announcement.

  Andrea Young, this annoying girl with curly brown hair, got out her math book and turned to page twenty-three.

  Ryan, who will eat anything, got out his math book and turned to page twenty-three.

  Michael, who never ties his shoes, got out his math book and turned to page twenty-three.

  I waited.

  And waited. And waited.

  No announcement! I was starting to get nervous.

  Neil, who we call the nude kid even though he wears clothes, got out his math book and turned to page twenty-three.

  Crybaby Emily got out her math book and turned to page twenty-three.

  Alexia, this girl who rides a skateboard all the time, got out her math book and turned to page twenty-three.

  Everybody was taking out their math books and turning to page twenty-three. Everybody except me.

  “A.J.,” said Mr. Cooper, “there isn’t going to be an announcement this morning. I checked with the office. Please take out your math book and turn to page twenty-three.”

  “No!” I said.

  Mr. Cooper put his hands on his hips. When a grown-up puts their hands on their hips, you know they’re mad at you. Nobody knows why.

  “Dude,” Ryan whispered to me, “you won’t believe what’s on page twenty-three.”

  “It’s gonna blow your mind, A.J.,” said Michael.

  Ryan and Michael usually know what they’re talking about. So I took out my math book. I turned to page twenty-three.

  And you’ll never believe in a million hundred years what was on page twenty-three.

  I’m not gonna tell you.

  Okay, okay. I’ll tell you. It said . . .

  2 + 2 = ?

  WHAT?! Are you kidding me? That’s what’s on page twenty-three? All these years I’ve been worried about what was on page twenty-three, and it was just 2 + 2 = ? Any dumbhead knows what 2 + 2 is.

  “FOUR!” everybody shouted.

  Mr. Cooper closed his math book.

  “Very good,” he said. “Now that we’ve finished page twenty-three, I think you kids are ready for fourth grade.”

  You’ll never believe what happened next.

  An announcement came over the loudspeaker!

  But I’m not going to tell you what it was.

  Okay, okay, I’ll tell you. But you have to read the next chapter. So nah-nah-nah boo-boo on you.

  The announcement was from Mrs. Patty, our school secretary.

  “Third graders,” said Mrs. Patty, “please report to the media center.”

  We walked a million hundred miles to the media center, which used to be called the library, but they changed the name. Nobody knows why.

  Mrs. Roopy was waiting for us at the door. She’s our media specialist. She used to be called the librarian, but they changed the name. Nobody knows why.

  “Good morning, everyone,” said Mrs. Roopy. “I’m so excited that you kids are graduating from third grade! Congratulations! I have some good news and some better news for you.”

  “What’s the good news?” asked Neil.

  “The good news is that I’m going to be in charge of your graduation!”

  “YAY!” we all shouted.

  “What’s the better news?” asked Alexia.

  “The better news is that Mrs. Stoker said I could bring in a guest speaker for your graduation.”

  “YAY!” we all shouted.

  Mrs. Stoker is our new principal. The principal used to be Mr. Klutz, but he retired.

  A couple of years ago, I went to my sister’s graduation, so I know that graduations are a total snoozefest. You have to sit around for a million hundred hours waiting for your name to be called. Then they hand you this piece of paper that your parents stick in your memory box for the rest of your life. Snore.

  “Hang on,” said Mrs. Roopy. “I’ll be right back. I have to make a quick phone call.”

  She dashed out of the room. So I did what I always do when there are no teachers around. I stood up on my chair and shook my butt at the class.

  “Arlo, sit down,” said Andrea, rolling her eyes. She calls me by my real name because she knows I don’t like it.

  A few minutes later, Mrs. Roopy came back. The weird thing was she didn’t look like Mrs. Roopy anymore. She was dressed like a man with a bushy mustache, glasses, and a jacket and tie. She must have stuffed a pillow under her shirt because she looked a lot bigger.

  “Why are you dressed like that, Mrs. Roopy?” asked Ryan.

  “Who’s Mrs. Roopy?” said Mrs. Roopy. “Never heard of her. My name is Teddy Roosevelt. I was the twenty-sixth president of the United States. My face is on Mount Rushmore.”

  Mrs. Roopy is loopy. Teddy Roosevelt died like a million hundred years ago. We all knew it was just Mrs. Roopy dressed up like Teddy Roosevelt.

  Well, almost all of us knew it.

  “You’re my favorite president!” said Emily, who will fall for anything.

  “May I be the speaker at your graduation?” asked Mrs. Roopy, I me
an Teddy Roosevelt. “I’ll tell you stories of my days as a trust buster.”

  Trust buster? I didn’t know what he was talking about. I looked at Ryan. Ryan looked at Alexia. Alexia looked at Neil. Neil looked at Andrea. We were all looking at each other.

  “I’ll tell you what,” Teddy Roosevelt said. “You kids think it over. I have to go bust some trusts.”

  Huh? What’s a trust? And why would anybody want to bust one?

  Teddy Roosevelt ran out of the room. A few minutes later, Mrs. Roopy came back, wearing her regular clothes.

  “Okay, I finished my phone call,” she told us. “As I was saying, we’re going to have a guest speaker at your graduation—”

  “Teddy Roosevelt was just here!” Emily shouted excitedly. “He said he had to go bust some trusts.”

  “Really?” said Mrs. Roopy. “Teddy Roosevelt is my hero! I’ve got to go get his autograph before he leaves the building.”

  She went running out of the room again.

  A few minutes later, Mrs. Roopy came back. She had gray hair and was wearing a plain black dress and granny glasses.

  “Who are you dressed up as now, Mrs. Roopy?” asked Andrea.

  “Who’s Mrs. Roopy?” replied Mrs. Roopy. “My name is Susan B. Anthony. I was one of the first leaders in the fight for women’s rights.”

  “Cool!” said Emily, who believes anything that anybody says.

  “May I be the speaker at your graduation?” asked Mrs. Roopy, I mean Susan B. Anthony.

  I looked at Michael. Michael looked at Emily. Emily looked at Andrea. Andrea looked at Ryan. We were all looking at each other.

  “You kids think it over,” said Susan B. Anthony. “I have to go fight for women’s suffrage.”

  “You want women to suffer?” I asked.

  “She said suffrage, dumbhead!” Andrea said. “It means the right to vote.”

  “I knew that,” I lied.

  Susan B. Anthony ran out of the room. A few minutes later, Mrs. Roopy came back. She was wearing her regular clothes again.

  “Ooooh, look!” she said, waving a piece of paper. “I got Teddy Roosevelt’s autograph! It was so exciting. I’m sweating.”

  “Mrs. Roopy!” shouted Emily. “You missed it! Susan B. Anthony was right here in the media center!”

  “No way!” said Mrs. Roopy. “She’s my hero! This is so upsetting. Oh, dear. I have to go, uh . . . powder my nose.”

  She went running out of the room again.

  “Why would anybody put powder on their nose?” I asked.

  “She isn’t powdering her nose, dumbhead,” said Andrea. “She went to the bathroom. When grown-ups don’t want to say they need to go to the bathroom, they say they have to powder their noses.”

  Grown-ups are weird.

  I was going to say something mean to Andrea, but I didn’t get the chance because Mrs. Roopy came running back into the room. This time, she was dressed as an old man with white hair and a bow tie.

  “Who are you now, Mrs. Roopy?” asked Alexia.

  “Who’s Mrs. Roopy?” said Mrs. Roopy. “I’m Thomas Edison. I invented the light bulb, the phonograph, and lots of other things.”

  “Wow!” said Emily.

  “May I be the speaker at your graduation?” asked Mrs. Roopy, I mean Thomas Edison.

  “Wait a minute. Isn’t Thomas Edison dead?” asked Ryan.

  “All those people are dead,” said Alexia. “How could any of them speak at our graduation?”

  “You know what they say,” said Thomas Edison, “you can accomplish anything if you put your mind to it. That’s how I got to be a great inventor. Oh, that reminds me. I have an idea for a new invention. Gotta run!”

  Thomas Edison ran out of the room. A minute later, Mrs. Roopy came back.

  “Now, as I was saying—”

  “Thomas Edison was here!” shouted Emily.

  “Really?” asked Mrs. Roopy. “He’s my hero!”

  “Yes!” said Emily. “He asked us if he could speak at our graduation. So did Susan B. Anthony and Teddy Roosevelt.”

  “What do you kids think?” asked Mrs. Roopy. “Which one of those people would you like to be the guest speaker?”

  “I don’t want Teddy Roosevelt,” said Ryan.

  “I don’t want Susan B. Anthony,” said Neil.

  “I don’t want any of those old-timey dead people,” said Alexia.

  “Well, who do you kids want to be the speaker at graduation?” asked Mrs. Roopy.

  I thought about it for a minute.

  “Joseph Gayetty,” I said.

  Everybody looked at me.

  “Who’s Joseph Gayetty?” asked Mrs. Roopy.

  “He was the guy who invented toilet paper,” I explained.*

  “I don’t think Joseph Gayetty will be available to speak at your graduation,” said Mrs. Roopy.

  Probably not. He’s dead too. He invented toilet paper back in 1857. Don’t ask me what people used before then.

  “Does anybody have another idea for a guest speaker?” asked Mrs. Roopy.

  “How about Mother Teresa?” suggested Emily.

  “She’s dead,” said Mrs. Roopy.

  “How about Martin Luther King Jr.?” suggested Alexia.

  “Also dead,” said Mrs. Roopy.

  “How about Neil Armstrong?” suggested Neil. “He was the first man on the moon.”

  “Dead,” said Mrs. Roopy.

  Bummer in the summer! All the good ones are dead. But that’s when I came up with the greatest idea in the history of the world.

  “You know who we should get to speak at our graduation?” I said. “Lil Mouse.”

  “Lil Mouse!” said Ryan. “I love Lil Mouse!”

  “Lil Mouse is the coolest,” said Michael.

  “Yeah, can we get Lil Mouse to speak at graduation?” asked Alexia.

  “LIL MOUSE! LIL MOUSE! LIL MOUSE!” we all started chanting.

  Chanting is cool.

  “Who’s Lil Mouse?” asked Mrs. Roopy.

  We all laughed. Everybody knows who Lil Mouse is. Well, every kid knows. Lil Mouse is the most popular singer and rapper in the world. Kids love him because he’s really cool. Grown-ups love him because he doesn’t say bad words. He always wears a mouse costume, so nobody knows what he looks like. His newest rap, “The Happy Little Clam,” is all over the internet. We told Mrs. Roopy all about Lil Mouse.

  “I’m sorry,” she said, “but Mrs. Stoker would never let me have a rapper be the speaker at your graduation. Besides, it would cost a fortune to get a famous person like that. We don’t have money to pay for a speaker. And Lil Mouse is probably too busy anyway.”

  “BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”

  Everybody started booing. No fair! Kids never get to decide anything. It’s our graduation. We should be allowed to pick the guest speaker. Bummer in the summer!

  This was going to be the worst graduation in the history of graduations.

  While we were eating lunch in the vomitorium that day, everybody was bummed about graduation. Nobody had much to say. During recess, we all just sat around the monkey bars in the playground. I didn’t even want to go to graduation. It was sure to be a big snoozefest.

  That’s when the weirdest thing in the history of the world happened.

  But I’m not going to tell you what it was.

  Okay, okay, I’ll tell you.

  I was hanging upside down on the monkey bars when I noticed something in the woods behind the playground. Just as the wind blew against the trees, I caught a glimpse of something—or someone.

  “What was that?” I said, pointing to the woods.

  “What was what?” asked Ryan.

  “I just saw a face in the trees over there,” I said as I hopped down off the monkey bars. I peered into the woods, but I couldn’t see the face anymore.

  “What did he look like?” asked Michael.

  “I don’t know if it was a he,” I replied. “I think the person was wearing a hat and looking through binoculars.” br />
  “Maybe it’s a robber,” said Neil.

  “Maybe it’s an international supervillain who wants to take over the world,” said Michael, who thinks everybody wants to take over the world.

  “Stop trying to scare Emily,” said Andrea.

  “I’m scared,” whimpered Emily.

  “Maybe it’s Amelia Earhart,” suggested Ryan.

  Amelia Earhart was a lady who was trying to fly a plane around the world. She disappeared and nobody knows what happened to her.

  “I think the blood was rushing to your head, A.J.,” said Alexia. “Maybe it was just a mirage.”

  “Yes, you were probably just seeing things, Arlo,” said Andrea.

  “I was seeing things!” I insisted. “I was seeing somebody hiding in the woods!”

  “We should tell Officer Spence, the security guard,” said Ryan.

  “Nah,” I said. “Let’s go look for ourselves. Come on, follow me.”

  Everybody climbed down off the monkey bars and followed me across the soccer field. I figured we should sneak over to the side and come around the back so the mysterious person in the woods wouldn’t see us coming.

  We were slinking around on our tiptoes, like secret agents. It was cool.

  “Okay, everybody be quiet,” I whispered as we made our way through the woods.

  “What if it’s a monster?” asked Neil.

  “I’m scared,” whined Emily.

  “Shhhhhhh!” I shushed.

  We slinked through the trees, being careful not to step on anything that would make noise. I didn’t see anybody hiding out there.

  But then we came to a clearing in the trees.

  I saw the back of a person sitting on a rock. It looked like a man. He was peering through binoculars at the playground.

  One of us must have made a noise because suddenly the man turned around. And you’ll never believe in a million hundred years who was hiding in the woods.

  I’m not going to tell you.

  Okay, okay, I’ll tell you.

  It was Mr. Klutz, our old principal!

  Betcha didn’t see that coming!

  “Mr. Klutz!” we all shouted.

  A few months ago, Mr. Klutz was forced to retire by Dr. Carbles, the president of the Board of Education. He’s a mean man who drives a tank to school. Dr. Carbles hired Mrs. Stoker to be the new principal.

 
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