Pig City (10 page)

They all saluted. Tiffany punched herself in the nose.

“Hi, Tiffany,” said Nathan.

“Hi, Nathan,” said Tiffany.

“Hi,” said Nathan. “How's your hamster?”

“Fine, thank you,” said Tiffany, “and yours?”

“Fine, thank you,” said Nathan, even though he didn't own a hamster.

Laura repeated her news about Monkey Town for Nathan's and Aaron's benefit. “We all have to be very careful,” she warned.

As they lined up for class, Tiffany pulled Laura aside. “That wasn't so bad, was it?” she said. “We
talked just like always.”

“I guess you're both too busy worrying about Monkey Town to worry about each other,” said Laura.

“Monkey Town?” asked Tiffany. “What's that?”

They went inside. Nobody laughed at the message on the blackboard. Nobody knew what it meant.

MONKEY ARE

    MARVELOUS

        MAGNIFICENT

           AND MUSTARD!

“Mustard!” exclaimed Karen.

“Is something bothering you, Karen?” asked Mr. Doyle.

“Uh, no, Mr. Doyle. Um, I don't like mustard.”

“Do you like ketchup?” he asked.

“It's okay.”

“Good, I'm glad you have something to put on your hot dog.” He erased the board and put the number 9 next to the rectangle under the word DICTIONARY.

“There's an egg in my desk!” Kristin announced.

Several kids laughed.

“Kristin?” said Mr. Doyle.

She showed him the egg.

Laura found an egg in her desk, too. It was
hard-boiled, without the shell.

“Hey, I got one, too,” said Aaron. He held up his egg.

“Does anybody else have an egg?” asked Mr. Doyle.

Everybody looked inside his or her desk. Five people raised their hands and eggs: Debbie, Nathan, Tiffany, Allison, and Laura. The entire population of Pig City had been
egg-laid
.

They brought their eggs to Mr. Doyle. He asked them how the eggs got in their desks, but they all said they didn't know. They returned to their seats.

“All right,” said Mr. Doyle. “We've had enough silliness for one morning. Now, I want to know where these eggs came from!”

Gabriel raised his hand.

“Gabriel,” said Mr. Doyle.

“Chickens,” said Gabriel.

For a moment, Mr. Doyle looked like he was going to explode, then he smiled. “That's very good, Gabriel,” he admitted. “I set myself up for that one.”

He addressed the class. “This happens every year just about this time,” he said.

“People find eggs in their desks?” asked Linzy.

“No,” said Mr. Doyle. “Sixth-graders go crazy. We have only three weeks until graduation, so everybody starts thinking that they're pretty hot stuff. You think you can do anything. Well, let me give you a word to
the wise. Your grades count more now than they did at the beginning of the year. If you fail your tests, you may be left back. If you break the rules, you will be punished. Anyone who owes me a dictionary page at the end of the year will not graduate. If you think I'm bluffing, go talk to some of my former students.” He looked out across the room. “A word to the wise.”

Laura smiled. Who are you trying to kid? she thought.

At recess, Pig City discussed how to best strike back at Monkey Town.

“We don't even know who they are,” said Kristin.

“But they know who we are,” said Aaron. “The eggs proved that.”

“There might be hundreds of them,” said Nathan.

“Why eggs?” asked Debbie. “What do eggs mean?”

Nobody knew.

“What does mustard mean?” asked Aaron.

“I wrote that,” said Laura. “It means they're yellow! They're chicken!”

“Do you think they'll be able to figure that out?” asked Debbie.

“That doesn't matter,” said Laura. “It's better if they can't. They'll worry more.”

Suddenly everyone stopped talking. Gabriel, Sheila,
Karen, Jonathan, Yolanda, and Howard were coming toward them.

“One, two, three …” said Gabriel.

They snapped their fingers and sang:

“Mon
key town! (snap-snap)

Mon
key town! (snap-snap)

We're the greatest club around! (snap-snap)

Mon
key town! (snap-snap)

Mon
key town! (snap-snap)

Gonna turn Pig City upside-down! (snap-snap)

Pigs
walk on (snap-snap)

four
legs! (snap-snap)

They're nothing but

BACON and EGGS! (snap-snap)

Mon
key town! (snap-snap)

Mon
key town! (snap-snap)

We're the greatest club around! (snap-snap)
”

“You mustard!” shouted Nathan.

They sang louder and changed from snapping fingers to clapping their hands.

“Mon
key town! (clap-clap)

Mon
key town! (clap-clap)

Gonna turn Pig City UPSIDE-DOWN! (clap-clap)

Pigs
walk on (clap-clap)
four
legs! (clap-clap)
”

“Monkeys are mustard!” screamed Debbie. Everyone in Pig City began shouting it. “Monkeys are mustard! Monkeys are mustard!”

“THEY'RE NOTHING BUT BACON AND EGGS!!!” sang Monkey Town as loud as they could scream.

Good, now we know who they are, thought Laura, calm amidst the chaos. She was the eye of the hurricane.

The war raged all week. By Friday, every pencil belonging to the citizens of Monkey Town and Pig City had been broken.

It started Monday after recess, when Howard accidentally dropped his pencil. It rolled under his chair and behind him. Debbie reached down and grabbed it, then broke it in half.

After that, no pencil was safe. If anybody left his or her pencil unguarded, for even a second, it would be snatched and snapped.

Besides pencil-breaking, there was a lot of name-calling, some apple-core-throwing, one homework-stealing, many attempted cap-liftings, and a day of mud-splashing.

It was Tiffany's homework that was stolen. Jonathan and Yolanda changed all the answers, then returned it to her without her knowing it. She didn't find out until Mr. Doyle returned it to her with a big red zero on top.

The mud-splashing occurred on Wednesday after it had rained heavily on Tuesday night. Jonathan was shooting baskets before school. He tossed the basketball high in the air. It was a perfect shot. The ball landed in the center of a mud puddle, just as Aaron passed by. Mud splattered all over his clean clothes.

As Jonathan and Yolanda were laughing, Debbie picked up Jonathan's books, which he had left at the edge of the court, and threw them in the mud.

Gabriel ran up behind her and stamped his foot into the mud, getting himself muddy, but Debbie muddier.

It continued all day. Only Laura's cap remained mud-free. It never left her head, despite numerous attempts by Monkey Town to steal it. Her cap became the most prized possession of the war. It was Pig City's flag. As long as she wore it, Pig City was the land of the free and the home of the brave.

Thursday, Allison opened her lunch sack and saw a pin sticking through the side of her carton of fruit punch, near the bottom. To everyone's amazement, none of the punch had leaked out. “Do you think it's safe to drink?” she asked.

“Take the pin out first,” cautioned Tiffany.

Allison removed the pin, and the punch leaked out the hole and onto her lap.

All week, Monkey Town continued to sing their song over and over and over again. Laura hated that more than anything else.

It was like a stupid song you hear on the radio or a silly jingle from a television commercial. No matter how much you hate it, you catch yourself humming it all the time.

It drove her crazy. When she went to bed at night, she'd hear her brain singing, “
Monkey Town
.
Monkey Town
.
Gonna turn Pig City upside-down
.”

We'll see who turns who upside-down! she thought angrily.

The morning messages didn't stop.

Tuesday: MONKEYS ARE MORONS

Wednesday: PIGS PICK THEIR NOSES

Thursday: MONKEYS CHEW THEIR TAILS

Friday: PIGS WEAR WIGS

Those were the messages that everyone got to see, anyway. Each message had been changed at least once, usually twice or three times, as Gabriel and Laura sneaked back and forth into the room one after the other in a dangerous game of chicken. On Friday, the last change was made from PIGS ARE WISE to PIGS WEAR WIGS only seconds before the bell rang.

The number 13 was placed next to the rectangle under DICTIONARY.

After lunch on Friday, Laura led Pig City around the side of the school to the door through which she entered every morning. “Now, nobody act suspicious,” she cautioned. “Pretend you're supposed to be here.” They sneaked inside.

The school was much more crowded during lunch than it was early in the morning. Teachers were everywhere, talking to each other or carrying books and papers from one room to another.

The citizens of Pig City walked straight toward Mr. Doyle's room, as if they owned the place.

A teacher crossed their path. She looked at them suspiciously.

“It's not fair we have to stay inside during lunch,” Nathan complained. “Just because we didn't finish our work.”

“Can we go outside?” Debbie asked the teacher.

“No,” she said. “You have to finish your work.” She continued on her way.

They walked through the yellow curtain.

Quickly and quietly, they turned every Monkey Town desk upside-down. They had to lift each desk up off the floor, then turn it over and gently set it down, so as not to make a lot of noise.

Laura wrote on the blackboard.

As Aaron and Allison turned over Karen's desk, it opened, and papers and books spilled out onto the floor.

Laura told them to stuff all her junk back in her desk. “We don't want to make a mess,” she said. “Mr. Doyle might get mad.”

The class was in an uproar. “‘Monkeys Kiss Donkeys!'” someone shouted. “That's what it says! ‘Monkeys Kiss Donkeys!'”

“Quiet!” Mr. Doyle shouted. “My word. Can't you come back from lunch without all this screaming and yelling? There are other classes going on, where, believe it or not, people are trying to do work. I know that sounds silly to most of you, but – Howard, what seems to be the problem?”

“My desk is upside-down,” said Howard.

“Well, I'd say you have two choices, Howard. You can either sit on your head, or turn your desk right side up.”

Howard chose the latter. The other members of Monkey Town did the same.

Mr. Doyle erased the board and put the number 14 where the number 13 had been.

“A wise person learns from the mistakes of others,” he said. “An average person learns from his own
mistakes. And a fool never learns. Here is today's homework assignment.”

“But it's Friday!” someone complained.

“I'm glad to see you know your days of the week,” said Mr. Doyle. “Maybe you'll learn how to tell time and tie your shoes. This is a kindergarten class, isn't it?”

Nobody said anything.

Mr. Doyle piled on the homework.

“It's not fair that we should all be punished because some people's desks were upside-down,” someone complained.

“Only the people with upside-down desks should be punished!” said Tiffany.

Mr. Doyle said that it wasn't punishment. He explained that since they had wasted so much time during the day with childish nonsense, they would have to make up the work at home.

“If you waste any more class time,” he said, “then you'll have more homework.”

Laura knew it was punishment. They had only wasted about fifteen minutes, and he had assigned over an hour's worth of homework. It was punishment, and everyone knew it, and Mr. Doyle knew they knew it, and he wanted them to know it.

When the bell rang, Gabriel came to Laura's desk and asked if he could talk to her alone.

Laura immediately covered her cap with her hand.

“I'm not going to take your cap,” Gabriel said. “I just want to talk to you, president to president.”

Allison and Tiffany came to her defense.

“I want to talk to Laura, alone,” said Gabriel.

“Did you hear somebody say something, Allison?” asked Laura.

“No, I didn't hear anything; did you hear anything, Tiffany?”

“No, I didn't hear anything,” said Tiffany.

“Laura,” said Gabriel.

“Something smells,” said Laura. She held her nose. “What is it?”

“It smells like old garbage,” said Allison.

“Like my brother's dirty socks,” said Tiffany.

“Laura,” Gabriel said again.

“Oh!” Laura exclaimed. “It's Gabriel!”