Pennybaker School Is Revolting, стр. 34

“Depends,” Flea said, settling onto the bench next to me. His didgeridoo slid over to the side and bonked me on the head. I barely even noticed. It was sort of understood that if you were friends with Flea, you were going to get bonked with his didgeridoo pretty much every day. “Where are you going?”

Chip fussily dabbed the corners of his mouth with his napkin, carefully laid it on his tray, and leaned forward. “Rumor among those in the History-Lovers Society is Mr. Faboo is the blacksmith out at Old Midwest Town on the weekends.”

“Old Midwest Town?” Owen asked. “What’s that?”

“The year is 1855, and our wagons have happed across a thriving town,” Chip started, spreading his hands as if to paint the picture of Old Midwest Town. “A church stands high and proud in the center.” His hands indicated a very tall church. “A one-room schoolhouse employs the young daughter of the colonel, who lives over here”—we all followed his hands—“in this mansion.”

“Whoa, a mansion?” Flea breathed.

“Well, a three-room house, anyway. With two whole stories. Might as well have been a mansion.”

“Is Mr. Faboo the colonel?” Flea asked.

“No, dummy, he’s the blacksmith. Weren’t you listening?” Colton tossed a wadded-up napkin at Flea; it bounced off his forehead and into his chili. He made a face as he plucked it out.

“Right next to the trading post,” Chip said.

I had been to Old Midwest Town before, but it had been a long time, and I couldn’t really remember it. Had Mr. Faboo been the blacksmith when I was there? It was totally possible. “What does he do all day?” I asked.

Chip shrugged. “Makes horseshoes and stuff. And talks about what it was like to be a blacksmith in 1855.”

“So we’re just going to go out to this place and pretend we need horseshoes or something?” Colton asked.

“There’s a festival,” Chip said. “It’s going on all weekend. We can ride our bikes there on Saturday.”

“I don’t know,” I said. “Where did you hear about—”

“We’re in!” Wesley interrupted.

“We are?”

He nodded. “It’ll give me awl kindsa practice with my drawl.”

I had no idea what he was saying, but I could roughly translate it to: character, character, blah blah, rehearsal.

“I don’t know,” I said. “Every time I listen to one of Chip’s—”

“No, Wesley’s right. I think it’s a good idea,” Owen said. He turned his laptop around so we could see a photo of the town. Sure enough, right out front, beaming for all the world to see, was a blacksmith. His face was smudged with soot and he was kind of squinting into the sun, so it was hard to tell exactly who it was, but it definitely could have been Mr. Faboo.

“Whoa. Wait a minute. I thought you guys didn’t want to be in my revolution,” I said.

“But Chip makes this sound fun,” Wesley said.

“Yeah, it’s not really a revolution. It’s a festival. And they probably have apple cider and homemade doughnuts and stuff,” Owen added.

I didn’t care if they had doughnuts and pizza and free-range unicorns. It still was unfair that they were all too busy to help me when I wanted to find Mr. Faboo, but were totally excited when Chip wanted to find him. My mind went back to watching Chip’s fancy handshakes with the guys. There was no way around it—they just liked Chip better than they liked me.

“I don’t have didgeridoo practice Saturday,” Flea said. “Okay. I’ll go.”

Buckley whispered in Colton’s ear. Colton listened, then said, “We’ll do it.”

“Splendid!” Chip said. “That’s everyone! Let’s meet at my house at precisely three thirty o’clock, Central Standard Time.”

How many times had I told Chip that he didn’t need to always say “o’clock,” and that he didn’t need to specify which time zone when we were all sitting in the same room?

“Wait a minute, wait a minute,” Flea said. “It’s not everyone.”

They all slowly turned to look at me. My burger had formed a big lump in my throat. Even though Chip and I were friends again, all I could think about was how uncool and unfair it was that they were all so willing to follow Chip but wanted nothing to do with the idea when it was mine. I wanted to tell them it was fine by me if they all went together, but I was out, because they were traitors. I tried to chew and mind my own business, but I couldn’t handle the stares. Plus, I didn’t want them to find Mr. Faboo and be heroes without me. Not after everything I’d already been through. “Okay, fine,” I said. “We’re all in.”

Mom was standing in Grandma Jo’s room with her arms crossed, one hand holding a dusting rag, when I got home.

“Hey, I’m going for a bike ride with Chip and the guys on Saturday, okay?” I said, pausing in the doorway.

“Uh-huh,” she said distractedly, without even looking my way.

“We’ll probably be out until supper. It might get dark.”

“Sure,” she said in that same distracted voice.

“But it’s a whole bunch of us, so you shouldn’t worry.”

“Yep.”

I walked up next to her, crossed my arms exactly like hers, and stared into the same spot. After a minute, I said, “What are we looking at, exactly?”

She flapped the rag at me. “Oh, nothing, I suppose.” She bent to dust the windowsill, but her head turned back to where she was staring before. She appeared to be looking at Grandma Jo’s bookshelf.

“Nothing?” I asked.

“You see that trophy there?” she said, gesturing toward the shelf. I nodded. “Have you ever seen that trophy before?”

“I guess.”

She finally turned to me. Her eyes were a little buggy and wild, like Mom was having a Close to Crazy Adventure. “No, not ‘I guess.’ Have you seen that trophy before or haven’t you?”

To be honest, no, I hadn’t seen it. But I also didn’t really spend a lot of time in Grandma Jo’s room. Mom was now tapping her foot at me and had her arms crossed again, and