Other Fan Fiction ❯ Alex Lanes and the Dead Man ❯ Whole Entire Story ( Chapter 1 )

[ A - All Readers ]

Um...nothing much for this summary. Again, the chapter's pretty long. Normally (pasted on the Microsoft Word) it has, like 71 pages. BUT it's still...good, I guess. I haven't read it in, like, forever. I've written it SO long ago. I don't write like that anymore. Really. AHEM.

Miscellaneous: Other Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Mystery | Type: Other | Uploaded On: 03.15.2007 | Pages: 21 | Words: 34.9K | Visits: 465 | Status: Completed

-ONE-

It was probably the worst day of seventh grade. But I probably should tell you why.

The first day Lila and I put our little feet in the school building, well, we felt or at least I felt shivers up my spine. It made me remember the old memories of sixth grade, and believe me, it wasn't great.

“Lila, I feel-I don't know… scared?” I whisper. Lila choked out a nervous laugh and says, “There's nothing to be afraid of. Your just feeling woozy because its' the first day of school.” You can tell-she's nervous, too. She's probably the only girl I know who's so obsessed with scary movies but she still gets freaked out easily.

You want to know more about Lila? Ask me. She is an animal lover who has three cats, two dogs, five birds, three hamsters, and last but totally not least, has twenty-eight fishes.

Lila is thirteen years old with two older twin brothers, Tom and Jerry, and one stepsister, Jason. Her real name's Jay-Lee but she hates that name-a lot. Jason's the kind of girl who loves sports and is totally obsessed with music so sometimes she drives Lila berserk.

Me? I'd rather have loads of sisters and brothers than be an only child. I lived with my mom and dad for about four years until my dad decided to go to New Jersey. My mom? She had to go to New Jersey to look for my dad and both of them never came back. So they left me alone in our house. Of course my Aunt Jade took care of me for quite awhile but she had a car accident and died when I was nine. But I'm used to being alone because with all these four years of practice.

When Aunt Jade died, I hid outside in Aunt Jade's rose bush, all because the cops were searching for I-don't-know in her house. If they found me, I'd be in a foster home and I know it stinks.

It was a crazy thing to do in her rose bush, but, it didn't matter anymore.

So that's why mom and dad never came back-they think I'm dead because they have no idea who I am.

I still go to school. When the teachers need to have a conference with my mom, usually Lila's stepsister takes over. Jason's fifteen, but she's tall -not that tall- just tall.

Jason usually wears thick makeup and dark huge sunglasses to hide her face when she has a conference with my teachers.

When I get home from school I sneak up to Aunt Jade's house.

I also earn money, too, from working in Paul's store.

“Alex, you okay?” Lila asks me. I took a deep breath and sigh, “Sure, I'm fine.” Right when I get into homeroom, I had this strange feeling. I looked behind me and there stood the ugliest boy I've ever saw in my entire life. He had freckles all over his face and huge buck teeth sticking out. His hair was everywhere, over his eyes-everywhere.

I gasp, “Who are you?” I meant to keep my mouth shut, but I couldn't help it-too ugly.

The ugly boy looked down at his shoes and shrugs.

“I'm nobody.” Right then, I knew he came from Texas. He had a thick Texas accent.
I shrugged and say, “Okay… hi Nobody,” and just went up to my new homeroom teacher and greeted her. As soon as Mrs. Larson, my homeroom teacher, announced that a new kid was joining our junior high member, I mutter, “No wonder I didn't recognized him,” to myself.

Now, if you're wondering why I'd say that, well, to tell you the truth, I didn't care. I didn't care if I got in trouble because I'm used to it. It's not like I'd get in trouble on purpose, which I could, but I'd only do it if it's important. But this time, the words just slipped out.

“Lila, why don't you believe me? He's as ugly as dirt, you know. Trust me, don't get near him! He has eyes that pop out, he has giant buck teeth ready to chomp you up, he has evil freckles invading his face-believe me, he's scary!” I followed Lila everywhere until she believes me, but she doesn't. She's crossing her arms, turning this way and that and pushing me aside.
“Please, Alex, I've been with you for my whole life and we've seen such ugly people, okay? And this boy, I cannot believe he is that ugly. We've met tons of ugly people! How can he be the ugliest?” She finally stops and stares at me. I stare at her. I sigh and look down at my feet and finally look back up.
“You wanna meet him? Fine, go ahead but I'm warning you-don't get near him!” I was about to tell her more about him when who walks straight towards us? Freckle Brain.
He says, “Hey,” to Lila. Lila looks like she just seen a ghost with her mouth gaping open and her eyes are about to pop out. Still, she gave him a smile and then glanced at me giving me a who-is-this-ugly-boy? look. I nudge her and say, “Let me introduce you. This is Lila and this is Jesse.”

Once he's away, Lila grabbed my arms and says, “Oh my lord, he is freaking me out!” I smiled and say, “Now you believe me?”

I kicked dirt while Lila told me all the cool stuff that happened. “What? How come you're so quiet? I don't want to hurt you, but you usually can't quit talking.” I laugh and say, “Well, nothing good happened to me.” And I was thinking about all the boring stuff that happened to me that I didn't realized I stepped into a puddle of mud and fell down on my bottom. Mud splattered everywhere.

“Ouch, that's got to hurt,” Lila says. I was just about to tell her to shut up when I noticed that everyone was staring at me and I just realized how many people were around us.

There was nothing but silence for a minute and then everyone cracked up.

I stood up fast and ran all the way home and stopped because something happened that I didn't really expect it to happen. Lila chased me and after she looked at me she asks, “What?” and then gasps, “Whoa. How'd he…?”

-TWO-

Seriously, I did not expect it to happen. There stood Freckle Brain, standing right in front of my house. I tried to hide my face but Freckle Brain already saw us.

“Hey Lila, I was wondering if you can show me around this town,” Freckle Brain says. Lila looked disgusted by him and then looks at me and gives me a why-me? look. I giggled and Lila kind of moves left to right, left to right. She does that all the time when she's thinking of a lie or something.
“Oh, sure, we'll show you around at five o'clock. See you then!” and marches off. I take one last look at Freckle Brain, giggle, and ran off to catch up with Lila.

“He likes you and you've got to admit it.” Lila looks at me like I've got dirt all over my face. “Get real!” I turn around as if someone's spying on us. Then I grab Lila's arm and say, “I know you're afraid of him, but why me? Why do I have to go with you and him? I'm just a poor innocent girl!”

And I stopped. This made Lila stop. “What?” she asks. I pointed at a black car.

“Isn't that car, you know, scary?”

“So what if it is black or scary, so what?”
“Take a look closer…”

We both took a few steps closer and gasp.
“Oh my…” and Lila couldn't get the right words out `cause right in the back of a car, what do we see? Guns, knives, all the dangerous weapons.

I take another step closer and no doubt about it, there's a murderer. I say, “Let's go inside-” I look around. “Garvey's Restaurant.” Lila looks at me like I'm crazy.

“Why? There's a murderer in town and we can't just go inside a restaurant and eat.”
“Exactly.”

“What?”

“You're right, we can't just eat. We're going in Garvey's Restaurant because the car's just parked in front of the restaurant which means…”
Lila shakes her head and says, “No you can't just do that! You're not a cop, okay? And besides, my idea is just to go home and forget it-just incase a murderer might stab us with a knife when we're not looking.”
I grab on Lila's hand and say, “We can't just ignore it! We're moving in,” and pulled her inside.

I've never been inside Garvey's Restaurant. The name's stupid and the restaurant look so small, but really, it's huge. The restaurant is so fancy-with all the huge smooth wooden tables and the rug's maroon. The red wallpaper has dark-red and pink flowers and Chinese words all over it.

“Whoa.”

“I know…”
All of a sudden, a waitress dressed in a white blouse with a Chinese vest over it, wearing an ankle-skirt, and such valuable black shoes asks, “May I help you?”

I opened my mouth to say something when all of a sudden Lila takes over, “No, we're about to get out anyway…”
I take one look at her and sigh.
“No, we're here to look around,” I say and practically dragged Lila around everywhere.
Lila whispers, “So why didn't you tell her there's a murderer?” I laugh and look at her like, are you kidding? “Of course I didn't tell her. I don't want people asking me questions and besides, if I'm stuck telling them everything, then obviously the murderer will get away with it, if you know what I mean.” Lila nods.

Okay, I'm trying to act like I'm not a bit freaked out, but actually I am. For one thing, I'm inside a restaurant where a murderer is and you never know if he or she'll pop up behind us and kill us.

When we got up to the next floor, well, all I want to do is get out of this place-fast! Because it's so dark that I can't even make a picture about what was around here. I walked forward a bit and Lila closes her eyes and mutters, “It's not scary, it's not scary, it's not scary,” over and over again. I slap Lila in the arm and whisper, “Shhh!” like that's going to stop her.

I lead the way towards the hall and peek inside the rooms. But I had a feeling I'm supposed to look out the window and so I did and what do I see? A black car moving out of parking and driving away.

“Lila, Lila! We've got to go outside-fast!”

“Why, Alex? I thought you said-”

“Don't ask! Just follow me!”

I led her outside but it's too late, the car's gone. If only I read the plate of the car.
I walked up the street and kept on going up. Lila followed me asking for me to wait up. And that's when I saw a black car driving up.

“Chase that car, Lila!”

“Alex, you're acting so weird. You never act like that!”

“If you're always complaining, then stay here and wait for me.”
“No way, I'm going!”

So we chased that car and for a minute, it was okay, until the car drove faster and faster. I tried to catch up, but I couldn't, but I figured out that I should read the license plate right now and what does it say? AD5322. I kept those letters going over and over in my head and say, “Let's go home. We've had enough for the day.” When I got back to my house, I took out a sticky note and wrote AD5322 and then underneath it I wrote Murderer's license plate.

Okay, I was scared half to death with the word `Murderer' keep running over and over in my head. Finally I got to sleep and when I woke up, I found myself sitting in a chair.

When I got to school, I ran over to Lila and whisper, “Here,” and gave her the sticky note. She sighs and says, “Alex, knock it off! I want to have a normal day. I don't want to think about that. It's just disgusting me ou-”

“Speaking of it… why were you at Garvey's Restaurant? And why were you chasing a black car…?”

We both turned around and there stood a boy. “Who are you?” I ask. He smiles and says, “Marcus… but call me Mark. So?” I flatten my shirt and nudge Lila. “Oh, nothing, we were there to see a relative. And when she saw us, well, she practically ran out of the restaurant and we had to chase her, so yeah we chased a car. So what?” All I wanted to do was get away from him when Lila says, “Oh, she's lying. If you want to know more about her, well, just be careful `cause she's good at lying.” I practically plowed Lila down into sand. “Lila!” I was so disgusted by her that I just stomped away. Entirely.

“Alex, I was telling Mark the truth. You are good at lying-” she paused and kept going on. “You're good at lying and acting. Didn't you notice he's cute?” I made a face and say, “All I think is cute is your face in the toilet!” I kept on walking and Lila stopped and crossed her arms and said, “Whatever! You're so grumpy,” and walked into a completely different direction.

I stopped for a sec and then say to myself, “Wait a second, we've never fought so long in our entire life!” I did a U-turn and ran where I thought Lila went.
I can lose her as a best friend.

-THREE-

“Lila, wait!” I kept on shouting. I bumped into Freckle Brain, great! “Have you seen Lila?” I ask. “Please? Help me out. I'm about to lose her as my friend!” And I did something I wouldn't have done in my entire life.

I held on Freckle Brain's arm and kept shaking it and begging him. Finally he says, “Hey, she's heading towards the cafeteria.” He pointed towards the direction like I didn't know.
I thanked him and ran to the cafeteria and there's Lila, sitting on bench thinking about something.

I ran to her and cry, “I was worried sick! Oh, Lila, I'm really sorry, I won't be mean to you ever again! Well, sorta.” Lila giggled a bit and then stood up. Her legs were wobbly and she tries hard balancing, but she couldn't.

I laugh, “Is something wrong… Lila?” Lila smiles and shakes her head.
“No, I've just been sitting here for a few minutes. No big deal!”

I say, “Sure…” and cross my arms and walked right out of the cafeteria, hoping Lila would follow, but she didn't. I looked behind my shoulder and there's Lila trying to follow, but she couldn't. “Lila, seriously, is something wrong?” I ask. I ran to her and helped her balance more. I can tell-it helped her a lot.
“Lila!”

“What?”
“Tell me the truth, is something wrong?”
“No…”

“Excuse me, Lila, but really, did I upset you that much?”
“No…”

“Then why can't you balance? You tired? Hurt? Sick?”
“No…”

I sighed. “I'm sick of the No… stuff.” Now it's Lila's turn to sigh. “Nothing's wrong. It's just that… I don't know… it feels like the floors' shaking.” So we both stood still for a minute or two. The floor wasn't shaking. “Lila, please… it's not the time to make jokes and believe me, it's probably around seven by now.” Now that made Lila all jumpy. So I helped her out when all of a sudden came a basketball flying out of nowhere.

“Arhhhh!” I shout. Lila jumped a mile up and screamed. “What was that?” I cracked up. “Oh, it's just a ball, you know from basket-”

“Yea! Hurry! Go, go, go!! Win for our team!”

I look at Lila like, huh? Then these boys come shooting in wearing roller skates. One look at them, and I knew, they were Tom and Jerry.

Lila walked up to them with her hands on her hips. “Oh I should have known that it was these pests. How many times have I told you? DON'T PLAY BASKETBALL IN SCHOOL! You can play in Physical Education but don't you dare play here!” She marched out of the room and I ran following her like a maniac.
“So what's with this floor shaking?” I ask.
Lila rolled her eyes and says, “Those disgusting freaks! Hey, I didn't know they were basketballs. Basketballs can't make the floor shake. Well, unless my brothers bounce them. Believe me, they really bounce.”
I laughed. “Well, better get going. We'll be late.” Lila takes one look at me like, are you kidding?

“We're already late! Thanks to you, I'll be in detention!” and ran off.
I stayed where I was and blinked for a second and then ran off to my homeroom. “Sorry I'm late. I-I-I was late because I had to find my dog,” I lied. I knew I didn't have a dog.

I walked to my desk and sat down politely. I folded my hands and stared at my teacher. Now, everyone would've known I wasn't listening because I had trouble staying still. I kept fidgeting and tapping my feet and swaying my head.

Normally, I'd stare at the clock, but this year's different.

“Did you go to detention?” I ask Lila. Lila rolled her eyes and crossed her arms. “I do not want to talk about it!”

“Oh, so I take that as a yes.” We were going down Clinton Street when I saw police cars parked around a parking lot. I'd just have ignored the police cars normally, but this time's different. I ran to a cop and asked, “What's going on?”
The cop used his hand to sleek back his Elvis hair.

He was short. Very short. And also skinny as a pencil.
Elvis Hair nods and says, “There's a dead person in there,” and points at Garvey's Restaurant. I almost panicked.

-FOUR-

I eyed Lila who's trying to pull me back. I would've known Lila was afraid of cops most, but I didn't.
“What does the dead person look like?” I ask.
Elvis Hair shakes his head and looked at his shoes and finally looked up again. “Let me remember… he's tall and old, has white hair, and has a white mustache, and I don't know… he just has been murdered.”
I looked at Lila like, see? I told you someone's goanna die!
I tried going in, but the cops wouldn't let me.
Elvis Hair pulls me back and whispers, “What in the world are you doing? I told you there's a dead person! Please… stay out of it!” I shook my head and pointed at Lila.

“He's our grandfather, sir!”
“I'm sorry.”
“But we both-” I pointed at Lila. “-we both promised our grandfather we'll visit him before we move to Ohio! And we're moving tomorrow! At least give us one last look?” I begged him. He sighs and then goes over and had a little chat with the cops.

So we waited for a couple of minutes which seems like an hour and finally Elvis Hair comes back and says, “You're lucky, kid, go in there and look, but only for a second, got it?”
We nodded and say, “Scouts Honor.” Well, we weren't even in the Girl Scouts because it's dumb, so, I guess we don't have to promise. We gave each other eyes like, ha-ha-ha!

It's the first time I've ever seen Lila going with my plan.

So we scattered in the building and took a look around. We grinned and gave each other looks. Finally we asked, “So where's our grandfather, you know, the dead guy?” The cop pointed up the stairs and says, “Go up there, turn left and you'll see a hall. In the third door to the right.” We nodded and say, “Got it,” and ran up stairs. We were hunched over taking deep breaths and finally ran to the hall and to the third door to the right.

This room had practically no wallpaper but I can see bits of it.
There were cops and investigators all around there. We pushed through them saying, “We're his granddaughter and we're moving tomorrow and having a last look,” or whatever we can think of. And when we reached the old man, we dropped down. Cold. I mean, blood was all around him. Lila put her hand to her mouth. “Lord, oh lord.”

Normally, when granddaughters see their grandfathers dead, they'd run to him crying. But we weren't crying because of course, we had no idea who he was and we didn't dare run to him and touch him and stuff because it's disgusting. The blood and stuff.

So we walked around him with our hands folded behind our back. “Hmmmm…”

“Hmmm…?”
“Mm-hmm…”

We kept going on with the Mmmmm thing for hours. Finally I knelt down and reached in his tiny pocket in his shirt. And then I found a paper that says Garvey's Restaurant-top floor - third door to the right in hall. If you ask me, I was pretty freaked out. I ran to Lila shouting, “Look! Look at this!” She turned around and hurried to me. “What? Oh gosh. Does that mean that he was supposed to meet someone here?”

“Yes… and it also means something else… obviously, this old man has a relationship with him.”
“Wouldn't that be cruel?”
“That's the point, Lila.”
“Wait, how come you act just like a cop?”

“Lila! I'm trying to stay from this situation as much as possible!”
“Okay, okay, smarty-pants.”

“Excuse me?”

“Never mind.”

“Whatever.”

Okay, so here we are, acting like idiots fighting with each other that isn't even important. At all.

So after we left the restaurant, I ran home. I took a sip of water and rushed into the living room. I have a T.V which, yeah, cost money but I don't have to pay bills. Instead of electricity, I use batteries and it works pretty well.

So I turn the channel to the news because I'm allowed to and also, I think it's better to find out a missing crook in town because maybe, just maybe, I can recognize him.

And who do I see? A dead old man from Garvey's Restaurant. That makes me shrink into the tiny sofa. Because who do I see right next to him? Me and Lila circling around him. I look, I don't know, like a freak-disgustingly freaky!

“Oh… I hope no one's goanna watch the news,” I sighed to myself.

I stood up and shuffled to the phone and called Lila.
“Hello, who's this?”

“Lila, it's me.”
“Oh, hi, Alex.
“You watch the news?”

“Yeah, it's pretty embarrassing, you know.”
“Are you going to blame me?”

“I have a better idea…”

“What?”

So there I stood, laughing, squealing, and jumping my legs off. The idea's terrific. Okay, not that terrific, just something that makes people believe us. It's someone I can count on - Lila. She always has great ideas-and I mean great, not just plain great, great, if you know what I mean.

“Oh, this is going to be so good!”
“I know, I thought it over for awhile and really, it'll be like no one will ever even know we lied. Trust me, it'll be great.”
“Well, yeah, but we have a lot to practice, to make them believe us double-time.”
“Since my mom and dad's home, well you know, they'll ask questions about what we're doing so, I'll come over as soon as I can, okay? Wait for me,” and she hanged up her phone before I had a chance to tell her how cool it'll be.

Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! I ran over to the door excitedly, and opened it. There stood a “five feet something” girl with a huge grin on her face. “Here, it'll be good help,” she says and handed me a small recorder. I squinted at her and ask, “So, what's this for?” She gives me an evil grin and says, “You'll see.”
So we practiced for a while and all of a sudden Lila's sounding like a man saying weird stuff but I didn't ask her.

And then we had a cup of coke. “Ah, this makes me feel way better. I'm glad I don't feel that hot anymore.” Then we both hear a ring and she stands up and checks her watch. “Alarm's ringing. I need to go home. Remember what we practiced, okay?” she says and gives me a wink.
I grin and say, “Sure I'll remember.”

Awesome! Today's the big day. School. So I packed my homework in my bag and ran out of my house. Of course, when no one's looking. I walked up Caner Road to school. Before I can take my first step in the building, Lila rushed over to me. “Here's the tape recorder.”

“So what's it for?”

Lila laughs and says, “Alex, you really can't wait, can't you?” I shrug and walk inside with Lila following right behind me. “I'll probably get sent to detention… again.” I looked at her. She looks at me. “It's because I didn't do my homework. I'm too tied up with that stuff.” I nodded and say, “Sorry about it.”

I see one of her eyebrows go up.

“Why…? Don't worry, detentions not that bad, right? I've been sent down there hundreds of times!”

I can see a little frown on her face.

I had to survive all that giggling in class. I never knew there were that many kids watching the news. Or maybe just one did and spilled the beans to everyone else.

I tried to ignore them, but then I got so mad that I had to yell, “I wasn't on T.V! How many of you watch the news?”
No one raised their snotty hands.

“Oh, so no one admits they watch the news. Well, whoever watches the news is-”

“Alex…”

“-stupid,”

“Alex…”

“-a big fat loser,”

“Alex…”

“-and a lying, insane, cold-blooded freak so stop staring at me!”

“Alex…”
“Haven't you got enough of me?”
“Alex…”

They pointed right at me. So I pointed at myself to and cry out, “What about me? Hey, I've insulted you enough so stop it!”
“No…”
So I looked around me and who did I see? The vice principal. He clears his voice and says, “So, what's going on, Alex? I can hear you about a mile away.”

He does a clicking noise and it's from Mr. Mortis and right then, I knew I'm supposed to go to his office and have a little talk with him. So I sigh and clumped all the way to his office and sat down in a big, white floppy chair.

“So? What's the story?”
I sighed and say, “It's a long story. Trust me.”

Mr. Mortis chuckles and says, “And we both have a long day don't we?”
I rolled my eyes when Mr. Mortis wasn't looking at me and finally told him from the start. He did a lot of Mm-hmm and stuff. Finally he says, “Well, anyway, let the cops do the job. You're still really young and you can get hurt.”
I nodded but really, I'm not exactly what you call, listening. Mr. Mortis, though, thinks I'm well behaved so he says, “Now get out of here and be cool, girl, be cool,” and really, I thought he was crazy! Cool? I mean, I've never ever in my life heard Mr. Mortis say that. Maybe he just wants to, I don't know, be cooler? You know, acting like us kids. But it freaks me out and I admit it, I'd rather have a regular teacher than a one that tries to act cool. “Seriously?”

“Yep. No go out there and prove it to people that you're a real man!”

“Uh… I'm a girl…?”

“Oh yeah.”
“Well, see ya.”

“See ya too.”

Now, I really want to get away from him, but I felt like I couldn't. It's like, I'm glued to the chair and I can't get out. It's like Mr. Mortis's trying to make me stay there and teach him to act young.
“Alex?”
“Uh, what? Oh, I'll leave.”
I finally got out of my chair and shot out of there like a rocket.

As soon as I got to my math class, I looked around to find Lila. She's in my math class. So when I found her, she looks at me like, where were you? I whisper, “I got sent down to the office.”
“Alexandra?”
I jumped. “Yeah?” I say. I looked at Mrs. Gondra right in the eye. She tisks and says, “Sit down at your desk. It's not a social work, Alexandra.” I rolled my eyes and sat down. “Excuse me, Alexandra?” she asks. And all I'm thinking is uh, oh when she says, “Never mind with that,” and turns to the class and announces, “Let's start off with long division. Turn to page one-hundred-thirty-one.” So I got out my math book and sighed. Who likes math anyway? No one I know except Mrs. Gondra. And if you want to know the truth, she's not that bad, for an old lady, anyway.

So I sit there trying to listen to that old woman chit-chat until Mrs. Gondra looked straight at me with her nose pointing down, asking, “What's six-thousand-seven-hundred-eighty-five divided by nine-hundred-two, Alexandra?” and right then, I knew she's trying to make me all, you know, lose, if you know what I mean. She's trying to make it harder for me.
“Uh-uh-well, you see, six-thousand-uh, what?” I'm probably making a loser out of myself, but really, what did she say?
Mrs. Gondra says, “Tisk, tisk, tisk,” and now she's tisking her head off. And then the bell rings and I grinned. Big. So we all run outside but Lila and I stood there for a while and then did big high-fives. “Whoa, did you make her mad!” Lila eyes Mrs. Gondra. I laugh and say, “No biggie, she's just not, you know, smart enough to outrun me.” Lila squints at me and then grins. “Well, you sure blew her! I bet she'll get you back. That'd be cool.”

“Really? I don't think so…” And I'm running to my next class as fast as I can, but Lila follows me. I look at her. “Hey, aren't you supposed to go to your next class?”
“Yeah, but I'm trying to get away from-” she looks around and whispers, “-Jesse.” I look at her like, who's Jesse? When out of the corner of my eye, I spot a freckled face boy. I pull Lila to the wall and pointed weakly at him and whisper, “He's right there.” She gives me a soft choking noise and turned her head away so Freckle Brain won't see her but too late-he spotted her and he's headed right towards us.
I should've told Lila he had a huge crush on her, but I didn't. I mean, that would've freaked her guts out, but then again, it's obvious and so she probably already knew. And I think I already told her that anyways…

“Hiya Lila,” he says happily and jolly to her and turns to me and his voice grew low. “Hey Alex,” he moans. I'm actually proud of myself because he didn't like me, I mean, wouldn't that be disgusting? Totally.

So I smiled at him and Lila. I looked at my wrist as if I had a watch -which I don't have- and exclaim, “Oh lookie here, I've got to go to class. See ya later Lila-gator,” and I winked at her and marched off to class. But the second I got in History class, I was as nervous as a fish out on the dry land. It's almost lunch and that's the main goal why we practiced last night. So I'm kind of nervous and sort of asking myself: is this going to work? Am I still going to be the laughing stock of Junior High history? I still had all these questions whizzing in my brain until I heard, “Alexandra? Alexandra? Are you okay? You don't look too good…” I looked up and saw Mr. Langton. I hesitated. “I uh, yeah I'm okay. I'm just-”and something worse happened. I never realized my face was green and so, I threw up on Mr. Langton. Not only kids will laugh at me, but teachers too, well, if Mr. Langton talks about me then, yeah.

Brownish-pinkish gooey, chunky stuff were surrounding me and Mr. Langton. I looked around and surely enough, kids were laughing there teeth off.

“Watch it!” I squeal at them. “Hey, you don't know how it feels to be me.”

“Sure we do…” Gerry Blotsmith says. Hey, if you embarrass yourself around him, you'll never live through it. So I stood up and ran out the door and into the bathroom. I looked at myself in the mirror and washed my mouth for a while. And really, whenever I touch water, it makes me pee so I got into the stall and, you know, went potty. But after I flushed the toilet, my eyes were caught on something. The stall. Inside the stalls, you usually see words on it like who they have a crush on or going for revenge, but this is something different. Really different. It says you never feel better until you write a letter, â™¥S.T.K. It's something different. Like a phrase. And believe me; I hate phrases because usually there are some tough words in it.

I thought that phrase was really interesting so I looked for other phrases too. And I did. Only really different like: a friend in need is a friend indeed, but of course, I've already heard that one but I didn't get it. I mean, why would a friend who needs help is a friend? But the more I think about it, the more I understood it. So a friend needs help and yeah, if your friend never needs help would be just boring.

I also found you can't poison him if you don't have `em, R.S.

Now, if you were in my shoes, I bet you wouldn't go back to my class after all that barf and the kids laughing at you. But somehow, I knew its' the right thing and besides, how mad can Mr. Langton be?

-FIVE-

So before I went inside History class, I peeked inside to see what they're up too. I can see Mr. Langton in a whole new outfit and the kids listening to every word he says.

“We're gonna see a movie today, about Martin Luther King and how he puts the black and white together. But of course before we start, we've got to wait for Alexandra to come in.” And before he gets to say another word, I took a deep breath and walked inside. “Hey Mr. Langton. I just had a break for a while if that's okay with you…?” I say. I heard some kids laughing behind me, but I decided that the best thing to do is ignore them.

Mr. Langton looked confused for a second and then he says, “Well, sure it's okay.” So I smile at him and took a seat.

When the lights are out and the movies' starting, I took out a piece of paper and pretty soon I'm writing facts and stuff that I thought was cool or just violent.

The movie was the best movie I ever watched in History class. It's about how Martin Luther King grew up and how the black people got treated. My favorite scene was when he saw a white man with his hands in his pocket go around the park and then the man pulled out a knife and stabbed all the black people. It was amazing. Not like I'm interested in violent stuff, but it was cool and you'd like it too if you watched it.

I also liked the part when Martin was deciding whether he'd leave the south and move somewhere safer and that's when he met his wife-at the church. She was going crazy around him and for a second, I thought she'd die from all that talking and laughing. I knew fairly well that she won't die because she lived for a pretty long time.

“Alex! Guess what? Guess what?” Lila cries and jumped around me. I took a look at her and moan, “What?” She looks around to see if anyone's listening and then leans close to my ear and whispers, “Jesse's going to Paris!” I squeal, “Really?” and she says back to me, “Yes!” I was so happy that the ugliest person in my life is gone.

“Good, because I don't ever want him in my life.”

She gives me a sad look, looks down at the floor and shakes her head. “He's only leaving for about two days but its enough to make me happy.” I frown and say, “That stinks.” She laughs and says, “Speaking of stink, what is that nasty smell?” She eyes me and says, “Spill it.” So I tell her all the embarrassing stuff and she laughed so hard the she nearly fell to the ground.

I urge, “Get up, you hear me?”

We head down to the cafeteria and ate our lunch. Everyone's still pointing at me and Lila and whispering about us on the news looking like dorks. So we get up and shout, “People, people! We were hired to do that!” We heard someone say, “Right…” like, uh huh. Lila about jumps ten feet up and shouts, “Really! He told us to practice doing that! I have proof, too.” She turns to me and puts her hand out. “Alex, you have the recorder?” I didn't really get what she's talking about and then I finally did. I reached in my pocket and say, “Right here, comin' up.” Lila takes it, turns it on and pretty soon we're hearing Lila say, “Alex, he doesn't want you to do like that! Here, fold your hands like this,” and pretty soon I'm saying, “Lila I'm trying! Hey, I didn't practice that long yet,” and than we hear Lila sounding like a man saying, “That's right Lila. Alexandra didn't practice that long enough to get the hang of it. Let her practice and she'll pretty soon be good. Don't be too pushy on her, we don't want her to mess up on the news,” and other blab-blab-blab stuff. So everyone's not laughing about it anymore. They think it's cool to be on T.V and how we're hired when Gerry asks, “Why'd they make you two do that? There gotta be a reason for them to hire two girls and making a fool of themselves.” Lila and I were quiet for a minute but then Lila suddenly says, “The guy you heard in the tape recorder is my relative! You got a problem with that?” Everyone's quiet because first of all, Lila never yells at anyone. She probably shouted out loud for everyone to hear her, but not yell at someone. Seriously, I thought she would put her hand to her mouth and say, “Oops, I got to keep my mouth shut,” or something like that but she didn't do anything I'd expected her to do. Instead of saying “Oops,” she screams, “Stop bothering me! This is proof so back off!” and pushes him to the side and marches out of the cafeteria room. I look at Gerry and whisper, “Sometimes she gets over reacted so listen to her,” and caught up with Lila.

“Lila! Didn't you know what you just did?”
“Sure I do. I yelled at him. Sometimes you have to yell at people so they'll stop messin' with you.”

“Yeah, but, that's not you!”

“Well, then, who said it?”
I rolled my eyes and looked at her. Hard. “Look, I know you said it but you usually -erase that- you never do it.” She looks like I have jelly beans for eyes. “Look at the bright side, kiddo-everyone believed us and that Gerry'll never bother us again.” She walks away from me. Fast. While I just stopped for a second and then ran up to catch with her. “Hey, I'm about your age!” She doesn't slow down a bit. “I'm older.” I lip talk, so? She holds my shoulder and shakes it. “Look, I'm trying to make everyone believe us-why are we fighting, anyways? I did something good for us and all you did was yelling at me!” She says.

“I was not yelling at you!”

“Uh huh, you did!”
“Are you deaf?” I blurt out. Now, if I had time before to choose if I'd say that or not, I'd choose not but I'm too late. She stopped walking and stares at me. “What?” she whispers. I looked around to see if anyone was watching or listening.

“I yeah, but… no I didn't say anything… yeah I did, but I did-did-didn't…” I whimper. And before I knew it, tears were racing down her cheeks and she cries, “You are so rude! We're not friends anymore, Alexandra Lanes, because first of all, I'm just trying to help us, but what did you do? You yelled at me and said I was deaf!” and runs away. I tried to stop her. I came running after her shouting, “No, you don't understand! I know you're trying to help me-help us. I'm just saying that you never yelled at anyone before!” but does that stop her? Not a chance. She kept running and running.

But now all I can remember was the night sky.

-SIX-

“Alex! Alex!”

“Oh my lord, she's dead!”

“No… no, she's still alive. I can feel her heartbeat.”
“But she's not answering.”
“Hey, you're not smart, you know that?”
“Why? How can you say-”
“Look!”

I moved my fingers a bit. And then all I felt was someone shaking me. “Alex! Breathe, Alex! Be calm, Alex, you're still alive. We're sending help right now. Wake up! Wake up!” I heard Lila's voice. I knew she was shouting, but all I heard was some muffling whispers that I can't really understand because right in my head, I can't hear almost anything. And I can't see anything. Everyone and everything is pitch-black. I wanted to speak to Lila, but I have a feeling she's not goanna hear me.

“Lila… what's happening?” I ask, anyway. I can tell she already looks confused. “What?” she says and I can hear clear well what she's saying now.
“What did Alex say, Mark?”
“How should I know?” says a voice. “Her lips are moving, but words aren't coming out. I can't just tell what she's saying… I'm not her!”

I feel more shaking. “Ouch, stop that,” I whisper, but I still know they're not understanding, but boy, was I wrong. “Hey, I know she's saying stop that. I can just tell.”

“I've got eyes, too, you know.”

“Humph!”

“Look! They're here.”
“Whoa, was that fast! Alex, help is here!”
I can hear sirens.

That's when I felt I was being lifted and then placed on this thing that felt like cloth. But I can feel it's really thin. I finally moved my hands and touched my forehead where it hurts. And I felt gooey liquid. I raised my hand to my nose and sniffed.

“Alex's awake!” I heard Lila scream. “I am, aren't I?” I whisper. I finally opened my eyes and I saw Lila and Marcus-or Mark. Lila put her hands to her mouth and whispers, “I can hear her, can you? Do you think she's okay?”

Marcus shakes his head and says, “No, no, she's not okay. If you don't bring her to the hospital soon, the blood will run out. All of her blood.”
I look confused. “What happened?” So Lila explained it to me. All of it. She told me that I was trying to make her stop until bang! I ran into a metal pole. And that's when I fainted and blood started oozing out of my head. Or should I say gushing out of my head. Either way that makes you grossed out.

“Hurry.” I warn them. “Tell that to the driver.” I had already figured out that we were in an ambulance.

So Marcus ran to tell the driver while Lila and I stared at each other. “I'm so sorry about the way I have been acting. I guess I must have been deaf,” she jokes. I gave out a sad laugh. I put my head up and say, “Well, I guess I have to say sorry, too.”
“No you don't. You didn't do anything wrong.”
“I told you you're deaf?”
“Oh yeah, that.” Lila frowns. I put my head back down and whisper, “Let's not think about it. I'm resting right now, so if I were you, I wouldn't bother.” I sigh.

So when my eyes are laid back open, I saw white crinkly things. It was the ceilings. Lila jumped up and down. “Alex, they want to ask you something! They want to know your phone number and they want to talk with your parents.”
“Who?”
“The doctors!”

“Oh, them. Uh… tell them that Jason will be right over.”
“But I can't! They want my family coming in, too! And Marcus's.”
“But why…?”
“I don't know! They just do!”

I wanted to jump out of this bed and smack the doctors right in the eye and shout, “None of your beeswax!” but of course, I didn't. Marcus came into the room and asks, “Why are you so afraid? And who is Jason? He's your brother?” I shake my head. “My mom.” Marcus looks at me straight in the eyes and asks, “I'm sure your mom's name isn't exactly that. And why would she want to make it a boy's name? Your mom must be cool.” I look at Lila nervously and nodded.
Lila shakes her head and says, “Alex, tell him! He's going to find out anyway.”
“But I can't!”

“Why'd you tell it to me, then?”
“Why do you think? You're my best friend!”

“Yeah, Alex, tell me,” Marcus says. I sigh and tell him everything. He looks at me like I'm a super star. “Whoa, you must be lucky to do anything you want!”

“Not exactly.”

“'Scuse me?”

I looked straight at him and I can tell he's pretty interested. “Well, uh, meet you tomorrow at school, hopefully… and thanks for saving my life!” I smile at him and turned my head at Lila. “You, too, Lila, best friends forever, right?” She laughed and nods, “Right.” So I'm trying to figure out how on earth I will ever get off this stinky bed with a sore head and an aching body.
“I'll help you, Alex,” Lila says and Marcus helps me out, too. “Don't let any doctors see me.”

So I thanked them when I felt better and went straight home.

The next day in school, I felt awkward. There were still brownish-red stain on the floor and I figured out right away that I was lying there the other day, almost dead.

People who walked by me looked disgusted and then eyed at the stain.
I put one hand on my hip and the other pointing at the stain. I say, “Hey, you must be relieved that I lived, you know! I am powerful to live,” and they ran away thinking I'll beat them up. But really, I didn't want to beat them up, I mean, yeah, I could if I wanted to, but I didn't.

I went strait to homeroom and waited until the bell rang. But I didn't even hear it once until someone's actually knocking me over. “Hey, watch it. Now you're definitely blind!” I say through my teeth and by the way she looked at me, I can tell she's about to punch me. “You watch it, you small rat.” I was about to stand up and shout, “Who you calling small rat, small rat?” because she's as small as me, but I had to bite my lips and I had to; I couldn't stand it by the fact that she might bug me all the time that I had to. And when I finally sat down and straightened my T-shirt, she really erupts.

She comes holding my shirt collar and shouting right in my face and I swear she spat on me-totally. And while the teacher is trying to break us up, all the kids were staring at us amazed. I even heard some kids say, “Tough girl against tough girl,” because both of us were tough and if I had to choose which one's tougher, I would have no idea, even though I rather pick myself, but I knew the answer would never be known.

I didn't want to get into a fight so I put my hands up in the air and say, “Look, I do not want to fight, I just want to sit down and relax and by the way, you've got to apologize from the way you're spitting on my face. If you're sick, then I'll get sick.” Some kids were laughing pretty hard.
Rena, the tough girl, spat a big blob on my cheek and I can feel the smoke rise upon my head. “You little idiot!” I grab her arm and started kicking her and then soon, pretty much anyone can see is a thick fog of dust.
“Alex! What happened? How can you get into a fight with Rena?” I heard Lila shout. I shout back, “Rena's the problem! She spat on my face!” And then, pretty much all the students in the school were in our classroom watching and yelling, “Fight! Fight! Fight!” over and over again.

When Rena and I gave up harming each other, we had a huge blob of blood on our foreheads and cheeks and noses and arms and legs and everywhere! Believe me, she's a good kicker and puncher, but I'm good, too.

So we both ended up having detention. The worst word you'd ever heard. Okay, maybe not, but still, detention's bad enough but why do I have to have to have a fight with her? Hey, did I tell you it was a two hour detention? How am I supposed to live through that?

“Hey, it's you fault you pushed right into me, Rena. I'm not trying to get into I fight, but it's obvious you wanted to.” She looks at me like I'm crazy.
“Please, I didn't mean to. Really. I'm just in some tough spot.”

I looked at her like, what tough spot? What do you mean? when all of a sudden she burst into tears.

“My mother lied to me! She says I'm her real daughter and then a couple of years ago, she told me she adopted me!”

“That's stupid.”

“I know! I'm just not used to it, so I ran away from home.”
“So you don't have anywhere to live?”
She shakes her head. “Nope. Just suffer in the cold.”
So that was the end of the conversation and I can tell she wanted it to end, anyway. “Well, you're lucky you know you have parents. I don't even have parents! Well, yeah I do, but they think I'm dead and I don't even know if they're dead,” I blurt out. I knew I should've kept it in my head that I didn't know where they were, but I just seemed so happy that a girl in my grade doesn't have anywhere to live, like me, well, I do but, you just don't get it.

Detention for us is different. Way different. If you get into a fight with someone, you spend your time in detention with that person and have to solve the problem out. So there we were, having fun and laughing about how stupid our parents were. I told her, “Don't you think its crazy going to New Jersey just to find your husband? She split up with him and she's still finding him!” and it was true, she's split up with him.
So we laughed and laughed some more until we barely had the spirit to laugh.

When Mr. Mortis came back and asked how it was going, we laugh and say, “Oh, better than ever!”

On our way to the mall, Rena went with us because she says she probably won't even have anything to do. I'm comfortable with her, but Lila isn't. She keeps nudging me and whispering, “She'll punch you again,” but now, I think she's feeling a bit happier with Rena.
Then she stops us and says, “Guess what?” And both of us stand there jumping up and down, saying, “What?” Lila smiles and says, “Well, I was on my way to Alex's homeroom to tell her this, but I didn't because, well, you know what happened.”
We nod.

“So I didn't tell you. But Mark just asked me if I wanted to meet him at Falling Food! He also told me that I can bring any of my friends!” she practically screams.

Rena stands there looking confused. “Who is Mark?”

Lila moves her eyebrows up and down. “He's only the cutest guy I've ever met.”
“Wow, you must be lucky! But to tell you the truth, I'm not really fond of boys,” Rena says.

I glanced at her and say, “I don't even like any boy.” And I look at Lila and ask, “Wait a minute, did you just say Falling Food? That's right in the mall.”
She shrugs, “Yeah, I know. I want you two to come with us.” I look at her. “No, I can't.”

“Why not?”
“Because I don't want to come.”
“Oh, come on. I thought you're brave. Wow, this is the first.”
“No, you don't get it. I am brave, but really, I'm not brave around boys.”
“Aw, come on,” and rushes away to the mall first before I can even say a thing. So off Rena and I go, in the mall, and heading strait to Falling Food. And when I lay my foot in the floor, I noticed right away that the boy with baggy pants and a huge long T-shirt is Marcus.
Lila shouts, “Hey, Mark! We're here,” and runs to him. I feel really embarrassed and probably about anyone would notice because Rena asks, “Alex, are you okay? You look really red right now.”
I blush and say, “Oh, I'm okay. Why don't you head to Marcus and Lila? I'll stay here and watch.”
“But then why'd you come with us? Come on, it'll be fun. And Lila's right. He is pretty cute. And he even might offer some food to us! Free food! That doesn't happen everyday, you know.” So I 0finally went with her, to Lila and Marcus.
“So, how's it goin'?” Marcus asks us. “Oh, we're fine. And we're about to leave right this minute if you let-”

“Alex! We're not going now.”
“Whatever.” I say and rolled my eyes. Being with Miss Lila, oh, the one and only girl who's obsessed with scary movies is tough, if you know what I mean.
And Rena's right. He offered some food and Rena and Lila accepted it, but I didn't. “Aw, come on, your such a party pooper,” Marcus says, “But for one thing, Lila's right-you are shy around boys.”
My eyes practically popped out. “Lila!” I shriek. “When will you just keep your mouth shut!” And again, everyone stares at me. I wanted to bolt out of the store in less than one hot second, but I didn't. Rena kept hold of my arm.
Lila looks so innocent. “Oh, I'm sorry, Alex. I didn't mean to. And you never really told me I couldn't tell someone else…”
“Lila, you know truly well what I mean and if I don't want you to tell anyone else. I'm your best friend, Lila, how can you do this to me?”
So when I finally accepted Lila's apology, I felt much better, that the fact Marcus didn't laugh or something. He even promised me never to tell and I made Lila and Rena promise, too. So we chatted for a little while. I finally say, “Well, I better be heading somewhere.” But Rena asks, “You don't have to. You're just choosing to because there's no one who wants you to go.”
I shake my head and say, “I'm going to work. In Paul's store.” Rena grabs my arm and says, “I'll go with you!” and pretty soon, Marcus and Lila wants to come, too, but I told them that Paul probably wouldn't accept friends over at work.

So I headed to Paul's store when I noticed I'm being followed. And really, I didn't feel frightened or surprised. I just feel mad. Very mad.

-SEVEN-

“Lila! Marcus! Rena! I told you not to follow me!” They shrug and say, “Well, we're already almost there, so what's there to lose? Let's just ask Paul if we can come in.”
I didn't agree with them, but I also didn't tell them that. We headed over to Paul's store and when Paul sees me with a bunch of teenagers, he looked happier than ever and that made me roll my eyes and sigh. I didn't want my friends watching me mop the floor and stuff.

“Why, Alexandra, who did you bring?” He asks joyfully. I sigh and point at them and grumble in a low tone as if I'm tired, “That's Rena, Lila, and Marcus-call him Mark if you like.” Paul frowns and asks me, “What's so low? Spill the beans!” I didn't want to tell him so I just told him I'm fine.

So there I am, sweeping, and cleaning, mopping, and dusting, doing all those chores and when I'm finally done, all I earn is about ten bucks. “Thanks a lot, Paul. See you next Wednesday!” So when I'm heading home, I still realized Rena, Lila, and Marcus is still following me so I shout, “Quit following me! You're being annoying, you know that?” and ran to my house.

I'm so relieved that they didn't follow me all the way to my house. I figured out that they just stopped and did a U-turn and walked to there own house but boy, was I wrong!

In school, I had a great mood. Lila and Rena ran up to me. Lila screams, “Marcus and Rena went over my house!”

I stared at her and just wished I went over her house too because they were talking about how great it was when all of a sudden, I found myself huddling with them and Lila whispers, “He asked me out. Cool, huh?”
I stand straight with one hand on my hip. “So what if he asks you out? So what?”
“Alex, are you jealous?”
“Heck, no!”
“Why are you acting like this?”
“'Cause I don't like to talk about boys.”
And they knew that I wanted this conversation to end and it did. And a skinny woman with curly blond hair tied up in a ponytail came up to us and asks, “Is something wrong?”
We stood there asking ourselves okay, so what is Goldie-Locks doing here in our school? Isn't she supposed to be eating porridge at the three bear's house? Fine, maybe they didn't think about that but I sure did! But I can tell-my friends looked totally blank.

So Goldie-Locks whimpers a bit and finally says, “Oh, I'm so sorry. I'm a staff here and I'm new. My name is Stacy Tory Karol. You can find me in the office just down that hall on the left.” She pointed. I stared amazed and ask rudely, “Can you take us in there? I've seen it loads of times but never really went in it. It looks creepy and that's the fun of it.” She stares at us until a wave my hands around her eyes and she just collapsed. Boy, was this woman funny!

So she shows us around her office. It's more like a room from a hotel or something because there's a red fancy rug in it and big comfy black sofas and a desk with a huge Microsoft laptop and a huge T.V. And fancy huge pictures are hanged everywhere on the wall. And the ruby-red wallpaper has little neat dark-red and pink flowers and it's just amazing. But it had little loose rips. Also it has Japanese words.

“The bathroom's right in there, if you need to go.” And I decided to go in even though I didn't need too. I just thought that the bathroom might be as cool as her office so I ask, “May I use the bathroom, please?” From the way I see Lila's eyes bugged out almost out of her eye sockets, well, I guessed that she never seen me that polite before because I never use “please” or “may I” in a sentence before. Not uh. Never.
Stacy nods and says, “You're always welcome.” So I went inside and it was as cool as the office. The sink was silver and in the sides of the sink, there was carved angels on it and the tub also had angels carved on it, but only the bottom and it's huge. And the mirror was gigantic and it was so cool. The edges had big pink flowers and the rug was painted gold with ducks on it. And ducks to me are way better than flowers.

And the toilets, that's right, toilets. Usually toilets are disgusting and now I'm telling you that this one's awesome. It's still gross if you think about the real one, but this one's amazing. When I put the toilet seat down, it wasn't hard or anything. A cushion was on it and it had a yellow duck waving hello.

So when we leave, I felt sick and tired. Like I didn't eat anything and I also didn't sleep.

“Alex, you okay?”
“Yeah, sure.”

Then all of a sudden, Marcus ran over to us and says, “Hey,” and I felt awfully sick. I sigh and then grinned to show him and Lila and Rena that I'm happy.

“Hey Marcus,” I say. Lila smiles and shows her white sparkly teeth and says with a half blush, “Hi Mark, so what's up?” He told her about how cool it'll be at night and when they were going to meet. And right then, I felt really, really sick. My face turns green and I can tell already. Rena leans to my ear and whispers, “You're sick. Go to the bathroom-quick! And also, why'd you turn green when Marcus's around? Unless you like him…” She moves her eyebrows up and down and keeps going on with that pattern.
“I do not!” I whisper back, because really, I don't like him. “It's just that Lila's not being her self. She doesn't talk about Marcus at all before he asked her to come to Falling Foods,” and I ran to the bathroom. I went in the stall and threw up there and I felt so bad. Just bad. Entirely.
I threw up in the toilet some more and when I looked up, I noticed I was in the same stall I was before because I noticed you never feel better until you write a letter, â™¥STK, and I also noticed that it was kind of mushy, like someone already tried to scrub that one off. A friend in need is a friend indeed is easy to read because it was written boldly. And I can also read you can't poison him, if you don't have `em, R.S is written in small letters. And then that's when it hit me, the person with the initials R.S probably killed the old man because that R.S guy has just written something down about killing someone.

But I also have other things on mind. I wanted school to be over quick as a flash.

When I get out of the bathroom, there's Rena and Lila. I was really happy that Marcus wasn't here and I laugh and ran to them but all of a sudden I here, “Hey, that took long,” and then I frowned and sigh and I crossed my arms. “You're still here?” I ask Marcus. “What? You're not happy?” he asks.
“No, it's nothing.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah, but I have to get out of the school. I need to go to Garvey's Restaurant-quick!”
“Why?”
And before I can explain to him, I grabbed Lila and Rena by the wrist and dashed out of the door.

Normally, I wouldn't do that. You see, you're not allowed to get outside during school unless you need to go outside by dismissal or something likes that.

“Alex, don't you know that this can cause trouble?” Lila says. I nod and looks at her like, I know that, now stop talking and follow me.

I ran into Garvey's Restaurant and asked the same Chinese woman “Is the dead guy still here?”
“No, he's your grandfather right?” She asks. I nod and say, “Is there still and blood stains or anything?”
“Sorry. We got the company to put new rugs. Is there something you want me to do?”
“Uh, no,” and I noticed the wallpaper. “Where did you get that wallpaper? Can I find it at a store?”
She shakes her head. “I'm sorry. If we tell you, you won't even find it. It was the first one ever made and also the last. The company won't be making more. It costs thousands of dollars, ma'am,” and all of a sudden, I felt… awkward. No lady has ever called me “ma'am” before in my entire life.

“Oh, so, okay, I guess that's it.”

So we three went back to school and had to go to detention again. It wasn't that bad, now that I'm used to it. So I didn't even feel like I wanted to cry like I used to.

When Mr. Mortis came to me, he asks, “So, you learned your lesson?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Well go on banging out there, dude!”

Now I definitely feel awkward. “Um, okay…” And went out.
I went to History class and Mr. Langton forgot all about that barf and I was relieved. Hopefully, everyone forgot about it. But not Gerry. Uh huh. If he can remember how Lila yelled at him, he'll remember the barfing part-I guarantee it.

“Hey,” I say and sat down on my seat. “So why were you so late, Alexandra?” Mr. Langton asks.

I just want to die. “Sorry, Mr. Langton, I just remembered I forgot to feed my dog so I left school.”
“You mean you actually got out of school without anyone noticing?”
“Yes, sir.”

He looked surprised but from my heart, I knew he wasn't. “Well, for a girl like you, Alexandra, you can be really sneaky, you know that, don't you?”
I laugh and say, “Sure I do!”

I was too relieved that school's finally over! Yeah!

So I get my bag with all that homework punched in and head down to Paul's store and I can still remember how Lila, Rena, and Marcus keeps following me.

On my way there, I see a man dressed like a clown go to me and ask, “We're donating money to the poor so would you be so kind?” I stood there like a freak.

“Uh, no… I'm sorry,” and turn away from him and then I knew how it felt to be poor with no shelters and food and water (sometimes it happens to me) and definitely has to work hard for money so I walked back to the clown and say, “I'm sorry, but I'm changing my mind,” and pick out ten dollars and put it in. Normally, I wouldn't put in that much money because that's how much I earn from Paul's store. But I did.

I look straight into the clown's eyes, and it looks creepy, let me tell you that. His eyes were greenish-blue and when I look harder into it, I can see thick white fog moving slowly everywhere.

“Hey, kid, what do you think you're doing?” He shouts. Now, he doesn't sound like that “can you donate money for the poor, please” with cute doggy eyes, he sounds like a real thief and I can even tell from his eyes.

And I figured it out right away that he wasn't donating to the poor, he's donating it to himself.
“Hey, you big liar! You're not donating to the poor! You're taking the money all for yourself! Come back here!” I shrieked and everyone's staring at us until the thief-half-clown ran. I chased him shouting, “Stop, thief! Give me back my money! I'm poor!” I kept running and he's heading right to a new store and I know that store. Paul's store. And I've been there so many times that I even found out there are shortcuts to go there. But I also found out that a dog's running loose behind me and that made it even better.

So I ran in a different direction and ended up getting to Paul's store first. The clown would still keep running because he'd hear that panting and the tapping on the ground, but that's not me. It's the dog.

So I found myself a place to hide right near the entrance.
“Alex, what are you doing?” Paul asks.
“A thief's heading right towards this place. Act cool like he isn't even a thief and he'll just tell you stuff and then I'll lock the door, okay?” I whisper.
“Okay… but when he finds out, won't he kill me?”
“I've been cleaning all around here many times and I seen a baseball bat here. Right behind your counter.” And I pointed there. He goes to the counter and then holds a big giant bat. He kisses it. “Wow, I was trying to find this for years!”

“Well, yeah, just use it to hit him with that. And also call the police. Tell them that there's a thief at the mall heading towards Paul's store.”
“Okay.”
He handed me the keys.

And a second later after he put the phone down, the giant clown ran in and closed the door.

“Hello, sir, do you want to buy anything?”
“No, I'm just running away from my wife.”
So they chit-chatted for a while until I sneaked to the door and locked it up.

Now, I would've thought going outside first and locking it, but instead, I locked it from the inside, so I don't have much time to unlock it and go outside because the scary clown dude spotted me. I put the keys inside my pocket and the clown yells, “Get over here!” like I would want to do that…
“Get over here now!” He looks at Paul and then looks at me. Paul shrugs and then the clown shouts, “Oh, so you two are working this out together!” and tries to kick me but I jumped up on the counter first and then I leaped on him.

I kick, kick, andkick while he punch, punch, punches later, he spits on my nose. I got so mad that I spit on him back and now it turns into a spitting contest, let me tell you that, and we kept spitting on each other when all of a sudden the glass entrance door breaks. It's like someone from the outside of this store's trying to get in, but its lock so they kick the glass and it breaks into pieces.
I felt like there has been a bomb in the door.

The cops ran in holding guns.

“What the heck are you doing? I'm on your side! Hey, I got germs just to help you!” I scream at the cops.

“Stay out of this kid, but I have to admit you're good and sneaky, and best of all, you're good at lying,” says a familiar voice and I knew who it belongs to. Elvis Hair.

“Hey, what makes you be here?” he asks.

But I didn't answer that question. Instead I say, “H-how do you know I'm good at lying? Because I'm the worst at it.”
“Oh really? I just talked to Mr. Corel's wife and she says she doesn't have grandchildren.”
“Who in the world is Mr. Corel? I don't know him so, ha!”
“You admit yourself. Mr. Corel's the dead man.”
I cover my mouth and whisper, “I meant that, bafoon.”

“So? What makes you here?”
“I work here.”
“Is that so?”
Paul steps up and says, “Yeah, she's my assistance.”
“More like a maid,” I say and laugh. Paul laughs, too, and so does Elvis Hair. “You hired a kid?”
“She has great cleaning skills, you know. She's poor, homeless, and she says her mom and dad thinks she's dead and she doesn't know where they are.”
“She's homeless?”
“Yes.”
“Do you know what this means? She's supposed to go to the foster home.”
“But I don't! It stinks!” I yell.

Elvis Hair sighs and puts his hands up in the air. “Girl, listen, you're supposed to. It's illegal for a young girl to stay all by herself.”
“No it's not! They treat you badly in the foster home.”
“I've been there couple of times and nothing bad has happened. They treat the kids like their own.”
“You're so stupid! Of course they treat them like kids when other adults are around!”
He gasps and calls to his “police friends”, “Why don't you and Bob go sneak up to Nathanial's Foster home? Don't let anyone there see you! Check in there to see if they're treating them nicely.”

I smile. Then he turns his head back to me and asks “Is that better? I'll make sure they'll treat you like a real daughter.”
“I don't want to go there! Leave me alone, will you? I caught this thief for you and for a favor of what I'd done for you cops, I'd like you to stop messing with me!” I shout.

He gasps and I smile. “Okay, bye,” and I wave and ran out of there quick.

Then Paul calls, “You didn't clean for me, Alex!”
I laugh and call back, “Can't I just have a day off? You would've been killed if it wasn't for me! Well, maybe.” And I ran home and called Lila and told her about what had happened and she believed me. But she's my friend so of course she has to!

I went outside and I lay down on the grass like I always do when it's nighttime.
I close my eyes and the next thing I knew was I feel asleep but something woke me up.
Something… scratchy.

-EIGHT-

Scratch! Scratch! Scratch!

“Ah! Would you please stop it?” I scream. And that's when I noticed it wasn't human. It was a cat scratching against the garbage can.

I'm not the kind of girl who's fond of cats. I think they're creepy, sneaky, evil and all that bad stuff.

“Stop it! Its garbage not cat food,” I say. I stood up, pulled out a dead, moistly branch and used it to poke the cat so it can run away. Then I noticed something in its mouth and I can tell by the look. It's paper. I pull out the paper and read: Ranger needs a home please and then I decided, nah, its' just a creepy cat! But again, I thought about how the cat will die because he doesn't have any food or stuff. So I pet Ranger and hug him and pretty soon, I found myself holding him and snuggling with him. “Ah, you're so adorable!” I say. If you met Ranger, you'd already like him.
I was just about to go over Lila's and show her this cat when I remembered the garbage can. What would Ranger want so much that he had to scratch it for almost an hour?
I decided, it won't hurt if I just check the garbage out, so I walk to the garbage can and opened the lid.

I gasp because something's in there and it's not a pretty sight. Believe me.

I was about to faint when I saw it. Guns. Knives. All those dangerous weapons were in the garbage. It looks just like the one Lila and I saw in the back of the black car.
“ Those weapons,” I gasp. “Lila! Rena!” I scream as if Lila and Rena are here.

But they weren't.
Who is? Marcus. “What's the matter with you, Alex?” he asks. I shiver and say, “Nothing you know of-or you'd want to know.”
“Maybe I don't know, but I do want to know.”

“It's nothing, no big deal.”

“Yes it is, how come you're screaming then?”
“Oh, uh, hey, I just found this cat and he scratched me. Of course I'm screaming!”
I tried walking away and going to Lila's house, but he keeps following me.

“So?” I ask.
“What?

“Why are you following me?”
He points strait up the street and says, “You're going to Lila's house, right?”
“Uh huh…”
“Me too, so I'm going with you.”
I nodded but really, I didn't want him to “follow” me. No way!
I look behind my shoulder and there's Ranger, walking happily behind me.

“Do you have some food cats would like to eat? Food for smart cats.”
“Yeah, crackers.”
“Cats eat crackers?”
“Uh, maybe, let's see.”
So he knelt down and reached in his pocket and pulled out a small plastic bag of crackers. He turns to me and says, “Your hand, please?”
So I held out my hand and he dumped some dry, grain crackers on my hand and some for himself, too, and I fed some to Ranger. “Here, boy, here you go.”
“He's a boy? How do you know?”
I pulled out a small folded paper and gave it to him.
“Oh… Ranger,” he says.

And before we knew it, we were just right in front of Lila's house. Lila was outside, with Rena, watering flowers.
“Oh, hi Mark!” Lila and Rena shouts at the same time. I wave two hands around in the air and ask, “Hey, what about me?”
They laugh and say, “Hi Alex!” So I tell them (even Marcus, eventually) about how I found Ranger and how he kept scratching the garbage can and all that stuff.

“You said you found weapons? They look like the one from the black car? You mean the car you and Lila chased?” Marcus asks.
I shrug and nod. “I just think so. They look alike. But what makes them throw their weapons in my garbage can?”
And Lila says, “And why did they throw the weapons away.” And Rena asks, “What weapon? You seen weapons in a back of a black car? Whoa, that must be freaky!”
I laugh and say, “Oh, it is,” and tell her and Marcus about how the story really went and why we were chasing the black car.

“Oh, so you are good at lying. Wow,” Marcus says, amazed. “Want to come to my house? It'll be fun and I'm sure you girls never went there before…” Marcus says, and I can tell, he's hoping we would.

So we say, sure!

And here we are, at Marcus's house. It's huge, white, I can tell there are four floors and it has a huge pool in the back-I can tell.

“This is a nice house,” I say.

“Yeah, it is. My dad bought it and I kept asking him how he gets that much money and he never answers me. Come in!” He beckoned to us to come in the house.
So we did and we heard a man ask, “Sonny, who'd you bring?” Now this voice sounds super familiar, but where'd I hear that voice. I really forgot.

So while I'm trying to figure out whose voice it belongs to, that man appeared and first of all, I gasp.

“Hey, I thought you're supposed to be in jail!” I shout, madly. He shouts to Marcus, “Get those girls outta here!”
Marcus says, “But dad, they're my friends!”
“You can't expect her to be your friend!” He points at me.
I glare at “the clown” and yell, “You're supposed to be in jail! How'd you get away with this?”
Marcus looks like I'm crazy and says, “My dad is not supposed to be in jail!” and he turns to his dad and asks, “Really?”

He's a subject changer, let me tell you. First of all, he told me that his dad's not supposed to be in jail and later, he says to his dad, really? Are you really supposed to be in jail?
“I'm not, sonny, don't listen to Alex.”
“Hey how do you know my name?” I ask-well, more like shouting.

Then I pointed at the clown and yell to Lila, “This man's the clown I caught yesterday!”
Lila put her hands to her mouth and whispers, “Oh, lord!”
As you can see, she says “Oh, lord” or “Oh, my lord” or “Oh, lord, oh, lord” or something that has to do with “oh” and “lord” when she's surprised. That's her way of saying it. My way's just gasping.

Marcus puts his hands in the air and says, “What are you two driving at?” and instead of explaining it to him, I just shout, “He's the guy who dressed up as a clown in the mall and asking everyone to donate to the poor when he's using all the money for himself!” Marcus crosses his arms and doesn't believe me at first, but then, because I look so serious, he finally does and shouts at his dad, “Why, dad, why? I can't believe this!” and ran out of the house. I follow him.

Lila and Rena stay in there to call the police again while I tried to comfort him.
“I'm sorry, I really am, but it's true.”
“Why'd you have to tell me?” He practically shouts.

I shout back, “Well I had to do something! If you don't want your dad to go to jail, then he'll keep on being a liar and he'll never get cured!”
“Then how does he get cured?”
“He has to go to jail and has to think about what he's done wrong and so he won't get used to asking for donation.”
“But if he'll stay in jail, it'll make him crazy.”
“No.”
“Well, anyway, how did you catch him? It sure seems interesting.” So I tell him all about it, and for a while, we're laughing and making rude comments about the clown.

“Oh, I got so wound up on that clown thing that I forgot he's my dad. It's a good thing you used the name “the clown” instead of “your dad” because I would've thought about him again,” he says to me.
“But you just did. You're just talking about him.”
“Seems like the world is full of lies, Alex, and I'll just have to ignore them.”
“Oh.”

Lila and Rena come back out and say, “The cops will come. Yesterday, after you left, that clown got away, Alex.”

I squinted at them and ask, “But how? There were so many cops that I'm sure I wouldn't get away.”
“I know but, most of the cops gone down to Nathaniel's Foster home so there are only a few left and he escaped,” Lila says. Marcus clears his throat and makes the “Ah hem…” sound so I knew we shouldn't talk about it.

So we didn't.
All of a sudden Marcus turns to me and says, “I kept a huge secret and if someone finds out, then everyone will be mad. I just told you that the world's full of lies, right?”
I nodded. “Yeah, you said so.”
“So…”he says, “Well, I'm keeping a huge secret from all of you. A lie.”

-NINE-

If you ask me, lying isn't a big deal. At all. Practically everyone does. So I didn't get so over reacted with it, but Lila and Rena sure did.
Lila practically demanded Marcus tell her what he lied about and Rena just kept begging and pleading him to tell her.

“Hey, knock it off; you're giving me a huge headache!” I say to Rena and Lila.
So finally, they stopped begging, pleading, and demanding him and we're just about to go home, when Lila asked all of us, “Want to sleep over my house? It'll be fun!”
I shrug and say, “Sure,” and so does Rena. Marcus's the one who doesn't know for sure.

“I don't know if my dad would let me…” he says. I laugh crazily and say, “But your dad doesn't even care about you! Whatever you want then…” I say and gave him an evil happy look.
So finally he decides to come.
I laugh.
Rena asks, “What?”

“It's just that Marcus is going to be the only boy out of us three girls. It's just something funny to think about. Nothing bad and all,” I say and laugh again and pretty much all of us is laughing except Marcus. Instead, he says to me, “Oh, so you're insulting me.”
“No, I'm just wondering if you have any other friends that are boys.”
He chuckles and says, “I have more than you do, that's all I know.” I pulled out my tongue at him.

School's the worst, let me tell you. Mr. Langton's retiring, even though he's not old at all, and Mr. Sanders is taking his place. The first time I laid my eyes on him, I almost ran away. If I had barfed on him, sure enough, I'd go to detention immediately. He looks scary, he sounds scary, and he even acts scary.

“Hey you! Come over here,” he shouts and points at me. I shiver a bit and point at myself like a loser and ask, “Me?” That made me in more trouble. “You need me to send you to the nurse for ear check-up?”
I shook my head and say, “No, I don't,” and walk up to him. “I don't want you ever to be sneaking out of the school again!” he yells at me. I was about to cry. He's freaky.

“Mr. Langton told you?”
“Yes, and so did the principle.”
“Oh.”
“And I don't want you to be sneaking off anywhere or doing things you aren't supposed to do, you hear me!” How can anyone not hear him? He's shouting so loud, the whole school can practically hear him.

“Yes, sir,” I say, but I didn't mean it. I didn't care.

So at lunch, I saved a seat for Rena, and when Rena sat down next to me, I told Lila and Rena about Mr. Sanders. They told me they heard about him, too, and stuff.

“Have you ever met him?” I ask.

They shook there heads. “No. Never. I don't want to; anyway, that makes us lucky!”

I mutter, “Yeah, but what about me?”

Then right in the corner of my eyes, I see Marcus walking towards our long table. And then he sat right next to Lila. Lila grinned and says, “Hey, Mark! What makes you here?”
And I add, “There's a lot more long tables for you to sit you know… and it looks like your friends saving you a seat,” I glance at his friends.
He waves one hand and says, “Nah, I'd rather sit with you.”
I pointed at myself, “Me?”
He shrugs and laughs, “That shows you how annoying they are.” I take a huge bite of my peanut-butter sandwich and grumble, “Yum!”

Lila laughs and points at me, “Hey, you're rude, you know.”
I nod and say, “I know that!”

Now all of a sudden, Naira Jenzy, the neat-freak comes up to me and says in such a mean way, “Look at you, you're so rude. How can anyone live to sit right next to you?”

Her brown curly hair was tied up in a bun, but in the bun part, some hair's just sleeking down.
She has a pink blouse on and a pink, short cheerleading skirt. If you ask me, more then ten seventh or eighth grade boys has a huge crush on her.

“If you're such a neat-freak, why don't you just get away from me? I'd be glad,” I say back to her.

She makes a face at me and says, “Fine, I will, who'd want to be with her anyway?” and looks at Marcus.

Now, I know what she's driving at. She's trying to make Marcus more focused on her.

I giggle a bit.

She snickers and looks straight at me. “What's so funny?” She glares at me.
“No, nothing, it would really insult you,” I say. And if I tell in front of everyone in this long table, she'd be embarrassed. More than embarrassed. So if she makes me tell her and everyone else, fine, it's not my fault.

“Tell me, you dirty rat!” She shouts.
I giggle and say, “But you're really goanna wish your dead.”
“Why? Tell me!” she screams.

I cover my ears and with my hands out, I say, “Okay, okay. All I'm saying is that you're trying to make boys look at you and like you. And from what I'm seeing right now, you're plotting Marcus.”
Everyone busts up.

Her mouth's wide open and she has two hands on her hip. “You lousy twit!” she jumps on me and tackles me.

I tried to kick her back, but, for a neat-freak, she's strong! Well, she's only good at kicking because she does cheerleading and gymnastics.
“Hey, I thought you said you wouldn't want to get near a dirty girl!” I yell at her.

Lila has her hand over her mouth with eyes as wise as her head and Rena's there acting like a cheerleader shouting, “Go Alex! You can do it! Yea!”
That makes me concentrate more. I finally push her back. “You're such a loser! Hey, girls as neat as you wouldn't be able to do this. Ask your friends. You'll never be part of them anymore,” I say as cool as a bee.
I glance at her best friends and I can see them nodding at me. My eyes were wide as Lila's. “You mean I'm right? You're dumping her?”
Kristy Lovonge, the boss of the girls most neat-freaks walks up to me using her hands to whack her wavy blond hair.
She has a hot-pink headband and has a white fluttery skirt and a pink sweatshirt wearing high-heels.

She puts one hand on her hips and nods.
“Yeah, she broke two rules of our membership. One is, do not tackle anyone. Two is, she's not supposed to get near someone dirty.”

I frown at her and point at me and then her. “I am dirty.” I say. She snickers and says, “Of course I know you're dirty. But really, I just want to thank you.”
“What?” I gasp.
“I've always been hoping Naira would just leave the club because she's starting to boss us around. But I can't make her leave. Even though I'm the boss, I still can't make her quit until she wants to leave or just break a rule,” she whispers.

I couldn't help it but laugh. I don't know why, so don't ask me, but I just did.

Naira goes through the crowd and then goes up to me, and gives me a huge smack, right in my stomach.

“Okay… what was that for?” I yell. My hands were flying everywhere, let me tell you, and then I accidentally smack her on the cheek. It was just a soft, gently touch, more like it.

But does she hide it? Totally!

“Ouch, that hurt! I'll tell!”

I call back, “Hey, you were the one smacking me! All I did was touching you!”

Everyone laughs.

Then Mr. Mortis came in and asks, “What's going on?” He looks at me and says, “Oh, Alexandra, what again?”
I shrug and say, “I'm not the one starting it. Naira did. I didn't do anything, either. She just came up to me, and says I'm a dirty brat, and all of a sudden she's flying on me like the wind and tackled me.”
He slowly nods and says, “Uh huh,” and I'm just on my way out when all of a sudden Mr. Sanders comes in.

I tried to cover my face, but he saw me. He held me by the collar, lifted me up, and goes marching back into the cafeteria.

I choke out, “You're killing me!”
Mr. Mortis runs to him and says, “No violence in school, Ron!”

And what does Mr. Sanders do? He argues back. “This is not violence, Frank; she's doing something to Naira!” And all I'm thinking is Frank? What kind of name is Frank for a principle when all of a sudden Mr. Sanders says, “Naira is my future daughter!” Everyone gasps, all except me, that is.
I actually laugh and from all that gasping and that I'm the only laugher, well, you can hear me practically anywhere.

Mr. Sanders stares at me and asks, “What?”
I shake my head and say, “I didn't say anything.”
Mr. Sanders shakes me until I practically had to faint. “Ahh! Let go, you beast!” I blurt out.
Now, everyone's staring at me like I just did something against the law.

And less than a hot second, I ended up lying on the grass. That's right, on the grass.
I got kicked out of school-for a day or two. But that'd make me happy!
And I wonder, why hasn't Freckle Brain returned? It has been more than two days, that's for sure. But still, I hate him; he's disgusting, ugly, and just plain weird.

“Alex! Alex!” I heard Lila and Rena scream. They helped me up and say, “Oh, we managed to get out of school, too.”
I stared at them. “You what? Wouldn't your mom and dad get mad?”
Lila shrugs and says, “Nah, they're always at our grandparent's house and besides, how many times did I get into detention?” Rena nods and says, “I don't have parents so it doesn't matter with me.” I smile and thought, boy, do I have some real friends, when Lila blurts out, “Mark just asked me out, again!”

I stared at her.

“Oh, Lila, please don't talk about this again!” I say.
Lila says, “Okay,” and then starts asking, “So why'd you laugh?” I smile and say, “I had to. Mr. Sanders is like Naira. They also have the same attitude. Wow, were they meant to be father and daughter!” Rena and Lila laughs.

We're on our way to my house when all of a sudden I see this black car parked near a store. Now, I started running to my house. Rena and Lila had to run after me but when they caught up to me at my house, they gasp, “Why'd you run?” I was out of breath but that doesn't stop me. I got into the living room, checked under the sofa and presto, I found a sticky note that says AD5322. I gently tucked the note in my pocket and say to Lila and Rena, “We've got to go back. To the black car.”
And all sudden Rena's asks, “What black car? I didn't see any black car,” and Lila's saying, “Oh no, it's not the car we found at Garvey's Restaurant. No way, that'd be such a coincidence.” I give her an evil smile that meant, we'll see about that.

So I ran back to where I found the black car and Rena and Lila were following me.

The black car was still there and I got the sticky note out and it matched perfectly to the car's license plate.

“Presto,” I say, acting like a mad scientist.

I look at the store. The Hair Dory store. And I'm thinking why would the murderer go into a hairstore? But the only way to find out is to look inside.

So before I wend inside, I peeked through the glass entrance door and plotted which person might be the murderer. I finally came in the store, acting cool and stuff.
“Lila, Rena, come on!” I whisper from behind my shoulder. I look in the salon, the shampoo and condition place, the hair ties and clips place, and the children's toys isle and almost everywhere until I went into isle thirteen. The wig place. And I'm thinking this hasto be the place the murderer's here for when who do I see in this isle? Lila, Rena and I, Alex. Okay, so we were the only one who's in this isle. Lila shouts to me, “Hey, you're freaking me out! You can kill us!”

“How?” I ask with an eyebrow up.

“Well, not you, them but your idea's bad as them.”
I giggled and that's when I heard, “Stand where you are!” Well, unfortunately, I didn't stand still because I didn't know who's saying this so I tiptoed up the front isle and peeked. There was a man with a black mask, black hat, black everything and is holding a gun and moving it everywhere.
I never get afraid of these guys. I imagine them using squirt guns instead of real guns and instead of wearing that black outfit, I imagine them wearing an underwear on their heads and sticking a finger up their noses.

Lila and Rena tiptoed up to me and whispers, “You're supposed to freeze!”
I sort of push Lila and Rena back and whisper to them, “Imagine them as something funny… you won't get scared.”

And I tell them, “Back away, please,” and then I got into my stomach, you know, lay down on my stomach.
I crawled my way out of the isle without the `Stand where you are!' shouters to see me. I ducked behind a huge white counter and winked at Lila and Rena. I have a feeling Lila's thinking oh my lord, Alex's doing this! She could kill herself! And Rena's thinking oh, this is so cool! Because Rena's smiling and sort of does a silent laugh while Lila mouthed, oh my lord!

I gave thumbs up sigh to them and then got back concentrating. I take a quick look at them. Those guys didn't see me so I did it again and pretty soon I'm poking my head out every second like a chicken poking her head out to see if the coast is clear-like if a cat's there or not.

Then suddenly BANG! He shoots at the counter. Lila almost got a heart attack while Rena's thinking this is like video games and I'm trying to think of a way to get away from him.

And I never really noticed who was following us. Kristy, Marcus, and Naira. I saw them just right behind those guys with guns. Kristy looks very afraid and so does Naira. Marcus looks worried. “Get out of hiding, little Miss Missy! I can see you!” One of the guys holding the gun yells. He had a sharp nose and a huge head. He's fat.

Another man's really skinny; the other two looks the same. Like twins.

I stand up with my hands in the air. I yell out to them, “Hey Big Head, you gotta have a diet, you know that?”
All of those guys with the guns cracks up accept Big Head. He looks serious, let me tell you that. But soon enough, he laughs too, just to show his gangster friends that he's got some spirit. And while they're laughing and trying to get serious again, I did a summersault in the air and ducked behind another counter. Wow, I never knew I can do a summersault in the air, but I did.

BANG! I did a quick peek and I can see Big Head trying to find me, but got back with the gang, afterwards.

“Anyway, we're here to get some money and things, not to get insulted,” Big Head yells. He goes in front of a register and pulls out money.

I never knew that this place would get so much money. And that's when I had the idea. When the gangsters were to busy getting money out of registers, well, I sneaked to isle eight, the children's place.

It has toys, girl's accessories, and books and movies-almost everything kids like.

But I was aiming for the toys section and when I got there, I saw fake guns, but they can actually aim at stuff. And another gun, but it's a black squirt gun. It looks like a real one, let me tell you that. It was perfect.
Lila and Rena were following me and I told Lila to sneak up into the bathroom and fill the squirt gun while Rena practiced aiming for a while. I had loads of hard basketballs and soccer balls in my arm and between my legs and stuff.

I ask, “Ready?” when we're done practicing. They nod, “Ready.” And we're off.
I first shout, “Hey, I'm goanna call the cops, you Big Head! I'm telling them, `There's Big Head, whose fat and round, Skinny Body, who's too skinny to even hold a gun-that means weak. And two Average Twins are here at the Hair Dory!'”
The Big Head stops putting money into his bag and hands it to Skinny Body and holds the gun up to me.

“We're going to shoot you before you even get to explain it.”
I smile and say, “Too bad we're not going to die. We have some weapons on our jeans, too, you know.” I say, acting all cool and thief-ish.

Rena comes up right behind me holding the gun. And then Lila comes up, too, and I can tell she's trying real hard not to let a water drip for the gun and she's freaked out, let me tell you.

The gangsters stood there for a minute and gasp.
Then Skinny Body says, “We have to get out of here fast!” but one of the Average Twins says, “No, those guns are fake,” and they started to agree on that one.

That's when I smile evilly and say, “Let it rip,” and I threw millions of balls on them. And at the same time I shout, “Get as many weapons as you can find and trap them! Hurt them! Make them feel like they wouldn't want to be here in the first place!” And so Marcus and Kristy do the job and even Naira does! Only Kristy and Naira gets the weak weapons like hair clips and ties. Hair ties hurts -more like sting- but balls are way better. Of course, hard balls.

And then BANG! and this time, someone actually did get shot! An average person at an average hair place. I couldn't breathe at first because that person is Rena.

-NINE-

That's right, Rena. She gets shot on her hand. I cried, “No! Rena! No!” and then I started sobbing and sobbing and I got so mad that I had to do something. I glanced at Lila and she was crying harder than I did.

I jumped on Skinny Body (because he looks the weakest) and tackled him. I kicked him with all my might, I smacked him, I did everything I could to get revenge.
But did that mean I didn't get hurt? No way! I got hurt tons! He also kicked me back and then I started to have blood dripping from everywhere in my body. Boy, was I wrong! He was such a great kicker and puncher.

“I hate you, I hate you! You hurt my best friend and you're going to pay!”

All of a sudden I heard sirens and that made Skinny Body and the other gangsters mad and rushy. Skinny Body finally smacked me hard on my face that I had to fall and then everyone got away. I was so worried that I didn't know what to do. I was on the ground, almost dead. I used my hand and pulled myself to the door, and when I got outside, I still had a long way to go. But I managed to go to my house in time-don't ask me why, I just did.

I couldn't bare see Rena get hurt or cry. All I want is to be left alone. I felt so guilty. If it wasn't for me, she would've been alive right now, on her way home from school.

I was on the rug sleeping and that made me feel way better.

“Alex! Open the door, Alex! Come on!” Lila screams and bangs on the door.

“Go away!” I say, and I'm sure they didn't hear me. So they kept banging until I finally trotted over to the door and opened it. First, Lila gasped.

“Whoa, you're a mess! Ah, take a shower, I don't want to see that disgusting shirt again,” she says.
“But, I only have five shirts! I've got to wear this sometimes!”

“I meant I don't want to see you wearing that shirt with blood on it.”
I look at my shirt. Sure enough, there was blood. Lots of blood. I'm all bloody from head to toe. But I didn't want to take a shower. It would sting-a lot. But should because the smell is getting more rotten than ever.

So I let Lila in and took a quick shower. It did sting, but I had to fight over the water.

So I came back to Lila, who was sitting on the sofa, and sat down next to her.

“So, did Rena go to the hospital? Did she get injured badly?” I ask worried sick. Lila smiles sadly and says, “Well, yeah she did get sent to the hospital, and she did get hurt. It turns out that the bullet only touched her.”
“What do you mean?” I ask. Lila says, “She only got skinned by the bullet.”
“Oh, that's great news and what did the cops say?”
Lila laughs so hard she had to take a drink of water. “Oh, that's my trick. I found a police car toy and it can make that siren sound. It's only fake! But after the guys with the guns got away, we called the cops and they said that they'll try to find them.”

“But they can't because they don't know what the gangsters look like.” I made a droopy smile. “Oh well, at least I know Rena's alright. I felt so guilty!”
Lila stands up and points out the door. “Well, you have to wash it! Go outside and look.”
So I stand up, went outside and looked. And what did I find? Sidewalks and roads covered with blood. I figured that it must have been me when I was pulling myself all the way to my house. “I guess I should…” I say. First I whined and then I got myself a mop and mopped the roads and sidewalks with Lila's help. Then I saw Rena walking over.
“Hey Rena!” I shout. “Hi Alex! My hand's alright,” she says with a huge grin on her face. I pointed at the blood and say, “I've got work to do. Wanna help?”

I knew Rena would help. She's a great friend and she did help and by the time we're all done, it was like, three o'clock in the afternoon.
“Wow that was long!” I say. Lila and Rena nods and I ask, “Want to go over to Falling Foods? I'll order us a huge cone of ice-cream.”
So we head over to the mall and into Falling Foods when who do I see? Naira.
I went over to Naira and say, “You were great last night.” Well, she wasn't but I just wanted her to forget what had happened in school.

She snickers and says, “Hey, I didn't want to help, but I had to so don't even think about it.”
I shrug and say, “I don't want to think about it,” and went back over to Lila and Rena and ask, “So what flavor?”
Rena screams, “Chocolate fudge!” and Lila screeches, “Pistachio!” I laugh and say, “I'll order a Cookie'n' Cream for me,” and went over to the counter and say, “One huge Chocolate fudge, one huge Pistachio, and a huge Cookie'n'Cream.”

I pay six dollars and they handed me the ice-cream cones. “Thanks,” I say and went trotting slowly over to Lila and Rena. “So, anything good happened while I was gone?” I ask. Rena laughs and says, “Ya! Everyone in the whole store tried to catch and throw stuff at the burglars but they got away! Even elderly people tried to do it!”

“You're kidding!” I say because I can never imagine elderly people trying to kill the burglars. “No, she's not kidding, it's true!” Lila says. I laugh and say, “Whatever,” because they wouldn't stop telling me how cool it was.

Naira comes towards us and I can see the fire in her eyes. “Hey, are you talking about what happened last night?” she asks and let me tell you, it's not a friendly voice. I say, “Yes, and I don't want to talk about it, got it?”
Naira, “Humph!” and goes away. I grinned and say, “So when do we go to school again? Tomorrow? The next day?” Rena says, “Tomorrow.”

I open my eyes and the sun was gleaming in my eyes. I call, “Ranger!” and there comes Ranger trotting over. I laugh and say, “Hey, boy, do you want to eat?” I went to the kitchen counter and got a bag of crackers and dumped it in a bowl. I put the bowl down near Ranger and he licked it. But then I curled his tail around my ankle and meowing.
“What's wrong, Ranger?” I ask. Ranger meows again and I figured out what to do. I got a huge spoon and smashed the crackers into small pieces. “Is that better, boy?” I ask. Ranger goes over to the crackers and finally eats it. I laugh and called Lila, “Hey Lila.”
“Hi Alex. So what's up?”
“Nothing, better get ready for school but I'm sort of worried about Ranger. While I'm gone, what will happen to him? What if he ate all his crackers and he's still hungry?”
“He eats crackers? Oh well, you can bring him to my house everyday of the week and my sister will take care of him.”
“Oh, okay, I'll come over as fast as I can,” and hanged up. I ate my breakfast which was peanut-butter cookies and milk and after I'm done, I carried Ranger all the way to Lila's.
But when I'm there, who do I see? Marcus and Rena. I'm glad to see Rena, but Marcus? Why does he come here almost every single day? It makes me sick, let me tell you. But I kept myself cool. “Hey Rena, hey Marcus,” and I turned to Lila and put down Ranger and say, “Here's Ranger. Tell Jason to take good care of him,” and Rena asks, “You're giving Ranger to her?”
I laugh and shake my head. “No, I'm just letting Lila's sister baby-sit Ranger.”

“Let's go to school!” Marcus shouts so off us girls go, to school with a boy walking with us.

And when we got inside, the only thing I wanted to do was lay down on Stacy's sofa.
So I walked to her office door and knocked. I knocked again. “Alex, what in the world are you doing?” Lila asks. I say, “I want to lie down on Stacy's sofa. Just for a second.”
“Are you out of your mind? You have a sofa yourself at your house. You're only lying there for a second so it won't really do you much good,” Rena says.
And I couldn't argue with her. She was right but still, I had a feeling I should. I just have a desire to lie on her sofa. So I banged on the door this time. And now I'm thinking what if she didn't lock the door? So I put my hand on the knob and turned. Bad luck for me, the door won't budge. So I tried again and no I found myself kicking the door.

Everyone was staring at me and Marcus, Lila, and Rena had already gone down to their homeroom while I'm still trying to get in. “What? I'm not stealing anything! Go to your classes and leave me alone!” I shout at everyone.
Then I saw Stacy heading towards me. “What are you doing trying to break in my office?” she asks. I smile and say, “I just want to lie down on the sofa. I just felt like I had to.” Stacy looks around us and says, “You'd even embarrassed yourself from trying?” and lets me in. I lay down on the sofa and pretty soon I'm staring everything down. The T.V, the pictures hanged on the wall, the rug, and the wallpaper. And something's odd about this. Really odd.

“Stacy, you do sound lonely, don't you have any friends to hang out with you?” I ask. Stacy laughs and nods. “Yes, I've got lots of them.” Stacy goes over and sits next to me. “Well, how come I don't see them as much? Do they work somewhere else?”

Stacy closes her eyes and says, “No, they all work here, but they're not allowed to hang out because I have loads of work to do.” I ask her, “But why'd you work choose to work here? It seems like you don't do anything.” She sighs and says, “Well, I do. I worked here because I love to write and I always volunteer to write first. And besides, none of my friends like writing.”

I smile and jumped off the sofa and say, “I better get to class.” But before I can get out of her office, Stacy hands me a folder. “What's this for?” I ask. Stacy says, “Open it up,” so I did and what did I see? Newspaper. And I'm in it.

“Whoa, is that really me?” I ask.
The picture was about two nights ago, I think, and it was about me fooling the gangsters. It was awesome.
“Wow, but I didn't know people took pictures of us,” I say and Stacy points at me in the picture and says, “Well, I heard that some people were standing around with mouths and eyes open wide watching. They were so surprised that they even took pictures. They're aiming for you anyway.”
I read the huge article and they wrote about everything. Everything I said and everything I did and also what other people did. “That's amazing!” I cried and ask, “May I keep this?” Stacy nods and says, “Yes you may,” and I run out of the door like a bullet.
When I got into homeroom, I say to Mrs. Larson, “I'm sorry I'm late,” but does Mrs. Larson even look at me? No, she was looking at the newspaper in my hand.

“What is that? Let me see it,” Mrs. Larson says. I hand it to her and soon she's reading the whole thing to the class and everyone's clapping there hands at me and Rena.
Mrs. Larson puts down the newspaper and says, “Wow, Rena, Alexandra, you two are very… brave and… strong. It's very fortunate of you to be in a newspaper.”
And that's when I found out my hand was covered in gray dust, the kind when you held a newspaper for a long time.
I held it up to my nose and sniffs, don't ask me why, I just did. And I was brainless, too, because I sniffed some dust up my nose and I sneezed and coughed.

“Alexandra, would you like to go to the bathroom?” Mrs. Larson asks me. I coughed and say, “That's what I'd like to do!” and ran out of the door.
I have no idea why, but Rena followed me. “So what's up? Did you do that on purpose?” Rena asks. I shake my head “no” and say, “I need to go to the bathroom!” and ran into the ladies' bathroom in one hot second.

I washed my hands and I had that feeling again, that I need to go potty. So I did and again, I found out I was in the same stall as I always had been. The one with the cool phrases and I read them over and over in my head.
I checked the you can't poison him, if you don't have `em, R.S and over and over again. And then I had all the people's names that I knew going over in my head and something about them. And that's when I realized that Mr. Sanders first name starts with an `R'. Check this out: Ron Sanders just like the R.S. But it doesn't make any sense. The thing about poisoning isn't really connected to the murdering stuff and the gangster stuff. Okay, so Mr. Sanders wrote something about poisoning but why and how? Why did he write something about poisoning? He wanted to poison someone? And how can he write it? He's new and I've seen this phrase a long time ago. Unless he used to work here or something. Or maybe it's someone else but I'm sure no one in seventh grade has a first name that starts with an `R' and a last name that starts with an `S'. I'm more than sure.

So I thought about people's names and attitude again and that's when it all connected.

-TEN-

I knew who the murderer is but how can I catch that person? And how do I get proof? Or should I do the easy way: call the police and tell them. And so, I was sure it would be the right thing to do. I ran out and grabbed Rena's hand and say, “I know who the gangster is! Well, one of them at least and we can't wait! Well, we can, but I'm just so jumpy, if you know what I mean,” and ran up to Mrs. Larson's room. “We need to go home!” I shout. Mrs. Larson puts a hand up her forehead and says, “You want to sneak off again?”
“No! This time I'm really telling you! I found out who the murderer is!” I scream.

Mrs. Larson puts a finger to her mouth and asks, “Murderer? What do you mean? You mean the thief from this article?” I nod and say, “We have to go!” Mrs. Larson stands up and shakes her head and says, “I don't know if I can trust you. Are you really going to catch that person? I'm not letting you do that.”
I roll my eyes and say, “I meant may I use the phone?” She nods and points to the phone near her.

“In this room?” I ask. She laughs and says, “Yes you have to.” So I call nine-one-one and I heard Elvis Hair ask, “So what's your problem?” I say, “It's me, Alex, and I found out who the gangster is! Well, you know, the murderer and the thief. I only know one of them, at least.”
Elvis Hair asks, “Who is it?”
I whisper, “Stacy Tory Karol,” and even Rena can hear me. “Stacy? Why would she be the murderer?” Rena asks practically yelling. I whisper to Rena, “Stop yelling! She can hear!” And then, Monika RoseAllen says, “Stacy Tory Karol? She's my friend! She can't possibly be a murderer!”
I give her a sad little shake and say, “Well, too bad, it's her.” She says, “You got all the clues mixed up! It can't be her!”

“Well, tell that to Stacy once she's in prison.”

I put the phone back up to my ear and say, “I'm sorry. Anyway, she's the one. I'll explain it to you once you catch her… okay… I'll see you in a few minutes, bye!” and put the phone down. Most of the kids in my class were arguing with me.

“It can't be her” or “How can it be her?” or anything. And then they'd feel sorry about what they had said to me after I tell the cops.

And one minute later, we all heard sirens. I jumped up and shout, “Yippee! They're here!” and some people whose friends with Stacy groans.
I tied my hair up into a ponytail.

I ran out of my class and stop right near the entrance door. Elvis Hair grins at me and wave. I wave back and say, “Her office is right there,” and pointed at her office door. All the kids were crowded around me and the cops. The sirens were still going on and it was so loud, let me tell you, that it was as loud as huge bells on top of churches!

The cops go over to her office door and checked it out while I was still near the entrance door explaining all the stuff to Elvis Hair and still, million of kids were crowded around us.

“You see, when I came in the restaurant, I saw these cool Chinese wallpaper and talked to a Chinese lady. She said that the wallpaper was the first and last and they cost thousands of dollars. And when I went into the room Mr. Corel died in, well, there was no wallpaper; well only tiny bits of ripped wallpaper were there. And when I found the note in Mr. Corel's pocket, it felt odd.”
“You found a note in Mr. Corel's pocket? Where? What did it say?” Elvis Hair asks.

I laugh and say, “The notes' at home. The note says something about meeting Mr. Corel at Garvey's Restaurant and in that room. The handwriting was neat and, you know, fancy. And then, a few days ago, I went into the ladies' bathroom and into a stall and I read this phrase in the stall that says you never feel better until you write a letter, S.T.K. And that handwriting was exactly like the one in the note. It matched perfectly. And the next day, or so, I met Stacy. She says her name is Stacy Tory Karol, just like the S.T.K and she also showed me her office. The wallpaper looked really familiar and first, I thought the wallpaper had Japanese words all over it, but it's Chinese. I only got mistaken because I couldn't tell apart if it's Chinese or Japanese. And so, she must have had torn that wallpaper at Garvey's Restaurant down and used it in her office. And she also says she likes to write and her friends don't, so her friends must be part of the gang, and she must have written that letter to Mr. Corel.” I was out of breath already. I say, “She says her friends work in this school.”
“So?”
“I just told you! Her friends must be part of that gang.”
“So you're saying that the gang is around here somewhere?”
I nodded.
And just before I can say something else, I heard footsteps. Hard footsteps.

-ELEVEN-

I followed the sound and there she is, Stacy Tory Karol, looking like she has to get out of the building because its goanna fall down any second. I smiled evilly and whisper to the cops, “She's trying to get away…”
“How? How does she know we're here?” Elvis Dude asks.
“Are you kidding? Anyone can hear that siren from anywhere!” Stacy's heading towards the back door. She's trying to escape. The entrance door is open and what do I see out there? A black car. I say to Elvis Hair, “She's getting on that black car! She'll escape!” The cops says, “Okay, we'll catch her,” but I gave them a disgusted look and say, “You? You're too old to catch her! I run fast! Stay here and watch them!” I tried to chase Stacy, but she's really fast. And right away, I knew this skinny woman was the guy I attacked, only she wasn't a guy; she was pretending to be one.
“Stop! Stop!” I shout and I knew she wouldn't stop, so what's the point?

I ran faster and faster. But I knew it was hopeless. But then I had an idea. I untied my hair, put the elastic band in my hand and aimed right at her ankle. Now, let me tell you, this elastic band was rubber and it really hurts.

Stacy screams and fell down on the floor. She was only about probably twenty yards away from me, but with her on the floor sobbing, I can catch her.

So I ran faster and faster, and she's still sobbing and on the floor trying to get up.
But too bad, by the time she tries to get up again, I had my foot on her back.

“I'll really step on you, well, more like stomp on you if you keep moving, Stacy.”
She cries and cries but does that mean she gives up? No! She used her foot and kicks and kicks and pretty soon, again, we're tackling like we did at Hair Dory. “You know how good I am!” I shout at her.

The cops are now running towards us and the kids, too. I can see Marcus right away laughing and finally, for the first time, Lila didn't look scared when she saw me fighting. She looked happy and so did Rena.

I finally smack Stacy in the face as hard as I can. “That teaches you a lesson from smackin me at the hair place!” I scream. And pretty soon you'd hear smack! Smack! Smack! You know, I did learn a lesson: once you start smacking someone, you can't stop. I tried to, but I couldn't. Now everyone's laughing, even Naira!

Elvis Hair's taking care of Stacy and saying to me, “You didn't really have to fight her, you know…” and I laugh back, “I wanted to! Hey, she hurt me badly at Hair Dory.”
And then Stacy says to me, “And thanks for calling me weak, you lousy girl.” And Mr. Mortis is out clapping and cheering and all of a sudden Stacy shouts at him, “Hey, I didn't know you had a detective in your school!” I laugh and say, “Nice joke, Stacy, since the first time I met you, I thought you were a funny lady. And besides, you were the one who was going up to me and asking what was wrong! It wasn't my fault I met you!” and I laugh again.

Stacy did something I never expected her to do after I fought with her and that she'll go to jail. She smiled at me and laughed with me. “I was never really planning to hurt you, Alex, sorry.”

“That's alright, I hurt you too,” I say and go to my friends. Then all of sudden I heard flash!
I knew it was cameras so I did thumbs up and smiled. But hey, this mystery isn't going to end! Not uh.

I ask Stacy, “Who's your gangster friends?”
She snickers and says, “Hey, I still might be nice to you, but my friends are worth a whole lot more to me. I'm never going to tell you, even if you kill me!”
So, I still need to find out who her friends are.

I look out at the back entrance door and whisper, “AD5322, AD5322, AD5322! That's it!”

Elvis Hair asks, “What's it?”
I say, “I'll explain it to you later,” and then run outside. Cameras were following me, and so did everyone else. I ran and ran. I shout back, “If you find a car with a license plate AD5322, then tell me!” So, that meant, let's separate! Only, trouble is, the cameras were still following me and my friends did too.

Then I stopped myself and stood there thinking, where would I go if I was trying to run away from cops? Well, I'd go to the airport and then fly somewhere else, but that was unnecessary. They probably won't even have enough money for it.
Then I started asking people. I asked a lady if she had seen a black car drive by and the license plate AD5322 and pretty soon I found myself asking everybody!

And when I got to this old man, I thought, nah! He'd probably be blind, when I gave some more muscles to it. So I ask, “Have you seen a black car drive by with the license plate AD5322?” The old man didn't say anything at first and then says, “He's headed to Oakland Street,” and first I thought, wow! He's got some eyes! Because his eyes were really narrow and small and he looks like he's a hundred!

But I say, “Thanks,” and then headed over to Oakland Street. I checked for houses with black cars, but none of them had a black one. Some blue, some red, some white, but no black.

And then I ran some more until I saw smoke. Smoke in the air. Now, believe me, this wasn't clouds. It's smoke from I-don't-know-where.

Then I look down and there it is, smoke rising above the forests. It's really close to us, and all of a sudden, I see liquid that goes all the way to the forests. And some car tracks, too. So I followed the tracks, and so did the people and cameras.
“Alex! That's fire! Stay out of this!” Lila screams so loud to me. I scream back, “But the forests will burn down and the gang's there!” And when I'm really close to the forest, I can see a black car with a fat man, and two men that looks the same-the Average Twins.

And while I'm running to them, I'm thinking how on earth did they crash into the forests? when I heard a cop shout, “Stay where you are! We're sending help right now,” and then I saw the murderers trying to get away.

I rolled my eyes and shout to the murderers, “You're just going to prison for twenty years! Would you rather go to jail for twenty years or die from fire?”
Okay, I might not be right about the `twenty years' in prison, but all I know is that I've got to make the murderers go to me. But trouble is they didn't.

So I had to go to them instead.
So I tiptoed in the forest and stay real calm. When the murderers saw me, they practically scream.

But I just put my hands up in the air and say, “Don't worry. I won't do anything. I'm just trying to get the fire out,” and I look around. No water in sight.

“Do you have a water bottle in your car?” I ask. Big Head backs up to the car and goes in and a minute later, he goes out and throws me a water bottle.

The bottle was full. I did a closed smile and say, “Thanks.” And a minute later, I'm finding myself asking Big Head and the Average Twins to take their shirts off. I know it's plenty disgusting, but what can I do to make them safe?
“Why don't you take your shirt off!” one of the Average Twins jokes.
But still, I point to myself and say, “Are you kidding? I'm a girl! It's not nearly as disgusting you know,” but did they take their shirts off? No way!
So I had to rip there shirts off and that's what I did. That's right, I ripped their shirts off.
Then I poured water in each shirt and say to them, “Now wrap this shirt around you nose and breathe,” and Big Head shouts to me, “Hey kid, we can take care of ourselves,” but you can tell-they're so relieved.

I scream, “Ahhh!” because I just noticed for the first time that fire was surrounding us. We can't get out! A huge tree just tipped over on the right and it's burning with fire; let me tell you, and the left sides' the same. And same with north and south.
“Help us!” Big Head shouts. I cross my arms and squint at him and say, “Stay calm, you big fatty! Hey, look at me! I don't have a wet shirt around my nose like you do!”
And that's when we all heard Elvis Hair shout, “The fire's too big!” I was so scared and let me tell you, I was about to faint. So the cops and firemen won't help us `cause the fire's too big, and we're surrounded by trees with fire on them, or just fire burning on the ground.

I cough and shout to the murderers, “Stay calm!” and I can already feel my skin turning all burnt-black because of all the fire. I cough again and then I say, “Come with me! One at a time!” and so one of the Average Twins came to me and say, “What?” I say, “Put the shirt over your head!” and then I found myself grabbing his arm and then leaping over the fire. It hurt so much, let me tell you, and I bet that guy didn't hurt a single bit! I risked my life for him. And now I'll have to do the same thing over with the other two. The Average Twin was about to run away when I shout to him, “Hey, go over to the cops! You could've killed yourself if it wasn't for me!”

And he had no chance of arguing back. He did a U-turn and walked towards the cops instead of the other direction to run away.

And shout to him, “Throw me that shirt!” and so he threw me the wet shirt and he continued walking to the cops.
I put the shirt over my head and leaped through the fire and then leaped back with another twin. And now I have a wet shirt over my head and another wet shirt around my arms.
I shout to Big Head, “C'mon!” and so I held his arm and leaped through the fire with him. And when I was done with my job, I fell to the ground and breathed and breathed.

The next thing I knew, I was in the hospital with cameras still flashing everywhere.

And not just cameras, video tapes, too, and Elvis Hair says to me, “I told you to not go back in the fire! Didn't you hear me?” I shake my head “no” and I gave him an I-was-too-busy-being-a-hero look. Elvis Hair shakes his head and says, “Not only did you find those guys and saved them, but you also found the false clown and you figured out that Stacy's the murderer. Nice job, but I don't want you poking your head into some trouble anymore,” and then I found myself being interviewed.
The interviewer says to me, “I was taping you while you were fighting with Ms. Karol and saving those men. Do you have anything to say, Detective?” I laugh and say, “Nice joke, but anyways, all I have to say to Big Head is that he has to go on a diet,” and we both laugh.