A Friendly Town That's Almost Always by the Ocean! Read online

  The tardy bell rang. “Now we’re definitely late,” Runa said.

  “You go ahead,” Finn said bravely. “I’ll be okay.”

  “No way! I’d never leave you.”

  Finn grinned.

  “How about peanut butter?” Runa suggested. “I think that’s supposed to help, too.”

  Runa rooted around in her lunch bag. She always brought her lunch, Finn knew, since she wasn’t a fan of the food in the school cafeteria. She pulled out a peanut butter sandwich, opened it, and smeared the peanut butter all over Finn.

  “Are those pickles?” he asked.

  “Just a couple,” Runa said. “But did it help?”

  “I don’t think so. But now I’m hungry.” Finn’s lower lip quivered. He wasn’t feeling brave at all anymore. “What if I’m stuck here past lunch? And dinner? What if I’m stuck here forever?”

  Runa looked worried. Then her face brightened. “I have another idea! I’ll be right back.”

  “I’ll wait for you right here,” Finn said.

  Runa was gone even longer this time. Finn wiggled his fingers. There was gum between each of them. And between his toes, even though he had shoes on. How was that possible?

  He squirmed to the right, then the left. It only made him sink deeper into the wall. The gum really did seem like it was pulsating—even breathing.

  In fact, Finn was starting to feel…chewed on.

  “HELP!” he called as loud as he could.

  A shadow appeared. It was a person—but not a human.

  “Oh, hello there, Earl Grey,” Finn said politely. “Do you think you could help me?”

  Earl Grey squinted at Finn, as if determining the best way to assist him. Then, snorting happily, he began to lick the peanut butter from Finn’s legs.

  Finn sighed. Now he was being chewed and licked.

  At last, Runa returned. “Scissors!” she said triumphantly.

  “You really shouldn’t run with those,” Finn said.

  “I’m only jogging.” She turned to the watch hog. “Earl Grey! Where did you come from?”

  “I think he heard me call for help.”

  “Wow! Watch hogs must have fantastic hearing. This one time, I was in the beach forest, and it was really quiet, and I—oops, sorry.” Runa held up the scissors. “Are you ready?”

  “Be careful!” Finn closed his eyes as she jabbed the point of the scissors into the gum, just an inch from his hand.

  The gum didn’t like that.

  Angry bubbles rose to the surface as Runa snipped the scissors. POP! POP! She kept snipping. With a damp, squishy hissing sound, the strands of chewing gum pulled away from Finn’s hand. He managed to grab Earl Grey’s collar.

  “Pull!” Finn and Runa shouted.

  “SSCHLORP!” the gum replied.

  With Finn’s hand gripping his collar, Earl Grey started forward. It was a game of tug-of-war between the wall and the watch hog. Runa snipped more gooey strings as Earl Grey pulled and pulled.

  Finally, with a smacking sound, Finn popped out from the chewing gum wall. He was cold and wet and covered in peanut butter, but the gum was all gone.

  “Hooray!” he shouted.

  The chewing gum wall looked just like it had before. “You think there’d be a Finn-print or something,” Runa said.

  “I’m pretty small. Thank you, Runa! You saved me.”

  “Earl Grey helped, too.” She grinned. “What a story. Do you think anyone will believe us?”

  Finn grinned back. “It doesn’t matter. We believe us.”

  They gathered up the bucket, and the rest of Runa’s lunch. Then they ran all the way to school, with Earl Grey blowing bubbles behind them.

  NEW STUDENT SURVEY (SECOND TRY)

  by Davy Jones

  1. Why did you move to Topsea?

  My mom made me.

  My mom got a new job at the seaweed cracker factory. (Why do people eat so much seaweed here??)

  2. What are you most excited to learn about at Topsea School, and why?

  I like math, because it makes sense. But the way Ms. Grimalkin teaches it is weird. She does multiplication tables by scratching them on the wall.

  I liked our geography lesson, but it made me really hungry.

  3. What’s your biggest fear?

  Getting attacked by those rock cats. They give me the creeps.

  CRABS. And crab—they keep serving it in the cafeteria. The meat is practically black. But for some reason, everyone seems to love it.

  4. What’s your favorite hobby?

  Fishing.

  Skeeball.

  5. What’s your favorite flavor of ice cream?

  Pistachio.

  Nia told me she got bees in her ice cream once! So anything that doesn’t have bees is fine with me.

  6. Do you have any other thoughts you’d like to share?

  I have ALL KINDS of thoughts!

  Thoughts about bottle caps. And basements. And crabs! And Monday’s milk sampler, which I REALLY wish had been labeled.

  But mostly I’ve got questions. Like: What’s in the Untold Caves? (They look scary!)

  And: Seriously, what is the deal with those rock cats???

  (And: This isn’t exactly about Topsea, but what do I do when it’s Father’s Day? Like if Ms. Grimalkin has us make cards or something, and I’m the only kid without anybody to make a card for?)

  And: Will I EVER fit in here?

  Basements

  Every house in Topsea has a basement.

  But not everybody knows how to get to them.

  Some basements are filled with old junky things, like model ships in murky bottles. Old beef bones with chew marks on them. Swashbuckler swords and vintage dresses. Rubber ducks with their painted eyes almost rubbed off. Baskets of seashells. Baskets of other kinds of shells. Baskets of oddly shaped teeth. Those basements are the most fun to explore.

  Some basements are filled with ocean.

  Some basements are filled with nothing. They’re just echoey spaces with moss on the walls, toadstools in the baseboards, and an ever-present smell of seaweed.

  Some basements have basements of their own.

  Some basements have never been opened. Others were sealed up for a reason, although the owners rarely remember what that reason was.

  So how do you find your house’s basement?

  Well, it’s located right below your house.

  Most likely, anyway.

  But if you want to find a way inside, first make a list of your house’s rooms and closets. Even that closet nobody talks about.

  Start with the kitchen. Put your ear on the floor and knock. Hear a hollow sound? That’s the basement. Keep knocking room by room, closet by closet, until you hear the sound change. That’s your basement door!

  But wait. Before you get out the jigsaws and skill saws, the handsaws and chain saws, make sure you really want to know what kind of basement you have.

  And what’s inside.

  Because that’s the thing about basements. They’re hard to open. But they’re even harder to close.

  What you find can’t be unfound.

  Talise was the only kid in Topsea with a deep-sea diving license. Exploring the ocean floor would have been pretty hard without one.

  (Except on Vanishing Tide Day, of course.)

  If it wasn’t for school, Talise probably would have spent more time underwater than on land. She loved the ocean. She needed to know everything there was to know about it—and there was a lot to know.

  Talise’s parents didn’t understand her obsession. They also didn’t understand why her math and science grades were the best in her class, but she struggled in English and social studies and art.

  Talise couldn’t explain it either. She studied equally hard for all her classes. Maybe it was because science and math were an important part of bathymetry, and they helped Talise better understand the ocean.

  Grades or no grades, Talise’s parents were very supportive of her hobby. But on
e day, they surprised her with something dreadful: an enormous tub where the shower had been.

  “It’s an extra-deep soaking tub!” her mom said proudly. “We’ve had the water running all day, and it’s finally full.”

  Talise stared in horror at the steaming tub. It was practically as deep as the school’s swimming pool. The drain was a shimmering gray dot.

  “Well?” her dad asked. “Do you like it?”

  “Of course she does!” her mom told him. “She looks thrilled. Doesn’t she?”

  They both stared at her expectantly.

  Talise’s emotions didn’t usually show on the outside. Sometimes, that was a good thing. Like when it helped prevent her from hurting her parents’ feelings.

  Because the truth was, Talise didn’t like the looks of this bathtub at all. It was filled with boring regular water, not salt water. And who knew what could be lurking at the bottom? Talise was an ocean expert, not a bathtub expert!

  “Thank you,” she said politely. “I am very thrilled. Um…did you save the receipt?”

  “Oh, we didn’t buy it,” her dad said. “I found it when I was cleaning out the basement. Enjoy your bath!”

  Beaming, her parents left her alone with the tub.

  Talise sighed. If she was going to take a bath, she needed to prepare.

  First, she pulled on her wet suit, flippers, and mask. Next, she strapped on her air tank, regulator, and buoyancy vest. Lastly, she grabbed her depth gauge, underwater compass, and bar of soap. By the time she finished preparing, she was sweaty and in need of a shower.

  But all she had was a bath.

  Climbing to the edge of the tub, Talise gazed at the water. She considered cannonballing. But that would just get her bath mat all wet. So she stepped off the edge and plunged flippers first into the tub.

  The inside of the tub was covered in colorful tile pictures of mermaids and seaweed and toothy cat smiles. Talise sank deeper and deeper, checking her depth gauge every so often. When she passed a tile octopus, the soap slipped out of her hand.

  “Drat,” Talise said into her regulator, only it sounded like blarp. Bubbles streamed in front of her mask.

  She consulted her compass and changed direction, following the soap. Her flippers touched the bottom at last. She looked around carefully, mentally listing everything she saw to add to her dive logbook later. A rusty bicycle. An anchor with a broken chain. A glass tortoiseshell. Tortoiseshell glasses.

  She flip-flopped over to the drain. Reaching down, she gave the plug a good yank. For a few seconds, she watched a tiny whirlpool form. But then the bar of soap drifted past her fingers. It zoomed straight into the drain, plugging it up again.

  “Blarp,” Talise muttered into her regulator, only it sounded like drat.

  Kneeling, she crammed her hand, then her wrist, then her whole arm down into the drain. Her fingers squeezed something squishy.

  SQUEAK!

  Even underwater, Talise heard it. She let go of the rubber duck instantly. Two more rubber ducks followed the first out of the drain, bobbing and dancing around Talise. They stared at her with rubbed-off eyes.

  Talise was not surprised. Rubber ducks with rubbed-off eyes seemed to pop up wherever she went. She found them hiding under the jungle gym at school. Floating in her bowl of cereal. Creeping up the toilet pipes. Once, she’d finished an ice cream only to find rubbed-off eyes gazing at her from inside the cone.

  She gathered all the rubber ducks and began to swim back up. When she reached the surface, she heard a knock on the bathroom door.

  “Are you still taking a bath, Talise?” her mom exclaimed.

  Talise took the regulator out of her mouth. “Just finished,” she called back. She tossed the rubber ducks into the bucket she kept by the sink.

  “I’m glad you like the new tub. But try not to hog the bathroom, honey.”

  “Okay.”

  Talise recorded her bath in her dive logbook, then went to bed.

  When she woke up the next morning, the tub still hadn’t finished draining. But when she checked the bucket of rubber ducks, all she found inside was her bar of soap.

  NOTIFICATION: RUBBER DUCK INSTRUCTIONS

  Courtesy of the Town Committee for Tideland and Bath Toy Safety

  Digging for clams on the beach is fun! But clams aren’t the only things hiding in the sand.

  Commonly found objects like glass bottles, rusty coins, and elongated molars are easy to clean and recycle. Other items are much more hazardous to handle—particularly those disguised as innocent toys.

  In particular, yellow rubber ducks with the eyes rubbed off.

  If you find a yellow rubber duck with the eyes rubbed off buried in the sand, please follow these steps:

  1. Fill a bucket with seawater.

  2. Wearing protective gardening gloves, place the rubber ducks in the bucket.

  3. Store the uncovered bucket in a freezer.

  4. During the next Vanishing Tide, take the bucket out on the ocean floor to a depth of at least twenty meters.

  5. Turn the bucket over on the sand until the ice block containing the rubber ducks slides out.

  6. Leave the ice blocks for the next tide. Return to the coast with the bucket.

  Tips:

  • For your own safety, do not squeak the rubber ducks.

  • Avoid leaving the ice blocks in or near areas with large amounts of seaweed.

  • If you’re unsure where the ocean floor reaches a depth of twenty meters, consult a bathymetrist.

  WARNING! If you find rubber ducks with eyes that aren’t rubbed off, contact the Town Committee for Tideland Safety and Preservation immediately. Do not make eye contact with the rubber ducks.

  MYSTERY CRABS: TO CATCH OR NOT TO CATCH?

  by Jules, Fifth-Grade Star Reporter

  The Gazette has just received this exclusive close-up photo of one of the new crabs courtesy of Talise, our class bathymetrist and sea-life expert. As you can see, the crab is black with a red smudge on its shell, kind of like a thumbprint. It has sharp pincers near its mouth. Talise recommends you avoid the crabs for now. But if you come across a dead crab, Talise says you should build a basic funeral pyre in your backyard, cremate the crab, and bury its ashes in a sealed clay vial in your basement. Thanks for the tips, Talise!

  Meanwhile, this reporter has intensified her search for answers about these mysterious crabs. They’re averse to water, which means they probably didn’t come from the ocean…so where did they come from?

  As many of you may know, construction workers recently excavated a giant hole in the southwest part of the bluffs in order to expand the still-closed Hanger Cliffs Water Park. This reporter trekked out to the bluffs yesterday to take a peek and now believes they were the crabs’ former home. The inside of the hole was strangely sticky, and covered in teeny marks that looked suspiciously crab-claw-like. What’s more, those claw marks can be seen leading from the hole all the way out to the rocks.

  This reporter’s stepsister agrees with her analysis, and added that she is doing an excellent job of investigating and should be very proud of herself. More soon, as the situation develops.

  PRINCIPAL’S PRINCIPLES

  Hello, students! This is a friendly reminder that the administration, staff, and cafeteria workers have a complete list of student allergies, including lactose intolerance, and would never serve any student a potentially harmful meal. Also, it’s possible to choke on any kind of food. But of course, that doesn’t mean we can’t serve food at all! Just be sure to chew thoroughly and avoid talking with your mouth full.

  We are aware that someone removed all of the coffee creamer from the teachers’ lounge and we are working on replacing it as soon as possible.

  On a separate note, the PTA no longer has access to the teachers’ lounge.

  Your Pal,

  Principal Josefina (Jo) King

  When Davy’s classmates asked if he wanted to sneak into the abandoned arcade, he agreed immediately. The “abandon
ed” part did sound kind of creepy. But Davy was willing to face anything for skeeball.

  He didn’t ask questions when Jules told him rust was afraid of vinegar, then made him rub the smelly stuff all over his arms and legs so the gate wouldn’t try to scratch him.

  Or when Nia pointed out the patches of seaweed surrounding the arcade most likely to grab his ankles.

  Or when Quincy demonstrated the best way to wiggle through the vent without getting attacked by cobwebs.

  Of course, Davy did have plenty of questions. Could rust really feel fear? Why was the seaweed so grabby? Could cobwebs really attack, or was that just a figure of speech? But he kept these thoughts to himself, because he was adjusting.

  Earl Grey was the last to squeeze out of the vent. “We’re all in!” Nia said.

  Davy looked around. Dried-up seaweed and sand clung to the checkered tile floor. Mold and watermarks covered the walls. “It looks like it got hit by a hurricane,” he said. “Is that why this place was closed?”

  Quincy sighed. “No, the PTA President closed it years ago.”

  “Because rides and games are unsafe,” Nia added in a mocking voice.

  “But don’t worry,” Jules told Davy. “It might be abandoned, but all the games still work. So what’s your favorite game?”

  Davy grinned. “Well, when my d—”

  He stopped abruptly, his smile vanishing.

  “Anything’s fine with me,” he said instead.

  “How about pinball?” Finn asked.

  Nia jumped up and down. “I have an idea! Let’s play pinball!”

  Davy followed the others to the pinball machine. But he was still itching to play skeeball.

  The pinball game was called Cave Escape. The playfield was a maze of tunnels filled with targets and kickers, spinners and rollovers, switches and stoppers. Finn stepped up to the machine. Jules pulled a smashed-up seaweed soda bottle cap from her pocket and handed it to him.

  “Here,” she said. “You can borrow this.”