Jackie's Jokes Read online

  "Not true," Marcia pointed out. Sometimes, it was as though she had rulers where the rest of us had eyes. "Annie's is still shorter, by a smidge."

  "Plus," Georgia added, "Jackie's looks more ... oh, I don't know ... French."

  "It is elegant," Zinnia said.

  "Yes, it is," Petal agreed. "I can see that now that I have survived my initial horror."

  "Well, I don't think it's elegant," Rebecca said.

  "Why don't you tell us how you really feel, Rebecca?" Annie said with a heavy sigh. "We've already missed the bus, and we'll have to call Pete for a ride to school because I certainly can't let people see me pull up there in the purple Hummer."

  "I think it stinks!" Rebecca said.

  "May I ask why?" Jackie asked, peacefully enough.

  "Because you're not supposed to change anything about yourself," Rebecca at last admitted. "None of us are."

  Then Jackie did something that surprised us all: she laughed.

  "What are you talking about, you silly girl?" Jackie asked Rebecca. "Not ever change? But I'm not Peter Pan! None of us are! Of course we can change. Even you can change something about yourself if you want to ... and not just your hair either."

  But Rebecca was in no mood for change, hers or anyone else's, as she made clear with a huffy "Well, while Annie calls Pete to come get us, I'm going to the drawing room to get my backpack—you know, the one with the same pattern I get every year."

  And then she was gone. Of course, we did have Jackie back, so we figured we were ahead, or at least even.

  ***

  "Everyone, come quick!" we heard Rebecca's voice shout from the drawing room a moment later.

  We had heard a lot of people calling us to come quick that morning, and nothing had turned out to be worth rushing for, but we went quickly now anyway. A person could never tell when speed might actually be required.

  In the drawing room we found Rebecca pointing at a stone in the wall. Whoever was leaving us notes always left them behind this stone, and it was now loose; a telltale sign that a note was there.

  "Pull it out!" Rebecca urged Jackie. "I'll bet anything that it's your gift arriving early—just like what happened with Georgia!"

  "Ooh, your gift!" Zinnia said. "I'll bet it will be something grand!" She sighed heavily. "I wish it were mine."

  A gift? Who could resist such a thing? Not even Jackie. Okay, maybe Georgia could, at least initially, but Georgia was always different. Come to that, we all were.

  Jackie went to the loose stone, pulled it all the way out, and...

  Rebecca's cat, Rambunctious, leaped out, practically knocking her over. When cats are put in small places, they are always eager to get out. We must say, though, this time, it wasn't nearly as funny as it had been when we'd put a cat in the mailbox and surprised the mailperson.

  "You are evil," Jackie said to Rebecca.

  "I do try," Rebecca said with a grin and then turned serious. "And I never intend to change."

  CHAPTER TWO

  We loved Pete's flatbed pickup truck. Twice he'd saved us with it, and once he'd used it to drive us to dinner at his and Mrs. Pete's home. His truck was a place of great safety for us, and we were looking forward to being driven to school in style that day. No yellow school bus for us!

  But when he honked his horn, the horn sounded funny. Well, we told ourselves as we trooped out to the driveway, people can feel fluey, why can't truck horns? So we were still excited when we got outside and found—

  "A white stretch limousine?" Rebecca didn't look happy at the prospect, although we must admit, Pete looked spiffy in the chauffeur's cap he wore with his navy blue T-shirt.

  "Don't you like it?" Pete asked.

  "Oh, it looks perfectly lovely, Mr. Pete," Petal said hurriedly. We suspected she worried that if we criticized the vehicle, Pete would get offended and leave, and then we'd have to walk to school.

  "Sure, limos are lovely," Rebecca said, "but we don't like change. Besides which, we're not rock stars."

  "Oh, but you should be," Pete said. "At any rate, I'm afraid the flatbed truck isn't running properly, so I had no other choice today."

  See? When we heard that horn, we knew there was a sick vehicle somewhere.

  "Oh, that is very sad, Mr. Pete," Zinnia said.

  "I know I hate it when I'm not running properly," Jackie said.

  "Do you think the flatbed will die?"Rebecca asked. "Death—now that's something that's going around a lot these days."

  Pete took off his chauffeur's cap and threw it to the ground. He looked disgusted, and although we'd seen that expression directed at us from other adults—the McG, Principal Freud, the Wicket, Crazy Serena—Pete had never looked at us like that. He was like our parents in that way.

  "Did one of us say something wrong?" Annie asked.

  "Rebecca often does," Durinda said.

  "It's just that I always assumed that if anyone could take a joke," Pete said, "it'd be you lot."

  "A joke?" Marcia wondered, looking around her as though she expected to find a joke hiding near the house, perhaps beneath some of the early flowers that were starting to bud. "Where's the joke?"

  "It was the idea that there might be something wrong with the flatbed truck," Pete said. "I'm Pete!" he added, as if we didn't know. "I own Pete's Repairs and Auto Wrecking! Of course there's nothing wrong with my own vehicle! If there were and I couldn't fix it, what kind of mechanic would I be? Personally, I thought it was probably the greatest April Fools' joke ever."

  We immediately saw the error of our ways.

  "We are sorry, Mr. Pete," Annie said.

  "We should have gotten the joke right away," Durinda said.

  "Of course we know you're an ace mechanic," Georgia said.

  "Really," Jackie said, "we talk about your mechanical skills all the time."

  "I guess we just never pegged you as the practical-joke sort," Marcia said.

  "But now that you've explained it to us," Petal said, "we think it's a most excellent joke, even better than pretending that a bunch of cats are about to stage a hostile takeover!" Then she added a nervous "hee-hee."

  "We hate practical jokes," Rebecca said.

  "Not all of us," Zinnia said. Then she picked up Pete's cap from the ground, brushed it off for him, and, when he bent down slightly, placed it on his head. "That cap really does look spiffy on you."

  "Thanks, Eights," Pete said, and we could tell he appreciated how bad we felt about hurting his feelings, which we would never want to do and not merely because he was the only adult we felt we could wholly trust. "But criminy," he added, "the missus never gets my jokes either."

  ***

  By the time we got to the Whistle Stop, Pete was in a better mood and so were we. Although we did love the flatbed truck better, we could see where the limo had its advantages: when Pete pulled up in front of the school, he opened the sunroof and let us, one by one, stick our heads out the top and wave to the other students as though we really were rock stars.

  "Need me to pick you up after school?" Pete offered.

  "Oh no, thank you, Mr. Pete," Petal said, still breathless from her turn through the open sunroof. "I don't think my heart could stand the excitement twice in one day."

  "As you wish," Pete said. "So, you know, study hard, Eights. Make something of yourselves."

  Good old Pete.

  "Oh," he added as we hopped out, "and try not to get yourselves into too much trouble today."

  "How do you mean?" Jackie asked.

  "Oh, you know," he said, "with it being April Fools' Day and all. Too many jokes can get a person in a peck of trouble." He keyed the ignition. "Oh, and, Jackie?"

  "Yes, Mr. Pete?"

  "Nice hair."

  ***

  In our classroom, Will Simms and Mandy Stenko looked awfully excited, which was odd, since they were rarely excited about the same things.

  Mandy had red hair, which she loved, while Will had white-blond hair, which we loved.

&
nbsp; "Mrs. McGillicuddy says we're to have recess all day!" Mandy said.

  "Oh yes," Will said. "She says we've been so good lately, we deserve an entire day of play." Will looked at us closely before adding, "Nice hair, Jackie."

  We looked at the McG. There she was, as always, in all her tall thinness, blond hair, and long nose holding up her glasses.

  "Is it true?" Jackie asked for all of us.

  "Yes," the McG said simply.

  "Really?" Jackie pressed.

  "Of course not," the McG said. "Do you think I've taken leave of my senses?" She threw back her head, and laughed the loudest laugh we'd ever heard come out of her, and then she and Will and Mandy all shouted at us, "April Fools'!"

  We were beginning to think Rebecca was right: this really was getting to be too much.

  ***

  The morning slipped away as mornings have a tendency to do when you are busy learning about continental drift, and before we knew it, it was time for recess.

  "I've got a splendid idea," Jackie said, after she'd called us all into a huddle on the playground. She included Will in the huddle as well. As for Mandy, she was off talking to the McG, no doubt laughing at the joke they'd pulled on us that morning.

  Jackie whispered her idea.

  "That really is splendid," Will said. "But are you sure you want to include me? After all, I helped play that joke on you this morning."

  "Yeah," Annie said, "but you're you."

  "And Mandy and the McG are Mandy and the McG," Georgia added.

  "So as you can see," Marcia said, "it's hardly the same thing."

  "Jokes are always fine," Rebecca said darkly, "until someone gets hurt."

  We ignored her.

  "Mandy!" Jackie called sweetly across the playground. "Oh, Mandy!"

  Mandy's ears perked up, almost like a puppy's does, and she trotted over.

  "Yes?" she asked.

  "We all thought we'd play soccer today for recess," Jackie told her. "You know:Will's favorite game?"

  Mandy looked briefly puzzled, and we can't say that we blamed her. We'd told her many times that Will loved soccer and just as many times that he hated it, so she probably no longer knew what the truth was. (Hint: he hated it.)

  "Oh, right," she said, her expression brightening after a moment's reflection. "Well, I'll just go get the ball for us then."

  For the next half-hour we played soccer as though we'd been born in Brazil.

  Well, at least Jackie did.

  She bounced the ball off her head several times, kicked it with authority; she even seemed faster than we remembered her being. We began to wonder: could her new short hair have something to do with her new speed? We swear, it was like she was everywhere at once—offense, defense, goalie—everywhere we looked, there was Jackie.

  "That was great," Jackie said after the end-of-recess bell rang. She didn't even look winded.

  "Yes, it was," Mandy said, bending down and placing her palms on her knees because she was winded. "It was so nice to play Will's favorite game."

  "Too bad, then," Jackie said, "that it isn't Will's favorite game."

  Then eight voices plus Will's shouted, "April Fools'!"

  Which was, of course, when Mandy Stenko burst into tears.

  ***

  We studied Principal Freud's head. Principal Freud was so bald, we wondered if other kids had called him Egghead when he was younger. Then we felt bad for being mean, not least because being mean was what had landed us in this mess in the first place.

  Twelve of us were crammed into Principal Freud's tiny office: we Eights, the McG, Will, Principal Freud, and Mandy, who was still sobbing, although she was sobbing more quietly now. We couldn't see her face because she had it covered with her hands.

  "Fancy seeing you all in here," Principal Freud said, only he wasn't looking at the other three when he said this; he was looking at us.

  We decided to look at our shoes. They were pretty, for school shoes.

  "It seems to me," Principal Freud said, "you're in here a lot now. Why, it's practically become a habit with you."

  What was he talking about? We'd only been sent to his office once so far in 2008, and that was back in February, when we'd gotten in trouble for making the McG feel loveless on Valentine's Day. Our record had been clean for a whole month and a half now. Honestly, we'd have expected the statute of limitations to run out on all our other crimes.

  "A very bad habit," Principal Freud added darkly.

  We looked up out of the corners of our eyes just long enough to see Principal Freud turn his attention to Will. And in that moment, we couldn't even begin to say why, it occurred to us that Principal Freud was not what he'd always appeared to be.

  "Will," Principal Freud said to our favorite boy in the world, "while it was wrong of you to participate in these ... shenanigans, I am quite certain you had no part in dreaming them up. You were merely following the poor lead of others."

  We stole a glimpse at Will: he didn't look happy. And somehow we knew it had nothing to do with his being labeled a follower, which no one ever really likes, and everything to do with his not wanting to see us hang alone.

  "But—" Will started to say. Principal Freud silenced him with a raised palm.

  "As for you eight," Principal Freud announced to us, rising from his chair to do so, "you are expelled."

  CHAPTER THREE

  And then three of the four other people in the room laughed. The McG, Mandy, Principal Freud—they all laughed.

  "What's so funny?" Will demanded, outraged. "The Whistle Stop will never be half the place it is now, not even one-eighth of the place, without the—"

  "Oh, if only you could see your faces!" Principal Freud said between gulping laughs.

  "We only pretended to be angry!" the McG said, her laughs somehow fogging up her glasses.

  "Of course I knew all along that Will hates soccer!" Mandy said. "Or at least, most of the time I remember that. You all do make it very confusing."

  "Does this mean we're not expelled?" Jackie asked.

  "Of course not!" Principal Freud said. "Why, if I expelled someone every time they pulled a little harmless prank, there'd be no one left here but me and Mrs. McGillicuddy!"

  "Then this was all just...?" Jackie started to say, leaving the end blank for someone else to fill it.

  "Yes!" Principal Freud shouted. "April Fools'!"

  We were liking him less and less by the minute.

  "Oh, and one more thing," Principal Freud called our attention back to him as we moved to depart. "Nice hair, Jackie."

  ***

  And then we had lunch.

  After lunch, it was time to get back to regular classroom topics. Or so we thought.

  "Now that we've all had our fill of practical jokes for one day," the McG said, "and that holiday has been dispensed with for another year, what other holidays fall in the month of April?"

  We were puzzled.

  "Okay, I'm fairly certain it's not Halloween," Petal said.

  "Correct you are," the McG said with a sigh. We couldn't really blame her for sighing. Sometimes, Petal had that effect on people.

  "It's not Groundhog Day," Durinda said, "or Valentine's Day."

  "It's not St. Patrick's Day," Georgia said.

  "Thank God it's not New Year's Eve," Rebecca said with a shudder. We knew what she meant. Once your parents have disappeared, or died, on New Year's Eve, you can never look at streamers, funny hats, and noisemakers the same way again.

  "Easter?" Zinnia suggested. "Some chocolate bunnies would be nice around now."

  "No," Marcia corrected her. "Don't you remember? We had Easter last month, only we were too busy with St. Patrick's Day and ... other things to notice very much."

  "I know!" Annie said.

  But before Annie could tell us what she knew, Jackie shouted out, "Passover!"

  "Ah, yes," the McG said, "Passover. I keep forgetting you Eights are Jewish now. But no, I'm afraid matzo and no bread weren't what I
had in mind. Come to think of it, though, I realize that what I'm thinking of is not what most people would consider a holiday at all."

  "It's not?" Jackie wrinkled her nose. "Then what is it? What have you been talking about?"

  "Tax Day!" the McG said with a big smile.

  "Tax Day?" Annie asked. "What's that?"

  "It's something that I have no doubt all your parents are very concerned about right now." Then the McG looked at us Eights, and suddenly she stopped smiling. "Well, your parents probably aren't."

  This sounded ominous to us, ominous being a vocabulary word we'd recently learned that means "foreboding evil."

  But we shrugged it off. If this Tax Day was something that concerned adults, then it didn't concern us. Besides which, at least we hadn't been expelled.

  ***

  Apparently, despite what the McG had said earlier, the foolish craziness and the crazy foolishness of April Fools' Day wasn't done for the year. Or at least, it wasn't done with us.

  Okay, so maybe none of us—except Petal—fell for it when the bus driver on the way home claimed we were being attacked by aliens.

  But when we got home?

  "This really is the limit!" Rebecca shouted to us from the cat room, where she'd gone to clean out the litter boxes. Annie had us on strict schedules to help out around the house, and it was Rebecca's turn to take care of the cats.

  Sometimes Annie's chore schedules had fun outcomes, like the time Petal did our first batch of laundry, put in too many soap crystals, and we'd found her swimming in a sea of tiny bubbles. Other times, not so fun.

  We followed Rebecca's voice and found...

  "Now, how in the world did they ever manage that?" Zinnia asked, true wonder and respect in her voice.

  All our cats, from Anthrax through Zither, had somehow gotten their paws on rubber dog masks and were staring at us with canine faces.

  We could have sworn we heard Jaguar laughing.

  ***

  And then things got really nutty.

  Robot Betty, our black and gold robot who was supposed to clean our house but never did it right, was making love-eyes at the flying watering can, which caused Carl the talking refrigerator to break into tears. Even after Betty made it clear she'd only been teasing him—you know, April Fools'!—it took an awfully long time for Carl to pull himself together enough to let Durinda make us a proper dinner.