Two Schools Out - Forever

65

"This is grounds for expulsion!" Mr. Pruitt screamed, veins popping out on his forehead.

I watched him with interest, calculating the chances of his keeling over from a heart attack within the next five minutes. Right now it looked like 60, 65 percent for.

The six of us were standing soggily in his office, half an hour after the last fire truck had left. Pruitt had insisted on seeing all of us together. We were chilled and bedraggled, and just wanted to get our butts home.

But nooo.

First we had to listen to the headhunter chew us out. Granted, being chewed out by someone as horrible as the headhunter was a walk in the park compared to, say, having Erasers try to kill you. But still, an afternoon-ruiner, for sure.

"The stink bomb was reason enough!" Mr. Pruitt shouted. "But I stupidly gave you a second chance! You're nothing but a bunch of street rats! Vermin!"

I was impressed. Vermin was a new one on me, and I'd been called everything from arrogant to zealous.

Mr. Pruitt paused to suck in a breath, and I jumped in.

"My brothers didn't do the stink bomb! You never proved it. Now you're accusing us again with no evidence! How-how un-American!"

I thought the headhunter was going to pop a vessel. Instead he reached out and grabbed the Gasman's hands, holding them in the air.

My heart sank as I saw the smudges of black powder, ground into his skin when the bomb went off.

"Besides that!" I blustered.

The headhunter seemed to swell with new rage, but just at that moment, the assistant showed Anne into the office.

She didn't work for the FBI for nothing-somehow she managed to calm the headhunter down and shooed us out of the office and into her Suburban.

For half a mile there was silence in the car, but then she started in.

"This was your big opportunity, kids," she began. "I'd had higher hopes..."

There was a bunch more, but I tuned it out, gazing through my window at the fading autumn color. Every once in a while words floated into my consciousness: grounded, big trouble, disappointed, upset, no TV. And so on.

None of us said anything. It had been years since we'd had to answer to any grown-up. We weren't about to start now.