Double Dog Dare (8 page)

In the kitchen Kansas could hear his mother putting away the Post-its in the drawer and sitting back down at the table. Probably back to studying, without even noticing he was gone. Kansas gazed at the computer screen. Twenty seconds passed. Then thirty. Still no reply from Francine.

Kansas took a deep breath. He had to type it, he decided. It was now or never. Before he chickened out. He
needed to tell Francine that he’d read her note from the office and that his parents were getting divorced too. It would be nice to finally be able to talk to someone about his parents, someone who would understand. He just hoped she wouldn’t be too mad about the note.

But Kansas didn’t get a chance to type a single word, because suddenly there was another loud
bloop!
and a second message popped up from Francine.

Kansas squinted as he read the words. Another message popped up. Then another.

What Kansas needed was to cool off. He couldn’t believe there had been a second in the day when he thought he
might actually tell Francine about his parents. All she cared about was the stupid Media Club and being the stupid news anchor. He’d wanted to make up a super-mean dare for her too, but he hadn’t gotten a chance, because she’d logged out of her IM right away.

He was planning on riding his bike, but the first thing he saw when he got outside was his basketball, sitting cold and lonely by the corner of the house. Ginny must’ve been playing with it. Which was stupid, really, because there was no basketball hoop. They’d had a hoop at their old house, and their mom had insisted they take it with them, but their new house didn’t have a driveway, so there was nowhere to put it up. Now the hoop remained stuffed inside one of the unpacked boxes. Which, as far as Kansas was concerned, was where it could stay forever.

Kansas stood in front of the screen door for a long while, just staring at the basketball. Then, almost reluctantly, he picked it up. It did feel pretty good. He tossed it up in the air and caught it, one-handed. Then he tossed it against the side of the house, at a spot just above his and Ginny’s window, and grabbed it as it bounced back his way.

As Kansas threw the ball—bounce and catch, bounce
and catch—his thoughts began to focus on the dare war. Kansas needed to think of something truly awful for Francine to do, something even worse than wearing your little sister’s tutu.

But what?

Kansas aimed at the spot on the wall again—there was a scuff mark there now, exactly basketball-sized, and the dirt underneath his bedroom window was packed enough that he could almost pretend like he was dribbling. Kansas used to love playing basketball. Back in Oregon, he had even been on his school’s basketball team. He’d been good too. Really good. But that was when his dad had been around to help him practice, to show up at games, to cheer for him. Kansas didn’t really feel like playing much anymore.

He bent down low and dribbled five times. Then he grabbed the ball in both hands, straightened up, and shot.

The basketball hit the siding at a bad angle and flew across the yard, thumping into the Muñozes’ fence next door. Kansas crossed the brown patches of grass to retrieve it.

“Hello, young man!”

Poking over the top of the fence was the head of a
gray-bearded old man in a fishing cap. “Um, hey,” Kansas said. He snatched up his ball.

“You must be Ginny’s brother,” the man said. “I’m Ernie Muñoz. I believe you know my wife, Ramona.”

“Oh.” Kansas nodded. He’d heard Ginny talking about Mr. Muñoz, from when she went over there, but Kansas hadn’t met him before. He’d just heard the sound of buzzing and hammering from the other side of the fence. Ginny said the guy was some kind of carpenter. “Yeah. Hey.” Kansas was just turning around to go back in the house when he realized maybe he was being rude. And maybe he shouldn’t be. He turned around. “I’m Kansas,” he said.

“Nice to meet you, Kansas.”

“You too.”

“I see you have a basketball there.”

This was the problem with old people, Kansas thought. They always wanted to talk to you forever, and they always said really lame stuff like, “I see you have a basketball there.” What else would it be? A turnip?

“Uh, yeah.”

Mr. Muñoz scratched his beard. “I saw you tossing it against the house earlier. Made quite a racket.”

“
Oh.” So that’s what this was about. Kansas had probably screwed up the old guy’s nap or something. “Sorry. I have a hoop from our old house but there’s nowhere to put it up.” He motioned to the dirt around him.

Mr. Muñoz nodded thoughtfully and scratched at his beard again. Kansas was beginning to wonder if maybe his beard itched a lot, that maybe he had beard dandruff or something, and then he started wondering if he should make Francine wear a fake beard all day. But that wasn’t mean enough.

“You know,” Mr. Muñoz told him, after a bit more scratching, “there’s plenty of room above our garage for a hoop, if you’d care to put it there.”

Kansas looked over to the Muñozes’ driveway. There
was
room for a hoop there, prime real estate. But putting your basketball hoop up on someone else’s house was just … weird. Wasn’t it? “I’d have to ask the missus, of course,” Mr. Muñoz went on. “But I’m sure she’d be all right with it. She’s taken quite a shine to you and your sister, I think.”

“Oh. Well”—Kansas shrugged—“I don’t know.” What he meant was
no,
but you really couldn’t say that so bluntly
to an old dude with an itchy beard, now, could you? “I’ll have to think about it.” Maybe he could dare Francine to get dandruff? No, that didn’t make any sense …

“Of course. You let me know.”

“Sure thing.” Kansas pressed the ball into his side. “Well, um … I’m gonna go.”

“Okay, Kansas, I’ll see you soon.”

Kansas was just creaking open the front door when he saw it. A patch of grass, peeking out between the cracks of their front step. It looked so strange there, so odd—that patch of green where it didn’t quite belong—that Kansas knew he’d come up with the perfect dare at last.

Kansas raced back into the kitchen and dug his mother’s folder of school stuff out of the junk drawer. He flipped open the cover, then found the right page and scrolled his finger down until he landed on it.

His fingers felt like they were on fire as he punched her parent contact number into the phone. This was going to
be perfect, he thought.
Perfect
. The club hadn’t voted on it yet, but they’d vote tomorrow morning, and it was such a good dare that Kansas was sure everyone would agree to it. Never in a million years would she do it, and then she’d be two points behind and lose the war and her precious news anchor job too. Which was exactly what she deserved.

Francine’s father answered, and Kansas put on his best calm, normal voice. But when Francine picked up, he screwed his face into a sneer, prepared to really wallop her.

“Hello?” she said.

“I double dog dare you,” he replied, with as much growl in his voice as he could muster up, “to dye your hair green for school tomorrow.” And with that, he slammed the phone down.

11.

A bottle of green hair dye

Luckily, the store was open late. And luckily, they sold green hair dye.

Well, Francine wasn’t entirely sure if it was lucky or not. When they were back at the hotel, Francine sitting sideways on the bathroom toilet and her father hovering above her with plastic gloves on and the bottle of green dye in his hands, she began to have second thoughts.

“How long does it take before it comes out again?” she asked. She’d washed and patted her hair dry already, like the instructions on the box said. The damp towel around her shoulders felt like it weighed a hundred pounds.

Her father grabbed the package off the sink and read the back. “Ten washes.”

Francine thought about that. If she went through with it, it would be at least a week—probably two—before her hair was back to its normal color. Two weeks of looking like a human palm tree, every single day at school.

Her father studied her reflection in the mirror. “You sure you really want the news anchor job this badly, pea pod?”

That
was one thing Francine didn’t need to think about. TV animal-trainers-to-be were meant to be in front of cameras, not behind them. She nodded, one sharp jerk of her head. Then she took a deep breath. “Do it,” she told her father.

“Okay …,” he said. And Francine watched in the mirror as he tilted the bottle over her head, squeezed, and …

Splat!

Francine Halata could no longer call herself a blonde.

12.

A SPARKLY WHITE TUTU

Kansas had had a lot of nightmares in his life. Nightmares about skeletons chasing him, and having to jump off mile-high cliffs into pits of bubbling lava, and vampires with machine guns for fangs. But wearing his little sister’s sparkly white tutu on his second Friday at his new school turned out to be worse than anything Kansas could have dreamed up in a thousand years. Even for the King of Dares, this one was a doozy.

Kansas walked up the front steps, eyes straight ahead, tugging tight on his backpack straps. He took each step casually and quickly, in a way that said, “Yes, I know I’m wearing a tutu, thank you. I think it looks pretty awesome.”
At least he hoped it said that. But he was pretty sure it didn’t. How could he look awesome in a
tutu
? He’d worn a plain white T-shirt that morning, thinking that it would blend in and make the tutu less noticeable, but the second Kansas had caught his reflection in the bus window that morning, he’d realized that it didn’t make him less noticeable. It made him look like a swan.

Beside him, Ginny took his hand and squeezed it. “Don’t worry, Kansas,” she told him. “I think you look good. Just like a real ballerina.”

After Kansas dropped Ginny off at Art Club, he focused his eyes on his feet. The waistband of the tutu was too tight, and it itched, too, chafing his belly with every step. And was it just him, or had the hallway gotten longer since yesterday? And more full of kids? Kansas’s senses were suddenly on hyperalert. He could hear every snicker of the swim team over by the lockers, laughing at him. He could feel the air rustling from every mathlete who whipped a head in his direction. And the fingers of all the yearbook members pointing at him were practically in Technicolor. One of the Basketball Club kids over by the
gym shouted, “Hey! Nice dress!” And the whole hallway broke out in screams of laughter.

Five feet from Miss Sparks’s door, Kansas felt a tap on his shoulder. He whirled around.

Francine.

“Nice tutu,” she told him.

“Nice hair,” he replied. Her smirk quickly faded into a frown.

Kansas almost couldn’t believe she’d really done it. But she had. Francine’s new green hair hung down in front of her face like vines in a jungle.

“I can’t believe you made me do this,” she said, jabbing a finger toward her head. “You’re so mean. I would never do anything that mean to you.”

“
I’m
so mean?” Kansas replied.

The door whipped open.

“Why, hello there, you two!” It was Miss Sparks, white teeth flashing. “I thought I heard some students out here. Come inside, won’t you? You both look incredible, by the way.”

Incredible? Kansas was pretty sure that what they looked like was two circus freaks.

Kansas was heading to his desk with his head down, pretending to ignore the whispers of his fellow club members, when Miss Sparks clapped her hands together. Suddenly, every head in the class was turned his way.

“Good morning, Media Club!” she said. “Before we get started on today’s announcements, I want you all to take a good look at Kansas and Francine.”

Kansas’s insides turned to Jell-O. What was going on? Had Miss Sparks finally had it with the dares? Was she going to make an
example
of them? Next to him, Francine looked equally perplexed.

From the back of the room, Luis snapped a picture.

“Everyone,” Miss Sparks went on. She put one hand on Kansas’s shoulder and the other on Francine’s. “This”—Kansas closed his eyes and waited for the humiliation to go away—“
this
is what true school spirit looks like.”

“Huh?” Kansas’s eyes popped open.

“What?” Francine said.

“Today,” Miss Sparks continued, “is School Spirit Day. We were all told to wear our school colors, green and white. And I see a few of you who tried”—she nodded at Alicia, in the far corner, wearing a green dress, and Natalie, with
a flowery green and white headband—“but no one put as much effort into their school spirit today as Kansas and Francine here, and I think that’s really commendable, don’t you?”

Commendable? Kansas looked down at his white tutu, and then up at Francine’s grass-green hair. Well, how about that? Maybe they
were
commendable.