Pickle (14 page)

 

33

Bad Eggs

“Taste one,” Oliver said.

“No way.” The jar was still in the cupboard, but the eggs inside looked like eyeballs in swamp juice. The vinegar had turned a cloudy green, and the herbs in the bottom looked rotten.

“We need to know if they're any good,” Bean said.

“It's a pickled egg. It's not going to be any good,” Frank said.

“Well, we can't enter them in the pickling contest if they stink,” Sienna said. She pulled them down out of the cupboard and spun the lid open. They did stink. Literally. Opening the lid was like setting off a stink bomb. Kids in the hall started complaining right away. It was pickley vinegar, sure, but there was something else there. Like when I left half a burrito in the car all weekend during a heat wave.

“Whatever. I'll try one, you chickens.” Frank dunked his hand into the jar, making the eggs and herb flecks swirl around. We weren't getting any points for hygiene.

“What the—” Frank dropped the egg he had snagged out of the jar and it clacked down onto the table.

“That one is fake!” He pulled a couple more out. Once they were out of the pickle juice, it was easy to see that they were the kind of plastic Easter eggs that broke in half.

“Real funny, guys. Where are the real ones?” I said, but everyone looked as confused as I was. We poured the rest of the jar into the sink.

“Who would do this?” Oliver said, sorting through the pile of eggs.

Twenty-two eggs, and not a real one in the bunch. The pickle juice had turned them all a yellowish gray.

“What are we going to take to the fair?” Sienna said.

“Forget the fair, what kind of sicko would steal our eggs?” Oliver said.

“Maybe somebody else in the pickle contest?” Bean guessed.

“Would someone really care that much about a ribbon from the Pioneer Fair?” Oliver said.

“Don't forget about the cash prize,” I said.

“Ah, cash. It corrupts us all,” Frank said. We all looked at him, and then back to the eggs. Oliver held one up to the sunlight shining in through the lab window.

“Wait—there's something inside this,” he said. He tried to crack an egg open, but it slipped out of his hand. Frank grabbed it and set it on the table and whacked it with my math book. Broken bits of plastic sprayed out, and a folded piece of paper stuck to the table.

If you want your eggs back, you have to let me in the club.

—Hector

We stared at the note. Frank's mouth hung open and his eyes were a little buggy. For once, he didn't look cool.

“I didn't see that coming,” Oliver said. We opened more eggs, but they all had the same note. Hector wasn't taking any chances.

“I didn't know he had it in him,” Bean said. It sounded like it was a compliment. I looked back and forth between her and Hector's note. I didn't know which one was a bigger surprise.

“Well, I guess there's only one thing to do,” Oliver said.

“Find him and knock him out?” Bean said.

“No.”

“Break into his apartment. Find our eggs. Steal them back,” Frank said.

“What? No, maybe we just invite him to join the club,” Oliver said.

“Are you crazy? Then he'll find out about the P.T.A.,” Bean said.

“Maybe that would be okay, too,” Oliver said.

“You've got to admit, this was slick. He's got style,” Frank said. Oliver and Bean stared at me, and Frank and Sienna stared at the sink full of plastic eggs. I didn't say anything. I hadn't expected Hector to try and join the club, and I'd been so caught up in the excitement that I hadn't really thought about it too much since the start. It would've been okay with me, really, but doing it without Hector was okay, too. The risk of getting busted was just too high. And I'm not just talking about myself. I looked around at them. I didn't know Frank or Sienna last year at all because they weren't at my school. I barely knew Oliver, and all right, I was afraid of Bean. But now the five of us were the League of Pickle Makers. And the P.T.A. And I'd sworn to keep it secret.

We set out to look for Hector, and we found him fifty feet away. He was sitting on the floor in the hall. He'd actually replaced the eggs right after our last meeting and had been waiting a week for us to catch on and contact him.

“Whoa. I thought, like, you guys would figure it out right away the first time you tested the pickling solution,” he said. “My grandma checks the solution all the time on her eggs.” Sienna shook her head.

“Talk to Ben,” Frank said, and left with the rest of the club.

I looked down at Hector. He just looked back at me like he didn't know where he knew me from.

“Where are our eggs?”

“I have them at home. I'm storing them in my bedroom in my grandma's pickling crock,” he said. I started to ask him what a pickling crock was, but I didn't really want to know. “If you bring a jar over, you can have them back. She'll probably want to use her crock soon.”

“Hector … you can't be in the club,” I said. “It just wouldn't work.”

“Why not? It could be fun.”

“Pickle making?” I couldn't believe it. Even a kid who doesn't like pickles wanted to do it. I was
lousy
at making a bad club. “You don't even like pickles. Why would you want to make them?”

“I just want to hang out,” Hector said. He scraped a scuff mark on the wall with his fingernail. “Aren't we friends anymore?”

“Of course we're friends, but it doesn't mean we have to do
everything
together all the time. People change,” I said.

“So, what, I'm not ALLOWED to join your club?”

“I just don't think it's a good idea. But, we can still hang out. I
want
to hang out.”

“Now?” Hector said. “Want to come over and get the eggs?” He said it like he'd still hang out, even after I told him he couldn't be a pickle maker. It made me feel like a dirt sandwich.

“No, not now. I need to go help Diego,” I said.

“Fine. Nice knowing you.” Hector got up and slung his backpack over his shoulder. He stomped down the hall to his grandma's office, where he knew I wouldn't follow him.

 

34

Sitting Fine on the Good Laws of Finland

From: Agent Super

To: Agent Fix-it; Agent 008; Agent Queso; Agent Snow

I have a plan. It's not illegal. I'll bring supplies. Details here: Pickle.

I went to the website, but her message was in a different language. It took me forever to figure out that it was in Finnish, and I'm not sure the translator was so hot.

Agent Super: Operation Zoo Escape

Plan is had that sits fine on good law. Masquerade clothing be already on place for you chosen. Local bird toilets, Saturday, 11

Sienna posted a reply right away in French.

Agent Snow: Saturday at eleven is when my dad calls, and he's been talking about coming to visit, so I'll miss it.

The frowny face was the same in English and French. I noticed that she didn't ask to reschedule it or anything. I think that the zoo prank made her nervous, too. Right away Frank posted. I was starting to get used to everyone's agent names. It was in English.

Agent Fix-it: Everybody can just say what they have to say. No need to change the language. The CIA couldn't even hack this.

We can take care of business without Agent Snow. I'm sure she can think of a makeup assignment. Peace.

Since everybody seemed to be online, I posted, too.

Agent Queso: Our eggs are safe at Hector's. I'll have them back in the pickle makers' cupboard ASAP. Messing around at the zoo could be fun, but nobody from school will even see it. Maybe it's not worth it?

I refreshed the page until there was a new response. Bean.

Agent Super: We're doing it for fun. Lighten up, birdbrain.

No help there. I went into the living room and asked my dad if he needed help in the restaurant on Saturday. He didn't.

 

35

Zoo Break

I logged into my email first thing on Saturday morning, sort of hoping that someone had called off the prank. Nobody from the P.T.A. had sent anything, but there was an email from Hector.

Wanna come pick up the eggs? We could hang out. I have to go to the salad bar with my grandma for lunch, but I'm here before that. —H

If I had plans with Hector, I wouldn't have to do the zoo prank, whatever it was. But, I didn't say anything the other day so they'd know it was more about having chicken parts than meet-up plans.

Sorry. Already have plans today.

—Ben

I checked my email after breakfast. Still nothing from the pickle makers. Or Hector, not that I gave him much to respond to. It was time to face the costumes.

I was ten minutes late, but I found Oliver waiting alone for me in front of the bathroom near the Domestic Birds of America exhibit. It was the perfect place for a secret rendezvous, because it was the most deserted corner of the zoo. Oliver held out a plastic bag from Lee's.

“Where's your costume?” I said.

“Frank's got it inside. He's changing and Bean's in there, too,” he said.

“In the boys' room?”

“Yeah, but you can change in the stall.”

“What am I?”

“You're an animal,” he said and threw the bag at me. We went into the bathroom and found Frank in a lion suit. The suit hung over his skinny body, but the face was pretty good. If he hammed it up, he could make it work. Bean stood there in her green overalls.

“Where's
your
costume?”

“I don't have one. Think of me as your animal trainer. If we were all in costumes, it might get too confusing,” she said. “Although, I really thought about wearing the army captain uniform today. Alas, I need to blend in.” She shook her head sadly.

“Here, you can take mine. I'll be the ‘animal trainer.'”

“No. I brought them, you wear them. This is
my
prank, remember?”

“Then you might want to think about doing it alone,” I said.

“Like you did that awesome cloud of gloom alone?”

“Well, if we're the ones wearing the costumes, we're the ones that could get busted. I don't see how this counts as an initiation for you,” I said.

“Good point, Ben,” Oliver said.

“I'm totally taking the risk! If you bozos get caught, you know what they're going to find? ‘Property of Lee's Costume' sewn into your mangy collars. My dad will know I took the costumes. All of the risk is on me. Mostly,” Bean said.

“Fine. Is torturing us part of your secret plan?”

“Yes.”

“What is your plan, anyway?”

“I'm going to keep it simple.” She paused for effect and looked around. “You boys are going to run around until we scare someone.”

It didn't sound like much of a plan, but then again, it wasn't so bad if we could leave as soon as we freaked someone out.

“Can we leave right after we scare someone?”

“Sure, Ben,” Bean said. “And make it snappy, because the costumes have to be back by three for the Bernstein-Miller wedding.”

I studied her face to tell if she was lying or not. But she just smiled and strolled casually out of the restroom. I knew we were in for trouble. I went into a stall to put my costume on. Not because I was shy, but just in case some pigeon fanatic came in to pee.

I tried to tell what Oliver was from what I could see of his legs under the stall walls, but I could only see brown fur. I pulled my own costume out.

“What is this, Frank?” I said.

“Dunno,” Frank said. “Bean wouldn't let us peek.”

Oliver's legs were light brown, but my costume was more of a reddish brown. It was a tight squeeze in the stall. I took off my T-shirt and shorts. I didn't want Bean to do something stupid like try and take a picture of me in my underwear to put online, so I pulled the suit on as fast as I could. The very tip of a big, fluffy tail dipped into the toilet, but it was only in there for a second.