The Curse of the Campfire Weenies (8 page)

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Authors: David Lubar

BOOK: The Curse of the Campfire Weenies
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I
hate Mrs. Barunki. She's the worst teacher in the school. I can't believe I got stuck with her for second grade. When I found out, I almost ran away from home. The worst part is that I came so close to not getting her. If I was one year younger, I'd have been safe. She's retiring at the end of this year. That's just about all she talks about. That and her stupid math facts. She makes us memorize stuff every single day. I'm sick of it. She makes us learn lots more math than we'll ever need.
But we get her back. All the kids hate her. We play tricks on her whenever we can. It's war—us against her. She teaches us math facts, we hide all her pencils. She teaches us math facts, we make faces when she turns away.
She used to shout a lot. That's what I heard from some of the older kids. This year, she hasn't shouted at all. But I still hate her. And she hates us. I know she does. Mom says that “hate” is a bad word, but Mom doesn't have to sit here every day.
At least the year is almost over. I made it through Mrs. Barunki's class in one piece. I survived.
“Well, boys and girls,” Mrs. Barunki said when there was only a minute left on the very last day, “I can't say I'll miss you, and I know you won't miss me. But I'll tell you one thing.”
She stopped and grinned at the class, taking time to stare at each and every one of us. When her eyes reached mine, I felt like I was trapped on the wrong side of a cage at the zoo. I waited to see what she would say.
“I'm going away—far away. But you'll never forget me. I can promise you that. I'll be a part of your life forever. I've made sure of that.” Then she started laughing.
The bell rang. It was over. I was through with Mrs. Barunki and her meanness and her math facts. She couldn't do anything more to me.
And she was wrong. No matter what she said, I knew I wouldn't ever think of her again. As sure as the sky is blue, as sure as water is wet, and as sure as two times three is seven, Mrs. Barunki was out of my life for good.
T
he old man held a large rock in his left hand and spoke a single word. He reached down with his right hand and grabbed a fistful of sand from the beach. Brendan, sitting on a fallen tree several yards away, watched as his father tried to find meaning in the strange sounds.
“Shanbruk,”
the man said lifting the rock higher.
“Shanbruk,”
Brendan's father said, writing the word in his notebook.
The old man grinned. Brendan noticed that he had lost most of his teeth. Holding out his palm with the small mound of sand, the old man said,
“Shanpana.”
Brendan got up, walked barefoot across the warm sand, and stepped into the gentle surf that rippled against the north edge of this small island in the Pacific. “I'm going out for a swim,” he called to his father.
Brendan's father gave him an absentminded wave. “Have fun.”
“I will.” Brendan waded away from shore until he was
waist deep in the water, then leaned back and floated.
This is the life,
he thought. Even if his dad's work was kind of silly, Brendan was enjoying his time on Senshoji Island. He just wished things would get a little more exciting once in a while. Even paradise could get boring.
Brendan drifted around and looked over toward the shore. His father was still talking to the old man, collecting more words. The people on the island—they called themselves the Wanoshenu—spoke a language that wasn't used anywhere else. It wasn't even all that much like any other known language. As far as Brendan could tell, people who cared about languages, people like his father, went wild over the chance to study a new one. It was sort of like when an astronomer finds a new star or a biologist discovers an unknown animal.
“I'll be staying with them for a month,” Brendan's father had explained. “I have to compile a lexicon—that's a list of the words in the language. Then I can start studying the grammar. I've made arrangements for you to come with me, if you'd like.”
It sounded pretty boring to Brendan. At least, it had sounded boring at first, but then he'd remembered something he'd learned in school. He'd thought about those twenty-four dollars' worth of beads and trinkets and how, if he remembered correctly, Peter Someone-or-other had bought Manhattan Island that way.
What could I buy with some shiny junk?
Brendan wondered.
“I'd love to go,” Brendan told his dad. Then he headed into town, where he'd picked up a nice assortment of fake
jewelry, sparkly beads, and other glittery products of a plastic civilization.
The islanders had gone crazy over the stuff—especially the rhinestones. It would have been perfect if they'd had anything good to trade. But they didn't have lots of knives or spears or anything cool. They had baskets and clothing. Brendan didn't need baskets, and he definitely didn't want their used clothing. So he was stuck on Senshoji Island for a month with nothing to do but swim and lie on the beach.
It could be worse, he thought, as he drifted with the rolling waves. The water was warm, the sun was warmer, and his dad let him sleep as late as he wanted. An hour later, when Brendan waded back onto the beach, he saw that his father was just finishing up the interview with the old man.
“Brendan, this is fascinating. Come have a look,” his father said, waving his notebook. He reached down to switch off the tape recorder.
“Sure,” Brendan said, though he wasn't the least bit interested. He joined his father and looked at the notebook. As his father talked about phonemes, morphemes, and rounded vowels, Brendan nodded and grunted, but he really wasn't paying any attention. The whole thing was boring.
When his father was finished, they walked back toward their tent. On the way, they stopped to stare at the stone statue that stood in a clearing on the path. The natives referred to it as
Murgobruk
. But to Brendan, it might as well
have been called Bug-Fish. It was a huge statue, towering at least twenty feet in the air, that looked like a combination of a cockroach, a fish, and a lobster. The thing that always caught Brendan's eyes was the mouth, with a pair of jaws lined with sharp teeth made of carved white shells. A fin with spiny bristles ran along the creature's back. It had five pairs of jointed legs. The front pair ended with claws. Its body terminated in a forked tail that was covered with spikes.
“I'd hate to run into one of those,” Brendan's father said. “Not that such a thing could exist. Anything that size would be crushed under its own weight.”
“That's a relief,” Brendan said. He didn't think a creature like the
murgobruk
could exist, but the huge statue still gave him the creeps.
A little one would be fun,
he thought. Maybe he could get one of the natives to carve a small model for him to take home. Not that there was any way he could communicate his request.
“Real or not,” his father said, “it's certainly fascinating to observe the beliefs of an ancient culture from such a close vantage point. Imagine how much we'll be able to learn once we know the basic language.”
He said more, but Brendan had tuned him out again. They reached their tent, which was set up next to the Wanoshenu village. Brendan saw some of the kids his age playing a game with small stones. He wandered over and watched for a minute. Remembering the word the old man on the beach had used, Brendan pointed at the stone and said,
“Shanbruk?”
The boy looked at him and laughed. Then he said,
“Naybu.”
That was one of the few words Brendan knew. It meant “no.” He tried again.
“Shanpana?”
“Naybu, naybu,”
the boy said. He held up the stone.
“Shantoji.”
The word may have been foreign, but the way he said it carried the universal tone of someone patiently trying to educate an idiot.
“Forget it,” Brendan said. He went back to the tent and got out his music player. He was going through batteries faster than he'd expected, but he really needed to sit back and blast some tunes.
His father came in a while later. When he started to talk, Brendan removed his headphones.
“Big day tomorrow,” his father said. “Some sort of special ceremony.”
“Like what?” Brendan asked. That sounded like it might be a nice change of pace.
“I don't know,” his father said, “but we'll find out soon enough. I think it has to do with
Murgobruk
.”
Great,
Brendan thought,
some kind of bug-fish ceremony.
He put his headphones back on and listened to music until he felt sleepy.
The next morning, Brendan was startled awake by shouting. A boy named Jasi stuck his head in the tent and yelled,
“Murgopana! Tanu gan weroba! Murgopana!”
Brendan shot off of his cot, wondering what was going on. He staggered outside, along with his father. The
villagers were all heading toward the mountain that rose from the center of the island.
“What's going on?” Brendan asked his father.
“I don't know, but it will be a great opportunity to learn about these people.”
Brendan and his father followed the villagers, who were hustling along the path. The people didn't seemed panicked, but they were definitely tense. From all around, Brendan kept hearing one word:
“Murgopana.”
Once the people reached the inland cliffs, they streamed into a cave. After everyone was inside, they started to drag a large rock across the opening, using wooden handles tied to it with ropes. The village chief looked out toward Brendan and his father. He pointed into the cave and said something.
“Shouldn't we join them?” Brendan asked.
“We won't learn anything in there,” his father said. “I'm pretty sure that whatever they're hiding from is going to happen out here.” He turned toward the chief and said,
“Naybu.”
The chief touched his chest in a gesture that Brendan knew meant “farewell.”
Brendan watched as the boulder sealed the villagers within the cave. “You sure we're safe?”
“Positive,” his father said. “They kept mentioning
weroba.
That's the ocean. Whatever is supposed to happen, I think it will happen there.” He headed toward the beach.
Brendan followed him. Again, they paused in front of
the statue of Murgobruk. “Why were they shouting, ‘Murgopana'?” Brendan asked.
“I'm not sure,” his father said. “‘Bruk' means ‘big'. And ‘toji' means ‘small.' They attach that to the end of a word. For example, ‘horu' is ‘man.' So they call me ‘horubruk' and they call you ‘horutoji.' I'm the big man and you're the little man.”
“But what about ‘pana'?” Brendan asked when they reached the beach.
His father shook his head. “I haven't quite figured that out yet. It could mean ‘tiny.'”
“Well, if the
murgopana
shows up, we'll know the answer,” Brendan said. He plunked down on the fallen tree and dug in the sand with his toes. He looked out toward the water. It was unusually calm today. Maybe the natives were afraid of calm water, he thought. That made him grin.
He glanced down at the sand.
Shanpana.
The word bubbled up into his mind.
Shanpana?
Brendan thought back to the day before.
The ocean grew less calm. The water started to churn. Brendan turned toward his father. “‘Shanbruk' means ‘big rock,' right?”
“Very good,” his father said. “And I thought you really weren't interested in my work.”
Brendan looked ahead. The water almost seemed to be boiling now. It was frothing and splashing, like a hard rain was pounding it. But the sky was clear. Brendan rose from the fallen tree and took a step toward the ocean.
Shanpana,
he thought. That's what the old guy had called his handful of sand. A handful of sand—many little rocks.
Many little …
Brendan looked at the sand at his feet. Then he looked at the water just ahead of him. The surf practically exploded in a burst of activity.
“Murgopana,”
Brendan said, suddenly understanding. Murgobruk was the huge statue. It wasn't real. It was far to big to exist. But
murgopana,
that was different … .
Brendan screamed as the
murgopana
burst from the surf and swarmed onto the beach. They looked liked the large statue, but each one was only the size of a scorpion. There seemed to be hundreds of them, maybe thousands. They charged onto the sand in wave after wave. The air filled with the clicking of their claws as they headed toward Brendan and his father.
“Pana!”
Brendan's father shouted. “I know what it means now.”
“I'm way ahead of you, Dad,” Brendan said. He turned to run. But the many small creatures, the
murgopana,
had another quality Brendan was about to discover. They were small, but they were also very fast.

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