Guy Wire Read Free Page B

I said, putting both hands on the boxand sliding it quickly over to the edge of the table, where I held it tightly against my chest.
    “No problem,” he said. “Some people don’t like swapping. George always said my lunch was too boring to trade anyway. You probably got something way more interesting than PBJ, huh?”
    “Maybe,” I said, knowing full well that whatever my mother had packed was guaranteed to scoot right past “interesting” directly into the category of “totally bizarre.”
    Fennimore unwrapped his sandwich and bit off the soft point of one of the triangles. He smiled at me as he chewed, but I looked away. He seemed nice enough, and he had made me laugh with his lunch-lady robot theory, but there was no getting around the fact that Fennimore was a dork. The helmet hair alone was clear proof of that. And I wasn’t about to befriend a dork. Life was hard enough as it was.
    “Listen,” I said suddenly. “Now that you know where the cafeteria is and everything,you don’t mind if I leave you here and go outside, do you? I sometimes like to play basketball during lunch with my friends when the weather’s nice. So I’m gonna go now, okay?”
    “Oh, sure. Okay,” he said. He sounded a little disappointed, but how sorry could I feel for him? After all, he had a normal lunch in his lunch box and a best friend back home. He was pretty lucky. Me, I didn’t even want to think about what ridiculous thing my mother had packed me for lunch, and it was depressing to think that even someone who had a silly name and walked around dressed up the way he was could have a best friend when I didn’t have one.
    “See you later,” I said as I picked up my lunch box.
    “Okay,” he said.
    When I got outside, I found a bench far away from the basketball court and opened my lunch box. As soon as I saw the contents, I was glad I’d decided not to open it up infront of Fennimore. There was a tortilla stuffed with raisin bran cereal; three slices of American cheese, which she had cut out in the shapes of the letters GUY ; and a can of guava juice. Occasionally my mother puts in something good for dessert, but this time she’d packed a long, hard skinny thing covered in brown sticky stuff, which was coated with tan crumbs. I had no idea what it was. As usual she’d written a note and taped it to the inside of the lid:
    Dear Guysie—hope you like my latest invention. I call it Rabbit Delight. Don’t worry, it’s not made of rabbit—it’s a carrot covered with butterscotch sauce and peanuts. Enjoy!
    Love,
Mom
    I unrolled the tortilla and dumped out the raisin bran. Then I put the cheese inside it and rolled it back up and ate it. I tried the guava juice, but it was repulsive so I threw itand the Rabbit Delight in the trash. It wasn’t exactly a satisfying meal, but believe it or not, I’d had worse. Sometimes the only normal thing in my lunch box was the napkin.
    When I looked up, I saw that Fennimore was standing near the basketball court looking over toward me. I felt sort of bad, because I’d told him I was going out there to play ball, and he could probably tell that I’d just wanted to eat my lunch alone. He raised one hand and kind of half waved at me. I didn’t wave back. I was not going to let my guilty conscience talk me into making the mistake of befriending this kid. My mother’s public displays of wackiness already kept me plenty busy trying to maintain my image as just a normal, regular, seven-year-old boy. I couldn’t afford to rock the boat.
    I wanted a best friend more than anything in the world—but the one I’d been wishing for every time I blew out the birthday candles was definitely not Fennimore Adams.

Chapter Four
    W hen we got back to the classroom after lunch, Mrs. Hunn rang her bell for the second time that same October day.
    “Boys and girls, settle down. Settle down, please. As you know, our second-grade play, The Princess and the Pea , begins rehearsals this afternoon. Up