Sink or Swim Read Free Page A

wonder if the robber who stole Charlie’s uncle’s shoes is the same guy who broke into Mr. Dieterly’s fish store?”
    â€œI wonder if it’s somebody we know,” Lucille adds. “Wouldn’t that be creepy?”
    â€œYeah!” I say. “Just like in
House of Wax
when Professor Henry Jarrod stalks the young and beautiful Sue Allen, and after he catches her he dips her in a vat of boiling hot wax and sticks her in his creepy exhibit of wax-coated corpses, and nobody realizes the dead woman is right under everybody’s nose.”
    â€œExactly like in
House of Wax
,” Sam says. “Only this
really happened
! And whoever did it is still
on the loose
!”
    My friends and I have seen
Wax
, as we like to call it, four and a half times. (The last time we watched it Balthazar ate a bowl of popcorn and threw up all over the couch. We had to stop in the middle to clean up the mess.) Our version of choice is the original, starring Vincent Price. Not the remake, starring Paris Hilton, which gets a minus ten on our fear-o-meter.
    The three of us love being scared. We will watch anything that gets the hairs on our necks to stand up. Of course, I don’t exactly have hairs on my neck anymore. I have scales. And I couldn’t get them to stand up if King Kong walked into my room carrying Jack the Ripper on his shoulders.
    â€œWe’re here, guys.” Sam points to the herd of wild animals otherwise known as the Stevenson Middle School student body, and we elbow our way across the courtyard and climb the big stone steps that lead to the lobby. My eight-foot tail barely makes it through the heavy metal front door before it slams behind us.
    The warning bell for first period rings. We’ve got Mr. Arkady’s science class in exactly sixty seconds.
    Mr. Arkady is my favorite teacher, and not just because he has pointy teeth, wears a black cape, and looks exactly like Dracula. But it helps.
    I like Mr. Arkady because if you ever have a problem you can always go to him for advice and he never makes you feel like you’re stupid. Unfortunately, he takes off for lateness. We make a mad dash for the third floor.
    â€œWhat’s hangin’, slimy flipper boy?” Craig Dieterly, king of the Banditos, says as he spots me hauling my seven-hundred-and-fifty-pound body up the stairs. He has been making my life miserable ever since we started pre-K together, eight long years ago. “Eat any disgusting insects lately?” He cheerfully punches me so hard in what passes for my arm that I could cry, only I would never give him the satisfaction. I turn around and glare right at him. But mutant dinosaurs basically always look like they are glaring, so I doubt if Craig Dieterly even notices.
    â€œSticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me.” The second it is out of my mouth I regret it.

    â€œThat is so third grade it’s pathetic, Drinkwater.” Craig Dieterly shoves me against the railing.
    â€œHey, watch it, Dieterly,” Lucille says angrily.
    â€œWhy don’t you go pick on someone else for a change?” Sam suggests.
    â€œFat chance,” he growls at Sam. He grabs my neck in his big beefy hands and gets right in my face. “I’m
glad
you broke into my dad’s store. Know why, Turtle Breath?”
    I shake my head, unable to speak.
    â€œBecause when they prove you did it, you will get into so much trouble you’ll wish you had never been born. I’m sick and tired of you making the rest of us look bad with your dumb four-point-six average and your sucky extra credit papers. It’s time somebody made you pay for all the misery you cause for the rest of us.”
    Craig Dieterly’s two Neanderthal-sized friends, Dirk and Dack Schlissel, join us on the stairs. They are famous for two things: having the lowest combined grade point average in the history of seventh grade, and picking their noses when they