Extraordinary Losers 2
Read Extraordinary Losers 2 Online
Authors: Jessica Alejandro
JESSICA ALEJANDRO
ILLUSTRATED BY CHERRYN YAP
Contents
For my Favourite People-:
Cheryl, Christine, Joella and Aw
Hey, guys, pass me the ball!” Janice stamped her feet in impatience. “Please!”
The three boys â Clandestino, Mundi and me â were ignoring her. Whoop, whoop, whoop. Clandestino spun the ball in his hand and raced to the hoop to do a slam dunk.
“And that's how you do it,” he said, sniffling.
Mundi was distracted. “The ball was spinning almost at the speed of sound, no?”
“Cool,” I muttered.
Just two weeks ago, we had agreed to⦠wait⦠been talked into a basketball match to prove our worth to our arch enemies Justin and Leonard. Now it was just two days before the inter-class basketball match.
This match was the biggest deal in Brightstar Primary. The match that would define you as a Real Loser or a Cool Dude. This was a match that teachers had no say in and one of the few matches in school that everyone was excited about. It was a match where children ruled and adults didn't have any say.
“Here, Janice!” I finally got my hands on the ball and as I got ready to pass it to her, I heard an unmistakable chomping.
“JAAAAANNIIICE! How can you eat in the middle of a practice session?”
Janice licked her cream-stained lips. “Don't judge me, Darryl! Basketball is not my thing. And besides, I got bored and hungry.”
She took one more bite of her strawberry donut and squashed the remaining bits into her pocket. Then she dusted her hands and claimed, “Okay, now I am ready. Seriously!”
Mundi was blinking and blinking. “Do you know the basketball match is in two days? Which means it is in 48 hours. In 2,880 minutes. In 172,800 seconds.”
“See, my good friend is faster than a calculator!” Clandestino proclaimed, panting.
He had just run 20 laps round the court in less than 10 seconds. He was the only one with the agile hands and feet. He was the SPEED. His hands and feet were faster than the speed of light. But the rest of us, we were not athletic at all. We weren't fast, agile or basketball material. I was way too short. Every time I looked up at the hoop, the sun was positioned just over the hoop. It would sting my eyes so much that all I saw was a blur of white.
I looked at my three friends. None of us were ready for the match at all. Had I made a wrong decision by accepting the challenge? But we had to! It was a challenge. And challenges are meant to be taken, unless you are really a loser. In this case, we weren't, and it was time to show the world why. Janice ran to her school bag, fished out her phone and came toddling back excitedly.
“Okay, let's try!” she said. “Come, everyone. Watch this!”
She grabbed Mundi by the wrist and forced him to sit down. “Are you ready?” she asked in our form teacher Mr Sebastian Grosse's distinctive voice. Janice never failed to crack us up with her funny impersonations. She could do anybody! Her voice was her power and she would put it to incredibly good use soon.
Mundi nodded.
“34 times 89!” she demanded.
“3,026. No?”
“Awesome!” I said. Janice was still tapping away on the screen. Her fingers were a little too fat and they kept keying in the wrong numbers.
Clandestino, impatient as usual, snatched the phone from Janice. “Here, let me be the judge. Okay, are you ready again, Mundi?”
Mundi nodded again, blinking like a frog in the rain.
“4,536 over 72 equals?”
“63!” Mundi declared, loud and clear.
Clandestino, even with his quick fingers, had just tapped on the equal sign. The answer was really 63!
Janice was excited. “Longer sums! Longer sums! This time I will say out the numbers while Clandestino keys them in.”
“Okay, I'm ready!” Clandestino said.
“Okay ⦠let's see ⦠15 times 23 times 44, divided by 33 divided by 10 times 99, equals?” Janice asked.
“4,554!” Mundi yelled.
It's reeeeaally incredible,” she said, stupefied.
“You're Amazing Mundi!” I said, ruffling his hair.
“Thank you.” He bowed. It was indeed 4,554. Janice leaned over to check the answer on her handphone. The screen was foggy with fingerprints and splatters of donut cream.
We were 11 years old. If you didn't know by now, all four of us are special. Even though we all have special powers, a calculator never fails to intrigue us. Even Mundi, who is a genius. How does the calculator know the answer to every Math question? And why do we need to draw models in Math problem sums when there is the magical calculator? All we really need to do is learn to tap on it fast enough. If there are touch-typing courses (where people learn to tap on the keyboard without looking), there should also be calculator courses where kids learn to press numbers quickly, accurately and without looking. That would indeed be a true life skill!
All of a sudden, a loud exclamation interrupted my thoughts. I have the ability to hear very very very well, but the calculator had distracted me so much that I didn't hear this one coming.
“Help! Help! Children!!”
“Guys! Do you hear something?” I asked.
The three of them looked at me blankly.
“I can hear something. Someone is running towards us, and⦔
Clandestino grew impatient. “Come on, Darryl! What is it?”
They couldn't hear anything. But I could discern nervous, frantic footsteps and a very panicky voice.
“Oh no! How could this have happened?” A voice accompanied the footsteps. They were coming from the direction of the main office.
“We can't hear anything?!” Janice waved. “Yoo hoo, Darryl, anybody home?”
“Wait, she is coming towards us.”
“Who's she?” Clandestino asked.
All of a sudden, we saw a lady running towards us. She was a skinny lady. Bespectacled with curly hair. The most timid person in the whole school. Her voice was barely audible. Her speech was a whisper, her yell was a squeak, her sneeze was a fizz, her footsteps were a⦠well, you get the idea.
“Miss Teo?” Janice said. It was indeed Miss Teo, our school's operations manager, running towards us. Arms flailing like a damsel in distress. She was panting. Panting hard.
“Old people really don't run fast at all!” Clandestino said with a yawn.
Miss Teo was in her forties and had mixed feelings about being called a “Miss”. She was, however, the kindest person in school. Whenever students got a scolding from a teacher, she would rush to their aid. Just recently, I had to stay back for detention as I had arrived late for school.
Miss Teo slid me a packet of fries and a can of Coke just so I wouldn't go hungry. Every student in the school liked her because she wasn't a teacher and she didn't scold us.
“Children! Finally, someone!” She gasped. “My favourite four!”
The four of us stared at one another with raised eyebrows.
“I was walking out of the office towards the staircase, when I saw⦠Just follow me and you'll know what I mean.” Miss Teo beckoned us to the office, desperation written all over her face.
We followed her obediently like restless Brightstars. After all, our basketball practice session wasn't going anywhere.
“I was walking out of the office towards the staircase when I saw ⦠” Janice mimicked, her arms flailing.
“Ssh⦠Janice! This is serious,” I warned. Miss Teo spun around when she heard our voices, and we acted like nothing happened. As we tailed Miss Teo, the excitement was so overwhelming that Clandestino began twirling his pens.