Mrs. Lizzy Is Dizzy! (4 page)

Friday was Crazy-Everything Day. I wore a bucket on my head and bounced to school on a pogo stick. Ryan wrapped himself in toilet paper. Michael attached bike horns all over his clothes and beeped them when he moved. Neil wore flip-flops and a hockey mask, and he carried a flyswatter
in one hand and a banana in the other.

This had to be the craziest day in the history of the world!

Mr. Granite spent the whole morning trying to teach us stuff, but it was useless. Nobody could pay attention. Finally it was lunchtime and we got to go to the vomitorium.

The guys and me sat at one table, and Andrea and her girly friends sat at the next one. We tried making armpit farts to get rid of them, but they wouldn’t leave.

Michael was eating a Lunchable. Ryan had soup in a thermos. I was eating a jelly and peanut butter sandwich. I used to eat peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, but
my mom said I couldn’t have the same lunch every single day, so I told her to make me a jelly and peanut butter sandwich instead.
*

“I wonder what Mrs. Lizzy is gonna teach us today,” Michael said.

“Something weird, that’s for sure,” said Ryan.

“That lady has way too much time on her hands,” said Neil the nude kid.

“Maybe Mrs. Lizzy isn’t our recess enrichment teacher at all,” I told the guys. “Did you ever think of that?”

“What do you mean, A.J.?” asked Michael.

“Well, maybe she kidnapped our
real
recess enrichment teacher and has her tied up in a secret room in the basement of the school. Stuff like that happens all the time, you know.”

“You say that about
everybody
, Arlo,” said Andrea at the next table.

“I do not.”

“Do too.”

We went back and forth like that for a while. But nobody wanted to hang around the vomitorium. We rushed through our lunch so we could see Mrs. Lizzy on the playground.

She looked crazier than
ever
! She had a spaghetti strainer on her head and a Ping-Pong paddle hanging from her neck, and
she was carrying a big box.

“Hi Mrs. Lizzy!” we all yelled. “What’s in the box?”

“Worms!” Mrs. Lizzy exclaimed as she opened the box to show us.

“Worms?!”
we all yelled.

“Ew, disgusting!” said Emily.

“Are we going fishing today?” asked Andrea.

“No, we’re going worm composting!” Mrs. Lizzy said.

Even Andrea didn’t know what that meant. But Mrs. Lizzy told us that you can use worms to turn food scraps into this
stuff called compost that can be added to soil to grow plants, flowers, fruits, and vegetables.

“The worms eat your leftovers and turn it into worm poop,” Mrs. Lizzy explained. “It helps things grow.”

“Ew, disgusting!” we all said.

“We’re supposed to put worm poop on our vegetables and then eat them?” Ryan asked. Ryan will eat anything. One time he ate a piece of the cushion on the school bus. But I don’t think he would eat something that was grown in worm poop.

“Yes!” Mrs. Lizzy said. “Worm poop makes a great natural fertilizer. And all you have to do…”

She didn’t have the chance to finish her sentence because at that very moment the most amazing thing in the history of the world happened. Officer Spence came running over.

“Freeze, dirtbag!” he yelled, pointing his finger at Mrs. Lizzy just like they do on TV cop shows. “You’re under arrest!”

WHAT?!

Suddenly, five guys in dark blue uniforms and sunglasses came running over. They surrounded Mrs. Lizzy.

“WOW,” we all said, which is “MOM” upside down.

“Put your hands in the air, lady,” Officer Spence ordered Mrs. Lizzy. “And don’t try any funny stuff!”

Mrs. Lizzy put her hands in the air even though Officer Spence didn’t actually have a gun. It was cool.

“Why are you arresting Mrs. Lizzy?” asked Andrea. “She didn’t do anything wrong. She’s our recess enrichment teacher!”

“No she’s not,” Officer Spence said. “She’s just
pretending
to be your recess enrichment teacher. This woman is actually…the crazy lady who escaped from the loony bin last week!”

“Gasp!” everybody gasped.

“That’s not true!” Mrs. Lizzy yelled.

“Oh, yes it is,” Officer Spence insisted. “Mrs. Lizzy—or whatever her name is—kidnapped your
real
recess enrichment teacher and tied her up in a secret room in the basement of the school!”

“That’s a lie!” Mrs. Lizzy yelled.

“Oh, yeah?” Officer Spence said. “Go get her, boys.”

The guys with the sunglasses ran into the
school and came back out carrying a lady who was tied to a chair. Officer Spence took off the rag that was tied over her mouth.

“Ma’am,” he said, “would you mind telling these kids who you are?”

“I’m Mrs. Sanford,” the lady said. “I was on my way to school on Monday to start the Recess Enrichment Program when that woman kidnapped me! She tied me up
in a secret room in the basement of the school!”

“WOW!” everybody said.

“I did not!” said Mrs. Lizzie.

“You did too!”

They went back and forth like that for a while.

“See?” I said to Andrea. “I
told
you Mrs. Lizzy kidnapped our recess enrichment teacher and had her tied up in a secret room in the basement of the school!”

“Does this mean we’ve been taking recess enrichment classes from a psycho cannibal zombie who eats kids for breakfast?” asked Ryan.

“Can you untie me now?” asked Mrs.
Sanford, the lady who was tied to the chair.

“In a minute,” Officer Spence told her. “I want Mr. Klutz to see this.”

While Officer Spence was putting handcuffs on Mrs. Lizzy, Mr. Klutz and Mrs. Jafee came running over.

“What’s going on here?” asked Mr. Klutz.

“Remember that crazy person who escaped from the loony bin last week?” Officer Spence said. “Well, here she is! Mrs. Lizzy is an imposter. She has been posing as the recess enrichment teacher all week.”

Mr. Klutz turned to face Mrs. Jafee.

“Didn’t you hire this woman to teach recess enrichment?” he asked.

“No, I thought you hired her,” said Mrs. Jafee.

“I didn’t hire her.”

“Well, neither did I.”

“Nobody hired her,” Officer Spence told them. “She just showed up on Monday and told everybody she was the recess enrichment teacher. She’s been teaching the children ridiculous things like how to milk goats and make armpit farts.”

“Those are important things to know!” yelled Mrs. Lizzy.

“Quiet, you!” said Officer Spence.

“And who is
this
woman tied to the
chair?” asked Mr. Klutz.

“I’m the
real
recess enrichment teacher,” said Mrs. Sanford. “I was going to teach the children useful things like how to use a camera, play musical instruments, and do arts and crafts projects.”

“Did you try to escape when you were tied up in the basement?” Ryan asked Mrs. Sanford.

“How could I escape?” she replied. “I was tied to a chair! And I couldn’t yell because there was a rag over my mouth!”

“You could have made armpit farts,” I suggested. “Somebody would have heard them and rescued you.”

“Or you could have yodeled with your
mouth closed,” suggested Michael. “That’s what I would have done.”

“I don’t know how to yodel or make armpit farts!” said Mrs. Sanford.

“Too bad,” said Neil. “If you had learned that stuff as a kid, none of this would have happened.”

“Are you blaming
me
for getting kidnapped?” asked Mrs. Sanford. “Untie me right now! I will never teach at this school again.”

“You haven’t taught here
yet
,” Mrs. Jafee told her. “We’ll untie you in a minute.”

“I checked up on Mrs. Lizzy,” said Officer Spence. “She’s wanted in thirty states. She goes from school to school pretending
to be a teacher. But she never got a teaching certificate. She’s a phony.”

“Oh, snap!” said Ryan.

“I just assumed she was one of our teachers,” said Mr. Klutz. “I mean, she showed up every day with crazy hair, crazy clothes, a crazy hat, and crazy shoes.”

“That’s because she’s
crazy
!” Officer Spence yelled. “And she picked the perfect week to come to our school. Nobody noticed how crazy she was because it was Crazy Week.”

Wow! I always thought there were a lot of crazy teachers in our school, but this is the first time one was
really
crazy. And we got to see it live and in person.

“Good work, Officer Spence!” said Mr. Klutz.

“Just doing my duty, sir.”

We all giggled because Officer Spence said “duty.” I think he should get the No Bell Prize for figuring out that Mrs. Lizzy wasn’t a real teacher.

“Take her away, boys,” Officer Spence said.

“I want to teach! I want to teach!” Mrs. Lizzy shouted as they dragged her away. “The children must learn how to yodel. Get your hands off my worms!”

“Don’t worry, Mrs. Lizzy,” Mrs. Jafee said. “We’ll get you the help that you need, you betcha.”

“I say they should lock her up and throw away the key,” said Officer Spence.

“Why would they do that?” I told him. “Then they won’t be able to unlock the lock.”

“That’s the
idea
, Arlo!” Andrea said, rolling her eyes.

“They could make a new key,” I told Andrea.

“You shouldn’t throw away keys,” said Emily. “Keys can be recycled.”

We watched as the guys with sunglasses put Mrs. Lizzy and her worms into a patrol car. She was yelling something about balloon animals.

I thought that would be the end of Crazy Week. But something even
crazier
happened the next Monday.

We were at recess swinging on the swings when you’ll never guess in a million hundred years who showed up on the playground.

No, it wasn’t Mrs. Lizzy.

I
told
you that you wouldn’t be able to guess. So nah-nah-nah boo-boo on you.

Just for that, I’m not gonna tell you who it was.

Okay, okay, I’ll tell you.

It was Pootie the goat!

There we were, minding our own business, when out of nowhere Pootie wandered over! It was the most amazing thing in the history of the world!

“Naaaaaaayyyyy,” said Pootie the goat.

“What’s that goat doing here?” asked Ryan.

“She must have escaped from Rent-A-Goat,” I said.

Pootie the goat was making weird noises.

“I think something’s wrong with Pootie,” Andrea said.

“Maybe she’s sick,” said Emily.

“Maybe she just needs to be milked,” said Neil the nude kid.

“Well, I’m not milking her,” Andrea said.

“I’m not milking her,” said Ryan.

“I’m not milking her,” said Michael.

Nobody wanted to milk Pootie the goat.

“I say Arlo should milk her,” said Andrea.

“Why?” I asked. “I milked her last time.”

“That’s exactly why you should milk her
this
time, Arlo,” Andrea said. “You
know
how to milk a goat. We don’t know what to do.”

“Milk the goat! Milk the goat!” everybody started chanting.

I was faced with the hardest decision of my life. If I milked Pootie, everybody
would make fun of me for sure. And if I didn’t milk Pootie, well, I was afraid that she might explode and there would be milky pieces of goat all over the place.

I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t know what to do. I had to think fast. I was concentrating so hard that my brain hurt.

Finally, I decided that I would rather be made fun of than be covered by milky pieces of exploded goat. So I got down on my knees and did what Mrs. Lizzy told me to do.

I thought I was gonna die. But Pootie calmed down as soon as I started milking her.

“Naaaaaaayyyyy,” said Pootie.

“You’re good at that, A.J.,” said Neil. “When you grow up, you should milk goats for a living.”

“Oooooh!”
Ryan said. “A.J. is milking Pootie the goat. They must be in
love
!”

“Hey A.J., when are you and Pootie gonna get married?” asked Michael.

If those guys weren’t my best friends, I would hate them.

Well, that’s pretty much what happened during Crazy Week at Ella Mentry School. I’m gonna miss Mrs. Lizzy. She may have been crazy, but she was cool. None of our
real
teachers ever showed us how to do cool stuff like yodel or do fart noises with our armpits. And she made great balloon animals. My mom really liked her Mother’s Day present.

Mrs. Lizzy was right about one thing. You never know when you might have to milk a goat.

Maybe the Board of Education will cancel the Recess Enrichment Program and just let us have fun again. Maybe we’ll
have another lockdown. Maybe Mrs. Lizzy will cut her hair and get earmuffs. Maybe Officer Spence will stop saying the word “duty.” Maybe a zombie cannibal psycho who eats kids for breakfast will escape from the loony bin. Maybe Emily’s mom will use a plate instead of eating breakfast in her pajamas. Maybe they’ll let Mrs. Lizzy out of the loony bin so she can finish telling us about worm poop. Maybe Pootie will go back to Rent-A-Goat. Maybe we’ll be able to talk Mr. Klutz into having another Crazy Week next year.

But it won’t be easy!