The Final Exam (27 page)

“This behavior is absolutely abominable, even for people of your great intellectual shortcomings!” Madeleine huffed angrily.

“You guys are such… such…” Lulu yelled heatedly as she searched her mind for the right word, “jerks!”

“She called us jerks,” Fitzy babbled proudly to Bard and Herman, who then both repeated, “Jerks! Jerks!”

“Do you even realize what you’re doing to us? To our school?” Garrison asked the Contrarians as Hyacinth whispered into Celery’s ear.

As Garrison continued his verbal attack on the Contrarians, the furry little animal ran down Hyacinth’s body, across the ground, and straight up Bard’s leg. Then, with the skill of a covert spy who also happens to be a rodent, Celery grabbed Petey with her mouth and removed him from Bard’s pocket. So deft was Celery’s theft that she was halfway back to Hyacinth before Bard even realized what had happened. And by the time his brain told his body to go after Petey, the stuffed snake was firmly in Hyacinth’s hands.

“Petey!” Bard yelled emotionally, staring at the taxidermied reptile held tightly in Hyacinth’s grasp.

Relishing her newly acquired sense of power, Hyacinth smiled mischievously. There was a great deal of pleasure to be had in tormenting the Contrarians.

“First things first: you are no longer my besties; effective immediately, that title has been revoked,” Hyacinth announced seriously. “Now, on to your snake.”

“Please don’t hurt him!”

“Um, Bard? Petey’s already dead,” Theo reminded him. “What could she possibly do to him?”

Madeleine elbowed Theo, warning him to stop his inadvertent weakening of Hyacinth’s position. A threat to the well-being of the snake was all they had to offer, so ignoring his deceased status was absolutely necessary.

“If you ever want to see Petey again, you need to give us the bird,” Hyacinth declared ferociously.

“I am really starting to like you,” Lulu said with a strange mix of pride and astonishment over the young girl’s bold behavior.

“Oh my gosh! Lulu and I are super besties!” Hyacinth squealed with delight as she broke into a celebratory dance.

“Maybe now isn’t the best time to dance over our friendship, seeing as you’re in the middle of blackmailing the Contrarians…”

“Petey!” Bard wailed, releasing an animalistic scream.

“How can you do this to your friend?” Garrison asked Fitzy with visible disgust. “What kind of a person are you?”

Fitzy looked at Bard’s tormented expression and grunted loudly. Unsure what to do, he bit his lip and closed his eyes. Oddly, the boy remained in this state for nearly thirty seconds.

“Is he meditating?” Theo whispered to Madeleine. “I wouldn’t have guessed he was the metaphysical type.”

“I believe this is something commonly referred to as stalling,” Madeleine answered.

“Oh, come on already! Just spit it out!” Lulu snapped, forcing Fitzy to open his eyes.

“We don’t have Toothpaste,” he finally said.

“Did you eat him?” Theo asked before covering his mouth dramatically with his hand.

“No! What kind of crazies do you take us for?” Fitzy replied, clearly offended by the insinuation.

“Big ones,” Theo replied earnestly. “Big, crazy, mentally imbalanced lunatics.”

“So, the thing is, we kind of don’t have a clue where Toothpaste is,” Fitzy said softly, wincing in anticipation of their response.

“
You kind of don’t have a clue where Toothpaste is?
What does that even mean?” Garrison asked suspiciously.

“We don’t know where the bird is… at all…”

“What kind of incompetent birdnappers lose the bird? It’s deplorable how bad you lot are!” Madeleine huffed angrily. “If you’re going to be criminals, the least you could do is be good ones!”

“I have half a mind to report you to the Better Business Bureau! This kind of shoddy criminal activity will not be tolerated!” Theo hollered nonsensically.

“You guys don’t understand; we never planned on kidnapping Toothpaste. It was an accident,” Fitzy mumbled, his moon-shaped face now cherry red. “We were trying to fly with these cool wings we built, and we wanted to see how a bird flapped up close. So we brought him into the yard to do a few laps, only he flew away immediately. And that was the last we saw of Toothpaste.”

“This is just a wild guess, but the wings didn’t work, did they?” Lulu commented dryly.

“It ended pretty much like the jet packs, only with feathers,” Fitzy admitted.

As the rest of the group fell silent, Bard’s whimpering grew more and more pathetic, until finally Hyacinth could take it no more. Desperate to alleviate the boy’s pain, she returned her now worthless bargaining chip.

“I really hope Toothpaste isn’t agoraphobic,” Theo said with sudden concern for the canary’s mental health.

“A bird that’s afraid of open spaces? I don’t think so,” Lulu countered.

“Animals have phobias, too! Some of them even have psychiatrists!”

“To be honest, Toothpaste looked kind of relieved to escape. I mean, Basmati did shave the bird’s right eyebrow off,” Fitzy said, playing with his messy red hair.

“But birds don’t even have eyebrows,” Madeleine responded, proudly recalling the ornithology section of her biology class.

“All I can tell you is that the bird has a big bald spot above his right eye,” Fitzy told her.

“Petey,” Bard whimpered, happily hugging his stuffed red snake.

“That’s sweet; he seems like a really good dead-pet owner,” Theo said matter-of-factly.

“There’s just one thing I don’t understand: If you never had Toothpaste, why does Basmati think you’re holding him hostage?” Lulu inquired intelligently.

“We may not be birdnappers, but we’re not dumb—”

“That is highly debatable,” Theo interrupted under his breath.

“We realized Basmati would leave us alone if he thought we had Toothpaste. You guys have to understand, he’s really weird. After he caught us lighting our shoes on fire, he tried to marry us off to an alpaca.”

“All three of you to
one
alpaca?” Theo muttered, “Talk about crowded.”

“Contestants!” Mrs. Wellington shouted hysterically from the house. “Contestants! We haven’t much time! This man is going bananas! Where is the bird?”

“Abernathy!” Basmati cried out boldly. “Bring me Abernathy!”

“Schmidty, hide him!” Mrs. Wellington hollered frantically. “Contestants, hurry!”

As the hysterical voices of Mrs. Wellington, Basmati, Schmidty, and Abernathy carried on, the Fearians looked to one another, unsure of their next step. Sensing an
opportunity to escape, the Contrarians slinked off. Knowing that Basmati would soon be looking for them, the trio went in search of a foolproof hiding spot.

“What are we going to do?” Garrison asked, his mouth suddenly parched from fear.

“If someone can find a picture of Toothpaste, some nontoxic paint, and another bird about his size, I think I can handle this,” Theo said hysterically.

“Get a grip! That will never work!” Lulu scolded Theo.

“Abernathy! Come here!” Basmati’s voice reverberated through the yard.

“Well, we can’t just stand here! We have to do something! Think!” Madeleine panicked as tears welled in her eyes.

C
haos, like fire, spreads at an alarmingly fast rate. Having realized that Mrs. Wellington was unable to produce Toothpaste, Basmati flew into a hysterical rage. The man screamed, threatened the life of the old woman’s left eyebrow, and demanded to speak to Abernathy. Believing that Mrs. Wellington had reneged on their deal, Basmati was determined to stop her from reaping the rewards of his hard work.

Under Schmidty’s diligent guidance, Abernathy had
retreated to the topiary garden and was hiding discreetly beneath a well-sculpted hedge. Nearby, Mrs. Wellington desperately attempted to reason with Basmati as he exited the Contrary Conservatory in search of her stepson.

“Please, Basmati! You can’t do this to me!” Mrs. Wellington pleaded with the crazy-eyed man. “You must leave Abernathy alone! He’s already been through so much!”

“You tricked me—you never had any intention of finding Toothpaste!”

“No! How can you even think that? Why would I do such a thing?”

“Because you’ve always been jealous of me!”

“Of you? Have you looked in the mirror recently? It looks like a lawn mower rolled over half your face!”

“Abernathy! Where are you? I must speak to you immediately!” Basmati bellowed as the School of Fearians created a human barricade in front of the contrary man.

“Why don’t you forget about Toothpaste? I can teach Celery to disagree with everything you say,” Hyacinth offered perkily.

“Yeah,” Theo agreed, “you can even dress her up as a bird and keep her in a cage!”

At this, Hyacinth and Celery, who was seated atop her shoulder, exchanged worried glances.

“Basmati, you need to believe us; we did everything to find Toothpaste. But the Contrarians don’t have him. They never did,” Garrison explained.

“I won’t listen to your excuses! Abernathy!” Basmati screamed as the School of Fearians continued to block his path.

“Well, well, well,” a gruff and gravelly voice declared triumphantly from behind the battling group. “Look who I found!”