The Final Exam (29 page)

Abernathy continued to gaze at Lulu, Theo, Hyacinth, Garrison, and Madeleine. These were his first real friends, outside of insects and squirrels. He trusted them; he knew them to be flawed but honest people. They believed in Mrs. Wellington, and that was something Abernathy simply couldn’t ignore, regardless of how hard he tried.

“Are you that reporter who’s going to run the story on School of Fear?” Abernathy asked quietly.

“Yes. I’m Sylvie Montgomery, the future winner of this year’s Snoopulitzer.”

“Well, then I guess we should talk.”

“No!” the School of Fearians screamed. “Don’t do this! You’re wrong! Please give her a chance!”

Just as Abernathy prepared to open his mouth, Basmati started screaming. And for once, it wasn’t about Toothpaste or Mrs. Wellington.

“Fire! Fire!” Basmati hollered as black smoke billowed out of the roof of the Contrary Conservatory.

Basmati, Mrs. Wellington, Schmidty, Abernathy, and the School of Fearians took off toward the house as Sylvie smiled euphorically.

“This just may be the best day of my life! First, an exposé on a secret society, and now a fire… It just doesn’t get any better than this!” Sylvie said with delight before waddling after the others.

The top floor of the Contrary Conservatory was aflame, with clouds of heavy smoke pouring from the windows. Fortunately, standing on the ground, covered in soot, were the three Contrarians.

“Someone call the fire department!” Theo screamed.

“There’s no phone here, Mister Theo!” Schmidty explained as he frantically searched for the hose.

“I must find the switch!” Basmati shrieked as he dangerously approached the front door of the Contrary Conservatory.

“You mustn’t go in there!” Mrs. Wellington hollered. “Step back, Basmati!”

“The switch! The switch!” Basmati repeated as he pulled a red lever on the corner of the front stoop.

Almost immediately, the sound of a complex sprinkler system went off inside the house. As the fire sizzled and smoke continued to pour out of the blackened structure, Basmati turned toward the singed Contrarians.

“Was Toothpaste in there?” Basmati asked with tears in his eyes.

“No,” Fitzy replied quietly. “We don’t know where he is, but he isn’t in the house.”

After releasing an audible sigh, Basmati stepped closer to Fitzy, Bard, and Herman, whose hair was unflatteringly charred from the fire.

“In twenty-five years of teaching difficult students,
no one has ever managed to burn down half my house,” Basmati said, seething with rage. “Do you have any idea how long it took me to build this place?”

“We’re really sorry,” Fitzy muttered, as Bard and Herman both echoed, “Sorry.”

“We were hiding in the greenhouse, and we wanted to see if burning roses would make the air smell like perfume. And before we knew it, flames were whipping all around us. It was really scary,” Fitzy babbled as his burned tee shirt crumbled to dust. “We’re giving up danger for good.”

“You’re giving up danger for good?” Basmati repeated with surprise.

“Yeah,” Fitzy grunted meekly. “We’re done. We can’t take it anymore.”

“All of you?” Basmati asked.

All three boys nodded feebly, still reeling from the fire.

“Well, normally I would say you had graduated, but seeing as I still think you know where Toothpaste is, I can’t do that,” Basmati said coldly.

“I swear we have no idea where that bird is!” Fitzy declared.

“Bird?” Sylvie said quietly to herself.

“I don’t believe you! Where is Toothpaste? Tooooothpaaaaaste!” Basmati shrieked emotionally.

“Hello?” a man’s deep voice cut through the air.

As everyone looked around, Sylvie sheepishly closed her coat.

“Hello? Toothpaste wants a cracker. Toothpaste wants a cracker. And a car. Toothpaste wants a car, preferably a BMW,” the deep voice continued as the group focused in on a highly suspect lump in Sylvie’s coat.

“About that source you mentioned—you know, the one who told you about the secret door. It wasn’t by chance a little birdie, was it?” Lulu asked knowingly.

“You have Toothpaste!” Basmati exclaimed angrily.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about!” Sylvie shot back defensively.

“I love you, Toothpaste!” Basmati screamed.

“I hate you, Basmati,” Toothpaste responded from inside Sylvie’s coat.

Basmati twirled his half-mustache before letting out an evil cackle that lasted almost thirty seconds. After which he grabbed the pink-skinned reporter by the arms.

“I’ve always enjoyed the taste of bacon. And you know what bacon is made of, don’t you? Dead pig,” Basmati said eerily as he opened Sylvie’s blue jacket and pulled out a small but terribly animated canary. Just as Fitzy had said, the bird was indeed sporting a bald spot above his right eye.

“Look, I didn’t kidnap the bird—he found me! Or he found my sandwich, actually,” Sylvie explained. “And then he just started talking and talking. I tried to interrogate him, but it was impossible to have a conversation because he disagreed with everything I said!”

“Good bird,” Basmati said, kissing Toothpaste’s bald spot.

“Bad human,” Toothpaste chirped.

“But then I caught on to his game, and that’s how I found the trapdoor. He told me some other stuff, too; my story on the Contrary Conservatory should make an amazing follow-up to the one on School of Fear. Now, then, Abernathy: How about that quote?”

“What quote?”

“About your stepmother,” Sylvie said victoriously as Schmidty, Mrs. Wellington, and the School of Fearians
grabbed one another’s hands in preparation for what was to come.

“Edith Wellington married my father when I was pretty young, and I admit that at first I really didn’t like her… not one bit. You see, I had promised my mother I would protect my father, and that is exactly what I intended to do: protect him from all the other women out there. But then I realized maybe that wasn’t
exactly
what she meant…”

Mrs. Wellington smiled at Abernathy, tears welling in her eyes.

“Yeah, but when did she send you to the forest?” Sylvie asked aggressively.

“Never.”

“What do you mean, ‘never’?”

“I mean she never sent me to the forest; I’ve been at Summerstone this whole time,” Abernathy lied.

“I’ve been training him, preparing him to continue the family legacy,” Mrs. Wellington added, tears streaming down her overly made-up face.

“Boring! Who is going to give me the Snoopulitzer for that?” Sylvie snapped before looking at Hyacinth.
“Thanks a lot for wasting my time! No one cares about happy stories; they want misery, drama, destruction! Oh, forget it; I guess I’ll just write about Basmati now!”

“How exciting!” Basmati responded joyfully. “Who is he?”

“You are he!”

“I am who?” Basmati answered.

“You are Basmati! And I am writing an article on you and the Contrary Conservatory.”

“How could you be writing an article about yourself?”

“I’m not! I’m writing it about you, Basmati!”

“But I’m not Basmati, you are,” Basmati shot back emphatically. “And I can have two government officials and a psychiatrist here in an hour to prove it. And then it’s off to the sanitarium for you.”

“Well,” Sylvie blustered, “maybe I should look into that gambling-obsessed attorney instead.”

“If I may inquire, Sylvie,” Schmidty asked calmly, “was it Munchauser who sold you the children’s files?”

“Twenty-five dollars and some inside information on the horses goes a long way with that guy,” Sylvie grunted angrily before waddling away.

“You did it, contestants!” Mrs. Wellington said, engulfing
the five students in a group hug. “You saved the school! You saved me!”

“We also saved ourselves from total humiliation. I don’t know what I would have done if the truth about my girdle came out,” Theo admitted.

“Come, children, let’s get out of here,” Mrs. Wellington said as she led them away from Basmati and the soot-covered Contrarians. “We have a graduation to plan.”

“We graduated?” Madeleine said elatedly.

“With honors.”

“Does that mean no more summers at School of Fear?” Garrison asked with a tinge of sadness.

“No, not as students—but maybe as counselors,” Mrs. Wellington said with a wink.

“Counselor Theo. I like the sound of that!” Theo announced.

“Of course you do!” Lulu, Garrison, Madeleine, and Hyacinth chimed in unison before breaking into laughter.

N
ever in all my many years of teaching have I had the pleasure of meeting five such remarkable individuals. Your compassion and bravery have inspired me, changing the very fabric and quality of my life,” Mrs. Wellington announced from behind a silver podium atop a sparkly pink stage on the front lawn of Summerstone.

In honor of School of Fear’s graduation, Schmidty had laid out ten rows of silver chairs, a pathway of rose petals, and a large pink stage. The audience, filled with
the students’ parents and siblings, emanated relief, excitement, and a healthy dose of shock. This was a moment they had long imagined, the day their children’s lives were no longer guided by fear, but by their dreams.