Pet Day Surprise

Chapter One
 
 
“I don’t care what you have in that box,” Melissa McKane said to Benjamin Hyde as they walked to school. “It could never be as good as Jeffrey’s report was.”
 
“Yeah,” said Kenny Thompsen. “Really cool, Jeffrey. A squirt-gun fight right in class. I couldn’t believe it.”
 
Jeffrey Becker smiled. He knew his best friends—Ben, Melissa, and Kenny—were all going to give terrific science reports in Mrs. Merrin’s third-grade class. But none of them could be as cool as his report had been yesterday. Even Jeffrey had to admit it.
 
“It wasn’t a squirt-gun fight,” Jeffrey explained. “It was a scientific report on water pressure. I think it’s a step forward for education. You get just as wet as in a squirt-gun fight, but you learn more.”
 
“I died when you said that to Mrs. Merrin,” Kenny said.
 
Melissa did a cartwheel on the sidewalk. “She must really like you. What other teacher would let you squirt her?”
 
“I had to do it,” Jeffrey said, grinning. “It was my proof that water pressure is strongest when the squirt gun is full.”
 
A cold February wind blew, and Ben pulled his down jacket around the shoe box he was carrying.
 
“Do me a favor,” Ben said to Jeffrey. “Don’t become a researcher when you grow up. I don’t think the world is ready for a scientist with your kind of mind.”
 
Jeffrey laughed. He and Ben had been a team ever since kindergarten. Ben was going to be a scientist when he grew up. His wild inventions were great at getting the two of them into trouble. And Jeffrey’s stories were great at getting them out of it.
 
“So what’s in the box, Ben?” Jeffrey asked.
 
“A thamnophis,” Ben answered, as if everyone knew what that was.
 
“In English, Ben,” Jeffrey said.
 
“A thamnophis,” Ben explained, “is another name for a garden snake. My report is on snakes, and I’m bringing in a prime specimen.” Ben pushed his gold-rimmed glasses back on his nose.
 
“Can I hold him, please?” asked Melissa.
 
“Her,” Ben said. “But I’m not opening the box. I don’t want Miranda to get cold.”
 
“Did you know that Arvin Pubbler is actually scared of snakes?” Melissa said with a laugh. “Maybe he’ll faint and you can do a report on first aid at the same time.”
 
Kenny, who always worried about other people’s feelings, asked, “Do you think Mrs. Merrin is afraid of snakes?”
 
“If she can face Jeffrey every day, I don’t think she’s afraid of anything,” Melissa teased.
 
Jeffrey looked at the box with interest. “If you’ve really got a snake in there, your report is going to be totally coolsville.”
 
Ben raised one eyebrow. “Coolsville? Jeffrey, sometimes you’re really weird.”
 
Whoops, Jeffrey thought. Coolsville. That wasn’t something that he’d normally say. But it was something that Max would say. Max always said things like “coolsville” and “dig you the most.” Max talked like people had in the 1950s, because that’s when Max had lived. Now he was a ghost. He was the third-grade ghost, and Jeffrey had found him in his desk at school.
 
The trouble was, no one but Jeffrey could see Max. So naturally no one else believed that Max existed. Finally, Jeffrey had stopped trying to convince his friends that he really knew a ghost. When the water fountain all by itself suddenly started squirting people in the face, or when Mrs. Merrin wanted to show a videotape about the moon but Bugs Bunny cartoons came on instead, Jeffrey just sat there and enjoyed the show. He knew it was the Max Show—the funniest classroom show ever.
 
When they got to school, Ben put the box on the back table by the sink. He stuck a giant Do Not Disturb sign on it. Everyone wanted to know what was inside, but Ben wouldn’t tell. He made Jeffrey, Kenny, and Melissa promise not to tell, either. Finally, after lunch, it was Ben’s turn to give his science report.
 
“Don’t worry,” said Jeffrey, who sat next to Ben. “I’ll help you out if it starts to get boring.”
 
Ben picked up his shoe box and his note cards. He walked to the front of the classroom. Then he wrote the word snake on the chalkboard in wavy, snakelike letters.
 
“The snake is in the scientific order of Serpents,” Ben said. “And you’ll find them in the class of Reptiles.”
 
“Just like this class,” Brian Carr called out. Brian never really listened to anything Snake that was going on. And he always interrupted everyone.
 
Ben ignored him. “Just imagine for a moment that you are a snake,” Ben said to the class. “How would you like to crawl on your stomach?”
 
“How’d you like to make me?” Brian demanded.
 
“That’s enough, Brian,” warned Mrs. Merrin.
 
“People don’t understand a lot of things about snakes,” Ben continued. “But now it’s time to come face-to-face with the truth about snakes.” With that, Ben dramatically ripped off the top of the shoe box. He pulled out Miranda, his long, dark garden snake. Miranda was a foot and a half long and thin. She curled around Ben’s arm, her tongue darting in and out.
 
“Pass her around,” said Melissa, who still wanted to get her hands on the snake.
 
“Don’t do it!” shouted Arvin Pubbler. “Put it back in the box!”
 
Ben started to show the snake around. But Arvin kept yelling.
 
“It’s on me! I can feel it!” Arvin yelled out.
 
Everyone looked over at him.
 
“It’s crawling on my neck!” he said, afraid to move.
 
No one could see a snake on Arvin. And no one could understand why he was so upset. Only Jeffrey knew.
 
Standing next to Arvin was Max, the third-grade ghost. He was running his finger up and down Arvin Pubbler’s back, giving him the chills. He made himself visible to Jeffrey for just a second. Then he disappeared again.
 
“Arvin,” said Mrs. Merrin, trying to comfort her frightened student, “it’s just your imagination.”
 
No it’s not, Jeffrey thought. But he kept the truth to himself.
 
Finally, Ben finished his report and put his snake back in the shoe box. Then he returned to his seat.
 
“I thought you were going to help me out,” Ben whispered to Jeffrey.
 
“With Arvin screaming and Brian interrupting, it never got boring,” Jeffrey replied.
 
“All right, class. Let’s take out our writing journals,” Mrs. Merrin said. She erased the word snake from the blackboard.
 
“It’s not fair,” Brian Carr blurted out. He said that about sixteen times a day.
 
“What’s not fair this time, Brian?” asked the teacher.
 
“Ben gets to bring his pet to school,” said Brian. “I want to bring my dog to school, too.”
 
Mrs. Merrin smiled. “Ben’s report was on snakes. What’s your report on, Brian?”
 
“Electricity,” answered Brian, “but—”
 
“But it would be really totally cool if we could bring our pets to class,” said Connie Fazio.
 
Mrs. Merrin was quiet. She just let the students say what was on their minds. And everyone had something to say.
 
“Mrs. Merrin,” said Melissa, “I’d like to bring my cat to school.”
 
Ricky Reyes tapped Melissa on the shoulder. “Why don’t you bring your snake instead?”
 
“I don’t have a snake,” Melissa said.
 
“Sure you do,” Ricky said. “His name is Gary.”
 
Ricky, Ben, and Melissa laughed. Ricky was right: Melissa’s older brother, Gary, was a snake.
 
“Could we talk about something else besides pets?” Jeffrey said loudly.
 
But he was cut off by Becky Singer. “Mrs. Merrin, may I say something?” Becky was Melissa’s best friend. She sat in the front of the class, so there was no way Mrs. Merrin could miss her raised hand. But when she got excited, Becky had to call out. “I would just like to say—and I hope it doesn’t hurt your feelings—if Ben brings his pet to school and we can’t, I think that stinks.”
 
When she heard that, Mrs. Merrin just stared at the class for a minute. Then she walked out of the room without saying anything.
 
“Uh-oh,” Melissa said. “We pushed her too far that time.”
 
Jeffrey nodded and waited with everyone else for Mrs. Merrin to return. A few minutes later she came back and sat down on the corner of her desk.
 
“Okay, guys, I’ve just been to the principal’s office,” she said. Everyone was very quiet. “And I’m happy to say, he’s given us permission to have a Pet Day! So, how about this? Two weeks from today, everyone can bring in one pet for sharing.”
 
The class cheered and applauded. Everyone except one person. Jeffrey Becker sat at his desk, resting his chin on his hands. “It’s a terrible idea,” he said. “I hate it.”