The Adventures of Pete and the Pals

GGray

GGray

New member
Introduction: How the Pal Club Began

As you can tell from the title, this story is about us—the Pal Club. You folks who aren’t acquainted with us probably want to know a few things...who the Pals are, how the Club was formed, etc. Well, here goes:

Pete Lewis is our leader. He’s eleven years old, and he’s the one who had the idea for our club. He’s got an older brother named Ed who’s nineteen and thinks he rules the world because he goes to college. He’s also got a sister, Anna Rose, who’s fourteen.

Johnny McGillis, who’s also eleven, is the second-in-command in our club. It’s kind of impossible to tell about Johnny’s family without telling about three other members of the Club—Henry, Rory, and Teddy—‘cause they’re his brothers.

Henry’s ten and real legal-minded. He’s the secretary, treasurer, and unoffical lawyer (for when we get into trouble).

Rory’s nine. He’s so fond of snacks that we made him the Offical Picnic Basket Packer.

Teddy’s only eight, so we made him the Citizen. Besides the four boys, there are two girls in the McGillis family—Sally (who’s twelve), and Lauri (who’s one).

The final member of the Pal Club is Tim Scott. He’s ten, and he’s the other Citizen. (Henry insisted that we needed at least two citizens in our club.) He’s got only sisters, ‘cause his mom and dad died a few years ago. His sisters are Amy, who’s twenty-five and unnecessarily bossy, Irene, who’s nineteen, and Evelyn, who’s fifteen and hangs out with Anna Rose.

Now that you know all about us and our families, we’ll tell you how the Pal Club got started. It went like this...

Pete and Tim were Pals ever since Tim moved in to the apartment building at age three. Then, last spring, the McGillises moved in. Pete and Tim naturally went to scout out the situation and see if they had any boys. Of course, they did, and soon all six of us became friends. One Saturday morning a couple of weeks before summer vacation started, we were hanging out in the basement lounge doing nothing in particular. That’s when Pete got his big idea.

“Say!” he shouted. “Let’s form a club!”

“What kind of club?” Johnny asked.

“My sisters belong to a sewing club,” Tim said, not too helpfully.

“Sewing? Are you kidding?” Johnny said in disgust.

“I don’t mean WE hafta have a sewing club—I was just saying,” Tim said hastily.

“I move we form a legal club,” Henry said, looking up from a big, boring-looking book. “We could study law.”

“Forget it,” Pete said. “That’s school. We’re not gonna waste summer vacation on THAT.”

“How about a stamp club?” Teddy suggested.

“Ed belongs to a stamp club,” Pete said. “It’s boring, unless you’ve got enough money to buy the rare and expensive ones. And once you get those, all you want to do is buy more, and before you know it, you’re broke.”

“How about..............” Teddy said. “A Trick Club?”

“Naw,” Tim said. “We’d be in too much trouble. You know Amy’s view of practical jokes.”

We did, and the idea was scrapped.

“I know!” Pete exclaimed. “This is the best idea yet—a Pal Club!”

“What’s a Pal Club do?” Johnny asked.

“Whatever we want,” Pete said. “That’s the best part—if we get bored doing one thing we can quit it and switch to another one, and it’ll still come under the title of ‘Pal Club’, ‘cause we’re Pals no matter what we do! Get it?”

“Super!” Johnny said.

“It’s fine with me,” Tim said.

“Sounds pretty legal,” Henry mused.

“I’m for it!” Rory cheered.

“Me, too!” Teddy said.

“All right!” Pete said. “I’ll be the Leader, ‘cause it was my idea, okay?”

The rest of us had to agree. After the rest of the ranks got handed out, we decided on a clubhouse—the room we were in. Henry told us that, as the treasurer, he needed to collect dues. The rest of us weren’t in favor of that, but Henry insisted. We eventually gave in, and Pete set the amount—a dollar a week.

“That’s most of my allowance!” Rory objected.

“Well, we have to have dues,” Pete said, squelching any further comments. “Anything else before we adjourn?”

“What’s adjourn?” Teddy asked.

“Break up the meeting,” Pete explained.

Amy’s voice ‘broke up’ the meeting just then. “Timothy James Scott! Dinner time!”

We all realized it was time to go upstairs, so most of us scattered. Henry scribbled on the flap of his lawbook, ‘1st meet. P. C. Today’, and followed our example.
 
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Chapter 1: Enter (and Exit) the Spikers

Two weeks before summer vacation, trouble moved in on the 14th floor. (Technically, it was the 13th floor, but the triskaidekaphobic people who owned the building refused to acknowledge it as such.) Yes, trouble...also known as VidKid Castlemaine. His real name was Donald, but we never heard anyone but his uncle call him that. His parents—real rich folks, by the way—had this thing for going on year-long trips, and his uncle was too busy spending money and writing news articles to the editor concerning delinquents to pay much attention to him. We thought for a long time he was complaining about VidKid, until we found out that he barely noticed him.

VidKid copied our club by hunting up the meanest kids in the apartment building and forming the ‘Spikers’ (named after their favorite brand of gel). VidKid was thirteen, and he was the Big Boss. Arch Harrington, who was also thirteen, was the Little Boss. ‘Big Blow’ Bladestyle Burke, who was eleven, was the Expert Firecracker Handler. ‘Heelies’ Frost, who was eleven, too, was the Supplies Manager. (In other words, he stole stuff for the Spikers.) Mohawk McCloy, another eleven-year-old, was the Assistant Supplies Manager. ‘Laser’ Allen, who was ten, was the Spy. Yeah, the names were fake, as you probably guessed. Their real names were Archibald (unusual), Justin, Brandon, Zachery, and Tyler.

The Spikers always wore evil-looking sunglasses, even inside, and used their favorite gel often. VidKid wore his hair in spikes at least six inches tall. They were stiff with gel and stood straight up, like porcupine quills.

At first we Pals tried to be polite, but as soon as we said, “Good morning”, VidKid gave a loud snort. “Doncha ‘good morning’ me, little people. That is soooo uncool.” He skidded away on his heelies, texting furiously on his neon green cell phone.

After that, we tried to ignore the Spikers. That didn’t work either. Within the first week of their club’s forming, they took possession of the basement recreation room. The occupation was controlled by VidKid. He stationed Arch and Big Blow by the elevator, ready to clobber any Pals
who tried to come in. By the staircase entrance were posted ‘Heelies’ and Mohawk, equally ready to clobber us.

Of course, no self-respecting Pal could stand for this. Henry declared it illegal, and everyone else agreed.

“It’s not fair that we can’t go down there anymore,” grumbled Teddy one morning two weeks after VidKid have moved in. He, like all of us, missed the comfortable armchairs, board games, snack machines, and the pool and ping-pong tables that had been taken over by the Spikers.

Pete finally announced that we Pals would hold a council of war. We all gathered in his room to discuss military tactics. It was about half an hour before Pete himself finally arrived, carrying a large bundle under his arm. He put it down on the bed.

“All right,” Pete told us. “Here’s the strategy. VidKid and his friends always leave at night, when the recreation room closes. We’ll have to get in right around then and spend the night there. When the Spikers come down, we’ll spring out and attack.”

Henry was unsure. “Is that legal?”

“Of course it’s legal,” snapped Johnny. “I say it sounds like fun. We’ll liberate the basement from the oppressing Spikers, like the Allies in World War II liberated those European places!” (Johnny loves history—when it involves the army, that is.)

Tim, however, had thought of something. “Suppose they win the fight.”

“I have it all planned out,” Pete grinned. “We’ll scare them silly. I bought these at a costume store. They were going cheap.” With that, Pete opened the large bag and emptied some costumes onto the bed. We Pals, especially Johnny, gazed in interest.

Pete handed Johnny a black costume. If you’ve ever watched The Lord of the Rings and seen one of those Nazgul things, you’ll get the idea of what it looked like. There was even a thin black mask that covered your face, and you could see through but no one else could.

The other costume included a cut-down tuxedo and trick boots that made you look taller than you were. The last prop was a small makeup kit and a false mustache.

“The tuxedo costume’s for me,” Pete explained. “Johnny, you’ve got the Nazgul getup. The rest of you guys will have to wear bedsheets or something. I’ll wear one, too, after I warn the Spikers the basement is ‘haunted’.”

“We’ve only got pink and blue sheets,” Tim said. “Pink and blue ghosts aren’t intimidating.”

“Well, it’ll be intimidating when they see the face,” Pete said. “Instead of getting four masks, I got this makeup kit. Johnny, you’re in charge of getting the other Pals’ faces done. Make them look as close to Frankenstein as possible.”

Johnny grinned. “Okay!”

Pete got into his costume first. He looked like a man with the help of the mustache and makeup kit. (He was supposed to go up the stairs and warn the Spikers that there were ‘monsters’ in the basement.)

He came back upstairs looking disappointed. “They tossed a bottle of coke at me and VidKid said, ‘Yo, Tuxedo! Get a life, and new clothes while you’re at it.’ I guess they didn’t believe me.”

“Too bad,” said Johnny. “They’ll believe you tonight when they get haunted! Here’s your ghost costume, Pete.” Johnny loved his costume. It was real blood-chilling. In fact, we were kinda scared ourselves! The rest of us looked okay—Johnny was real good at drawing gruesome and ugly faces.

“Now, run!” Pete ordered, Anyone who was looking would have see a Black Rider, four white ghosts and one pink ghost sneak downstairs and hide behind couches. The Spikers were getting lectured by the maintenance man for sticking their chewed gum on the pool table and leaving empty pop bottles under the chairs, so they didn’t notice us.

The electricity was turned off in the basement, and the place was darker than a coal cellar (not that any of us had ever been in a coal cellar). Henry was the only one who brought a flashlight, and he was using it to read a National Geographic. We all wanted the light, but he refused.

About five minutes later, we heard Amy’s voice outside, talking to the maintenance man.

“Have you seen my little brother, Timmy?” she asked. “He hasn’t shown up for bed.”

Tim made a digusted noise—quietly, though. “She always complains if I’m not in bed by nine,” he confided to Pete. “I forgot about that!”

“Do you suppose you could have locked him up in the basement?” Amy said.

“No, ma’am,” the maintenance man said. “He’d have yelled if I did that.”

“I’ll take a look just in case,” Amy said.

“Sorry,” the maintenance man said. “It’s closed. I didn’t lock it yet, but—”

We heard Amy open the door. She never did pay attention to what other people said. As you probably guessed, plan number one was a complete flop. Amy discovered us and told us to get upstairs. We all listened, even though Amy is nobody but Tim’s boss. We were grounded for two days.

Pete came up with our next plan while he was grounded. It was a nice one!
 
Weekly dues? Well, never mind that for now.

GGray, I guess you are aware that THIS club, the Professor's Writing Club, has featured much discussion for fiction writers, about how much exposition should go at the opening of a story, versus how quickly to get the action moving. I thought about this afresh as I began to read your story; and it came to me that your narrative was not giving a FEEL of too much front-end exposition.

I decided that the reason why the exposition DIDN'T seem like too much, was because of the lifelike style of your first-person narrative. I felt as if I were already inside the action of the story, because I was already "meeting" the boy who was telling me about the Pals Club.

So GGray scores points again!
 
“We’re gonna dress up like Spikers and infiltrate the fortress,” Pete announced.

“Infilter?” Rory tried to echo. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Get into the basement,” Pete said. “We’ll dress up as kids like them, and they’ll let us in.”

“And then?” Henry asked.

Pete grinned. “We’ll find out something bad about ‘em and use the old Milverton maneuver.”

“Which is...” began Tim.

Pete rubbed his hands together. “We find out something bad they do or did, and threaten to tell the world unless they let us use the basement.”

“Of course,” Henry added quickly, “if they’re doing something LIFE-THREATENING bad, we’ll have to tell. Legal complications and all.”

Teddy was curious. “So, why do you call it the Milverton maneuver?”

“Haven’t you ever read Sherlock Holmes?” said Johnny. “One of his cases involved Charles Augustus Milverton, famous blackmailer of London. Milverton made it big, you know, until a vengeful duchess or something came in with a gun and let him have it.”

“Well,” Pete continued, “they know there are six of us, so only four will dress up as cool people. We’ll exclude Rory and Teddy, because they’re too short to be Spikers. Besides, Rory’s hair is too curly to spike.”

The four of us who were disguising got to it. We copied the styles we saw the Spikers wearing. This required some shopping (the cash all came out of the treasury). After we were perfectly ‘coolified’, we stepped confidently into the elevator. To our horror, Amy joined us as the elevator doors opened on the next floor. We crowded as far away as possible from her, especially Tim. However, we were elated to discover that she didn’t recognize us!

Johnny decided to try her out a little more. “Hey, lady, do you know if VidKid Castlemaine lives in this building?”

Amy nodded. “Yes...but you’re going in the wrong direction.”

Johnny grinned at us. We smiled back.

Amy got off on the first floor, and we all sighed in relief. Sure, Johnny had fooled her, but who knows how long we could keep up our double identities?

Pete, the bravest Pal, knocked on the door to the basement. It was answered by none other than VidKid himself—spiky blond hair, slanted sunglasses, black T-shirt with a homemade Spikers logo, and all.

“Hey, man,” said Pete, “you must be VidKid Castlemaine, the coolest dude in the U.S.A. These are my P—er, buddies, and we wanna get in the know.”

“Bout what?” demanded VidKid, although he looked flattered at being called the coolest dude in the U.S.A.

“If you’re acceptin’ new members anytime soon...dude,” Pete replied.

“Sure, man,” said VidKid generously. “The Spikers is, like, an open club. Hold it—first you gotta pass a test.”

“You mean like a dare?”

VidKid shook his spiky-haired head. “Naw, naw. You hafta answer the Eight Questions of Doom.” He motioned to Mohawk McCloy. “Yo! Gimme four of those sheets, dude.”

VidKid passed us a sheet of paper each. Each had the same eight questions. We had to answer them all. Most of them were just plain ridiculous, but we filled them out anyway. The questions and our honest answers are shown below. (Of course, we didn’t write down our names.
The names are only there to show whose answer it is.)

1. What would you do if you were inside an iron chest and someone slammed the lid?

Pete: Threaten to call the police on my cell phone if they didn’t let me out within the next 10 seconds.

Johnny: Bust out in a rage and capture the guy responsible for such a terrible deed.

Tim: Pretend I was dead so they’d dump me out. Then I’d run for the nearest police station.

Henry: Is there any reason why I’d be sitting in a large iron box in the first place?

2. What would you do if you had your head inside a lion’s mouth and it started to close?

Pete: I’d never try a stunt like that unless I was in front of an oohing and aaahing crowd, and if all those people were around, hopefully one or two of ‘em would save me.

Johnny: Whip out the gun I’d obviously have on me if I was around lions and blast the beast.

Tim: Pull my head out, quick.

Henry: I’d never put my head in a lion’s mouth.

3. What would you do if a racecar came speeding down the street towards you and there was no time to get out of the way?

Pete: Jump up on the windshield.

Johnny: Hate and despise all car racing for the rest of my life—approximately half a second.

Tim: Run for the sidewalk.

Henry: Racecars aren’t even allowed to race on streets.

4. What would you choose if you were offered the choice of eating a stack of paper or being beheaded for your crimes?.

Pete: Eat the paper, unless it had poison ink.

Johnny: Loudly decline both.

Tim: Eat the paper, a tiny piece with every meal stretched out over a couple of years.

Henry: I didn’t commit any ‘crimes’.

5. What would you do if you were hanging onto a cliff edge with both hands and your feet were swinging inches away from an electrical box that would zap you dead if you touched it?

Pete: Stay still and await the arrival of an emergency helicopter.

Johnny: Swing up onto the cliff.

Tim: Yell for help so loud that people miles away would hear.

Henry: I’d hope I was wearing non-conductor rubber boots.

6. What would you do if the Lord of the Nazgul slipped into your house at night?

Pete: I’d slip out of the house.

Johnny: Throw things at them to delay them while I made my getaway.

Tim: Hope somebody who wasn’t a living man passed by to come to my aid. But, since those chances are slim, I’d probably hide in the laundry room, the last place a ringwraith would look.

Henry: Wraiths don’t exist, Nazgul or otherwise. Besides, I wouldn’t be able to do anything. I’m ASLEEP at night.

7. What would you do if you fell out of an open airplane window and the only thing to catch on to on your way down was a deadly electrical wire?

Pete: Try, fry, and probably die.

Johnny: Fall to a mangled death, to quote the comic books.

Tim: Open my parachute, if I had one. If I didn’t...then, I’d break my neck when I hit the ground.

Henry: Airplane windows don’t open, so how could I fall out in the first place?

8. What would you do if you sliced your finger on a rusty piece of metal and the nearest hospital (or town) was three weeks away?

Pete: Well, I wouldn’t go near rusty metal in the first place, but if I accidentally got cut, I’d call an emergency helicopter on my cell phone.

Johnny: If I was that far from the civilized part of the world, where would the piece of metal come from?

Tim: Hope I brought an emergency kit and use a flare to signal for aid.

Henry: I’d never travel that far away from civilization. And if this somehow did happen, I wouldn’t worry. I have a tetanus shot.
 
*laughs* That quiz sounds a lot like the "What Would You Do If...." thread on Dufferland.

As far as the deadly electrical wire is concerned, I'd go with Pete's answer: try, fry, and probably die.
 
Glenburne said:
*laughs* That quiz sounds a lot like the "What Would You Do If...." thread on Dufferland.

As far as the deadly electrical wire is concerned, I'd go with Pete's answer: try, fry, and probably die.
Click to expand...

That's actually where my sister (SeaStar) got the idea to start that thread.
 
When we completed the Eight Questions, we handed back the sheets. VidKid read them, then nodded. “I like your logic, kids. What’re your names?”

We all gasped. We hadn’t thought of NAMES!!!!

“Not real ones,” VidKid continued. “We don’t want any Williams or Harveys or Peters or Matthews around here. We want cool combinations of noise and personalities.”

“CoolKid,” said Pete, thinking fast.

Johnny said the first thing that entered his mind. “Um....Frankencobra.”

Tim was having trouble thinking of a pseudonym, so Henry spoke up next. “Er, uh, Vancouver.”

VidKid raised an eyebrow. “Vancouver? What’s that?”

Henry produced a postcard from his pocket. “This is a postcard my uncle sent me from Vancouver last winter.”

‘Heelies’ eyed it with interest. “Whoa, sweet. Looks like Florida—see all the snow?”

Tim finally thought up a ‘cool’ name. “Mine’s Bang McQuang.”

“Ohh ooh ooh!” said Mohawk McCloy. “Another Mc!” He elbowed Tim. “Buddies, man! Cousins!”

Tim put on a grin and moved away from the excited Spiker.

“Congrats!” shouted VidKid. “You’re now full-fledged Spikers! Here’s what you can do now that you’re, like, Spikers: you can spend all day down here with us and do stuff.”

“Uh, stuff?” Tim questioned.

“Yeah, stuff,” VidKid replied. “Talk about the latest....stuff!” He gave us four Spikers logos to put on our T-shirts. “Here ya go, Bang, Frankencobra, Cool Cruncher, and......Van. Oh, yeah, to be a real Spiker you hafta have a cell phone. For texting secret messages, you know.”

Luckily for us, Pete had a phone that his mom had given him for emergency calls. “This is an iPhone, so it counts as four.”

VidKid eyed it enviously. “Oh, yeah, I’ll have enough money to buy a new one next week. My last one got totaled by some dude who claimed he was an expert.” He glared at BigBlow, who grinned sheepishly.

Things went all right for the next day. The Spikers talked about styles of sunglasses, “wicked cool” T-shirts, and hairdos. When they weren’t talking they were texting. This got a little expensive—fifty cents per text message, but it was all in the name of exposing the Spikers. So we just pretended to look interested as we awaited something illegal to happen.

The days after that went by slowly. We began to wonder if the Spikers were breaking any rules after all. How long would we have to be Spikers—and even more importantly, when it was time to turn back into Pals and expose the Spikers, how could we explain the sudden
disappearance of Cool Cruncher, Frankencobra, Vancouver, and Bang McQuang?

One day, ‘Heelies’ pulled us aside. “VidKid wants us under the ping-pong table, pronto. A little secret, okay?”

When we joined the rest of the Spikers, who were huddled under the table, we got a huge surprise. VidKid glanced around to make sure no non-Spikers were around, then opened a plastic bag. “Look what I borrowed from my relatives in Manhattan last year. Like, I’ve been saving them for a time like this.”

A chorus of oooooh’s and aaaaaahhhh’s erupted when the bag was opened. It showed an assortment of colorful, deadly-looking firecrackers, all stamped with the logo EXPLO 54-X—TRIPLE THREAT.

Henry frowned. “Fireworks are illegal in Manhattan...and here.”

“Get a life,” said VidKid scornfully. “Big Blow—bring out the matches.”

Big Blow emptied his pockets. There was a homemade lockpick, a few slugs for the gumball machines, a wad of chewed gum and a bottlecap that said, “Sorry, Next Time!”

“They’re You Know Where,” Laser reminded him.

“Oh, yeah!” Big Blow snuck across the room to the pool table, reached down one of the holes, and pulled out a packet of matches.

VidKid read the label aloud. “Like here: To light, strike on rough surface. Keep out of reach of children...blah, blah, blah. Gimme a rough surface.”

Arch offered his knee. (He was wearing jeans.) VidKid struck the match and prepared to light the firecracker.

Big Blow was doubtful. “Uh, are we going to like set this off under here?”

“Aw, what could happen? Just lose a few fingers. We got ten each.” But VidKid yielded to the warning and went out into the room. He placed the firecracker on top of the table.

“It’s illegal!” shouted Henry, forgetting to use his fake Spiker voice. “I’m going to tell the janitor!”

Everyone froze. VidKid dropped the match. Fortunately, it was stomped out by “McQuang” and “Frankencobra”.

“Hey—you’re no true Spiker!” shouted Arch. “You’re a...PAL!”

“No!” gasped Big Blow.

“Uh-huh. Look—the four of ‘em are really those Petey, Johnny, Henry and Timmy people. GET THEM!”

We were all tackled by Spikers, except for Tim, who managed to get to the exit in time. VidKid grabbed some shoelaces and tied us up.

“You won’t get away,” he assured us. “I’m totally using my special Spiky Twist Knot. No one can untie it except ME.” He fetched some firecrackers and Spiky Twist Knotted them to our ankles. “Now, Big Blow. If they make one move for the exit, light the fuses.” He grinned and turned to us. “You’ll be blown sky-high!”

Actually, we would’ve burst into a thousand crispy, ashy fragments, like Johnny pointed out right there and then, but VidKid thought ‘sky-high’ would be enough. Anyway, we got his point and didn’t make any funny moves.

Obviously, since we’re still here telling this story, we didn’t burst into a thousand crispy, ashy fragments (or blow sky-high). A few minutes later, the janitor, followed by Tim, flung the door open and charged into the room. The Spikers scattered. Two (‘Heelies’ and Laser) did escape, only to be confronted by the Spikers’ dads on the stairs. Good old Tim had fetched them all...not to mention VidKid’s uncle.

Even we don’t care to tell what happened to the Spikers after that. The point is, the rec room was opened to Pals again—no Spiker was allowed within ten feet of the door.

Their parents made sure of that.
 
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2: Alone at Home

About a week after the Spikers got it good, the four of us Pals who are McGillises ran into the newly-freed rec room with some news.

“We get to stay alone at home for a whole week!” Teddy shouted.

“Well, at least while Dad’s at work,” Johnny said.

“Why? Where’s your mom going?” Pete asked.

“She’s going to visit Great-Aunt Patricia in Alberta, Canada,” said Henry. “She’s leaving tomorrow.”

“Wow,” Tim said. “Alone at home for a whole week!”

“Sally’s a certified kid-watcher,” Johnny explained. “Mom’s taking Lauri with her, but she’s leaving the rest of us because train tickets to Alberta are wicked expensive.”

The day Mrs. McGillis left, Pete and Tim went to the McGillises’ apartment. Sally was unloading groceries with the help of her brothers. Johnny accidentally dropped a box of cereal, which spilled all over the floor. Sally got the broom and dustpan.

“No no no wait!” screeched Rory, “Let me eat it! Don’t waste it! It’s my favorite—Fruity Rounds!”

“Where did you get a box of Fruity Rounds?” Pete asked.

“Dad bought three boxes for a treat,” Sally said. “Rory, you can’t eat that off the floor.”

“Why not?” Rory shouted. “The floor’s clean. Mom washed it yesterday. Besides, Fruity Rounds give you nutrition! It says right on the box, see, right here: Carbohydrates, Iron, Sugar, Zinc, and Red #3, Blue Lake #2.....Yellow #6—”

“Skip the poison part,” advised Sally. Then, to her horror, Rory scooped up most of the cereal and put it in a bag.

“It’s still eatable,” Johnny said. “I agree with Rory. Why waste sugar cereal? Now, if it was Healthy Squares or something....”

“What’s for lunch?” Teddy interrupted.

“I don’t know,” Sally said.

“I’ll make it!” Johnny offered.

Sally didn’t look too happy about that. Then she changed her mind. “All right. I’m going up to see Anna Rose. I’ll be back in a hour, okay?”

The moment she closed the door behind her, Johnny raced for the recipe box. “Let’s see....what should I make? Cake, brownies.....”

“PANCAKES!” screamed Rory.

“Okay,” said Johnny. “Pancakes. I love ‘em. Let me find the recipe.....”

“We don’t need a recipe!” Rory said. “I’ve watched Mom make ‘em a million times.”

Johnny gave up looking through the confusing recipe box, which was not arranged alphabetically but in some strange order none of us could figure out, and said, “Sure, Rory. You tell me what goes in and I’ll mix it up in this bowl.”

“Flour first,” Rory said. Teddy went to get the flour. There were two containers that both had powdery white stuff in them, so Teddy just grabbed one. It was a good thing that Pete stopped him and tasted the stuff in both containers. Teddy was going to give Johnny powdered sugar! Johnny put in three cupfuls of the right stuff and nodded to Rory.

“Salt comes next,” Rory said confidently.

“How much?” Johnny inquired.

Rory made an estimate. “Oh, about five tablespoons.”

In went the salt.

“Let’s see, what was next....oh, yeah, eggs.”

“How many? Maybe....two?” Henry hazarded.

“Two eggs?” gasped Rory. “We’re talking pancakes here! Half a dozen, at least!”

Johnny went on to add sugar and some water, because the batter was kind of dry.

“You put in too much!” Henry told him. “Now it’s too liquidy.”

“Never mind,” said Rory. “That’s how it’s supposed to look.”

Johnny threw in a little more flour to even off some of the water, and another spoon of sugar.

Henry didn’t approve of that move, either. “That’s too much sugar.”

Johnny waved this aside. “You can never have too much sugar. What’s next?”

“That’s all. Now we need to fry them,” Rory said, dragging out the McGillises’ frying pan out of the cupboard. He tossed it onto the stove, and then Johnny poured some of the mixture onto it. We waited a long time until the frying pan got hot because Johnny forgot to turn on the stove, but finally we fried the entire bowlful of batter. The pancakes looked pretty good, and we were feeling great.

“We forgot the baking powder!” Rory suddenly exclaimed.

“Oh, well, it sounds optional,” Pete said hopefully.

“I hope it is,” said Tim doubtfully.

“Let’s try a different thing, like lemonade,” suggested Johnny, who found that he liked cooking.

“No, you need to squeeze lemons for that,” Henry objected. “The lemon squeezer doesn’t work.”

“I could jump on ‘em,” Rory offered.

“And get ‘em all dirty?” said Teddy doubtfully.

“Pie,” proposed Johnny.

“What kind?” asked Teddy.

“Chocolate!” exclaimed Pete.

“Blueberry!” Rory advised. “That’s easiest.”

“No,” said Henry. “The pie-tin got crushed when Teddy dropped it out of the cupboard and Lauri sat on it.”

We decided not to cook anything else after a ten-minute argument. Pete suggested that we kill time til Sally got back by playing his new video game: Rise in the Ranks. He explained the rules: Three of us would have bad characters, and the other three would play the good ones. We got to make up everything about the characters, including names and costumes. Pete, as Leader of the club, got to go first.

“Mine will be one of the good characters. I’m naming him Exterminator Sprout,” said Pete, putting a green outfit and a sprout hat on his computer character. Pete is random sometimes.

“Supersonic will be mine,” said Tim, “In a purple ’n’ yellow super-hero costume! He’s got to be good if he’s a super HERO.”

The rest of us Pals began calling out our characters’ names. Pete, who had the main controller, was making them to order.

“Executioner Chop!” said Johnny, “He’s the top villain, so give him a black executioner mask and a black costume!”

“Apple Swingchop,” said Rory, stealing the ‘chop’ from Johnny. “He’s Executioner’s right-hand man. He wears red-and-white-checkered clothes with apples on the white checkers!”

“That’s too hard!” objected Pete.

“Well, skip the apples on the checkers and give him one big apple on the front of his suit.”

“Mine’s Go-blast!”decided Teddy. “He’s good, and he wears a blue-and-green costume. If you can manage it, give him....”

“No, I can’t,” interrupted Pete, who was still having trouble with Rory’s intricate apple design. (He had to draw it himself using the buttons on the controller.)

“Mine’s Diogenes,” announced Henry.

“What’s a Dye Ojennies?” Teddy asked. “Some kind of clothes dye?”

“No! Diogenes. I like it. It’s a legitimate name,” answered Henry, “He wears a tuxedo and he carries a double-headed battle ax.”

“Why not a gun?” Teddy wanted to know.

“Because it’s illegal to carry a concealed firearm without a permit,” Henry explained, “and Diogenes is a legal-minded man, even though he is a criminal.”

“That’s kind of strange,” Johnny remarked. “So is the name.”

“You think everything is strange,” Henry commented. “Diogenes was the first cynic.”

Rory was interested. “Did he wear a tuxedo and carry an ax?”

“Of course not! He lived years before the first tuxedo was even thought about. Anyway, my character is only named after Diogenes. The real one didn’t bother himself with rising in the ranks of an army.”

“He was too busy being cynical and philosophizing,” Tim added.

“That’s it! I did ‘em all!” said Pete, who had quickly done the rest of our characters while we were talking about ‘Diogenes’. Suddenly, the game started up.

“Mastermind Software presents....” screamed the announcer.

“Oops! Guess I forgot to adjust the volume,” admitted Pete.

“That really killed my ears!” Johnny complained.

Pete tried to lower the sound. “Okay, it’s good now.”

But it wasn’t. The announcer screamed again. “It’s time for...Rise in the Ranks: an amazing, educational game about armies and strategy!”

Pete paused it before our eardrums were popped. “Something’s wrong.”

Johnny held up the box. “You get your cash back if the game’s broken. It says right here.”

“Does it say you get it back if the sound’s broken?” Tim inquired.

Johnny read further. “Nope.”

“I found the problem!” Pete yelled. “The volume control is busted on the TV remote.” He proceeded to lower the sound using the button on the TV itself, and we started playing the game.

Half an hour later, Sally walked in. “Did you make the meal?”
 
“Sure,” replied Rory, proudly displaying the pancakes.

“What’s burning?” asked Sally.

Johnny jumped. “The stove!”

Rory grabbed Rise in the Ranks and made for the nearest exit, a window. The rest of us, including Sally, dashed to the stove. It turned out that a recipe card for meatloaf was right next to the burner, and it was getting toasted.

Pete grabbed it and threw it in the sink. “That was close. Just think, in a few minutes WE could’ve been toast!”

Henry didn’t agree. “Toast? No, we would’ve suffocated from the smokiness and then been burned.”

“Where’s Rory?” said Sally, looking around.

“He took Rise in the Ranks and jumped out the window!” gasped Teddy, who had been a little slower than the rest of us and witnessed what Rory had done. “But he landed on the fire escape.”

Pete frowned. “If he busted Rise in the Ranks, he’ll have to buy me a new one.”

We looked out the window. Sure enough, Rory was standing below on the fire escape, waving his arms frantically.

“What’s up with him?” demanded Tim.

“He just remembered—he’s afraid of heights,” Johnny figured. “Open the window and tell him there’s no fire and he can come in.”

Sally tried to slide the window open, but it wouldn’t work.

“Just like the TV remote,” said Pete grimly. “Move over—I’ll get it open.” Unfortunately, it was jammed harder than he’d expected. The window wouldn’t budge. Neither would the other ones. (They were locked, and we didn’t have the key. We found it later in a drawer, after all the trouble was over.)

“Let’s try Pete’s windows,” suggested Teddy. “Those will open to the fire escape.”

“Pete’s apartment is five floors that way” said Johnny skeptically, pointing at the ceiling. “No way is Rory going to climb the fire escape that far up.”

“Tim’s?”

“It’s on the same floor as Pete’s, remember?”

“Well, looks like we’ll have to call the fire department,” Teddy said.

“Are you crazy? We can’t call the firemen! There’s no fire!” Johnny pointed out. “We’ve got to get him down some other way. Hmmm....”

“He can climb down,” Pete said. “We’ll have a trampoline at the bottom.”

“That’s a good idea,” said Sally. “But where are we going to get a trampoline?”

“I know!” said Johnny. “There’s a small-size trampoline in the apartment next door. I saw some men delivering it. We can borrow it for five minutes and put it back later.”

“That’s illegal,” Henry said firmly. “Anyway, we don’t have the key to the apartment.”

“We could get in without a key,” suggested Johnny.

Sally smashed that idea. “We’re not going to break into anyone’s apartment, not even to 'borrow’ a trampoline.”

“We could make a net,” Teddy suggested.

“Jumping from that height, Rory would break a homemade net,” objected Johnny. “Let’s take a big blanket, have him climb down, and lower himself into it. We’ll be holding the edges.”

“Dangerous,” remarked Pete.

“That’s what makes it fun,” said Johnny. He loves excitement.

We sent Tim outside to stand under the fire escape and tell Rory to climb down. After tons of persuasion, Rory agreed and began to climb—carefully. We all brought a quilt outside and joined Tim.

“It looks like fun,” said Johnny. “I might go up there someday, and get all the way to the roof.”

But by the time Rory managed to jump into the blanket with a thud (Teddy dropped his corner), and by the time we all went inside and Sally put the quilt in the washer, we’d all had enough of the fire escape business.

Pete brought out the plate of pancakes. “Now we can eat.”

Rory stuffed one into his mouth and began to chew. Suddenly, he grabbed his throat and started coughing.

“He’s choking!” shouted Teddy, jumping to his feet and knocking over his chair. “CPR!”

Rory swallowed the mouthful. “I’m okay. But the pancakes don’t taste like Mom’s. They taste a little funny.”

“That’s because we’re so creative,” Johnny said knowingly. “We’re not stuck on recipes.”

Before Sally could say anything, Rory gasped.

“Are you choking now?” suggested Teddy. He’s always wanted to do CPR on someone.

“No—it’s Rise in the Ranks. I left it on the fire escape!”

Pete froze halfway through putting a pancake in his mouth. “WHAT?”

“Ooooh! I want to get it!” Johnny yelled.

“Nobody’s going out on the fire escape,” Sally began to say, but Johnny had already rushed out of the room.

“Let him,” said Pete. “He won’t fall.”

A while later, Johnny appeared in the room, waving Rise in the Ranks triumphantly. “Safe and sound. It’s not even scratched.”

“Good,” said Pete, looking at Rory. “If it did break....”

Sally cut in. “Let’s finish lunch. We can make some candy after we’re done eating.”

The pankcakes tasted so bad that we had to eat some leftover chicken instead. While Sally washed the dishes and Henry dried them, the rest of us looked through the candy part of the
cookbook.

“I say we make chocolate bars,” Pete said.

“No, I want to make fondant,” Rory said. “It turns into delicious colored hard candy when it cools. Mom made it once, remember? It came out like party mints.”

“Sure,” Johnny agreed, reaching for the corn syrup.

We mixed all the stuff up. Sally cooked it, and when it was done she poured it in a buttered pan. “We have to let it cool and then pull it. Butter your hands, everyone.”

We thought that was pretty disgusting, but Sally insisted. The fondant stuff was crazy. It wouldn’t turn into hard candy no matter what we did to it. Rory’s hand got stuck in the pan and we all had to pull it out. Rory yelled and yelled while we were doing it. We pulled and tugged the fondant, but all it did was stick to everything in sight—the counter, the floor, and the walls.
Even the butter didn’t keep it from sticking to our hands. We finally gave up and threw the big yellow glob into the pan.

“We’re really in hot water now,” Sally said, looking at the mess.

“Let’s clean it up quick,” Tim said, scraping fondant off his hands.

It took an hour to get all the fondant off everything. Then we found that the fondant had hardened to the pan and we couldn’t pull it off. At last, Pete took a hammer and hit it. It smashed into lots of pieces, and we put them in the cupboard for tomorrow. We didn’t feel like eating it then, for some reason. Then Pete and Tim left, tired out by the candy-making, the lunch-making, and the fire-escape business.
 
Thanks, Zella!

The next morning, all of us Pals met back in the McGillis apartment. Sally was just cleaning up after breakfast with the help of the McGillis boys.

“What’ll we do today?” Johnny questioned when we were all sitting in the living room.

“Let’s eat the fondant from yesterday,” Rory said, and we did. (He ate half of it alone.) It was pretty good, only it didn’t taste anything like the kind you buy at the store.

When we were done doing that, Tim thought of something. “Hey! Let’s go down and ride our bikes to the movie theater in the mall and watch that new movie that came out last week.”

“You mean The Alien That Ate New Zealand?” Pete said doubtfully.

Tim looked horrified. “NO! That’s a PG-13. Amy would kill me if I saw it. The other one . . . Savannah Safari.”

“I don’t want to watch a movie about a girl on a safari!” Teddy shouted.

Tim looked puzzled. “What makes you think a savannah is a girl?”

“There was a girl in my class last year called Savannah,” Teddy said.

Henry shook his head. “A savannah is a grassland in Africa.”

“Well, let’s go,” Pete said, interrupting the discussion.

On the way to the mall, we played an exciting game Johnny called ‘tire ripping’. You had to scrape your bike tire against the back wheel of the bike in front of you without tipping over. We all did this in a line. Teddy rode in front because he couldn’t keep his balance while scraping someone. Sally, who had decided to come along, rode in the back and ‘ripped’ Rory’s tire.

When we got to the mall, we watched the movie. It was pretty cool, even though it was about real animals and there was no dialogue...only a solemn-sounding narrator.

“Africa,” announced the Narrator’s voice during a helicopter view of a savannah.

“Of course it’s Africa,” snorted a Spikery voice. “What did you think it was, Antarctica?”

Whoever owned the Spikery voiced was squelched by the people behind him.

The Narrator went on. “Miles of savannah stretch in all directions, as far as the eye can see. This terrain is inhabited by several different species of wildlife.”

The screen showed a bunch of zebras grazing by a waterhole. Then it got a little more exciting. A lion was hiding in the grass, inching towards them.

“It’s gonna eat a zebra,” Teddy whispered.

This was true. It was also messy. The next scene wasn’t so tense. It was a baby elephant running around. After a long talk on how elephants are related to manatees, it switched to monkeys—apes, actually. Gorillas are apes. Henry already knew that.

After one-and-a-half hours, the credits rolled. Most of us didn’t want to stay and read them, but Henry did.

“We have to!” Henry said. “We owe it to film makers.”

So we did. They were about fifteen minutes long, and the theater was empty when they finished.

“Let’s hide under the seats so we can watch the next movie without buying tickets,” one of us suggested. (In order not to embarrass that boy, we won’t tell their name. You can guess it wasn’t Henry, though.)

“Are you JOKING?” Henry gasped. “That’s...illegal! It’s robbing the film makers, the theater, and the entire American Film Institute!”
 
Not all of us agreed with him, but in the end his side won (Sally was the tie-breaker). Actually, it wouldn’t have mattered if we stayed—we would’ve been kicked out by the janitor, who came in to clean the floors right after we left.

“What’ll we do now?” Teddy asked.

“Let’s go to the food court and get some lunch,” Rory suggested. This sounded like a good idea. We were all pretty hungry. (We hadn’t bought anything to eat during the movie because the snacks were, to quote Johnny, ‘wicked expensive and a complete rip-off.’)

On our way to the food court, we passed one of those decorative fountains that people throw pennies into. (What a waste of money. Pennies add up.) Johnny suggested retrieving a few from their ‘watery grave’, but, of course, Henry spoke up with an objection.

“It’s....”

“Don’t tell us...illegal,” Johnny interrupted. “You know, sometimes it’s just annoying having you as a brother, Henry McGillis. And don’t bother siding with him, Sally,” he added as his sister opened her mouth.

“Hey,” Pete said. “No fighting among Club members. You know what that leads to.”

“Dissension,” Henry said solemnly.

“See, there you go, showing off your vocabulary,” Johnny snapped.

Sometimes it’s hard to believe that Henry and Johnny are brothers. Mrs. McGillis says this to Pete’s mom a lot when she thinks we aren’t listening.

The argument was stopped when an angry man tapped Johnny on the shoulder. “Hey, kids. Go loiter somewhere else. I’m trying to read.”

This unjust remark caused Johnny to direct his anger away from Henry. “You don’t own the mall,” he said calmly.

The rest of us were kind of shocked. We looked over in Sally’s direction to see what she would say, but she had already cleared out and was a few feet away trying to pretend she wasn’t related to Johnny (or any of us).

“See here, little boy,” the man said. “If you don’t leave immediately, I’ll report you to the mall security.”

Pete elbowed Johnny. “Don’t put a bad name on the Pal Club. Having security called on you is something that would happen to a Spiker, not a Pal.”

Fortunately for the reputation of the Club, Johnny was convinced to leave the area. We practically RAN the rest of the way to the food court.

“How could you do that in PUBLIC?” Sally whispered angrily as we stood in line at the Burger Bud’s.

“Well, no one gets away with calling me a loiterer!” Johnny whispered back.
 
I have known adults with dirtier eating habits than Rory. I have done well at making pancakes, but I dare not even tell you what a debacle I scored the first time I tried to make a meatloaf. :(
 

After we ate our burgers, we immediately headed for the best place in the mall— the arcade. One of the coolest games in the world was there—Spaceman Pro. After watching us for a few minutes, Sally declared that she was going home. Teddy muttered, “Sure, go ahead.” The rest of us didn’t even look up. We were mesmerized by Johnny’s amazing talent at shooting down enemy robots—except Tim, who was busy playing a US military game. He prefers that over spacemen because he claims he’ll join up when he graduates.

“Okay, my turn,” Pete said when Johnny reached Level 3.

Johnny looked like he might argue, but then Henry pointed out that another game, almost as good as Spaceman Pro, was open, so Johnny went over to that one (which was called Football Power). However, a different game distracted him—one none of us were allowed to play. It was called by the short but unquestionably well-merited title of ‘Crime’. The point of the game was to gun down all opposing you (including the police and the army) while committing several different crimes.

Henry saw Johnny’s fixated gaze. “Jonathan McGillis...” he said warningly, sounding like Sally. Fortunately, Johnny remembered his parents’ orders and started to play Football Power.


 
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