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  “Frankie, try not to be like yourself,” Mrs. Hooping-Koff scolded.

  “You get headaches when your lollapalooza is bumped or jolted in some way,” I explained.

  “You have to be careful with your brain,” I continued. “It fits very snugly against your skull. And if your skull gets bumped really hard, the brain can come loose and drain down the back of your neck. That’s called brain drain, and it’s very dangerous.”

  SEVEN

  Wacky Jackie reached out and tapped the top of Cranky Frankie’s head three times with her fist. “Hear that? It’s hollow! Brain drain! Definitely brain drain!”

  Frankie slapped Jackie’s hand away. “I’m smarter than you without a brain!” he exclaimed. “Your IQ is so low, it’s a minus zero! You have to stay up and study all night to be able to find your socks in the morning!”

  Jackie turned to Mrs. Hooping-Koff. “Did that make any sense?”

  “No, not really,” Mrs. Hooping-Koff replied. She turned to me. “Good work, Janey. You’ve done a lot of research . . . I think.”

  I nodded. “I didn’t just read articles. I also read the captions that were with the photographs.”

  “Impressive,” our teacher said. “Please go on. I understand you have a demonstration.”

  “Yes, I brought something for everyone to try,” I said.

  “Did you bring Wacky Jackie a new brain?” Luke Puke shouted.

  Jackie swung around to face him. “I don’t need a brain to punch your lights out!”

  Luke laughed. “I’m not scared of you.”

  “You should be!” Jackie shot a fist to his forehead, and his head wobbled around like a bobblehead doll.

  Mrs. Hooping-Koff moved quickly down the row of desks—and gave Jackie a hard pinch on the cheek.

  PINNNNNCH.

  “No violence!” she cried. “No violence in my class! No violence or I’ll pinch you till you faint!”

  She’s a big believer in nonviolence.

  “I gave him a love tap,” Jackie said softly. “I was just messing with him.”

  Luke had a hand over his mouth. “May I be excused? I think I’m going to—” And he ran out of the room.

  “Janey, please continue,” Mrs. Hooping-Koff said.

  “I brought everyone a brain today,” I said. “Actually, a small piece of a brain. You know, some people eat brains.”

  There were a lot of groans and laughs.

  “No, really,” I said. “Once, in a fancy restaurant, I ate a big plate of brains.”

  Nervous Rex made a gasping sound. “Did it make you sick?”

  “Of course not,” I said.

  “I’ll bet it tasted just like chicken,” Babbling Brooke said.

  “No,” I explained. “It tasted just like brains.”

  That got a lot of EEEWs and YUCKs.

  I walked to the back of the room and picked up the platter I had brought. “Here you go,” I said. “I have a little piece of brain for everyone. Taste it and see what you think.”

  EIGHT

  I had already cut the sections of brain into little squares, and I placed a piece on every desk as I made my way down the aisle.

  Patty Perfect raised her hand and waved to the teacher. “Mrs. Hooping-Koff, if we eat the brain, do we get extra credit?”

  The Perfect twins want extra credit for everything they do. Peter Perfect once asked if he could have extra credit for going to the bathroom.

  “I think Janey should get extra credit for bringing in treats for us to snack on,” Mrs. Hooping-Koff said, flashing me another smile. “Let’s all sample ours at the count of three, class. One . . . two . . . three.”

  I watched as everyone popped the little squares into their mouths and started to chew.

  Mrs. Hooping-Koff swallowed hers with a loud GULP. Then she turned to me. “What kind of brains was that, dear?”

  “From my Uncle Henry. He died last week.”

  Mrs. Hooping-Koff’s mouth dropped open in a groan of horror. “Ohhh noooo!”

  The class erupted in wails and moans. Kids pressed their hands over their mouths and gagged. A few kids ran out of the room, choking.

  I laughed. “Kidding! Just kidding!” I shouted over the uproar. “I was just messing with you!”

  I may be a brainiac, but I like to have fun, too.

  “They are actually potatoes!” I confessed.

  Everyone was gagging and screaming and carrying on so loudly, I wasn’t sure they heard me.

  “Potatoes!” I shouted. “Potatoes!”

  I grabbed a square off the tray and popped it into my mouth to show them. They finally started to settle down, but they weren’t laughing.

  After school, I walked home with Babbling Brooke. Brooke wants to be a cheerleader and was practicing cheers in her head.

  Pooper greeted us at the front door, wagging his big tail and jumping up, trying to knock us over. Wacky Jackie and Junkfood John were already sprawled on the couch watching an episode of that superhero show they like, Jonny Pantsfalldown.

  We were all just hanging out when Adam Bomb came bursting into the house. He looked about ready to explode.

  “I think we’re all in serious trouble!” Adam shouted. “Let me tell you what I heard in school today.” He was red-faced and balloon-eyed and frantic.

  “I heard that Mr. and Mrs. Perfect are coming to our house,” he cried. “I think—”

  Then there was a loud knock on the front door.

  Adam’s face went from tomato red to milk white. “It’s the Perfects!” he cried. “We’re dead meat!”

  NINE

  I’m Cranky Frankie. Let me tell you what really happened . . .

  I knocked on the door three times and no one came to open it.

  I muttered some nasty words under my breath.

  What were they trying to do, keep me out? Just because once in a while I lose my temper and use a few bad words?

  Those bird-brained, pig-headed, jerk-faced sloth buckets know how much I like them. The dunder-faced idiots are my buddies—my best friends in the whole world. I wouldn’t hurt their feelings for anything . . . if I could help it.

  I knocked again.

  I could hear Adam Bomb’s voice shouting something about the neighbors. And I could hear Jonny Pantsfalldown on the TV.

  Yeah, I had been there in the living room with them before. But I had to get out when Babbling Brooke started doing her cheers. I’ve been asked not to say anything bad about her cheerleading ability. So I don’t say anything.

  I took a walk around the block, and when I came back, they wouldn’t let me in.

  I knocked a fourth time, and finally Adam opened the front door.

  He gawked at me like he’d never seen me before. “Oh, it’s you!” he cried.

  “No, it’s Bazooka Joe,” I said, and pushed past him and into the house. Everyone was in the living room. They all looked shocked.

  “Don’t stare at me like bug-eyed toads,” I said. “I live here, too, you know.”

  “Wh-why did you knock?” Adam stammered. He still looked pale and shaky.

  “I forgot my key,” I said.

  “We don’t use keys,” Adam replied. “The door is always open.”

  “Oh, I forgot,” I said.

  I turned around and Luke Puke followed me into the house.

  “Why are you back so soon?” I demanded. “I thought you had a hurling match at school.”

  Luke frowned at me. “Coach Swettypants sent me home. He said I couldn’t puke with the team today.”

  Adam blinked. “Why?”

  “Because I have an upset stomach.”

  Adam nodded. “That makes sense.”

  “Do you know the cure for an upset stomach?” Handy Sandy asked.

  Luke turned to her. “No, what?”

  She shrugged. “I don’t know. I was asking you.”

  I wrestled Junkfood John to the floor and took his place on the couch. Then I grabbed his bowl of pretzel-covered pretzels and
finished them off for him. I even chewed the last one right in his face so he could see how much I was enjoying it.

  “Help yourself to my pretzels, Frankie,” he said. I think he was being sarcastic, but I didn’t pay any attention.

  Babbling Brooke came striding to the center of the room. She smiled at Luke and said, “I’ve been practicing some new cheers. I’m going to be a cheerleader for your hurling team.”

  “Brooke, we don’t have time—” Adam said.

  But she leaped into the air, swung her hands high, and began the cheer anyway.

  “HURL IT UP! HURL IT UP! WAAAAY UP!

  “SMELLVILLE IS GONNA ROCK YOU.

  “SMELLVILLE IS GONNA SHOCK YOU.

  “DA DA DA DADADA DA DA! DA DA DA DA.

  “YAAAAAY!”

  She clapped her hands and finished with a split. Then she grinned. “What do you think, Luke?”

  “Brooke,” Luke said, “what are all the ‘da da da’s at the end?”

  “I haven’t finished it,” she replied. “But do you like it?”

  I spoke up before Luke could answer. “I like it as much as pounding a six-inch nail into my forehead.”

  “Oh, thank you!” she cried happily, clapping her hands.

  TEN

  I’m Luke Puke. My turn now . . .

  Pooper, stretched out on his stomach against the wall, raised his head and groaned. I don’t think he liked Brooke’s cheer, either.

  “Ptooey!” called a shrill voice. “Ptooey!”

  That’s our other pet, a fat smelly parrot named Ptooey. He loves saying his name over and over.

  That’s not all he says. He thinks he’s some kind of insult comedian. Actually, he’s just nasty. I don’t like to go near his cage because he bites.

  “Ptooey, why don’t you shut your yap?” Cranky Frankie shouted.

  “Why don’t you swallow your head?” the parrot squawked back. “Swallow your head! Swallow your head!”

  “Somebody pull the cover over his cage,” Adam Bomb said.

  “Not me,” Nervous Rex said. “The last time I went up to his cage, he bit my middle finger off.”

  I squinted at him. “Let me see your hand.”

  Rex held it up.

  “How’d you get the finger back on?” I asked.

  “Kwazy Glue.”

  “Ptooey! Ptooey!” the parrot squawked. “Come near me again, I’ll peck your face off. Try me!”

  “How did we get that featherbrain, anyway?” I asked.

  Silence.

  “No one knows,” Rob Slob said.

  We all turned to Brainy Janey. She’s the brainiest brainiac in the house. She knows everything.

  “Do you know how we got the parrot?” I asked.

  She shook her head. “No, I don’t.”

  “Do you know how we got our dog, Pooper?” Adam asked.

  Janey shook her head. “No, I don’t.”

  “We don’t know anything about ourselves,” Handy Sandy said. “Janey, do you know how we all got here in this house?”

  Janey shook her head. “No, I don’t.”

  “Well then, how did we all get to Smellville?” Sandy asked. “Do you know?”

  Janey shook her head. “No, I don’t.”

  “Why don’t we have parents?” Brooke chimed in. “And why do we live here all by ourselves?”

  “I don’t know,” Janey said.

  “Why are we all sort of . . . different?” Wacky Jackie asked. “How come we’re not like the other kids? Do you know?”

  Janey shook her head. “No, I don’t.”

  “We’re not getting anywhere,” I said. “Enough with the questions.”

  Brainy Janey turned to me. “If we don’t ask questions, how are we going to learn anything?”

  JONNY PANTSFALLDOWN

  Favorite TV superhero of Wacky Jackie and Junkfood John Episode 233

  Keep the faith, everyone! And keep your belt buckled tight for ADVENTURE! It’s time for another thrilling episode of JONNY PANTSFALLDOWN, told by me, the world’s greatest sidekick—THE MIGHTY HAIRBALL!

  “I will never let you down!”

  That’s what Johnny Pantsfalldown promised the good people of Pupick Falls.

  And he always keeps his word.

  Every night, after a healthy dinner of fish parts and lo mein, Jonny puts on his cape, his mask, and his Pants of Steel. Then, side by side with me—the Mighty Hairball—he fights crime and terrifies criminals with his famous battle cry:

  “YODEL-AY-EEE-OOOO!”

  Tonight, I found Jonny pulling on his costume in his secret dressing room high above the cliffs of Pupick Falls. He struggled with the mask. I saw that he had the eyeholes in the back, and I helped him turn his mask around.

  “How strange. I can see much better with the eyeholes in the front,” he said in the deep booming voice that makes evildoers’ ears bleed. Jonny’s eyes burned into mine. “Hairball, did you bring the suspenders I asked for?”

  “GULP.”

  I made a loud gulping sound. I like to brag that I gulp better than any other sidekick in the superhero universe. My secret: I practice gulping in my room.

  “Sorry, Jonny,” I said. “I forgot your suspenders.”

  “No worries,” he boomed, pulling his Pants of Steel higher on his impressive hips. “Tonight, nothing can hold up my path to victory.”

  “What criminal are we chasing tonight?” I asked, adjusting the spandex underpants I wear on the outside of my costume.

  “Tonight, we will bring down Big Bootus,” Jonny announced. “Big Bootus will attempt to rob twelve-year-old Shirley Ba-Birley’s piggy bank right off her bedroom dresser.”

  I blinked. “Big Bootus plans to rob a piggy bank?”

  Jonny nodded. “Shirley Ba-Birley is an amazing finder of quarters and nickels on the sidewalk. So far, she has tucked away two million dollars in her piggy bank—and Big Bootus knows it.”

  “Wowser.” I shook my head in awe. “Jonny, how do you always know how to find Big Bootus?”

  “It’s easy,” Jonny said. “He has the biggest bootus in town.”

  JONNY PANTSFALLDOWN CONTINUED. . .

  We took off into the night. Jonny’s pants fluttered in the wind as he soared higher into the purple sky. When the wings of my battle helmet started to flap in the breeze, I sailed up after him.

  The moon rose to meet us and cast its white light on the houses down below. I had to remind myself not to look down. I’m afraid of heights.

  Jonny pointed to a long ranch house down below. “That’s Shirley Ba-Birley’s house,” he boomed. His voice is so deep it knocked over a few trees.

  Jonny swooped down and landed on the grass of the backyard.

  “YOWCCH.” I dropped down hard into a metal wheelbarrow. I felt several bones in my legs crack.

  A good reminder to practice my landings.

  Both legs were broken. A minor injury for the Mighty Hairball. I couldn’t let Jonny know I was hurt. He depends on me.

  I scrambled out of the wheelbarrow and crawled across the grass toward Shirley’s house.

  It was completely dark. The windows were black and appeared to gaze out at us . . . like black windows gazing out.

  “Big Bootus is already inside,” Jonny whispered. “Shirley’s room is at the top of the stairs. We’ll creep up and catch him in the act.”

  “Sounds like a plan,” I said.

  “Trust me, he won’t get his hands on the two million dollars in that piggy bank,” Jonny whispered.

  I followed him onto the back stoop.

  He tried the door.

  “Locked.”

  He shook his head sadly.

  “Now what do we do? I’m stumped.”

  “Try the front door?” I suggested.

  Jonny sighed. “It’s probably locked, too.”

  He shook his head again. “Defeated. We’re defeated, Hairball.”

  We both stared at the locked door.

  “Did you happen to bring any
door keys with you?” Jonny asked.

  I shook my head. “No . . . sorry.”

  That’s when I spotted an open window a few inches in front of Jonny’s face and pointed. “Jonny, look. A window.”

  “Brilliant!” he cried. “An open window. It just goes to show, Hairball, that you should never give up hope.”

  A few seconds later, we were in the kitchen. Slowly we peered around in the darkness.

  My X-ray nose went into action. I gave several long, hard sniffs. “My X-ray nose tells me they had roast beef for dinner,” I whispered.

  “Good work, Hairball.” Jonny tried to pat me on the back, but he missed. It was crazy dark in there.

  “Let’s move,” he whispered. “Let’s get upstairs to Shirley’s room before Big Bootus can get his hands on that piggy bank.”

  JONNY PANTSFALLDOWN CONTINUED. . .

  We started to race through the darkness. CLANNNNNG!

  I ran headfirst into the refrigerator.

  The pain paralyzed me for a few seconds, then I pulled out a pad and pencil. “I’m making a note to bring a flashlight next time,” I said.

  “I like the way you think,” Jonny whispered.

  I followed him into the next room. My X-ray nose told me that someone had gone to the bathroom recently.

  “We’ve got to find the stairs, pronto,” Jonny whispered. “Big Bootus has a head start on us. We can’t let him leave.”

  Stumbling in the dark, we circled the room. There was no stairway.

  “Follow me,” Jonny whispered, and we found ourselves in a long hallway. Silently, we crept on tiptoes so we wouldn’t wake anyone up. “I don’t see a stairway in this hall,” Jonny said.

  We doubled back and started in the kitchen again. Then we tried the dining room and the living room.

  “How strange,” Jonny said. He stopped short and I walked right into him. “No stairway anywhere. How does Shirley Ba-Birley get to her room?”

  My brain was spinning. “I think I know what the problem is,” I said. “We’re in the wrong house.”

  “Brilliant!” Jonny cried. “I love how your mind works!”

  I could feel myself blushing.

  “Hurry,” Jonny urged. He darted to the kitchen door and tried the knob. “Locked,” he said. “We’re locked in.”