25

NAME: ZACH POWERS

First things first: I didn't believe it for a heartbeat.

The rumors were beyond nuts. Cap's in the hospital…He's in the morgue…He's in a persistent vegetative state…He's suffering from amnesia…He's upside down in a fish tank….

I'd lost all respect for the intelligence level in this place. They should have raffled off the Brooklyn Bridge at the next PTA fund-raiser.

I couldn't explain where Cap was, and frankly, I didn't care. Not only was my year in ruins, but my name was mud at C Average. Me—Zach Powers! And it was all thanks to the Case of the Disappearing Hairball.

People were nuts on the subject. I don't think I heard a single conversation on any other topic the whole first week after Cap disappeared. Teachers in both divisions were complaining that their students could focus on nothing else. I figured most of the kids were just bummed that the dance had been canceled. No—even senior high students, who could care less about our dance, were genuinely worried about the hippie!

"What's the big deal?" I said for the umpteenth time. "So, he slipped back through the same time warp he dropped out of in the first place."

Naomi cut me dead with a flamethrower glare. "You never liked him! You tried to make a fool of him!"

It was scary how much that girl hated me now. I used to think she was kind of hot for me. Maybe I misread the signs.

"Yeah," I admitted. "So did you. So did the whole eighth grade."

"But then some of us saw the kind of person Cap was," Lena put in. "Some of us appreciate how he devoted his heart and soul to the school."

"Heart and soul?" I exploded. "He held a funeral for a bird! He danced on the front lawn! He played senior citizen music! The Beatles and that other grandpa—Guitarfunkel, or whatever his name is."

"Garfunkel," Naomi corrected icily. "Simon and Garfunkel."

"Listen," Lena told me, "Cap gave his life—"

"He didn't—"

But I was fighting a losing battle. If Lena believed it, it might as well have been the lead story on CNN. Cap put his all into C Average, and for that he was struck down. If he wasn't dead, he was seriously messed up.

"Just because you can't find someone doesn't mean he's at death's door!" I argued with at least twenty people. "I can't tell you exactly where Tom Cruise is, either. That doesn't make him a corpse."

Talk to the wall. Twenty-six hundred kids were absolutely convinced that the eighth-grade president had come to tragedy. And it was all thanks to the junior high football team, Darryl Pennyfield, and me.

I couldn't take three steps in the hall without getting a dirty look from somebody. Even sixth graders felt they had the right to scowl in my direction. Every time I came back to my locker there was a fresh insult scratched into the paint: asshole, jackass, or something else with the same number of letters.

I finally found out the truth about Cap from Lena and Naomi on Friday morning, the day our dance was supposed to be. It turned out that I was right- Cap was safe and sound. The reason the hairball suddenly disappeared was that his grandmother had showed up to take him back to the same freak farm he came from. The girls also told me that Sophie had asked them not to tell anyone outside our friend group about what really happened to him.

"Everybody's gone off the deep end, and we can't even tell them the truth," I complained to Hugh in the cafeteria after I told him the truth about Cap. "When the Garrets redid their kitchen, nobody saw Alicia for like, three weeks. Not one person thought she was fucking dead."

"Yeah, but the whole fucking school didn't watch Alicia Garret being loaded into an ambulance," he pointed out. "And the biggest junior high party of the year wasn't canceled right after that."

I scowled at him. "Don't tell me you were about to join the chorus of mourners for our dear departed Sasquatch."

"Of course not," he told me. "I thought it was a load of hooey from the start, but I can't say I was surprised. If this school were full of geniuses, I'd have a lot more company on the chess team."

It was the ultimate barometer of my plummeting status. The only person willing to eat lunch with me was Hugh. If I could locate Garland Farm using hippie LoJack, I wouldn't know whether to haul him back or hide out with him there. Part of me just wanted to disappear.

"Hey, what's that?" Suddenly, Hugh reached over and began rifling through my hair.

I slapped his arm away. "Cut it out, man!"

"Look!" He plucked a small object from behind my ear and held it in front of me—a pea-size blob of soggy white paper.

A spitball.

I examined it, unbelieving. "That's fucking impossible—"

He was disgusted. "Spitballs can travel both ways, you know. You don't have a fucking force field around you."

I stared at him, the target of more of my spitballs than everybody else put together. "I suppose you're waiting for an apology."

"I'm just enjoying my front row seat at Payback Fest," he sneered.

"Hey, you brought a lot of it on yourself," I accused.

"It's my fucking fault I got picked on?"

"From the first day of kindergarten, everything about you screamed dweeb—your clothes, your hobbies, your vocabulary—"

He scowled. "And you're fucking perfect."

I told the truth. "My whole life, it's always been obvious what sports to play, what bands to listen to, what people to hang out with. It's as if I was born with a natural guidance system inside my head, showing me how to be cool." My brow clouded. "But Cap Anderson didn't come with a book of instructions."

Instead of gloating, he actually seemed to understand. For Hugh Winkleman, the whole planet didn't come with a book of instructions.

He said, "Too bad you couldn't just start liking him."

If he had smacked me with a brick, I couldn't have been any more stunned. How could I have missed something so obvious? "Hugh, that's it!" I exclaimed. "If we can't stop this hippie bandwagon, we'll have to find a way to jump on."

"Isn't it a little too late for that?" he challenged. "Cap isn't dead, but he's definitely fucking gone."

"We might be able to work that to our advantage. Come on."

I strode out of the lunchroom and across the hall to the junior high library. He wolfed down what was left of his sandwich and followed.

I logged on to a computer, pounded the keyboard for a few moments, and swiveled the screen toward him. His eyes widened as he read:

A TRIBUTE TO CAP ANDERSON

PAY YOUR RESPECTS TO

THE BEST 8TH GRADE PRESIDENT EVER

TODAY AT 7 P.M.

(THE TIME OF THE HALLOWEEN DANCE HE NEVER GOT TO GIVE US)

IN THE PARKING LOT

ALL C AVERAGE STUDENTS ARE WELCOME

DO NOT SHOW TO ANY TEACHERS!

He tried to say something and began to choke on a mouthful of peanut butter and jelly.

I pounded him on the back, cackling with glee. Zach Powers was down but not out!

"Load the paper tray. We've got a lot of printing to do."