Chapter 23

Later that night, I waited for Fang to call a flock meeting so we could talk about our evil principal being gone, hopefully for good.

Finally, at dinner, I cracked. "Okay, flock meeting!" I ordered, standing up.

Fang frowned. "You're not the leader."

I rolled my eyes. "Yeah, yeah. Whatever. Flock meeting right now."

If he was annoyed, Fang didn't show it. Then again, Fang doesn't really show very much emotion about anything.

We gathered in my room, five minutes later. "Alright," I said. "We have some important business to discuss," I announced, trying to sound all formal.

"Okay," Fang said, frowning. Alright, so maybe he did seem a little annoyed at me for stealing his job.

"As you all know except for Fang, Mr. Robin is gone," I went on, smiling. "Iggy and I got rid of him."

"Right," Iggy said. "We were sent to his office, when all of a sudden, these Erasers come out of nowhere and start attacking us. If that isn't proof that he's evil, I don't know what is. I mean, you're not supposed to trust people who give you free candy, right?"

"And now he's gone!" Nudge piped up. "Max says that he jumped off the roof!"

I laughed. "Well, yeah. Um, kind of." Quickly, I filled Fang in on the rest of the details.

"So he's not dead," Fang said.

I nodded. "Yeah. He won't be back for a while, though. I think he broke every bone in his body."

Gazzy grinned. "Goodbye, evil principal!" Nudge laughed, and Iggy was smiling too.

Only Fang seemed unconvinced. "Isn't it still dangerous?"

I crossed my arms over my chest. "We got rid of the evil dude! How can there still be danger?"

Fang stood up. "We should leave."

"Wait….what do you mean, leave?" Nudge shrieked, standing up on my bed. "We can't leave! I like it here! We all do!"

Gazzy nodded. "I mean, Mr. Robin's gone! Everything is going to be okay! That's what Max said!" he added, pointing at me.

Fang frowned, looking at me. "Max isn't the leader anymore."

"Oh yeah?" I asked, leaning in closer to him. "You wanna see who the real leader is?" I turned and faced the rest of the flock.

"Guys, who's the leader here?"

"MAX!" Iggy yelled, and Gazzy and Nudge echoed him. "Max! Max! Max!"

I smirked at Fang. "Sorry. It looks like they like me better."

Fang rolled his eyes, but didn't object. "Okay, fine. Max is the leader."

The others cheered, and I turned to grin at the rest of the flock. My flock.

~~::~~

Days went by after that, and days turned into weeks, and weeks into months.

And suddenly, before we knew it, December had arrived.

"Where's the snow?" Gazzy complained, looking out the window. "I want it to snow!"

I laughed, ruffling his hair. "I'm sure it will snow soon."

"But it's almost Christmas and there's no snow!" he whined. "We need snow for Christmas!"

"Yeah!" Nudge agreed. She was sitting at the table, eating breakfast. "And we can make cookies and hot chocolate and Santa will come!"

"Right," I muttered, rolling my eyes. "Santa."

"Santa doesn't exist!" Iggy yelled, laughing.

Nudge gasped. "How could you say that? Santa exists!"

"Oh yeah," Iggy replied. "I guess the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy exist too?"

"Duh!" Gazzy responded.

I laughed. "Gazzy, come eat your breakfast. We have to get to school."

"Not until you admit Santa exists!" Gazzy yelled.

Well, Gazzy ended up not eating breakfast that morning. We made it to the bus stop just in time. Despite the lack of snow, Colorado was freaking cold in December, and we were bundled up in scarves, jackets, and boots. Nudge, of course, had an all-pink outfit, which gave me a headache.

"Hi, Fnick!" Jaz called, waving to Fang as we got on the bus. Yes, she was still overly attached to Fang. "It's so cold!"

"Yeah," I heard Fang respond, and snorted. Fang and his typical one-word answers…

"Let's sing Christmas carols!" Jaz decided, and I rolled my eyes.

"Yeah!" Gazzy agreed, and started singing "Jingle Bells" at the top of his lungs.

I grimaced and covered my ears with my hands. "Gazzy, shut up!"

Unfortunately, that made him sing even louder. "OH WHAT FUN IT IS TO RIDE IN A ONE HORSE OPEN SLEIGH!" he finished with a smile.

I breathed a sigh of relief. "Well, at least that's over…."

That was Gazzy launched into "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer." I'm pretty sure everyone on the bus groaned that time.

"Are we there yet?" I muttered under my breath.

~~::~~

"Alright, class!" Mrs. Jenkins said, clapping her hands. "We're going to do something fun!"

I exchanged a look with Fang. In Mrs. Jenkins' class, fun usually meant doing an extra math worksheet or something.

"Since this is the last week before winter break, we're going to be Secret Santas."

I frowned. "Uh, Mrs. Jenkins, sorry to rain on your parade, but Santa doesn't exist."

Everyone laughed, and I narrowed my eyes. That wasn't meant to be funny.

Mrs. Jenkins arched an eyebrow. "Maxine, Secret Santa is when you secretly give gifts to another person. The recipient doesn't know who the giver of the gifts is."

I rolled my eyes. "Well, that sounds boring."

Mrs. Jenkins frowned. "Would you like to visit Ms. Ruiz?" Ms. Ruiz was our new principal, and I had been to her office plenty of times. Fortunately, she didn't seem too evil.

Unfortunately, she didn't give out candy.

I shook my head. "Um, no thanks. I'll be quiet," I promised, though most of the time I couldn't keep that promise.

Mrs. Jenkins shook her head and took a jar filled with slips of paper off of her desk. "Each person will choose a slip from this jar. You will be that person's Secret Santa. Remember, don't tell anyone whose name you have."

She walked over to the kids on the opposite side of the room, and they began to pull slips of paper out of the jar. I got bored of waiting and started zoning out, wondering who my Secret Santa would be.

Suddenly, a jar with a few slips of paper was right in front of my face.

"Maxine?" Mrs. Jenkins was saying. "Kindly choose a slip of paper."

"Oh. Right." I closed my eyes, reached in, and pulled out a slip of paper, while Mrs. Jenkins moved on to Fang.

Slowly, I unfolded the piece of paper, and my breath caught. The paper had the name Jeff on it.

I'd chosen Iggy.