After ascending the scare-case, I entered the cafeteria. Lizzo blared in the background as I surpassed the soup on my way to sit with the first graders. Among them was Zak, the rotund young man that bore a fohawk, Emma, the silent girl that always store icy daggers at everyone, Tim, the supposed leader of the first graders with his big nose and bad attitude, and finally Chuck, the massive, acne-encrusted chonk with a penchant for wearing thin, white t-shirts and sweating nervously.
"Hi guys, what's for dinner?" I said, sitting in my seat. Chuck began sweating as he rushed to hide his Yugioh cards.
"H-hi Maddie," he honked. "I think I'm going to have a butter sandwich. I-i can show you how to make one if you want." A butter sandwich? That sounded super interesting. A question mark appeared near my head.
"A butter sandwich? What's that?" I asked, obviously confused.
Tim snorted derisively. "Only an idiot wouldn't know what a butter sandwich is."
Zak put on some triangle-shaped sunglasses and pulled out his microphone. "A blee blop ba doo wa pa zow!" he spat, sounding all the world like George Clooney. Zak was the coolest member of the group by far, and even though his name was actually Zach, which is short for Zachary, he spelled it Zak because it looked cooler that way. In that sense, he was the exact opposite of Jor-bah.
Emma shut her book loudly. "I'm going to get some soup," she declared, glaring at me. "and none of you better get in my way." Her chair scraped silently across the carpeted floor as she stood off and walked towards the soup. Zak flashed a grin, turned his baseball cap sideways, and took out his flip phone to snap a selfie.
"Hmph," said Tim, also rising and walking with a dignified heir towards the bread.
Stuffing the rest of his Yugioh cards into the pockets of his oversized cargo shorts, Chuck stood up, knocking over his chair backwards in the process. His massive frame towered over my tiny body.
"Come on," he trembled. "I'll show you how to make a butter sandwich." Avoiding Tim, he lumbered off towards the butter with me in hot pursuit.
"So aside from the bread," explained Chuck, picking up a gallon tub of Country Crock margarine, "the main ingredient of the butter sandwich is butter." Still gripping the tub of margarine, he gazed toward the bread section with an expression of barely disguised panic. Clearly, he was waiting for Tim to finish preparing his tofu, arugula, and quinoa sandwich on hearth-baked, artisan, nine-grain wheat bread. While we waited for Tim to leave, my attention drifted towards the oyster crackers. These small delicacies were my favorite food. Secretly, I wondered how they would taste with the Country Crock margarine. I wanted to go grab some but they were next to the soup, which Emma was ladeling into a bowl, and the had told us all not to get in her way. I wondered why she was so mean to me. My mama says it's just because she's jealous of me, but I don't know why she would be jealous of me because she's a year older than me and doesn't like any of the boys that like me.
Chuck hesitantly tapped my shoulder as the music in the background changed to Sum 41. "Maddie, look," he said. "We can get the bread now."
"Okay," I said. "Let's get this bread," I added, feeling a bit like Owen. Chuck grabbed four slices of wonder bread and gave two to me.
"Aside from the butter," explained Chuck, gesturing towards the tub of margarine held under his arm, "the main ingredient of the butter sandwich is bread."
"Whoa," I said, clearly impressed. He was so smart. "You sure know a lot about butter sandwiches, Chuck."
"Ha ha," said Chuck, putting one of his hands behind his head. "What can I say? It's kind of my bread and butter." With our ingredients in tow, we returned to the table to prepare our fancy feast.
"So what you do now," said Chuck, nervously trying to remember, "is take a butter knife and use it to spread the butter on the bread." Tim paused between delicate nibbles of his handcrafted sandwich and sips of his blended drink of V8 vegetable juice and chamomile tea to stare at us incredulously.
I raised my hand. "What do I do if I don't have a butter knife?"
Chuck started sweating again. "Sh-shoot," he muttered, knowing he had forgotten something. "Uh… that means… we… uh… have to get one from the silverware section."
"Okay," I said cheerfully. "Lead the way, Chuck!"
"R-right!" said Chuck, knocking over his chair again as he stood up and going pale from embarrassment. "Uh… Tim, Emma, Zak, please don't take our food while we're gone!"
"We wouldn't want your… butter sandwiches anyways," said Emma, shooting Chuck a glance that made him grow even paler.
"Ka-zoom," agreed Zak, not even looking up from the mini-electric keyboard he was currently playing. Tim did not even deign to respond to us; he was too busy looking down at the screaming children running around on the playground below through the window.
As Chuck and I approached the silverware section, an adult stepped into our path, her back turned to us. Chuck froze like a deer with headlights. Thankfully, my mama had tolden me how to handle situations like this. I approached the adult, tugged on her skirt gently, and cleared my throat.
"Excuse me," I said, "We'd like to get to the knives please, and you're kind of in our way."
The adult turned around and gave the two of us a look that might have even have intimidated Emma. Chuck looked like he was plumb about to pass out. "How rude! How dare you speak to me in that way! Children like you should not even be allowed near knives in the first place. I will report you to the president at once!" She stalked off to complain to one of the lunch ladies.
I grasped Chuck's hand and began pulling him towards the silverware, which seemed to snap him out of his trance. "Let's get the butter knives now."
"Wow Maddie," said an awestruck Chuck. "I can't believe you stood up to her like that! It was awesome! You're so brave."
"It was nothing," I replied, grabbing two butter knives and giving one to Chuck. "Careful, kids like us shouldn't be playing with these."
Chuck laughed nervously. "Oh, that's right! I still have to show you how to make the butter sandwiches! We need to hurry before lunch is over." We went back to the table.
"Okay, so now that you have the butter knife," said Chuck, "you scoop out some of the butter using the butter knife and spread it around on the bread." Chuck demonstrated this to me using both of his slices of bread, and I was able to copy him without much trouble.
"Great job!" he said. "You're a quick learner, Maddie. Now after this, you just have to put the two breads together like this -" he stuck the two buttered sides of each slice of bread together - "and cut the sandwich in half like this." He cut the sandwich diagonally into two triangles.
"Are you sure?" I asked. I was a bit nervous since my mama always says that I'm only allowed to have my sandwiches cut into rectangles, otherwise Jesus would be mad at me. And I don't wanna make Jesus mad.
"Yeah," replied Chuck. "Trust me, I've made at least..." he counted on his fingers, "uh, seven butter sandwiches."
I hesitated for a little bit, but eventually decided that Chuck was probably right. He had made at least seven butter sandwiches, which is at least seven more butter sandwiches than my mama has ever made, and is even more years old than I am. Plus, it was hard to imagine Jesus being mad at someone as nice as Chuck, even if he did cut his sandwiches into the devil's shape. I cut my sandwich into triangles, just like Chuck, and ate it. It was the most delicious thing I had ever tasted, maybe even better than oyster crackers. From that point onward, I always cut my sandwiches into triangles, unless my mama was watching. After all., as long as she couldn't see me do it, neither could Jesus.
Little did I know, however, that I was being watched, but not by my mama or by Jesus. The security camera in the cafeteria zoomed in on me and Chuck as we ate our butter sandwiches, broadcasting our every move to the security guards watching from the camera room.
"S'that… a butter sandwich?" said one guard in disbelief.
"Looks like it, doc," replied another, sipping his coffee.
"Wha'd'you mak've it, chief?"
"Well boss, I think we need to make sure these kids be getting better nutrition at this here school."
"And how d'you s'pose we do that, guy?"
"It's simple, bud. We just hafta activate Operation: Nutrition."
"Aye aye, captain."