Johnny "Cream Corn" Velazquest was a jack of all trades, master of some. He could fix bikes, service vending machines, think on his feet, and artfully criticize professional wrestling with wit, insight, and a stinging sarcasm that often times sent his dad running crying to his bedroom. "Liz! Johnny made fun of WCW! Waaaaaaaah." He could write serviceable poetry, and was known to leap small puddles in a single bound. He was fascinated by how things worked, and sometimes took apart various machines and such to see what went on "under the hood" so to speak. One time, he and his brother Lincoln broke into the junkyard across town and disassembled a lemon Chevy they found parked near a shack. Johnny wanted to learn about cars so that he could begin working on them (thereby creating another revenue stream). They took it apart piece by piece, tracing where all the tubes and wires went and how the engine was mounted. They learned a lot that day.

Unfortunately for them, the car that they thought was garbage actually belonged to the guy who ran the dump. As in, it was his personal vehicle that he drove on a daily basis. When he found them among the scattered ruins of his whip, the radiator here, the fan belt there, he went apoplectic and passed out. Johnny and Lincoln managed to escape, but every time they saw him thereafter, he threatened to "increase your lead content" if he ever caught them at the junkyard again. Johnny was pretty sure that that was a veiled threat of gun violence, but he couldn't be sure. Like…maybe he only meant he'd stab them with a sharpened lead pipe or something.

Johnny let it go, but he and Lincoln steered clear of the junkyard until he was replaced by the new guy, an old black dude named Earl who wore greasy coveralls and a trucker hat. Earl was pretty chill and didn't care if Lincoln and Johnny snuck through the hole in the fence and took auto parts. But only some auto parts. There was a special fenced in area where Earl kept the good stuff, the bits and pieces that he sold. One time Johnny climbed the fence to yoink a head gasket, and Earl came running over with a shovel. "Get outta there! That's my stuff!"

Earl was tall, lanky, and had a gray beard. He was totally non threatening, but that day, waving a shovel around and screaming obscenities, he was terrifying. Johnny scrambled over the fence like a frightened tree monkey, and he and Lincoln ran all the way home. The next time they went out there, Earl calmly and rationally explained that the stuff in that area was off limits. "Unless you wanna buy it."

Uh…yeah, fat chance of that happening. Another thing Johnny was a master at was saving money. He loved the green stuff, and parting with it made him sad. He was basically Mr. Krabs in that respect. He tucked his wallet into bed at night and read it a bedtime story. He hated spending money unless it was on something he really wanted, and if he could get something for free or dirt cheap, he would, even if it was crap. Why pay 50 bucks for a brand new radiator when you can get a junk one, bang it out with a hammer, and patch it for a dollar?

Yet another area that Johnny had mastered was lunch. Johnny loved him a good lunch. See, lunch is different from breakfast and dinner. Both of those are big, heavy meals, one meant to get you through a trying morning, and the other meant to fill you up at the end of the day. Lunch, right in the middle, was a different animal altogether. People might throw anything on a plate around 12 noon and call it lunch, but that's like throwing some black coffee in a cup and calling it a mocha latte. Close, sure, but no cigar. Seriously, you can't have one because you're wrong and only people who are right can have a juicy, succulent cigar. Lunch should be light, but not too light. Lunch was the domain of sandwiches and Johnny was a sandwich fiend. Every evening, he made himself a sandwich to take to school in the morning. Roast beef and Swiss on Italian bread; a BLT on rye; so on and so forth. Everyone said that he made the best sandwiches, and he took a great deal of pride in that. He didn't just slap stuff onto a piece of bread and call it a day, oh no, he took his time and carefully crafted flavorful experiences.

One day over the summer, Johnny made himself an Italian club on a hoagie roll and ate it in the garage, where Lincoln was servicing Lana and Lola's broken down Barbie Jeep. They had left it in the rain the night before and now it wasn't working. Lincoln had to order a new battery from Advanced Auto Parts since Earl didn't have one that small, but he wanted to jerry rig it so that it would work until the new battery came in. Johnny doubted that he would be able to do it, but he was curious to see if he could or not. Sitting on the work bench with his sandwich, legs swinging back and forth, Johnny watched his brother at work. "You could unplug that red wire and cross it with that blue one," he said around a mouth full of mush.

"Too dangerous," Lincoln grunted. He was kneeling over the open engine block, his face covered with grease and his white hair streaked with black. "It'll cause too much of a reaction."

"It won't be that bad."

"It'll melt the hood," he said.

Johnny chewed it over with his bomb butt sandwich for a moment. "Maybe you can put a piece of sheet metal under the hood."

Lincoln looked at the hood for a second, his mind visibly working. "Yeah, that might work," he said. He got to his feet, dusted off his hands, and went to fetch a piece of sheet metal from behind the garage. Johnny finished off his sandwich and licked his fingers.

"Darn, that was a good sandwich," he said. "I -"

All at once, it hit him like a shot in the dark. He jumped off the table and shoved his finger into the air like a proctologist getting down to business. "THAT'S IT!" he cried.

Lincoln knelt beside the Jeep. "What's it?" he asked casually. He was used to Johnny being overly dramatic about things. In fact, he was a little surprised that he didn't cry eureka!

"Sandwiches," he said, "we'll sell sandwiches. We'll use that to replace the vending machines."

A month ago, someone started robbing the vending machines Lincoln and Johnny had put up around town. They would jimmy the locks, open the change box, and take whatever was inside. One time, too impatient for that, they smashed one open with a sledgehammer and took not only the cash, but a good portion of the product as well. Not all of them were vandalized, they were still making money with a few, but it was seriously cutting into ther profit margins. Two weeks ago, they rolled up to one machine just in time to catch the perps. They were two older guys. One wore a red track suit with white stripes down the sides and the other was in a button up short sleeve and slacks. The first had black hair with gray at the temples, and the second weighed about five hundred pounds.

"HEY!" Johnny cried.

He and Lincoln ran over. "What are you doing? That's ours!"

Tracksuit turned around and looked them up and down. He had a squashed nose that looked like it had been broken a dozen times in the past and his eyes were beady and reminded Johnny of a weasel…or some other kind of small, furry rodent. "We're your new partners," Tracksuit said. "We're just gettin' our end."

"You're not our partners," Lincoln said.

"Yeah?" Tracksuit asked. "We are now."

He and Fatso went back to trying to open the machine, and Lincoln and Johnny looked at each other in disbelief. "What are you, the mob?" Johnny asked.

"Hey," Tracksuit said, "I don't know nothin' about no mob, capice? I'm just a businessman."

"There's no such thing," Fatso said. "You just made it up."

"No, he didn't," Lincoln said, "it's literally -"

Fatso cut him off. "I said there ain't no mob. Youse guys are mistaken."

"Really?" Johnny asked. "I knew you guys went down the tubes after Sammy the Bull ratted on everyone, but this is sad. You're literally stealing change from vending machines."

Lincoln shook his head. "How far the mighty have fallen."

"Sammy the Bull was a liar," Tracksuit snapped. "So was that loser Henry Hill."

"They liked makin' up stories too," Fatso said, "just like you. Now open this machine or you're gonna wind up in a pair of concrete shoes."

Lincoln and Johnny had no choice but to do as their new partners said. In the following weeks, they saw Tracksuit and Fatso bumming around town, committing small crimes. They ripped off the last payphone in Royal Woods, stealing a bag full of change; they shop lifted from Flip's; they even broke into the junkyard and stole some stuff from Earl's super special stash. One time, Johnny even saw them shake down a little boy for his lunch money. They hung out at a social club on Pine Street. Everyone else Johnny saw going in there was in their eighties or nineties. Maybe they were old mob guys, maybe they were just old, who knew? Tracksuit and Fatso, however, seemed to be on their own. Maybe they were actual mobsters, maybe they were nobodies who decided to start ripping people off. Either way, Johnny doubted they had the backing of anybody. If, theoretically, he and Lincoln were to take them out, no one would come after them, no one would care. Heck, given how old their buddies were, Johnny doubted anyone would remember.

Anyway, the mafia twins were cutting into Lincoln and Johnny's money and they had been thinking of a way to make more.

Now Johnny had found it.

Sandwiches.

He was certain that he could make a killing making his world famous sandwiches. Lincoln sometimes made his own homemade potato chips that were hecka good. If they put the two together, and maybe added a Sam's Cola or some other cheapo beverage, they could sell whole combo meals. Maybe they could also sell hotdogs.

Johnny excitedly told Lincoln all about his plan, and Lincoln nodded to himself. "That's a good idea," he said. "We'll need a cart, though."

Later that day, they went to the junkyard and sifted through piles of rubble and debris. As fate would have it, they actually found an old hotdog cart, the kind with an umbrella, only the umbrella was long gone. The wheels were bent and the refrigerator inside was busted, but Lincoln and Johnny could fix both problems easy peesy.

Then things went sideways when he has his "accident."

You know, the one at the hands of the Loud girls that turned him into a white haired skitzo with a bulging crazy eye.

Johnny was in the hospital for several weeks, and then spent another week or so all out of sorts. When he finally got back into the swing of things, it was late August and summer was almost over. Lincoln had fixed the hotdog cart up on his own, and on August 28, they loaded it with chips, sandwiches, and cans of soda. It was their first day of business and both of them were excited.

You know what'll make for a grand opening? The crazy voice asked Johnny. Johnny had come to think of him as Jeff. Pooping yourself?

Johnny sighed. Jeff had an obsession with Johnny pooping himself in public. His goal, Johnny had decided, was to humiliate Johnny in the worst way possible, and there's nothing more humiliating than crapping your pants.

You'd probably sell more feces than you will sandwiches, the sarcastic voice said. Johnny had dubbed him Jeeves, because he had a posh, snobby British accent. Your sandwiches are nowhere near as good as you think they are.

Well, screw you too, buddy.

They were just getting ready to roll out when Ronnie Anne walked up with her friend Nikki, the really tall blonde girl from the city who had taught Ronnie Anne to skateboard. "Hey, guys," Ronnie Anne said. "You remember Nikki."

"Hey, what's up?" Lincoln asked.

"You look different," Nikki said to Johnny.

"Eh, I thought I'd try a new hairstyle," he said.

She nodded, clearly not buying what he was selling.

Greet her with a turd in your pants, Jeff said.

Bro, stfu.

"Nikki just moved to town so you're going to be seeing a lot more of her," Ronnie Anne said.

Nikki grinned at Johnny. "A lot more."

Was she hitting on him?

Of course not, Jeeves said, you're a freak of nature with a deformed eye and a mental illness. No woman would ever want you.

Okay, wow, you didn't have to say all that, but okay.

"What are you guys up to?" Ronnie Anne asked.

"We're gonna sell sandwiches," Lincoln said. He opened the cooler and took a couple out, handing one to Ronnie Anne and the other to Nikki. "Here, try them. On the house."

The girls took the sandwiches out of their Ziploc baggies and tucked in. "Wow," Nikki said, "this is really good."

"Yeah," Ronnie Anne agreed, "I can't lie, it's a decent sandwich."

After parting ways, Lincoln and Johnny rolled their cart down the driveway and hung a left on Franklin, following the sidewalk downtown. They set up shop in the town square, cast in the cool shade of a statue, and waited. It was slow going at first, but by the time lunch rolled around, they were swamped. The line stretched around the corner and everyone who bought a combo meal raved about how amazing it was. At one point, a cop car pulled up and Sheriff Rhodes, a big fat man with graying hair, swung out. He hitched up his belt and walked over, his eyes hidden behind polarized sunglasses. "What'cha boys doin'?" he asked in a slow, southern drawl.

"We're selling sandwiches, sir," Lincoln said.

"You got a permit?"

Lincoln and Johnny looked at each other. "Uh, no," Lincoln said. "We didn't know we needed one."

Sheriff Rhodes hummed. "Well, I'mma have to shut you boys down. You can't go sellin' food without a permit." He picked up a sandwich from the cooler. "What's this?"

"Chicken salad," Johnny said.

The old man stared at him from behind those glasses, then unwrapped the sandwich and took a bite. For a suspenseful moment, he said nothing…then he took off his hat, waved it around, and fired his gun in the air. "Yeeehaw, this is the best durn sammich I ever had. You boys don't need no permit."

Hotdog, they got to stay in business.

Johnny loved happy endings.

After the lunch rush, Johnny was counting the money when two familiar faces appeared.

Tracksuit and Fatso.

"Looks like we had a nice first day," Tracksuit said.

"Now give us our end," Fatso said.

Lincoln threw back his head. "Oh, come on, we worked really hard for this."

"Yeah, we did," Tracksuit said. "Now hand it over."

They made two hundred dollars that day. The mafia twins got half.

"This is BS," Johnny raged as they pushed their cart home. "We can't keep letting these bozos rob us like that."

"What are we gonna do?" Lincoln asked.

Johnny sighed. He didn't know. Snitch them out to the cops? Like he said, he didn't think they had the backing of anybody. If they ratted on them, they wouldn't have to worry about retaliation. Except from the mafia twins themselves, of course. How long would they be in jail for shaking down a couple of kids? A month? A week? As soon as they hit the street, they'd want revenge, and that wasn't a road Johnny wanted to go down.

The next day, Johnny and Lincoln were at the Loud house getting ready to take their cart out when Nikki walked up. She was by herself. "Hey, guys,' she said.

"Hey," Johnny said. "Where's Ronnie?"

Nikki shrugged. "I dunno. I just figured I'd come over on my own. If that's okay."

"Sure," Johnny said.

She smiled. "Cool."

She's hitting on you, Jeff said. You should -

I swear to God, if you tell me to poop myself…

I was gonna say ask her out.

Oh.

Huh.

Alright then. He wasn't ready for a committed relationship yet but it was nice to hear Jeff make a reasonable proposal for once.

"You guys going out to sell more sandwiches?" Nikki asked. "My parents bought a couple from you guys and wouldn't stop talking about them." She chuckled. "They said they'll buy from you guys every day if they can."

"Who are your parents?" Lincoln asked.

"Arnold and Helga Shortman," she said.

LOL. Those names meant nothing to Johnny, but the surname Shortman was kinda funny, since Nikki was so tall. It's like calling a fat guy Slim. "My dad has a head shaped like a football and my mom has a serious unibrow," Nikki said. "Maybe you guys remember them."

Johnny and Lincoln both thought, then shook their heads. They'd seen so many faces yesterday and they didn't really sit there and study on their appearance. They made orders and moved onto the next one, that was it.

"Anyway," Nikki said, "they love your sandwiches and want to give you all their money."

"That's awesome," Lincoln said, then frowned. "But half of it will wind up going to the gruesome twosome."

Nikki raised her eyebrow.

Lincoln and Johnny told her about the mafia twins. When they were done, she scrunched her lips to one side. "I know how to take care of them."

"How?" Johnny asked.

"You'll see," Nikki replied, "let's go."

Lincoln and Johnny exchanged a look, then shared a shrug. Nikki led the way, Lincoln and Johnny following behind. She knew exactly where they had set up the day before, presumably because her parents told her. They parked the cart in front of the statue and started doing their thing. The crowd came fast and hard, and in a little over two hours, they had nearly as much as they had the day before. "We're raking it in," Johnny said.

Might as well celebrate by pooping on your -

"Shut up," Johnny snapped.

Lincoln and Nikki both looked at him funny.

They didn't have time to ask him who he was talking about before the mafia twins showed up. Tracksuit put his hands on his hips and Fatso reached over the counter and grabbed for the lock box full of money like he owned it. "Whoa, there, big guy," Nikki said, "before you do that, I got a little business proposition for you and your buddy here."

The two mobsters perked up. "What kind of proposition?" Tracksuit asked.

"You ever see extreme sports?"

Tracksuit narrowed his eyes. "What are you talking about?"

Instead of telling him, Nikki whipped out her skateboard. "Watch this." She hopped on and skated to a nearby set of stairs. She jumped onto the railing and slid down. She pulled a kickflip and sailed through the air.

She came down right on Tracksuit's head.

The man crumpled to the ground and lay there, wounded. "Hey!" Fatso yelled and jumped back. Nikki jumped into the air, did a handstand, and caught her board on her feet. She spun around on her head like a top and kicked her feet. The board flew off her feet and smashed Fatso in the face. His head whipped to one side and blood spurted from his nose. Tracksuit was getting back to his feet, dazed and bleeding. He was on one knee, struggling to get up. Nikki skated up to him and kicked the back of her board. It flipped up and caught Tracksuit under his chin. His eyes rolled back into his head and he slumped limply over like a sack full of dirty diapers. Fatso got up and tried to lunge at Nikki, but she sidestepped him and stuck out her leg, tripping him. He crashed headfirst into the ground and groaned.

Nikki stood over him, picked up her board, and brought it down across his back. He cried out and jerked like he'd just been shot. He got to his feet, staggered over to Tracksuit, and helped him up. They cast a terrified look over their shoulders and ran away. "That's right," Nikki called, "come back whenever you want some more."

From the looks of pure horror on their faces, Johnny doubted they'd ever be back.

Nikki turned around and dusted her hands off. "There you go," she said, "problem solved."

"Wow," Lincoln said, "that was impressive, not gonna lie."

She turned to Johnny. "Did you like it?" she asked.

"It was impressive," he said.

She smiled at him.

When the day was done and they had made enough money, they pushed the cart back home, to the Loud house. When they got there, they stored the cart in the garage and went inside. "That was awesome," Johnny was saying. "The more I think about it, the cooler it becomes. You used sick flips to take them down. Hahaha, what a couple of losers." He laughed.

"I think after that we should make Nikki a partner," Lincoln said.

"I think so too," Johnny said. He turned to Nikki. "How about it? You wanna partner up with us in the sandwich business?"

Nikki grinned. "Sure, I'm down."

"Great," Johnny said.

On the first day of school, Lincoln and Johnny went into the lunch room at noon. Every year their lunch group seemed to change tables, and Johnny had to look around to find out where his squad was. He spotted Sid, Stella, Liam, and Maggie at a table by the wall. They got their lunch and walked over. By the time they got there, Ronnie Anne and Nikki had joined them. "Hey, Johnny," Nikki said with a smile.

"Hey," Johnny said and sat down.

"How was your summer?" Sid asked him quickly. "I missed you. I mean, you missed hanging with you guys." Her face flushed.

Before Johnny could reply, Stella said, "I missed you guys too. It's good to see you again. I heard something happened to you." She was referring to his hair and eye.

"Yeah, it was nothing."

"I think he looks kinda cute," Nikki said. "White hair really suits him."

Now it was Johnny's turn to blush. "It's not my favorite but I can rock anything."

Nikki propped her elbow on the table and rested her chin in her upturned palm. "Yes you can," she said.

Sid, Stella, and Ronnie Anne all felt a little prick in their hearts as they watched Nikki flirting with Johnny. On some level, and to some extent, all of them liked him. For Ronnie Anne, however it was more possessive than anything else. He belonged to her and she didn't like Nikki moving in on her territory. She didn't plan to date him or anything, but she liked having the option. What if she wanted to date him one day, huh? She couldn't because of Nikki.

Lincoln noticed their reactions but ignored them. He did not envy Johnny and the drama surrounding him. Better you than me, bro, he thought. He had Maggie and that was enough.

Sid, Stella, and Ronnie Anne all wanted to say something but kept their silence. Meanwhile, Nikki did her best to endear herself to Johnny.

Was it all part of her plan?

Maybe. Mayne not. They would just have to wait and see.