Chris Grabenstein - The Smoky Corridor

Eddie parked his little car in front of a shabby cottage. The sign hanging on the lawn read “Madame Marie: Medium.”

A lopsided door swung open and out waddled a bubbly woman in a bright green smock decorated with even brighter green flowers.

“Welcome,” said the woman. “I am Madame Marie!”

The morning sun glinted off earrings dangling under her rosy cheeks like crystal chandeliers.

“I understand,” she said mysteriously, “that you and your employer cannot find that which you seek without the aid of one who has passed over to the other side?”

“Yes, ma’am. Such is our situation.”

Madame Marie toddled toward the tiny car. “It would be best if we had some object from your deceased loved one for our séance. Perhaps a favorite bit of clothing, a hat, a letter.”

“We have a letter and we know where he is buried.”

“Excellent! May I see the letter?” She held out her chubby hands, fingers eager to touch the past.

“I’m afraid I could not bring it with me on this trip. It is quite old, very fragile.”

“Of course, of course. When was it written?”

“In 1873. Eight years after the War of Northern Aggression.”

“You mean the American Civil War?”

Eddie smiled politely. “Yes, ma’am. That’s what some folks call it.”

18

Zack satalone in the middle of the school bus, because Benny and Tyler were still pretending they didn’t know him, and Kurt Snertz was sprawled out like a king in the back so he could keep an eye on all his terrified subjects.

“Excuse me? Is this seat taken?”

The kid sat down before Zack answered.

“Pardon me for asking, but you’re new, correct?”

Zack nodded.

“I attended fifth grade at Pettimore Middle last year,” the kid said, smiling from ear to ear. “So, tell me: Why does everybody already hate you? I know why they don’t like me and it’s not because I’m black, because, as you can see, Shareef Smith in the second row is also an African American and everybody wants to sit near him because he is cool. Me? I mostly do sudoku puzzles. Do you do sudoku?”

Zack inhaled but didn’t get to answer.

“It’s actually very simple. Sudoku puzzles are based on a Latin square. Do you know about Latin squares?”

Zack shook his head while his seatmate pulled two sudoku books out of his backpack and started filling in squares on two puzzles at once—one with a pen in his right hand, one with his left.

“It’s basically an n × n table filled in such a way that each symbol occurs exactly once in each row and exactly once in each column. Oh, by the way, my name’s Malik. Malik Sherman.”

“I’m Zack Jennings.”

“Pleased to meet you, Zack. If you like, we can be friends. I promise not to ostracize you! Do you know what that word means?”

Zack nodded.

“You do?”

“Yeah. Means you’ve been banished.”

“But did you know that ‘ostracized’ comes from the Greek word ‘ostrakon,’ which means ‘shell’ or ‘potsherd’?”

“No,” said Zack.

“It’s true! The Greeks used to write names on shells or potsherds when they were voting to kick unpopular people off their peninsula.”

Zack wondered if the Greeks turned it into a TV show.

The school bus lumbered up the road. Made stops. Picked up more kids, some of whom almost sat down in the rows behind or in front of Zack before Kurt Snertz, all the way in the back, loudly cleared his throat or coughed to suggest that they’d better sit somewhere else or face his wrath.

Finally, Zack could see Pettimore Middle School.

Malik closed both sudoku books. “So, Zack, what’re you doing for lunch?”

“I packed a sandwich.”

“Good idea. The food in the cafeteria is rather awful. Except the chicken strips with broccoli florets on Wednesdays.”

The bus chugged to a stop. The front door swung open.

Someone walking up the center aisle finger-flicked Zack on the back of the ear.

Kurt Snertz.

“See, Jennings? You just never know when I’m gonna sneak up and get you!”

The three guys behind Snertz started chuckling.

“What’s the problem back there?” demanded the bus driver, watching the boys in his big rearview mirror.

“Nothin’,” snorted Kurt Snertz as he and his crew moved forward.

Zack and Malik remained seated while everybody else exited the bus.

“I take it Kurt Snertz is not a fan of yours?” said Malik.

“He hates my guts.”

“Excellent. He hates mine, too! See you at lunch, Zack, if not before!”

“Right.”

“Promise?”

“Sure.”

And to keep his promise, all Zack had to do was stay alive till lunch.

19

Zack studiedthe slip of paper one of the teachers handed him at registration and, after a few wrong turns, found his locker.

“Good morning, Zack!”

It was Ms. DuBois, the pretty teacher he’d met the night before. She was carrying a stack of books and manila folders under her chin.

“Good morning.”

“All ready for a brand-new school year?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Exciting, isn’t it? I just love the smell of freshly sharpened pencils. I can’t wait for the school year to start!”

Oh, yeah. Zack couldn’t wait, either. School might also mean the smell of Ty-D-Bol up your nose when Kurt Snertz dunked your head in a toilet.

But he smiled at Ms. DuBois anyway. It was hard not to. She had such sky blue eyes. And that morning, she smelled like a warm cinnamon roll drizzled with icing.

“See you at third period, Zack.”

“Okay!”

She bustled off around another corner.

“Hey, Zack!”

It was Benny, his so-called friend from Stonebriar Road.

“This your locker?” Benny asked.

“Yeah.”

“Cool. Hey, me and Tyler meant to ask you on the bus: You gonna blow up anything here at school like you did to that tree?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Why not? There’s a humongous old tree behind the gym building. It’d blow up real good.”

“I’m not blowing up any more trees, Benny.”

“I see. Movin’ on to bigger stuff, huh? What? Gopher holes?”

“I don’t think so.”

“What? Something even bigger? Oh, man! The principal’s office? That is so amazingly awesome! You’ll tell us before you do it, right?”

“Sure, Benny.”

“Cool!” And Benny dashed happily up the hall.

What was it Davy Wilcox used to say about Benny? About as sharp as a bowling ball, ain’t he?

Zack smiled, remembering his first true friend in North Chester, the farm boy who didn’t live in North Chester anymore.

He turned to his locker. Worked the combination. Slid up the handle and popped open the door.

“Howdy, pardner!”

Zack nearly fainted. “Davy?”

“In the galdern flesh, or whatever a dang ghost is supposed to say, seein’ how this ain’t actually flesh hangin’ off my bones no more, now, is it?”

“What are you doing inside my locker?”

“Your locker? Well, dang! This used to be my locker, too!”

“What?”

“I went to school here, Zack. Back in my day, we had us this one teacher, Mrs. Crabtree—Mrs. Crabbybritches we called her—made me write ‘I will not whittle in class’ on the blackboard five hundred times.”

“I don’t believe this,” Zack mumbled, practically crawling inside the locker with Davy to make sure no one passing could see him talking to an empty metal box.

“I decorated up this thing with a whole heap of magazine pictures. Snazzy cars. Bright red Ford Powermaster 861.”

“What kind of car was that?”

“That one weren’t no car, Zack. Powermaster’s a tractor.”