Big Mouth Read online

  Despite the Halloween festivities and my newfound fame, I was starting to get nervous. The cafeteria was Shane’s turf; sooner or later he’d show up. He probably knew I was becoming famous at his expense and wanted to knock me back into place. I couldn’t guess how he’d do it, but the smart money was on pain and humiliation.

  I started looking around, wondering how I could make a smooth exit if things went bad. Maybe I shouldn’t have been in there today. After all, it was one thing to act ballsy off the cuff like I did yesterday—well, like they thought I did yesterday—but today I had time to premeditate. And premeditation was where the big mind game happened. That’s when you knew whether you had big enough cojones to actually do the thing you were premeditating. And right then, my cojones felt about the size of M&M’s. The kind without nuts.

  “Here, I got extra ketchup today.” Gardo tossed a handful of packets across the table to me. He had two hamburgers on his tray and a large plate of fries. I had three corn dogs and some Tots. Our ketchup requirements were high.

  I picked up a packet that had landed on top of the ASB pumpkin centerpiece, which now sported a yellow mustache. The Mustard Taggers certainly had an eye for detail. Go, Mustard.

  “I am so hungry, man.” Gardo jammed a handful of ketchupless fries into his mouth.

  “Do tell,” I said. Lipstick smeared his upper lip. “You have the table etiquette of a gorilla, Ms. Monroe.”

  “Wrestlers don’t need manners,” he said through the fries. “But I need food. This Friday’s practice meet against the Del Heiny Junior nine was just canceled.”

  “The Beefsteaks?”

  “None other. Our fine janitors left a hose running outside the wrestling room, and the water leaked in and ruined all the mats. We can’t use the Beefsteaks’ gym, either. It’s being renovated. Which means I get one more week of not worrying about making weight. I swear, I could eat a wrestling mat.”

  I felt another tap on my shoulder and turned to find Tater standing there with Tweedle dee and Tweedle dum behind him. Both Tweedles wore yellow hats and yellow wristbands with their costumes, and all three guys had loaded food trays.

  “Mind if we sit here, Thuff?” Tater asked.

  “Here? Yeah. I mean, no, I don’t mind. If you can make room.”

  “We can make room.” Tater waved up the Tweedles and they all scrunched and scooted and squeezed until they’d worked themselves onto the bench on Gardo’s side. Elbows banged as they ripped at their ketchup packets. Tater took his beloved green marker out of his back pocket and stuck it over his ear. Maybe it was poking him in the rear.

  My lab partner introduced the Tweedles as his friends Roshon and Runji. They were cousins. I’d seen them in the halls but had never met them.

  “Hey, Thuff,” Tater said. “Rumor has it you’re the next hopeful for speed-eating champion or something like that. Why didn’t you tell me? Is it true that you speed-ate five gallons of ice cream in three minutes yesterday?”

  “Five gallons in three minutes?” Is he nuts? “Are you crazy?”

  “That’s what I heard.”

  “Well you heard wrong—”

  “It was twelve minutes,” Gardo interrupted. “That’s a regulation heat. And he didn’t even bat an eye.”

  I shot Gardo a look, like, What are you talking about?

  He shot back a look: Shut up and let me handle this. “Shermie’s training to take on Tsunami,” he announced. “That’s the fastest hot dog eater in the world. Seventy hot dogs in twelve minutes.”

  Seventy?

  “Seventy?” Tater exclaimed. “Gimme a break. Nobody can eat that many hot dogs. And not in twelve minutes.”

  “Tsunami can,” Gardo assured him. “He’s a medical marvel. The guy’s stomach expands like a popcorn bag in a microwave. But Shermie’s going to beat him. He’s got the Mustard Yellow International Belt of Hot Dog–Eating in the bag.”

  “Wow.”

  The guys were impressed. I wasn’t. Gardo was lying through his teeth. Tsunami’s record was fifty-three and three-quarters HDBs. And that was pretty near inhuman. Seventy wasn’t possible, at least not without some kind of alien stomach transplant.

  But Gardo was still running at the mouth. “Ice cream is part of Shermie’s cross-training. He’s already an expert at it. Five gallons in twelve minutes is nothing. He’ll beat that before the week’s out.”

  “See, I told you Chad doesn’t lie,” Tater told Tweedle Dee, AKA Runji.

  Who’s Chad? Does everyone know about the ice cream? Oh no—Lucy!

  Runji was intrigued. “So Thuff—”

  “Thuff Enuff,” Gardo corrected.

  “Sorry. So Thuff Enuff, even if you can eat that many hot dogs—”

  “Oh, he can.”

  Shut up, Gardo!

  “—how can you eat them that fast?”

  All eyes were on me, even Gardo’s. He could spin the hype, but he didn’t have a clue when it came to actual techniques. Luckily, Lucy had explained those to me already.

  “Well…” I said, trying to remember them all, “there are several techniques. I haven’t settled on one yet.”

  “Like?”

  “Well, like the Chunk ’n’ Dunk. That’s when you dunk the whole HDB—that’s the hot dog and the bun to us eaters—you dunk the whole HDB, then eat it, then dunk it, then eat it.”

  “What do you dunk it in?”

  “Water.” I shrugged. “Nothing fancy. Or you can eat the HDB regular, just like anybody who eats a hot dog. That’s the Traditional Style. Then there’s the Japanese Method. In that one, you pull the dog out of the bun, then you eat just the hot dog, followed by just the dunked bun.”

  “Is that how Tsunami does it?” Gardo was just as fascinated as the others. See, there were things I knew better than him.

  “No,” I answered, warming up to the spotlight. “He uses the Solomon Method. He pulls the dogs out of the buns, then breaks them in half and eats both halves at the same time. It’s pretty cool to watch, actually.” My mind replayed the online footage Lucy showed me of Tsunami winning one of his six Nathan’s Famous contest titles. It was like watching a ballet dancer or something. He had grit and timing and didn’t falter a single bite. “He chomps the halves side by side in three real fast bites. That’s it, three. Then he breaks the bun in half, dunks it, and chomps it down the same way. I don’t think the guy even swallows. The food just disappears.”

  As I explained this, I monitored the room. No sign of Shane or the Finns.

  “Well, Thuff Enuff,” Tater said, “I take my hat off to you. I had no idea that this whole semester I’ve been sitting next to a world champion hot dog eater in the making. And a fearless anti-Shaner, too. Walk silently but carry a big stick, eh? I like that in a Plum. Someday that robe of yours will be hanging on Culwicki’s Wall of Fame with the other Del Heiny Junior 13 sports greats.”

  Gardo grinned wide, clearly pleased with himself for making me wear the boxing robe. I had to admit, he was right about that. I grinned back at him. I was lucky to have him as a friend.

  “Gardo’s singlet will be up there, too,” I said. “You’ll see, he’s going to wrestle right to the top.”

  “If the janitors don’t burn down the wrestling gym first,” Gardo muttered.

  “That’s so messed up,” William said. “Can’t they move the meet to the main gym?”

  “No. That’s already reserved for the girls’ JV prep badminton team.” Gardo stuffed several fries into his mouth at once.

  Tater looked like he had an opinion of badminton—and it wouldn’t be a flattering one—when Lucy came up, interrupting him. Ignoring me, she set a white plastic grocery bag on the table and motioned to Gardo with her hand. “Do you mind?”

  He dutifully scooted over, which made Tucker, William, and Tommy have to scoot over, too. William was hanging so far off the end of his bench that I could only figure he was holding on by a single butt cheek.

  “Thank you.” Lucy settled in without acknowledgin
g my presence. She caught a glimpse of Tater as she settled onto the bench. “Nice earring,” she told him.

  He scowled, then took his lucky green marker from behind his ear and stuffed it back in his pocket, elbowing people in the process.

  Lucy reached into her plastic bag and pulled out a container of salad with a clear plastic lid, a small cup of brothy soup, and another small cup of lumpy white stuff that better be cottage cheese. What did she do, steal Max’s lunch?

  I tried to work on my own lunch, but it was just too weird to be sitting two feet from Lucy’s face and not talking to her. She was making such a production of opening all her containers and unwrapping her spork…I bet she wanted me to notice. Well, I wasn’t going to.

  I ate a French fry doused in ketchup and watched the ceiling. For a minute. Then I just couldn’t help it, my eyes slid back to Lucy. She was prodding her fluffy pile of green, purple, and red leaves with her spork like it was some strange Mad Max experiment. There were some stringy orange things in the salad, and a few black things, too. Definitely not anything I’d want in my mouth. But even more disturbing was that there wasn’t a single tomato as far as I could see. What was Lucy thinking?

  “You’re gonna get suspended,” I blurted before I could stop myself. She didn’t look up. Leonard and Tater did. Shoot. Now I’m committed. I pointed at her lunch. “You can’t have that here. None of that is ketchup-dunkable.”

  She reached into the bag again. “Neither is what’s between your legs.”

  The guys exploded with laughter. I quickly raised my soda can for them to see. Lucy was no dummy; she knew where I stashed my soda every day.

  She had a sly smile on her lips as she pulled out napkins and blotted the corners of her mouth. She probably thought that was a good shot.

  Well, she could take all the potshots she wanted, but an illegal soda between my legs wasn’t a plate of illegal food on the table for all the world to see. She was just asking for trouble. Culwicki had drilled and drilled and drilled us that first week of school: All cafeteria food must be ketchup-dippable. He’d lectured everyone about it in the daily bulletin for a week, and we’d received special mailings at home about it. He was probably afraid of losing precious funding if we ticked off Del Heiny. All the mustard graffiti around campus must’ve had him crapping bricks already. And it was only escalating. Just minutes after lunch started today they’d found the ketchup packet bin filled with mustard packets. I swear, I’d never seen the cafeteria ladies move so fast. They had the bin refilled to the brim with red packets within minutes.

  It was no joke. With a lunch of salad, soup, and white gunk, Lucy was definitely walking on thin ice.

  “There’s not even a tomato in that salad,” I warned her. “I’m telling you, if one of those janitors sees you with that, you’ll get suspended.”

  “How can I get suspended for eating healthy?”

  “This is healthy.” I pointed to each item on my tray. “Protein in the burgers, grains in the buns, veggies in the French fries and the pickles. And it’s all dippable in ketchup—yet another vegetable.” I raised my milk carton in a toast. “Plus, I’m washing it all down with a nice, cold box of milk. It does a body good.” Gardo and I bumped our cartons together. “Cheers!”

  The other guys bumped their cartons, too. “Hear! Hear!”

  Lucy observed this scene quietly for a moment. “What about mustard?”

  “What about it?” I wiped off my milk mustache with my sleeve.

  “You like your burgers with mustard. Last week at McDonald’s, I had to go back and ask for a bunch of mustard packets for you.”

  “So what?” I said. “They don’t have mustard here.”

  “Oh yes they do.” Kenny and William laughed and flashed mustard packets hidden in their fists. They must’ve swiped them before the cafeteria ladies swooped in. Like Tater, Kenny and William were hard-core Yellow Shirts, sticking with their yellow gear today instead of wearing a Halloween costume.

  Lucy poked her salad with her spork. “My point is, they’ve outlawed mustard.”

  I shrugged. “Yeah. So?”

  “So, you’re going to be the hot dog–eating champ, aren’t you? Where’s the big eat-off held every year?”

  “You know where it’s held,” I answered. To the guys I said, “At Nathan’s Famous.”

  “Precisely,” she said.

  I shook my head in confusion. “You lost me.”

  Gardo was just as confused. “What’s Nathan’s?”

  “Nathan’s Famous. It’s only the most famous hot dog place in the world, Mr. Image,” Lucy said. “Or should I say Miss Image?”

  Gardo winked his false lashes and tipped his wig like a true gent.

  “Nathan’s Famous is a Coney Island landmark,” Lucy said. “Every Fourth of July they hold a huge hot dog–eating contest. It’s the Super Bowl for competitive eaters. Shermie, what’s your cupboard stocked with at home?”

  I had the feeling I was being set up, so I didn’t answer.

  Gardo did. “He’s got mustard in his cupboard. I’ve seen it. Bottles and bottles of it.”

  “What kind of mustard?” Lucy asked.

  Leonard gave it a try: “French’s Classic Yellow?”

  Lucy shook her head, then stared at me calmly, waiting for my answer.

  I didn’t want to answer, but the silence was excruciating. “Nathan’s Famous mustard,” I finally said.

  Nathan’s Famous mustard was the highest-rated condiment in the Sherman T. Thuff Book of Good and Tasty Things. I slathered it on everything, not just hot dogs. I even tried it on pizza once. Lucy herself had three pieces of that brilliance. She knew I was crazy about the stuff, and she knew that when I first heard that Nathan’s Famous wasn’t just a mustard brand but an actual restaurant, one where they hold the main eating event of the year, that was what convinced me that choosing hot dogs as my trademark food was destiny. But what did that have to do with her soup and salad?

  “I still don’t get your point,” I said. “So they don’t serve mustard in the school cafeteria. So what?”

  “So you’re letting them dictate which condiment you can put on your food. Condiment, Shermie. If that isn’t Big Brother, I don’t know what is. Who are they to tell us what food we can or can’t eat, let alone which condiment we top it with? What if I want relish? I’m gonna get kicked out of school for relish?” She pulled a big, shiny yellow lemon out of her grocery bag, scored it with her fingernail, then squeezed the pee-colored juice onto her lettuce. “I will not give in to the Man. Del Heiny may own Culwicki, but it doesn’t own the universe.”

  “She’s got a point there,” Tater said, tapping his Yellow-Shirted heart.

  “Of course I do.” She stirred the juice and salad with her finger. Then she stabbed her spork into the bed of colorful leaves and raised several pieces daintily to her mouth. It was as mesmerizing as watching Tsunami execute the Solomon Method.

  “That’s your lunch?” I’d pass out from starvation if all I ate was salad with a squirt of lemon, a few sips of broth, and some goopy cheese.

  “It is.”

  “I swear,” Tater said, shaking his head, “I don’t get girls. Lettuce and a squirt of lemon juice? Next thing, you’ll be pulling rice cakes and tofu out of your backpack. Are you on a diet or something?”

  She made a face when he said “tofu.” “I’m not on a diet. Everything anybody eats is part of their diet. I’m watching what I eat.”

  “Why?” I asked. She looked fine to me.

  Gardo fielded that one. “Because she’s a girl, and girls do weird things with food, man. Don’t think about it too hard.” He chomped into his second burger. Ketchup dribbled down his chin like blood. “Man! Whoever invented hamburgers should get the Nobel Prize.”

  “No way,” I protested. “The inventor of pizza should get it.”

  “Over my dead body,” Leonard cried. “Ice cream wins, hands down.”

  “No,” I countered. “It can’t—”
/>   “Don’t you argue with me, Thuff Enuff.” He cut me off. “You know exactly what I’m talking about. The way you trained with that ice cream yesterday…I don’t know how you didn’t puke from it all.”

  Lucy’s eyes snapped up from her salad. “Ice cream training?”

  Gardo nearly choked on his burger.

  “Yeah,” Leonard said. “Didn’t he tell you? He totally pigged—ow!” The whole table jolted as he grabbed his leg and glared at Gardo.

  Nice shot, Gardo.

  Lucy drilled me with her eyes. “Shermie? What’s he talking about?”

  “Leonard is an idiot,” Gardo said quickly, returning Leonard’s glare. “He’s got Shermie confused with someone else.”

  It was no use. Once Lucy sank her teeth into something, she didn’t let go. “Shermie…”

  Leonard and his big mouth. I wracked my brain for an answer that wouldn’t get me killed. What did a guy have to do for a little divine intervention around here?

  “Out of the way, scrub,” a voice boomed across the cafeteria.

  My stomach seesawed. Shane. His kind of intervention was far from divine.

  But at least he got Lucy’s eyes off me. She and the rest of the Plums couldn’t help but watch as the ninth grade king strode toward his table with Gabriella Marquez, the hottest eighth grader in the whole school. Gabriella was wearing her own crown and cape and hanging on his arm.

  “We got a lady coming through,” he declared. “Make way.” Another scrub was getting a promotion from Shane.

  Using his scepter, Shane poked Plums out of the path to his table. Gabriella was smiling and waving at everyone she passed, looking royally happy. Plodding behind them, the Finns looked royally unhappy in their green tights, red tunics, and floppy green-and-red jester hats. It amazed me what traitors would do to stay in the upper class’s good graces.

  A hush settled on the cafeteria as a roomful of eyes flicked from Shane to me to Shane to me. The Plums seemed to be waiting for something big to happen. Something big…like me.

  Quick, Shermie, do something. “Stupid shoe,” I blurted then ducked below the table.