Green Algae and Bubble Gum Wars (13 page)

W
hat's in the bag, Ave?” asked Charlotte. She and Isabel were standing by Charlotte's locker, discussing their contributions to the Sentinel that week, when they'd spotted Avery hauling a gigantic duffel through the hallway of Abigail Adams Junior High.

“You'll see,” Avery replied with a snarky smirk.

“Come on,” urged Isabel. “Just give us a teensy little clue.”

Avery looked right and then left to make sure none of her enemies was listening and then motioned for Charlotte and Isabel to huddle in closer. “This bag,” she began in a soft but important voice, “contains my greatest invention yet.”

“A soccer ball that never deflates?” guessed Charlotte.

“A hair ribbon destroyer?” Isabel joked.

Avery groaned. “No and no. For your information, Isabel, hair ribbon destroyers are impossible…but I wish. Actually, it's five pounds of original, homemade Avery Madden chewing gum. It's stickier, tastier, and way better for you
than that Tru Blu stuff Kiki's been giving out. Check. It. Out.” She reached into her duffel and produced a small drawstring bag. “Contained in this bio bag is the best gum you've ever tasted!” she announced, and then dramatically pulled out a long roll of gum with indentations along it.

“That's gum?” Isabel asked suspiciously, staring at the gum roll in Avery's hand.

“I'm not chewing that!” Charlotte said decidedly. “It looks kind of sketchy, Ave.”

Avery rolled her eyes. “You guys, it's
supposed
to look that way—the design cuts down on wasted wrappers, which saves garbage
and
the manufacturing of all that paper, which takes tons of water. And it comes in its own totally, completely biodegradable bag. This gum, my friends, is my way to help save the planet—and I think it's pretty ingenious, if I do say so myself. See?” She broke off a piece of the gum roll and held it out. “Come on, Char—you trust me, right? Izzy? Try a piece?”

Isabel grimaced and shook her head.

Avery gave a frustrated sigh. “Ugh. I expect more from my BSG. You girls are
chickens
.”

“Hey!” cried Isabel. “I resent that.” She grabbed the gum from Avery's outstretched hand, broke off a piece, and stuffed it in her mouth. Gradually her skeptical scowl became a broad grin. “Hey, Char, you gotta try this stuff. Wriff riff rerry grrrd.”

“What?” asked Charlotte.

Isabel folded the gum under her tongue and repeated, “I
said
, this is really good. It tastes like berries but…you know[ ]…tangy like!”

Avery was glowing. “Yeah? Nice! It took me eight hours last night to get the recipe right.”

“Eight hours?” Charlotte balked. “You must have gotten like, no sleep!”

“Don't need sleep,” Avery said, slapping her bag. “Got sugar! Pure cane sugar, actually.”

“Hey, girls. What's in the giant duffel?” asked Katani. She strode over with an uncharacteristically serious-looking Maeve by her side.

“Well…so far, Avery made enough gum to last till 2012, and she's eaten enough sugar to keep her awake till next Thursday,” Isabel explained.

“What's with all the gum?” asked Maeve.

“It's part of my master plan to take over the world…one gum wad at a time…wah, hah, hah!” Avery did her fake evil laugh.

“No, seriously,” said Katani. “What's going on?”

“Wellllll…my master plan has four points of genius. One, the packaging for this gum is biodegradable, so when you are done enjoying its record-breaking awesomeness, you don't have to worry about it filling dumps for all eternity. And it comes in this nifty roll, which cuts down on even more packaging. It's like buying juice in a big bottle instead of a lot of little boxes—way better for the environment. Tru Blu Goo comes with every little piece wrapped up in its own paper wrapper! So not enviro-friendly.

“Two, this gum,
Avery Madden Gum
, is all natural. None of that nasty artificial sweetener stuff. I mean, ‘aspartame'? Who even knows what that is? Three! Big gum factories like the one Kiki's dad is promoting use an artificial gum base that
comes from petroleum. It's basically all wax and rubber and other chemically things…talk about ewwww.
My
gum gets most of it its sticky-wicky-deliciousness from chicle.”

“Uh, what's that?” Isabel asked a little nervously, shifting the huge wad of Avery's gum to one side of her mouth so she could talk.

“Tree sap!” Avery exclaimed with a huge grin. Isabel looked pale. “But it's totally okay for you to chew it, Iz,” Avery reassured her quickly. “It comes from these trees called sapodillas that grow in Central America. Like in the rain forest.”

Isabel was looking less convinced by the second, so world-traveler and history buff Charlotte jumped in. “I've heard of that. I think I read somewhere that the Mayans used to chew chicle,” she told Isabel encouragingly.

“Yep!” Avery agreed. “And that's not even the best part about chicle. Using it helps save the rain forest, because people harvest the sap from the trees over and over again. It doesn't hurt the trees at all and it gives people a good reason to not cut them down. And we need those rain forests, because more than a third of the species in the whole world live there, and all those trees and crazy-looking, giant plants absorb tons of carbon dioxide!”

“Ooo, Ife been weading abowt cawbon dioxide!” Isabel exclaimed. When the girls turned to her with confused looks, she tucked her huge wad of gum into her cheek and tried again. “Sorry! I said, I've been reading about carbon dioxide. It's one of those greenhouse gases, right? When there's too much of it in the atmosphere it can make the weather go crazy all over the world.”

“Ding ding ding! Five enviro points for Isabel!” Avery shouted. “
And
using chicle helps the rain forest economy,” she gushed, looking directly at Katani, “because it supports the people who live there and harvest the chicle.”

“How do you know?” demanded Katani, still touchy from the conversation about the gum factory and the economy the day before.

“Hours of research, dude,” Avery answered, pulling out a thick packet of papers from her backpack. “And I talked to the people at Glee Gum. But the third point of my master plan is the best of them all.” Avery rubbed her hands together in what she hoped was a menacing way. “My gum is so much better than Kiki Underwood's that no one is going to care or even want that super yuuugly Tru Blu stuff. That is, once they try my masterpiece.” Avery grinned at everyone.

“And just how do you plan on doing that?” asked Katani doubtfully. “Not that I'm on her side or anything, but it seems like Kiki's gum is pretty popular. All the kids at AAJH have been rocking bright blue tongue…if you haven't noticed.”

Avery casually waved her hand. “Just watch. Hey, Nick!”

Nick Montoya jogged over to the BSG. “Hey, guys…hey, Charlotte.”

“Hi,” Charlotte said softly. Whenever Nick Montoya came around her knees turned to pudding. “Did you get my e-mail?”

The girls glanced at each other with raised eyebrows, but Maeve looked away. Usually seeing puppy love like Nick and Charlotte's made Maeve feel all warm and fuzzy inside. Today, however, it made her feel like bursting into tears and
running into a bathroom stall. It didn't help that once—even though it was a while ago—Nick Montoya had been her crush project. But after one disastrous date, it was clear to Maeve and the rest of the BSG that Nick Montoya had eyes only for Charlotte.

“I was just gonna say!” Nick exclaimed to Charlotte. “I think it's an awesome idea. I just ran into Chelsea outside, and—”

“Shhhh!” Charlotte shushed him, tilting her head toward the rest of the BSG.

“Oh, right, top secret!” Nick answered, dropping his voice. “I mean, uh, I did
not
just run into Chelsea outside, and she definitely did
not
just tell me that she's totally on board.”

Everyone, including Charlotte, had to grin. “I guess now we know who your partners-in-science-fair-crime are,” Avery teased.

“That's great that she, uh,
didn't
say that,” Charlotte laughingly told Nick. “Now, I say we talk to Ms. R after class and get her okay…”

“And then we can meet at the bakery today after school,” Nick said, finishing Charlotte's sentence, almost as if the two shared one brain.

Avery rolled her eyes and mouthed, “True Love,” even managing to right Maeve's perma-frown into a smile. “Listen, Nick, as much as we'd all like to hear about you and Char's secret meet-up-ez-vous—”

“Don't you mean
rendezvous
?” asked Charlotte, who was not only a word nerd, but had lived in Paris.

“Whatever,” Avery went on. “The thing is, Nick, I called you over here for a reason.”

“Oh, yeah? What?”

“I was wondering if you wanted to try a piece of my homemade gum.” Avery broke off another section from the gum roll and extended her hand with the gum resting in her palm.

Nick leaned in. “Dude. That looks totally sketchy. I mean,
totally.
”

“That's just what I said!” Charlotte cried.

“It's actually weewy good,” Isabel uttered between chews.” But I can't get it to make a bubble…” She made a funny face as she shifted the gum all around in her mouth, trying to blow a bubble.

“That's because it's
not
bubble gum, Iz,” Avery told her. “It's
chewing
gum. You know what makes the bubbles in bubble gum? Elastic. And there's no
way
I am putting that in my gum! It's supposed to be natural, remember?” She shook her hand holding the gumball in front of Nick's nose. “So…Nick…whadaya say?”

He gritted his teeth and shook his head.

“Watch this,” Avery whispered to Katani. Then she declared loudly to Nick, “I
dare
you.”

Now Nick looked intrigued. “What'll you give me?”

Avery squinted and said in her most serious voice, “Respect.”

Nick nodded. “Deal.” And with that he took the gum and popped it in his mouth. “Hey! This is
rad
! You don't even miss the bubbles…I mean the elastic…whatever. Yo, Dillon, Yurtmeister…get over here.” Dillon Johnson and Henry Yurt ran over to join the group. “You've got to try the Ave's gum, dudes. Avery, set 'em up with some of that.”

Avery distributed the gum to the boys, who both gave her two thumbs way up. Soon, Avery had kids coming up to her in twos and threes shouting, “Gum! Gum!” Before the first bell rang, half the stock in her duffel bag was gone. As the girls hustled off to class, Avery turned to her friends and snickered, “You see that?”

Confident that her gum would soon be the AAJH gum of choice, Avery stopped in front of her locker to store the rest. Her face turned purple when she grabbed her locker handle. Blue stickiness smushed through her fingers. She narrowed her eyes and whispered, “Let the games begin!”

Math Boy Strikes Again

“Hello! We're home!” Katani hollered. She and Kelley walked into the hallway and were greeted by silence. “Hey! Anybody here? I said we're home!” shouted Katani.

Kelley put her bag down and carefully hung up her yellow raincoat on its proper hook. “This is
peculiar
.” Peculiar had been her word of the day. She knew it meant weird and had used it five times on their walk home. The only near-disaster was when she asked a man in a cowboy hat, “Why are you wearing a peculiar hat?” Katani didn't think the cowboy hat man had appreciated that.

“Hey, girls, how was school?” Patrice appeared in the hallway sucking down one of her banana soy milkshakes. She loved to make them after especially exhausting basketball practices.

“It was…okay. A little out of control,” Katani mumbled.

“It was
peculiar
,” Kelley pronounced. “Too much gum. There was gum everywhere. It wasn't normal.” She laughed.

“What?” Patrice raised her eyebrows and collapsed in the easy chair in the den off the hallway. “I need to know more.”

“Kids can be really immature,” Katani muttered. “Kiki Underwood is trying to be the Gum Queen of Massachusetts—as if being a Queen of Mean isn't enough.”

“You guys still call those girls that? Speaking of immature,” Patrice teased. She just loved to get under Katani's skin.

“Whatever, Patrice. Besides, some gremlin kids are taking her silly blue gum and sticking it on stuff everywhere. Why anyone could think that's funny is beyond me. Then Avery made this gum at home that she said was better than Kiki's and brought it to school today. By lunch, all you could hear at Abigail Adams was chewing and popping. And of course some doodle-brains lack the
decency
to throw their completely repulsive, used gum in the trashcan. Ugh. Seventh grade can be such a zoo. Now there's gum
everywhere
. Doorknobs…chairs…desks…it's really disgusting. Like totally
out of control
. I think I'm going to have to talk to Grandma about this.”

“Out of control,” echoed Kelley. “Totally out of control…and very peculiar.”

Patrice got up and peered out the window that overlooked the garage. “Are you even listening?” Katani challenged.

“What? Oh, forgive me if I'm not completely fascinated by your, um, gum story. I'm more interested in the junior-hottie situation going down in the garage.”

“What junior hottie situation?”

Patrice shrugged. “I don't know. About an hour ago some
kid came over and wanted to talk to Dad. I've never seen him before, but he looks like he's about your age. He had this crazy messy ‘fro and freckles, and he was wearing these awesome shades.”