Night of the Zombie Chickens Read online

  “You scalped it!” I yelp.

  “It’s not my fault! It’s a cheap synthetic! Look, at least I tested it in back.” Alyssa twists the wig for me to see. “It won’t even show in front.”

  She lowers the heat, then gingerly tries another curl. This time the wig doesn’t burn, but the curl looks like a perm that’s gone bad. Way bad.

  “Kate!” my mother calls from downstairs.

  “In a minute!” I shout back. I know we’ve only got one more call, and then my mother will be coming up the stairs for me.

  “Hurry,” I prod.

  “Do you want to do it?” Alyssa snaps. I don’t, so I watch over her shoulder as she works. “It doesn’t curl like regular hair,” she complains. “I don’t think this wig is meant to be styled. You’re not supposed to get it wet,” she adds accusingly.

  “What was I supposed to do, leave the chicken poop? That would be kind of a giveaway, wouldn’t it? Everyone would know I took it.”

  “You did take it,” Alyssa retorts.

  I glance at her to see if she’s having second thoughts.

  She grins at me and dangles the wig. “Crapkate Walden strikes again.” The strange-looking curls bounce up and down. It looks more like a synthetic snarl than a curly red wig.

  “The plastic head sits way in the back of the room by the window,” I say, trying to sound positive. “No one will even notice.”

  “Kate!” my mother yells up the stairs. “RIGHT NOW!”

  “We’re coming!”

  I pop the wig into another plastic bag. The image of the hens fighting to get into my backpack comes back to me as I stow the wig. What were they after? I search inside my pack and find bread crumbs scattered everywhere. Derek. Grudgingly, I have to admit his plan shows a certain evil genius.

  That doesn’t stop me from telling my mother what happened when we’re in the car. “They dragged my stuff out into the yard and ruined it!”

  “I guess Derek needs more practice feeding the hens,” my mother says. “Two weeks ought to do it.”

  Derek starts to whine, then snaps shut his mouth after a warning look from our mother. He and I glare at each other.

  “Did you hear the thunder last night?” my mother asks in her let’s-be-pleasant voice. “We’re supposed to have more bad storms this afternoon.”

  The sun glares off the windshield, without a cloud in sight. It’s sticky and hot for October. Everyone says we’re having an extralong summer this year. The tree leaves are usually flaming orange and yellow by this time, but they’ve only barely begun to turn. Small bursts of color stain the trees like someone went crazy shooting off a paintball gun.

  Suddenly, I feel nostalgic. We started shooting Night of the Zombie Chickens almost exactly a year ago. In one of the first scenes we shot, a zombie hurries down the road, searching for Mallory. As soon as it’s out of sight, Alyssa pops out of a big, colorful mound of leaves and runs the other way. It’s one of the movie’s more scenic moments. Then I think of Margaret’s hair glowing like fire as she walks down the road toward the sunset. That was pretty spectacular, too.

  I can’t help wondering if Margaret would be so eager to help return the wig if she knew Alyssa wants me to reshoot the end of my movie. If I use the ending with Margaret, Alyssa will be upset. If I cut the ending and reshoot, Margaret will be hurt. My heart starts thumping and a dull pain throbs at the base of my skull as we pull up to school. I decide I can only worry about one thing at a time. My movie will have to wait. First, we have to save my neck and restore Alyssa’s honor. Let the auditions begin.

  Alyssa and I split up. She goes to her locker and I head straight to the music room. Despite all our planning last week, I never actually signed up to audition. Luckily, the sign-up sheet is still hanging on the wall. It looks like the name of almost every female seventh grader is on it. I scrawl my own at the bottom of the list.

  “Hello, Kate.”

  I jump about a foot at Mr. Cantrell’s voice right behind me. He has one of those quiet gazes that make you feel nervous, like he knows something and he’s just waiting for you to come out and admit it.

  “Hi, Mr. Cantrell. I was just signing up for auditions.”

  “Good, good,” he says vaguely. “I was just coming to get the list.”

  I untape it from the wall and hand it to him.

  “Oh, my.” He riffles through the pages and smiles weakly. “Lots of interest, I see.”

  “It’s too bad about the wig,” I say, and then immediately want to kick myself. It’s a well-known fact that criminals often return to the scene of their crime. They also have an obsessive need to talk about what they did. Here I am, hardly twenty feet from the bald plastic head, blabbing away. But Mr. Cantrell merely nods.

  “Yes, it is too bad.”

  “You know, I don’t think Alyssa took it,” I say in a rush. “She’s not the type to steal stuff. And why would she want the wig, anyway?”

  “I certainly hope you’re right, Kate.”

  “It was probably just someone playing a practical joke,” I blindly go on. “Now that rehearsals will be starting soon, I bet whoever took it will put it back.”

  Mr. Cantrell gives me another wistful smile and departs with the list. I treat myself to a good hard pinch for giving away the plot like an amateur. But seeing his sad face makes me feel even guiltier. Poor Mr. Cantrell probably took the theft personally, like a slap in the face. He’s probably devastated that someone would stoop so low as to take the red wig for his musical. I can only hope he’ll feel better once the wig is returned.

  At lunchtime I sit with Margaret and Doris, as usual. Alyssa and I decided we would pretend to still be mad at each other until we got the wig safely back on its plastic head.

  “I wish I could help,” Doris says for the hundredth time, “but I don’t sing. And I have Math Club after school.”

  I didn’t even know our school had a math club. I’m tempted to ask what they do, exactly, but Doris has her mouth full and I decide not to chance it.

  “That’s okay. You’re the mastermind,” I tell her. “The mastermind never gets her hands dirty with the gritty details.”

  “Did you tell Alyssa about the ending to your movie?” Margaret asks me.

  She says it casually but I feel an icy finger in my stomach. Margaret has figured out that if Alyssa and I become friends again, then Alyssa might want to finish Night of the Zombie Chickens.

  I always wished my life could be a movie, but now I’m not so sure. Even I can’t keep up with all these plot threads. “Um, yeah. She thought it sounded...interesting. Once she sees it, she’ll love it,” I babble on.

  Margaret smiles, cheered.

  I try to smile back, but it’s hard. Frogs are jumping in my stomach, and the thought of singing in front of Mr. Cantrell makes me want to puke. I push away my sandwich. There’s no way I can eat anything today.

  The afternoon crawls by. In history class I gaze out the window, hiding a yawn. Huge clouds hang in the air like floating sledgehammers. When I glance back at the clock, I’m almost positive it’s gone backward.

  By business ed class at the end of the day, all the sledgehammers have blended together and the last bit of blue sky has disappeared. The wind churns in the trees and leaves scatter everywhere. A hard rain begins to drive against the windows.

  As we leave class, Alyssa bumps into me and whispers in my ear: “There’s a severe thunderstorm warning. I hope Mr. Cantrell doesn’t cancel auditions!”

  I shrug like I’m not worried. A small part of me wishes he would cancel so I don’t have to humiliate myself. When I drag myself to the choir room, it seems like the entire seventh-grade female population is waiting in the hallway, and a lot of eighth graders, too. They all watch me as I check the audition schedule. Sure enough, with a last name of Walden, I’m second to last in line, right before Margaret Yo
rkel.

  “I heard there’s a tornado watch,” Margaret says at my elbow. She smiles and I can feel the eyes of every single girl on me.

  “Cool,” I say loudly. “Maybe we’ll all get blown away.”

  It looks like it’s going to be a long wait. Luckily, the music department is tucked away at the end of a wing because most of the girls are sprawled on the hallway floor, chatting, texting, or doing homework. I dump my backpack, slip off my shoes, and join them. It takes all my concentration just to try to look relaxed. Mr. Cantrell is doing the auditions in the choir room. The music classroom, where the bald plastic head sits, is just two doors away.

  A huge crack of thunder makes everyone jump. Lydia and Tina Turlick both scream and collapse on the floor. Mr. Cantrell emerges from the choir room and frowns.

  “Please, girls, keep it down. Jennifer Adams?”

  Jennifer bounces into the choir room behind Mr. Cantrell. Mr. Cantrell has decided that everyone should sing the same song to make it easier. We hear the piano plunk out “Tomorrow.” Jennifer’s voice screeches on the top note.

  Lydia makes a face like a constipated opera singer and everyone laughs. It occurs to me that being second to last isn’t such a bad thing.

  I was worried about getting through the song since I hadn’t exactly prepared, but after hearing fifteen auditions in a row, I know the words well enough to sing in my sleep. When Debbie Jacobs goes in, I slip away to the bathroom and text Alyssa. You’re next.

  By the time Alyssa arrives, Debbie is just leaving the choir room. Mr. Cantrell pokes his head out. “Alyssa Jensen?”

  Every pair of eyes is glued on Alyssa as she walks through the crowded hallway to the door. Luckily, Mr. Cantrell waits for her because the crowd’s mood is ugly. I think I would have sagged under the weight of all those eyes and sunk right through the floor. Alyssa keeps her head up and her eyes straight in front of her, but her cheeks flood with red.

  As soon as the door closes, Tina Turlick makes a nasty face, which isn’t very different from her normal face. “I can’t believe Mr. Cantrell is letting her try out! She should be banned from the play.”

  “We should chop off all her hair, dye it red, and make a new wig,” Sarah Perkins adds.

  Lydia gives a huge gasp, like she’s just come up with the perfect idea. “Yeah, let’s scalp her! I always wanted to scalp somebody.”

  Everyone falls quiet then as Alyssa’s voice rises on the chorus of “Tomorrow.” She’s a little pitchy, but you can hardly blame her. She knows everyone is listening and talking a mile a minute about her. I close my eyes and say a little prayer that our plan will work. I need to clear Alyssa’s name fast or she’ll crack under all the pressure. My heart sinks as I remember the condition of the Not-So-Cute Red Wig. Even if we manage to safely return it, I have to face facts—no one is going to want to put that thing on her head. The uproar would continue, only now it would be about who destroyed the wig. The best I can do is make sure nobody suspects Alyssa any longer.

  Alyssa sails out the door and I hold my breath. Will she remember her lines?

  “Thanks, Mr. Cantrell!” she says loudly. “I’ve got to run! I have a doctor’s appointment. I’m already late!”

  So far, so good. Everyone knows she’s leaving the building.

  “Maddie Long?” Mr. Cantrell calls out. He’s holding the door open, and through it we can see sheets of rain spraying the windows.

  “‘I have a doctor’s appointment,’” Tina mimics. “She doesn’t want to hang out here with the rest of us.”

  The rain has given me an idea. I casually pick up my backpack. My eyes meet Margaret’s for a split second and then I take a few steps down to the music classroom. Luckily, the door has a pane of glass and through it, I can see the big wall of windows on the far side of the room. The rain and the whipping wind outside look pretty impressive.

  “Wow!” I say loudly. “It looks really nasty out there.”

  A few girls glance over my way, but I’m too low on the social totem pole for them to pay much attention. I need Lydia. I take a deep breath and take my game, and my decibel level, up a notch.

  “Hey, Lydia,” I call out, so loud that everyone looks over. “You might have to audition during a tornado.” I nod toward the music classroom window.

  “Cool,” Lydia calls out. “Maybe it’ll suck me up and I won’t have to sing!”

  Just what I’m afraid of—I got her attention for a millisecond, but not enough to make her get up and come over. I lick my lips. I need to deliver an Oscar-winning performance and I’m running out of time. Lydia is up next to audition. Luckily, everyone is tired of hearing endless renditions of “Tomorrow.”

  I flinch like something big just flew past the window. “Holy crap, what was that?” I exclaim. “I think a house just flew by! Too bad we’re not trying out for The Wizard of Oz!”

  I say a private Hallelujah as Lydia laughs, then bounces up and strolls over. Immediately, five other girls follow, then four more. Pretty soon, everyone is trying to peer through the small window in the door. Hens act pretty much the same way. They’re impossible to herd, but if you can get the leader to follow you, the rest will tag along.

  I grab the knob to throw open the door so everyone can go inside and that’s when I realize I’m in big trouble. The door is locked. Mr. Cantrell must have started locking it since the theft of the wig. My head starts swirling like the leaves outside the window. If the door is locked, then I can’t get in to replace the wig. I glance at Margaret. She bites her lip, looking worried.

  “That’s some seriously nasty weather,” Lydia agrees, peering through the door.

  Just then, Mr. Cantrell pops his head into the hallway and consults his list. “Lydia Merritt?”

  My brain is frozen. I can’t think of what to do. Then, Margaret’s voice sings out.

  “Mr. Cantrell, have you seen how bad the weather is? We want to look through the windows, but we can’t get in.”

  I rattle the door for effect. Some of the others chime in and suddenly it’s a game. The girls on the outside of the pack start jumping up and down like they’re trying to see in. “Come on, Mr. C!” they call. “We want to see the big storm.”

  Mr. Cantrell glances at his list of names. Luckily, there’s one thing I know about teachers. Deep down, they all want to be cool. They want to be liked by their students. I think that’s why Mr. Cantrell finally shrugs and smiles. “It is ugly out there.”

  My knees practically sag with relief as he unlocks the door. Thank goodness for Margaret. Everyone spills inside and oohs and aahs at the black sheets of rain pouring down. The windows shake like they’re possessed by evil demon chickens.

  I cross over to the window with the others and then accidentally on purpose knock over the bald head. “Oops,” I say cheerfully. “Poor bald, plastic head.”

  Margaret laughs loudly. “We should buy her a hat!”

  No one laughs much, but we’ve made our point. The wig is still missing.

  “Okay, girls,” Mr. Cantrell calls. “We still have lots of auditions. Let’s go. Lydia, you’re up next.”

  Lydia smirks and suddenly everyone is rushing out behind her, eager to hear her sing. Margaret makes sure everyone gets out and then nods to me as she leaves. She will watch the door for me. Moving quickly, I grab the wig out of my backpack, fluff up the limp curls as best I can, stick it onto the plastic head, and then shove the head against the windows. Maybe if the wig is in silhouette, people won’t notice the sorry shape it’s in.

  Luckily, everyone is listening breathlessly to Lydia sing. I ease open the door and slip out without anyone noticing.

  In my short time on earth, I’ve already observed that life can be flat-out wrong sometimes—the prettiest girls also end up having the best voices, or they rock in gymnastics, or they’re ballerinas and star in The Nutcracker Suite, or all of the abo
ve. I’m not sure who makes up the rules, but I’m pretty sure that “Life is fair” isn’t one of them. I’d already made up my mind that Lydia would get the part of Annie. That’s just how life works.

  Usually. As I glance around, nobody dares to snicker but I see definite grins. A steam cloud of relief rises up from our huddled masses as Lydia yowls her way through the chorus. She might be funny, but she’s no Little Orphan Annie.

  Still, when she swaggers out of the choir room and pops her gum, everybody laughs like she’s just cracked the funniest joke ever. “Sayonara, ladies,” Lydia calls with a wave. “I’m off to surf the tsunami.”

  Thunder cracks overhead as if on cue. “Don’t drown,” Tina calls, and everybody nervously laughs.

  Mr. Cantrell calls out another name and the next victim follows him into the choir room. Roughly half the girls are now gone. I decide to wait for a few more auditions before “discovering” the wig. Only a few girls need to see it. The rest of the class will hear about it in a nanosecond or two once the first text message goes out.

  As we head into the names that start with S, Margaret suddenly starts telling me how she’s redecorating her room. “Do you want to come see it when it’s done?” She talks fast and her eyes dart around the hall. We’re both nervous. I can tell she’s trying to figure out how to “discover” the wig without raising suspicions. Suddenly, the storm lets loose with a humongous boom of thunder.

  Margaret jumps up and screams. “Did you hear that?”

  She runs back to the music room door and peers through the window. I follow behind her and so do a few of the other girls. We gaze out the window, exclaiming how dark it is—and seriously, it is dark and scary-looking by now. I want to blurt out something about the wig, but I know I have to be careful. After all, I’m the one who pointed out the bald head earlier. If I mention the wig now, it will be too on the nose. That’s a script-writing term for “too obvious.”