The Fourth Stall - Chris Rylander [7]
I caught the ball and nodded. He was right, but what else could we do? I felt the stitching and then spread two fingers across the ball like I was going to throw a splitter.
“We may have to dip into the Emergency Fund,” I said, throwing the ball back. The Emergency Fund is a pile of money that I started a few years ago. I keep it in my closet right next to the Game Fund, and it’s there in case we are ever in a pinch and need a bit of money.
Vince caught the ball and shook his head.
“But that’s only supposed to be for real emergencies, like if I need an ice cream really bad and I don’t have any spare change. Or if I lose a video baseball game because my dumb third baseman makes an error and I get so angry that I throw my whole gaming console right out the window and it smashes the windshield of my mom’s car,” he said.
I smirked in spite of myself. Even now, when he was genuinely concerned about our money supply, Vince was still joking around.
“If we get to the point where we actually have to use the Emergency Fund, then . . . well, then this whole situation probably will be an emergency,” I said.
“Actually, I just got an idea for this Fred situation that might help to save some money,” Vince said.
That’s one reason Vince is such a great business partner—he always comes up with great ways to save money and pinch pennies, thrifty ways to solve tough problems. I mean, sure, his jokes are fun, too, but I’d trade those in any day for his ingenious ideas.
“Let’s hear it,” I said.
“Well, we could let him hang out in here until we find someone to do it for cheap. That would keep him safe and it would be free,” he said.
“Nice, Vince,” I said. “But won’t that let people know that we’re involved?”
“Maybe, but kids are going to find out eventually either way. We’ll just make sure we get him here as soon as possible each recess and lunch and hope that too many kids don’t notice.”
“All right, let’s plan to do that for now, but I don’t want anything to interfere with normal business long-term. We eventually need to find someone else. We need to keep things running smoothly,” I said.
Vince nodded. “It’s like my grandma said once. ‘When the coin purse is empty, the pocket lint is king,’” he said after a moment of silence.
We all looked at him and then burst out laughing.
Vince’s grandma is senile. She is a hundred and three years old or something like that, and she is always saying stuff that doesn’t make any sense at all. Most of his family looks at each other uncomfortably when she does that, but Vince loves it. He writes down all the stuff she says in a quote book. Vince loves to quote his grandma. Which I usually find pretty funny.
After a few more minutes of discussion we decided to hire a kid named Tanzeem down the line to look after Fred during lunch and recess long-term, if things went on longer than expected. Tanzeem is a pretty tough seventh grader, and Joe said we could trust him. Joe was going to tell him to meet me here tomorrow during lunch.
This was shaping up to be a pretty tough case, but the one thing I actually thought I had on my side was the element of surprise. Staples didn’t know yet that Fred had this kind of protection. Something I learned long ago from watching lots of action movies and playing video games is that having the element of surprise is huge. It’s one of the best things to have.
That’s why it really sucked that I didn’t actually have it. Not at all. We soon found out that Staples somehow knew I was protecting Fred right from the beginning. Kids usually didn’t get the drop on me. But then, Staples wasn’t your usual kid.
Chapter 4
The first sign that somebody had the drop on us came the next morning before school. I went a little early so I could stop by my office to make a few notes in my Books. I unlocked the door to the bathroom and flicked on the lights, and was in the process of shutting the door so I could lock it when it was pushed back open. The force on the other side was so hard it knocked me backward onto the floor of the bathroom.