Crumbledown School: The Betrayal (Chapter 3)

Chapter 3

 

I sat at my desk in detention, chewing my pencil nervously. Choco sat next to me, fiddling with his cap. Mrs. Hazycurls was with us at the beginning; giving us work to do, but by now she had left, off to the cafeteria to eat. We were allowed to get our food from the cafeteria, even though we weren’t too hungry. What’s the point of stuffing yourself with food when soon you’ll be stuffing yourself with sweets?

“You know, as much as I hope they’ll get it, I’m starting to wonder if they really will.” Choco suddenly admitted.

I looked at him, “What makes you think that?”

Choco placed his cap back on his head, “Well, Billy Snooze is one to fall asleep, like that,” he snapped his fingers, “Will is one to get cowardly and freak out, like that,” he snapped his fingers again, “And Eric is one to take things too seriously, and start demanding for a lawyer or something if Tom protests, like that,” he snapped his fingers for the final time.

This thought of Choco’s crept into my own head, and I too started worrying if we’d actually succeed. It was one thing to plan out your mission, and another to sit in detention hoping your friends did it right.

The bell rang, signalling the end of break. We dashed out of the classroom. No one was outside yet, but I had a feeling they’d come. And minutes later, they arrived.

Choco and I whooped with joy, and jumped up and down and punched the air. Our cheers died down as we saw that Eric was stomping towards us. Will Freckles trailed behind with Billy Snooze.

“What’s wrong?” I asked slowly, as they neared.

“The plan failed, if you must know,” Eric snapped.

I turned to the others, “Billy?” I felt my face fall even more, “What happened?”

Billy’s shoulders drooped. He shuffled awkwardly, “I don’t know. Not too sure. All I know is we failed. Sorry.”

“Billy fell asleep,” Eric looked sour, “The moment we reached Tom Sandy’s table he fell asleep and wouldn’t wake. Will started freaking out, saying we were mysteriously being taken out one by one.”

Will blushed, his freckles brightening.

“Ran away like a chicken,” Eric Redmane continued, “I decided to still go ahead with everything. But then Tom Sandy kept saying he can’t give us the sweets, and didn’t answer me when I ask him why. I guess I raised my voice too high for Mrs. Freckles’ liking, because she told me to leave, and I demanded for a lawyer.”

“Quite dumb actually, if you think about it,” Billy pointed out.

Eric growled in frustration, “MY POINT IS WE FAILED. WE’VE BEEN FAILING ALL DAY, SO WE MIGHT AS WELL GIVE UP!”

Mr. Croaky popped his head from outside the teachers’ office, which was at the end of the hall. He put a finger to his lips, and then disappeared back into the room.

“But if we give up, we’re losers,” Will Freckles looked upset.

“LOSERS, I tell you. We wouldn’t be able to walk into school without feeling like losers for months.”

Choco couldn’t resist the urge to snicker, “You sure? You’ve always seemed like a loser to me.”

“Yup.” I agreed, smiling as Will looked angrily at us, “You have that loser face…” I dashed away as Will chased after me playfully.

“Eggster Bold! Come back here!”

He knocked into Eric, who ran after him, until Choco Stix and Billy Snooze couldn’t help but chase after us all. Soon all our worries had washed away and we flopped down in a pile.

Students were returning from the cafeteria to their classrooms, and the stream of people had to part in two as they neared us. We lay there feeling relaxed, until Mr. Principle scolded us and we scrambled to our feet and quickly headed for class.

___________

Our worries came back to us in Art class, the last lesson of the day. The Art room was the biggest classroom in the school, with a long white table running along the length. The room was decorated with paintings done by students, and had two sinks at the front of the class. Behind the art table, and were we all sat, were the art supplies and some of our previous work.

Five easels stood on wobbly legs behind us, four with canvases on them, one with a sheet of paper nailed into it, displaying just how terrible everyone’s art skills were. There weren’t enough easels for us all, as usual, and so the other half of the class had to have cardboard boxes as easels, and paper nailed into them as substitutes for canvases. Eric Redmane had gotten the box with the tiny scrap of paper – there wasn’t anything else you see – and he wasn’t particularly happy about that. So instead of drawing, he had scribbled: UNFAIR!

Mrs. Hazycurls, who was also our Art teacher, sat at her desk near the door.

Tom Sandy sat right at the end, with Laura Sunset (who was busy retrieving her lump of clay that she had dropped onto the floor) and Cinnamon Stix next to him. Poppy Petal sat opposite Cinnamon, reading her book. We were all supposed to be making figures out of the clay we were given. Mrs. Hazycurls was busy tapping away at her computer, her back towards us.

Eric Redmane was poking at his lump of clay, convinced it was alive. Will Freckles was peering at the clay too, worried it might suddenly move on its own. Billy Snooze had parted his grey lump into three chunks, shaping them into Zs. This made him feel sleepy, and his face went smack on the table, the Zs looking as though they were floating out of his face, like smoke from a chimney.

Choco Stix and I were trying to form dinosaur shapes with our clay, but the silly thing ended up looking like a weird rock. Choco’s piece of clay looked more dino-like than mine, but he couldn’t get the claws right.

“We only have one chance to get Tom,” I said, “And that’s after school. Let’s not bother him this lesson. If he thinks we’ve given up, maybe he won’t rush out so quickly.”

“What’s wrong with you?” Emily Rose glanced at all of us disgracefully, “Why can’t you leave poor Tom alone. He clearly doesn’t want to share, and you have no right to force him to. If you wanted to win the sweets you should have dressed better.” And with that Emily collected up her clay that had been transformed into delicate flower petals and leaves, and walked off in disgrace, sitting down on the other side of Poppy, away from us.

“Snob,” Eric muttered, “She’d be doing the same thing as us if she hadn’t won.”

“We better get out of class early. Tom always heads round the back of the school to get his bike,” Billy suddenly said, waking up.

We all nodded, took a glance at Tom Sandy making a clay-bike, and then saw each other’s smiles spread across our faces.

Crumbledown School: The Betrayal (Chapter 2)

Chapter 2

 

Maths class would have been far more interesting if we had a far more interesting teacher. Mr. Longdivision droned on and on about the seven times table, making us repeat everything after him. He was always sick, with a cold or a sore throat or a high temperature, sometimes all three at once. This day he seemed to have a terrible cold, and was sniffing and snivelling, and snorting and sneezing, not taking in to consideration that half his class would end up sick, thanks to him.

Our classroom had a pair of tables, each with five seats. Tom Sandy managed to sit in the group were all the girls where, away from us boys who were desperate to ask for his sweets to be divided, like promised. So far he hadn’t eaten any himself, probably worried we might snatch them away at any moment. As if WE would do that! I glanced at Will Freckles from across the table. Well, he might.

Cinnamon Stix and Poppy went up to ask Mr. Longdivision a question, and while he was distracted, Eric Redmane leaned forwards and whispered to Choco, Billy and me,

“I’m getting fed up with Tom. He’s stalling things, I think.”

I raised my eyebrow at him and said sarcastically, “You think?”

“Some of us doubted that you could,” Will chuckled.

Eric narrowed his eyes at Will, but didn’t say anything, “What I want to know is why he won’t share with us? I mean, when has Tom Sandy never offered us anything? He’s basically a boy version of Emily.”

I could tell Tom heard this, and he looked like he wanted to answer back, but he chose to keep quiet and do his work. Yup, Tom was acting weird today, hardly saying a word to any of us. His friends. I looked over at Cinnamon and Poppy. They were still in deep conversation with Mr. Longdivision. Both of their seats were on either side of Tom Sandy.

“I have an idea.” I whispered to the others.

“That’s a first,” said Will.

“I’m serious. I’m going to go over to Tom right now. Someone else can come to block him from escaping on the other side.”  As I said this, Billy slumped back in his chair, fast asleep.

“I’m coming.” Eric Redmane, Choco Stix, and Will Freckles all stated at the same time.

“Not all of you!” I hissed, “We don’t want to arouse suspicion,” I nodded towards Mr. Longdivision, “Fine, Choco can come.”

“That’s only because he’s your BFF,” Will whispered furiously to himself. I suppose he had a right to be jealous, I did pick Choco because he was one of my best friends.

We scuttled out of our seats and plonked down on either side of Tom, startling him.

“What? What are you two doing?” he asked angrily, “Sir will catch you out of your seats!”

“Not if you quiet down he won’t,” said Choco, “We’re here to ask you about –”

“The sweets,” Eric finished, appearing by my side. Will came hovering behind Tom Sandy, and even Billy was awake to come over and add in his opinion,

“‘Off with his head!’”

We boys (apart from Tom) stared at him in awe and wonder, while the girls, Emily and Laura, looked completely confused.

“William Shakespeare,” Billy Snooze added, seeing their confusion, “One of his very popular quotes.”

“Ohhh,” Emily now understood, “that makes sense,” while Laura Sunset simply asked, “Who?”

“What are you all doing here?” Tom looked at everyone, irritated.

“He’s right,” I said, “What happened to not arousing suspicion?”

“We wanted to come,” said Will firmly, “It’s not fair, us missing out on the fun.”

“If you all think detention is fun then you must be out of your minds!” Mr. Longdivision was standing next to us, Poppy and Cinnamon at his side, “BACK TO YOUR PLACES!”

We rushed back to our seats, not in fear of getting detention but because Mr. Longdivision suddenly had that look in his eyes, which told us he was about to have a sneezing frenzy.

“That went well,” Will said sarcastically. He grinned.

Choco’s face turned sour, “It WOULD have, if you hadn’t come and RUINED everything.”

“Choco Stix,” our teacher frowned, “Quiet down – AAACHOO! – or I’ll give you – AAACHOO!  – detention.”

We sat quietly after that, and did our work. When the bell rang for the end of Maths lesson, signalling the beginning of Science, I told Choco to get ready to pounce. But, as we headed out, following close behind Tom Sandy, Mr. Longdivision called us back.

“Take Billy Snooze with you,” he gestured towards a snoozing Billy. I sighed. So close yet so far, again. 

__________

We lugged Billy along with us, no sign of Tom. Eric and Will were still hanging about, waiting for us.

“You two should have gone ahead and pounced,” I panted, dropping Billy’s leg.

“I wish you’d stop using that word,” Choco let go of the now awake Billy, “Pounce. It makes us seem like we’re in the wrong.”

“Perhaps you are,” said Cinnamon, as she walked by with her Science books, “Have you even asked Tom why he won’t give you any sweets? If you ask me you should buy your own.”

“Well we didn’t ask you,” Choco said tartly, “And it’s wrong to eavesdrop.”

“Look who’s suddenly obeying the rules,” she said, before hurrying off to be in time for the next lesson.

Billy got to his feet and headed for his locker, which reminded us all to collect our books. As we slammed our lockers shut, Will suddenly had a thought,

“You know, today’s Friday.”

“So?” Eric asked.

“And tomorrow’s Saturday.”

“So?”

“So, the next time we see Tom will be after the weekend. And by then no doubt all the sweets will be eaten.”

I suddenly realised exactly what he meant, “We’d better speak to him today, or we’ll never get our share.”

“Cucumbers!” slapping his hand to his forehead, Choco said, “You and I’ve got detention, Eggster.”

I groaned deeply.

Billy came over and patted me on the back, “It’s alright Eggster. Just go to sleep in detention. It’ll be over in no time.”

“You’re right Billy.” I smiled as we headed down the hall, “And I have an idea; at lunch time you and the others are going to talk to Tom Sandy about our share of sweets. You have to. Tom’s pretty clever, and always manages to get away from us in the classroom.”

Will nodded, getting excited. Billy blinked, fighting the urge to sleep to hear the rest of the conversation. Choco and I grinned; positive our plan would work this time.

Eric whispered as we arrived in class, “We’ll meet you outside English class, with a bag full of sweets!”



Coming up: Collage Spreads, Smoothie Recipe, Original Story!

Assalamu Alaikum everyone!

Todays post is a look at what we have planned for the month of February. We have some fun ideas and projects to share so we hope you are looking forward to them.

Collage Spreads

This is a craft that we have wanted to share for a while now but have not found the time. Insha'Allah we will share this fun craft with you all sometime this month.

Fruit Smoothie Recipe

Insha'Allah, Maryam will be sharing another smoothie recipe.

Crumbledown School Chapter Release Days

If you didn't know, Zainab has shared the first chapter of her original story Crumbledown School: The Betrayal last week. Insha'Allah, the remaining chapters will be coming out every Monday and Wednesday. Hope you all enjoy them!

Gardening

Insha'Allah Maryam will finally update you all on her balcony garden that, unfortunately, did not go according to plan.

Well, that's all for now. Make sure to check back on Mondays and Wednesdays, insha'Allah, for the next chapters. See you all next Friday!

Love and wasalaam,

Crumbledown School: The Betrayal (Chapter 1)

Chapter 1

For the Best Dressed Girl in our class, Emily Rose won the bag of sweets, which was no surprise. She did not come to school with her hair all done up and in a fancy, fluffy outfit. She was wearing her normal pink dress, and the only thing different was that she had a necklace on.

She didn’t win because of that; she won because she was the only girl to participate.

Poppy Petal didn’t sign up for it because she was far too busy reading her book to care. She only ever participated in Story Writing Competitions and the End of Year Spelling Bee – which, by the way, was compulsory.

Cinnamon Stix stated she was too modest and down to earth to enter a Best Dressed Competition.

And Laura Sunset, as you can imagine, had forgotten.

All of us boys entered the competition. I came in my green hoodie, with the zip half undone and stood around with my hands in my pockets. Mrs. Freckles, the dinner lady, an enemy to us all (except for her son, Will Freckles) stated that I looked more like a gangster than a school boy.

Choco Stix and Billy Snooze came in their everyday-clothes but were wearing caps to match. Billy Snooze was wearing his to the side, while Choco had his backwards. They both said it made them look “cooler”.

Eric Redmane went overboard with the “coolness” and wore a pair of dark shades, even indoors!

Tom Sandy wore a suit and clip-on tie, while Will Freckles put on a top hat.

Of course, the teachers thought Tom looked the “neatest”, and chose him as the winner. None of us thought it was fair and even Tom Sandy was surprised.

“My mum made me wear this,” he whispered to us after his name was called, “I never thought I’d win!”

“Will you share?” I asked, “The sweets?” But he had already gone ahead to claim his prize.

“What did he say?” called Choco, a few rows back.

“He didn’t say yes, and he didn’t say no.” I replied.

Eric took off his sunglasses, “Then it’s a no.” He cleaned the lenses with an expression that read: You let me down! “Whenever they don’t reply, it’s because they are secretly saying ‘no’.”

“The traitor!”Will cried, “I knew we never should have trusted him!’’ This was not true. Will was the one nobody trusted to keep a promise. Tom was always true to his word.

Billy Snooze chose this moment to collapse to the floor in front of me. If there was someone new in the playground, they would have thought Billy had fainted. But this was not so. Billy was very lazy and liked to fall asleep whenever he felt like it, which was often. Normally one of the teachers would try and wake him up, but today all eyes were on the Best Dressed students.

After taking his bag of sweets, Tom Sandy went up and stood next to Emily Rose. He shifted uncomfortably from side to side. All the kids lined up together to take a group photo. Half the kids looked shy while the other half posed like snobs. Then Mr. Principle, the Principal, announced,

“You may return to your classes.”

The half that had stood around shyly hurried off while the half that posed like snobs dilly-dallied by combing their hair, or fiddling with their shoes, pretending they hadn’t heard Mr. Principle. They wanted as much time in the spotlight as possible.

To our surprise, Tom Sandy walked right passed us and stood at the back of the line, not facing us. Emily was already handing out some sweets to everyone. She even offered to us boys, but we didn’t want to eat anything out of a pink bag. She even offered to some of the kids from the other class! And then there was Tom, ignoring us even though he was supposed to be handing out sweets like Emily.

Mr. Principle told us all to file back to our classrooms. Everyone seemed eager to get back, and I was swept along with them.

When we arrived in English class I sat down, and glanced at Tom. He sat next to Laura Sunset in English classes, and seemed to purposefully avoid eye contact with me, choosing to look out of the window instead. I frowned. Perhaps for once Will Freckles was right. Perhaps Tom had allowed greed to take over him, and decided to keep all the sweets to himself!

Since none of us had won the competition, we saw no point in keeping our outfits on. I shrugged off my hoodie and placed it in my bag. Choco left his cap on his desk and Will had stuffed his hat in his locker on his way down the hall, while Eric fiddled about with his sunglasses, putting them on the top of his head then in his trouser pocket.

Halfway through our spelling test there was a knock at the door. In came the teacher from Year 6 and behind him, being dragged by the foot, was Billy, snoozing away.

“Miss, you forgot him, again,” he said.

“Oh my, so sorry,” Our granny-old teacher got to her feet and went over to Billy. Both teachers prodded Billy a couple of times to wake him up.

While this was going on I whispered in Choco’s ear, “After class let’s pounce on him down the hall to Maths.”

Choco looked puzzled, “Who, Billy?”

“No, no! Tom Sandy. We’ll ask him about the sweets. He’ll have to answer us straight.”

Choco nodded.

Billy Snooze had finally woken up, and walked over to his desk next to Poppy Petal, who was reading her book, out of Mrs. Hazycurls’ view.

“Right Billy,” said Mrs. Hazycurls, “take out your spelling book quickly and I’ll say the words again. The rest of you just listen carefully; make sure you haven’t missed out any words.”

“What words?” Laura Sunset called.

Mrs. Hazycurls blinked, “The words for the spelling test, Laura.”

“There was a spelling test?”

Mrs. Hazycurls sighed. 

__________

We would have pounced on Tom Sandy after class, if only Choco and I had not gotten into trouble. We couldn’t help but whisper to each other about Tom’s weird behaviour, and kept glancing over at him. Mrs. Hazycurls warned us to keep quiet a number of times, and to pay attention to the spelling test, for we were both rather bad at spelling. She also seemed to have a suspicion that we were discussing the spelling test words, which we weren’t, for the bag of sweets was the only thing on our minds.

Nevertheless, after my third attempt to quietly tell Choco an idea of mine on how to confront Tom Sandy, Mrs. Hazycurls rapped her pen on her desk and called,

“Eggster Bold and Choco Stix, since you can’t seem to listen to me and keep quiet during the test I’m afraid I’m going to have to split you up. Eggster, will you kindly bring your chair to my desk, thank you.”

I was hot with embarrassment, and Will Freckles didn’t help with his sniggering. Dragging my chair to her desk, I sat down awkwardly, not daring to glance back at Tom, or anyone for that matter. I tried to ignore all the eye’s staring at me. Mrs. Hazycurls, however, wasn’t finished,

“After the lesson I would like to have a word with both you and Choco.”

And so when the bell rang, instead of hurrying out of the class we were held back and made to stand at our teacher’s desk. She got straight to the point,

“Disobeying the rules of your teacher is something I take very seriously. Sharing your work in a test is not something that I approve of either.”

Choco shook his head quickly, “But we weren’t doing that, miss.”

I was quick to agree, and I could tell Mrs. Hazycurls wanted to believe us, but was a little sceptical. She just sighed and then said,

“Well, to be sure this doesn’t happen again, I shall be giving you detention at lunch time.”

We began to protest, but that didn’t help, and she seemed even surer of her punishment now.

“You will have detention, and that is that. Now, you may run along to your lesson.”

We trudged out into the hallway, and of course, there was no sign of Tom.

“Well,” Choco sighed, “We’re too late.”

We went over to our lockers and swapped our English books for our Maths books. A few other students, who were not too keen to go to their next lessons, still lingered about the hall. Will Freckles was one of them.

“So what did Miss want?” he asked us, fiddling with the padlock on his locker like he couldn’t quite close it. This was a trick we often used to waste more time out of lesson. “Suspected one of us to have cheated from the other,” I replied.

“Was she right?”

“No,” said Choco, “Though we’re still in trouble.”

“Shouldn’t you boys be in class? A gruff voice, that sounded like it had a terrible frog in its throat, came from behind us. It was Mr. Croaky, our Science teacher.

“Yes,” Will said, “But, we were... just admiring the view.”

“What view?” he looked around.

Choco and I both took a hold of one of Will’s arms, “Nothing,” we both said, and hurried him off to class. When it came to excuses, Will was definitely the worst at them.