Chapter 1

"Watch it, man!"

I careened into a guy with a pencil rammed up his nose and tore past the nurse into the hall. Have to get out of here. I hurtled over a girl tying her shoe and dashed by my locker without stopping. Every second counted.

I glanced at my watch. This was going to be close. The bell would ring any time now.

"Cole Erickson, do you have a…EEEEeeeeommph!!"

Cathy Starks, playing hall monitor, had popped out of nowhere, and I had just flattened her. I’d been having a run of bad luck all day, but getting caught now by the Jackson Middle School Gestapo -- after not watching where I was going for the second time today – would definitely put the cherry on top.

Scrambling to my feet, I peered back down the hall. The door to my Algebra class flung open. He’d be after me in a heartbeat.

"Sorry, Cath… there’s the bell. Gotta go!"

I headed for the side door by the gym, figuring it’d be safer, and burst outside. As my eyes adjusted to the light, I did a quick recon. Dang it, Ted. Where are you? I need to be on board… like yesterday.

Sniffing, I could smell the fumes. Then I saw Jackson’s canary-yellow limo service chug into the far end of the parking lot. I ran for the bus and pounded the side as it squealed to a stop. The door slid open, and I scrambled up the steps.

"Heeeeeeeey! Slow down, pard’ner. We ain’t leaving ’til I got a full bus."

Ignoring the whinnies of Mr. Ted, our horse-faced bus driver, I darted down the aisle toward the back and crashed to the floor in front of a window seat. Made it!

~

By the time I’d caught my breath, everyone had started piling in. Soon, I spotted my next-door neighbor, Travis McDonald, gliding by my row heading to the back seat.

"Psst. Trav."

"What are you doing, Cork?" Travis asked.

"Shut up and sit down. Hurry!"

"Dude, what’s up? Did you finally ask Ashley to go with you? I told you you’d get slammed. No one in this school is on her radar -- not even Rick. She only dates Arbor High jocks."

"No, I’m still working on that. But this could turn out to be even more humiliating. Give me your backpack."

"What is it then?" My interested friend handed me his bag and then leaned down to me. "You hiding from a fight or something?"

"Moron, don’t look down; you’ll give me away! Just stay seated and ignore me."

Travis shrugged. "Fine. Don’t tell me." He pushed himself back up and turned to the guy behind him. "Hey, you seen Cole? You know, Cole Erickson?"

I kicked him. "You idiot. Dorkman’ll hear you."

Travis’ jaw dropped, and he whispered, "Dorkman? Tell me you didn’t. Not him."

I let my head fall forward against my knees and said, "Yes… Dorkman." I had forgotten his real name, if I had ever known it.

"Well, well. Speak of the devil. The D-man’s getting on now, and he is looking for someone," Travis goaded me. "Dorkman and Cole, sitting in a tree…"

"Shut up."

Thankfully, Dorkman always sat alone in the front seat right behind Ted. Maybe he hadn’t heard my loudmouth friend.

"This is priceless. What did you do?"

"Nothing… really. After lunch, Coach put out the schedule for baseball tryouts, you know, and I was reading over it while I walked down the hall. Then I heard someone come up and say, ‘Good luck this season. I know you’ll kill ’em again this year.’ You know I can’t resist talking ball, but all I said was, ‘Thanks. Hope you’ll come watch,’ and then…"

Travis burst out laughing. "Unbelievable!"

"Hey, it could have been the Prime Minister of friggin’ Chad, for all I knew."

"Yeah, right. What a classic mistake! But go on, what happened next?"

As I told Travis the story, I relived the dreadful moment I’d spoken to Dorkman. I had wanted to jump up, grab my words from out of the musty hallway air, and swallow them before they made it to his ears.

But I couldn’t. They were out there.

"…and I think I saw his intestines, no kidding, his smile was that big. Next thing I know, Dorkman turns around, and he’s following me. Starts asking me questions and stuff. ‘When’re tryouts?’ ‘When’s practice?’ ‘When do games start?’ ‘Does a jock really itch?’ He was killing me, but I finally managed to beat it to class."

Travis choked on his laughter and pounded on the back of his seat. He found my tragic tale a good bit funnier than I did. Gripping the seat rail, I continued the story.

"Then, after fourth period, there he was again… right on my heels. Last thing I want is for anyone to see this, right? I tell the kid to get lost, but he just keeps tagging along, and now he’s talking about all sorts of nonsense: red velvet ants, amphibians, he even started going on about cereal and high fiber diets, I kid you not.

"He’s in my sixth period class, so before heading to Mr. Tatum’s room, I decided to cut my losses, skip, and go to the clinic. Told the nurse I had a bad pain in my neck, and she let me lie down for forty-five minutes."

Nearly in tears, Travis snorted and laughed so hard, I thought he’d pass out. "Seriously, Cork, what are you planning to do? This guy’s a Cling-On. If you’re not careful, you’re going to be walking around with a Permanent Insignificant Other."

The labels our student body came up with for kids like Dorkman were pretty uninspiring but generally on target. Everyone knew that anyone who talked to these losers ran the risk of having a new best friend… forever.

"I’m hoping I can avoid him for a couple of days. Then, maybe, he’ll move on to bother someone else."

"Good luck, I think you’re going to need it." Travis laughed and wiped his eyes. "Watch it! He’s looking back here again," he teased.

"Travis! Could you please get a grip before he notices that you’re talking to me?"

"Okay, okay," he said, sniffling back the laughs. "I’ll try to lay low. You do the same."

So, I crouched in the floor for the whole bumpy ride until we arrived at Dorkman’s stop, and he finally got off. Then, I pulled myself up into the seat and stretched my aching back.

Travis leaned past me and started banging on the window, so I threw myself back to the floor. "You really amuse yourself, don’t you Trav?"

"I am pretty dang funny, but the coast is clear, now." He snickered and stared out the window.

"What are you looking at?"

Turning back in his seat, Travis grinned at me and said, "Cathy Starks. You know, you could probably still get her to like you."

"I dunno, maybe."

Feeling that Travis had tired of making jokes, I pulled myself up again. Cathy had gotten off at Dorkman’s stop, and she marched directly past him like he was invisible. She was a nice girl, and I’d even heard she liked me last year, but she wasn’t in Ashley’s league. Of course, who was I to talk?

"Although, come to think of it, she’s smart enough to stay away from Dorkman, so probably not."

"That’s it, clown boy." I grabbed Travis in a headlock. "You ready to get your butt whipped?"

~

My stomach grumbled as I sat in the floor of my room, video game controller in hand, jamming to some tunes, and playing Smackin’ Jack’s World Series Baseball. I was amazing! Up 57 to 3 in the ninth, I struck out the side to complete the slaughter and started thinking about grabbing a snack. Then the doorbell rang.

"Cole!" my mom shouted from downstairs. "Someone is here to see you!"

Clicking the stereo off, I tossed the remote, and it clanged off the television.

A sinking feeling knotted my stomach. Maybe it was the odd way Mom yelled,

"Someone," or maybe it was just a hunch. I wasn’t expecting anyone, and the way my day at school had gone, this "someone" was probably bad news.