Just My Luck Read online

  ZACK DELACRUZ

  JUST MY LUCK

  By Jeff Anderson

  PRAISE FOR ZACK DELACRUZ: ME AND MY BIG MOUTH

  “Zack Delacruz prefers to stay in the background. He knows that being noticed will only lead to trouble. After a school assembly on bullying, Zack decides to stand up for a fellow classmate and in the process gets roped into being the lead fund-raiser for the school dance (if he and his classmates sell enough chocolate bars, they’ll be allowed to attend the dance for the first time). Zack goes from flying under the radar to being the center of attention. Things go well until someone eats several of the boxes instead of selling them, leaving Zack to pick up the pieces. Though characterization is light, Zack’s class is a diverse mix of students. Zack is a relatable narrator and embodies the middle school experience. The steady pace makes this novel a solid pick for reluctant readers.”

  — School Library Journal

  “Anderson’s debut children’s book stars sixth-grader Zack, who has perfected the art of being invisible in school—until he surprises himself by standing up to the class bully, José. … [Zack] is a sympathetic narrator, and Anderson spiritedly renders the voices and personalities of preteens. … The story does trace Zack’s maturing and his class’s bonding to a pleasantly satisfying finish.”

  — Publishers Weekly

  “By book’s end, [Zack’s] a hero.”

  —Booklist

  “By the end of the story, readers are going to be dancing. I’m sure of it.”

  — Kathi Appelt, Newbery Honor author of The Underneath

  “Zack and his crew prove that to survive middle school, you need street smarts, kind hearts, and some crazy, gutsy determination.”

  —Wendy Shang, author of The Great Wall of Lucy Wu and The Way Home Looks Now

  STERLING CHILDREN’S BOOKS and the distinctive Sterling Children’s Books logo are trademarks of Sterling Publishing Co., Inc.

  Text © 2016 by Jeff Anderson

  Illustrations © 2016 by Sterling Publishing Co., Inc.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means (including electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without prior written permission from the publisher.

  ISBN 978-1-4549-2113-4

  For information about custom editions, special sales, and premium and corporate purchases, please contact Sterling Special Sales at 800-805-5489 or special​sales@​sterling​publishing.​com.

  Illustrations and Design by Andrea Miller

  www.​sterling​publishing.​com

  For those who need to know it gets better. (It does.)—J.A.

  CONTENTS

  Chapter 1

  By the Seat of My Pants

  Chapter 2

  Tornado of Trouble

  Chapter 3

  Mission Distraction: San Antonio Fun Facts

  Chapter 4

  Cardboard Khakis and a Loaded Diaper

  Chapter 5

  Compelled

  Chapter 6

  The Firing Squad

  Chapter 7

  Magic to Do

  Chapter 8

  I Don’t Want to Talk about It

  Chapter 9

  The Other Side

  Chapter 10

  No Accounting for Taste

  Chapter 11

  Not a Magic Shop

  Chapter 12

  A Slice of Danger

  Chapter 13

  Reversal of Fortune

  Chapter 14

  Run!

  Chapter 15

  Pit Bull Run

  Chapter 16

  Bus Ted or Cursed?

  Chapter 17

  Zack Smellacruz

  Chapter 18

  The Name of the Game

  Chapter 19

  Cinnamon Roll Day

  Chapter 20

  Dilum and Gloom

  Chapter 21

  Your Destiny Awaits

  Chapter 22

  Let the Fiesta-val Begin!

  Chapter 23

  Fruit of Dilum

  Chapter 24

  Who’s Driving the Train?

  Chapter 25

  Not a Fortune for Your Fortune

  Chapter 26

  Truth Be Told

  Chapter 27

  Seriously, How Fast Is That Train Supposed to Go?

  Chapter 28

  The Best Ride Ever

  Chapter 29

  Pay Attention to What’s in Front of You

  Chapter 30

  Just My Luck

  Life is partly what we make it, and partly what is made by the friends we choose.

  —Tennessee Williams

  CHAPTER 1

  BY THE SEAT OF MY PANTS

  Alone in the noisy Davy Crockett Middle School cafeteria, I sat with my pepperoni pizza, my fruit cup, and my thoughts.

  Only two weeks ago I saved the sixth-grade dance with a car wash. An eighth-grader called me Mighty Mouse, and the whole sixth grade cheered for me. But here I was, eating by myself.

  You’d think that kid would be sitting at a table surrounded by friends. And they’d be laughing at one of his clever stories. But that’s not what happened. Not at all. Don’t get me wrong. Things did get better. I didn’t try to disappear anymore, but it turns out that I was invisible whether I liked it or not. After all that had happened, I still only had one friend who’d eat breakfast and lunch with me—Marquis. But today he had a doctor’s appointment for the ankle he sprained helping me save the dance. He wouldn’t be back till tomorrow.

  “Eat up!” Mrs. Gage, the cafeteria monitor, ordered like a military officer. At the next table, Cliché and Sophia rolled their eyes and swigged the last of their chocolate milk before carrying their trays to the wash station. The rest of their table followed, because the blue-eye-shadow gang mimicked everything that Sophia did. After eating, everyone returns their trays and goes outside to the blacktop. I try to avoid the blacktop. Lots of kids + a paved surface + one easy-to-distract teacher’s aide = trouble.

  To keep myself inside, I concentrated on eating slowly. Each time I took a bite, I counted thirty chews. One, two, three … When Marquis was gone, everything seemed to take longer—even chewing. Dad said I should “widen my circle,” whatever that means. Dad asked me the other night: “Do you ever do anything without Marquis?”

  “Uh, no.” I shot back darts with my eyes. “He’s my best friend.”

  “Best—not only,” Dad had said. He didn’t know how rare sit-by-you-at-lunch and talk-to-you-when-I-don’t-have-to friends are.

  From the tray to my mouth, I moved my Spork in slow mo. To keep my mind busy, I read the signs taped up on the cinderblock walls: FALL FIESTA-VAL THIS SATURDAY! Oh, brother. Next my eyes scanned to the à la carte line, which everybody calls the pizza line because nobody wants to say “à la carte.” Can you blame them? But the next sign I read caught my attention. I had to read it twice:

  TABLES ARE FOR EATING STUDENTS ONLY.

  Tables are for eating students only.

  I moved my lips as I reread the sign, scrunching my face up with disgust.

  Seriously? That sign must be one of those “funny” errors Mrs. Harrington always talked about in English. To be honest, the whole sign is ridiculous because in all the time I’ve spent in this cafeteria, I’d never seen anyone “eating students” at these tables. Not even once. Not that I’m complaining. Seeing kids going full-on zombie, munching on brains or peeling off each other’s skin like it was fried chicken, would totally skeeve me out.

  “You need to eat and exit, sir!” Mrs. Gage paced and prodded, paced and prodded.

  “I’m still eating,” I pleaded, turning back to her, flashing my pi
tiful puppy-dog eyes. I was trying to give myself even more time to stay off the blacktop.

  “Humph!” She rolled her eyes as if I’d offered her a cafeteria roll I’d found on the floor.

  I wondered if Mrs. O’Shansky, the head cafeteria lady, had made the tables-are-for-eating-students sign. If she did, she ought to loosen her hairnet for more blood circulation to her brain. One thing’s for sure, whoever wrote that sign didn’t have Mrs. Harrington for English. That lady is all about “your writing making sense.” You have to know what punctuation means. Especially when it’s “published,” and I know anything laminated is definitely published.

  Fwam!

  José Soto, aka El Pollo Loco, just finger-flicked my ear, zooming past my table on his way to the pizza line. Again.

  “Very funny, José,” I turned and said to everyone who was listening, which was no one. Just when I think El Pollo Loco and I are cool, he flicks my ear or trips me in class. The honeymoon-from-José harassment had lasted only a few short days after the dance. He, like the others, seems to have amnesia about how great we all were at the end of the dance, laughing and talking. I mean, they still talk to me. Like Sophia said hi to me in the hall the other day. It’s just not how I expected. That’s middle school: one day you’re hot, the next you’re not.

  I chewed and chewed again while my mind chitter-chattered away. I was sporking up the last bit of my gray fruit cup pears when out of the corner of my eye someone captured my attention. I turned. A girl I’d never seen before stood at the end of my table. A new girl. She looked like she was from some far-off place. Maybe India or California or something.

  Anyway, I always love it when new kids come to school because your past is washed away. They’ve never seen or heard of you. They don’t know your nicknames or any of the goofy things you’ve done. You get a second chance. You can be somebody new—cooler, funnier, better looking. I sat up straighter just thinking of it.

  Her eyes were grayish ice. I had never seen gray eyes like that before. And she stood a few inches from my table.

  Problem was, the new girl was with the most irritatingly happy girl known to man: Blythe Balboa. Blythe was just elected the sixth-grade student council representative, and she is bossy—b-o-s-s, b-o-s-s-y. She always wears a cardigan sweater with way-too-long sleeves because she’s freezing. “BRRRR” will be etched on her gravestone:

  HERE LIES

  BLYTHE BALBOA

  “IT’S FREEZING IN HERE, Y’ALL. BRRRR.”

  Seriously.

  If she doesn’t freeze to death soon, I’d be surprised. Anyway, as student council representative for sixth grade, Blythe was the official introducer of students new to Davy Crockett Middle School. Blythe shows them around, pointing her sweater-covered hands at the gym and the library. I wondered if the most interesting girl with grayish ice eyes would be in my classes.

  “That’s the pizza line. Did they have those where you came from?” Blythe pointed her sweater stump to the left. “That’s the regular tray line. Today, it’s Salisbury steak, tater tots, and mac and cheese.” Blythe stuck her sweater-covered stub up for a high five. “Starchfest!”

  But the interesting girl shook her head “no.” She wasn’t having any of it.

  “Oh, yeah, I forgot you’re one of those vegetarians.” Blythe nodded. “Principal Akins warned me.”

  Ooh, a vegetarian. I liked that. I mean, I didn’t really like vegetables, but this vegetarian sounded cool.

  “My mom’s a vegetarian.” The words escaped my mouth like a loud burp. The thing is, my mom isn’t a vegetarian, but the counselor, Dr. Smith-Cortez, said, “One way to make friends is to find things you have in common.” I didn’t know anything else about her, so I’d have to go with vegetarian.

  The new girl looked at me. She smelled like the candle aisle at the supermarket.

  Blythe Balboa turned her nose up at me and spun away. “This way,” Blythe wrapped her Balboa constrictor arm around the new girl and dragged her toward the pizza line. “À la carte’s over here. We’ll get you a potato. Don’t worry, the Fakin’ Bits aren’t real bacon. I’ll get one too.” Blythe laughed. “We can be potato twins. I just LOVE potatoes—any starch really! Starch gives me so much energy. Oh! I could just about explode!”

  And no one would have been surprised if she had.

  The new girl looked back at me and cracked a tiny smile. The most interesting girl I’d ever seen in my whole entire life, and I made her smile. Ca-Ching!

  Wait a minute. My mind chitter-chattered again: What’s going on here? Why am I so interested in this girl? Why is she the most interesting? I didn’t even know her. Still, I was interested. I had to talk to her. Now. It was important. Man, I wished Marquis were here to bounce this off of.

  And then I heard a voice: “Just get up and go talk to her. You know you want to.”

  Was that my conscience calling? My conscience calls me sometimes—especially when I’m feeling nervous. But usually I let the call go to voicemail.

  “Life is a banquet, and most poor suckersss are starving to death!”

  As the voice continued, I realized my conscience sounded an awful lot like Janie Bustamante.

  I spun around. At the end of the next table, Janie—the movie line quoter—stood. “Auntie Mame, nineteen fifty-eight, starring Mrs. Rosalind Russsssssell.” Janie crammed the rest of her Fudge-icle in her mouth, and pulled out the empty stick, pointing it behind me. “Six O’clock.” Her voice was muffled by Fudge-icle, but I knew she meant for me to turn around.

  “Hurry up or El is going to get to her first.” Janie warned. She’d taken to shortening El Pollo Loco, José’s infamous nickname, to El. I hated it. Basically, she was calling him “The.” But for some unknown reason El was catching on with everyone else too. Anyhow, whatever you called José, he was bouncing up and down behind the most interesting girl, while she shook pepper on her potato. I thought about it. The new girl wouldn’t know what a fool José was either. Janie was right. I had to talk to her first.

  Both the confidence I’d gotten this year and the old panic flooded my body. I had to do it. I would stand up. I would walk over to the pizza line and talk to the new girl before El won her over. Ugh. Now, I’m calling him “The.” I’d had enough; I jumped up from my stool.

  RRRRRRiip!

  Let me clarify. I jumped up. My pants? Not so much.

  CHAPTER 2

  TORNADO OF TROUBLE

  The seat of my khaki pants, the whole backside above my legs, stayed attached to the stool, caught on a screw. Now my pants only covered the front of my legs and the bottom half of the back of my legs—just below my biscuit. (That’s what Dad calls a butt. Don’t ask.)

  For the first time in recorded history, the Davy Crockett cafeteria was still and silent: no loud voices competing to be heard, no Sporks scraping against plastic trays, no movement at all. Everyone was suspended like in a photo. A sea of faces stared, eyes wide, mouths open. No one even let out a breath for what seemed like an embarrassing forever.

  A chill raced up my spine when it hit me: I’d run out of underwear this morning, so I had worn my Champ the Choo-Choo Underoos from second grade. Dad doesn’t get rid of anything—he says we can use old clothes as cleaning rags when we paint or something, but then we never paint anything. Anyway, it was either tiny Champ the Choo-Choos or some of Dad’s nasty, baggy boxers, or commando. What would you have done?

  I hadn’t counted on my khakis catching on the stool.

  The underwear had been so tiny it looked like I was wearing a thong. The thong song was playing in my head the whole way to school this morning. How could I forget?

  Now I’d never be allowed to forget.

  As the shock wore off the crowd, a tornado of comments spun around the cafeteria, picking up speed.

  “That’s so thong!” José called from the pizza line. “Nice chones, Dela-loser!”

  Chones is Spanish for “undies,” but some people say it means “girly panties.” A funnel cloud
of laughter and shouts whipped and whirled over the cafeteria tables.

  “Oh, my eyes!” Blythe covered her face with both cardigan stumps.

  My eyes shut too. I couldn’t look at anyone. I wanted to sink through the cafeteria floor, far away from here.

  Panicked, I attempted to outrun the tornado, but the lower half of my pants still clung to the stool. I was chained up like a pit bull in a yard, pulling and struggling to get loose from the stool. Everything blurred into the sound of the cafeteria laughing and pelting me with insults: “Thing a thong for us, Zack” mixed with “I saw something so thong” and “Zack ate Maca-chone and cheese.” Swirling and twisting out of control, the tornado of embarrassment destroyed every bit of courage I’d gained this year.

  With one final yank of my body toward the cafeteria exit, the rest of my khaki-covered legs tore free, leaving behind my dignity along with the frayed threads and part of my khakis that had once covered my swimsuit area.

  My Champ the Choo-Choo biscuit was on full display as I fled toward the exit. Even though my Underoos were tiny, my hands were not large enough to cover them.

  With a bang, I burst through the metal doors and sprinted down the long hallway without looking back. Faster than I’d ever taken laps for Coach Ostraticki, faster than José could scarf a pizza slice, I ran. The front of my pants flapped in the wind, exposing even more of me.

  I would’ve raced all the way home, but by the time I sprinted out the front doors of the school, I was out of breath. I leaned over, hands on my knees, panting by the flagpole.

  The hot sun warmed the bare back of my legs, and I did the only thing I could do—collapse on the sidewalk. My khakis looked more like a frayed tan blanket in my lap than pants. The only way to cover myself was to sit my biscuit on the hot sidewalk for the rest of my life.

  Coach Ostraticki walked out the front doors of the building. “What’s going on, Delacruz?” He twisted the ends of his curly mustache.