The Last Last-Day-of-Summer Read online

  Sheed yanked the knot loose from the post. “Now!”

  Otto ran to undo the other end so they could bind the rubbery menace and get some answers.

  Mr. Flux groaned, still stunned from impact. Other Clock Watchers peeked from under tables and behind chairs and from other hiding places. Anticipation buzzed through the room.

  The cousins tugged the rope tight between them, prepared to pounce.

  One, mouthed Otto.

  Two, mouthed Sheed.

  “Three!” shouted Mr. Flux, his eyes popping open like window shades.

  The boys screamed. The Clock Watchers screamed. Mr. Flux screamed, but his scream was threaded with laughter. Bullies loved terrorizing those around them.

  Mr. Flux’s bent knees straightened, lifting the rest of his body to a standing position in a way no normal human could ever manage. Upright, he reached for his discarded hat, which lay at his feet. His arm bubble-gum stretched. Once the brim was pinched between his thumb and forefinger, the arm retracted like fishing line on a reel. He placed the hat on his head, taking his time to adjust the fit. As he did, more Clock Watchers fled the room.

  Otto and Sheed exchanged terrified glances, but would not run. Without saying another word they executed Maneuver #21: stand your ground. They’d worked too hard to get a lead on Mr. Flux to simply turn tail. That was not what legends did.

  “Well, aren’t you the brave ones?” Mr. Flux chortled.

  Sheed said, “You’re going to help us fix time.”

  “I already did. You wanted more summer. Now you have all you can ever stand.”

  “You tricked us,” Otto said. “You’re a dirty trickster.”

  “Now, now. All that name calling is beneath you.” Mr. Flux took a step closer, almost in range for some rope wrangling. “While you’re saying nasty things to me, you could be enjoying all the time you have . . . left.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” said Sheed.

  “Oh,” said Mr. Flux, “I like you two so much, I’m thinking I don’t want to ever see you change. Another picture may be in order, to preserve you just the way you are.”

  His hand snapped forward, like a frog’s tongue snatching a passing fly, grasping for the camera still dangling from Otto’s neck. His fingers folded around it like spider legs as he attempted to rip it from Otto. The canvas and leather strap around Otto’s neck held strong, and Otto backpedaled while Sheed rushed forward, still gripping his length of rope.

  Sheed, using the natural athleticism his gangly legs allowed, circled Mr. Flux twice, looping the rope around his calves.

  “Hey! Stop that!” Mr. Flux said, distracted.

  While Sheed drew his attention, Otto slipped free of Flux’s grip. With his part of the rope, he ran around Mr. Flux in the opposite direction, doubling the loops around his legs. Sheed snapped his section of rope like a whip, and it lassoed Mr. Flux’s left arm. Otto performed a similar move on the other side, snagging the right arm. Maneuver #38: rope wrangling.

  The boys moved like a couple of dancers in a well-rehearsed routine until most of their rope wound around Mr. Flux, mummy-style. Otto wrapped his remaining length around Flux’s hands and leaned back, drawing the rope tight. Sheed did the same on Mr. Flux’s other side, so they both looked like contestants in a game of tug-of-war, where Mr. Flux was the bowed ribbon at the center of the rope.

  “We’ve got you!” said Otto, triumphant and straining. “Now, if you answer our questions and help us fix time, we might let you go back where you came from.”

  Sheed said, “Otto, stop trash talking and let’s get this rope tied to something.”

  Otto tugged on his rope extra hard. “We won. He’s not going anywhere.”

  Mr. Flux, sad-faced and defeated, said, “He’s right, you know.”

  “See?” said Otto, in his boastful Otto way.

  The entangled Flux said, “I’m not going anywhere.”

  In a sudden burst of movement and strength, Mr. Flux spun on his heels. Otto and Sheed were yanked off their feet, colliding with one another. As they bounced off each other they lost their grips on the rope, and it was sucked into the Mr. Flux cyclone, which spun in such a blur he was more like wind than man.

  When he slowed and settled, his limbs were free again, and the rope was thrown aside. He snatched the hat from his head, tipped it toward the boys, and bowed like a showman thanking his audience. Ta-da!

  Grinning a malicious grin, he straightened and replaced the hat atop his head. “Now, boys, for my next trick, I’m going to make two little problems disappear!”

  He leapt forward, his fingers curled into claws, grasping for Otto’s neck.

  13

  The Unluckiest Chapter

  Sheed grabbed Otto by the shoulder and rolled him away from Mr. Flux’s grasp. With some distance between him and them, the boys scrambled to their feet, on guard.

  “Give me that camera!” Mr. Flux spat.

  Otto and Sheed exchanged glances, a silent message, and then bolted for the door. Sheed’s speed was a natural gift, one he hoped to use as a Fry Flamingo one day. Otto was less athletic, though he kept up when it mattered. Like now.

  Neither boy was faster than Mr. Flux, who moved like snakes, and living taffy, and malignant rubber bands, slender and stretched. He jetted forward like an eel through water, bending his body around them and positioning his torso between them and the exit while his legs ran to catch up. His elongated body snapped back to normal human shape. “No way out, boys.”

  Otto looked about, this way and that, refusing to give up, because giving up was something else legends didn’t do. Mr. Flux was wrong. There was a way out, it just might not be the safest, smartest route.

  “Sheed, follow me.” Otto ran for the hole in the wall.

  There was no time to discuss this. Sheed knew that, the same way he instantly knew what Otto intended they do.

  “Like a jungle gym!” Otto shouted over his shoulder, the only instruction he had time to give before leaping through the ragged hole in the wall.

  They were three floors up. Airborne for a moment, Otto stretched, grabbing at a frozen brick that had been dislodged then restuck in time when the Time Suck crashed through the wall. He caught it in a good, solid, life-saving grip.

  Then it unfroze.

  He’d expected this, knowing he had but a second before his touch permanently unstuck the debris, so he swung to the next lower piece of frozen brick, grabbed it, then swung to the next as each previous piece thunked to the ground. Swing, grab, swing.

  Like a jungle gym.

  While he descended the three floors, piece by piece, in clumsy, grasping hand grips, Sheed traversed the debris, nimble as always. He leapt from brick to brick on his tiptoes, as if skipping across steppingstones (steppingstones that fell away a moment after he touched them). His pace was fast and sure, and he reached the ground before Otto, turning his last bouncing step into a somersault and landing in a superhero crouch.

  Otto released his last handhold, landed beside Sheed, and said, “Showoff!”

  Sheed shushed him with a hand wave.

  The Time Suck that created their escape route lumbered toward them, brushing chunks of frozen brick wall aside.

  This close, it was clear this particular Time Suck wasn’t as large as the one that had frightened them at Mr. Archie’s store. If that other one was the size of a full-grown elephant-platypus thing, this one was more like a kid elephant-platypus thing. Extra-large or not, it was still capable of doing a lot of damage. Just ask the wall hovering around them in pieces.

  “Freeze again?” Sheed whispered.

  No, that wouldn’t work. The creature had already seen them in motion and wouldn’t be fooled.

  Otto said, “I think we need to move slowly.”

  They’d landed mere yards from where they’d laid their bikes, so it was only a matter of shuffling—​slowly—​to them. No problem. So long as the creature didn’t eat them.

  Brave, brave Sheed moved
first. He did a slow lunge toward his bike, planting one foot, then sliding the other to meet it. The Time Suck angled its snout his way and took a slow step closer, too. Sheed took another step toward his bike, and the beast took another step toward him. Almost close enough to touch.

  Otto began his slide, wanting to be nearer to Sheed in case this turned into a fight.

  Sheed stopped moving, but the beast took a bouncy step forward and poked its snout in his face, stopping short an inch. The remaining distance it covered with a flicked tongue, mopped sloppily across Sheed’s cheek.

  “Ohhhhh,” Sheed moaned. “Gross!” First tentacles, now this.

  Otto panicked, his heart plummeting to the ground with the loose bricks he’d dragged down. He stood at an angle that only allowed sight of the beast’s action, not the result. “Are you okay? Did it lick your face off?”

  Sheed twisted his way, revealing an intact, yet moist, cheek. “I’m covered in giant monster spit, Otto. I’m not okay.”

  The beast chuffed, gusting hot breath that rippled Sheed’s tiny ’fro. It angled toward Otto.

  “Oh no you don’t.” Otto mounted his bike.

  The creature did not pursue its next intended lick victim, eyeing the bike with the suspicion of a dog seeing its first cat.

  Otto told it, “I ain’t gonna hurt you. You ain’t gonna lick me either, though.”

  While he laid out those simple rules for the Time Suck, Sheed gathered his bike and sponged spit off his face with his b-ball jersey. “Grandma’s not going to let you keep that thing, you know.”

  “I wasn’t thinking about keeping it,” Otto lied. He was. It was cute. Clearly, it wasn’t a vicious creature, for it would’ve attacked them by now. It had only acted out because of Mr. Flux, Otto reasoned. Mr. Flux made you do things you didn’t want to do—​he knew that firsthand.

  Sheed said, “We should go before Flux gets down here. If he’s taking the stairs, we’ve only got a little head start.”

  Mr. Flux didn’t take the stairs.

  A black streak ejected from the hole in the wall above their heads, dropping directly onto the Time Suck’s back. He gripped handfuls of its fur and dug in his heels, riling the docile creature into a rage.

  “Boys,” Mr. Flux said, “shall we continue?”

  14

  Manure for You?

  The boys twisted their handlebars away from the beast, stood on their pedals, and pumped. Sheed got off to a good start, having imagined on many occasions that his bike was a street-racing motorcycle. He’d practiced fast getaways, fantasized he was revving a powerful engine that left a skid mark and dust behind. Glancing over his shoulder, he saw Otto wobbling, having gotten off to a not-so-great start. He might crash!

  Sheed slowed up, letting his shaky cousin pull alongside him, then placed a hand on Otto’s shoulder, steadying him. The beast gained—​Sheed could feel its breath puff at his bike—​but Otto was pedaling confidently now, so his lost lead wasn’t nothing but a thing. They were together. That was what mattered.

  “I was fine, you know,” Otto said, his backpack bouncing with every pedal pump.

  “You’re welcome,” Sheed mumbled between short breaths.

  They used every ounce of leg strength to put some distance between them and the galloping beast. It worked, too. A couple of brown boy missiles fired down the hill away from Fry High.

  Otto didn’t dare think on how fast they might be going. One thousand miles per hour, maybe? Two thousand? Surely they’d broken the sound barrier but were moving too fast to notice.

  The gap between them and Mr. Flux was widening, as the creature he rode didn’t have wheels and couldn’t simply coast down the steep incline. If it had been all hill, all the way to wherever the boys were going—​something they hadn’t decided yet—​this getaway would’ve been a breeze. That was not the case.

  The base of the hill—​a T-shaped intersection where Fry High Boulevard met Hill Valley Lane—​was fast approaching. Worse, the intersection was not empty. Frozen cars occupied the road, nearly bumper to bumper, only the narrowest of gaps between them.

  “Sheed!” Otto said.

  “I know, I know.”

  If they slowed down, Flux would catch them. If they didn’t hit the gaps between the cars just right, they’d wreck and become road scabs.

  “You left,” Sheed shouted, “me right. Split!”

  Their paths wishboned, Otto aiming for the gap at the front fender of a big old frozen SUV, Sheed taking the gap at the back bumper.

  “Arrrrgghhhhhhh!” the boys screamed, understanding this could be the moment when their legend ended.

  Vwoosh! Vwoosh!

  Otto sailed through his gap with inches to spare. A second later, so did Sheed.

  “Ohhhhhh!” Otto shouted, excited, and relieved, and proud, and ecstatic and a bunch of other words!

  Sheed laughed madly and screamed, “Hitting buzzer beaters can’t feel better than that!”

  They were so caught up in celebrating their awesomeness, they stopped pedaling. Otto squeezed his handbrake and fishtailed his back tire so he now faced the direction from which they’d come. Sheed did the same. The lumbering Time Suck had just reached the base of Fry High Boulevard, where its path was blocked by the cars. It stopped at the barricade. For the shortest second, the boys thought Flux had given up and taken the lost race like a good sportsman.

  He jerked the tufts of the beast’s hair, and it reacted angrily, wedging its snout beneath that massive SUV and tossing it to the side, where it froze in midair after leaving the beast’s path free and clear. It galloped at them, roaring in pain.

  The chase began again.

  The hill had been their only advantage. Now that they were on level ground, zooming through Fry, zigging around frozen people and things, they found their bikes maintained only the narrowest lead over the creature. When they rode down the trashed street by Archie’s hardware, they had to dodge all the stuck-in-midair debris. Flux and his beast ran straight through it.

  When they took shortcuts down alleys and between restaurants, the beast leapt onto walls and rooftops, chasing them from impossible angles.

  Zooming past one side street, Otto spotted Missus Nedraw in a wrestling match with her mirror tentacles and thought, This is the worst last day of summer ever, for everyone.

  They hadn’t been caught, though, which was good news. But good news often came with bad, and this was no exception. They were getting tired.

  Otto and Sheed had the energy of all young boys. It seemed limitless, but wasn’t. Otto’s legs felt heavy, like they’d been dunked in cement, and it was hard catching his breath. Sheed winced from a sharp pain in his side, and his tummy felt like the time Grandma said he shouldn’t have eaten so many shrimp.

  The Time Suck was unbelievably quick. Running in galloping strides more suited for a racehorse than a furry, potbellied, face-licking thing. Flux was like a cowboy on its back, gripping fur with one hand, slapping the creature’s flank with the other. The boys rode harder.

  “We . . . can’t,” Sheed panted, “keep . . . this up.”

  Otto had figured that out five minutes ago, but was too winded to speak.

  “We should . . . split . . . up.”

  Through the pain in his chest, Otto forced a “no.”

  If he could have formed whole sentences, he’d have explained that they watched too many scary movies to make that mistake. You never split up when the monster’s after you. That’s just dumb.

  “Then . . . what?”

  Otto swerved around a frozen cat and hopped the curb at Main Street, his brain straining in the midst of exhaustion. Maybe there was a way, something from a previous adventure. Like—​

  “Look!” Sheed said, pointing toward a rooftop up the street.

  At the ledge, with an oddly wriggling, person-size bundle hoisted on his shoulder, was the stranger who’d dropped out of a sky portal that morning. Still in his not-from-Fry clothes, with his dreadlocks all over the
place, he yelled something.

  They weren’t quite close enough to hear him, and the moaning beast on their tail didn’t make listening easier. The stranger cupped his hand around his mouth, shouting something that sounded like . . . manure for you?

  Is his sack full of poop? Otto thought. Why would we want his sack of poop?

  To Sheed it sounded like mature coo-coo. What?

  Closer, with the stranger straining his voice, the call was clarified. He screamed, “Maneuver. Forty. Two!”

  Maneuver #42?

  That was . . . genius. Also, very stupid. They were out of options, though.

  The winded boys didn’t have to waste any more breath communicating what came next. All energy poured into the next mile in order to execute Maneuver #42. They aimed their bikes away from Main Street, away from town.

  They were heading into the Gnarled Forest, toward the Eternal Creek. Which was more like a narrow river, but people in Logan didn’t like to name things in a boastful way.

  Not only was it like a river, it was like a deadly river. Easily in the top three most dangerous places in Logan County.

  And Maneuver #42?

  They were gonna have to jump it.

  15

  We Can Only Hope

  The Eternal Creek was not actually eternal, because eternal means something goes on forever. Like at school when Leen Ellison answered questions in science class, or like when Grandma yelled at them for breaking one of her porcelain dolls.

  The creek did begin and end. North of the county, it started as an offshoot from the Meherrin River. South of the county, it dropped off into a waterfall. The “eternal” problem happened along the stretch of creek between the Logan County borders.

  Last spring, one of Otto and Sheed’s classmates, Wallace, age eleven, fell in the creek, and was swept south by the current. Luckily he was a strong swimmer; he didn’t drown. Unluckily, he fell in within the county borders. So, at the southern border, where he should’ve kept going until he dropped over the waterfall, he was transported back to the northern border and swept down the creek all over again. The second time he hit the southern border, he was transported to the northern border again. And again. And again. An eternal loop.