Big Mouth by Deborah Halverson Read Free Book Online Page A

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CHAPTER 5
    “Everyone was talking about you after lunch today.”
    Gardo and I were at Scoops-a-Million for my evening shift. Actually, I had taken over Grampy’s shift, because he claimed his psoriasis was acting up. No one wanted a guy with scaly, flaky elbows scooping their ice cream, so what could I do but fill in for him. And I’d have to do inventory for him afterward, too. Funny how the guy always managed to develop some gnarly disease on inventory nights. Arthur was working with me, but he was on break and there weren’t any customers. Gardo was gnawing a tiny pink taster spoon.
    “Great,” I responded. “Now I’m the laughingstock of Del Heiny Junior 13 twice in two weeks.” At least I hadn’t bawled like a baby again, stud that I was.
Pathetic.
“Are you gonna keep sucking on that empty spoon, or do you want some ice cream on it?”
    “Will you relax? I have to make weight. Coach will kill me if I don’t. Anyways”—Gardo jabbed his bitten-up spoon at me—“I said they were
talking
about you, not
laughing
about you. You’re the BMOC now.”
    “The what?”
    “The big man on campus.”
    “Give me a break, Gardo.”
    “I’m serious. Anyone who didn’t know you before sure knows you now. When Shane dropped into that Sugarfoot stance today, you just stood up straight and stared him dead in the eye.” He scowled. “No one’s ever stood up to Shane before.”
    They thought I was standing up to him? I thought I was looking for an escape. “I don’t know about
stood up to him.
”
    He eyed me for a second, then said, very slowly, very deliberately, “You stood up to him, Shermie. I saw it, everyone saw it.” Then he waved his hand dismissively. “The rest is just details, and nobody cares about details. You’ve got a rep now, and rep is everything, remember that.”
    In a pig’s eye, I have a rep.
I was leaning against the display case, trying not to think about how I just almost got my butt kicked. In front of me, a rainbow of bright-colored ice cream circles lined the display case in side-by-side rows. I thought of the paint set my dad gave me when I was in kindergarten and painting was fun. Now it was just one more thing I sucked at. Maybe I was stupid trying to get famous. Maybe my destiny was to serve up ice cream, simple as that.
    “Here,” I said, “give me the spoon. I’ll put some ice cream on it.”
    “I said I don’t want any.”
    “You did not.”
    “I did, too.”
    “Nuh-uh.”
    “Fine: I—don’t—want—any—ice—cream. How’s that?”
    Boy, this not-eating thing was turning Gardo into a real crank. With my luck, he’d start hucking maraschino cherries my way.
    “Who doesn’t want ice cream?” I said. “Ice cream is the best. I’d scarf down every one of these tubs if I could.”
    “So do it.”
    “Shut up.”
    “
You
shut up.” Suddenly Gardo pulled up straight and slapped his palm on the counter, the unmistakable sign that he’d just had a Brilliant Gardo Moment. “Hey! You
should
do it, Shermie. Seriously. You don’t have to stick to hot dogs, right? You need to cross-train with lots of different food, right? C’mon, let’s see how much ice cream you can eat. Is there already a record for that?”
    “Of course there’s a record for it. Cookie Jarvis, one gallon, nine ounces, twelve minutes flat.”
    “What is he, a girl? You can beat that.”
    “That’s a lot of ice cream! And twelve minutes goes by faster than you think.”
    “Which is exactly why you should practice.” He leaned in and lowered his voice confidentially. “I don’t mean to disrespect Lucy, but by making you specialize in one food, she’s limiting your career. I’m telling you, the more foods you eat, the