“What’s your problem?” Brendan demanded.
“I haven’t got a problem,” Kim snapped. Seeing the look on Brendan’s face, she sighed. “Don’t like that guy, that’s all. He bugs me. Don’t know why.”
Brendan got the feeling she wasn’t telling the whole story, but he didn’t press her. “Who wants to go to Papa Ceo’s for a slice?”
The suggestion was met with immediate approval from Dmitri and Kim, but Harold’s face fell. “I’m not supposed to eat things outside of mealtimes.”
Brendan sympathized. His own mum would flip if she found out he’d been eating pizza before dinner. She railed at him about eating greasy food making his acne worse. How could it be any worse?
“You don’t have to eat anything,” Brendan insisted. “You can just have a diet pop… or a salad or something.”
Harold thought about it for a moment then nodded. Brendan was relieved. He didn’t care about the pizza, really. He just wanted to hear what the others had thought about the new teacher and his incredible chalk trick.
They set off across Queen’s Park Crescent by the Royal Ontario Museum. The giant weird crystal perched on top of the limestone building looked like an alien spaceship. 31 Many people didn’t like the new crystal but Brendan thought it was kind of cool. He’d been inside the structure on the night of the opening and had wandered all over inside. His father was playing in a jazz quartet for one of the parties, so while his dad played, he explored. The odd angles of the ceilings and walls had been really neat.
They turned away from the ROM and headed south to Hoskin Avenue. Brendan was about to broach the subject but Harold beat him to it.
“What do you think of this Greenleaf guy?” Harold asked. As he walked along, he was sketching in his book with a pencil. He was always drawing and he was quite talented. In a few strokes, a hummingbird appeared on the blank page. Brendan marvelled anew at Harold’s gift. He wished he had some comparable talent. If he did, he certainly hadn’t discovered it yet.
Kim grunted but didn’t say a word.
“He certainly made chemistry more interesting,” Dmitri said. “He has a very interesting teaching style.”
“Those tricks he pulled were amazing,” Brendan opined. “The chalk changing colour and the hummingbird? Cool.”
“I’m sure he must have had the chalk up his sleeve,” Dmitri said, “Or in a false pocket in his vesk.”
“Vest,” Brendan corrected. “Not vesk.”
“Vest!” Dmitri repeated. “Right.”
“And he totally shut down Chester, that’s for sure,” Harold said with a grin. He had flipped the page in the sketch pad and was feverishly carving a portrait of Mr. Greenleaf with a lump of charcoal on a fresh sheet of white. “I bet he’s a magician!” Harold offered, “and maybe he had an accident during a show. Like he accidentally sawed a woman in half for real. On stage. That would be wicked, right?”
“I think that’s highly unlikely,” Dmitri commented.
“Still, it’d be wicked, right? Am I right?”
“Blah, blah, blah,” Kim suddenly cut in. “Who cares. He made a bird appear! Big deal. You guys act like he’s some kind of genius. Anybody can learn a magic trick. He buys a book at a joke shop and you guys think he’s Gandalf.”
Brendan frowned. “Oh, yeah? Like you could do a magic trick.” It was a lame thing to say but he was just annoyed.
She sneered and reached over her shoulder to grip the handle of her ever-present field hockey stick, jutting out of her knapsack. “Why don’t I put you to sleep with my magic wand.”
“Ha-ha!” Brendan sneered back. “Do you want me to push that for a while?” He pointed at her scooter which she was currently guiding along, holding the handlebars. Her silver helmet dangled by its strap from the field hockey stick.
Kim smiled. “Naw. Thanks. I can manage.”
Brendan loved that scooter. It was a lustrous, lovingly restored Vespa in metallic candy-apple red with a black leather seat. He had begged Kim on a number of occasions to give him a ride, but she always said no. The insurance wouldn’t allow it. He envied her having such an amazing ride. Kim leaned her scooter against a telephone pole outside Papa Ceo’s Pizza and they joined the line for slices.
Brendan marvelled that Kim never bothered to lock her scooter. “Aren’t you worried that someone’s gonna steal it?”
Kim grinned wolfishly. “Who’d dare to steal from me?” Looking at that smile, Brendan decided he wouldn’t want to cross her.
They got their slices and sat on the bench outside the window. Brendan bit into the hot, melting cheese and savoured the garlicky tomato sauce beneath. No one did a better slice than Papa Ceo. Harold looked on with a woeful expression until Brendan inevitably said, “I can’t eat all mine. You want half, Harold?”
Harold gladly accepted the half slice. It had become a ritual between them. Kim shook her head at Brendan.
“You aren’t helping,” Kim scolded.
“Aw, it’s only a half slice,” Brendan said, shrugging. “No harm done.”
Dmitri was holding a veggie slice that was easily bigger than his whole head. Brendan had bought it for him. Dmitri’s family didn’t have a lot of money so Brendan spotted him a slice or a pop from time to time. He thought that the tutoring Dmitri gave him in science and mathematics was easily more valuable than a slice or two.
“I don’t like him,” Kim said suddenly. “If I were you guys, I’d keep away from him.” She said this to all of them but she looked at Brendan when she spoke. To accentuate her warning, she popped a giant jalapeno in her mouth and chewed. No matter how much junk food Kim ate, she always stayed lean.
Harold shook his head, gazing enviously at her pizza. He had already inhaled his. “And it was pretty cool how he knew everybody’s names, like right away. That just proves he’s a magician. How else do you explain the bird?” Harold demanded.
“Sleight of hand,” Dmitri mumbled, with his mouth full. “I’ve seen magic shows on TV. It’s all illusion.”
“Looked pretty real to me,” Harold said. “Hey, Brendan? You all right?”
Brendan had been sitting looking at a poster in the nearby bus shelter, his pizza drooping in his hand. “Hmm?”
Harold waved a hand in front of Brendan’s face. “Earth calling Brendan!”
Brendan raised his head and looked at his friends. “What?” he said dumbly.
“Have you established a psychic link with the alien spaceship yet?” Harold asked sarcastically.
“Very funny,” Brendan said. “I was just looking at that poster. You ever heard of her?”
They all looked at the poster. In ornate Celtic script the title read “Deirdre D’Anaan: One Night Only at Convocation Hall.”
“My mum’s going to that,” Harold said, wiping his mouth with a napkin. “She’s a folk singer or something.”
“Pretty,” Dmitri said.
Brendan stared at the picture of the woman. The entire poster was her face. She was beautiful but in a very intimidating way with piercing grey eyes and a haughty expression. Her hair spread out in a red, tangled mass about her head. The artist had manipulated the image so that her hair melded with a border of green vines and wildflowers. The eyes seemed to peer right into Brendan’s heart they were so alive.
“That’s a cool picture,” he said and turned to look at Kim. She was sitting stock-still, her pizza forgotten. She stared at the poster with a fevered intensity bordering on fury.
“Kim? Are you all right?”
Kim blinked. She realized they were all staring at her. “Huh? Yeah. I’m fine. Fine.”
Dmitri tossed his napkin into the garbage bin and picked up his books. “I have to go. My mother gets worried if I don’t head straight home. Are you taking the subway, Harold?”
Harold nodded.
Brendan watched Kim as she stuffed the last piece of her pizza into her mouth. She was acting so weird today. He decided to push his luck. “That Mr. Greenleaf is pretty strange,” Brendan said. “I don’t know what to think
