The Revenge

The Revenge

By Carolina

Chapter 1

 A bowl of fruit carefully set atop a cafeteria side table by a caring mother was perhaps the only still life at the Pipswich elementary school. Otherwise all was awhirl.

Joey Sanders elbowed his best friend, Sammy Macintosh, across the lunch table.  “Hey, Sam!” “Wanna go outside?”

 “Sure, let’s play kickball,” Sammy answered.  The two boys jumped up from the table, and took turns tossing their uneaten fruit into the big blue trash barrel.

 Annie put down her sandwich wrapper, intending to pick up her apple, but

grabbed a cookie instead, leaving the apple untouched.

Mrs. Tobblebee, the most eccentric of lunch ladies, stalked by chomping on a peppermint patty, and reminding the children all to clean their lunch places “real good” when they left. After watching the kids scramble out of the cafeteria and onto the playground, Mrs. Topplebee smiled a sideways smile and turned a waddling heel. She began to wipe down the table.

 Mrs. Topplebee thought she heard a giggle in the corner of the room. She

twisted around to see what it was.  All that was there was a bowl of fruit. “Good gracious!” she exclaimed. “I must be hearing things!”

But reader -- Mrs. Topplebee was not wrong...

CHAPTER 2

 “Did you hear that Cara?” Susie whispered anxiously with cupped hands to the girl next to her.  “There’s cafeteria ghosts!”

 Tommy, an older boy, leaned in to Cara’s and Susie’s conversation.  “Ya tell’n secrets?”

 “Listen!” hissed Cara, “Sppsss -sppsss.”

 “Heck” “That’s nothin!” Tommy snickered.

********************

The fruit waited patiently for the last custodian to exit the school building. Finally… finally they heard the door close and the keys turning. Timidly, a kiwi spoke up. “Um… Banana, I… I mean Top Banana, aren’t we going to have a meeting now?”

 “Exactly right!” boomed a particularly large yellow banana (who preferred to be addressed by the name of Top Banana). “Ahem! Places, everyone!”

This led to a mad dash of fruit scrambling in all directions. Eventually, everyone

was in their rightful spots, and the meeting could begin.

 “Well, I think the whole plan sounds just lovely,” said Pamela Peach quietly. “We shall start right away.”

 “Ouch, Kevin. Stop!” Patty Pear was not in the mood to be jumped on, and Kevin Kiwi was jumping up and down to see better, causing a couple of bruises on his way.

After a quick detour to examine everyone’s mushy spots, the fruit got back to their meeting. Fortunately, everyone agreed on the plan, and all wanted to start as soon as possible. The meeting was released.

 *********************

Top Banana woke up to the sound of the door being swung open and the first staff member entering the building. Top Banana yawned sleepily.  “Wake up everyone,” he mumbled.

 “Can’t I sleep a little bit longer?” Patty Pear mumbled.

 “You want the humans to throw us away then?”

 “No.”

 “Well, then you better skedaddle.”

Once everyone had gotten up and stretched, Top Banana, waiting impatiently perched on the corner of the bowl, announced triumphantly, “Plan:  Stop Humans from Being Wasteful -- Into action!”

Getting out of the bowl was more difficult than expected. For one thing, only the largest of the fruit could emerge. It happened that top Banana and

Orville Orange climbed out, and then Orville had to climb back in to rescue the others. Eventually, everyone was freed, and they began their voyage to Mrs. Jane’s cloakroom. This, too, was difficult, because the fruit had to find quick hiding places to avoid being stepped on (and seen) by various teachers. Luckily the door to Mrs. Jane’s cloakroom was left open and the fruit were able to go right inside. They decided to begin here because Mrs. Jane was the only teacher who had a cloakroom.

Orville Orange was being heavily complimented, because he was the one to find a spacious storage bin stacked at the end of the room. Here they decided to spend the half hour before the students arrived.

 “Just think” said Top Banana contentedly. “Soon we will be back in the proper life cycle of a fruit.”

 Top Banana was rudely shaken awake from his daydreaming.

“The kids are here,” Patty Pear hissed. “Their backpacks are here and they are in their morning classes.”

Top Banana peered through the thick plastic and saw that, indeed, yellow and blue and green and orange backpacks lined the wall waiting for their masters to come and take them home.

“Oh, er, I knew that,” he said, slightly flustered. “Pamela, you take the yellow backpack. Orville, you take the green one. Patty, you take the blue one and Kevin and Ava, you take the orange one.”

“But I wanted the green backpack,” complained Kevin.

 “Wait a minute,” Pamela said softly, “What about you? What backpack will you take?”

 “I haven’t assigned my own yet,” Top Banana snapped.

 “Yeah, right,” sighed Patty.

 “I’m going to take the purple bag in the corner,” he huffed.

Pamela pushed her way through the massive yellow bag. As she slowly got used to the dark light, she could start to see things. Broken pencils, homework, paper, scissors – Vicks cough drops – What’s this? In big printing -- almost too big to read -- a title read The Doll People. “Hmmm, that looks interesting....Ouch!”

 Pamela reached up and scratched her fuzzy head. Then she looked above her. A huge box with polkadots on it  towered over her. And hanging off it was a black zipper that had struck the top of her head. “The lunch box!” she exclaimed.

Pamela scrambled up the edge of the lunch box to the black zipper. She

grasped the metal object and pulled. The zipper did not budge. She pulled and pulled and pulled. Still the zipper did not budge. This time, Pamela gave a great heave and the zipper slid along, just enough so that she could carefully squeeze through.

Pamela Peach peered into the lunch box. Sitting in the corner, staring right into Pamela’s eyes, was peach. A dark, elderly peach.

“Quick!” said Pamela immediately. “I have come to talk about something

important!”

“What?” said the other peach wearily. “This better be important...I don’t care for such nonsense.”

 “Oh listen, please listen. Soon you will understand. The children attending

Pipswich -- where we are now...”

 “I know perfectly well where we are,” the elderly peach interrupted coldly.

Pamela ignored the interruption and carried on with what she was saying. “—and the townspeople are throwing away all their uneaten fruit. They are eating sweets before they go and eat their healthy foods. This is horrible because we feel unhappy and unloved. We aren’t even composted. What good do we do for the planet if we are carelessly thrown in the trash?”

Pamela stopped to catch her breath. “We have decided on a daring plan of revenge.” She lowered her voice, then raised it again, realizing there was no one there to snoop. “Today, at lunch, we will rise from this lunch box when it is opened, run from the cafeteria, escape from the school, and across the field to the town hall. From there, we will raid the mayor’s office and take over the town.”

She stopped, surprised by her own outburst, then looked over at her audience. Surprisingly, the elder peach looked amused. “We will not give back the town until they agree to stop being wasteful. We will not stop, and we will not give up until they promise to stop. Do you understand?”

 “Yes, I understand. I will go along with your plans, but I cannot say I will be much help. I am not as fast and energetic as I was in my younger days.”

The old peach looked distressed and Pamela immediately felt sorry for her.

*****************

In all the other lunch boxes, the other fruit were having similar conversations. All except Top Banana. His box contained a long fruit roll-up, two Oreo cookies, a peanut butter and fluff sandwich, and a bag of potato chips. Top Banana was horrified at the food choices, plus more than a little disappointed that he didn’t have anyone to whom to pontificate. Soon, Top Banana came to the conclusion that he would have to climb all the way out again and go on to the next bag. Here, he found a mango and started his long-winded conversation.

After each fruit explained their plan to their new friends, they exited that backpack and went on to the next. All together, they covered twenty-one backpacks. Three had no fruit at all, four had some sort of vegetable (not very friendly, except for Bob and Paul, two carrot sticks who got stuck in a packet of ketchup and never got out). Other than that, they all had fruit.

CHAPTER THREE

Lunch that Wednesday started like any other lunch. First the

kindergarteners walked in and sat down at their table in the corner. Then the second grade filed in, then the sixth grade, and finally the fourth grade. It was the fourth grade that had the miscellaneous fruit within...

The sixth grade carelessly tossed and unzipped their packs, followed by second grade, and the kindergarteners raced to do the same.

Somewhere dotted between these lines, the fourth grade unzipped their own. The fruit that lay in some lunchboxes appeared. Ordinary at first, until Kevin let out a tremendous sneeze. The fourth grade girl, who had him in her bag, yelped and leaped to her feet.

 “Was that you?” Mrs. Topplebee pointed a plump finger at Tommy, an innocent kindergarten boy.

 The room fell silent. Tommy’s face went white.

 “Charge!” hissed Top Banana.

Out came mangos, strawberries, groups of blueberries, grapes, and so many more. Mrs. Topplebee fainted, and landed heavily in the arms of Mr. Fishy, the kindergarten teacher. Mr. Fishy quickly handed her over to the muscle-y gym teacher, and phoned the nurse.

A group of sixth grade girls shrieked and climbed onto the top of the table, screaming. Kindergarteners sat in their seats, staring, mesmerized by the walking fruit. The fourth grade hurried over to make sure they were all okay, then climbed on the table themselves, realizing they just as scared as the kindergarteners.

The second grade was brave and stood by the chairs they had once sat in, picking up their feet occasionally to avoid the passing fruit.

Like a mad dash of angry buffalo, nearly escaping a hungry lioness, the fruit fled. Past chairs and tables. Past children, past teachers. Past bits of cookie mashed and ground into the floor. Past sponges and buckets filled with water and finally past the rectangular gap in the cafeteria wall that served as the door.

Several custodians rushed to find big brooms and mops to fend off the

scrambling fruit.

Down the hallway and into the lobby the fruit ran. And then they stopped. There was no way to get out. Top Banana looked sheepishly at the others. He opened his mouth to say something then closed it again immediately. The custodian with the long white beard -- down to his belly -- was fumbling for the doorknob so that he could get out to sweep the walkway. This

was a mistake, because the wide gap in the door was a perfect fit for at least

twenty one fruit to slip by. That is why Top Banana had no need to hold an emergency meeting. “Charge!” he yelled again, collecting back his courage.

It just so happened that the town hall was straight across from the elementary school, and sprawling out right in front of the building was the town green. That would be easy to cross.

Unfortunately, before you get to the green, you have to cross the road. Not the biggest road in Pipswich, but big enough for any fruit to feel frightened. Cars were screeching to a halt, and one custodian ran right into a rose bush and just sat there feeling sorry for himself.

Mr. Beetlehum, the school’s personal crossing guard, blew his whistle and, signaling the traffic to stay still, he let the commotion get to the other side.

 “Almost there,” puffed Patty.

“Almost there,” screeched Kevin.

 “ALMOST THERE! Almost there! Almost there!” chorused the others.

Top Banana said nothing, stealing quick glances behind his shoulder to survey the many troops. A lady walking her dog came by, and let it go dangerously close to, as Top Banana would say, the “slaves” escaping from illegal work. The dog barked furiously and bared its teeth at the fruit. Sticky dog drool came showering down on them, and his breath smelled like rotten eggs and decaying fish. The lady jerked the leash and the dog trotted away, for which Pamela (and many others) were grateful.

The custodian wearing jeans and a blue plaid shirt tripped over his broom and fell in the soft green grass. The custodian in the yellow shirt, looking straight

ahead, tripped over the one in the blue shirt. The one wearing the green shirt tripped over the second custodian. The last one, in the orange shirt, was studying a bird sitting nearby in a tree, and walking backward at the same time. And you know what happened.

This particular chaos was glorious for the “troops” because it gave them one less thing to worry about.

The fruit were nearing the entrance of the Pipswich Town Hall by now. They began to organize themselves into small groups. With this, they tackled the stairs. Gathered in a big cluster off to the side of the door, the fruit stood catching their breath.

“Okay,” said Top Banana sternly. “We need to discuss the important matter of this risk. We will march straight in and to the mayor’s office. We will find a hiding place to stay in until the timing is perfect. We will do whatever it takes to save fruitkind. Do you understand?”

“Yes sir!”

“Good.”

The door swung open, and a man wearing a tuxedo and carrying a briefcase stepped out. The fruit didn’t wait a beat, but caught the opening just in time. The front desk woman peered through skinny triangular glasses over her

desk. “George!” she exclaimed. George was the president of the Pipswich gardening club. “George! Come here!”

To Be Continued...