Lunch Walks Among Us Read online

  Being the only mad scientist around, she was the expert on unstable industrial waste, so she took care of that personally.

  Then Franny pulled a needle and thread from her backpack.

  “This will require absolute silence,” she said, and the kids watched her begin stitching the lunch meat together.

  Franny worked quickly as the kids watched in terror, occasionally handing her additional slices of salami or bologna when she so instructed.

  They knew they were watching something not of this world, something that no human eyes had ever seen before, and in that moment the pants wetter decided to let loose one more time.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  HAM, I AM

  Finally Franny walked solemnly across the room and washed snips of ham and smears of mustard off her hands in the sink.

  She sighed a deep, satisfied sigh and turned to gaze on her creation.

  There, standing motionless in the middle of the classroom, was a giant monster thing made entirely of glistening, delicious bologna, salami, pickle loaf, and ham.

  The time had come to provide this creature with the awesome power source it would need to come alive.

  Franny grasped its salami nose and slid two batteries up its nostrils. “Awaken,” she commanded. The creature’s eyes slowly opened. It growled and looked at Franny. The kids clung to one another in fear.

  “The flagpole,” Franny ordered, and the creature began walking stiffly toward the wall. With a mighty punch it smashed its way through and headed outside.

  “Bread!” Franny yelled, and the kids, following Franny’s plan, began pushing the pile of bread over to the base of the flagpole.

  The Lunch-Meat Creature grabbed the pole and shook it. Miss Shelly screamed, and the kids gasped.

  “Shake harder!” Franny commanded.

  The Lunch-Meat Creature shook and shook until finally the Pumpkin-Crab Monster dropped Miss Shelly.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  THE FINAL INNING

  Franny watched calmly as Miss Shelly fell toward the ground, screaming. Then, with the loudest puff sound anybody had ever heard, Miss Shelly fell right into the big, squishy pile of white bread, completely unharmed.

  Franny turned to the Lunch-Meat Creature. “Now, my lunch-meat abomination, go get that pumpkin-headed creep.”

  The Lunch-Meat Creature grabbed the flagpole tightly and pulled until bologna-flavored sweat dripped off its forehead.

  Finally, with a monstrous groan, the Lunch-Meat Creature ripped the flagpole right out of the ground, causing a very angry Pumpkin-Crab Monster to fall and hit the pavement with a ground-shaking crash.

  The Pumpkin-Crab Monster got to its feet and growled. It began stomping toward the kids.

  It was almost on top of them when Franny, the only kid that did not look worried, calmly whistled.

  Suddenly a cloud of bats flew down from the sky and grabbed the Pumpkin-Crab Monster by the arms.

  “Batter up,” she said.

  The bats flew as fast as they could with the Pumpkin-Crab Monster, and they headed right for the Lunch-Meat Creature, who had the flagpole up on its shoulder.

  The bats dropped their burden just in time for the Lunch-Meat Creature to bring the pole around like a giant baseball bat and connect with the Pumpkin-Crab Monster as if it were a giant, stinky softball.

  With a loud crack it went hurtling off into the sky, never to be seen, or heard from, again.

  “Home run!” shouted Franny.

  Then Franny turned around and saw the shocked and horrified kids huddled around an equally shocked and horrified Miss Shelly.

  They looked more scared of her than ever.

  Franny had the sad, sinking feeling that she had saved the day but had lost all of her friends.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  EASY COME, EASY GO

  I, uh, could probably take the Lunch-Meat Creature apart and make your sandwiches again,” Franny offered weakly.

  “And sorry about the flagpole, Miss Shelly,” Franny said. “And about the wall my Lunch-Meat Creature smashed through.

  “Sorry about your pants, kid,” she said to the boy who had wet his pants and who was now getting pretty tired of people talking about it.

  The kids all just stood there, trembling. They didn’t say a thing.

  Franny turned away and walked home, sadder and lonelier than ever before.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  BACK TO THE GRIND

  The next day Franny went to school as herself. There was no reason to pretend anymore. The kids were afraid of her and probably always would be. Worse yet, Miss Shelly was probably afraid of her now too.

  Franny opened the door to her classroom slowly. Suddenly a giant cheer went up from the kids inside.

  “Hooray for Franny!” they yelled. “Hooray, hooray, hooray!”

  Franny looked around, stunned. The kids were all hugging her and thanking her for saving them.

  “Thank you,” Miss Shelly said and hugged her closest of all.

  Franny was shocked. She fumbled over her words. “Uh, you’re welcome.”

  “Your monster fixed the flagpole and the wall,” Miss Shelly said. “And it did such a great job, the principal wants to hire it to work here.”

  The Lunch-Meat Monster waved and grinned proudly.

  “You’re the coolest, Franny!” the kids shouted.

  “You’re not scared of me?” Franny asked.

  “Well, it would be hard not to be a little scared. I mean, you did make a monster out of cold cuts,” one girl said. “But still, you’re our friend. And that makes it all okay.”

  “Friend!” Franny said. “Yeah, I am your friend. Just the way I am, just the way you are. Friends!”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  WEIRD, BUT I STILL LIKE THEM

  They didn’t always like the same things, but they were all still friends after that. The other girls decided that Chompolina and Oozette actually were pretty fun.

  And Franny learned how to enjoy an occasional peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

  And together they figured out a way to play softball with both kinds of bats.

  It was an unusual friendship, but a great one. And considering how experiments often end up for mad scientists, Franny thought this one had gone pretty darn well.

  READ ALL OF FRANNY’S ADVENTURES

  Lunch Walks Among Us

  Attack of the 50-Ft. Cupid

  The Invisible Fran

  The Fran That Time Forgot

  SIMON & SCHUSTER BOOKS FOR YOUNG READERS

  An imprint of Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing Division

  1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, New York 10020

  www.SimonandSchuster.com

  Copyright © 2003 by James Benton

  All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.

  SIMON & SCHUSTER BOOKS FOR YOUNG READERS is a trademark of Simon & Schuster.

  Book design by Dan Potash

  The illustrations for this book are rendered in pen and ink.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Benton, James K.

  Lunch walks among us / James Benton.—1st ed.

  p. cm.—(Franny K. Stein, Little girl mad scientist ; #1)

  Summary: Franny K. Stein is a mad scientist who prefers all things spooky and creepy, but when she has trouble making friends at her new school she experiments with fitting in—which works until a monster erupts from the trashcan.

  ISBN 978-0-6898-6291-5

  ISBN 978-1-4424-9516-6 (eBook)

  [1. Monsters—Fiction. 2. Science—Experiments—Fiction. 3. Schools—Fiction. 4. Identity—Fiction. 5. Humorous stories.] I. Title.

  PZ7.B447547 Lu 2003

  [E]—dc21

  2003009362

 

 

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