TWENTY-THREE
JimJim and PosterGuy were in JimJim’s classroom. They had gotten there a little early. It was not time for school to start yet.
They were hoping that they would get there before TT. This was their lucky day. TT wasn’t at his desk yet.
PosterGuy was on his poster, sticking to the wall in the corner. JimJim and PosterGuy hoped that no one noticed it there.
JimJim leaned close to PosterGuy and asked, “Are you ready? It’s time.”
PosterGuy nodded and JimJim walked over to sit down. Instead of sitting at his regular desk, JimJim sat at the desk behind TT’s desk. From there, he could see PosterGuy smiling from his poster.
TT came into the classroom. He walked to his desk and sat down. He turned around and stared at JimJim. TT said, “What are you doing here? Your desk is over there. You better get yourself over there where you belong.”
JimJim said, “I’m just sitting here until school starts. I will move when the teacher gets ready to start.”
TT started to say something else but just shrugged his shoulders and turned away from JimJim. JimJim watched PosterGuy. In a minute or so, PosterGuy winked. He was watching TT. The wink ment that TT wasn’t paying attention. He wasn’t going to notice when JimJim reached down and took the gadget from TT’s book bag.
JimJim was nervous. He had never done anything like that before. He leaned down like he was picking something up that he had dropped. Quickly, he reached his hand into TT’s book bag.
Yes, the gadget was right there, on top of the stuff in the book bag. JimJim took it and put it into his book bag. He looked up. PosterGuy gave him a thumbs up. No one had seen what JimJim did. So far, so good.
JimJim was just shoving TT’s gadget into his book bag when the teacher cleared her throat and started getting everyone’s attention.
JimJim whispered to TT, “I better get to my own seat. See you later.”
TT just looked at JimJim and shrugged his shoulders.
JimJim was nervous all day. He saw TT check his book bag several times. Each time, he looked at JimJim and frowned. JimJim was sure that something bad was going to happen but it didn’t. If TT knew that JimJim had taken his gadget, he wasn’t saying anything about it to JimJim. Maybe he thought that he forgot to put it into his book bag that morning.
That evening, the Council trio was in JimJim’s room. JimJim and PosterGuy hadn’t told SueSue about stealing TT’s gadget yet. They were both excited about telling her. They thought she would be very happy about what they did.
JimJim finally couldn’t wait any longer. He showed SueSue TT’s gadget and said, “It’s TT’s gadget. We have it now and he can’t use it to make purple shadows or anything else to scare us. You said that you wanted to stomp on it. Here is your chance. You can stomp it into little pieces.”
SueSue was excited. She really wanted to stomp on TT’s gadget. She threw it onto the floor. She raised her foot. She was ready to stomp.
SueSue stopped. She lowered her foot slowly to the floor beside TT’s gadget. She looked first at PosterGuy and then at JimJim.
SueSue quietly said, “I can’t do it. It’s not right. It wasn’t right for you and PosterGuy to steal it and it’s not right for me to stomp on it. We are Council Kids. We don’t do things like stealing and breaking other people’s things.”
JimJim and PosterGuy were very surprised. That wasn’t what they had expected. They expected SueSue to stomp on TT’s gadget. They expected her to be as excited as they were. They were confused.
SueSue sat on the edge of JimJim’s bed. She said, “I want to stomp on TT’s gadget. I really want to stomp it into little pieces.
“I almost did it. I just about started stomping. Then I remembered. We are Council Kids. We don’t do things we know are wrong. We have to defeat the Shadow Kids but this isn’t the way to do it. We have to figure out a better way.”
JimJim felt like whining. He wanted to tell SueSue that it wasn’t fair. He and PosterGuy had been very clever, as clever as TT. They had a terrific strategy. They didn’t really steal TT’s gadget. They just took it! He couldn’t go around scaring kids and doing his trouble making stuff anymore. He wanted to tell her all of that but he didn’t.
Instead, JimJim took a deep breath. He said, “You are right. PosterGuy and I know you are right. We should have thought about it more before we did it. Stealing TT’s gadget wasn’t right. What can we do now? It’s too late. We already took Tt’s gadget. It’s a big mess and it’s our fault.”
