From Hero to Zero - Chris Tebbetts Read online

  “Uh… it is,” I said. “Sorry about that. I’ve got it now.”

  By the time I got to the fifth floor (which was really the sixth floor), Mr. Rourke was waiting in the hall by himself.

  “Did you get lost?” Mr. Rourke asked me.

  “Kind of,” I said.

  “Well, it’s past curfew,” he said, and pointed down the hall.

  When I finally got to Room 566, I put my card in the little slot, waited for the green light to come on, and then opened the door.

  “What’s up?” Tyler Fleischman said when I came in. He was sitting on one of the beds, channel-surfing. Bobby was on the other bed, playing some game.

  “Uh—,” I said.

  “You’re next door,” Bobby said. “We switched.”

  “What do you mean?” I said.

  “We already talked to Mrs. Stricker and she said it was okay. I’m going to room with Tyler now,” he said.

  Tyler held out a different key card. “This one’s yours, and you’re supposed to give me that one,” he told me.

  What could I say? I know when I’m not wanted. (Believe me, I know! Lots of practice on that front.) Besides, if there was ever someone I owed, it was Bobby Flynn.

  “Yeah, okay,” I said. “I’ll, uh.… see you later, I guess—”

  “Bye,” Bobby said. He didn’t even look at me.

  So now I was in Room 568, which was one over. I walked next door, stuck my card in the slot, and…

  Have you already figured out what’s coming next? Because I hadn’t. I was too busy thinking about how Bobby hated me, and what I was going to do about all that.

  Which makes this next part more like one of those scenes in a horror movie where you want to yell at the dummy on the screen.

  But it’s always already too late. And this time, I’m the dummy on the screen.

  The music gets all spooky. I stick my key in the slot. I pull open the door of that dark, creepy hotel room… CREEEEAAAAKKK… and I walk straight into the shadows to meet my fate.

  Terror in Room 568

  Hello?” I say.

  It’s dark in here. Really dark. I try the light switch but nothing happens. It would probably make sense to go back outside and get some help. But this is a horror movie, remember? So I do the opposite of that, and I keep on going.

  There must be a lamp in here somewhere, I think. I can still see a little bit of where I’m going, from the light in the hall. So I take another step inside. Then my foot squishes on the carpet. I look down. When I raise my shoe, a trail of dark slime sticks to it from the floor.

  “What the…?” I say, just before—

  SLAM!

  The door whams shut behind me. Now it’s pitch-black, and my heart is picking up speed. I feel my way up the hall, trying not to panic.

  Then I remember my phone. Good idea! I pull it out of my pocket and light up the screen. It’s not much, but it’s something. I shine it around, trying to see where I’m going.

  SCREECH! HISSSSS!

  The sound makes me jump about eight feet—before I realize it was just a cat down in the alley.

  “Phew,” I say. I even laugh a little, because I was getting so paranoid for a second there.

  But there’s nothing scary here. It’s just me, an ordinary hotel room, and some weird-smelling furniture. (That is the furniture I’m smelling, right?)

  Finally, I spot a lamp by the bed. Just what I’ve been looking for. I breathe another sigh of relief as I walk over, reach for the switch, and—

  I FEEL SOMETHING TOUCHING ME!

  A hand shoots up from the bed. Cold, clammy fingers close around my wrist. I try to scream, but nothing comes out.

  That’s when I see the flesh-eater lying there, like a sack of invisible bones just waiting for his next meal.

  “Touch that light switch and you die,” he growls.

  And in those last few seconds before he starts turning me into his own personal three-course meal, I remember something.

  I remember that in horror movies, there are two kinds of people. There are the ones who walk into dark, creepy hotel rooms alone at night. And then there are the ones who have a chance of surviving to the end of the movie.

  Guess which one I am?

  Terror in Room 568: Part 2

  Wh-wh-what did you say?” I asked. “I said… touch that light switch and you die,” Miller told me.

  He was already in bed, with the covers pulled up and everything. That was pretty weird, I thought. And I only managed to think that because I’d already thought—

  I took my hand off the lamp and stepped back—out of Miller’s reach.

  “You’re sleeping in there,” he said. Then he pointed at the bathroom door.

  “Say what?” I said.

  “You heard me.”

  My eyes were starting to adjust to the dark. I could see Miller had his stuff all over the second bed. I also noticed there weren’t any blankets or pillows on that bed.

  Now I was totally confused. First of all, I’d ended up with Miller the Killer as my roommate, which was insane. Second, I’d been alone with him for at least forty-five seconds, and I was still standing. And third—

  “Do you really expect me to sleep in the bathroom?” I said.

  “Do you really want to live?” he said.

  “Listen, Miller. I’m sorry about what happened on the plane,” I told him. “For real. I mean it—”

  “One more word, and I’m coming over there to turn you inside out,” he said.

  I believed him, too, and not just because Miller was twice my size.

  So I didn’t have a choice.

  I went in the bathroom, closed the door, turned on the light, and sat down to figure out what should happen next.

  Then I got up again, locked the door, and sat back down.

  Something told me I wasn’t leaving that room anytime soon.

  Friend-mergency

  I do some of my best thinking in bathrooms. In fact, it wasn’t all bad, being stuck in there. That tub was plenty big, and it was better than trying to sleep three feet away from Miller. He even gave me two pillows, so that counted as a win.

  But that just meant I was good for the next eight hours. I still had the rest of the trip to worry about. Miller may have been my newest problem, but he wasn’t the only problem. I had thirty-four more of those to deal with, one for every kid on this trip. How was I supposed to do this Editor in Chief thing when all thirty-four of them hated me? (Except maybe Jeanne, but throw in Mrs. Stricker, and we’re back up to thirty-four haters.)

  This was like a friend emergency. Or a friend-mergency. I’ve had a few of those before, but never so many at the same time.

  And that’s when I went for my backup.

  A lot of you might already know Leo’s story. He was my twin brother, but he died a long time ago, when we were little kids. After that, he was more like my imaginary friend, which I know is kind of weird. But so is sleeping in a bathtub in London.

  I don’t talk to Leo nearly as much as I used to. He got me through a lot of rough times back in the day (all right, a year ago). Now, mostly I just put him into the comics I draw. Still, he’s always there if I need something.

  “’Ello, ’ello, ’ello!” Leo said as soon as I thought of him.

  “Hang on. You’re not going to speak in an English accent the whole time, are you?” I asked.

  “Why not, guv’nah?” he said. “It’s bloomin’ England!”

  “Well, for one thing, not everyone talks that way here,” I said. “And for another—hello? I could use a little non-accented help. I’m three thousand miles from home, I’ve got the world’s toughest school assignment, everyone’s mad at me, and I have a psycho killer for a roommate.”

  “Is that all?” Leo said.

  “Very funny,” I said. “I’m trying to come up with a plan.”

  “What have we got so far?” he asked.

  “Not much,” I said. “But I was thinking about what Mom told me, ho
w I should be more friendly to people.”

  “Seriously?” Leo said. “I’m already bored.”

  “I’m not trying to be exciting,” I said. “I’m trying to make people like me.”

  “You want to get people to like you?” Leo said. “Start with Jeanne Galletta.”

  I almost laughed. It’s like Leo has a mind of his own sometimes, and it’s even crazier than mine.

  “Who said anything about Jeanne?” I said. “She’s the only one who’s not part of my problem.”

  “Exactly,” Leo said.

  “Huh?”

  “Tell Jeanne how you feel about her,” Leo said. “Like once and for all. For real this time. This is me, remember? And we both know you’ve been in love with her since the first day of middle school.”

  “I don’t want to talk about Jeanne, okay?” I said. “I want to talk about a plan.”

  “Hellooo?” Leo said. “Dude, that is the plan. Believe me, if you get Jeanne to like you, then you won’t be worrying about what everyone else thinks. It’ll be like taking care of thirty-four problems in one shot. That’s what you call a Master Plan.”

  “Yeah, maybe,” I said. “If it had any chance of working. Which it definitely doesn’t.”

  Not to mention, telling perfect Jared McCall’s girlfriend that I was in love with her seemed about as smart as running into a wolf’s den dressed as a lamb chop.

  “Besides,” I said, “if something was going to happen with Jeanne, it would have already happened by now.”

  “Or, maybe you never went for it,” Leo said. “You never really tried.”

  “Whatever. I’m not doing it,” I said. And since I was the one walking around in the real world, I got to decide. So I picked up my sketchbook and started drawing instead.

  “Okay, fine,” Leo said. “You let me know when you’re ready to do something a little more brave than making comics and being nice to everyone.”

  And then he was gone. Poof! Just like that.

  See, Leo’s all about danger, risk, and excitement. If it’s not big and crazy, he’s not interested. And telling Jeanne how I really felt about her was like the definition of crazy.

  Still, that didn’t mean Leo was wrong. If I could have actually gotten Jeanne to like me (like that), then everything else probably would have looked like small potatoes. Too bad Leo’s “Master Plan” was also totally unrealistic, totally impossible, and totally not-going-to-happen.

  And even worse—now that he’d brought it up, I couldn’t stop thinking about it.

  Thanks a lot, Leo.

  The Strangest Thing Ever

  That bathtub was more comfortable than you’d think. I don’t even know when I fell asleep, but I did—right until something woke me up in the middle of the night.

  It took me a second to remember where I was, and why my bed felt so bathtubby. But then I heard that noise again.

  Someone was crying.

  It must have been some loud crying, too, because I could hear it all the way in that bathroom. Was it Bobby? Or Tyler? Or someone in the room on the other side?

  I sat up and listened closer. There was this gulpy sound, and then one of those shaky breaths you only get when you cry.

  And then I realized it wasn’t that loud, after all. It was coming from closer than I’d thought. In fact, it was coming from the other side of that bathroom door.

  Yeah, that’s right. It was Miller.

  Crying.

  Miller was crying.

  For real.

  WHAT. THE. HECK?

  I had so many questions, I felt like I was being attacked!

  Once I was done dying of shock, I knew I had two choices. I could try to go back to sleep, or I could investigate a little further.

  Well—DUH. This was waaaay too big to walk away from.

  I got out of the tub and tiptoed over to the door. That’s when I heard Miller talking, too. He was just whispering, and it sounded like he was on the phone with someone, but I couldn’t hear any words.

  So I put my hand on the doorknob and turned it about a hundredth of an inch, just to see if it made any noise.

  It didn’t. Then I turned it a little more. And a little more. It took forever, but I finally got the door open, just wide enough to stick one ear through.

  “But I already told you—,” Miller said.

  Then there was a long silence, except for a couple of wet sniffs.

  “I know,” he said. “But I—”

  Someone kept cutting him off. Was some girl breaking up with him over the phone? Was he homesick? Did his parole officer just call with bad news? This was Miller, after all. I was ready to believe anything.

  But the real question was—what did I do with this now? Was I supposed to feel sorry for Miller? Because weirdly enough, part of me did.

  Was I supposed to use it against him somehow? That’s not really my style. But I wasn’t about to ignore it, either. Not in a million years.

  So by the time I was tiptoeing back to my tub/bed, I’d figured out a few things.

  1. I was going to find out what was up with Miller, one way or another.

  2. I couldn’t let Miller know I’d heard him crying. If he knew I was listening in like that, he’d wipe me out completely, just to erase that piece of information from the planet.

  3. My trip to London had just gotten a lot more complicated.

  4. A lot more dangerous, too.

  5. Somewhere in my crazy imagination, Leo the Silent was smiling.

  Gooooood Morning!

  In the morning, Miller was back to his old self. I know because when I woke up, he was right there in my face, making sounds like a gorilla trying not to laugh.

  “What are you doing?” I said, sitting up fast. I guess I forgot to relock that bathroom door in the middle of the night.

  “Get out,” he growled.

  “Yeah, all right,” I said, getting out of the tub. “But now that I spent a whole night in here, we’re even for what happened on the plane. Okay?”

  “We’ll see,” Miller said, and slammed the bathroom door closed behind me.

  In other words, we weren’t even yet.

  In fact, by the time he came back out, he was smiling bigger than ever. And when I went to brush my teeth, I found out why.

  “What’d you do with my toothbrush?!” I yelled. And I heard some more of that gorilla giggling from the other room.

  “Nothing,” Miller said. “I mean… I might have cleaned my toenails a little bit—”

  “WHAT?” I said.

  “Don’t be a baby,” Miller said.

  Oh man. This was EXACTLY what I thought rooming with Miller would be like. In the worst possible way.

  “So NOW we’re even,” I said. “Okay?”

  “Sure,” Miller said. “Whatever.”

  And that’s when I saw my best pen sitting on the bathroom floor with the cap off. Which is also just before I looked in the mirror, and found out what all that stupid gorilla giggling was really about when I woke up.

  So despite whatever had been bothering Miller in the middle of the night, he was in a way better mood now. Probably because the sun was up and he could get back to playing with his own personal stress ball.

  Also known as me.

  Chiefly Speaking

  Speaking of stress, things only got weirder at breakfast. That’s when Mrs. Stricker got up to make the morning announcements.

  Well—announcement, I guess. Singular. It might’ve just been one, but it was a doozy.

  “I hope you all have your cameras and travel journals with you this morning,” she said. “I expect you all to take good notes as we set out today. And on that topic, I’d like to announce that the Editor in Chief for our Living-Learning Report will be…”

  There was only about a nanosecond between that part of Mrs. Stricker’s sentence and the next part, but I swear, it was enough time for every eyeball in the room to turn Jeanne’s way.

  Right before Stricker said—

 
; “… Rafe Khatchadorian.”

  And—PINNNGGGG!!!!

  That’s the sound of the giant pin you could hear dropping in the room after Mrs. Stricker said I’d be in charge. It was that quiet. I think everyone thought they must have heard wrong, like maybe Mrs. Stricker had given the job to some new kid named Schmafe Schmatchadorian.

  Because the real truth was even weirder than that.

  The first one to speak up was Simon.

  “Really?” he said.

  The second, third, and fourth ones were Katrina, Maya P., and Lily. I mean, if laughing counts.

  “Yes, really,” Mrs. Stricker said.

  Then she named off the topic leaders—Isaiah for arts, Alison for politics, Mackenzie for history, Simon for science, and… of course… Jeanne for current events.

  Because, you know, things weren’t already weird enough.

  When I looked over at Jeanne, she looked like she was about to cry. She’d probably already been thinking about how that Editor in Chief job was going to look on her pre-pre-college applications. Is that a real thing? I don’t even know. I just know that seeing Jeanne fight back those tears made me feel like the lowest piece of dirt on the dirt clod on the bottom of the shoe of a bottom-feeding bottom-feeder.

  It didn’t help that Jared was staring at me, too, like I’d just stolen something from his girlfriend. Which I kind of had. Even if it wasn’t on purpose. (Sound familiar? It should.)

  In other words, Day Two was off to just as good a start as Day One.

  Get On the Bus

  When we came out of the hotel, there was this big double-decker tour bus waiting for us. It was all open on the top level like a giant convertible, so you know everyone went straight for those seats.