Unbelievably Boring Bart Read online

  BART MARTY BEAN TRIUMPHANT!

  I woke up on Monday to discover I was the toast of the town.

  And I don’t even like toast!

  But seriously—as I walked up to the front doors of school it seemed like everybody recognized me.

  “Marty, you rocked the game last night.”

  “Can you teach me that wave good-bye thing?”

  “Dude, Marty, that was so lit.”

  Yeah, okay, so most of my fellow students thought I was “Marty Bean,” the nobody from nowhere who stepped up and single-handedly beat the Lerkians. So I guess in a way I was still anonymous.

  And then Nick himself came walking up to me, hand in the air, expecting me to return a high five. Like… what?

  “Bartholomew! Don’t leave me hanging.”

  So, yeah, I gave him a high five. I was too confused to do anything else.

  “I’ve been thinking about this,” he said, walking with me toward our next class as if we were BFFs who did this every day. “I think the Hecklr people released a 2.0 version on the night of the ChickenHead LavaLamp event just to mess with us. So all the old strategies didn’t work. But somehow you knew. And that’s crazy impressive, man. You gotta teach me some of your moves.”

  The more he talked about the game, the more I realized: whoa, Nick the Mimic may actually want to be friends with me.

  After my first class, naturally, I ran into Giselle in the hallway.

  But here’s the crazy thing: she didn’t run into me at all.

  In fact, she went out of her way to avoid me, keeping her eyes on me the whole time, as if I were a banana peel on the high school track. I couldn’t believe it. So I did the only thing that made sense.

  “Giselle!”

  She froze mid-step and turned her head cautiously in my direction. “Hey, Bartholomew.”

  She knew my name. Like, my real name. What?

  I didn’t know what to say. So I stammered out the first thing that came to mind:

  “Um, I think the Hecklr people released a 2.0 version on the night of the ChickenHead LavaLamp event just to mess with us. So all of the old strategies didn’t work.”

  Giselle stared at me for another second or two, then said “Thanks,” and continued down the hall.

  Whoa.

  The rest of my day was full of random classmates shouting out “Hey, Marty!” and “You schooled the Lerkians, bro!” And then came lunch period.

  Now, normally, I’m sitting alone in the cafeteria, coding like crazy. But on this day, I found myself surrounded by people who wanted to hear all about my Hecklr strategies. I’ll admit it: I kind of loved the attention.

  But then I felt this presence behind me. The air itself seemed to thicken with unease. Everyone at the table had the same worried expression on their faces as they looked behind me. I turned, bracing for the worst…

  And indeed, the worst was standing there. Tigran the Tyrant.

  “I know what you did, and it’s not cool,” he said, then held out my beloved smartphone. I took it, warily, wondering if he was going to snatch it back and yell “Psych!” But instead he simply turned away and started to disappear into the lunchtime crowds.

  As overjoyed as I was to have my phone back, I excused myself from the table and went running after Tigran. I caught up with him near the pizza and fries station. My hand reached out and grabbed his arm.

  “You were the one who sent me that anonymous message, weren’t you?” I asked.

  Tigran looked down and grimaced as if my hand were covered with fish guts and mayonnaise. I quickly removed it from his arm.

  “I didn’t send you any message,” he said.

  “But you just said—I know what you did.”

  “Yeah. I saw all that coding stuff on your phone. I figured you were the one behind the whole thing.”

  “You… um… oh.”

  Suddenly, my blood was about as cold as the soft-serve at Frosty’s. What was Tigran going to do, now that he knew the truth?

  “You didn’t have to be a jerk about it and embarrass me in front of the entire school district,” he continued. “You could have just asked for your phone back.”

  “But why did you take it in the first place?”

  Tigran just shrugged. As if to say, Bees sting. Dogs bark. The moon spins around the Earth. I borrow stuff.

  “Anyway, cool game.”

  And with that… Tigran was gone.

  I was relieved for about 2.5 seconds. Because if Tigran didn’t send that anonymous message last night, who did?

  On my walk home from school I navigated my way around the high fives and “Yo, Marty dude, you’re awesome!” comments and wondered who could have figured out my secret.

  By the time I reached the apartment complex, though, it hit me like a fifty-foot jumbotron screen.

  CyberGirl03 was on her balcony, as usual. She waved at me, but this time I didn’t wave back. Instead I went up to the front door of her apartment and—gulp—knocked.

  THE GIRL BEHIND THE HANDLE

  I wasn’t sure if she would answer. Heck, I wasn’t sure if I should even be knocking. This was already a day where my life had basically turned upside-down. And now I might be making things even crazier.

  But slowly, the door opened. I expected to see CyberGirl03 standing there, but instead she was sitting down. Like, in a wheelchair.

  “Hi, Boring Bart.”

  “Hi, CyberGirl. I got your message.”

  “What message?”

  But she said it with a sly smile that told me I had been right. I know who you are. And I know what you did tonight. That, however, didn’t explain the mystery of why the best friend I’ve never met was trolling me.

  “Do you want to come in for a snack or juice or something?”

  “Sure.”

  I followed her into the apartment, which was just like ours—only reversed, like a mirror image. Some part of me wondered if the promise of a snack and juice would lead to… blackmail! You know, where she makes me promise to fork over half of the profits of Hecklr in exchange for her silence about me creating it.

  But a.) there were no profits, since I always intended the game to be free, and b.) that just didn’t seem like the CyberGirl I knew.

  “My mom’s still at work—she won’t be home for another couple of hours,” CyberGirl told me as she rolled to the fridge and opened the door. “Apple? Peach? Sweet tea?”

  “Whatever you’re having. Uh, can I ask a possibly stupid question?”

  She paused to look up at me. “Depends on how stupid.”

  “Hah-hah,” I replied, which may have been the fakest, most nervous laugh ever. “Why don’t you go to Rancho Verdugo? There are ramps and stuff for people with disabilities.” Then, seeing the nervous expression on her face, I quickly added, “See, I warned you it was probably stupid.”

  “No,” she said. “Not stupid at all. I ask myself the same thing. And I wish I could. But… let’s put it this way. It’s a miracle I’m even talking to you in person. Normally strangers freak me out. Crowds especially freak me out. So I do school at home. You know, cyberschool? Through my computer?”

  “You’re probably comfortable around me because I’m so boring.”

  “You’re not boring at all, Boring Bart. You might be the most interesting person I know.”

  Were my cheeks red? Possibly. But it was probably the sweet tea, which has been known to increase the flow of blood to the face… okay, I’m totally making that up.

  “So why did you send that anonymous message to the game last night?”

  CyberGirl grinned. “Ah-hah! Busted! So you do admit it! You’re the secret creator behind Hecklr, aren’t you? You’re the one who sent it to me in the first place. I should have known all along.”

  “Maybe…”

  Stop it, cheeks! I could feel them getting even redder. Ugh.

  “Well, whoever created the game should know something. I didn’t finish the message. It should have read: I know who you are.
And I know what you did tonight. And I want to thank you.”

  “Thank me? I mean, thank him? For what?”

  “Hecklr actually makes me want to go outside, which is something I haven’t wanted to do since, like, fourth grade. So I wanted to thank you for that. Or thank whoever created it.”

  “I’ll pass that on,” I said, “if I see whoever created it.”

  At this point, if you cracked a raw egg over my cheek, you’d have had a sunny-side up in a matter of seconds.

  “My name is Aaliyah, by the way.”

  “Um, and I’m Bartholomew.”

  “Yeah,” Aaliyah, a.k.a. CyberGirl03, said. “I know. Maybe you can show me a little coding? I’ve always wanted to try.”

  THE BILL BEAN FACTOR: THE FINAL CHAPTER

  When you’re flying high, that’s the exact moment you should buckle your seat belt, pull out the airline sick bag, and double check that there’s an inflatable life vest is under your seat. Because things could go south at any given moment.

  That moment came when I keyed into my apartment and noticed that Pickleback hadn’t come bounding up to lick my face and try to knock me to the ground. That wasn’t good.

  I cautiously walked down the hallway to my room. Pickleback was on my bed, looking vaguely guilty about something. I tried to stop him, Bart, I really did, but… well, he’s kind of my master.

  That master, a.k.a. Coach Bean, a.k.a. my dad, was sitting at my desk, looking at my computer. On the screen were the coding guts of Hecklr. Oh, no. Triple busted! After all these months of working in the shadows and keeping my work on the game a total secret, three people in the last three hours have figured out my secret identity. First Tigran. Then CyberGirl03/Aaliyah. And now… my Luddite dad.

  Ugh. This must be a new world record. I would make the world’s lousiest superhero or secret agent.

  “I don’t know what I’m looking at exactly,” Dad said, “but I have a feeling it isn’t your math homework.”

  What could I say? I didn’t want to lie to my dad anymore.

  “No, it’s not my math homework.”

  “Now I know I’m just a knuckle-dragging gym teacher, but that was computer coding on your screen, wasn’t it?”

  “Don’t sell yourself short, Dad! Your knuckles don’t drag on the ground at all…”

  “Bart.”

  “Yes?”

  “You created that insult alien game, didn’t you?”

  “Yeah, I did.”

  Dad sighed. “Buddy, I have to say… I’m really disappointed. If you created that game, that means you were making fun of those three kids last night.”

  “But you don’t understand. They’re the three jerks who always pick on me! I didn’t mean to take it that far, but…”

  My words trailed off, because I knew I could only finish that sentence with the truth. “I thought that if I took my revenge, I’d feel a little better about myself.”

  “Bart, you have a brilliant mind. It’s scary how smart you are sometimes, because I don’t know anything about this stuff. I’m a gum-chewing high school gym teacher who somehow was blessed with the brainiest kid on the planet.”

  “Clearly I’m not that smart. You figured it out.”

  Dad blinked. “Um…”

  “I didn’t mean it that way!”

  “Anyway, considering how brilliant you are, it’s very important to learn that you can’t use those gifts to hurt people.”

  Now it was Pickleback’s turn to sigh. Wonderful. Even he was ashamed of me.

  “I thought it would feel good,” I said, “totally humiliating them in front of the whole school district.”

  “And did it?”

  “No,” I said, truthfully. “Not at all. I think one of them, Nick—you know, the humble kid—even thought we were friends. Which makes me feel like a crumb.”

  “The one who was chanting ‘Mart, Mart, Mart’?”

  “I think he was saying Bart.”

  “Sounded like ‘Mart’ to me. I had a lot of people ask me about ‘Marty Bean’ today, and if we happened to be related. Anyway, I guess there’s only one thing left for us to discuss.”

  Oh no. Here it comes. The moment I was dreading.

  I had the distinct feeling that I was about to be taken off all electronic devices for the foreseeable future. And I could foresee a long, long, long future. As in, I wouldn’t be allowed to have so much as a pocket calculator until my senior year of high school.

  Goodbye laptop, so long cell phone, sayonara SlapTalk. No more coding for me. Wi-Fi signals would be mere legend and rumor, and someday I’d tell my grandkids about the magic time when I was allowed to access some mythical place called “The Internet.”

  I gritted my teeth and awaited punishment.

  DAD VS. ALIENS

  Explain this game to me. How do you play?”

  Stunned, I un-gritted my teeth. This couldn’t be for real, could it? Was Dad actually asking me about Hecklr? Even Pickleback cocked his head slightly, ears up, wondering if they were deceiving him.

  “Are you serious, Dad?”

  “Of course. I wish you would have showed it to me earlier.”

  This boggled my mind. Dad… dude… I’ve only been trying to get you to play since the beginning of the school year! But I quickly recovered.

  “We’ll have to go outside for the full effect. I really don’t keep many Lerkians around here. They’re kind of a distraction.”

  “Lerkie-whats? You mean the dental floss monsters?”

  “Come on, follow me.”

  As Dad, Pickleback, and I walked outside and headed down to Rancho Verdugo Boulevard, I explained the basics to him. Which was kind of like trying to explain second-year algebra to a caveman, but whatever. I was impressed he kept up with me at all.

  “Now, point my phone at the neon sign and look through my screen.”

  We stood in front of Joey G’s Back to the 50’s Diner—a Lerkian favorite. Dad pointed the phone at the sign and his whole body jolted.

  “Whoa! It’s one of those alien things from the game last n—no, wait, there are two of them. Three!”

  “Yeah, they really like this place. Must be the grease.”

  “So, what do I do now?”

  “Tap the screen to get their attention, and then—”

  “Wait! They’re ripping apart the neon sign!”

  “Yeah, that’s what they do, Dad. Now once you get their attention, you type in something to threaten them.”

  Slowly but surely, my dad understood the game. Threats, he could do, even though at first he was typing lame things like:

  I’M GOING TO CALL THE POLICE

  and

  IF YOU DON’T COME DOWN FROM THERE I’M GOING TO MAKE YOU DROP AND GIVE ME 20.

  Coach Bean, man. He’s a gym teacher down to his very soul.

  Even Pickleback got into the act, barking at the neon sign because his human family members were shouting and laughing and pointing. Pedestrians who strolled by probably thought we were goofy in the head. But that was fine. We were having too much fun.

  But I forgot something important. In all the excitement of last night, I forgot to dial back the Lerkian aggression factor. Soon we had dozens of the little jerks crawling all over Joey G’s neon sign, as well as nearby traffic lights and cars. Dad kept looking through my phone and freaking out.

  “There’s another one! And whoa… another one! They’re everywhere!”

  “Let me see.”

  Dad was right. Rancho Verdugo Boulevard was positively SWARMING with Lerkians. At this rate, they’d tear about the entire Boulevard (well, at least the virtual version I’d programmed into the game) in no time.

  “This is not good,” I said.

  “So, what do we do?” Dad asked, genuine panic creeping into his voice. Which was surprising and kind of flattering.

  “We ask for help.”

  I stood up on a chair outside Joey G’s place, cleared my throat, and did something very unlike me (again). I shou
ted to everyone within earshot.

  “Hecklr players! If you’ve got your phone with you, we could really use your help.”

  There was an awkward silence for a moment. I thought, Great, now I’m the one who’s going to look like a complete fool. And in front of my dad, too!

  But then some high school kid, maybe sixteen or seventeen, recognized me. “Hey, aren’t you that Marty Bean guy, from the game last night?”

  “Yeah!”

  The kid smiled, then started shouting out to everyone else. “We got a serious Lerkian situation, bros. Marty Bean is leading the charge!”

  Ugh. “Marty” again. But whatever.

  On the plus side, within seconds, everybody who had downloaded the game was pulling out their phone. Soon at least two dozen people were spread all up and down Rancho Verdugo Boulevard, shooing away Lerkians as fast as they could find them. This drove Pickleback bonkers, by the way. I felt kind of bad; maybe I could design a special add-on for dogs and their human companions.

  Dad was impressed. “So this is kind of like a team sport?”

  “Yep,” I replied. “Exactly like a team sport. With, uh, cell phones.”

  Which, okay, let me just say:

  Finally!

  “That’s pretty cool,” Dad said.

  It was amazing. There was hope for Coach Bill Bean yet.

  EPILOGUE

  HECKLR 2: THIS TIME, IT’S PERSONAL

  So I’m standing in front of the class, and I’ve just started giving the most important report of my life. I’m nervous, because a massive part of my future depends on this.

  I’m about three sentences in when I realize: Houston, we have a problem! I look up from my paper and quickly scan the classroom.

  “Er, as I was saying…”

  You know how you look out into the class and hope for a bit of encouragement to keep you going?

  “Ummm…”

  But there’s nothing. No reaction whatsoever.