Free Big Mouth by Deborah Halverson Page A

and blue bar graph, was a handwritten label: BODY WEIGHT-TO-HBD RATIOS.
    “I’m sorry, Shermie, I didn’t make this up. It’s common knowledge on the circuit. It explains why the big guys are losing to little guys by so much.” She touched her finger to the colored bars. “See, Tsunami was only a hundred and thirty-one pounds when he got his first record of fifty-three and a half HDBs, and just one-sixty when he broke that record with fifty-three and three-quarters. For six years the closest anyone else could get was thirty-eight. And that guy was skinny, too. The big guys couldn’t even get that many HDBs down. Even a hundred-and-five-pound lady kicked their butts with thirty-seven. Only a hundred and five pounds, Shermie; we’re talking toothpick. They call her the Black Widow, and the big guys are terrified of her. She wins nearly every eat-off she’s in. Isn’t that cool? Anyway, no matter how you look at it, the tiny eaters are the big winners.”
    I stared at the graph but didn’t say anything. What could I say? My left leg weighed more than the Black Widow.
    Lucy went on hesitantly. “People think that the skinny guys are eating so much because their stomachs can expand more. The big guys’ stomachs can’t expand so far because…well, because they have this…restriction….” She ran her hands back and forth across her belly. The plastic pumpkin hit her elbow and bounced into the aisle, where a fairy quickly snatched it up and threw it toward the front of the bus.
    I focused my eyes on the pumpkin, watching as shrieking Plums batted it around the front bench. I was hoping Lucy wouldn’t say what I thought she was going to say.
    “They call it the Belt of Fat. And you have one, Shermie.”
    She said it.
    “I’m sorry, Shermie. But we have to talk about this.”
    No we don’t.
“I’m tired and I’m sore. I don’t want to talk about training anymore.”
    “Shermie—”
    “No.” I scooted painfully over to the window and leaned my head against the glass. It vibrated against my temple.
    What’s poking me in my…Oh.
I leaned forward and pulled my Galactic Warrior photon taser stick out of my back pocket. The stupid costume shop was out of taser holsters. Where was a space warrior supposed to store his taser if he didn’t have a holster?
    Whap!
The pumpkin hit my chest and fell into my lap. The Jedi leaned over the back of my seat and nudged my aching shoulder. “Hey, big guy, give it here.”
    I picked up the pumpkin and dropped it out the window.
    “Hey!” he shouted.
    “Shermie!”
    Lucy was shocked, but so what? I rose painfully and used every ounce of strength left in my arms to slide the window shut. I faced the Jedi. “It’s gone. Deal with it.”
    “You suck, man.” He dropped back into his seat. A chorus of
boos
rang out.
    Stupid pumpkin.
I sat down and leaned my head against the window again. Man, I felt like death warmed over. Maybe I should’ve tossed
myself
out the window. Wait, silly me, with this belt of fat, I wouldn’t have fit. Silly, stupid,
fat
me.

    Our clunker bus got to school about the same time as Mad Max did. I saw her through my window as we drove by the staff parking lot, which at that late time was full of cars but deserted of people. She was unloading a big crate from her trunk, struggling to slide it onto a wheeled metal cart. She must have had one serious costume if an entire crate was needed to get it to her room. She was draping a giant blanket over the cart when I lost sight of her behind the other buses.
    I waited for the rest of the costumed Plums to clear the bus before I slogged off into the busy quad, right next to the tomato-shaped bus stop sign. All of its letters except the
st
in STOP had been scrawled over with mustard. Now it read MUSTARD! with a smiley face in the
D.
    Someone touched my shoulder. “Excuse me, Shermie.”
    I stumbled to the side as a yellow M&M with red hair pushed past me and stood under the sign. Tater stepped up and