Free Project Jackalope by Emily Ecton Page A

until I come up with a plan,
I thought. But I nodded. It’s not like I had any choice. “Yeah, I guess. Okay. So…later.”
    “Yeah, later.” We did a really awkward kind of wave thing, and then Agatha headed downstairs. It was really weird and anticlimactic.
    I unlocked the door to my apartment and did a once-over of the place just to make sure there weren’t any Mr. Suit types hiding under the bed. But I didn’t find anything. (I say once-over, but it was actually four or five once-overs. I wanted to be sure.) But I was alone.
    I sat down at the kitchen table and fiddled with a twist tie. I didn’t know what to do with myself. Technically, I wasn’t even supposed to be home, since it was a school day and all. And even though it felt like the day had been thirty years long, it wasn’t even noon.
    After I demolished the twist tie, three napkins, and a flyer about a car wash, I felt better. I headed into my room and lay down on the bed. I figured I’d earned a nap. And it’s not like anyone was there to stop me.
    I’d barely closed my eyes when the knocking started. It was frantic, more like pounding, actually. I don’t know if people can levitate, but I swear I almost hit the ceiling in my rush to get to the door.
    I flung the door open, sure that it was going to be Professor Twitchett standing on the mat. But it wasn’t. It was Agatha.
    She pushed past me into the room and slammed the door behind her. “I got a note,” she hissed, looking around nervously.
    “Where?” She didn’t have to tell me who it was from. There was only one person who would be leaving us notes.
    “I was trying to feed the hybrid, but he didn’t want a carrot for some reason. And there was a knock on the door. I opened it, but there was no one there. That’s when I saw the note in the gargoyle mouth.”
    Twitchett. I nodded. “What did he say?”
    Agatha opened her sweaty fist and I took the note that was clenched inside.
    Zoo. 3:00. Bring my experiment.
    I stared at the note, trying to get my brain to work. “What do you think?”
    “It’s pretty sloppy, but I guess it’s his handwriting. But it’s not really his style, is it? And he doesn’t say anything about the hybrid.”
    “But he wouldn’t want to be specific in case someone else found it.” I stared at the note again. I wished Agathahadn’t sweated all over the ink. It’s hard to judge handwriting when it’s all smeary. “It was in the right place.”
    “True.” Agatha bit her lip. “We should go.”
    “But—” I hesitated. “Why did he knock on your door? Why not mine? He told me not to tell you.” Sorry to be rude, but he did.
    “I know. Maybe Bob told him I came by?” Agatha took the note back and put it in her pocket. “We should go, just in case. We’ll be smart and keep our eyes open. I’ll get the hybrid.”
    I didn’t like it, but I didn’t know what else we could do. “So we’ll meet a little before three and head over.”
    Agatha nodded. She was just turning around to go downstairs when my phone rang. We both froze. It’s amazing how scary a ringing phone can be when you’re already on level ten freakout. We just stared at each other as it rang a second and third time, and then slowly I went over to it. It’s my house, so I figured it had to be me. But I really didn’t want to know who was on the other end.
    I took a deep breath and answered it.
    The connection was really crappy, and I couldn’t even hear at first. Then all I could hear was breathing. I took a chance. “Professor Twitchett?”
    “Jeremy, you have to go.”
    I nodded to Agatha and mouthed the word “Twitchett.” “Don’t worry, we are. We got your note. Zoo at three o’clock.” I tried to ignore the fact that he’d called me Jeremy instead of Igor. He’d never done that before. “Right? Zoo at three? I’ll meet you there?”
    “
Jeremy
,” Twitchett’s voice sounded ragged and painful. “You have to go, now. GET OUT. Informant. They’re in the