19

Monday Things have really fallen apart for me ever since I dropped my Magic 8 Ball in Mrs. Merritt's class. After Vice Principle Roy gave it back to me, I noticed it seemed a lot lighter. It turned out when it hit the floor, it cracked and the blue liquid behind the little window leaked out. So that meant it was totally USELESS. I ended up tossing it over Gramma's fence on the way home from school that day. But lately I've missed having it, because I've had some REALLY tricky decisions to make. I finally caught up on my missing homework assignments, but my Science Fair project is due on Thursday, and I still don't even have an IDEA for it yet. So I thought of Eric Glick. I've always heard he could hook you up with an old assignment if you were in a

自从我把我的神奇八号球掉在梅里特老师的课上之后，我的生活就彻底崩溃了。 罗伊副校长把它还给我后，我注意到它似乎轻了很多。 结果，当它撞到地板上时，它破裂了，小窗户后面的蓝色液体漏了出来。 所以这意味着它完全没用。 那天放学回家的路上，我把它扔过了奶奶家的栅栏。 但最近我想念它了，因为我要做一些非常棘手的决定。 我终于补上了落下的家庭作业，但我的科学展项目周四就要交了，而我还没有一个想法。 于是我想到了埃里克·格利克。 我一直听说他能给你安排一个旧任务如果你在

pinch, and I figured maybe he could even get his hands on a Science Fair project. But still, I didn't know if I wanted to get involved with a shady character like Eric. This was just the kind of decision I'd ordinarily leave up to the Magic 8 Ball, but today I was totally on my own. I was pretty desperate, though, so at recess I found Eric hanging out behind the school and told him about my situation. Erick said he could take care of me. He did some kind of secret knock on the door a few feet away that had no handle on it. Then the door opened from the inside.

我想也许他能参与到科学展的项目中来。 但我还是不知道自己是否想和艾瑞克这样的坏人扯上关系。 这是我通常留给神奇八号球的决定，但今天我完全靠我自己。 但我非常绝望，所以在课间休息时，我发现埃里克在学校后面闲逛，我告诉了他我的情况。 埃里克说他能照顾我。 他偷偷地敲了几英尺外那扇没有把手的门。 然后，门从里面开了。

It took a minute for my eyes to adjust to the darkness. The room was apparently some kind of storage area, and there were half a dozen kids crowded around a desk with a pile of papers on it. There were old book reports and history papers, and a bunch of other stuff, too. The person who seemed to be in charge was Denny's Denard, who's in eighth grade but got held back twice. I'm guessing he stayed in middle school on PURPOSE because he's got such a good racket going

我的眼睛花了一分钟才适应黑暗。 这个房间显然是一个储藏区，有六个孩子挤在一张桌子周围，桌子上放着一堆文件。 有旧的读书报告和历史论文，还有一堆其他的东西。 貌似负责的人是Denny的Denard，他上八年级，但被留了两次。 我猜他是有意留在中学的，因为他的生意很好

on. Eric told Dennis I needed a Science Fair project, and he took me to a separate area in the back where there were SHELVES of old ones. As far as I could tell, the better the project, the more it cost.

上。埃里克告诉丹尼斯我需要一个科学展项目，他把我带到后面一个单独的区域，那里有一架子的旧的。 据我所知，项目越好，成本就越高。

One of the projects seemed kind of familiar, and when I took a closer look I knew why. It was RODRICK'S Science Fair project from when HE was in middle school. I remember Rodrick working on that one. His idea was to see if different types of music have an effect on how fast flowers grow. So he put a potted flower in every place in the house where there was music.

其中一个项目看起来有点熟悉，当我仔细观察时，我知道为什么了。 这是罗德里克在中学时的科学展项目。 我记得罗德里克在做那个。 他的想法是看看不同类型的音乐是否对花朵生长的速度有影响。 于是，他在家里每个有音乐的地方都放了一盆花。

The flowers all died within two weeks, and Rodrick thought the music killed them. But Mom told him the reason the plants died was because he never WATERED them. I guess the school just dumps all the old Science Fair projects in the storage room, whether they got a decent grade or not.

花在两周内全部凋谢，罗德里克认为是音乐杀死了它们。 但是妈妈告诉他，这些植物枯死的原因是他从不给它们浇水。 我猜学校只是把所有科学展的旧项目都扔在储藏室里，不管他们的成绩好不好。