10 IT’S BAKING THEM CRAZY

CHAPTER TEN IT'S BAKING THEM CRAZY The next morning, the bake sale table was mobbed. Almost every kid in the school was there, and they were not happy. They were yelling and shouting and demanding their muffins. Mona and Vincent collected big handfuls of money as kids bought all the muffins they could hold. Franny was delighted.

"Wow! So many muffins! And look at all that money!" "They are really craving these things," Mona said as she took a bite from her own muffin. Franny looked around at the kids. "I don't think I recognize everybody here. Are some of these kids from other schools?" "Maybe," Vincent shouted above the crowd.

At recess, most of the kids sat on the ground, or leaned against the wall eating crumbs off their shirts. They were too full to do anything. Only a couple of them even talked, and all they talked about was eating muffins.

Over the next few days, Franny noticed that most of the kids were eating muffins instead of their lunches, and some were complaining that their clothes didn't fit them very well anymore. The muffin sales just kept growing, and more and more kids from other schools were showing up to buy them. Franny caught up with Mona and Vincent after another after-school muffin sellout. "You should have plenty of money for the art and music departments by now," Franny said. "Probably," Mona replied. "I'm just not that interested in the money anymore."

"Yeah," Vincent added. "When I'm practicing the flute, I'm just thinking about how I could be using my mouth to eat muffins instead." How could muffins be that important to anybody? Franny thought to herself. On the way out of the building, Franny stopped by the art room. There were piles of unused supplies. And the music room had unopened boxes and boxes of brand-new instruments. "This is weird," Franny said. "But I guess if they're not interested in that stuff anymore, that's up to them. And I have projects of my own waiting for me back at the lab."

After dinner and homework, Franny went to her lab and got back to work on her new inventions. "Igor!" she shouted. "Please come here and hold these wires while I tighten this screw." But Igor didn't come. "IGOR!" she shouted again. Igor didn't answer.