7. A Present for My Sister

7 A Present for My Sister "Let's go to Candy Castle!" Ryan shouted as soon as we got out of the line. "Let's go to Cinnabon," shouted Michael. "Let's get ice cream!" said Neil the nude kid. "Let's go to the skateboard shop!" said Alexia. Malls are cool. There's so much stuff to see and do, especially around Christmastime. Our mall even has a train in it. We ran over to the train. It goes around and around in circles on metal tracks. At the ticket booth was an elf with a funny hat and

pointy ears, like on Star Trek. The elf turned around, and you'll never believe who it was. Mrs. Kormel, our bus driver! "Mrs. Kormel!" I shouted. "What are you doing here?" "Bingle boo!" she said. "I'm running the train... and earning a little extra money over the holidays." "Aren't you a little tall to be an elf?" asked Alexia. "Elves come in all sizes," Mrs. Kormel told us. "All aboard! Toot toot!" That train ride looked lame, so we didn't get on. Any train that needs an elf to toot for it must be lame.

We ran over to the escalator. Escalators are cooler than trains, and you don't need tickets to ride them. My friend Billy, who lives around the corner, told me that if you run down an up escalator for ten seconds,

you'll travel back in time.* Neil said he had to go to the bathroom, so we went over to the men's room and waited for him to finish. That's when I remembered that my mom gave me money to buy a present for my sister. I didn't know what to get her. What do you get for an annoying sister? "You're a girl," I said to Alexia. "What do you think my sister would like? Perfume? Jewelry?" "Why don't you get her a new skateboard?" suggested Alexia. "That's what I want." A skateboard! "My sister doesn't even know how to ride a skateboard," I told Alexia. "Why would she want that?" "No, that's a great idea, A.J.!" said Ryan. "Buy your sister a skateboard. Then when

she doesn't use it, the skateboard is yours." "That's genius!" I said. Alexia and Ryan should be in the gifted and talented program. Neil came out of the bathroom. We were about to go over to the skateboard shop to buy my sister's present when the most amazing thing in the history of the world happened. It started with a noise—a high-pitched screech. At first it was far away. Then it got louder. And louder. There was the thunder of feet. They were getting closer. And closer. Then there was screaming! Then we saw a bunch of girls running in our direction. There must have been five hundred of them.

"EEEEEEEEK!" one of them screamed. "I think I see Cray-Z!" "I love you, Cray-Z!" Cray-Z was running right at us, and he was being chased by a thundering herd of screaming girls. "In here!" I yelled to him. "Follow me!" Ryan, Michael, Neil, and Alexia formed a human wall to stop the girls. I hustled Cray-Z into the men's bathroom. He was gasping for breath. I thought he was gonna die. He put his hand on my shoulder and looked me in the eye. "You gotta help me, dude," he said. "Those girls are nuts!"