7. The Easter Bunny Is Weird

7 The Easter Bunny Is Weird It was Mr. Klutz who poked his head into the doorway! "Are you all having a good time?" he asked. "Yes!" shouted all the girls except for Alexia. "No!" shouted all the boys and Alexia. "This looks like fun," said Mr. Klutz. "Did you ever dye Easter eggs, Mr. Klutz?" asked Ryan. "Sure I did," he replied. "I was a boy once, you know." "Only once?" I asked. "I'm a boy all the time." Everybody laughed even though I didn't say anything funny.

Mr. Klutz leaned down so he could get a good look at our colored eggs. That's when I noticed something. Mr. Klutz's head looked just like an egg! "Hey Mr. Klutz," I said, "can we dye your head?" Well, it was like I said a bad word or something. All the kids stopped talking. Mr. Klutz looked at me. Ms. Hannah looked at me. Everybody was looking at me. I thought I heard crickets chirping. "I'll make a deal with you, A.J.," Mr. Klutz told me. "I'll let you dye my head... if you can recite the eight times table." Hmmm. We were learning the eight times table at school. I wasn't sure if I remembered the whole thing. "Eight times one is eight," I said. "Because one eight can only be eight. Any dumbhead knows that."

"Right," said Mr. Klutz. "Eight times two is sixteen," I said. "Because eight plus eight is sixteen." "Yes..." "Eight times three is... twenty-four," I said, adding another eight. "Um-hmm." "Eight times four is..." "Thirty-two," Andrea whispered in my ear. "Thirty-two," I said. I kept going. Some of them I knew, and some of them I didn't. When I didn't know an answer, Andrea or Emily whispered it in my ear. Finally, I got to the end.

"...and eight times ten is... eighty!" I said. "That's right!" said Mr. Klutz. "Now you may dye my head." We couldn't dip Mr. Klutz's head into a cup because it was too big. Ms. Hannah gave us Q-tips so we could dab the dye on Mr. Klutz. We had a great time dyeing his

head red, white, blue, and green. When the dye was dry, Andrea drew a butterfly right in the middle. It looked cool. After that Mr. Klutz left, and he took his dyed head with him. It was cleanup time. While we cleaned up, Ms. Hannah turned on a boom box, and the song "Here Comes Peter Cottontail" started playing. "Hey, guess who's coming, kids?" asked Ms. Hannah. "Santa Claus?" I asked.

"Santa comes at Christmas, dumbhead!" said Andrea. "Oh, snap!" said Ryan. I was going to say "So is your face" to Andrea, but you'll never believe in a million hundred years who walked into the door at that moment. It was a giant Easter Bunny! He walked right into the door! "Ouch!" the Easter Bunny yelled. "Who put this door here? I can't see through this stupid bunny head." That voice sounded familiar. I knew I had heard it before. "Hey, the Easter Bunny isn't supposed to talk!" said Michael. "Oh, yeah, I forgot," said the Easter Bunny.