The Left Behinds and the iPhone That Saved George Washington Read Online Free

wait to see the results—he just turns and starts running back to the stable.
    “
Teufel!
” the guy screams. “
Teufel!
”
    Now, I can’t say I’ve heard the word before, but I think I know what it means. It means, I’m pretty sure, “devil.”
    I don’t know about you, but I think it’s kind of cool to have somebody call me a devil.
    And then run away from me as fast as they possibly can.
    It gives me this weird kind of feeling, like I actually have some
power
.
    It doesn’t matter that I don’t have a gun, a musket, a bazooka, or a flamethrower.
    What I do have is a
belief
. Not mine, but theirs. Which just shows you which one is stronger: a belief or a gun. We’re the Apple Artillery. Two black ones, one white. We hold them aloft like they’re death ray guns and watch as all the German dudes scatter.
    It’s almost funny, till I notice on mine that I have a message. A text.
    Which doesn’t compute for a second, because howcould a text … you know … from now to then … I mean, from then to now … be sent? Or received?
    It’s from my teacher. Mr. Hart. American History.
    And then I start to remember a couple of things. It’s like a fog starting to break up. Like: isn’t this whole … expedition … part of some lame school trip? For us Left Behinds? And isn’t Mr. Hart our sorry teacher who got stuck with us for the Christmas holidays, because maybe he himself had nothing better to do either?
    And didn’t Mr. Hart say, this very morning, “Kids, today we’re going to the reenactment of Washington’s crossing of the Delaware, which they do every Christmas at Washington Crossing State Park.”
    Bev and Brandon rolled their eyes. Me? I was kind of into it, if you want to know the truth. I have no defense. I’m a history nerd, which is only totally uncool.
    “What’s the matter, Mel?” Brandon says. “See something funny?”
    “I got a text,” I say. “From Mr. Hart.”
    “Yeah? What does he want?”
    I read it myself first.
    Where R U?
it says.
    I read the message aloud, and all of us stop and puzzle over it.
    And then I get another one. The same three-chord micro melody.
    R U lost?
    I read this one aloud, too. We take a glance around. I guess the answer would be yes and no.
    “You have to tell him something,” Bev says. “He might be worried about us.”
    “What should I say?”
    “Tell him we’ve taken a little detour,” Brandon says. “The scenic route.”
    “I think I’ll tell him we’ll be right back,” I say.
    “Will we?” says Bev. She’s worried all of a sudden. Which isn’t something you see from Bev very often. She’s always so sure of herself. Her being worried gets me worried.
    “Let’s hope so,” I say, and type it in. I notice that I’m down to nine percent power.
    But we have other things to think about at the moment. Immediate, like, issues. They’ve run, the Germans have, but they haven’t left. They’ve
taken positions
. To the left of us, and to the right of us. Muskets at the ready. They’re maybe seventy or eighty yards away. They’ve
fallen back
to a
secure line
.
    It’s easy to throw around military terms when you’ve learned a few. I used to tell people I was playing Xbox when I was really watching the History Channel.
    “Boys,” Bev says. “Behind us is nothing but woods.”
    “And in front of us,” Brandon says, “is nothing but muskets.”
    “That one guy,” I say. “The guy who speaks English. He’s looking at us. Through a telescope … Spyglass? Whatever they call those things.”
    “He’s curious,” Bev says. “He wants to know what our phones are all about.”
    “Maybe,” I say, “he wants one for himself.”
    “For what?” says Brandon. “So he can take pictures?”
    “Everybody,” I say, “wants to get their hands on an iPhone. It’s just natural.”
    “Boys,” Bev says again. “What’s the plan here? Backward? Forward? Left, right? ’Cause I don’t know about you guys, but I’m getting