The Quirks, Welcome to Normal Read Online Free Page B

everything for you.” All of the toilets began to flush repeatedly—Molly guessed this was Penelope’s
mind’s way of covering up the sound of her blubbery tears.
    “You’re not ruining anything,” Molly insisted loudly. She had to shout over the sound of the flushing. Molly wrapped her long arms around her sister. She hated seeing Penelope
cry—it felt a little like looking in the mirror at herself crying. “It’ll be fine this time, Pen. I promise.”
    Molly knew she couldn’t
really
promise, but sometimes a little lie was her only option. As Penelope blubbered beside her, Molly tapped her toe on the tiles in their stall. She
wished she could make her family fit in to a place as well as the graying bathroom tiles did—in a perfect line, arranged just so. She always thought if she could just shuffle a few clunky
pieces into position, everything would work out spiffy-dandy-nice. But the jigsaw puzzle pieces of her family were just a little too oddly shaped for order.
    “Yoo-hoo,” a male voice called from the door of the girls’ bathroom. All the toilets completed one loud and final flush at the exact same moment before finally sitting quiet
again. “Anybody home?”
    Molly and Penelope both bristled. Pen was still crying, and Molly didn’t know if her sister (or, more importantly, her sister’s imagination) had calmed down enough for company. Molly
peeked out through a sliver of a crack in the toilet stall but couldn’t see anyone. She could see the empty sinks and the hand dryers and the teal tiles that lined the walls of the bathroom,
but it looked like the girls were still alone—and Penelope’s magic hadn’t crept out of their stall quite yet.
    “I’m missing two fourth graders,” the voice continued patiently. “I usually don’t lose a student until at least the second week of school.”
    “It must be Mr. Intihar!” Penelope whispered. “What should we do?”
    “You should come on out,” their teacher’s voice answered. He whistled a few bars from an old song Molly recognized—it was something their mom sang along with on her iPod.
“The mouse is gone, so there’s no need for you to be scared, girls.”
    “He thinks we’re scared,” Penelope whispered urgently to her sister. “Do you think I can keep hiding? Will they notice if I just don’t go back?”
    “Probably not,” Mr. Intihar whispered back. “Though I’m not as foolish as the other students may have led you to believe. Actually, I know there are
two
Quirk
girls, and they
both
seem to have gone missing.”
    “Can he hear me?” Pen said quietly.
    Molly rolled her eyes. It was obvious their teacher could hear everything Pen said. Sometimes her sister could be as scatterbrained as their mom. Molly slid the lock to open the door of the
bathroom stall. She peeked around the corner.
    She could see the tip of a shoe holding open the bathroom door, but that was all. Molly walked slowly toward the door, realizing it did seem pitiful that she and Pen had gone into hiding when
the mouse had turned up in their classroom. If only their teacher knew the truth—that Penelope was the reason that mouse was there at all.
    When Molly pulled open the bathroom door all the way, she found herself face-to-face with the tallest man she had ever seen. He had legs the length of a giraffe’s, and a torso that
stretched almost to the top of the bathroom door. His head was small in comparison to his body, but the smile on his face was gargantuan.

    The shock of yellow hair sprouting from his head reminded Molly of the silky hairs on an unopened ear of corn. It went this way and that, and seemed totally out of control. She wanted to call
him Mr. Corn, but stopped herself just in time. “Hello there,” the mile-high man said in a friendly voice. “I’m Mr. Intihar.” He bowed. “A pleasure to meet you,
Miss Quirk.”
    Instantly, Molly forgot about her family’s magic and her nerves about the first day of school. She beamed