Absolutely Normal Chaos

Chapter Three

“Together, Pythagoras and his—” Harry’s hand rose shakily.

“Er, Professor?”

“—formed a group that met—”

“Professor?” Mr. Butler paused, looking bored. “Yes, Mr. Dursley?” It took him a second to realize that the teacher was talking to him.

“Can I, er, can I use the restroom?” Harry asked, blushing slightly. The class tittered.

“Surely you can wait until after the film?” Mr. Butler said impatiently. Harry licked his lips and glanced at the clock.

“Er, I, uh, I really need to, um, you know...” his voice trailed off. The professor looked at his watch.

“Very well, then, you have five minutes,” he said with narrowed eyes.

Creeping out of the classroom, he felt very much relieved when he was in the hall, away from Mr. Butler’s icy stare. Striding confidently now to the boy’s restroom on the third floor, he checked his watch. 15 minutes to lunch. He hoped his friends remembered.

He leaned against the tiled wall. A minute ticked by....another....and then the door opened.

It was Jackson, grinning from ear to ear. Behind him were Rupert and Owen, looking shifty.

“Took us a while to get away from Horse-Face Videll,” Jackson said.

“She wouldn’t let us all go at once: Rupert had to fake being sick!” Ben crowed. Harry grinned. Without a word, they sneaked down the hall.

Frank and George were the two janitors that reigned over the joint schools. It was their unpleasant duty to scrub the toilets, feed the furnaces, retrieve soccer balls from the school roofs, and mop the cafeteria floor. On the side the two also found time to feud endlessly. The students were well-accustomed to see the doddery old men point bony fingers at each other and yell (the Maris girls just sniffed and ignored them). They were constantly on the brink of all-out war. Harry and his friends had just decided to speed things up.

So there they were, tiptoeing down the hall. Time was precious. They only had three minutes. They stopped in front of the Janitorial Closet, a plain, windowless door marked only with a nameplate that said “Frank W.” and had rude words scribbled all around it in permanent marker. They’d seen Frank trying to scrub it off while glaring daggers at George, who had passed by chortling hoarsely. Checking to see that no one was watching, they creaked open the door. Inside, a tiny closet was covered in cobwebs and lit by a single, flickering lamp hanging from the ceiling. They closed the door behind them and got to work.

***thirty seconds later***

“Oy, Harry, found anything yet?” Rupert called from his corner.

“Shh-hhh-hhhh.”

“Oooh, how about this?” Owen pulled himself from the janitorial cart where he’d been searching and held up a large bottle of liquid soap. Harry spotted Frank’s rubber gloves hanging over the edge of the cart and grabbed them. Jackson giggled and poured the thick, creamy soap into the gloves. They snickered and pretended to be Frank when he put on his glove and found the surprise.

“—ooh, I’ll get you, George—”

“—so immature!—”

“—eek! What is this stuff, anyway?—”

They were gasping and clutching their stomachs when the door opened.