I couldn’t sleep that night. Whether it was from relieving the torment inflicted on me by my dad and Grincher or from worrying about a terrible, terrible future, I just could not shut off my mind. Because I didn’t like the word ‘obedience’ one bit, I found it easier to get up than trying to force myself into slumber.

  To pass the time in the murky gloom, I raised the curtains slightly and took out the black binoculars that Jordan Chen had gifted me for my ninth birthday. They were small but they had a magnitude of a mile. So I decided to peep and spy out my next-door neighbors in the towering glass giant that was vastly different from my condo’s Brutalist brick-rock design.

  What I saw was mostly monotone and dull-grey, black, or red curtains protecting the privacies of sleepers and maybe some less unsavory things and acts. The only window that was open unfortunately had no light in it and was devoid of any human presence. Then a small flickering light appeared. It seemed to bob up and down like a jack-o-lantern. It was mesmerizing to watch, to say the least.

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  Then a human silhouette gradually began to appear. First the outlines, then the murky skin color, and after that the clothes (a white nightgown and nightcap). Finally, the face fully came into view. It… it… the face was recognizable. It was Mr. Grincher!

  My jaw dropped at this unexpected revelation. How the hell had I not known that my most hated teacher was living a doorstep away from me? At that moment, I felt like I was the most retarded boy in the whole wide world. More importantly, I was terrified. An enemy so close to me would prove so bad that my terrible summer would turn nightmarish. If my dad saw him outside, the two would join forces and I would be roasted alive on a rack while they gleefully watched.

  As I contemplated my emergency steps, a brilliantly wicked idea popped into my mind. Back in March of 2012, I had bombed the toilet that Veronica was sitting on in retaliation for her sending me to Grincher detention based on her evil lies. The crazy thing is that I was never suspended as Andy took the fall for me (I forced him to). I didn’t even get detention with Mr. Grincher for the bomb prank. I was smart as hell. If that had worked then on a Grincher minion, it would work on the boss himself. And the perfect guy to make that “Submarine Bomb” was the only nerd in my group, Ethan Kowalczyk.