You decide to stick around and arrange another meeting

As your parents catch up you scuttle outside with them, pushing the door open and holding it for them, stepping off the pavement into a patch of mud. Grimacing at the squelching sound of your sinking foot you make up your mind.

"I, uh, forgot my coat. I'll get a ride home!" you tell them, and dash off.

They're so busy raving about meeting the mayor's son that they simply wave vaguely toward you. Not that you can blame them for raving. You'd be raving too if there was anyone you could talk to. Who'd have thought that an ancient man would have you rushing back inside and desperately trying to come up with a ploy to meet him again?

Inside you pause, not wanting to run into Applebottom or Fudge again, and so decide to go up to the second floor.

"Hey!" a voice yells, making you leap a foot in the air. Mister Finkle, often called Tinkle or Fickle by the students, points as you with his mop, looking his usual dishevelled mean-spirited self as he glares at you. "I just washed that!"

With no clue what he's yelling at you for you scurry down the hall, eliciting another outraged yell. Hindered by his mop and the wet floor between you and him you easily dash away, unaware of the trail of muddy footprints you've left on the floor in your wake, spoiling his evening's work of mopping the floor.

"Grouchy old coot," you mutter, hoping that you won't run into anyone else until you reach the cafeteria where the parents would have left their coats. Those that left them there. You've no way of knowing if Mister Wright had brought one or left his there but it's your best chance. At worst you can try hanging around Fudge's door in hopes of 'running into' him again.