Kevin protested, “What about me? I didn’t do anything!”
Mr. Peeler said, “Sorry, Kevin. When the captain misbehaves, the crew pays the price.”
“No fair!” Kevin shouted. Then he gave Webby a quadruple stink eye.
So Kevin was mad at Webby, and Webby was mad at me and Henry.
But Henry and I were very happy.
“I know you don’t like me that way,” I told him.
“And I know you don’t like me that way,” he said back. “We’re only friends.”
“There’s nothing only about being friends! What could be better than being friends?”
“Being best friends.”
“You’re right. Being best friends is better.” Then I thought for a second and said, “But you know what’s even better than that?”
“What?” Henry asked.
“Best friends and co-champions!” I proclaimed.
Henry grinned. “That is unbeatable!”
And that’s exactly what we were.
Happily,
Claire
Dear Bess,
Today was the last day of school. Next year I’ll go off-island to Choptank Middle School, where there are plenty of girls.
The end of the school year was a lot better than the beginning. No Dodgeball Massacre, for one thing. Henry and I are friends just like we used to be—better, even. Webby has stopped picking on me, mostly, and the other boys don’t obey him like they used to. Three of them asked if they could crew for me in the regatta next fall! But I’ll stick with Henry.
We have our graduation ceremony tomorrow, but Mr. Harper held a private mini-ceremony today, just for our class.
He made a medal for each fifth grader—cardboard covered in gold foil, hung with a ribbon—to commemorate something special we had done during the year. He called us up one by one in alphabetical order to receive our medals.
“Kevin Ames.”
Kevin walked to the front of the room.
Mr. Harper said, “Kevin, I give you this medal in recognition of your Great Knowledge of Dinosaur History.”
He hung the medal around Kevin’s neck. We clapped and cheered, and Kevin took a bow and sat down. He seemed really happy about his medal. It’s true—he knows more than anybody about the dinosaurs.
Here are some of the other awards Mr. Harper gave out:
Henry Long: Excellence in Drama for His Outstanding Portrayal of Ebenezer Scrooge.
Gilbert Mellencamp: The School Spirit Medal for Cheerfulness and Kindness.
Zachary Mendoza: Excellence in Notebook Organization and Class Gerbil Caretaking.
Webster Peterson: Lunchroom Manners, Most Improved, earned mostly by not throwing banana peels at people more than once a month.
Calvin Pitovsky: Grossest Social Studies Presentation.
Zachary Roth: Most Explosive Papier-Mâché Volcano.
Claire Warren: Exemplary Courage and Resilience in the Face of Unusual and Extraordinarily Difficult Conditions.
Which means being the only girl in school.
The boys clapped extra hard for me. They whistled and cheered. Maybe they were cheering harder for me because I come last in the alphabet and my medal meant the school year was finally over. Maybe they cheered because I’m part of island history. Maybe it’s because I found Smuggler Joe’s treasure map or won the regatta again. I don’t know.
I choose to think it’s because they like me.
I stayed late after school so I could make my last drawings on our clubhouse wall. I’m going to miss having an entire school bathroom to myself. And I’ll miss drawing the story of my life on the wall.
I drew events from the whole school year on that wall. A lot happened in the fifth grade.
There was my feud with Webby, and my sadness about Henry. There were soccer games and the square dance and the school play, and sailing, and rides with Starshine and Bruno. There was bowling with Gabe and the Killer Deer attack and my birthday party. There was the day we found Smuggler Joe’s treasure map.
For my final picture, I drew this scene—me with my medal of courage, Mr. Harper and the boys cheering.
The cave drawings are now finished. It’s a record of my year as the only girl at Foyes Island Elementary School.
I took a picture of it because I know it will be painted over by next fall.
But that’s okay. On to the next adventure.
Your friend forever,
Claire
Natalie Standiford was neither the only girl in her school (there were plenty of girls) nor the only girl in her family (she has a sister). She was born and raised in Maryland, and now lives in New York City, where she writes a lot and also plays in a rock band with three other writers. She is the author of The Secret Tree, Switched at Birthday, and a book in The 39 Clues series. You can find her online at www.nataliestandiford.com.
Text copyright © 2016 by Natalie Standiford
Illustrations copyright © 2016 by Nathan Durfee
All rights reserved. Published by Scholastic Press, an imprint of Scholastic Inc., Publishers since 1920. SCHOLASTIC, SCHOLASTIC PRESS, and associated logos are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Scholastic Inc.
The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Standiford, Natalie, author.
The only girl in school / Natalie Standiford. — First edition.
pages cm
Summary: In a story told in letters, when Claire’s best friend moves away just before the start of fifth grade, Claire becomes the only girl in her tiny island elementary school—and suddenly boys she has been friends with her whole life turn into resentful, bullying strangers.
1. Small schools—Juvenile fiction. 2. Elementary schools—Juvenile fiction. 3. Loneliness—Juvenile fiction. 4. Social isolation—Juvenile fiction. 5. Bullying—Juvenile fiction. [1. Schools—Fiction. 2. Loneliness—Fiction. 3. Friendship—Fiction. 4. Bullying—Fiction. 5. Letters—Fiction.] I. Title.
PZ7.S78627On 2016
813.54—dc23
[Fic]
2015015699
First edition, February 2016
Cover art © 2016 by Nathan Durfee
Cover design by Nina Goffi
e-ISBN 978-0-545-82998-4
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this publication may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher. For information regarding permission, write to Scholastic Inc., Attention: Permissions Department, 557 Broadway, New York, NY 10012.
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