Only Emma

by Sally Warner

  I think that’s better than staying a little bit mad for a long time, which is more like what I do. My mom says I’m a kid who really knows how to hold onto a grudge.

  “Hello, Anthony,” Cynthia says, sounding like a teacher already. “Do you want to play school with us?” she asks him. “It’ll be fun.”

  “Nuh-uh. That’s okay,” Anthony says. He stretches his neck, trying to see around Cynthia—who is standing right in front of the TV. If he were in the third grade, like us, he would probably say, “Move! You make a better door than a window,” the way EllRay Jakes does at school.

  I still don’t really get that. Why would anyone want to be a door or a window?

  Cynthia tries again. “I brought some fun little prizes for you,” she says.

  “Move it,” Anthony says, still trying to see the TV.

  “That’s not very courteous,” Cynthia informs him. I can tell that she does not like it that things aren’t going her way. “We’re going to have to teach you some manners, young man,” she says, sounding sniffy.

  “Okay, please move it,” Anthony says to her. I can also tell that Anthony is getting mad.

  Uh-oh, I think. I am the only calm person in the living room—and even I am not feeling so calm anymore. “Listen,” I say to Cynthia, trying to make things peaceful again, “why don’t we play school with Anthony after dinner?”

  “Shhh,” Anthony says, staring at the video. “I can’t hear what they’re saying.”

  “We should play now,” Cynthia tells me. “He’ll be too tired later. And you shouldn’t let little kids have their own way when they’re being bad.” And she grabs the remote from the table, punches its one red button, and turns both the TV and VCR off.

  “Hey,” Anthony yells, and he tries to jump up from the chair. His legs get tangled in the little blanket, though, and he crashes to his knees.

  “Horses eat hay,” Cynthia informs him, the very second that he starts to cry.

  Ms. Sanchez says, “Horses eat hay” whenever one of us kids in her class says, “Hey.” That’s where Cynthia got it from.

  “Horses? So what?” Anthony is yelling, just as my mom rushes into the living room. Mom is holding a wooden spoon straight up in the air as if she is an insect with only one antenna.

  “Anthony, what happened?” Mom asks him. “Did you fall? Are you hurt?”

  “Cynthia and Anthony are just having a teensy little fight,” I tell her. “It’s no big deal.”

  “That not-nice girl made me fall off the chair,” Anthony says between big sobby gulps—ignoring me. He points his blaming finger at Cynthia.

  “It’s rude to point,” Cynthia says, as though she is reciting a rule that everybody knows. But her voice is a little bit quieter now, because my mom is in the room.

  “Point, point, point,” Anthony says, jabbing his finger at her again.

  “Anthony, darling, calm down,” Mom says to him.

  Cynthia takes a deep breath. “Yes,” she says, pointing at Anthony now. “Sit. And stay.”

  Just as if Anthony was a cocker spaniel or something!

  I can’t help it—I start to giggle.

  Mom starts chuckling, too.

  But not Anthony, and not Cynthia. Now they are both angry—with us. “Stop it,” Anthony says, putting his little hands on his little hips.

  “Yeah, quit laughing,” Cynthia says, but to me, not to my mom. “I thought we were friends, Emma,” she adds, scowling.

  “We—we—we are,” I say, trying to catch my breath. “You just sounded funny, that’s all.”

  “I did not,” Cynthia says.

  “Sit. Stay,” I say, pointing at Anthony. I am pretending that I am Cynthia, so she can see for herself how silly she sounded.

  “No,” Anthony yells at me.

  “Bad dog,” I yell back.

  Now, Cynthia is the one to giggle—she can’t help it!—but then she turns her laugh off suddenly, as if it were a radio someone had turned on by mistake. She glares at me, even angrier now. “Hmmph,” she snorts, and she flops down into a chair. She folds her arms, scrunches up her face, and starts looking at the wall, even though there is nothing there.

  And Anthony is madder than ever, too.

  If that is even possible.

  “Yah-h-h,” he howls, and he runs out of the living room and down the hall.

  Mom and I stare at each other. I think each of us is wondering, What just happened?

  And then, just when you would think that nothing more could go wrong, the doorbell rings.

  10

  No Fair!

  Even though the bell jingles and jangles, Mom and I stand very still, the way animals do when they don’t want anyone to notice them. “It’s probably the police,” I tell Mom. “I guess our neighbors heard all the yelling and everything. You can’t make a lot of noise when you live in a condo, remember.”

  “Oh, Emma,” Mom says. But it’s as if my words have released her from a magic spell, because she runs to open the front door.

  And Anthony’s mother is standing there.

  She came home early. No fair!

  “Surprise,” she says, holding out her arms as though she knows we will be happy to see her. “I tried to call from the airport,” she says, “but—”

  “Mommy!” Anthony shouts, hearing her voice, and he whizzes down the hall and throws himself into her arms.

  “Little bunny rabbit,” Anthony’s mother says, and she bursts into tears while she is hugging him.

  I guess that’s where Anthony gets his crying skills from.

  They Mommy and Little-bunny-rabbit back and forth a couple of times more. You would think that my mom and I had been making Anthony’s life miserable, the way he is clinging and carrying on.

  You would think I hadn’t been playing with him—more and more each day actually. And enjoying it, too.

  I sneak a peek at Mom. We are both looking a little bit lonelier already.

  “Can you stay for dinner?” my mom asks Anthony’s mom. “It’s almost ready.”

  “No. Jack’s out in the car with the motor running,” Anthony’s mom says, standing up.

  Mom gives her a worried look. “Well, I hope that Anthony’s grandmother—”

  “Complete recovery. Happy ending in Tucson,” Anthony’s mom says, smiling.

  Mom sighs. “Well,” she says, “let me get this little guy’s things together. It will only take a minute.”

  “Could I stop by tomorrow, instead, to pick up his gear?” Anthony’s mom asks. “We’re just so anxious to get home. I know you understand.”

  Home. To our old neighborhood. Just the three of them.

  I understand, anyway.

  In fact, I kind of wish I could go with them.

  “But I want my bunny now. And my blanket,” Anthony says, and he trots off down the hall. He comes out of my bedroom with the stuffed rabbit—whose head is practically falling off, it has been kissed and slobbered on so much—and he goes into the living room for his blanket.

  And I suddenly remember: Uh-oh. Cynthia’s still in there. I had forgotten all about her. So I go into the living room, too.

  “Here,” Cynthia is saying, holding out the raggedy little blanket to Anthony.

  “Okay, thanks,” Anthony says back, businesslike, as he scoops it into his arms.

  “I’m sorry if I was kind of bossy,” Cynthia says to him.

  See, that’s another good thing about Cynthia: She says sorry when she is wrong.

  I hate doing that.

  “You were a lot bossy,” Anthony informs her. “But that’s okay,” he adds, waving his rabbit in the air as if he is using it to say I forgive you.

  Sure, he can be nice to her now, because he is leaving!

  Right before he walks out the door, he turns around, runs back to me, and gives me a big old hug. “Bye, Emma,” he says. “See ya.”

  I don’t say anything. I just squeeze him back.

  After Anthony and his mother are gone, Cynthia,
my mom, and I sit down for dinner. We are having spaghetti, Anthony’s favorite. I give a big sigh and slurp up a few noodles in his honor.

  The three of us are pretty quiet.

  When dinner is finished, Cynthia and I wander back into my bedroom. Mom has already taken the used sheets off Anthony’s bed so she can wash them. That’s one good thing! Cynthia and I can sleep on regular beds tonight, in my own room.

  So everything is back to normal, except for the part about me missing Anthony.

  Cynthia dumps her little round suitcase out onto my bed. She looks at the markers she brought for playing school with Anthony, and the paper, and the prizes she brought for him: a granola bar and an eraser shaped like a goldfish.

  I want that cute eraser. “You can play school with me,” I tell Cynthia.

  “It’s not the same,” she says, shaking her head. She picks up the granola bar, though. “Want to to split it?”

  “Sure,” I say, and so we do.

  11

  Here is What i Think

  It is Saturday morning. After breakfast, Cynthia and I are sitting on the little wall in front of the condo, waiting for Cynthia’s father to come pick her up. She turns to me and asks, “So, what was it like, anyway, having a little brother?”

  “He wasn’t really my brother. And I only had him for five days,” I say.

  “But what was it like?”

  I think for a minute. “Well, I hated it at first,” I say, remembering. “And I never really loved parts of it. Not the mess and the noise, or watching my mom give him presents and hugs. And everything in the house got sticky, and the VCR was always blaring away, and my whole room smelled like peanut butter after a couple of days. But I don’t know, I kind of got to really like Anthony.”

  “How come, when he wouldn’t even play right?” Cynthia asks. She is frowning as if she is trying to do subtraction at the board, which is the hardest kind. In front of other people, I mean. “You couldn’t make that kid do anything,” she reminds me.

  “Yeah, but I didn’t want to make him do stuff,” I tell her. “I just got used to having him around, I guess—doing nothing. I like him,” I say again.

  I look down the road. Maybe Anthony and his mom are on their way here now, to pick up the rest of his stuff. I kind of hope they don’t come until Cynthia is gone, though. Because Anthony and I would have more fun without her being here.

  “Huh,” Cynthia says, as if that is not the answer she was looking for. “Well, I like being an only child. I would hate it if my mom and dad had another kid,” she adds, smoothing her hair back.

  It is already smooth, though. It always is.

  “Well, I like being an only child, too,” I say, even though I am not as sure about this as I was a week ago.

  Just then, Cynthia’s father drives up in his navy-blue Audi. So she says good-bye to me, and away they go.

  But I stay on the little wall, in the shade.

  Here is what I think: The good parts about being an only child are that nobody messes with your toys and stuff, and you get to watch what you want on TV, and your mom gives lots of everything—hugs, toys, attention—just to you.

  The bad thing about being an only child is—no Anthony. Only Emma.

  Oh, sure, I guess I will get used to being alone again. I will probably even like it. But for right now …

  Yuck.

  Turn the page to read an excerpt from the next book featuring the lovable Emma:

  Not-so-

  Weird

  Emma

  1

  Are You Listening?

  “Settle down,” Ms. Sanchez calls out as we straggle into the classroom. She claps her hands once, and her engagement ring flashes. You should see it.

  You can tell that she means business. Everyone sits down fast, as if we are playing a game of musical chairs. I sit down fast, too. There is a scuffle over by the window. “Ow. Quit it,” Annie Pat says to Jared Matthews. She rubs the top part of her arm.

  I secretly call Jared “Jar-Head,” because he is so mean to little kids, especially the ones in kindergarten and first grade. Just because we are in third grade doesn’t mean we have to be bullies, does it? Also, his mud-brown guinea-pig swirly hair always looks as though he has been sleeping on it—or as though an invisible lid was just twisted off his head. He is the biggest kid in my class.

  My name is Emma McGraw. I am the second littlest kid in class, next to EllRay Jakes. EllRay is small in size but large in noise.

  Jared holds up both of his square hands and makes his eyes big and round to show how innocent he is. “It was an accident,” he says. But he is making sure that the other boys—especially Kevin, EllRay, and Corey—see that he is laughing at Annie Pat.

  “I have an announcement to make,” Ms. Sanchez says. Her eyes are sparkling. It must be a good announcement, not a bad one, like Uh-oh, you all have to take home this letter to your parents about head lice, or a confusing one, like Guess what? The P.T.A. is having another candy sale, even though everyone keeps telling you not to eat candy.

  The entire third-grade class wriggles with excitement at the same time. Even the chairs look more alert. It reminds me of this nature show I saw once on the Animal Planet about a coral reef. The whole reef was alive, every little part of it.

  See, that’s what’s so great about nature: the interesting surprises. In real life, the surprises are all the kind of thing that makes you feel sick to your stomach—like when your mom loses her job, and you have to move from a house to a condo, and you have to transfer from one school to another for practically no reason at all. Just because of someone not making enough money to pay private school tuition anymore.

  “Emma McGraw, are you listening?” Ms. Sanchez asks.

  Uh-oh. My new friend Cynthia Harbison looks down at her hands, embarrassed for me. Jared snickers, and Corey blushes, but I nod and look alert. “Yes, I’m listening,” I say.

  “Well, good,” Ms. Sanchez says, smiling, “because I don’t want anyone to miss what I have to say.” She looks around for a second, still smiling. It’s as though she wants us to love her for what she hasn’t even announced yet.

  Someone sneezes, and everyone laughs. Sneezes are always funny in our class. I don’t know why.

  “Now, I know that school only started a few weeks ago,” Ms. Sanchez says, “but you’ve all been working pretty hard. And I know that some of you have been struggling.”

  Next to me, I hear Corey Robinson give a little groan. I think he is allergic to arithmetic.

  “… so I’ve planned a treat for all you third-graders,” Ms. Sanchez is saying.

  Heather’s hand shoots up in the air, as usual. She holds her arm up with her other hand, as if otherwise it might fall off. “Oh, oh,” she says, before Ms. Sanchez has even called on her. “Are we going on a field trip? Because my big sister’s class, they went on a field trip to the San Diego Zoo, in a bus.”

  A trip to the zoo! I’m glad that I am paying attention now. I have been to the zoo a lot of times with my mom, of course, but this would be different. This would be official. It would be like we were real nature scientists, almost—traveling on a special research bus.

  And a nature scientist is what I want to be when I grow up.

  “No, it’s not the zoo,” Ms. Sanchez says, and my hopes drop right down into my shoes. “And it’s not any kind of a field trip,” she continues. “The treat will be right, here, this Friday, on our very own playground. Well, on the lawn next to the playground.”

  I hide my fingers and start counting on them, even though I have supposedly outgrown doing this. Today is Tuesday, so my fingers tell me that the surprise will happen in three more days.

  “Our treat will happen right after lunch,” Ms. Sanchez says in a singsong, keeping-secrets kind of voice. “Now, be sure to wear play clothes on Friday, and not your usual prom dresses and dinner jackets,” she teases us. “And tell your moms and dads,” she adds. “They are welcome to join us, if they can take a little t
ime off work. And they might want to bring their cameras.”

  “We don’t have to wear costumes, do we?” Jared asks, sounding suspicious. “Are you going to make us put on funny hats or have a parade?” It is only October, but I know already that Jared is not a parade kind of kid. And if there was ever a Funny Hat Day at this school, he would stay home with a convenient stomach ache or something.

  I’m sure of it.

  Ms. Sanchez laughs out loud. “No, don’t worry, Jared. You’re safe.”

  “Because I’m not wearing any funny hat,” Jared announces.

  I guess he thinks having funny hair is bad enough. Funny hats would be too much.

  “No hats,” Ms. Sanchez promises. “Friday will be a hat-free day, okay?”

  Heather’s hand flies up again. “Oh, oh,” she says. “And no coconut, okay? Because I get a rash.”

  “Oh, darn,” Ms. Sanchez cries, pretending to be disappointed. She slaps her desk with her left hand, and the ring makes rainbow shines. “The treat was going to be that you would all eat coconuts while wearing silly costumes and hats and then have a parade. And now it’s ruined.”

  Heather starts to pout. “I was only saying,” she mutters. She looks around for sympathy, but everyone is too busy whispering to notice her.

  “Now get out your workbooks,” Ms. Sanchez calls out. “It’s time to do some heavy-duty subtraction.”

  Poor Corey groans again.

  I guess it’s back to real life—until Friday afternoon, anyway.