A grown-up would not call him a purple cootie. Ramona faced front without speaking. This boy was not going to spoil her first day in the third grade.
Thump, thump, thump against the back of Ramona’s seat. The bus stopped for other children, some excited and some anxious. Still the kicking continued. Ramona ignored it as the bus passed her former school. Good old Glenwood, thought Ramona, as if she had gone there a long, long time ago.
“All right, Danny,” said the bus aide to the kicking boy. “As long as I’m riding shotgun on this bus, we won’t have anyone kicking the seats. Understand?”
Ramona smiled to herself as she heard Danny mutter an answer. How funny—the bus aide saying she was riding shotgun as if she were guarding a shipment of gold on a stagecoach instead of making children behave on a little yellow school bus.
Ramona pretended she was riding a stagecoach pursued by robbers until she discovered her eraser, her beautiful pink eraser, was missing. “Did you see my eraser?” she asked a second-grade girl, who had taken the seat beside her. The two searched the seat and the floor. No eraser.
Ramona felt a tap on her shoulder and turned. “Was it a pink eraser?” asked the boy in the baseball cap.
“Yes.” Ramona was ready to forgive him for kicking her seat. “Have you seen it?”
“Nope.” The boy grinned as he jerked down the visor of his baseball cap.
That grin was too much for Ramona. “Liar!” she said with her most ferocious glare, and faced front once more, angry at the loss of her new eraser, angry with herself for dropping it so the boy could find it. Purple cootie, she thought, and hoped the cafeteria would serve him fish portions and those canned green beans with the strings left on. And apple wedges, the soft mushy kind with tough skins, for dessert.
The bus stopped at Cedarhurst, Ramona’s new school, a two-story red-brick building very much like her old school. As the children hopped out of the bus, Ramona felt a little thrill of triumph. She had not been carsick. She now discovered she felt as if she had grown even more than her feet. Third graders were the biggest people—except teachers, of course—at this school. All the little first and second graders running around the playground, looking so young, made Ramona feel tall, grown up, and sort of . . . well, wise in the ways of the world.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
ALAN MCEWAN
BEVERLY CLEARY is one of America’s most beloved authors. As a child, she struggled with reading and writing. But by third grade, after spending much time in her public library in Portland, she found her skills had greatly improved. Before long, her school librarian was saying that she should write children’s books when she grew up.
Instead she became a librarian. When a young boy asked her, “Where are the books about kids like us?” she remembered her teacher’s encouragement and was inspired to write the books she’d longed to read but couldn’t find when she was younger. She based her funny stories on her own neighborhood experiences and the sort of children she knew. And so, the Klickitat Street gang was born!
Mrs. Cleary’s books have earned her many prestigious awards, including the American Library Association’s Laura Ingalls Wilder Award, presented to her in recognition of her lasting contribution to children’s literature. RAMONA QUIMBY, AGE 8 and RAMONA AND HER FATHER have also been named Newbery Honor Books. Her characters, including Beezus and Ramona Quimby, Henry Huggins, and Ralph, the motorcycle-riding mouse, have delighted children for generations.
Get to know all the kids in Ramona’s neighborhood in The World of Beverly Cleary at WWW.BEVERLYCLEARY.COM
Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins authors and artists.
BACK AD
OTHER BOOKS BY BEVERLY CLEARY
Enjoy all of BEVERLY CLEARY’S books
FEATURING
RAMONA QUIMBY:
Beezus and Ramona
Ramona the Pest
Ramona the Brave
Ramona and Her Father
Ramona and Her Mother
Ramona Quimby, Age 8
Ramona Forever
Ramona’s World
• • • •
FEATURING
HENRY HUGGINS:
Henry Huggins
Henry and Beezus
Henry and Ribsy
Henry and the Paper Route
Henry and the Clubhouse
Ribsy
• • • •
FEATURING
RALPH MOUSE:
The Mouse and the Motorcycle
Runaway Ralph
Ralph S. Mouse
• • • •
MORE GREAT FICTION BY
BEVERLY CLEARY:
Ellen Tebbits
Otis Spofford
Fifteen
The Luckiest Girl
Jean and Johnny
Emily’s Runaway
Imagination
Sister of the Bride
Mitch and Amy
Socks
Dear Mr. Henshaw
Muggie Maggie
Strider
Two Times the Fun
• • • •
AND DON’T MISS
BEVERLY CLEARY’S
AUTOBIOGRAPHIES:
A Girl from Yamhill
My Own Two Feet
CREDITS
Cover art by Jacqueline Rogers © 2013 by HarperCollins Publishers
Cover design and hand lettering by Cara E. Petrus
COPYRIGHT
RAMONA AND HER MOTHER. Copyright © 1979 by Beverly Cleary. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text 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 hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
www.harpercollinschildrens.com
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 2012948578
ISBN 978-0-380-70952-6 (pbk.)
ISBN 978-0-688-22195-9 (hardcover)
EPub Edition February 2013 ISBN 9780061972324
Version 03012013
Reillustrated edition, 2013
13 14 15 16 17 LP/BR 72 71 70 69 68 67 66
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