“I can handle it,” said Etta.
Celery had taken a small notepad and pencil from his pocket and was scribbling busily.
“What are you writing?” Libby asked.
“As band manager, I’m making a note of our responsibilities,” Celery explained.
He wrote:
Band Manager — Mr. Celio Travis.
Assistant Band Managers — Ms. Libby Meek and Ms. Etta Page.
“Who said anything about Assistant Band Managers?” said Libby, reading what he had
written.
“In a small band you always need backup.”
Celery continued:
Musical Director — Ms. Libby Meek.
Assistant Musical Directors — Ms. Etta Page and Mr. Celio Travis.
Band Stylist — Ms. Etta Page.
Assistant Band Stylists — Ms. Libby Meek and Mr. Celio Travis.
Celery smirked at Etta as he read the last line out loud.
“I’d rather my mother told me what to wear than you,” Etta scoffed.
“We need a Development Plan,” said Celery. “It says so in the stuff I found on the Internet. So what should we do next to develop?”
“You have to build up your repertoire,” Ms. Cattermole pointed out.
“We need to learn more tunes, too,” said Etta.
Celery jotted in his notebook. “What else?”
“We need posters,” Libby suggested. “We can put them in the mall and at the Save Easy and the post office, so people will ask us to play. We’d have to do them in special lettering. You’re good at stuff like that, Etta.”
“But I don’t know what to write.”
“I’ll write it out, and then you do it on poster board in fancy lettering.”
“How about I use tangrams to make shapes like a piano and a cello and a guitar?” Celery suggested. “I’ll add them to the posters when Etta’s done.”
“Cool,” said Libby.
Celery wrote in his notebook and looked up. “Is there any other business?”
“We need a gig,” said Libby.
They looked at one another, thinking.
Finally Etta suggested, “How about we play in church?”
“Good idea,” said Celery. “I can just imagine it.” He pretended to be the minister, holding his hands clasped in front of him and chanting in a deep voice. “Would the congregation please rise and join me in the singing of ‘Baby Baby Baby, Oooooh Baby Baby.’”
“I guess not,” said Etta.
“We’ll keep thinking,” said Libby.
As they left, Libby said, “We have a name for the band . . .”
“And we have repartee,” Etta added.
“Repertoire,” Celery corrected her.
“That’s what I said,” Etta retorted.
“You know what we need now?” said Libby.
Celery and Etta looked at her.
“Outfits!” she said.
Etta grinned.
Celery groaned.
5
Test Practice
Libby knew she was right.
“Miss Nightingale, it’s Wednesday morning, so it’s time for choir. We always have choir on Wednesday morning,” she repeated, gesturing fiercely with her hands.
She looked at Etta and Celery, who were sitting beside her at the table.
They nodded in agreement.
Miss Nightingale shook her head, her dark brown curls bouncing, and said firmly, “Not today, Libby.”
“But —”
“And not next Wednesday, or the Wednesday after that. In fact, there will be no music at all — or gym, or art — for the next month, not until after the test. That’s what Professor Brayne meant the other night when he said there would be no non-essential subjects to distract you from studying.”
“No music?” Libby gasped.
“And no extracurricular activities. No chess club, or drama club, or art club, or soccer.”
Etta shot upright in her chair. “Professor Brayne banned soccer?”
Miss Nightingale smiled sadly before going on. “Instead of choir, Professor Brayne will be here in a moment to help you get ready to write the test again. He’ll be here three times a week for the next month. Isn’t that kind of him?”
No one spoke.
The door opened, and Professor Brayne walked in.
“Say good morning to Professor Brayne, class,” Miss Nightingale said.
“Good morning, Professor Brayne,” the class obediently chorused in sing-song voices.
The professor nodded at Miss Nightingale and folded his hands behind his back. “Now, children,” he began, looking around the class. “You have to be at school by nine o’clock —”
“School starts at eight-thirty,” Libby corrected him. “We have to be here by —”
Professor Brayne held up his hand for silence and repeated firmly, “You have to be at school by nine o’clock —”
“Eight-thirty.” It was Etta who corrected him this time.
Professor Brayne threw up his hands and looked at Miss Nightingale.
“I think Professor Brayne is asking you the sort of question you might get on the test,” Miss Nightingale explained to the class.
“Why didn’t he say so?” asked Kyle Hanley.
Professor Brayne started again. “You have to be at school by nine o’clock . . .” He paused and looked at Libby and Etta.
Libby shook her head.
Professor Brayne carried on. “It takes you fifteen minutes to get dressed, twenty minutes to have breakfast, and thirty-five minutes to walk to school. What time should you get up?”
The students looked at one another.
“I get up when I hear Edwin go downstairs,” said Libby.
“I don’t get up until Mom screeches that if I don’t show my face within the next ten seconds, she’s going to come upstairs and drag me out of bed,” added Etta.
“Children, please . . .” said Professor Brayne.
“I like to rise early so I can study for an hour before breakfast,” Celery said.
“You’re sick,” Etta said to Celery.
Professor Brayne said, “Excuse me, children . . .”
Emma Binns offered, “I don’t have to get up because I sleep on the couch in front of the TV.”
“You’re so lucky, Emma,” said Etta wistfully.
Kyle Hanley added, “I get up early so I can watch cartoons while Mom gets breakfast.”
Libby looked at Kyle, wide-eyed. “You’re allowed to watch TV before you come to school?” she asked.
Kyle shrugged. “’Course.”
“Me, too,” said Emma.
Professor Brayne exploded. “Children! I am trying to help you prepare for the test by giving you a problem to solve.” He frowned around at the class. “Let’s try another. When I was on vacation in the summer —”
“Where did you go?” Libby interrupted.
“It doesn’t matter.”
“Who did you go with?” Celery asked.
“That doesn’t matter, either.”
Emma Binns said, “Did you have fun?”
“These questions have nothing to do with the problem.”
“I went to New River Beach,” Etta said.
“That’s nice, but —”
“With Mom and Dad,” Etta added.
“I love New River Beach,” said Libby.
“Parlee Beach is better,” Kyle called out. “It’s got more stuff to do.”
Professor Brayne exploded again. “Children! Can I continue, please?” He glared around the class.
“Go for it,” said Etta helpfully.
Professor Brayne s
tarted. “When I was on vacation in the summer . . .” He paused and looked around threateningly before going on. “It rained on fifteen different days, but it never rained for a whole day, because rainy mornings were followed by clear afternoons, and rainy afternoons were preceded by clear mornings. There were twelve clear mornings and thirteen clear afternoons in all. So — how long was my vacation?”
The students looked at one another.
Then Etta said, “We went to Mispec Beach for a week.”
Miss Nightingale had come forward to stand beside Professor Brayne. Libby heard him mutter to her, “No wonder they didn’t do well on the test.”
At the thought of having to do the test again, Libby’s thumb crept up to her mouth.
“Pay attention to Professor Brayne, please, class, and try to answer his question,” Miss Nightingale said.
Etta hissed at Celery, “Why don’t you say the answer? You know it, don’t you?”
“Yes,” said Celery. “But I’m not telling him.”
Professor Brayne slowly shook his head. “Let’s see if you do better with written questions.” He walked around the class, placing papers face down on each desk. “Do not touch the paper until I give you permission to start,” he warned. “Then you will have thirty minutes to complete the questions. You are not allowed to help one another, and there will be no talking.” He looked at his watch. “You may begin.”
Celery muttered, “I have to pee.” He raised his hand.
Miss Nightingale nodded permission to Celery.
Libby turned her paper over and read the first question.
1. A gorcery stove has a seal on nabanas. If you yub six nabanas, you teg the seal rice.
a) If the gorcer has 489 nabanas wow many
She stared at the paper. She must have forgotten how to read. She squeezed her eyes shut, opened them, and tried again.
1. A grocery store has a sale on bananas. If you buy six bananas you get the sale price.
a) If the grocer has 489 bananas, how many bunches of six can he sell at his sale price?
b) In this case, how many can he sell at the regular price?
Now Libby could read the words, but it didn’t help her make sense of the questions.
Why not just charge the sale price no matter how many bananas someone buys? she thought. And what if you only wanted four bananas? Or three? Or two? What kind of grocery store makes you buy six bananas before you get the sale price?
Libby knew what her mother would say if the Pleasant Harbour Save Easy had a sale like that: “There are plenty more grocery stores that will be pleased to take my money.”
She thought of the last time she went to the Save Easy with her dad. Edwin had said, “Why don’t you get us some bananas, Libby?” and she went to the fruit bins and picked out two for her mother and two for her father and two for herself. Oh . . . six! So she’d have got them on sale if the Save Easy had had the same deal on bananas.
“Are you in dreamland, Libby?” Miss Nightingale whispered in her ear.
Libby hadn’t noticed her teacher moving around the class.
She nodded, and Miss Nightingale patted her shoulder before moving away.
Libby forced her mind back to the question.
If the grocer has 489 bananas, how many bunches of six can he sell at his sale price?
What was the sale price? The question doesn’t say. How was she supposed to work out how many bunches of six he could sell if she didn’t know what he was selling them for?
Libby sneaked a glance around her table. Was she the only one who was finding the question this difficult?
Celery seemed to be at least halfway through his paper, but he had his hand up again. She guessed that meant another trip to the washroom. Etta was leaning back in her chair, her eyes closed, legs stretched out, and her feet crossed.
“Have you finished already?” Libby risked whispering to Etta.
Etta opened one eye. “Are you kidding? I haven’t started.”
“Aren’t you going to do the test?”
“I might. There’s still lots of time.”
“No talking!” Professor Brayne snapped from the front of the room.
Libby rolled her eyes.
Etta did the same and giggled.
Professor Brayne frowned at her. Etta smiled at Professor Brayne.
Emma, holding her stomach and rocking in her chair, uttered a low groan. Miss Nightingale bent over her to see if she was okay.
Libby glanced at the clock on the wall behind Miss Nightingale’s desk. Fifteen minutes had gone by, and she didn’t even have answers on her paper yet. She decided to skip the first question and try the next.
2. Rachel opened her math book and found that the sum of the facing pages was 243. What pages did she open to?
What sort of stupid question was that? Rachel, whoever she was, would have to know what page she was opening her math book to, wouldn’t she? And what was she doing adding up the page numbers when she should be doing her math? Libby read the question again. What were facing pages, anyway?
She heard a snorting sound and knew who it was before she looked up. Kyle Hanley was leaning back in his chair, looking at a clump of hair in his hand. He seemed surprised to find it there. Libby watched as he leaned over his paper again, one hand holding his pencil, the other tugging at his hair. As he worked and tugged, he groaned, “Whoo whoo whoo,” until Miss Nightingale stood beside him and calmed him with a hand on his shoulder.
“You have fifteen more minutes,” Professor Brayne announced.
Libby returned to her paper, but looked up again as Emma Binns moaned, “I’m going to puke.”
Miss Nightingale hurried to her, took her hand, and led her from the room.
Professor Brayne was alone with the students. He watched nervously as Kyle Hanley, groaning “Whoo whoo whoo,” pulled out another clump of hair and stared at it.
The professor walked across to Etta, still slumped in her seat with her eyes closed, and said, “What are you doing?”
Etta opened her eyes. “I’m thinking.”
“But your answer paper is blank.”
“That’s what I’m thinking about.” Etta closed her eyes again.
Professor Brayne, shaking his head, paced back to the front of the class.
Miss Nightingale returned with Emma Binns and settled her back in her seat. Then she went to check on Kyle Hanley.
Professor Brayne walked to Emma’s desk and asked, “Do you feel better now?”
“Yes, thank you,” Emma said, then threw up on Professor Brayne’s shoes.
6
The Director, the Manager, and the Stylist
After school on Monday, Celery announced to Libby and Etta, “We’re having a band meeting when we get home.”
“Who says?” Etta demanded.
“Me,” said Celery. “One of the things the Band Manager does is call meetings.”
“The Musical Director calls meetings, too,” Libby pointed out.
“Does the Musical Director want a meeting?” Celery asked.
Libby considered. “Yes. We have to make plans.”
“Then it’s agreed,” said Celery.
“What about the Band Stylist?” said Etta.
“Who cares about the Band Stylist?” said Celery.
“Jerk,” the Band Stylist replied.
Etta’s father was still on nights, so Mrs. Page said they couldn’t make a noise at her house. Celery’s father said he’d just done the housework and wasn’t having three pairs of feet tramping through his house. So they met at Libby’s house.
They sat at the kitchen table, Celery at the head, Libby and Etta on each side. Mr. Meek served them milk and cookies.
Celery got out his notebook. At the
top of a new page, he wrote:
The Underachievers
“What are you writing?” Etta asked.
“I’m recording everything the band does and what we talk about in meetings,” Celery explained. “It’s called the minutes.”
Etta, peering at the notebook, said, “You spelled Underachievers wrong.”
“Have not.”
“Have too.”
“How?”
“It’s Under-a-c-h-e-i-v-e-r-s.”
“Isn’t.”
“Is too.”
Celery shook his head firmly. “Remember the rule Miss Nightingale taught us? ‘I before E except after C.’”
“The I is after a C.”
“But it’s not right after it. There’s an H in there. So it’s Under-a-c-h-i-e-v-e-r-s.”
“He’s right,” said Libby. “It’s like friend and believe and piece.”
“And not like ceiling and receive and deceive,” Celery added.
“I guess,” Etta said.
“May I please continue?” asked Celery. “The first item on the agenda —”
“Would anyone like another cookie?” Libby interrupted.
“Excuse me,” said Celery. “Would the Musical Director please raise her hand so the Band Manager can give her permission to speak?”
“I’m not asking your permission to speak,” said Libby.
“Me neither,” said Etta.
“But the chair has to recognize you before you can speak,” Celery pointed out.
“The chair?” said Etta. “How can a chair recognize anyone?”
“It’s just an expression,” Celery explained. “It means the person who’s chairing the meeting. It’s what they say at meetings.”
“How do you know?” Libby challenged.
“Because I’ve been to union meetings with my dad.”
“Well, Etta and me say we can speak when we like,” said Libby. “Let’s vote on it. Raise your hand if you agree.”
Libby's Got the Beat Page 3
