by AJ Stern
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
GROSSET & DUNLAP
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Text copyright © 2010 by AJ Stern. Illustrations copyright © 2010 by Doreen Mulryan Marts. All rights reserved. Published by Grosset & Dunlap, a division of
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CHAPTER 1
“I have simply magnificent news!” Mrs. Pellington called from the front of the room.
We had just come back from gym class and we were still feeling run-aroundy, so Mrs. P. gave two long claps followed by three fast ones. This is our signal to clap back and concentrate.
I love clapping back songs. If there are jobs other than teaching where you get to song-clap, I want to work at one.
Mrs. P. always announces “simply magnificent news” on Thursdays. Mostly it’s about school things like changes on the chore calendar or cleaning out the gerbil cage. But today, Elizabeth Sanders’s dad was standing next to Mrs. P., which meant that maybe the news really was simply magnificent.
Elizabeth’s dad is very important and interesting. It is a scientific fact that he has his own radio show. And if he has a radio show, then he must have an office. And if you don’t already know this about me, I love offices.
If Mr. Sanders has an office, then he probably has an assistant. Which is the exact thing I told my parents I wanted for Christmas.
They’re thinking about it.
Mrs. P. was so excited that she didn’t wait long to blurt out, “Mr. Sanders has invited our class to visit his radio station on Election Day!” Then she covered her heart with both hands and gave Mr. Sanders big, blinky cartoon eyes.
Our whole class sucked in a fast gulp of happiness. Elizabeth acted like it was no big deal. But she only did this because Mr. Sanders is her dad. Secretly she was proud. I could see a really small smile on her face. I’m very smart about really small smiles.
Mr. Sanders’s show is about news. My parents listen to The Sandy Sanders Show every morning. I am not supposed to say this in public, but my parents think that he is good at some things and not so good at others. A for instance of what I mean is that he’s good at the news part, but not at the call-in part. Sometimes my parents slap their heads at his advice and say, “What on earth is he talking about?”
“Isn’t this fabulous? Aren’t we lucky?! We’ll see firsthand how a radio station works,” Mrs. P. said. Then she looked right at me and changed her face channel to strict.
“There will be special conditions for certain people.”
That was when my whole body started to turn hot. This is because of what happened on the last class trip.
We went to the office of Cambridge Magazine and the office man let us all take turns in his swivel chair. We could swivel all we wanted, but we weren’t to touch anything on his desk. But my dad says a messy desk is the sign of a messy mind. Maybe the office man didn’t know this because his desk was very messy. When it was my turn in the chair, I got a great idea. And that idea was that when the office man’s back was turned, I would surprise him by quickly organizing his papers.
But not everything went according to plan. When I reached over to straighten the papers, I knocked over a glass, which spilled water all over his desk. The office man was very upset. He kept squeezing his hands together saying the papers were “originals.” My dad calls me an original, which is a good thing. So I didn’t understand why the office man was so upset. Or why I got in such big trouble. Now I know. Original means one of a kind. Which is good if you’re a person, but bad if you’re wet paper.
“Does anyone have any questions for me?” Mr. Sanders asked.
My hand shot up so tall, I felt like I could have touched the ceiling without a ladder. Everyone else’s hands shot up, too. When he chose me first, I knew I had a really lucky arm.
“Actually, Mr. Sanders, does a radio station have an office?” Actually is a really grown-up word and I like to use grown-up words as oftenly as possible.
“Yes, actually, we have a lot of offices.”
See what I mean about actually ?
“How many offices?” I asked.
“Everyone who works there has an office. And there are more than twenty people who work there.”
More than twenty offices!? In one place!? A veterinarian only had one office. A dentist sometimes had three. But twenty? They probably had a lot of staplers.
“But the most exciting office is the big one in the middle.”
“Why?” I wanted to know.
“That’s where all the action is. That’s where all the disc jockeys work.”
I raised my hand one more time.
“Yes, again?”
“How old do you have to be to work actually at a radio station?”
“Well, actually, some of our interns are as young as eighteen years old.”
Eighteen? That was in twenty-sixteen years! I did not want to wait that long for a job.
At the end of the day, Mrs. P. gave us permission slips to take home.
But she pulled me aside. “Please ask your parents to come speak with me at school.”
That is not such a good sentence. And that is a scientific fact.
CHAPTER 2
When I got home, I slammed the front door behind me so everyone would know I was there. At school they get mad when you do that.
“Frannie? That you?” my mom called from upstairs.
Frannie.
What kind of a name is that, anyway? It sounds too much like fanny, which is another word for butt. And butt is not such a nice word.
Frankly, I don’t understand why kids can’t just name themselves. (Frankly! Now there’s a good name!)
“My name is Fran
kly!” I yelled, pulling open the refrigerator with both hands.
“Frankly, that you?” my mom called again. I changed my name a lot. My parents were used to it. Sometimes I added titles, like Doctor or Mrs., because they were really grown-up. “YES!” I shouted back, as I stuck my head in the refrigerator.
I pulled out some bread, a package of sliced turkey, mustard, and lettuce. I am the only kid I know who likes mustard.
Okay, here’s a secret. I don’t really like mustard. It’s too spicy, but I like the idea of liking mustard. Every grown-up I know likes mustard and I want to do grown-up things.
I opened the lid on the mustard and sniffed. It made the inside of my nose crinkle. I quickly put the lid back on. I try to smell it as oftenly as I can. My dad says you can’t be good at something without practice. So, I practice liking mustard. Ketchup isn’t grown-up at all.
I held my sandwich in one hand, skimmed the wall with my other, and climbed the stairs to my parents’ room on the second floor.
My mother was lying on the bed, reading the newspaper.
“Hi, button!” My mom’s cheeks looked rosy. That’s how they look when she’s sick. My stomach flumped over. I do not like when my mom is sick.
I felt tears welling up in my eyes. “You seemed okay when you drove me to school . . . And now you’re in bed. Are you sick?”
It is a scientific fact that my mom drives me to school and that my best friend Elliott’s mom drives me home. And Elliott, too, of course!
My mom smiled and scooted closer, wrapping me up in her arms. I love my mother so so so so much. She nuzzled my neck and kissed me all over my cheeks until her powdery smell rubbed off on me.
“No, Lovey Dove, I’m not sick.”
I wanted to believe her, but she paused for too long before answering. I’m very smart about pauses. So maybe she wasn’t telling the truth.
I put down my sandwich and ran to the bathroom as she called out, “Where are you going?”
“To get you some tissues.”
When I returned, I held them to her nose and said, “Blow.”
My mother laughed and gently lowered my arm. “I’m not sick, Lovey.”
I ran back to the bathroom to get a thermometer and put it in her mouth, even though I didn’t know how long to keep it there. I tapped my foot a couple times and looked at my wrist even though I did not wear a watch. Finally, it was boring, so I pulled the thermometer out of her mouth.
“Do you feel better now?” I asked.
“Lots,” she said. And then, “May I sit up now?”
I picked my sandwich back up, shrugged, and with my mouth full, said, “I guess so.”
“I know you think I’m sick, but I’m not. I just took a personal day.”
“What’s a personal day?”
“Sometimes people don’t go to work because they’re on vacation and sometimes people don’t go to work because they’re sick, but there’s another kind of not going to work and that’s called a personal day. When you take the day off because you have a lot of personal business to take care of.”
This gave me an idea.
“Can I take a personal day?”
I could tell my mother thought this was hilarious because she laughed so hard, her eyes watered. Then she said, “Oh, Frannie, you are such a comedian.” But I don’t want to be a comedian. Comedians don’t have offices.
“I’m not sure schools give out personal days,” she said.
“Well, that’s not very fair. Kids should be allowed the exact same things adults are allowed.”
“You think adults have it pretty easy, don’t you?”
“Yes, I do. Kids have it much harder.” Especially when they have to tell their parents Mrs. P. wants to talk with them.
“It’s not so easy for us, either, you know,” said my mother.
I shrugged. I didn’t believe her. She said things like this all the time just to make me feel better about not being older.
A while later the front door opened and we heard my dad singing along to his iPod. He’s a really bad singer. Sometimes my mom and I cover our ears to joke with him.
I hopped off the bed and ran down the stairs.
“There’s my Bird!” my dad called. I jumped up for a lift-hug. My dad is the only person who calls me Bird. It is a scientific fact that Bird is my middle name. But please, do not tell anyone.
“What’s new with today?” he asked.
“I was mom’s doctor and I fixed her, because I’m really good at that job. And I changed my name.”
“What’s your new name?” asked Dad.
I took a very long breath and then announced, “My name is now Frankly!” I said, looking down at all the mail in my father’s hand. Opening mail was really grown-up.
My dad looked up at the ceiling for a minute, then back down at me.
“Frankly. I like it.”
Then my mom came down and we all went into the kitchen and I helped make dinner. Some families say grace or a prayer before their meals, but not my family. My family says, “To the Millers!” because that is our last name.
After we said “To the Millers!” we talked about the news of the day. My parents like to talk about politics. I have very strong opinions about politics. And my opinions are that politics are boring.
“I have something to say.”
“Well, we’d love to hear it,” my dad said.
He and my mom both leaned back in their chairs. I had their full attention.
“My class is going to visit The Sandy Sanders Show. At an actual real-life radio station.”
“Uh-oh,” was what my mother said.
My father inched his way back to the edge of his seat. “Hmmm . . . What did Mrs. Pellington have to say?”
That was the exact question I did not want to answer.
I answered it, anyway. “She wants to have a talk with you.”
My dad folded his arms across his chest. “Yeah, she probably wants us to have a good long talk about the Cambridge Magazine trip and your curious hands.”
“That was a long time ago. My hands are really different now!”
“Birdy, it was three weeks ago!”
“But I know better now! I won’t touch anybody’s desk. I promise.”
I realized that I needed to be very serious. So I thought for a minute. The only way to show them how serious was to use my English accent. I spoke very slowly, just like Eliza Doolittle in My Fair Lady.
“It is a scien-tific faakt that I will nawt touch any-theng.”
My parents looked at each other. They sent tricky smiles back and forth.
My dad said, “We’ll see what rules Mrs. Pellington suggests.”
My mom looked me directly in the eyeballs. “And you will have to follow them.”
I flumped my hands to my side. I really hoped Mrs. P. was in a simply magnificent mood.
CHAPTER 3
When I woke up the next morning, I had a hurricane of butterflies in my belly. That’s what happens when I get nervous. My best friend, Elliott, gets moths. It’s a scientific fact that butterflies are big and moths are small. He says he can feel a machillion wings in there and there’s no way a machillion butterflies would be able to fit in his stomach. So they’ve got to be moths.
My mom was downstairs drinking her coffee. I was trying to be very silent. If my mother didn’t hear me, maybe she’d forget about me and then maybe she would forget to take me to school.
But before I even knew it, we were in the car. And before I even knew it again, we were already in the school parking lot. When we drove around to find a parking space, there were a lot of trucks. And coming out of the trucks were people carrying big booths. I guess I forgot about being silent because my mouth blurted out, “What are they doing?”
“They’re carrying in the voting booths to get ready for next Tuesday.”
“We’re getting a new president?”
“No, it’s time for a new mayor. Didn’t Mrs. Pellington tell you?”
<
br /> I shook my head no. But a little voice in my brain wasn’t as sure. “Did she?” it asked.
“Chester Elementary is where the entire east side of town will vote for the mayor on Tuesday.”
My mouth almost dropped off my face. My school was going to be one big voting office for the entire east side of town!
“That is actually really important,” I said.
“It certainly is,” said my mother.
Certainly is also very adult-sounding .
As my mom and I climbed up the stairs toward my classroom, I concentrated hard on sending a wish from my heart into her brain. The wish was: I wish you would forget all about your meeting with Mrs. Pellington! But it didn’t work.
Mrs. Pellington was waiting at the top of the stairs. I thought if I stood there with both of them, it would stop them from talking about me, but that didn’t work, either, because Mrs. Pellington said, “Frannie, why don’t you go inside the classroom and give me and your mother one minute alone?”
I will actually tell you for a scientific fact that it was absolutely, positively, and certainly not just one minute. I know this because I counted. My entire class and I watched through the window on the classroom door as my mom and Mrs. Pellington talked. Then Elliott did armpit farts. All the kids laughed at this. I made my mouth laugh with the rest of the kids. I even acted out laugh noises, but my insides did not think it was funny at all.
I was too nervous about what my mom and Mrs. P. were actually saying to each other. I wanted to hear them but I couldn’t.
I did hear someone shout, “Watch out, Millicent!” though. I turned around right as Millicent banged into Will. Millicent loved to read so much that anytime Mrs. P. turned her back, Millicent pulled out a book. Her hands were so fast that by the time Mrs. P. turned back again, Millicent’s book was already hidden and she wore her “I’m paying the best attention of anyone” face.
