by K. A. Holt
Also by K.A. Holt:
Rhyme Schemer
House Arrest
Knockout
Redwood and Ponytail
FOR CHRISTINE BURROUGHS:
an enigma, a force of nature, and the reason why I will always recognize prepositions as something a squirrel can do to a tree.
A very special thank you to Christy Stallop, fine artist and friend. Christy creates delightful paintings and sculptures of luchador grackles that you can find all over Austin, Texas (and beyond). When I asked Christy if one of my characters could represent himself as a luchador grackle, she graciously agreed without hesitation. My renderings don’t come close to Christy’s playful energy and skillful talent, so it was extra kind of her to allow me to borrow her ingenious idea. You can find Christy’s work all over Austin, from galleries to billboards to murals to towering eight feet over the grounds of Austin City Hall. You can also find her work online at www.christystallop.com. Javier and I thank you to the moon and back, Christy!
Copyright © 2020 by K.A. Holt.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publisher.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data available.
ISBN 978-1-4521-8251-3 (hc)
ISBN 978-1-7972-0761-2 (epub, mobi)
Design by Jennifer Tolo Pierce.
Typeset in Fedra Mono, Cultura New, Air, GFY Ralston, FG Alex, FG Joe, and Karmatic Arcade.
Illustrations by K.A. Holt.
Hand-lettering by Isaac Roy.
Chronicle Books LLC
680 Second Street
San Francisco, California 94107
Chronicle Books—we see things differently. Become part of our community at www.chroniclekids.com.
Contents
Acknowledgments
About the Author
It's Time to Save Ur Server . Save Ur Self!
Hello! Welcome to your own curated Sandbox adventure! As you move through your journey, you will be faced with many choices. Will you opt for adventure and danger, or will you choose certainty and likely, though not guaranteed (watch out for those sneaky ghosts!), safety? Who will be your allies? Who will be your foes? Be careful! Sometimes it’s hard to figure out one from the other.
So!
Are you ready for your adventure to begin? Great! What would you like to name your server?
Congratulations! You have created a unique and impressive name for your server. Now you have a big choice to make:
To allow anyone to play on your server, turn to page 44.
To password protect your server for invited players only, turn to page 70.
From Save Ur Server, Save Ur Self: A Many Choices Sandbox Adventure Book by Tennessee Williamson
BEN B
I don’t like to read.
There.
I said it.
Books have too many words.
It takes forever to read a page.
It takes at least infinity to read a chapter.
This is why
shhh
I have never
and will never
finish reading a book.
It’s not that I hate words.
I don’t.
It’s not that I hate stories.
I don’t.
It’s not even that I hate books.
I don’t.
It’s just . . .
I don’t like to read.
It’s hard to read.
When you’re in first grade,
pretty much everyone has a hard time reading.
In second grade,
lots of kids still have a hard time.
But then,
in third
fourth
fifth
sixth
the other kids,
they figure it out.
And when you don’t?
It’s just . . .
Uuuuuuuugh.
You know what’s not
uuuuugh?
You know what always makes sense?
(And when it doesn’t, is
actually fun to figure out?)
You know what has zero words?
You know what’s the opposite
of boring?
Sandbox.
With every minute I can spare,
I build universes.
I lead alliances.
I save the world.
Me.
I do that.
Without reading a word.
The thing is,
unlike other things,
you can’t fail at Sandbox.
It’s a fail-free zone.
Mistakes become inventions.
Accidents become lessons.
You don’t just imagine the
impossible.
You make it happen.
You bring it to life.
So tell me this:
if I spend every day
bringing the impossible to life,
then why can’t I figure out
how to pass the dang FART?
Florida
Rigorous
Academic
Assessment
Test
Everyone calls it the FART,
even though
even I know
that’s not how you spell fart.
This class,
you know who we are?
We’re the FART Failures.
Dang, kid, you have FART Failure again?
Only cure for that is summer school.
If you work hard.
Can you work hard?
How did I even fail the FART to begin with?
We spent so many days last year
practicing
studying
practicing more.
Filling the bubbles
carefully
perfectly
no marks
out of line.
But something was out of line.
My brain, I guess.
Because even after all of that
I still failed it.
My sharp pencil a torpedo
sinking that test
to the bottom
of all the other tests,
drowning
in so many
bubbles.
At least I’m not drowning
all alone.
Jordan J.
Javier.
Ben Y.
Ben B. <— that’s me
Ms. Jackson.
Summer school.
Language Arts.
Room 113.
All working
all summer
to keep our heads
above
this bubbly
FART water.
Room 113
is not even a room
at all.
You go through double doors
to get to the stairs
and then
you don’t go up those—
you go around them
and then under them.
Four desks
crammed in the stairwell,
a table for Ms. J,
a whiteboard on an easel.
Make your Harry Potter jokes.
We’ve heard them all.
Oh, Benjamin.
Again?
Why do you keep failing?
Dad’s words
turned to icy, stabby
spikes that still
live in my brain.
I hear those words
when I wake up
when I’m
in class
when I eat lunch
when I go to bed.
Fail.
Sometimes it shimmers in the air,
so bright
I can almost see it
dancing and laughing at me.
Pointing at and taunting me.
Because it knows,
just like I know
that I did work hard.
I do work hard.
And it’s never enough.
Never is.
Never has been.
Never will be.
How do my parents not see that?
It’s like their eyes are so wide,
looking for so many ways
I can be better and smarter,
they can’t actually see
what’s right in front of them:
There is no better.
There is no smarter.
This is as good as Ben B gets.
This is just . . . who I am.
Except!
When I click on my screen,
dive into Sandbox,
become BenBee
instead of Ben B . . .
when I am cloaked in yellow and black,
I actually do a good job.
Every day.
I build and create.
I learn and remember.
When I am BenBee
instead of Ben B
I am
the best me.
I am
the smart me.
Why can’t BenBee be the real me?
Why can’t BenBee be the one my parents see?
Why can’t school be like Sandbox?
No instructions.
No manuals.
You just try stuff.
Sometimes it works
and you make a volcano
to protect your private island.
Sometimes it doesn’t work
and you accidentally make a waterfall
out of chickens.
See?
Even when it doesn’t work,
it’s still fun.
(And, you know?
I guess I learn stuff, too.)
Jordan laughed so hard
when I told him about my chickenfall
he fell
right out of his desk,
a Jordanfall.
You know,
Ben Y said,
turning around in her chair,
a chickenfall
is the most divergent idea
I’ve heard
in years.
Everyone laughed at that.
About one million times a day
Ms. J tells us:
You’re the smartest kids in this school.
You are divergent thinkers.
Divergent thinkers change the world.
Mm-hmm.
I’m sure all the world-changers
had summer school classrooms
under the stairs.
Today, though, Ms. J
sounds like she’s got popcorn
stuck
in her throat.
She ahem-ahems.
She ahem-ahems again,
while we all laugh at Jordanfalls
and divergent chickens.
I can see that you all have a lot to talk about
right now,
but when I ask
questions
about the reading,
everyone is silent.
Why is that?
That’s because none of us do the reading.
It’s boring.
And terrible.
I don’t say that.
But maybe I should.
She seems so hopeful.
It kind of makes me sad.
But mostly it makes me mad.
I don’t need to disappoint anyone else
in my life.
I don’t need to watch the light
dim in their eyes
when they figure out
what I can’t do.
I can’t do a lot of things.
Even though I’m always busy
trying to do All Of The Things.
Tune up those fine motor skills,
Mom says,
with art classes!
Strengthen those gross motor skills,
learn teamwork,
be social,
Dad says,
by playing soccer!
Pass the FART,
Mom says,
tutoring will help!
Handwriting practice,
Dad says,
will complement those art lessons!
And music,
Mom says,
music activates your brain in such
important ways.
Don’t forget music!
So.
Art Class Monday.
Soccer Practice Tuesday.
FART Tutoring Wednesday.
Handwriting Thursday.
Piano Lessons Friday.
Soccer Game Saturday.
House Cleaning Sunday.
All of this
extra
bonus
helpful
learning
is so exhausting,
my brain mostly wants to
hide in a corner
of my mind
and think about chickenfalls
until I fall
asleep.
Now that I think about it,
all of my extracurriculars
make a weird thing happen:
even with . . .
the reading,
the tests,
the failing,
the struggling,
the blah blah blah,
the same same same,
sometimes school’s like
a dang
vacation
from everything else
in my
lined-up,
signed-up,
piled-up
minivan
on the way
backseat burger
can’t be late
here and there
never good enough
never smart enough
everyday
life.
Dad wants me to
practice this,
study that,
listen up,
never quit,
Do you hear me, Benjamin?
Do I need to take away your screens, Benjamin?
But even when I
practice
study
listen
never quit,
even when I
try to read better
try to pass every test
try to win win win,
Dad never says,
Good job.
He never says,
Nice try.
The look in his eye
only ever dims
instead of brightens.
So maybe summer school
isn’t so bad.
Maybe it’s actually a break
from the summer vacation
I could have had,
disappointing Mom and Dad.
Maybe it’s a chance
to finally get better
at something
even if that something
is just
getting away
from them.
That’s a weird thing to think,
right?
A screechy noise
snaps me back
to the stairwell.
What can I dooooooo?
Ms. J throws her arms in the air.
Very dramatic.
What can I do to get you to read?
This is important.
She taps the book on Javier’s desk.
It’s required.
No one
in this class
can fail
the Assessment
again,
you hear me?
&nbs
p; Do you want me to yell?
Do you want me to fail you?
She takes a deep breath.
She looks up at the underbelly of the stairs,
the zigzag lid to our too-tight space,
as if the answers are written there.
This class was created
for divergent learners . . .
just for you!
To help you,
not to punish you.
But you all have to help me, too.
Now.
Can anyone tell me about the reading?
No?
Her mouth scrunches up.
She smacks the book onto her desk.
BAM.
Get out your spelling lists.
I think what Ms. J doesn’t understand,
what she totally
totally
doesn’t get
is this:
the FART Failures?
We still fail even when we do try.
So why not skip the frustrating part
when we can just stay at zero?
BEN Y
<0BenwhY>
They’re renovating the teachers’ restrooms.
Ms. J’s mouth—
a tight line.
Her dangly earrings
quiver.
This means teachers must use
the student restrooms.
Her breath comes in short bursts.
The tops of her ears glow bright red.
And THAT means, I found this.
She holds up a sopping wet book.
It shakes in her hand,
matching the quiver
of her earrings,
a danse
macabre
that maybe
might just
have something
possibly
to do with
me.
Uh-oh.
Uh-oh.
UH-OH.
I found it,
she repeats,
lurching toward me,
in a toilet.
Ms. J slams the book,