I had trouble running my fastest because I was in my new penny loafers that were a little too big. I was almost catching up to her when I tripped over the toe of my shoe and skidded across the pavement. Lulu didn’t even stop to help. She kept running and yelled, “I won, I won,” when she reached the car.
It didn’t hurt.
I stood up and started to pick the tar off my elbow. There was also a tar stain across my shirt. I didn’t care. It was India’s hand-me-down Krispy Kreme T-shirt. I looked down at my penny loafers, and there was a big tar spot on the toe of my left shoe, and the penny was lying on the pavement, stained black and sticky.
That’s when I started to cry.
I couldn’t help it.
Mom and the manny thought my elbow hurt. I went with it. I grabbed my elbow and kept sobbing.
Lulu still got the good seat, but I could tell she felt guilty.
She grabbed my shoe and started to clean off the tar.
September 1
I got new penny loafers, but I think I’ll keep nickels in them instead. I like silver better than copper. My foot is a whole size bigger since last year.
Mom and the manny rode in the front seats of the Eurovan. They laughed and talked. I think that’s what Sarah and I will be like when we grow up. I tried to listen to see what they were talking about, but Lulu wouldn’t stop singing to the radio. All I could hear was Mom telling an Uncle Max story and the manny calling someone cute. I bet it wasn’t Lulu.
Born on this day: Rocky Marciano, Lily Tomlin, Gloria Estefan
26
Lulu Hates Naked People
The night before the first day of school the manny and Uncle Max came over to help us pick out our clothes for the next day. Lulu modeled her rubber shoes and miniskirt with a pink collared shirt. India modeled faded jeans and a multi-colored shirt. She kind of looked like a roll of Life Savers, but in a good way. I modeled my penny loafers and my SMARTY PANTS jeans, which I told them I hated because of those stupid words. I also had on a white button-down shirt and a blazer. Uncle Max said that I looked a little too eager to be at school. The manny said that maybe I shouldn’t wear the blazer. He showed me how to unbutton my shirt a few buttons and roll up my sleeves. He called it relaxed chic. He told me that if I untucked my shirt, nobody would see that my jeans said SMARTY PANTS. Uncle Max showed me how to put gel in my hair, starting from the back and working forward.
Belly modeled her shoehorn. She walked through the living room like a runway model with nothing on except a shoehorn balanced on top of her head. She twirled around with her hands on her hips. Lulu grabbed a blanket and wrapped it around Belly.
Lulu hates naked people.
I showed the manny and Uncle Max all of my school supplies. The red plastic box that I had chosen to hold my pencils and erasers. The red plastic ruler. The battery-operated paper shredder that Mom let me get.
The manny helped me fit it all into the sleek black backpack that he had helped me pick out. He said that it looked just like the one he had seen in the Prada store. It looks just like the bag that I saw the hip and trendy people in business suits carrying in New York City.
I got my bag at Target.
Mom made us all take baths and wash our hair. She even cleaned out our ears with Q-tips. She said she was cleaning out the summer sand.
I hung my new outfit on my clothes valet and put my pocket change and watch in the bowl on top. I grabbed the BE INTERESTING coconut and rubbed it.
As I tried to fall asleep, I could hear Uncle Max and the manny downstairs packing our lunches and laughing. They sounded like Mom and Dad when I can hear them talking and laughing through my bedroom wall.
September 3
Tomorrow is the first day of school. Sarah and Scotty are in my class. I hope that Craig isn’t.
I didn’t grow very much this summer. Belly did. She wears the jeans that I wore in the first grade, and she’s only three.
I heard Uncle Max ask Mom and Dad if they wanted to have dinner with the manny and him on Friday night at the fancy restaurant. I want to go, but Dad said no when I asked. I think they want to talk about adult things, like who’s sexy in Hollywood and how much houses cost. I wonder who will stay with us. Grandma used to when the manny couldn’t.
Born on this day: Memphis Slim, Alan Ladd, Marguerite Higgins
27
Dumb Butt
I woke up early the next morning and put on my school clothes that were hanging, clean and ironed, on the clothes valet. I kept my white dress shirt untucked just like the manny had showed me, because I didn’t want anybody to see that the back of my jeans said SMARTY PANTS. I slipped on my penny loafers, which had shiny nickels stuck in the slots, and I bolted down the steps. When I ran through the living room, I winked at Grandma. I imagined her saying, “Take me wherever you’re going, handsome.” Or maybe she really did say it.
Lulu and India were already having breakfast when I ran into the kitchen. Lulu’s hair had big curls in it. She looked like Nellie Oleson, the mean girl from Little House on the Prairie. I watch Little House on the Prairie reruns on channel 36. India had little braids all around her head. She looked like Sarah did when she got back from the Caribbean last spring break.
“You sure are excited for school,” Mom said.
“He thinks his teacher is foxy,” Lulu said, grinning.
“How are things down at Oleson’s Mercantile?” I asked her, and pulled on one of her curls.
Mom laughed. She loved Little House on the Prairie when she was little.
We ate breakfast quickly so we wouldn’t miss the bus. Mom handed us our lunches, and we raced out the door. I didn’t run because I didn’t want to fall again and stain my shoes. I just walked fast, like the grandmothers who walk around the mall.
At school Mrs. House asked how Lulu was doing.
I answered, “She still has that Tai Pei personality.”
I’m not quite sure what a Tai Pei personality is, but I heard Dad say that Lulu inherited her Tai Pei personality from him.
Mrs. House looked at me like I was speaking Chinese. Then she said, “Keats, would you pass out these lists of classroom rules to everybody?”
I made sure that the back of my pants was covered and walked to the front of the classroom.
Rule number one was “Be nice.” It was written in black marker and had a big yellow smiley face next to it. Craig was in my class. When I put a sheet of rules on top of his desk, he pretended to knock it off accidentally with his elbow. I bent over, picked it up, and put it back on his desk.
“Thanks, smarty-pants,” he said.
I flared my nostrils and pointed to rule number one on the sheet on his desk.
“I said thanks,” he said.
I didn’t waste any more time with him. How could I expect polite behavior from someone who didn’t even know what a verb was? Last year Ms. Grant called on Craig and asked him to explain what a verb was. He stood up and said that a verb was when you burped and a little bit of vomit came up into your mouth.
He wasn’t trying to be funny.
I could have given Ms. Grant the correct answer, if only the poofy-red-haired girl hadn’t conditioned and curled her hair the night before.
I passed the rest of the rules out. When I got to Sarah’s desk, she told me that she liked my shoes. She said that her dad had shoes like that and her mom said that they were “smart.”
When I walked back to Mrs. House’s desk to return the rest of the papers, she extended her foot out and said, “Look, I wore the shoes that you like so much.”
Mrs. House wiggled her foot and asked if I would be line leader on the way to lunch. I looked at Mrs. House’s Hush Puppies and smiled while we were walking to lunch.
I told Sarah that the manny and Uncle Max had made my lunch. She wanted to trade with me before she even knew what was inside. I opened it and found a bag with five sushi rolls in it. Uncle Max learned how to roll sushi when he visited his college roommate in Japan last year. He
rolled vegetables and rice inside little seaweed strips. Vegetable rolls are my favorite.
Taped to the bag of vegetable rolls was a two-dollar bill that had a note written across it: BE WHO YOU ARE. WE LOVE YOU. THE MANNY AND UNCLE MAX.
I put it in the back pocket of my SMARTY PANTS.
In the classroom that afternoon Craig bent down by his desk and said, “Look, I found a nickel.”
I looked down at my shoes. My right penny loafer still had a nickel in the slot, but the left one was empty. I didn’t say anything. I thought maybe Craig needed the nickel more than I did. Maybe he could use it as a down payment for a better personality. I pulled the two-dollar bill out of my pocket and read, “Be who you are.”
I kept it on my desk while I wrote my essay titled “What I Did This Summer.” I wrote about Grandma and the garden. I wrote about her funeral and how we watched her ashes dance around the garden. I also wrote about being brave enough to jump off the high dive. I turned it in and started to work on my math review assignment. An hour later Mrs. House called me to her desk to pick up my graded essay.
She said, “You’re a very descriptive writer. May I keep this essay to read to next year’s class as an example?”
I nodded yes and imagined Mrs. House devoting a whole shelf in her closet to my projects.
Then she said, “It’s nice to read an essay that is about important things that happen.”
Then she stood up and cleared her throat to get the class’s attention.
“This essay was written by Keats, and it’s an example of thoughtful writing.” Then she read my essay to the class. Craig pretended to be sleeping with his head on his desk.
The class clapped when Mrs. House was finished, and Craig pretended that it had surprised him awake. He looked around like he was wondering what he had missed. He’s a bad actor. I know he heard it.
The bell rang and Mrs. House dismissed us.
When I was getting on the bus, Craig said, “Bye, smarty-pants.”
I wanted to scream at him and accuse him of stealing my nickel, but instead I said back to him, “See you tomorrow.”
The manny met the bus. He wasn’t doing anything strange. He was just standing there like a normal person. He hugged me when I got off the bus. When he turned to hug India, I noticed the words DUMB BUTT stitched across the back of his jeans pocket with yellow yarn. He didn’t have his shirt untucked like he had shown me.
September 4
Today was the first day of school.
Craig is in my class, and he’s already being mean to me, just like last year. I’m trying to remember what the manny said about not letting him bother me, but it’s really hard. At recess he and his two friends said that they needed to have their first MASK meeting of the year. Sarah had her first meeting too. There were twelve kids on top of the monkey bars with her. I went to my spot behind the Dumpster and found where I had written my name on it, but somebody had added to it. Now it said, “Keats Dalinger … crys back here evry day.” I thought that it must be Craig because cries and every were spelled wrong.
I didn’t cry. I changed the c in crys to a t, so that it said, “Keats Dalinger … trys back here evry day.”
When I got home, the manny helped me pull the SMARTY PANTS stitching out of my back pocket. He took an old Levi’s label from one of Dad’s pairs of jeans and sewed it onto my jeans. He says next year he’s going to be a fashion designer.
Born on this day: Beyoncé Knowles, Paul Harvey, Daniel Burnham
28
Amanda
On Friday, Mom and Dad went out to dinner with Uncle Max and the manny. A high school girl named Amanda came over to watch us. She put braids in India’s hair and painted Belly’s toenails pink. Belly rubbed most of the nail polish off her toes and onto Housman’s fur. Housman didn’t mind. He thought she was petting him.
Lulu pretended that she and Amanda were the same age. She asked Amanda about boys and things like that.
Amanda told her, “The way to get a boy’s attention is to be really dramatic and cry a lot. Make sure that the boy knows that you can’t live without him by writing him love notes. If he still doesn’t pay attention to you, write your first name on your notebook with his last name right after it. Boys love it when they think you want to marry them.”
India looked at Amanda and asked, “Do you have a boyfriend?”
“No,” Amanda said.
“Hmm,” said India.
Amanda made popcorn and put on a movie that she had rented. It was called Ever After, and everybody talked with a snotty accent. Amanda and Lulu cried during it. I thought it was boring. I waited by the window for Mom and Dad’s headlights to appear in the driveway.
While I waited, I started my own “Amanda Files” but only got as far as the title.
When Mom and Dad did get home, Lulu said, “Amanda’s a lot more competent than the manny. Can she come watch us again sometime?”
I wanted to shove a pillow in Lulu’s mouth.
“We’ll see,” said Dad, picking up Belly, who was sleeping on the couch.
Belly started laughing. She always pretends to be asleep when Mom and Dad come home from somewhere, and she always laughs when Dad picks her up.
“What do you think, Keats, should Amanda come back?” asked Mom.
I wanted to say, “No, she should move to New York City and write tragic romance movies for Lifetime,” but Amanda was standing right next to me.
Instead I just nodded an unenthusiastic yes and went to my bedroom to write in my journal.
September 7
I think the fourth grade is going to be just like the third grade. We had to write haiku in class today, and Mrs. House read one by one of her former students. It went like this:
Be strong, healthy girl
Belong only to yourself
Beautiful woman.
I knew that it was Lulu’s haiku even before Mrs. House told us. Mrs. House has a whole file in her drawer full of Lulu’s drawings, poems, and papers.
Every time I ask to go to the bathroom, Craig asks if he can go and get a drink. He follows me and kicks my heels. He took my glasses and held them over the toilet like he was going to drop them in, but Mr. Robbins, a second-grade teacher, walked in. Craig pretended that I had dropped them, and handed my glasses back to me, saying, “Here you go, Keats.” I’m not going to go to the bathroom at school anymore. I’ll hold it all day until I get home.
At dinner tonight Lulu wouldn’t stop talking about Amanda. She acted like a movie star had come over to watch us. She even asked Dad if he thought that she looked a little bit like Julia Roberts. Dad loves Julia Roberts.
Born on this day: Grandma Moses, Queen Elizabeth I, Buddy Holly
29
We’ll Always Be Good Friends, No Matter What
I woke up on Saturday morning and found a memorandum attached to my door with Scotch tape. It called a family trial to “investigate collected evidence.” It was from Lulu. They were taped on all of our bedroom doors. Even Belly had one, but she shredded it in the battery-operated paper shredder that I’d gotten with school supplies.
Family trials are called only when something is really important to a member of the family. If a family trial is called, it means that Mom and Dad will really listen and try to change whatever the problem is. That’s why I was worried. The only evidence Lulu had been collecting was about the manny.
We have had only two other family trials. One was about the need for another bathroom. Lulu called that trial. The other trial was called by Dad. It was about not leaving our toys in the driveway. He had backed his car out of the garage and felt a crunch underneath the tire. He panicked because he thought it was Housman, but it was just Belly’s Sit’n Spin. It doesn’t spin anymore, so Belly just gets on it and sits.
After breakfast we all sat in the living room for family court. Lulu sat at the coffee table and opened up a three-ring binder in front of her. It was full of marked-up papers with lists on them. Lulu was wearing a
blazer and had her hair pulled up so that she looked like a lawyer.
It was “The Manny Files.”
She began stating her case. “I have brought forth this lawsuit because I think it’s time that we had a normal babysitter again, like Amanda. I’m not sure that the manny is a good influence on young, impressionable minds like Belly’s, Keats’s, and India’s.”
India rolled her eyes and crossed her arms. She didn’t say anything because we’re not allowed to interrupt in family court. A person is allowed to have his or her say. We’re not allowed to roll our eyes, either.
Lulu said, “I’ll hold you in contempt of court, India.”
In family court being in contempt means you have to unload the dishwasher that night after dinner. I was held in contempt at the last trial because I shot a rubber band at Lulu while she was making her case for having an additional bathroom put in for her. She said that I never put the toilet seat up when I used it and that it was disgusting. I always put the toilet seat up. It’s Housman that gets the seat wet when he drinks from the toilet, which he’s not supposed to do. We didn’t get a new bathroom. Instead we got a laminated “Bathroom Rules” list, which hangs next to the light switch.
Flush the toilet when you are finished.
Close the lid when you are finished.
Clean up after yourself.
If you stand up to pee, make sure the seat is up.
(That one is for me.)
5. Keep out of Lulu’s drawer.
The last rule is written in black marker in Lulu’s handwriting.
India sat up, and Lulu started to list all of the evidence that she’d been recording since the manny arrived. My stomach hurt even before she started reading her files. I knew Mom and Dad liked the manny, but what if they agreed with Lulu that some of the stuff he let us do was inappropriate?
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