And she thought, I know they can help me. If they want to. And I’m sure they want to. Because they’re both nice . . . kind of. Abby thought another second. And besides, I bet they don’t really want me hanging around here again next year.
A minute later both teachers walked back in and sat down.
Mrs. Beckland said, “To be promoted to seventh grade, you would have to do three things. First, you would have to do all your homework every day from now on, in every subject.”
Abby nodded and said, “I could do that . . . I mean, I will. I will do that.”
Mrs. Cooper said, “And second, you’re going to need to get at least a strong B, that’s eighty-five percent or better, on all your tests and quizzes from now on, in every subject.”
Abby nodded again. “If I work really hard, I could do that. And I will.”
Mrs. Beckland said, “And finally, since your language arts and social studies grades are worse than your math and science grades, you would also have to do a special assignment for me, a project. For extra credit. Are you willing to do that?”
The thought of even more schoolwork was horrible, but Abby managed to smile and say, “Sure . . . but, like, what kind of project?”
“I’ve got a number of different assignments,” she said, “and you would have to pick one. And you’d have to do a great job to get the credit—plus keep up with all your regular work. It won’t be easy.”
“But if it means I’ll get promoted,” Abby said, “then I’ll do whatever I have to, I really will. And I’ll do a good job on everything, from now on. And I’ve already started, because I did all my homework for today.”
Mrs. Beckland said, “All right then. I’ll make up an academic contract. And Mrs. Cooper and I will sign it, and you’ll sign it, and your parents will sign it. And then it will be up to you to do the work.”
“And I know you can,” said Mrs. Cooper, and she gave Abby a thin smile, not exactly warm, but sincere.
Mrs. Beckland stood up and said, “Now let’s go next door so you can pick out your project. Because you’ll need to get started on it right away.”
Abby got up from her chair and went toward the doorway, but then stopped and turned around. “Thanks, Mrs. Cooper.”
The math teacher smiled again, a few degrees warmer. “You’re welcome, Abby. See you later.”
As Abby followed Mrs. Beckland out of the math room, she tried to keep a strong, confident look on her face. But walking along the hallway, her eyebrows scrunched together, and she began biting her lower lip the way she did when she watched a horror movie.
And she thought, I actually have to get a B or better on every test and quiz? And never miss a homework assignment? For the rest of the year? How is that even possible?
Because ever since third grade, when that first batch of letters appeared on her report card, Abby had never been a solid B student. More like a shaky C student. And sometimes, a D student. And now it was like she had to go from flunking out to being on the honor roll—instantly. And if she couldn’t, then next year would be déjà vu—sixth grade all over again.
She thought, For the next four and half months my life is gonna be nothing but homework, quizzes, and tests. Plus the extra-credit project. So basically . . . I’m dead.
CHAPTER 5
THE PROJECT
Abby followed Mrs. Beckland into room 131 and watched as she opened a cabinet and took down a large shoe box from the top shelf. It was covered with red construction paper, and there was a hole in the lid about as big as a TV remote. On the long side of the box, printed in neat black letters, were two words: EXTRA CREDIT.
“How come I’ve never seen that before?” Abby asked.
“Because I’d rather have kids doing a good job on all their regular assignments instead of relying on last-minute bailouts. But there are always exceptional cases.” Mrs. Beckland gave the box a few good shakes and said, “Here’s the way this works. I’ve got about ten different assignments in this box, each one written on a folded piece of paper. You reach in and pull one out, and that’s the project you have to do—no second choices, no backsies.” She held the box in front of Abby. “So, pick one.”
Abby put her hand into the box, and groped around until she had hold of a piece of paper. Then she let go of that one, and found another and started to pull her hand out. But then she let go of that paper too, and reached over into a corner, grabbed a third piece, and pulled it out.
Mrs. Beckland said, “Go ahead and read it out loud.”
Abby unfolded the paper and her voice filled the empty classroom: “Project Pen Pal. Number one: Your teacher will help you find the name and address of a school in another part of the world, somewhere with a culture different from yours.
“Number two: You will write a letter and ask a student at this other school to become your pen pal.
“Number three: Using copies of the letters you send, plus the letters you receive, you will make a bulletin board display in the classroom.
You will update your display as often as there are new letters.
“Number four: When you have written and received at least four letters, you will give an oral report to the class about what you have learned from this experience.”
That was the whole assignment, and after she finished reading it aloud, Abby read it again silently.
Mrs. Beckland said, “So, what do you think?”
“Sounds like a lot of work, a lot of writing . . . but sort of fun, too,” she added quickly. “And you’re going to help me find a school I can write to?”
The teacher nodded. “I’ve got some good contacts—e-mail connections with a teacher in Jakarta, Indonesia; with a school administrator in Kabul, Afghanistan; and with a professor in Beijing, China. Any of those places sound interesting to you?”
“I . . . I don’t know,” said Abby. She didn’t know a thing about those places, except that the Olympics had been in Beijing. Then, a thought: “But . . . are there mountains there, in those places? Big mountains?”
Mrs. Beckland said, “Take a look at a globe and decide for yourself.”
There were three globes on a table by the windows: a political globe that showed all the countries of the world in different colors; a historical globe that showed the different countries of the world in the year 1800; and a raised-relief globe with a textured surface that showed mountain ranges, river valleys, ocean trenches, and other physical features of the Earth.
The teacher pointed at the raised-relief globe. “All right, start by finding Australia.” Abby turned the globe and put her finger on it.
“Now, to the north and west of Australia, that long arc of islands? That’s part of Indonesia, and right there on Java, that’s the capital city, Jakarta.”
Abby moved her fingers across the area. “Not very mountainous.”
Her teacher nodded. “That’s because it’s not very high above sea level—which is true about a lot of islands. Now, can you find Beijing?”
Abby traced her finger northward from Jakarta, across the South China Sea to Hong Kong, followed the coastline north past the island of Taiwan, then moved inland from Shanghai. “There,” she said. “Beijing.”
“Any mountains?”
Abby shook her head. “Pretty flat.”
“Okay,” Mrs. Beckland said, “move south and west from Beijing toward India.”
Abby did, and when she got close to India, she said, “Mountains—huge ones.”
“Right. Which ones are they?”
Abby read. “ ‘The Himalayas’—that’s where Mount Everest is.”
“Right. Now follow the mountains north and west—good . . . stop. That’s the country of Pakistan. And if you move straight west from there, you’ll come to Afghanistan, and its capital.”
Abby spelled it out. “K-a-b-u-l . . . How is it pronounced?”
“Just the way it looks. It’s a short A sound, with the accent on the first syllable: KA-bul. How does the land seem there—flat or mountainous
?”
Abby said, “Well, it’s not like the Himalayas, but it’s nowhere near as flat as Beijing or Java.”
“Right,” her teacher said, “and all those bumps and ridges north of Kabul? Those are the Hindu Kush mountains, very steep and rugged.”
Abby said, “Then I want to find a pen pal around that part of Afghanistan.”
Mrs. Beckland nodded. “All right. And I think that’s a good choice. I’ll try to get you the address you need before the end of the day tomorrow.”
And just two days later, Abby had written and mailed her first letter to Afghanistan—the letter in the green envelope. The letter that arrived during the second week of March at a village school in the hills above Kabul.
CHAPTER 6
STUCK BETWEEN
Will you read the letter this time? Will you? Pleeease?”
Sadeed shook his head. “No. And stop whining. If you don’t practice reading English, you’ll never get better at it. And don’t touch that writing paper again or I’m going to take you outside and push your face in some snow. Now begin reading. And look carefully at each word before you say it this time.”
Sadeed knew he was being tough on Amira, but all this? It was too much to ask of any self-respecting boy, especially one who would be twelve in four short months.
The brother and sister sat side by side on the charpoy, a low, four-legged bed that the family used as a couch. They were in the central room, one of four in the small stone and mud brick house just off the main street near the western edge of the village. This room was the warmest one during the winter because the kitchen was at the far end. The evening meal wouldn’t be until after the bazaar closed and evening prayers ended, but the small charcoal cookstove was already lit, partly for warmth. Their mother had come home from her work at the sewing co-op to heat up some rice for the children’s lunch, and now she stood at a wooden table by the stove, cutting chunks of lamb, onions, and lemon slices to make a stew for dinner.
Sadeed gritted his teeth as Amira began to read the letter aloud for the second time, still stumbling over the simplest words. But he couldn’t really blame her. First of all, the handwriting in this letter was sloppy. The words had been written with a dull pencil on a piece of lined paper with a ragged edge. English was a hard language anyway, and remembering that the sentences had to be read from left to right was difficult. Plus, he reminded himself that Amira was almost two years younger than he was.
Still, it was painful to listen to her read.
“Dear Pen Pal,
My name is Abby Carson, and I live in the town of Linsdale in the state of Illinois in the United States of America. Illinois is sort of in the middle of our country. It is flat farmland all around here—almost completely flat. What does it look like where you live? Can you see any mountains?
The truth is, I’m writing this letter as a special school assignment. And I guess this letter might make some extra work for you, too—whoever you are. And I say that because until you write back, I won’t know who I’m actually writing to. But the more I think about how this letter is going to travel all the way to Afghanistan, it’s sort of amazing. We hear about your country in the news here in America, mostly about how there has been so much fighting. Is there fighting around where you live? I hope not.”
As his sister continued to struggle with each word, Sadeed thought back to what his teacher had said to him at noon as he and the other morning students were dismissed from school for the day.
“Sadeed, I’m giving you this task because I have faith in you. You will do a fine job. And I know you will make our village proud . . . you and your sister, I mean. I have spoken to her. She will be writing to a student in America. But not alone. Amira will sign the letter, because the American is a girl, and that is the most proper way, to have one girl writing to another. And Amira has promised she will not talk to others about how you are helping her to write. But you will watch to be sure Amira writes well. And that she says interesting things, good things. And now I give the letter to you, for safekeeping. Do you understand?”
“Yes, sir,” Sadeed said, remembering to look surprised about the whole arrangement as he took the letter.
But, of course, he had been expecting this, because of what he’d overheard at Akbar Khan’s compound. And as he accepted the letter, he noticed how his teacher gave no hint that the village elders had insisted he take this approach. He thought, It must be hard to have so many masters.
Not that Sadeed had ever imagined that his teacher had an easy job. Mahmood was the only teacher for more than a hundred boys and girls. The village school had just one room, and the children in grades one through six attended as one large group in the morning. In the afternoon the older students attended, with a movable partition down the center of the room, boys on the right, girls on the left.
Sadeed was able to tolerate the younger students in the morning class with him, but just barely. Really, he thought, Mahmood should make me his assistant for the rest of this year. Because he saw so clearly how skillful Mahmood was at keeping different groups of kids working on different levels at the same time. I could do that, he thought. At least the man has the good sense to make sure that advanced sixth-grade students like me have plenty of challenging work. So that’s good. Sadeed was especially glad that Mahmood allowed him to borrow from his small library of English-language books. He had read all of them except Great Expectations, a very long British novel. I expect I shall read that book soon—shouldn’t take me more than a few days.
Amira stopped reading, which snapped Sadeed back to the present moment.
“What?” he said. “Why did you stop?”
“Because you’re not even listening to me,” she said, pushing out her lower lip.
“I can hear you just fine,” he lied, “and you’re doing a good job. So keep reading, and hurry it up a little.”
Amira heaved a sigh and resumed reading, even slower than before.
“So anyway, I hope you tell me something about yourself when you write back. And maybe tell me about your family. And also tell me what it’s like where you live, and what you look like. And if you have a picture to send me, that would be fun to see.”
Sadeed’s mind drifted back again to the talk with his teacher. The envelope he had been given was a brilliant green color, like an apple in July. Two pink paper butterflies were pasted on the front, one on either side of the address. Every other letter Sadeed had seen in his life had looked serious, important. Some had been pale blue airmail envelopes, others dark brown or white, loaded up with official stickers and postmarks and stamps. This letter was clearly not serious at all. And there were only three stamps on the envelope, each one a small picture of an American flag.
Along with the letter Mahmood had also given him a new pencil, a dozen sheets of bright white paper, and five envelopes with official international airmail stamps on each one. Sadeed had carefully tucked everything but the pencil between the pages of his school notebook.
His teacher said, “The bus that comes from Kabul twice each week? The driver will carry the letter back to a post office. It is all arranged. So the letter must be ready by tomorrow afternoon. I’m sorry it must be done so quickly, but it cannot be helped. Can you and your sister prepare a letter that soon?”
Again Sadeed had said, “Yes, sir,” and nodded respectfully.
As Sadeed had left the school, his friend Najeeb was waiting outside, his sheepskin collar pulled up high against the biting wind. “What did your best friend want to tell you? Are you being honored again? Or did he ask if he could shine your shoes for you?”
Sadeed shoved Najeeb so that he almost stepped into a pile of goat droppings. “It was just about some work I have to do, nothing a fool like you would understand.”
As he talked, he kept a tight grip on his school notebook. If his friends ever found out that he had been given a silly green envelope containing a letter from a girl, he would be teased and taunted for the rest of his life.
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As Amira neared the end of the American girl’s letter, Sadeed wished he’d been able to avoid this task somehow.
Because now he had no choice but to help his sister. In truth, he would have to practically write a letter for her. And then she would sign it. And then the letter would be sent to this girl in America. And then she would probably write back again.
So he would be stuck between two girls for weeks, maybe months, forced to listen in to their pointless chitchat—could anything be worse? What a terrible waste of time and paper and stamps.
And now his sister was supposed to write a perfect letter? In one afternoon? In English? It would be easier teaching a dog to drive a motorbike.
Amira read the last few sentences.
“I hope you write back soon, because if I don’t get enough letters from you, then I won’t get a good grade on this project. And I really need a good grade. Are you a good student? I hope so.
Thanks for reading this, and I’ll be watching for your first letter to me.
Sincerely, your American pen pal,
Abby Carson”
Sadeed looked again at the photograph that had come in the envelope. The girl wasn’t even facing toward the camera. She was clinging to a gray wall that was covered with bumps, holding on the way a spider does, her arms and legs spread wide. A rope hanging from above went to a wide belt at her waist. Her head was uncovered, and her light brown hair was short, not even to her shoulders. She wore red trousers with the word LIONS written along the outside of the leg. She had black shoes on her feet, and she wore a yellow T-shirt. Her arms looked thin. Also strong, for a girl. The skin of her arms and face was pale. She was looking upward, and the expression on her face was stern, almost angry.
And this spider girl was the cause of his problem, the creator of all this extra work. Which seemed so pointless. And which also seemed false, to pretend that Amira would be answering the letter on her own.
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