by Annie Tipton
“You’re right. I’ve always known what you’re thinking … until recently,” EJ says. “So what about it, Bert? What’s going on with you? And please explain to me—a dirty diaper?”
Bert lies down with his front paws on EJ’s knee.
“Was that too gross?”
“Yes, I think ‘too gross’ is putting it lightly.” EJ thinks for a moment. “So what’s the deal? Pacifiers? Rash cream? Beef and noodles? Do you not like Faith or what?”
“Oh no! Faith is great—I love Faith!” Bert says. “I just … well … I don’t want to say it.”
“Bert, you’re my best furry friend. Whatever you say won’t change that,” EJ says. “Spit it out already.”
“Well, it’s like this, EJ.” Bert takes a big breath before he continues. “Before Faith came, I could count on getting attention from everybody in the family. Obviously I’m your dog, so you’re my favorite human Payne.”
“Obviously.” EJ grins.
“But Faith needs a lot of attention because she’s a baby—I know she can’t feed herself or dress herself or clean herself. But she’s hilarious and fun to have around. So it’s not just that she’s getting attention from Mom and Dad….”
A light bulb flashes on in EJ’s brain. “You think Faith has taken your place as the center of attention … that she’s the new family pet?”
“Some days I think the only way I can get anybody to even notice me is if I do something that will get me into trouble, EJ!” Bert breaks eye contact with EJ and looks embarrassed. “If I get scolded or sent to the kennel, at least you guys know I’m there.”
EJ scratches Bert’s head, feeling guilty.
“Even though I knew you were bummed that you had to bring me to obedience school today, I was just plain old excited because that meant we would get to spend the whole morning together—just like we used to!” Bert’s tail wags a little sadly.
“Aw, Bert. This is all my fault.” EJ pulls her pooch onto her lap. “You’re right. Faith takes up a lot of our attention. But you’re my dog and my friend, and I have to make sure that I’m giving you attention, too.”
“Do you mean it, EJ? Really?” Bert jumps up and licks EJ’s face, his tail wagging excitedly.
“Yes, I promise.” EJ crosses her heart with a fingertip. “But you’ve got to promise me no more diapers. Deal?”
Bert yipped happily, and EJ was sure that meant “deal” in Bert-speak.
“Isaac, you’d better come in here and clean up your cars or Dad is gonna be mad!”
EJ had just stepped on a Matchbox car and skidded across the linoleum floor in the kitchen. Just last night Dad had given them both a lecture about cleaning up after themselves and keeping temptations away from Bert and Faith. “And if Faith gets ahold of one of these cars and chews on it, you’re gonna be in even bigger trouble!”
“Those aren’t mine. You clean them up.” Isaac’s response came from the living room, where he was watching a DVD.
EJ rolled her eyes and took from the pantry two bacon-flavored dog treats for Bert and four Oreos for herself. Isaac was the only one in the family who played with Matchbox cars, so unless a Matchbox car bandit broke into their house and left without cleaning up his toys, it was Isaac’s mess to take care of. EJ shut the pantry door and turned to see Bert eyeballing one of Faith’s soft chew toys abandoned under the high chair.
“Bert, leave it.” EJ used a new command they had learned at obedience school. Bert immediately responded, stepped away from the toy, and looked at EJ with an innocent face. EJ reached in her pocket and gave her friend the reassuring click-click sound to tell him that he did the right thing.
“Good boy, Bertie. Come get your reward.” Bert eagerly accepted the bacony goodness EJ offered and trotted to his dog bed in the corner of the room for a snooze.
EJ picked up the baby toy and set it on the high chair tray and was just about to pop an Oreo in her mouth when an idea popped into her mind. An idea so brilliant that she couldn’t believe she had never thought of it before. Now she just had to put it to the test.
“Isaac, would you come here, please?” EJ figured asking instead of commanding was probably the best way to train a brother.
“I told you, they’re not my Matchbox—” Isaac said as he walked into the kitchen but stopped short at EJ’s click-click. He came, just like she asked.
“Hey, Isaac, have an Oreo.” EJ held out a single chocolate-and-cream sandwich to her brother.
“Wow, thanks!” Isaac took the cookie and gobbled it down.
“Would you like some milk?” EJ grabbed two plastic cups from the cabinet, already knowing her brother’s answer. Isaac nodded. “Sit.”
Isaac hopped up on a stool at the edge of the countertop. Click-click. “Here’s another cookie to go with your milk.”
“Score!”
“Isaac, I know you said those cars aren’t yours.” EJ poured milk in the cups and slid one toward her brother. “But would you do me a big favor and just pick them up anyway?”
Isaac’s eyes drifted to the remaining cookies in EJ’s hand and he took a milk-mustache-making gulp from the cup. EJ could almost see him salivating as he wiped the milk from his upper lip with the back of his hand.
“Yeah, okay. I’ll put them away.” Isaac slid off the stool and quickly picked up the six tiny cars from the floor, stuffing them in his pockets to take to his room. EJ set two more Oreos next to Isaac’s milk and grinned at him.
Click-click.
“Good boy—er, I mean—good job, Isaac.”
Chapter 4
THE NINJAS OF THE SQUARE TABLE
February 18
Dear Diary,
Remember my fourth-grade teacher named Ms. Pickerington? Remember how it took all year for her to warm up to me, and it wasn’t until the very last day of school that I found out she actually liked me? Thankfully, last year is just a distant memory, because fifth grade has really turned out to be amazing. Not only is my best friend, Macy, in my class this year, but we also have a fantastically spectacular teacher—Mrs. Smiley. Her name is pretty much perfect for her because she puts a smile on my face. She is fun and creative and is always quick to laugh and give encouragement. (In my very first creative writing essay in fifth grade, I described two friends as being “kindred spirits,” and Mrs. Smiley wrote a note in the margin with a big star that said, “EJ, you are a girl after my own heart—I love Anne of Green Gables, too!” After that, I knew fifth grade was going to be just fine.) But she also expects a lot from us—that we are ready to learn and that we will give her our full attention and our very best effort. And I try my very hardest not to disappoint her.
In language arts, Mrs. Smiley has been teaching us about Camelot. King Arthur, Guinevere, Sir Lancelot, and the Knights of the Round Table—the whole thing is so fun because it feels like history, but it’s legend. It’s a cool mix of near-fact and fiction, complete with royals and castles and dragons and death-defying rescues and defended honor and heroes and villains!
I’ve never really liked the idea of damsels in distress, Diary. I tend to think that Rapunzel is just lazy for not figuring out a way to escape the tower on her own—and that Sleeping Beauty should fight the urge to lie down for a snooze and just drink a can of Mountain Dew to stay awake. So in my Camelot, Queen Guinevere would never be helpless, relying on dudes to rescue her. In fact, if King Arthur didn’t allow her to put on the suit of armor and sit at the Round Table with the other knights, my Guinevere might just start her own medieval club: the Ninjas of the Square Table. Who needs bulky, clanky-janky armor when you can have stealthy, catlike reflexes, nunchucks, and throwing stars?
EJ
EJ bounced the basketball four times before attempting a layup. The orange ball hooked up, up, and right over the basket.
“Aaaaair baaaaall!” CoraLee McCallister sang behind her. “Hurry up, EJ. Mr. Bergan said we can’t skip stations, so I have to wait here—completely bored—till you figure out how to get the ball in the
hole.” CoraLee yawned dramatically.
EJ rebounded her missed shot and took a deep breath. There were two people on the planet who really got under her skin: the first was Isaac (but now that she’d started training him with the dog clicker and Oreos, maybe there was still hope for him); and the second was CoraLee, a tattle-tale-ey, spoiled, know-it-all girly girl who liked to pick on EJ and make fun of her last name (Payne-in-the-neck, giant Payne, major Payne, chronic Payne—EJ had heard them all). EJ and her family had secretly helped give the McCallister family a Christmas over a year ago when CoraLee’s dad had been laid off from his job. EJ was still glad the Paynes had helped the McCallisters, and EJ and CoraLee had even worked together last summer at church camp, but sometimes—like now—EJ wondered if CoraLee would ever stop being mean.
“EJ, your basketball skills are Paynefully pathetic! Shoot. The. Ball!”
“Hey, CoraLee, those words aren’t encouraging to EJ.” Mr. Bergan, the Spooner Elementary phys ed teacher, caught CoraLee off guard, and EJ saw her blush. If there was one thing CoraLee hated, it was being called out by a teacher. “How about you try again?”
“What I was saying was, shoot the ball, EJ—you can do it!” The blushing CoraLee tried to make a quick recovery in front of the teacher, but Mr. Bergan wasn’t fooled at all. “That’s better. CoraLee, why don’t you come help me hang up some jump ropes and Hula-Hoops from kinder-gym class, and then you can come back into the obstacle course rotation?”
EJ and CoraLee both knew jump rope and Hula-Hoop duty was a mild punishment for the unkind words the teacher had heard come from CoraLee’s mouth. “Yes, sir,” she mumbled, but then whispered so Mr. Bergan couldn’t hear, “This isn’t over, royal Payne.” EJ waved and stuck her lower lip out in a mocking sad face at CoraLee as she followed Mr. Bergan.
Without the pressure of CoraLee taunting her to make a basket, EJ was able to make a layup easily. She set the basketball in the rack along the wall and took a moment to enjoy the hubbub as her twenty-two classmates played at stations set up around the gymnasium. From basketball and tumbling on mats to jumping through hoops and double-dutch, there really was something for everyone.
As she followed the masking tape arrow on the floor to the next activity station, she was happy to see that it was one of her favorites: beanbag launchers. These crazy contraptions looked like small teeter-totters that you would load a beanbag on one end and then stomp on the other end to send the beanbag up in the air, finally catching the projectile on the way down. Students were supposed to launch and catch the beanbag five times before moving on.
EJ’s best friend, Macy Russell, was at one of the launchers. As EJ took a spot at the empty launcher next to her, Macy gave a colossal stomp, and the beanbag soared a good ten feet in the air.
“Nice one, Mace!” EJ grinned.
“Wha—?” Macy startled and her attention swiveled from the beanbag to EJ. “Oh, hey, EJ!”
Thunk. The beanbag landed squarely on Macy’s athletic-shoed foot. “I don’t think I could’ve done that if I tried!” Macy said. “I wish I could stick the landing in my gymnastic events half as well as this beanbag just did.” The girls laughed.
Soon the friends were locked in a contest to see who could launch their beanbag higher. EJ seemed to have the raw strength needed to get maximum height, but Macy had amazing accuracy—it turned out she actually could get a beanbag to land on her foot if she tried. Or her head. Or even EJ’s head.
“It’s too bad there’s no career potential in beanbag launching,” Macy said. “If there was, you could add it to your list of things you want to do when you grow up.”
“Well, we could defend a castle with these catapults,” EJ said. “There have to be castles that need defending somewhere. Like Camelot….”
“I dub thee Dame Macy, order of beanbag, first class, a Ninja of the Square Table. And I am Dame EJ, heir of the Royal Payne dynasty, first class, a Ninja of the Square Table.”
“It’s an honor to serve alongside you, Dame EJ.” Macy adjusts her black ninja mask so she can see clearly through the eye opening.
“Our goal today is the same as it is every day, my fellow Ninjas of the Square Table.” EJ addresses the crowd of stealthy black-wearing individuals gathered around her. She motions to the thick stone wall fortress they’re all standing in front of. “And that goal is to protect the people of Camelot from enemies who mean to do us harm.”
The ninjas peer silently at their beloved home. Merchants in the square selling fresh produce and goods. Children skipping through the streets singing folk songs. Old men playing a game of chess around the edge of the fountain. Their beloved King Arthur ruling justly from his throne.
“All of these things can be gone in a second if we let the wrong person past the fortress gate.” The ninjas’ bright eyes turn back to their leader. EJ sees their determination and—even more than that—dedication. “What say you, my friends?”
“I speak for all of us, because as ninjas they are silent,” Dame Macy replies. “We join with you, Dame EJ, your Royal Payneness.” As if on cue, the ninjas press their pointer fingers to their masks in the “hush” gesture and bow reverently. EJ smiles, nods, and pulls her ninja mask down to cover her face.
“You guys are hogging the beanbag launchers.” CoraLee’s shrill voice sliced through the daydream. “Let me have a turn!”
“Who goes there?” Dame EJ calls out, motioning to her ninja soldiers to load ammunition into the catapults. “Ye shall not gain entry to Camelot without the proper permission.”
“What are talking about you, you weirdo?” CoraLee huffed. “Okay, fine, I’ll play along in your bizarre little game.” She continued, mumbling, “’Tis I, Princess CoraLee of the kingdom of, um, Spooner.”
EJ rolled her eyes, convinced that CoraLee must have the smallest imagination of anyone she knew.
“Princess CoraLee of Spooner, you have been found guilty of insults, bullying, and general tattle-taleyness.” EJ peers off the edge of the wall at the princess, dressed in the puffiest bubblegum-colored ball gown she’s ever seen. “But the king is a forgiving king, and if you will promise to change your ways, he will grant you entry to Camelot.”
“How dare you accuse me of such things?” Princess CoraLee’s dress quivers as her temper tantrum gains strength. “You—you are nothing more than a servant! So why don’t you fetch my slippers, servant? Do it NOW!”
“Mr. Bergan! EJ and Macy won’t let me—”
“Fire!” At least forty rocks soar through the air toward Princess CoraLee, who immediately runs in the opposite direction.
Tweeeeeeeet! “Time to clean up and head back to class,” Mr. Bergan called out.
“Camelot is safe for another day.” Macy picked up her beanbag launcher and propped it on her shoulder.
“Well done, Dame Macy.” EJ grinned at her friend and pressed her finger to her lips.
Chapter 5
DOWN ON ONE KNEE
February 28
Dear Diary,
Sometimes (okay, most of the time) it feels like there’s nothing to do in Spooner during the winter. When the deep freeze sets in and temperatures dip to the single digits (on a warm day), we can’t be outside for more than two minutes without turning into kidsicles. So it’s indoor activities for a solid four months of the year here in Wisconsin.
Today we’re going to one of my favorite places in Spooner: Billy and Bobby’s Bowl-a-Rama. (Isn’t that a fantastic name for a bowling alley?) Billy and Bobby are grandpa-aged identical twins who have lived in Spooner their whole lives. And when I say identical I mean identical. They dress alike, talk alike, and I’m pretty sure they each know what the other is thinking. There’s a legend that the two boys spent their entire third-grade year at Spooner Elementary pretending to be each other, tricking the teachers so that some days Billy sat at Bobby’s desk and vice versa, and they’d intentionally get bad grades on each other’s homework—but nobody could tell them apart enough to be able to catch them
in the act. I don’t know if I believe it or not, but it’s a pretty good story anyway.
The best thing about going bowling today is that my favoritest neighbor and second-favoritest neighbor, Mrs. Winkle and Mr. Johnson, are going, too! It’s going to be a girls versus boys battle: Mom, Mrs. Winkle, and me against Dad, Mr. Johnson, and Isaac. Faith will be there to cheer (or shriek and blow raspberries, more likely) both teams on. But let’s be real, Diary, the boys will be no match for us. Mrs. Winkle bowls on a league of retired teachers, and she has bowled not one but two perfect games in her life. She even has her photo up on the “300 Club” board at the Bowl-a-Rama, where she’s wearing a neon-yellow bowling shirt that says “Livin’ la Vida ‘80s” across the front. (“We were celebrating our favorite decade—the 1980s were a decade of thrilling colors, dear,” Mrs. Winkle told me.)
For the boys’ team, today will be the first time Isaac has ever bowled without bumpers, so I’m betting that at least his first three frames will be gutter balls. (I will try not to laugh. But I’m sure I will.)
EJ
EJ stood in front of the rows of colorful balls, looking for the perfect shade of red. Soon she spotted a nice pearly one on the bottom row.
“Aw, rats—sixteen pounds!” EJ knew better than to try to pick up a ball that heavy. At Macy’s tenth birthday party, EJ had tried bowling with a beautiful red fifteen-pounder and had almost ended up with a broken foot.
“EJ, the kid balls are over here!” Isaac waved at EJ from across the room. “Look at this Star Wars one I found!” Sure enough, Isaac had a hand on a black bowling ball that had an intricate pattern of stars and the movie logo on it.
“Nice!” EJ hoped she’d be able to find one as cool.
“But wait, there’s more.” Isaac lifted the ball from the rack to reveal a picture of Darth Vader’s head on the opposite side of the ball. “The force is strong within this ball. (Inhale, exhale.) Luke, I am your bowling ball. (Inhale, exhale.)”