As soon as the bell rang at the end of the day, I ran outside to find Penny. The kindergarteners get out of school five minutes before everyone else, so I knew she’d be waiting for me. I always meet Penny, her friend Zoey, and whoever is picking us up that day right by the flagpole next to the parking lot.
Evie raced to catch up with me—she’s part of our carpool too, but she couldn’t run as fast because she was in silver sparkly shoes instead of sneakers. For clothes she had on a pink plaid skirt and a white blouse. It wasn’t school picture day or anything. That’s how Evie always dresses. I don’t think she even owns any clothes that aren’t fancy.
When we got to the usual meeting spot, Penny wasn’t there.
“Penny’s in trouble!” Zoey called out.
Then she filled Evie and me in on what happened.
There’s a new boy in Penny’s kindergarten class. At lunchtime, he asked Penny to trade her candy for his celery. She didn’t want to. Obviously. Who would want celery instead of candy? Not me! But the new boy got mad and called Penny a baby. That’s when Penny stomped on his foot. REALLY hard. Then Miss Griffin sent Penny to Mr. O’Neil’s office.
Miss Griffin is Penny’s kindergarten teacher. I had her too, but she never sent me to the principal’s office. In fact, NO ONE has ever sent me to the principal. I don’t even know what his office looks like!
“Where is Penny now?” I asked Zoey. “Still with Mr. O’Neil?”
“No. But he called her parents.”
“They’re also my parents,” I reminded her.
“Right. And her dad—”
“He’s also my dad.”
“Yeah, yeah, I know. He came to pick her up as soon as school was over. He said she couldn’t come over because she’s not allowed to have a play date after she stomps on someone’s foot. Penny said it wasn’t fair.”
That’s exactly what Penny would say about something like that. It’s not fair is the sentence she says the most out of all the sentences in the world.
“Really it’s not fair to me,” Zoey continued. “Because I didn’t stomp on anyone’s foot and now I don’t get a play date. It’s all Bruce’s fault!”
“Now, now, Zoey,” Mrs. Benson said. Mrs. Benson is Zoey’s mom, and also the Monday carpool driver. My best friend Willa’s dad used to drive carpool on Mondays. But Willa’s family moved to Pennsylvania and the whole schedule got switched around.
“But it’s true!” Zoey insisted. “It’s not fair!”
We pulled up outside Evie’s house a few minutes later.
Actually, Evie doesn’t live in a house. She lives in an apartment. Except she doesn’t say apartment. She says flat. Here are some more things she says:
Chips instead of French fries
Lift instead of elevator
Loo instead of bathroom
It’s because she’s from England. She has a really cool accent, too. But get this—she thinks I’m the one with an accent! An American accent!
Anyway, back to the story.
Evie’s dad was waiting for us on the sidewalk. He works at home instead of in an office. He’s an artist. Sometimes he paints things and sometimes he draws things on the computer that go up on websites.
“Hi Dad,” Evie said.
“Hi girls,” Mr. King said. “How’s your mom feeling?” he asked me. People always ask how she’s feeling since she’s been pregnant.
“She’s fine,” I said.
“Where’s Bella?” Evie asked. Bella is her puppy. She’s a Maltese, which is a kind of dog that looks like a ball of marshmallow fluff.
“She’s taking a little nap back at the apartment. I think I tired her out during our walk.”
“I can’t wait to show you Bella’s new trick,” Evie told me. “I taught her to sit—in English and French. I want her to be bilingual, like I am.”
Evie is the only third grader in our school taking French. She started it at her old school. Now she gets private lessons with Mrs. Blank in the learning lab. The rest of us will start language classes in fourth grade, but Evie’s been teaching me some words so I’ll be ahead like she is.
Most words I still don’t know. “How do you say ‘sit’?” I asked her.
She said something that sounded like “Ah-see,” but since it was another language, I knew the spelling was probably different. “How do you spell it?” I asked.
“A-S-S-I-S,” she said.
I’d have to add that to the list I have at home–Stella’s French Words.
“It must be hard to teach a dog to sit in TWO languages,” I said.
“Not at all,” Evie said. “When I see her sitting, I say ‘sit’ and ‘assis.’ Then I give her a treat, so she knows she’s done something right.”
Evie, her dad, and I walked up the path to apartment number 307—that’s where the Kings live. “Is Mum home?” Evie asked.
Mr. King shook his head. “She had a trip today, remember?” Evie’s mom is a flight attendant. When she has trips, Mr. King takes care of Evie.
He unlocked the door and pushed it open. “Bella!” Evie called.
“Shh, honey, I told you she was sleeping,” Mr. King said.
“But she always comes to greet me when I get home from school,” Evie said. “She smells me coming up the walkway because she has a particularly keen sense of smell.”
Evie sometimes talks like a grownup. I think that happens when you’re from England, but I’m not sure because Evie’s the only kid I know who comes from there.
“Also because she knows how much I miss her,” Evie continued.
“Did you miss your old dad that much?” Mr. King asked.
“Not quite as much,” Evie admitted. “Sorry Dad.”
Here’s something funny: Evie says “Dad” just like American kids do, but she calls her mom “Mum.”
“Oh, bother,” Mr. King said.
“What?” Evie asked.
“I just realized I forgot to fetch the mail. I’m expecting a work call in the next few minutes. Would you girls mind getting it?”
We both shook our heads no.
“Just don’t run out in the street.”
“Duh,” Evie said.
“That’s how you talk now that you’re in America?”
“No, not really,” Evie said. “That’s just what a boy in school always says.”
Inside, we could hear the phone start to ring. Mr. King handed Evie his mailbox key. The two of us headed back out.
In Hilltop Acres, all the mailboxes for all the different apartments are in the same place, stacked one on top of the other. Like this.
It’s a smart idea to have a key to open the mailbox, so no one can steal anything. At my house, our mailbox is at the end of the driveway, and it doesn’t have a key. Not that anyone has ever stolen our mail, but you never know.
Evie inserted the key into the lock and opened the mailbox. She pulled out a bunch of envelopes and a magazine, and she handed it all over for me to hold while she locked the mailbox back up. I sorted things into size order: the magazine was biggest, then two white envelopes that looked like bills, and then a tiny blue envelope.
Wait a second! The front of the blue envelope said: Miss Evie King. “You got something,” I told her.
“My first mail in Somers!”
“Did you get a lot of mail in England?” I asked.
“No, just for my birthday and such things. I haven’t had a birthday since we’ve been here.”
“Is it your birthday soon?” That’s the only time I get mail, too.
“Not for months.”
I handed it over. “Open it now,” I said.
She did. Inside was a blue card with red letters:
JOSHUA LEWIS IS TURNING NINE!
Join the celebration at Batts Confections
Friday, 4–6 p.m.
Joshua Lewis is the same Joshua who’s in our class. I told Evie in case she didn’t know his last name.
We walked up the sidewalk, back to her house. “You didn’t tell me he was having a party at your store,” she said.
“I didn’t know,” I told her. How come Mom and Dad didn’t tell me? New rule: From now on, if anyone from my class wanted to have a party at the store, they had to tell me first.
“That’s probably why he invited me,” she said.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“I bet you’ll have the invitation waiting for you at home. He had to invite you, because it’s your store. Then he probably invited me because I’m your best friend.”
Evie is really my second-best friend. Willa is my first-best friend—but she moved to Pennsylvania last month, so Evie is my best friend who lives in Somers.
“But I don’t think he should get to have a party in your store since he’s a meanie,” Evie continued. “He made Asher feel bad about his dragon story.”
“I’d rather read Asher’s story than Joshua’s,” I said.
“Me too,” Evie agreed.
We got back to number 307. When Evie pulled open the door, a little ball of marshmallow fluff fur popped out.
“Bella!” I said. “You woke up!”
“You see, she does smell me coming up the walkway,” Evie said. She reached down. But just as she was about to scoop Bella up, she ran off, a marshmallow streak down the steps, across the garden and straight out to the main sidewalk.
Mr. King had told us to avoid the street. Now Bella was headed right toward it. What if she ran into the street and got hit by a car?
“Bella!” we both called after her. “Bella, stop!”
