We had thirty minutes left before the bell rang for us to go home. Miss Fuqua asked the class, “Could you please clean up around your desks?” My area was clean. Manny Flemon had crayons, cut-up strips of paper, and glue balls that looked like boogers stuck to his desk.

When we finished, we went to the coat closet and grabbed our things, one group at a time. Then Miss Fuqua surprised us, especially me, when she stood before the class and said, “Pluto-3 has been given the honor of selecting a student to go to the office and read the first-day-of-school announcements.”

I crossed my fingers, closed my eyes to make a wish, and tried hard not to blurt out, “Me, me, me!” But Miss Fuqua kept looking at Marquetta Loopy, like she’d been chosen. I just kept wishing. Me. Me. Me. And, yeah! My wish came true. Miss Fuqua walked past grumpy-faced Marquetta Loopy and came right over to me. “You’ll be first, Ruby Booker. You’ve been such a good leader and such an interesting new member of Pluto-3. Make us proud.”

This was my turn to shine! Me. Me. Me. The plan I thought up to finally get everyone’s attention could happen now. This was so perfect. I smiled at Marquetta, even though she was still frowning.

Miss Fuqua said I could come back later to get my stuff from the classroom. She said reading the announcements would only take about three minutes. I grabbed the hall pass from a hook by the door and tore down the hall like a jet-powered kid.

I went down the steps, and there was Miss Cherrybaum fussing, in her high, squeaky, chipmunk voice, at some boy who had been caught running down the stairs, throwing pieces of paper off the banister.

When I walked past Miss Cherrybaum and the goofy-looking boy who got caught, Miss Cherrybaum stopped me and said, “I’m counting on you to do a good job with those announcements, Miss Ruby Booker.” Miss Cherrybaum smiled at me and then turned back to the boy. The flower that she had in her hair from the assembly was still there. Now that I was up close, I could see that it was real.

“Your flower is pretty, Miss Cherrybaum. It looks good on you,” I told her. She looked at me again and smiled even wider. She told me to go into her office and wait for her to come in. So that’s what I did. No one was in the office at the time. Even the secretary, Miss Funkhouser, had stepped out for a break.

When I walked into Miss Cherrybaum’s office, the first thing I noticed was the big golden microphone for the PA system sitting on her desk. That was the same microphone that kept interrupting my moments of greatness all day. The announcements were written on a piece of paper on her desk. They looked short and sweet. The button to turn on the microphone was calling my name. All I had to do was flick it on when the time came.

I thought that maybe Miss Cherrybaum would think it was very leader-like to read the announcements without being told. But really, the announcements were the last thing on my mind. I thought that maybe it was my turn to flip the switch and introduce myself to the whole school. But then I stopped myself. What are you doing, Ruby Booker!? I thought.

I started to walk out of Miss Cherrybaum’s office when the words to “Cotton Candy Clouds” came over me. This was the right moment to jump on! There was the microphone. And there I stood, ready to share with the whole school who the real Ruby Booker was. I shut the door to the office, but I didn’t lock it. I walked back over to the desk, turned on the microphone, and took a deep, deep breath.

“Good afternoon, Hope Road. This is Ruby Booker from Miss Fuqua’s third-grade class.” I was a little nervous, too. I wanted to say my name but not say anything about my brothers. This was about me, not them. I continued, “Instead of reading the announcements, I want to do something different. Here we go.”

And then … I sang. I sang loud. I sang strong. I sang for the whole school to hear:

“When the sun hits the clouds

And rainbows kiss the sky,

A sweet wind blows, and then I know

That today is mine, all mine.”

I knew that most of the kids, especially the girls, were fans of the Crazy Cutie Crew, so I could almost see the kids sitting at their seats and singing the words along with me. Through the walls, I could even hear kids from the classrooms next to the office singing. How cool was that?!

Nobody told me to sing. I just did it. I knew I was probably going to get in trouble for singing over the PA system, but it just seemed like the right time to shine. When I finished singing “today is mine, all mine” for the second time, Miss Cherrybaum came rushing through the door and then shut it behind her. I switched the microphone off after I told the entire school, “Let’s have a good school year, y’all.” The wide smile Miss Cherrybaum had given me in the hallway had gone away. Miss Cherrybaum pointed at the seat in front of her desk. That meant for me to sit down. So I did.

Miss Cherrybaum came over to her seat behind the desk. She stared at me over the golden microphone. I just knew I would be in so much trouble. What made me do something so dumb?

All of a sudden, Miss Cherrybaum broke into a smile and said, chipmunk-style, “Ruby Booker, THAT WAS GREAT!”

“What? I mean … what do you mean?” I asked Miss Cherrybaum.

“That was the most colorful, well-prepared yet unexpected school announcement I’ve ever heard. Your voice is beautiful!”

I just sat there blinking.

“Ruby Booker, you can come back to sing and read the announcements anytime!” Miss Cherrybaum squeaked. She also said that my voice reminded her of Ella Fitzgerald’s, a famous singer from the old days. That was probably a compliment.

Even if every kid in the school still didn’t know who I was, they would never forget the voice that floated out of the speakers into their classrooms. One thing was for sure. I knew three boys in this school who would now have to see me as an equal Booker. As long as they knew that I would be as big a Booker as they were at Hope Road Academy, that’s all that mattered to me.

When I walked back into Pluto-3, Miss Fuqua and the rest of my classmates gave me a standing ovation. Even Marquetta Loopy was standing.