“Hey, look at this,” Danny said.
Cam Jansen and her friends Eric and Beth looked.
Danny put a straw into his milk container. He blew milk bubbles that spilled onto the lunchroom table.
“That’s not funny,” Eric said.
“Well, this will be funny,” Danny said.
His cream cheese and jelly sandwich, a large heart-shaped cookie, and an apple were on the table. Danny unwrapped the sandwich, took off the top piece of bread, and put it on his nose. It stuck.
Cam and Eric started talking about math. Their teacher, Ms. Benson, had just taught a lesson on different kinds of triangles. Beth ate her sandwich.
“You’re not looking. You’re not laughing,” Danny said.
“I’m eating,” Beth told him. “That’s why I’m here.”
Danny took the bread off his nose and put it on his chin.
“Look now,” he said. “I have a beard. I’m Abraham Lincoln.”
“Danny, why don’t you just eat your lunch,” Beth said. She showed Danny his heart-shaped cookie. “Look at what your mother wrote on your dessert.”
I Love You was written in red icing across the front of the cookie.
“That’s because it’s Valentine’s Day,” Danny said. “She always gives me heart cookies on Valentine’s Day.”
Beth told him, “Your mother wants you to eat your lunch.”
“And I want to wear my lunch,” Danny said.
When Danny spoke, the bread on his chin went up and down. Children at the next table laughed.
“Don’t laugh,” Beth told them. “If you laugh when he’s silly, he gets sillier.”
Danny did get sillier. He stood on his chair and made chicken noises.
“Cluck! Cluck! Cluck!”
He held up his apple and said, “I laid a red egg.” He hugged it and said, “My little baby.”
The children at the next table didn’t laugh.
“You’re right,” a boy said. “He did get sillier.”
Danny looked at the children at the next table. They were eating. He looked at Cam, Eric, and Beth. They were eating, too. Danny sat down. He took the bread off his chin and bit into it.
“Your mother is nice,” Eric said to Danny. “She’s a reading teacher,” he told Cam and Beth. “In first grade, when I was having trouble learning to read, she helped me.”
“Cam,” Beth said. “How is your mother? When will she have the baby?”
“Soon, I think,” Cam answered. “Maybe in a few weeks. She said I’ll be surprised.”
“What’s the surprise?” Eric asked. “You know you’re getting a sister.”
“Maybe the surprise is, she’ll be like Cam,” Danny said. “She’ll have a picture memory, too. She’ll be born holding a camera. Instead of crying ‘Boo hoo,’ she’ll cry, ‘Click! Click!’”
Cam has an amazing photographic memory. It’s as if she has pictures of whatever she’s seen stored in her head. Whenever she wants to be sure she remembers something, she looks at it, blinks her eyes, and says, “Click!” Cam says that’s the sound her mental camera makes when it takes a picture. When Cam wants to remember something she’s seen, she says, “Click!” again.
Cam’s real name is Jennifer Jansen, but when people found out about her amazing memory they started calling her, “The Camera.” Soon “The Camera” became just “Cam.”
Danny said, “We can call your new sister Film Jansen or Flash Jansen or Click Jansen.”
Cam said, “I like the name Alice. It means ‘truth.’”
Cam, Eric, and Beth had finished eating their lunches. They put the wrappers from their sandwiches and their empty milk containers in their lunch bags and threw them away.
“Hurry,” Beth told Danny. “Lunchtime is almost over.”
Danny took a big bite of his apple. Before he chewed it, he took a big bite of his heart-shaped cookie. His mouth was full. As he chewed the apple and cookie, crumbs fell onto the table.
Rrrr! Rrrr!
“That’s the bell,” Beth said. “Let’s go.”
Cam, Eric, and Beth started to leave the lunchroom.
“Wghmt aw we!” Danny said.
“What?” Beth asked.
Cam told her, “I think he said, ‘Wait for me.’”
Danny threw away his wrappers. He wiped the cream cheese and jelly off his face with his sleeve and said, “I’m ready.”
They left the lunchroom and walked toward their classroom.
The halls were decorated with large paper hearts. In the middle of each heart was a message. Among them were, I Love to Learn, I Love to Read, and I Love School.
The children turned the corner. Their classroom was straight ahead, at the very end of the hall.
“Hey,” Cam said. “Someone is talking to Ms. Benson.”
“Maybe it’s your mother,” Beth said to Danny. “Maybe you’re in trouble.”
“No,” Danny said as they got closer. “It’s Eric’s mother.”
