Chapter Two

Wave like Wheat

Before I go to lunch, I leave a note on Ms. Garcia’s chair.

Dear Ms. Garcia,

Are we going to find out about the surprise today? I’m soooooo tired of waiting. You told me not to ask again in class, but I’m not in class right now, I’m outside playing soccer (I hope—I don’t actually know because I’m not actually outside yet), and I think you are eating lunch at your desk, reading my note. Unless you have yard duty. If you do, please close this note right now, because I might be in class when you find this note and you might be exasperated.

Shalom,

Lola Levine

When I come back from lunch, Ms. Garcia is smiling and I don’t see my note, so I guess she isn’t exasperated with me. Ms. Garcia is the best.

“Are you ready for the surprise?” Ms. Garcia asks.

“Yes!” we say. Finally. I couldn’t even concentrate during the soccer game over lunch. Alyssa Goldstein scored on me, which I disliked very much.

“For the next eight weeks, we are going to have a special drama class, with a special drama teacher who will come twice a week,” Ms. Garcia says. “At the end of the class, we will have a class play!”

A new teacher? I’m not sure how I feel about that. Ms. Garcia is my favorite teacher ever. And I’m not sure what a drama class involves.

I have heard Mom use the word “dramatic.” Last time my grandma Levine visited, for example, I heard Mom ask Dad, “Why is your mother so dramatic?” I didn’t know what she meant, so I borrowed Mom’s dictionary. There were a lot of different definitions for “dramatic,” but I picked the ones that said:

1. extreme and sudden

2. attracting attention; causing people to look and listen

Mom must have been talking about the way Bubbe hugs extremely tight. And now that I think about it, Bubbe does get a lot of attention, mostly because of how she dresses. She looks like a rainbow and always wears colorful shawls and scarves. I think she is why my dad became an artist.

And it is easy to listen carefully when Bubbe talks, because she talks really, really loud. I talk loud, too. Especially on the soccer field. And sometimes in class. Last year, when I was in first grade, I used to get in trouble a lot for being loud. My teacher would say, “Lola Levine, use your inside voice.”

“This IS my INSIDE voice,” I always answered. For some reason, my teacher didn’t like that answer very much. But it seemed like when she talked to me, she always used a voice you could hear all the way outside—it was very confusing.

Ms. Garcia lines us up, and we get ready to go to the gym.

“Psst. Josh!” I say. “Do you think I’m dramatic?”

“Definitely,” Josh whispers back, smiling. We get to the gym, where our new teacher is waiting.

“Students,” Ms. Garcia says, “give a warm Northland Elementary welcome to Ms. Tinkle.” When I see Ms. Tinkle, I’m not sure where to look. I’ve never seen someone with so many sparkles. She has on big, shiny butterfly earrings and about a hundred bracelets, which click and clang together when she moves her arms. And guess what? Ms. Tinkle moves her arms a lot.

“Good afternoon, students!” she says with a wave of her arms. She sort of reminds me of a butterfly, actually, because she is wearing a big orange shirt and green pants. I see that she’s wearing sandals, too, with purple glitter toenail polish. She even has rings on her toes! Wait until I tell Mom.