Chapter Ten

“Have you heard the news?” Mary Eliza popped out from behind her locker. “Sally Smith is moving!”

“I know. Jane told me,” said Isabelle. “She’s having a farewell party for Sally. She’s inviting everyone.”

“Everyone?” Mary Eliza drew herself up haughtily. “That’s a lot.”

“It’s twenty-two, including Mrs. Esposito. My mother’s helping Jane’s mother.” Isabelle aimed a neat blow in Mary Eliza’s direction. “Only one cupcake to a person,” she hissed. “That’s the rule.”

Mary Eliza backed off and hissed back, “I’m getting Sally’s job!”

“What job?” Isabelle asked, knowing perfectly well what job.

“Art editor of The Bee.” The Bee was the class paper. Some kids wanted to call it The Bumble Bee but that was voted down as being too buzzy.

“It just so happens I have a picture with me I drew only this morning.” Mary Eliza dove down into her briefcase and pulled out a drawing of a girl in a ballet suit.

Mary Eliza was the only person in the fifth grade, maybe even in the entire school, who had a briefcase.

Isabelle squinted at the picture. “It looks just like you,” she said, “only not as ugly.” Then she put out her arms and soared in circles around Mary Eliza, making airplane noises, preparing for takeoff.

Insults bounced off Mary Eliza like bullets off Superman. “It’s interesting you should say that, because it is me,” Mary Eliza said with pride. “A good likeness, if I do say so. Notice the placement of the feet, how the arm is extended. Perfect form. I am the artist as well as the artist’s model. You might say I’m a shoo-in to be the new art editor of The Bee.”

“You might but you won’t catch me saying it,” Isabelle said. “I wouldn’t say you were a shoo-in if you tied me to a tree and poured honey on my nose so the ants would lick me to death.”

“Ants can’t lick you to death,” Mary Eliza said, crossing her arms on her chest and slitting her eyes, getting ready to pounce.

Isabelle backed off. She wondered if it was possible to run backwards. She’d never find out until she gave it a try. Moving backwards, she picked up speed.

“Hey! Watch where you’re going!” Herbie hollered, as she bumped into him.

“Oh, hi. I thought you were still sick,” Isabelle said. “I thought maybe your mother locked you in so the germs couldn’t find you.”

“She wanted to, but I told her if I missed any more school, I might get left back. So she wrote a note to excuse me from recess and gym so I wouldn’t get overheated,” Herbie explained.

“I thought only cars got overheated,” Isabelle said. “I didn’t know people did too.”

“There’s your little brother!” Mary Eliza shouted as Guy came down the hall.

“She doesn’t have any little brother,” Herbie said, scowling.

“I knew it! I knew it!” Mary Eliza cried.

“You can come to my house today if you want,” Guy said. “My mother said it’s all right.”

“Today’s my last day to do the route,” Isabelle said. “Philip owes me a buck fifty times two.”

“A buck fifty times two!” Herbie whistled.

“Whose little brother is he, then?”

“Go paint yourself into a corner, why don’t you?” Isabelle suggested.

Mary Eliza twirled a few times to clear her head. “I might just do that,” she said. “A portrait of the artist sitting in a corner. Another first for me.”

“How about sitting on a tuffet, eating your curds and whey?” Herbie said.

“What’s a tuffet?” Mary Eliza said.

“You don’t know what a tuffet is?” Isabelle exclaimed, popping her eyes out.

“I bet you don’t know what a tuffet is either, smarty pants. What’s a tuffet, then?” Mary Eliza yelled.

“I’m not telling,” Isabelle said. She made herself stand quietly and smile at Mary Eliza. It was easier to smile than it was to stand quietly. Much easier. But she did it. Then she turned and walked away—walked, not ran. All the way down the hall, she felt Mary Eliza’s eyes on her.

Slowly, slowly. Walk, do not run.

Once around the corner she broke into a fifty-yard dash.

“Slow down!” she heard someone yell.

A sixth-grade traffic cop, the worst kind. Isabelle slowed down, feeling, in some way, victorious.

What is a tuffet anyway?