Being Teddy Roosevelt (5 page)

Broad-brimmed hat. Grant had one that Riley had borrowed. Check.

No leather jacket. That had been impossible to find. But Riley looked suitably rugged in jeans and a plaid flannel shirt. Check.

Carefully, Riley peeled off the tape from the sticky back of his mustache and pressed the mustache between his nose and his upper lip.

Check.

“Bully!” Riley pronounced. It was cool to lookin the mirror and see Teddy Roosevelt looking back at him.

“Are you ready to head off to school, Teddy?” his mother asked, giving him a hug.

Riley grinned. “Charge!” He felt ready to head off to the White House.

On the playground, Riley saw some other kids already in costume. Napoleon swaggered around in a navy-blue military uniform. Pocahontas was wearing a brown fringed tunic with matching leggings; her hair hung in two long dark braids.

Helen Keller had on an old-fashioned dress, but she wasn’t blind or deaf yet. Riley wondered if Sophie would use a blindfold and earplugs all afternoon long, or just pretend. Either way, it would be interesting to see.

Queen Elizabeth was in her usual jeans and T-shirt, but she carried a large shopping bag, stuffed with something made of bright purple velvet.

Grant, too, showed up in regular clothes, with a much smaller shopping bag in hand.

“Is it in there?” Riley asked.

“One super-duper, deluxe, premium-grade loincloth. I’m not going to put it on until after lunch. My mom thought it would be too distracting.”

Riley thought Grant’s mom was probably right. You could forget you were wearing a mustache if you didn’t happen to catch a glimpse of your reflection somewhere. But there was no way that you could forget you were wearing a loincloth. Or that anyone would let you forget.

The morning dragged. Teddy Roosevelt would have done long division with gusto—he did everything with gusto—but it was hard when the answer to the problem on the board was 324, with a remainder of 7, and Riley came up with 410, with a remainder of 8. He’d have to work harder on his math homework if he was going to get to buy Sophie’s brother’s saxophone. With the yard sale profits, he had $40.21 now. He was almost halfway there.

Finally, after lunch, Mrs. Harrow sent the kids who weren’t in costume to the restrooms to change. The others sat at their desks and waited.

When Queen Elizabeth appeared, a ripple of astonishment ran through the classroom. There she stood, in an extremely fancy, long, purple-velvet, olden-days gown, with a crisp, stiff ruff around her neck. A crown sat on her newly red hair—a wig, Riley guessed. In her right hand she held a royal scepter.

Riley almost leaped to his feet to bow, but he stopped himself in time.

“What’s happening? Who came in?” Sophie asked Riley. She had her blindfold on, but not her earplugs. Riley was glad Sophie wasn’t trying to be blind and deaf simultaneously. Maybe she would alternate: blind for thirty minutes, deaf for thirty minutes.

“Erika has a great Queen Elizabeth outfit,” Riley told her.

“Does she have a crown?”

“A crown
and
a wig. And she’s carrying a scepter.”

Sophie clicked her teeth in frustration. Riley understood. It was one thing to be blind while doing homework at the library. It was another thing to be blind at the biography tea.

Socrates entered, looking embarrassed in a toga. Marie Curie bustled by in a lab coat.

“Has anyone seen Grant?” Mrs. Harrow asked Shakespeare and Isaac Newton, who had just emerged from the boys’ room in their costumes. “He’s the only one we’re still missing.”

“He’s coming,” Shakespeare said. Isaac Newton gave a chuckle that came out sounding more like a snort.

Riley flipped through his note cards one last time. He wanted to have all his facts straight in case anyone asked Teddy Roosevelt any hard questions.

Suddenly the room exploded into shrieks of laughter. Riley looked up, startled.

Mahatma Gandhi had entered.

In a loincloth.

And completely bald.

“Grant!” Mrs. Harrow cried out.

“The name is Gandhi. Mahatma Gandhi.”

“Your hair!”

“I shaved it off. I brought in my dad’s electric razor and plugged it into an outlet in the boys’ room.”

“Do your parents know about this?” Mrs. Harrow asked faintly.

Grant nodded. “I told them I needed to do it to get an A. So do I get an A?”

Mrs. Harrow visibly pulled herself back together. “The grade for our biography unit is based on the written report, which I’ll hand back in a minute, and on the costume, and on how well you act as your character at the tea party. But for your costume today, yes, you get an A.”

Riley felt a tiny bit hurt that Grant hadn’t told him about his head-shaving plan. But he also felt glad that he had the coolest best friend of anyone.

Most of all, he felt nervous about his grade on the report. His mother would never let him do instrumental music if he ended up with a C or a D. But if he got a B—or even better than a B …

“All right, class,” Mrs. Harrow said. “I’ll give you your reports, and then we’ll move into the library, where our room mothers have set up for our tea party.”

She handed back the reports in alphabetical order. Grant got his before Riley.

“A,” he signaled to Riley.

Mrs. Harrow laid Riley’s report on his desk. He could hardly bear to make himself look at the grade at the end, but he did.

A-!

Mrs. Harrow had written, “Great job, Riley! Lots of interesting details, especially about the Roosevelt family’s hikes. Next time, check your spelling.” It was the best grade Riley had gotten on a report, ever.

“I can’t see my grade!” Sophie wailed when Mrs. Harrow placed Sophie’s report on her desk.

As if Sophie needed to look to know she had gotten an A+.

Riley’s own A–made him feel generous. “Do you want me to look for you?” he offered.

She hesitated. “Okay.”

Riley peeked. “A-plus.”

Sophie sighed with satisfaction. “Thanks, Riley.”

“Hey,” Riley said, since Sophie was being so friendly. “I have over forty dollars saved up so far, to buy your brother’s saxophone.”

She didn’t reply.

“The one I saw at your yard sale?” Riley said, to remind her.

With her blindfold on, Riley couldn’t see Sophie’s eyes. But her mouth looked stricken. “He already sold it,” Sophie said.

“No!” Riley couldn’t believe it. His one best chance at a sax, gone just like that.

“Two days ago. I didn’t know you were saving up for it. I’m so sorry, Riley.”

“Famous authors, artists, inventors, generals, presidents, kings, queens, and all you contributors to the culture and civilization of our world,” Mrs. Harrow said in a grand voice, “please follow me to the library for our biography tea.”

Numb, Riley stood up. He wasn’t Teddy Roosevelt anymore, just a kid who didn’t have a saxophone and would never have one.

“Ow!” Sophie cried out crossly as she banged her shin into a chair. “I hate being blind!”

“I hate wearing a loincloth,” Grant said, but Riley didn’t think he meant it. Grant still looked pretty pleased about the whole thing.

“I hate wearing a dress,” Erika said. “If I really was a queen, the first thing I’d do is outlaw dresses.”

To Riley’s surprise, Erika took Sophie’s arm and helped her walk in the procession to the library. Had she gotten nicer since becoming a queen?

Riley fell into step beside Grant. “Sophie told me her brother just sold his sax,” Riley said, trying to keep his voice steady.

“Bummer,” Grant said.

It was more than a bummer. It was the worst thing that had happened to Riley since his dad left five years ago. “So where am I supposed to get a saxophone now?” This time his voice did wobble.

“We’ll think of something,” Grant said. “Mahatma and Teddy will think of something.”

Riley felt like giving up instead.

All the tables in the library were covered with white tablecloths and set with china plates, cups, and saucers; stiff cloth napkins; and forks and spoons that gleamed like real silver. On each table stood a vase full of flowers, and two teapots. Every teapot was different. Riley saw one shaped like a little house and one shaped like a black-and-white cow.

“Look for your name cards,” Mrs. Harrow instructed them.

Riley searched for his. He was at a table with Gandhi, Queen Elizabeth, Napoleon, Abraham Lincoln, and Queen Victoria.

“I thought the six of you might enjoy talking politics,” Mrs. Harrow said as she stopped at their table to pour tea.

One of their teapots was fat and round and yellow; the other was shaped like Humpty Dumpty. Several of the mothers were going from table to table with plates of small sandwiches, pastries, and cut-up fruit. Sophie’s mom was there helping, but Grant’s mom and Riley’s mom had to be at work.

“So, Queen Victoria,” Grant said to Mandy, the girl who was dressed up as Queen Victoria. “You conquered India to add it to the British Empire, but I liberated it.”

Queen Victoria scowled. Maybe it wasn’t the best idea to talk politics.

What else could they talk about? All Riley wanted to talk about was how to get a saxophone. But he couldn’t very well ask Mahatma Gandhi, Abraham Lincoln, Queen Elizabeth, Queen Victoria, or Napoleon.

Or could he?

“I have a question,” Riley said.

“Yes, Teddy?” Queen Elizabeth said.

“Well, it’s not really a Teddy Roosevelt question. It’s just a question. If you wanted something more than anything in the world, and you didn’t have the money to buy it, how would you get it?”

“Conquer it,” said Napoleon.

“I guess I could behead anyone who wouldn’t give it to me,” Queen Elizabeth said, “but that gets old after a while.”

“I’d go on a hunger strike until someone gave it to me,” Gandhi said, stuffing a huge cookie in his mouth.

“I’d write a speech about it,” Abraham Lincoln said. “Four score and seven years ago, I wanted this thing.”

Queen Victoria appeared to be thinking. “It would depend on what kind of thing it was,” she said wisely. “What would you do, Teddy?”

What
would
Teddy do? Riley sighed. “I’d keep on working and working and never give up.”

Riley was no closer to knowing what to do than he had been before. Conquering, beheading, going on hunger strikes, giving speeches—those weren’t really helpful suggestions. Working hard was helpful, sort of. But Riley had already worked so hard. He had worked hard enough on his Teddy Roosevelt report to get an A–. He had worked hard with Grant on the yard sale to earn $36. What was he supposed to do now? He could ask his mom again, but he had heard her complaining about bills just the other day.

Suddenly from Sophie’s table there came a deafening crash. It was followed by a piercingscream. Riley could see a teapot—a pink one with red roses all over it—shattered on the floor. An enormous pool of tea was spreading everywhere.

Sophie jumped up from the table and yanked off her blindfold.

“I can’t do it!” she cried. “I can’t be blind. Helen Keller was blind
and
deaf, but I can’t be blind even for one hour!”

Sophie’s mother gave her a hug as the other mothers scurried to get paper towels to soak up the tea and sweep up the teapot pieces.

“It’s hard,” Mrs. Harrow told Sophie. “Being Helen Keller is hard. But, Sophie, no one expected you to really
be
blind this afternoon, at our tea. We expected you to pretend. We’re all just pretending, you know.”

Riley was pretending most of all. He wasn’t Teddy Roosevelt any more than Sophie was Helen Keller. He couldn’t charge up a hill in a war, or be elected President, or dig the Panama Canal. He couldn’t even get himself a saxophone so he could do fourth-grade instrumental music.

Maybe he should rip off his mustache, the way Sophie had ripped off her blindfold. Maybe he, too, should shout out, “I can’t do it! I give up!”

He must have looked as bad as he felt, because Queen Elizabeth said to him in her new kind voice, “What’s wrong, Teddy?”

Riley couldn’t keep it inside any longer. “I don’t have a saxophone.”

Queen Elizabeth looked genuinely puzzled. “Did Teddy Roosevelt want to play the saxophone?”