Chicken Soup for the Kid’s Soul (13 page)

What’s Wrong with a B+?

R
eality isn’t the way you wish things to be, nor the way they appear to be, but the way they actually are.

Robert J. Ringer

It seemed to take forever, but I finally turned thirteen last Saturday. I felt warm and happy inside, and would have spent the day with my friends, but alternating sleet and rain kept me at home. I decided to hang around my room and junk a bunch of kid stuff. By midafternoon, three bulging garbage bags leaned against my door. As I grabbed the first bag and began dragging it down the stairs, a snapshot fell to the floor. The face staring up at me was Jane’s. We had been friends in the fourth grade and probably would have been friends forever if her father hadn’t been transferred to Japan. He was vice president of some big hotel chain.

Jane Farmer was the smartest girl I’d ever known. She almost always got straight A’s, and she was pretty, too. Part of me wanted to hate her, but I couldn’t. She was too nice. Instead, I envied her and longed with all my heart to be just like her.

Her hair was the color of honey. She had a zillion corkscrew curls, usually held back by a satin headband that matched our school uniform. When she walked, the curls bounced up and down and reminded me of my pogo stick. My hair was straight, wispy and braided every morning into pigtails.

She was a little plump, but that didn’t matter. Like the other popular girls, Jane was short. That’s what really mattered since most of the boys in our class were also short. I was tall and skinny. Even Jane’s freckles were the cute kind, and the dimples on either side of her mouth made her look like she was always smiling.

My grandfather often called me “funny face” to get me to smile. He wasn’t being mean. He just didn’t understand that my face was the serious sort. My mother didn’t understand either. “Stand in front of your bedroom mirror, Donna,” she’d say. “Practice for five or ten minutes each day, and before long, you’ll have a lovely smile, too.” I tried it a few times, but I felt dumb, and it didn’t work anyway.

Jane was an honor student and got to sit in the front of the class. My desk was in the back, on the side of the room that had no windows. I’d watch Mrs. Schnell, our teacher, pace back and forth in front of us. She was short and stout with wiry red hair and a smile she turned on and off like a water faucet.

I always slumped way down in my desk, desperately hoping to hide myself behind Stanley, the kid who sat in front of me. It was difficult. Stanley was a head shorter than I was, and he often also scrunched down, trying to hide from Mrs. Schnell. There I would wait, terrified that the next name I heard would be my own. Sometimes my heart thumped so loudly that I was sure her ears would find me even if her mean eyes didn’t.

Day after day, she strutted up and down the aisles, her right hand clutching a sheet of paper that listed every one of us alphabetically. She pretended to study it for a moment, and then her eagle eyes, searching out their prey, would dart from kid to kid. “Who shall it be this time?” she’d crow.

Each time she called out a name, the victim would have to rise, stand straight as a broomstick, shoulders squared, and with a book resting across open palms, read to the entire class. Sometimes the person was lucky and only had to read a few sentences or a short paragraph. Other times, it would be a page or two. Once in a while, a whole chapter would be read before she called out the next name.

More than anything, I hated to stand and read aloud to the class, a feat so easily accomplished by Jane. Unlike me, she never slurred her words or stuttered, and she rarely made a mistake. And if she did, she was never made to feel ashamed. Mrs. Schnell would flash a pleasant smile and patiently guide her toward the correct answer. I wasn’t good at reading and could tell that Mrs. Schnell was often not at all pleased with me. If only she had treated me the way she treated Jane, I would have done much better. But she was always correcting me too soon, never giving me a chance to say the words.

One day after soccer practice, Jane and I were standing together waiting for our mothers. All of the other kids’ parents had come for them and taken them home. Jane leaned against one of the stone columns that supported the wrought-iron gate at the front of the school. I leaned against the other and watched Jane read a textbook. We weren’t friends yet. I wanted to ask her if she liked movies and if her parents ever let her go to weekend matinees, but I changed my mind when I looked at her face. I just stared at her instead. She seemed to feel my eyes.

“What are you looking at?” she asked. Her voice was soft and kind, not what I expected.

“You,” I said, unable to stop staring.

“Why?” she asked.

“Because you look so sad,” I said.
It’s rude to stare
. My mother’s words played over and over in my head.

“I got a B+ on the history test,” she said, sounding like she had committed some awful crime.

“That’s why you’re sad?” I asked. It didn’t make sense to me.
What’s wrong with a B+?
I wondered. Before I knew it, I was talking so fast I couldn’t stop myself.

“Gosh, Jane, a B+ isn’t exactly the end of the world, you know. I’d love to get your grades, read and spell like you, have the teachers like me for a change—and you’re worried about a B+? You must be nuts! What’ll happen to you anyway?”

She looked at me for a moment, maybe deciding if she should trust me. Then she leaned over and whispered in my ear as if we were best friends sharing a secret.

“Promise me you won’t tell anyone. Promise.”

The fact that Jane wanted to share her secret with me made me feel good, important like the popular girls she hung around with. But it surprised me, too. She grabbed my arm when I didn’t answer her right away, and I felt her fingernails dig into my skin.

“Promise me,” she demanded. I nodded, and she released my arm.

“My dad uses a leather strap on me,” she said, her voice so low that I could hardly hear her. Tears had welled up in her eyes, but she kept talking. “Straight A’s are all he wants to see. I have to get straight A’s.”

I was sure I had misunderstood what she said. “You mean he takes off his belt and hits you with it? He hits you because you get a B+ and not an A?”

“Yes,” she cried, hanging her head as if she were ashamed to show her face. “He will tonight, just as soon as he gets home from work.”

“He hits you?” I asked again, not wanting to believe her, not wanting to believe a dad would do such a thing or be so cruel.

“Yes. He says there’s no excuse for poor grades. He always got straight A’s in school, and since I’m his daughter, I must do the same.”

She lifted her head and looked at me, but I knew she wasn’t seeing me.

“It’s expected,” she said, in a tone that was as flat and cold as the stone floor in our basement.

“What about your mother?” I asked.

“Oh, she leaves the room. But she comes back later, after he’s gone. She hugs me and tells me how much Daddy loves me, how he’s only doing it for my own good.” Jane shrugged her shoulders as if it didn’t matter. “Besides, it only hurts for a little while. You see, Donna, grades are very important. Doesn’t your dad think so?”

“My dad is always saying that my brother and I must have a good education. When we get home from school, we’re not allowed to play outdoors or have friends over until all of our homework is done. He’s pretty strict about that, and it sure doesn’t make him happy when we get bad grades. But he never hits us.”

“But doesn’t he punish you when you mess up?”

“Well, not really,” I said, “at least, not the way your dad does.”

“What do you mean?” she said.

“If you knew my dad, you’d understand. He just stands there, straight as an arrow, his gray eyes locked onto yours. Then he says your first name very slowly, in a very low, stern voice. Then he says your middle name very slowly, and in the same low, stern voice. That’s all he does, and believe me, my brother and I know he means business.”

“And then what?” Jane asked. She seemed to shiver, and I saw fear in her eyes. I knew she expected to hear a truly horrid thing, some sort of gruesome punishment far worse than being beaten with a leather strap.

“And then what?” she repeated, impatient for my answer.

“We fix the problem real fast,” I said. “We work harder the next time and do a better job.”

Just then, we saw Jane’s mother coming up the circular drive in a big, white, shiny car.

“That’s my mom. Gotta go now. Bye, Donna,” she said and dashed to the car. She opened the door, then suddenly looked back at me and whispered, “Remember, Donna, you promised.”

I nodded and watched her climb into the passengers side of the front seat.

“Bye, Jane.” Their car cruised around the drive, then sped away down the long, narrow, tree-lined street. I watched Jane’s big car get smaller and smaller until it disappeared around the corner at the end of the lane.

Jane and I became best friends after the day she shared her secret with me, but from then on I never again envied Jane Farmer.

Donna M. Russell

Just Ben

C
hildren: much more than just little people.
Young kids are definitely special people. There are no other people like them in the world.

Adrian Wagner

It was late August and quite chilly outside. I was coaching a soccer team for kindergarteners and first-graders, and it was the day of our first practice.

It was cold enough for the kids to be bundled up in extra sweatshirts, jackets, gloves and mittens.

I sat the kids down on the dugout bench—soccer in Austin is played on the outfield grass at the softball complex. As was normally the case any time I was coaching a new team, we took the first few minutes to get to know one another. We went up and down the row a few times, each kid saying his or her name and the names of all the kids sitting to the left.

After a few minutes of this, I decided to put the kids to the ultimate test. I asked for a volunteer who thought he or she knew the names of all eleven kids on the team and could prove it to all of us right then. There was one brave six-year-old who felt up to the challenge. He was to start at the far left end of the bench, go up to each kid, say that kid’s name and then shake his or her right hand.

Alex started off and was doing very well. While I stood behind him, he went down the row—Dylan, Micah, Sara, Beau and Danny—until he reached Ben, by far the smallest kid on the team. He stammered out Ben’s name without much trouble and extended his right hand, but Ben would not extend his. I looked at Ben for a second, as did Alex and the rest of the kids on the bench, but he just sat there, his right hand hidden under the cuff of his jacket.

“Ben, why don’t you let Alex shake your hand?” I asked. But Ben just sat there, looking first at Alex and then at me, and then at Alex once again.

“Ben, what’s the matter?” I asked.

Finally Ben stood up, looked up at me and said, “But coach, I don’t have a hand.” He unzipped his jacket, pulling it away from his right shoulder.

Sure enough, Ben’s arm ran from his right shoulder just like every other kid on the team, but unlike the rest of his teammates, his arm stopped at the elbow. No fingers, no hand, no forearm.

I’ll have to admit, I was taken aback a bit and couldn’t think of anything to say or how to react, but thank God for little kids—and their unwillingness to be tactful.

“Look at that,” said Alex.

“Hey, what happened to your arm?” another asked.

“Does it hurt?”

Before I knew it, a crowd of ten players and a bewildered coach encircled a small child who was now taking off his jacket to show all those around him what they all wanted to see.

In the next few minutes, a calm and collected six-year-old explained to all of those present that he had always been that way and that there was nothing special about him because of it. What he meant was that he wanted to be treated like everybody else.

And he was from that day on.

From that day on, he was never the kid with one arm. He was just Ben, one of the players on the team.

Adrian Wagner
Submitted by Judy Noble

The Green Boots

D
on’t compromise yourself. You are all you’ve got.

Janis Joplin

On Monday morning I wore my green platform boots to school for the first time since I had started at Edison Middle School.

It was the day of the poetry festival, and I was excited. At my old school, I had won the poetry ribbon every year. I’m horrible at sports, too shy to be popular and I’m not cute—but I do write good poetry.

The poem I wrote for the Edison Festival was about my dad. I had a good feeling about sharing how special he was to me, even if it was just with the fifth grade and Mrs. Baker.

English class was not until after lunch period on Mondays, so by the time we started poetry, I was so nervous my mouth was dry as toast. When Mrs. Baker called on me, I had to clear my throat, take a breath and swallow about ten times before I could speak. I didn’t even bother to look at my paper. I’d spent so much time perfecting the rhymes, and counting the beats, that I knew the poem by heart.

I had just started the third verse when I noticed Mrs. Baker was glaring furiously at me. I stopped in the middle of a word and waited for her to say something.

“Linda, you are supposed to be reading an original work, a poem you made up yourself, not reciting something you learned. That is called plagiarism!”

“Oh, but it’s not. I mean . . . I did make it up; it’s about my dad.” I heard a “Yeah, right!” from somewhere behind me, and someone else giggled.

I felt as if I’d somersaulted off the high dive and then, in midair, realized that there was no water in the pool. I opened my mouth to explain, but no words came out.

“You will leave the room and will not return until you are ready to apologize,” said Mrs. Baker. “Now. Go!”

My last thought was a flash of understanding as to why the kids had nicknamed her “Battle-Ax Baker”—then my brain just fizzled out, and I turned and left the room.

I’d been standing outside for about half an hour when Joseph, the school janitor, came over to ask me what heinous crime I’d committed to be banished for so long. He loved using unusual words.

We’d made friends one morning before school, when he saw me sitting alone, pretending to do homework. He invited me to help open up the classrooms, and after that, it sort of became my job. He always talked to me as we wiped down the chalkboards and turned on the heat. Just that morning he’d been telling me that Mark Twain once said that the difference between the right word and the almost right word is like the difference between lightning and a lightning bug. I liked that. My dad would have liked it, too.

Now as Joseph waited for me to answer, he looked so kind and sympathetic that I poured out the whole story, trying not to cry. A tightness flashed over his face, and he jerked an enormous yellow duster out of the pocket of his gray overalls. “So what are you going to do?” he asked, rolling up the duster into a tight ball.

I shrugged, feeling helpless and sad. “I don’t know.”

“Well, you are not going to stand here all day, are you?”

I sighed. “I suppose I’ll do what she said. You know . . . say I’m sorry.”

“You’ll apologize?”

I nodded. “What else can I do? It’s no big deal. I’ll just never write anything good in her class again.”

He looked disappointed with my response, so I shrugged once more and turned away from him.

“Linda.” The tone of his voice forced me to look back. “Accepting defeat, when you should stand up for yourself, can become a very dangerous habit.” He twisted the duster around his fingers. “Believe me. I know!”

He was staring right into my eyes. I blinked and looked down. His eyes followed mine, and we both noticed my green boots at the same time. Suddenly his face relaxed and creased into a huge smile. He chuckled and said, “You’re going to be just fine. I don’t have to worry about you. When you put on those boots this morning, you knew you were the only Linda Brown in the whole world.” As if he didn’t need it anymore, he cheerfully dropped the duster back into his pocket and folded his arms across his chest. “Those are the boots of someone who can take care of herself and knows when something is worth fighting for.”

His eyes, smiling into mine, woke up a part of me that had been asleep since I’d come to this school, and I knew that he was right about me. I’d just lost direction for a while. I took a deep breath and knocked on the classroom door, ready to face Mrs. Baker—ready to recite
my
poem.

Linda Rosenberg