Read Online Don't Call Me Christina Kringle by Chris Grabenstein - Free Book Online Page B

you guys are good. Real good.”
    â€œToo bad!” said Nails. “Mister Fred insulted us!”
    â€œI know. You told me. He gave you sweaters.”
    â€œNever give a brownie clothes,” said Professor Pencilneck. “If you do, we leave. Such has been our people’s way since time immemorial!”
    â€œRight,” said Christina. “No clothes. Got it.”
    She felt the two brownies squirming around in the backpack.
    â€œNow what’re you guys doing?”
    â€œJust popping up to take a quick peek,” said the professor.
    â€œDon’t let anybody see you!”
    â€œI shan’t. I’m merely peering through a tiny crack in the zipper.”
    â€œI poked a nail hole through the nylon.”
    â€œNails!”
    â€œRelax, Professor. I’ll sew it up when we’re done checking out the scenery.”
    â€œMy,” Professor Pencilneck sighed, “what marvelous shop windows! What festive decorations!”
    Christina looked at the same old storefronts she passed every day on her way to school. They were all decorated for the holidays. Twinkle lights. Wreaths. Fake snow flecked on windowpanes. Disco-dancing Santa dolls.
    â€œJust a bunch of cheap plastic crap you have to take down in January when it’s freezing cold,” she said. “It’s another reason I hate Christmas.”
    â€œReally?” said Nails skeptically.
    â€œTotally. If you ask me, Christmas is a waste of time and money. Christmas stinks.”
    After Homeroom, Christina went to music class.
    She was quite good on the violin; she had been taking lessons since she was six.
    This morning, as part of the school orchestra’s rehearsal for the upcoming holiday concert, she performed a piece she had worked up over the weekend. It sounded sad and melancholy. Like a funeral dirge. Something an undertaker string quartet might play during a graveside burial service.
    â€œThat was … interesting, Christina,” said her music teacher, trying to sound positive. “Somber. Morose.”
    â€œThank you. That was my intention.”
    â€œUhm-hmm. What, exactly, was it?”
    â€œA yuletide classic.”
    â€œReally? I didn’t recognize the tune.”
    â€œIt’s ‘Have a Holly Jolly Christmas.’ That’s what it sounds like if you play it really, really slow.”
    After music came math.
    The teacher, who liked to wear loud Christmas ties all through December, strolled up the aisles between desks collecting homework papers.
    â€œMiss Lucci? Your homework.”
    Christina winced. She had forgotten all about her math homework! She had started it that night when Nails and Professor Pencilneck first showed up but had never gone back to finish it.
    â€œRight,” she said, wondering what to do or say. “Homework.”
    â€œYou did do it, didn’t you? You had all weekend.”
    â€œOh, yes sir.” She bent over. Fussed with her backpack. Unzipped the top. “But I think …”
    â€œWhat? Your dog ate it?”
    The other kids laughed.
    â€œNo, sir. We don’t have a dog. …” She reached into the bag.
    â€œWhere, then, is your homework, Miss Lucci?”
    â€œWell, sir, I …”
    While her hand was inside the backpack, she felt a stack of papers that was shoved into it.
    Stunned, Christina slowly pulled out the pages she had never worked on and handed them to the teacher.
    â€œI certainly hope, Miss Lucci, that you gave this assignment more attention than you typically …”
    He looked at her work.
    Then he looked amazed.
    â€œYou factored the trisection of the angle and the quadrature of the circle?”
    â€œI did?” She felt a small kick in her shins from her book bag. “Yes, I did.”
    â€œI didn’t assign those.”
    Christina pasted a smile on her face. “I figured I could use the extra credit.”
    â€œWell,” said the math teacher, scratching