Read Online Icy Sparks by Gwyn Hyman Rubio - Free Book Online Page B

that’s not healthy.”
    â€œThat don’t…mean…I—I don’t…like meat,” I stammered. “If someone gives me meat, I’ll eat it. I ain’t spoiled. There is hungry people in China.”
    â€œThere are hungry people in these parts,” Mrs. Stilton said.
    â€œYes, ma’am,” I conceded, “there are hungry people all over this country.”
    â€œNot in Illinois,” Mrs. Stilton said, wheezing air through her nose. “We don’t have hungry people in Chicago.”
    I vigorously shook my head. “Oh, no!” I said. “Chicago doesn’t have any hungry people.”
    â€œFinish your ham,” Mrs. Stilton ordered, pointing to the pink square on my plate. “You need some protein.”
    I smiled again, stabbed a piece of ham, and poked it into my mouth. Mrs. Stilton nodded and continued her walk down the aisle.
    â€œThat was close,” Emma Richards said.
    I kept on eating, cutting my ham into little cubes, popping them between my teeth, chewing, and swallowing. I ate my cornbread and also the little packet of saltines on my tray. I didn’t know what the crackers were for, but I ate them anyway, then I downed the cherry pie and drank my carton of milk. Pleasing Mrs. Stilton was going to be hard work, I thought. Good grammar, manners, and answers all of the time. “Whew!” I said, wiping my forehead. And school had only just begun.

Chapter 6
    T he weeks at school passed with Mrs. Stilton’s eyes following me. Her gaze accompanied my every step, and I felt like she was a sleek black panther, ready to pounce.
    â€œDon’t press down so hard!” Emma Richards whispered to me from across the aisle. “You gonna make a big hole in your paper.”
    â€œI’m nervous,” I whispered back, looking up to see if Mrs. Stilton was sitting behind her desk. She wasn’t. “That woman’s always studying me,” I said.
    Emma pursed her lips and twitched her nose. “That ain’t true,” she said prissily. “Your mind is just playing tricks on you.”
    â€œThen how come she’s all the time catching me at something?” I asked her, ferociously erasing the t in today . “How come I’m the one who gets in trouble?”
    â€œWell, you ain’t the only one.” Emma Richards screwed up her face and simultaneously shrugged her shoulders. “She gets mad at Lane, too.”
    â€œLane Carlson.” I poked out my tongue. “He don’t count. That big sissy deserves everything he gets.”
    From the back of the room came a high hysterical giggle—Lane’s.
    â€œIf a sissy touches you, you’ll turn into his opposite,” Emma said, looping the tail of her y .
    â€œI don’t believe you!” I said a little too loudly, my eyes instinctively scanning the classroom. Mrs. Stilton still nowhere in sight.
    â€œIf Lane Carlson rubs against you,” she said, clicking her tongue against the top of her teeth, “then you’ll change into a tomboy.”
    I made a burping noise with my lips. “Well, that don’t scare me none,” I told her, tossing back my head, “’cause I already do tomboy things.”
    Emma slid her paper over to the edge of her desk. “Look at mine,” she said. “Ain’t my penmanship fancy?”
    â€œThem curlicues look like vipers,” I said. “Like little baby snakes.” I stretched out my neck, thrust my tongue between my lips, moving it sideways, and hissed liked a snake.
    Emma ran her tongue along her top lip. “You might even grow a mustache,” she shot back. “It’d come out yellow to match your hair.”
    I pressed my index finger against my mouth. “Shush!” I warned her. “You’re gonna get me in trouble.”
    Snatching her paper away from the desk’s edge, Emma daintily crossed her feet—one ankle over the