Claudia's Book

  “What?” I said.

  “We got Ms. Jameson,” said Kristy. “She’s really cool. She’s from the south and she has this neat accent and she does cool stuff.” Kristy nodded for emphasis. “Charlie had her. He told me all about her.”

  “Good,” I said. I was ready to like Ms. Jameson. And I did, the moment she walked into the room. She was dressed casually, the way Mr. Eccles used to dress — in jeans and a jacket and she even had on a sort of tie. Her black hair was cut short and close to her head, and she was wearing gold hoop earrings. She had dark brown skin and dark brown eyes and a soft voice with a real southern accent. I’d never heard a southern accent before, except on television, and I was fascinated.

  She spoke softly, too. At first I thought the class would just roll right over her, everybody talking at the top of their lungs. But we didn’t. Something about the way she spoke, and then looked at us, as if she were talking one grownup to another, made us settle down.

  Soon the classroom was so quiet, you could practically hear a pin (or maybe I mean a pen) drop.

  Ms. Jameson nodded, and welcomed us to her classroom. “But it’s not just my classroom,” she told us. “It’s your classroom, too. We’re all responsible for what we learn here. There’s a saying my grandmother taught me: it takes a village to raise a child. We are, in a sense, a village. We are part of it. It takes all of us to make sure each of us is the best that she or he can be.”

  I didn’t understand everything she was saying, but I liked the sound of it. And I liked Ms. Jameson. I especially liked her when I found out she had had Janine as a student, too. I found out because Janine told me. Ms. Jameson never mentioned it.

  Ms. Jameson became my new favorite teacher of all time — or at least, she tied with Mr. Eccles.

  What I didn’t like was the schoolwork.

  Somehow, between second and fourth grade, I’d gotten lost. I didn’t understand anything anymore.

  “I hate school!” I told Mimi one afternoon, slamming my spelling book closed.

  Mimi looked shocked. I had never done that before. But I was tired of the way my spelling words were never spelled the way they sounded. I didn’t understand it.

  “I don’t need to be able to spell, anyway,” I said. “I’m going to be an artist. Artists don’t have to spell.”

  “But even artists must go to school,” Mimi reminded me. She picked up the book and pulled it toward her. “Let us practice the words one more time. I think you are getting better.”

  I didn’t think I was. In fact, I knew I wasn’t. But I kept trying.

  I tried for my mom, who brought special books home from the library and worked with me at the kitchen table at night.

  I tried for my dad, who explained math and science to me, reading ahead in my books so he could understand enough to show me what I was supposed to be learning.

  I tried for Mimi, always.

  I even tried for Janine, who wanted to help me with my book reports. But Janine didn’t understand what it was like not to understand. If it took a village to raise a child, Janine would have been the village genius.

  And I would have been the village dummy.

  Ms. Jameson tried to help me, too, of course. She never wrote my grades in big, mean red letters. She didn’t believe in announcing grades in class. She let me do some of my book reports orally, with illustrations instead of in writing.

  But it wasn’t enough. Finally, one day, she sent a note home with my parents — along with the worst report card I’d ever gotten.

  “You are a bright girl,” Ms. Jameson said to me. “You are without question one of the most creative students and one of the most imaginative I have ever had in my class. But you are not achieving up to your level of intelligence … ”

  “Underachiever,” I muttered. I’d heard the word before. I hated it. In my mind it meant “dumb kid who doesn’t try.” But I did try.

  Ms. Jameson surprised me. She took my hand and said, “Perhaps that is not the best word. You achieve great things in some areas.” She put the note in my hand and closed my fingers around it. “Give this to your parents, and I will talk to them.”

  A parent-teacher conference. Well, I’d been the subject of those before. That was nothing new. At least, that’s what I kept telling myself as I walked home from school with Mary Anne and Kristy.

  We didn’t discuss our report cards. We never did. Kristy and Mary Anne made good grades and I didn’t, and we’d just stopped talking about the report cards somewhere in the middle of third grade.

  My family always talked about them at home, though. But not this one. That was almost worse than anything. My mother looked at my report card and then she said, “Oh, Claudia.”

  “I tried,” I said. “I really did.”

  “I think you did,” said my mom. “I do.” And then she didn’t say anything else to me about it. She must have called my father before he left the office, because he didn’t say anything, either. Then, two days later, they went to school to talk to Ms. Jameson on my mother’s day off from the library.

  When I got home from school that day, Mom was waiting for me.

  That scared me. “I’m not expelled, am I?” I cried before I even put my books down.

  “Claudia, of course not!” My mother looked indignant. “But we are thinking of trying … Ms. Jameson suggested a couple of approaches. A test for learning disabilities … ” My mom’s voice trailed off. She frowned, then tried to look more cheerful. “Or a school more suited to someone who has your particular talents, talents that are visual, rather than verbal or mathematical.”

  “Another school! But Mom, all my friends are at Stoneybrook Elementary! I don’t want to go to another school.”

  My mother pulled me closer to her and smoothed back my bangs. “It’s just one possibility, Claudia. There’s a private school in Stamford that Ms. Jameson particularly recommended. Of course, there are tests you have to take to get in…. ”

  The moment I heard the word “tests” I stopped worrying. There was no way I would ever pass any entrance test to any school. And even though I tried as hard as I could to pass every test at SES, I resolved immediately that I would try to do just the opposite on any entrance exam to any private school.

  My mother had been watching me anxiously. She looked very relieved when I nodded.

  I shrugged. “Oh, okay,” I said.

  “It’s nothing definite,” Mom went on. “But I wouldn’t feel right if we didn’t check into it, particularly after Ms. Jameson recommended it.”

  I had thought Ms. Jameson liked me. But maybe she didn’t after all. That hurt.

  I resolved to try harder. I even tried to convince my parents that it wouldn’t be good for me to have to skip school to go all the way to Stamford to be interviewed for the Stamford Alternative Academy, and to take their tests. My parents disagreed. So on the very last day of November, we drove to Stamford.

  The academy was pretty: lots of rolling grounds and low buildings with big trees. The gym, standing on one corner of a lawn, was awesome. Inside the administration building, my mother pointed to the student artwork on the wall.

  I tried to be polite, but personally I thought SES was much better. Not so fancy. Not so formal. Not so stuck-up.

  I was polite in the interviews, but I tried not to tell them too much about myself — except when they asked me how I saw myself as a student.

  “Oh, I’m a terrible student,” I told the two women who were interviewing me (I had three interviews in all, plus the tests). “Terrible, and I’m getting worse all the time. Everyone says I’m an underachiever, and I guess maybe they’re right.”

  There. That should convince them that they didn’t want me at their academy. The two women looked solemn and made notes on their yellow pads. Then they asked me what my strengths were.

  I thought a moment, then said, “Oh, I don’t really think I have any. Sometimes teachers say I’m good in art, but you know what I think? I think they’re saying tha
t because I’m so terrible at everything else.”

  The two interviewers looked even more solemn and made a lot more notes without speaking.

  When the interview was over, I left feeling more cheerful. For once it had felt good to say I was a terrible student. And even though I knew I was a good artist and getting better all the time, I hadn’t minded telling that fib about what my teachers said. And who knows — maybe it had been true for my third-grade teacher, so it wasn’t a complete fib after all.

  I was in a good mood on the way home. I had skipped a whole day of SES, and I had passed the tests at SAA with flying colors, at least the way I saw it. I was pretty sure I’d failed them all.

  Good-bye, Stamford Alternative Academy.

  So you can imagine how shocked I was the week before Thanksgiving when my parents gave me the news after dinner one night.

  I’d been accepted at Stamford Alternative Academy. I was going to begin school the second semester of the year, after Christmas vacation.

  “You’re kidding!” I gasped.

  “Isn’t it wonderful?” said my mother. “The classes are very small. And students are put into classes according to their level. The emphasis is not on competition and comparison with other children, but on working at your own pace.”

  “Plus lots of help and individual attention,” my father said.

  “I don’t want help and individual attention,” I replied, trying to gather my stunned wits. “You and Mom and Mimi — and, and Janine — give me plenty of that! Besides, how can you trust that school? Did they tell you I passed all those entrance tests to get in? I didn’t, I know I didn’t!”

  My father looked puzzled. “Those weren’t entrance tests,” he said. “Those are given only to determine your strengths and weaknesses. You were accepted on the basis of your remedial needs. The school thinks it can help you.”

  “No! No! I won’t go!” I cried, and ran out of the room.

  But I didn’t have a choice. My parents let me sulk and complain for a few days. Then they sat me down for another talk. And they made it clear that nothing I could say or do would change their minds. I was going to Stamford Alternative Academy at the beginning of the second semester.

  The rest of my time at SES was a nightmare. People made plans for Christmas and I felt left out. Kristy and Mary Anne complained about walking to school in the cold. Mary Anne was hoping her father would let her get a new, less babyish coat for Christmas. “I think he’s weakening,” she said. “He actually said he liked the color of your parka the other day, Claudia.”

  I tried to be enthusiastic. I managed to make myself act reasonably normal. But inside I felt numb. And too embarrassed to tell my friends about transferring to a “special” school. I didn’t think they wouldn’t be my friends because of it, but I knew they’d be walking to school every morning without me. They’d be doing things at SES without me. Soon I would be forgotten.

  Soon I’d be all alone at the “special” school.

  On the last day of school before winter vacation, Ms. Jameson kept me after class for a moment. I’d been sneaking all my stuff home a little at a time so that I didn’t have to clean out my desk or my locker.

  “I’ve enjoyed having you as a student, Claudia,” she said.

  “My friends are waiting,” I replied.

  “Good luck,” said Ms. Jameson.

  “Good-bye,” I said. “And thanks.” Under my breath as I walked out, I added, “For nothing.”

  If Ms. Jameson had really liked having me as a student, why had she recommended I be exiled to Stamford?

  Phooey on Ms. Jameson.

  I don’t remember much about Christmas that year. It just sort of floated by. I finally got up the nerve to tell Kristy and Mary Anne that I wouldn’t be going back to SES — the night before I started at Stamford. (SAA started a day earlier than SES.)

  They were totally shocked. And totally supportive. They told me not to worry. That we’d always be friends. That it would probably be cool. They teased me about how lucky I was not to have to walk to school (my father was going to drive me to SAA on his way to work).

  It didn’t help. It made me feel worse than ever.

  The morning I left for SAA, the sky was gray and a few soggy, fat, ugly flakes of snow were starting to fall. I sat in the corner of the front seat as far from my father as I could get. He kept up a cheerful conversation on the way. I stuck to “yes” and “no.” He pretended he didn’t notice.

  When we reached the school, I thought for a moment about pretending to climb the front steps and then running away the moment my father left. But I didn’t get a chance. A tall, thin woman with a friendly smile opened the door at the top of the steps and waved. “You must be Claudia Kishi!” she called.

  “What is she, my baby-sitter?” I asked my father. He gave me the look that said I had gone too far.

  “ ’Bye,” I said quickly and got out of the car. I walked up the stairs as slowly as I dared. I didn’t look back. I didn’t look up as the tall woman put her hand on my shoulder and said, “I’m Corla Magnusson, the academic coordinator. Welcome to Stamford Alternative Academy.”

  My life was over.

  Kristy and Mary Anne came over to my house the moment I returned home from my first day at Stamford Alternative Academy. I told them how much I hated it. Kristy said I should just try to flunk out. She didn’t believe it when I told her I had already tried … and failed.

  That was the thing about the SAA. It looked like a normal school, except maybe prettier and neater, more picture bookish. But at SAA, they didn’t believe in failure. No one ever even said the word. If you didn’t get something right, they said things such as, “Hmmm. Well, what about trying it this way?”

  The classes were small, too. Tiny. So if I was having a problem with spelling or math or I stopped paying attention for even an instant, a teacher would suddenly be there, bending over and saying, “How’s it going, Claudia?”

  “Crummy!” I wanted to shout. “Horrible!”

  But if I had, I wouldn’t have been telling the whole truth. Because one thing wasn’t crummy and horrible anymore — my schoolwork.

  I began to get an idea of what was going on in math. I learned how to look at the way things were written so I could understand the contents, and remember what I’d read more easily. And because there weren’t a bunch of other kids with big fat A + s and 100s written on the tops of their papers (SAA, remember, didn’t believe in that kind of grading), I didn’t feel stupid when it took me a long time to figure something out. The important thing was that I did figure it out. And when I did, my answer was just as good and just as right as anybody else’s.

  Too bad I didn’t have any friends to share it with.

  I didn’t have any friends at SAA because I didn’t want any. Oh, the kids weren’t weird or anything like that, although I guess I’d expected them to be. I mean, no matter how you said it, SAA was a school for kids who didn’t do well in school. Which to my way of thinking meant the kids would be weird.

  But I was wrong about that. If anything, I was one of the weirder kids in the school. I liked to wear bright colors and I was already making my own jewelry and sewing different kinds of buttons on my shirts. Most of the other kids dressed more like kids in Gap ads.

  The girl who sat next to me, in Core Group (that’s what our main class was called), had said hello the very first day after I’d been walked to my class by Ms. Magnusson. She was short with neat, shoulder-length brown hair and friendly blue eyes.

  “I’m Mary Rose,” she said, giving me a big smile. “You’ve got a good Core. Mr. Ho, our Core teacher, is neat.”

  “I’m so excited,” I said sarcastically.

  Mary Rose had looked surprised and then hurt. “Well,” she finally said, “let me know if you need any help.”

  Unfortunate choice of words. Wasn’t I at SAA because everybody said I needed help But who wants help if they haven’t asked for it?

  “I don’t need any h
elp. Thank you,” I said.

  Mary Rose hadn’t spoken to me since. And I hadn’t bothered to talk to anybody else. I even ate lunch alone, which of course made me feel sorrier for myself than ever.

  My days were all boringly the same now: get up, get dressed, leave earlier than ever because my father had to drive me to Stamford on his way to work. Since I arrived at school a little early, I went to the Open Area. It was part of the school library, a big, sunny room off to one side with long tables where you could sit and study or read or even play quiet games with other students.

  I drew sketches in my notebook. Or I sat and stared out of the window until the first bell rang.

  At the sound of the first bell, we all went to Core Group. When I wasn’t in Core Group I was in language arts or art class.

  I actually enjoyed art class. It was the only good part of the day: a whole period, every single day, to work on art projects. And I could do anything I wanted. It was a small class like all the others, but in this class no teacher swooped down every time I stopped and stared off into space. The art teacher understood that creating things takes time — without interruptions.

  At the end of the day, I stood on the steps with the other kids, waiting for my mother or father to show up. When one of them did, I walked down the steps and got in the car without saying anything to anybody. It was the end of another long, quiet, mostly boring, horrible day.

  My parents always said, with big smiles, “How was your day, Claudia?”

  “Fine,” I would say in a tone of voice that meant just the opposite. They always ignored my tone of voice. After awhile I just stopped answering and shrugged.

  It didn’t help that I hardly ever got to see Kristy and Mary Anne anymore. Not only did I not talk to anyone at my dumb new school, but because the dumb new school was in Stamford, I was always late getting home. Usually Kristy and Mary Anne had already walked home from school (together) and had started their homework or were doing something else (together) by the time I returned home. At first, if they were hanging out, I would join them. But after awhile I realized that I was always the one going over to Kristy’s house (and, less often, to Mary Anne’s, because she had all these weird baby-sitters her father kept hiring to stay after school with her until he got home). They never came over to my house.