Book 1: School Starts
September 5, 2005
Hello! My name is Allisen Zepetto. I just found this blank notebook when I was cleaning out my closet today. I decided to use it as a diary. I think I’ll write this diary kind of like a story. I mean, I’ll only write stuff that really happens, but I’ll do it in story form, with narration and dialogue and everything. I think that’ll be fun to look back on when I’m older. It’ll be like reading a book with me as the main character.
So, I’ll start with today. Today is Labor Day. School starts in 2 days. Last night, my family and I got back from a great vacation to my grandparents’ house in Michigan. Now I have less than twenty-four hours to enjoy the rest of summer, before the start of SCHOOL.
Don’t get me wrong. I like school, for the most part. It’s just that it’s always been a little crazy for me, so I’m kind of nervous. I’m going to a new school this year— my fourth new school in only six years. When I was really young, I was homeschooled. Then for third grade, I went to a private school (I liked it, but it was super expensive). For fourth grade, I went to public school (It was okay, but the work was too easy). For fifth grade, I went to a Fun House school.
Fun House schools are sort of private schools, I guess, except they’re less expensive and they have stores, restaurants, pools, and lots of other fun things that are open for several hours after school gets out. Supposedly this is so kids can have a safe place to stay if both parents have to work all day. That was never something my family had to worry about (Dad’s an electrician, but Mom’s a writer so she gets to work from home), but when we heard my cousin Carolina in Pennsylvania rave about the one she had started going to, we thought Fun House schools sounded awesome.
Until Mom and Dad enrolled my sister and me at STARS, a brand-new Fun House school right down the street. It was a mess. All the classes were made up of kids of all ages randomly thrown together and given pointless assignments that were usually either too easy or too hard. There were almost no rules, so the kids were out of control. I don’t think anyone really learned much there.
Mom and Dad found a different Fun House school for us to try this year. It’s called Learner’s Cove. We visited at the end of last school year and it seemed really nice. The kids seem decent, the work looks reasonable, and there’s a list of school rules that all make sense.
But I’m still nervous, and that’s mostly because of who’s starting school with me.
I’m going into sixth grade. I’m turning eleven on September 28, so I’m pretty normal for someone my age, as far as school goes. However… my little sister, Mirisen, is eight. She’s going into 6th grade too. With me. In my same class.
As if that’s not weird enough, I have an older brother, Pete. His real name is Jefferson, but he insists on being called by his middle name because Jefferson was the name of his biological dad (Mom and Dad adopted him when I was little), who apparently wasn’t a good person. Pete’s seventeen, and he’s really rude and annoying. He won’t be in my class (good thing!) but he’ll be at my same school, because it goes from kindergarten up through twelfth grade (although technically the seventh through twelfth grade section of the building is called “Learner’s Academy”). Pete’s in eleventh grade this year, although I think he should be in preschool because he’s not very smart. Anyway, I don’t want anyone to know we’re related, because Pete’s the kind of kid who always gets in trouble and does really bad things. He even looks like a punk, with his dyed green hair and disgusting lip piercing.
There’s one member of my family going to my school, other than me, who is normal. That’s my little brother, Harrisson. He’s six and going into first grade. He’s never been to school before, so he’s really excited.
Okay. Enough talk about school. Let me tell you about me, so you can have a little bit of background knowledge for this diary/story I’m about to write (even though the only one who will ever read it will be me). My full name is Allisen Kaylah Zepetto. Yes, that’s Allisen with an e, not an o. My parents really liked the name Allison, but they already knew a few Allisons and they wanted me to be unique. So they changed the spelling. It’s kind of annoying sometimes because people usually spell my name wrong, and places that have personalized things like mugs and keychains never have anything with my name spelled correctly. But overall, I like the spelling of my name, and I like that it’s unique.
Here’s some more stuff about me: I live in Nashua, New Hampshire. I’ve lived in this same house for my entire life. My favorite thing to do is write (That might be kind of obvious). I also like to read, swim, draw, play outside, and do a bunch of other things. I have long brown hair and a lot of freckles on my cheeks and nose. You already know that I’m ten and have three siblings. I also have two wonderful parents, and three cats named Tuxio, Sniffer, and Leelee. Sniffer is my best friend in the whole entire world, but I don’t have a human best friend.
Maybe that will change when I start sixth grade. Somehow I doubt it.
September 7
School! I am writing this at school. I’m in my classroom right now, sitting at a desk on the right side of the very back row. All around me I see unfamiliar faces, except for right next to me, which is where Mirisen is sitting. We’re seated in alphabetical order by last names, and since our last name is Zepetto, we’re dead last.
It looks like there are 21 kids in the class. Not everyone is here yet, but that’s how many desks there are. That’s a lot more kids than were in my 3rd grade private school class, but fewer than were in my 4th grade public school class, and my 5th grade crazy school class.
A lot of the kids are giving Mirisen weird looks. I don’t blame them. Aside from being two or three years younger than most of us, Mirisen is very short, only like 3’8 or 3’9. She looks about six. I wonder if people think she’s my little sister. I mean, she is my little sister, but I wonder if people think she’s my little little sister, like not supposed to be in this class. I’m not going to say anything. They’ll find out soon enough.
September 7, later
Our teacher’s name is Mrs. Banks. She introduced herself, then asked everyone in the class to introduce themselves by saying their name and something fun they did over the summer. I managed to catch a few names— Rob Lebeng (who I remembered because he has the same last name as the principal— I wonder if they’re related?), Sara Corey, Natalia Frink, and Joseph San something— but mainly I was too nervous to pay much attention.
My turn came too soon. “Um, hi,” I began, trying to focus only on Mrs. Banks and not on the nineteen unfamiliar students looking at me. “I’m Allisen Zepetto, and this summer I went to Michigan to visit my grandparents, and I, well, rode my bike a lot and hung out with my family and stuff.”
Mrs. Banks nodded approvingly, and then it was Mirisen’s turn. “My name is Mirisen Zepetto, and I—”
A boy near the front interrupted. “You’re in this class?”
“Yes,” answered Mirisen. “And this summer I—”
“How old are you?” a girl near us asked.
I felt sorry for Miri. I could tell she didn’t want a big fuss about her age. “Eight years and ten months,” she mumbled. “Anyway, since Allisen is my sister, we did most of the same—”
“Did you just say you’re eight?” someone blurted.
“Yes!” Mirisen answered, trying not to sound impatient. “This summer I visited my grandparents and I read and I played with my little brother and…”
“Did you skip a grade? Or two? Or three?” a girl interrupted her again.
Miri looked uncomfortable. “Actually, I—”
Someone else started to say something, but they were cut off by Mrs. Banks. “Ladies and gentlemen, you are being very rude right now. I can assure you that Mirisen is supposed to be in this class, and I expect you to treat her like you would any of your other classmates—with respect.”
She let Mirisen finish, and this time no one interrupted her. But by the time we moved on to our first subject (math), people were still staring.
September 8
2nd day of school. My only friend is my sister. Apparently some boys in our class (particularly two class clown types named Thomas and something like Steve Ray) think it’s hilarious that Mirisen is only eight, and keep asking her how old she is just to annoy her or hear it again or whatever. She told them the first couple times, then decided to ignore them. She told me she’s going to calculate how old she is in days and tell them the answer in days if they ask her again.
Mirisen and I have been sitting together at lunch, just the two of us, away from everyone else because we don’t have any friends yet. Actually, Mirisen does have a couple friends, because she went here for a few extracurricular activities last year, but they’re all in lower grades. Fifth, sixth, seventh, and eighth graders eat lunch together, and her friends are all in third and fourth.
Today, we made the mistake of sitting at a table that later became populated with a bunch of rowdy 8th grade boys. They were all talking about… Pete.
“Yeah, this dude in my brother’s math class, his hair’s bright green. Bright as a traffic light. And he’s got this spike through his lip and everything. He’s sick.”
“Hey, I think I’ve seen him! Yeah, scary dude. Pretty sizzle, though.”
“Yeah, he’s cool.”
Mirisen and I didn’t dare look up throughout our entire meal. We didn’t even speak. We were so relieved when lunch ended.
September 10
Ah, the weekend. Two days to recuperate before I have to go to school again. Yesterday was just as yucky as the first two days.
September 11
4 years ago, terrorists flew planes into the World Trade Center in New York. Today, our church had a special peace pole dedication in memory of all the people who died in those attacks. Other than that, we didn’t do much today.
September 12
School again. At lunchtime, Mirisen and I sat at a vacant table. Someone else plopped down across from us. It was a girl I’d seen a couple times at church, including at the peace pole dedication yesterday. She had blond hair and an unusual-looking face. I don’t really know how to describe her face except that it looked different from most people’s faces.
“Hi!” she said with a smile. “I know you from church. What’th your mane?”
Her speech was slurry and kind of hard to understand. “My…name?” I said, to make sure I understood what she was asking.
She nodded.
“Allisen, and this is Mirisen, my sister. What about you, what’s your name?”
“Mouthie!”
“Mouthie?” I exclaimed. What an odd name.
“No. Mou-thie.” She said it the exact same way.
“Mousie?” asked Mirisen.
The girl giggled. “No, thilly! My—mane—ith—MOUTHIE!”
“Oh!” Mirisen suddenly exclaimed. “Nowcie?”
“Yeth! Yeth! Mouthie! I’m ten. How old are you?” They began talking, but I could barely understand anything Nowcie said. I still don’t know how Mirisen managed to get Nowcie out of Mouthie.
September 14
Oh, great. Does Mom want me to go crazy??? She signed me up for a typing class! It starts next Monday (Sept. 19). At least Mirisen will be in it too. Still, it goes AFTER school! That means another hour of being at school! No! NO! NO!
Mirisen’s excited (of course). She’ll finally learn to type really fast like Mom. Mom writes self-help books for adults as her career, so she can type really fast. What I don’t get is if she’s such a great typist, why can’t she just teach us herself?
Oh, sigh. I guess school this year is better than it was last year, but not by much.
September 16
“I love school.” That was Harrisson. He, Mirisen, and I were sitting in my bedroom. I was doing my homework and they were playing with stuffed animals (Mirisen, of course, had already finished all of her homework). “Don’t you just love school?” Harrison continued. “I do. First grade is really fun. My teacher’s Miss Enshaw. She’s nice. Do you think your teacher is nice?”
“No,” I answered immediately. “She gave me a 90 on my spelling test!” A 90 is an okay grade for me most of the time, but not on spelling, my best and favorite subject.
“Well, you did miss two words,” pointed out Mirisen, who, of course, had gotten a 100. “She didn’t ‘give you’ a 90, you gave yourself a 90.”
“But she didn’t even give us a word list to study!” I seethed.
“There you go, then. A 90 without studying is a pretty decent grade.”
Little smarty-pants. She chose not to point out the fact that she, two years younger than me, got a 100 without studying.
September 19
Oh no! Typing class today! I am dreading having to spend an extra hour at school.
September 19, later
There were only three kids from my class who went to the typing class, other than Miri and me. Two of them were Toby and Mariah, who I knew were already best friends with each other. The other was Emalie Maye, a tall brown-haired girl who didn’t seem to have any special friends in the class. She came and sat down next to me. After the instructor, Mr. Ellesagonan (he told us to just call him Mr. E), explained things to us and got us set up with the typing games, Emalie Maye turned and started talking to me. “You’re Allisen, right? I’m Emalie Maye. Are you new here? I’m new. I used to go to a public school but my parents said this school has more options for classes and stuff so they signed me up here. I love this school! It’s really fun!”
She was super talkative, and I liked her at once. I told her all about how bad my first couple days had been, about Pete and his craziness, and about Nowcie, who hadn’t eaten lunch with us since last week but had waved excitedly to me when I saw her in the hallway yesterday. “Oh, I know who you’re talking about!” Emalie Maye exclaimed. “That’s Nalcie Halls. She ate lunch with me once too. She’s really nice, but did you find it hard to understand her? I did. I think she has some sort of disability. The teacher she was with said she’s in a special ed class. Hey, you wanna eat lunch with me tomorrow? I don’t mind eating alone or with random people like Nalcie, but I just thought it would be fun to sit with someone from my class.”
“Sounds great!” I replied, ecstatic. Then Mr. E came over and told us to stop talking and start typing.
September 22
Well, now that I have a friend in my class, school isn’t too bad. Emalie Maye and I have been eating lunch together for the last couple days, and we’re becoming really good friends! Nalcie ate with us yesterday too, and I had an easier time understanding her this time. And the day before yesterday, Mirisen managed to find her friend Michael Caxzis, who’s in 5th grade. He’s actually homeschooled, but he comes here sometimes for the restaurants and stores and stuff. When Michael’s not here, Mirisen hangs out with Emalie Maye and me, which I think works out well. I still get time with my sister at school, but I also get time alone with my new friend!
Guess what. Only six days until my 11th birthday! I’m going to ask if we can celebrate with Emalie Maye.
I think school will be good this year.
Book 2: Me, A Babysitter?
September 5, 2005
Hello! My name is Allisen Zepetto. I just found this blank notebook when I was cleaning out my closet today. I decided to use it as a diary. I think I’ll write this diary kind of like a story. I mean, I’ll only write stuff that really happens, but I’ll do it in story form, with narration and dialogue and everything. I think that’ll be fun to look back on when I’m older. It’ll be like reading a book with me as the main character.
So, I’ll start with today. Today is Labor Day. School starts in 2 days. Last night, my family and I got back from a great vacation to my grandparents’ house in Michigan. Now I have less than twenty-four hours to enjoy the rest of summer, before the start of SCHOOL.
Don’t get me wrong. I like school, for the most part. It’s just that it’s always been a little crazy for me, so I’m kind of nervous. I’m going to a new school this year— my fourth new school in only six years. When I was really young, I was homeschooled. Then for third grade, I went to a private school (I liked it, but it was super expensive). For fourth grade, I went to public school (It was okay, but the work was too easy). For fifth grade, I went to a Fun House school.
Fun House schools are sort of private schools, I guess, except they’re less expensive and they have stores, restaurants, pools, and lots of other fun things that are open for several hours after school gets out. Supposedly this is so kids can have a safe place to stay if both parents have to work all day. That was never something my family had to worry about (Dad’s an electrician, but Mom’s a writer so she gets to work from home), but when we heard my cousin Carolina in Pennsylvania rave about the one she had started going to, we thought Fun House schools sounded awesome.
Until Mom and Dad enrolled my sister and me at STARS, a brand-new Fun House school right down the street. It was a mess. All the classes were made up of kids of all ages randomly thrown together and given pointless assignments that were usually either too easy or too hard. There were almost no rules, so the kids were out of control. I don’t think anyone really learned much there.
Mom and Dad found a different Fun House school for us to try this year. It’s called Learner’s Cove. We visited at the end of last school year and it seemed really nice. The kids seem decent, the work looks reasonable, and there’s a list of school rules that all make sense.
But I’m still nervous, and that’s mostly because of who’s starting school with me.
I’m going into sixth grade. I’m turning eleven on September 28, so I’m pretty normal for someone my age, as far as school goes. However… my little sister, Mirisen, is eight. She’s going into 6th grade too. With me. In my same class.
As if that’s not weird enough, I have an older brother, Pete. His real name is Jefferson, but he insists on being called by his middle name because Jefferson was the name of his biological dad (Mom and Dad adopted him when I was little), who apparently wasn’t a good person. Pete’s seventeen, and he’s really rude and annoying. He won’t be in my class (good thing!) but he’ll be at my same school, because it goes from kindergarten up through twelfth grade (although technically the seventh through twelfth grade section of the building is called “Learner’s Academy”). Pete’s in eleventh grade this year, although I think he should be in preschool because he’s not very smart. Anyway, I don’t want anyone to know we’re related, because Pete’s the kind of kid who always gets in trouble and does really bad things. He even looks like a punk, with his dyed green hair and disgusting lip piercing.
There’s one member of my family going to my school, other than me, who is normal. That’s my little brother, Harrisson. He’s six and going into first grade. He’s never been to school before, so he’s really excited.
Okay. Enough talk about school. Let me tell you about me, so you can have a little bit of background knowledge for this diary/story I’m about to write (even though the only one who will ever read it will be me). My full name is Allisen Kaylah Zepetto. Yes, that’s Allisen with an e, not an o. My parents really liked the name Allison, but they already knew a few Allisons and they wanted me to be unique. So they changed the spelling. It’s kind of annoying sometimes because people usually spell my name wrong, and places that have personalized things like mugs and keychains never have anything with my name spelled correctly. But overall, I like the spelling of my name, and I like that it’s unique.
Here’s some more stuff about me: I live in Nashua, New Hampshire. I’ve lived in this same house for my entire life. My favorite thing to do is write (That might be kind of obvious). I also like to read, swim, draw, play outside, and do a bunch of other things. I have long brown hair and a lot of freckles on my cheeks and nose. You already know that I’m ten and have three siblings. I also have two wonderful parents, and three cats named Tuxio, Sniffer, and Leelee. Sniffer is my best friend in the whole entire world, but I don’t have a human best friend.
Maybe that will change when I start sixth grade. Somehow I doubt it.
September 7
School! I am writing this at school. I’m in my classroom right now, sitting at a desk on the right side of the very back row. All around me I see unfamiliar faces, except for right next to me, which is where Mirisen is sitting. We’re seated in alphabetical order by last names, and since our last name is Zepetto, we’re dead last.
It looks like there are 21 kids in the class. Not everyone is here yet, but that’s how many desks there are. That’s a lot more kids than were in my 3rd grade private school class, but fewer than were in my 4th grade public school class, and my 5th grade crazy school class.
A lot of the kids are giving Mirisen weird looks. I don’t blame them. Aside from being two or three years younger than most of us, Mirisen is very short, only like 3’8 or 3’9. She looks about six. I wonder if people think she’s my little sister. I mean, she is my little sister, but I wonder if people think she’s my little little sister, like not supposed to be in this class. I’m not going to say anything. They’ll find out soon enough.
September 7, later
Our teacher’s name is Mrs. Banks. She introduced herself, then asked everyone in the class to introduce themselves by saying their name and something fun they did over the summer. I managed to catch a few names— Rob Lebeng (who I remembered because he has the same last name as the principal— I wonder if they’re related?), Sara Corey, Natalia Frink, and Joseph San something— but mainly I was too nervous to pay much attention.
My turn came too soon. “Um, hi,” I began, trying to focus only on Mrs. Banks and not on the nineteen unfamiliar students looking at me. “I’m Allisen Zepetto, and this summer I went to Michigan to visit my grandparents, and I, well, rode my bike a lot and hung out with my family and stuff.”
Mrs. Banks nodded approvingly, and then it was Mirisen’s turn. “My name is Mirisen Zepetto, and I—”
A boy near the front interrupted. “You’re in this class?”
“Yes,” answered Mirisen. “And this summer I—”
“How old are you?” a girl near us asked.
I felt sorry for Miri. I could tell she didn’t want a big fuss about her age. “Eight years and ten months,” she mumbled. “Anyway, since Allisen is my sister, we did most of the same—”
“Did you just say you’re eight?” someone blurted.
“Yes!” Mirisen answered, trying not to sound impatient. “This summer I visited my grandparents and I read and I played with my little brother and…”
“Did you skip a grade? Or two? Or three?” a girl interrupted her again.
Miri looked uncomfortable. “Actually, I—”
Someone else started to say something, but they were cut off by Mrs. Banks. “Ladies and gentlemen, you are being very rude right now. I can assure you that Mirisen is supposed to be in this class, and I expect you to treat her like you would any of your other classmates—with respect.”
She let Mirisen finish, and this time no one interrupted her. But by the time we moved on to our first subject (math), people were still staring.
September 8
2nd day of school. My only friend is my sister. Apparently some boys in our class (particularly two class clown types named Thomas and something like Steve Ray) think it’s hilarious that Mirisen is only eight, and keep asking her how old she is just to annoy her or hear it again or whatever. She told them the first couple times, then decided to ignore them. She told me she’s going to calculate how old she is in days and tell them the answer in days if they ask her again.
Mirisen and I have been sitting together at lunch, just the two of us, away from everyone else because we don’t have any friends yet. Actually, Mirisen does have a couple friends, because she went here for a few extracurricular activities last year, but they’re all in lower grades. Fifth, sixth, seventh, and eighth graders eat lunch together, and her friends are all in third and fourth.
Today, we made the mistake of sitting at a table that later became populated with a bunch of rowdy 8th grade boys. They were all talking about… Pete.
“Yeah, this dude in my brother’s math class, his hair’s bright green. Bright as a traffic light. And he’s got this spike through his lip and everything. He’s sick.”
“Hey, I think I’ve seen him! Yeah, scary dude. Pretty sizzle, though.”
“Yeah, he’s cool.”
Mirisen and I didn’t dare look up throughout our entire meal. We didn’t even speak. We were so relieved when lunch ended.
September 10
Ah, the weekend. Two days to recuperate before I have to go to school again. Yesterday was just as yucky as the first two days.
September 11
4 years ago, terrorists flew planes into the World Trade Center in New York. Today, our church had a special peace pole dedication in memory of all the people who died in those attacks. Other than that, we didn’t do much today.
September 12
School again. At lunchtime, Mirisen and I sat at a vacant table. Someone else plopped down across from us. It was a girl I’d seen a couple times at church, including at the peace pole dedication yesterday. She had blond hair and an unusual-looking face. I don’t really know how to describe her face except that it looked different from most people’s faces.
“Hi!” she said with a smile. “I know you from church. What’th your mane?”
Her speech was slurry and kind of hard to understand. “My…name?” I said, to make sure I understood what she was asking.
She nodded.
“Allisen, and this is Mirisen, my sister. What about you, what’s your name?”
“Mouthie!”
“Mouthie?” I exclaimed. What an odd name.
“No. Mou-thie.” She said it the exact same way.
“Mousie?” asked Mirisen.
The girl giggled. “No, thilly! My—mane—ith—MOUTHIE!”
“Oh!” Mirisen suddenly exclaimed. “Nowcie?”
“Yeth! Yeth! Mouthie! I’m ten. How old are you?” They began talking, but I could barely understand anything Nowcie said. I still don’t know how Mirisen managed to get Nowcie out of Mouthie.
September 14
Oh, great. Does Mom want me to go crazy??? She signed me up for a typing class! It starts next Monday (Sept. 19). At least Mirisen will be in it too. Still, it goes AFTER school! That means another hour of being at school! No! NO! NO!
Mirisen’s excited (of course). She’ll finally learn to type really fast like Mom. Mom writes self-help books for adults as her career, so she can type really fast. What I don’t get is if she’s such a great typist, why can’t she just teach us herself?
Oh, sigh. I guess school this year is better than it was last year, but not by much.
September 16
“I love school.” That was Harrisson. He, Mirisen, and I were sitting in my bedroom. I was doing my homework and they were playing with stuffed animals (Mirisen, of course, had already finished all of her homework). “Don’t you just love school?” Harrison continued. “I do. First grade is really fun. My teacher’s Miss Enshaw. She’s nice. Do you think your teacher is nice?”
“No,” I answered immediately. “She gave me a 90 on my spelling test!” A 90 is an okay grade for me most of the time, but not on spelling, my best and favorite subject.
“Well, you did miss two words,” pointed out Mirisen, who, of course, had gotten a 100. “She didn’t ‘give you’ a 90, you gave yourself a 90.”
“But she didn’t even give us a word list to study!” I seethed.
“There you go, then. A 90 without studying is a pretty decent grade.”
Little smarty-pants. She chose not to point out the fact that she, two years younger than me, got a 100 without studying.
September 19
Oh no! Typing class today! I am dreading having to spend an extra hour at school.
September 19, later
There were only three kids from my class who went to the typing class, other than Miri and me. Two of them were Toby and Mariah, who I knew were already best friends with each other. The other was Emalie Maye, a tall brown-haired girl who didn’t seem to have any special friends in the class. She came and sat down next to me. After the instructor, Mr. Ellesagonan (he told us to just call him Mr. E), explained things to us and got us set up with the typing games, Emalie Maye turned and started talking to me. “You’re Allisen, right? I’m Emalie Maye. Are you new here? I’m new. I used to go to a public school but my parents said this school has more options for classes and stuff so they signed me up here. I love this school! It’s really fun!”
She was super talkative, and I liked her at once. I told her all about how bad my first couple days had been, about Pete and his craziness, and about Nowcie, who hadn’t eaten lunch with us since last week but had waved excitedly to me when I saw her in the hallway yesterday. “Oh, I know who you’re talking about!” Emalie Maye exclaimed. “That’s Nalcie Halls. She ate lunch with me once too. She’s really nice, but did you find it hard to understand her? I did. I think she has some sort of disability. The teacher she was with said she’s in a special ed class. Hey, you wanna eat lunch with me tomorrow? I don’t mind eating alone or with random people like Nalcie, but I just thought it would be fun to sit with someone from my class.”
“Sounds great!” I replied, ecstatic. Then Mr. E came over and told us to stop talking and start typing.
September 22
Well, now that I have a friend in my class, school isn’t too bad. Emalie Maye and I have been eating lunch together for the last couple days, and we’re becoming really good friends! Nalcie ate with us yesterday too, and I had an easier time understanding her this time. And the day before yesterday, Mirisen managed to find her friend Michael Caxzis, who’s in 5th grade. He’s actually homeschooled, but he comes here sometimes for the restaurants and stores and stuff. When Michael’s not here, Mirisen hangs out with Emalie Maye and me, which I think works out well. I still get time with my sister at school, but I also get time alone with my new friend!
Guess what. Only six days until my 11th birthday! I’m going to ask if we can celebrate with Emalie Maye.
I think school will be good this year.
Book 2: Me, A Babysitter?
