The Magical Ms. Plum (8 page)

“Well, I suppose we do have some time.”

The class clapped and smiled, and Brad gave a piercing two-fingered whistle.

Ms. Plum straightened her plum-colored skirt, smoothed down her hair, and pushed her sparkly glasses a little higher up her nose.

She smiled, then said quietly, “Thank you, class.”

Then, like a famous conductor, Ms. Plum raised her spoon over the glasses and flowers and proceeded to play Beethoven’s world-famous “Ode to Joy.”

One day in April, while Carlos snooped around the empty classroom during lunch recess, he opened the door to the closet and slipped inside. Being supersmart, he wondered why he hadn’t thought of this before.

Carlos smelled the mysterious smell. He looked at all the colored pencils and glue sticks. He took a red licorice stick from the big jar on the shelf. He was just about to take a bite when he heard a faint rustle. He looked around, but there wasn’t anything there. Even so, it felt like something was watching him from the dark. He decided he better leave.

Stuffing the licorice in his pocket, Carlos sneaked out of the closet and shut the door.

Just then Eric came into the classroom. “What’s that?” he said.

“What’s what?” said Carlos, his heart beating fast.

“You’ve been in the closet,” said Eric.

“Have not,” said Carlos. How could Eric tell?

“Where’d that wolf come from, then?” said Eric.

“What wolf?”

“Right there,” said Eric, pointing at Carlos’s heel. “Right behind you.”

Carlos whirled around, but there wasn’t anything there.

“Now he’s behind your leg. He turned when you did,” said Eric.

“You’re just making that up,” said Carlos, twisting around. He couldn’t see anything.

Just then Mindy came in. Her eyes widened.

“You’ve been in the closet, haven’t you?” She pointed toward Carlos’s heel.

“Have not!” cried Carlos.

But it was no use, because everyone could see the little wolf. Everyone except Carlos. No matter how fast he turned, the wolf turned faster, so he was always out of sight behind Carlos.

“What’s he look like?” Carlos asked.

“Like he would eat a passel of baby chickens,” said Tashala.

“Scraggly and mean,” said Becky Oh.

“His teeth are really long,” Nadia added nervously.

“I think he’s kind of cute,” said Emiko.

Carlos ran to the mirror. But still he couldn’t see it.

“He moves whenever you do. Like he’s hooked to you or something,” said Brad.

“It’s not true!” said Carlos, swallowing back the lump in his throat.

Then Ms. Plum came in. Carlos felt his heart jump like there was a squirrel inside his chest. What would happen when she found out he’d gone into the supply closet without permission?

But Ms. Plum didn’t seem to notice the wolf.

And even though every kid in Ms. Plum’s room knew Carlos had sneaked into the supply closet, no one told on him. They went over their spelling words as if it were just a regular afternoon.

Ms. Plum asked Carlos to come to the blackboard to write out their first spelling word:
kleptomaniac
.

“Someone who can’t stop stealing things,”
announced Becky Oh. She liked the especially hard words Ms. Plum sometimes gave. They were always interesting.

Carlos stood to go to the board. That’s when he saw the wolf reflected in the window glass.

It was thin, low-slung, like a giant rat. And it followed him up to the chalkboard.

Now he could feel its warm breath, sensed it nearly touching him with its long, sharp nose. He hurried up to the blackboard, wrote out the word, and hurried back to his desk.

Ms. Plum announced their next word. “Jealousy.”

Carlos didn’t hear it. All he could feel was the presence of the wolf at his heel. He felt like the wolf might bite him on the back of his ankle, and he wanted to rub his ankle, but he was afraid he would touch the wolf.

When the bell rang, Carlos sat at his desk, waiting. All the kids glanced at him as they went out the door. Carlos didn’t look at them.

Finally, when they were all gone, Carlos went up to Ms. Plum’s desk.

“Can I take him back, Ms. Plum? Please?” he whispered.

“Take what back, dear?” said Ms. Plum, looking up from the work sheets she was grading.

“The wolf.”

“Wolf?”

“Can’t you see it?” Carlos waved toward his heel.

Ms. Plum stood up, leaned over her desk, and squinted.

“I don’t see anything, Carlos,” she said.

Carlos hung his head.

“I went in the closet,” he said. “Without permission. I took some licorice.”

Carlos set the limp red vine on her desk. “And then
he
came out,” Carlos added, nodding toward his heel.

“Oh, I see.”

“Can I take him back? Please, Ms. Plum.”

“Yes, I think that would be the smart thing to do.”

Carlos hurried into the closet and back out again.

“Do you see him, Ms. Plum?” he asked.

“No.”

“You sure?”

Ms. Plum nodded.

“But you never could see him,” Carlos pointed out.

“True. But what do you think?” said Ms. Plum. “Is he still there?”

Carlos knew he was gone. He could feel it inside.

“I’m glad you couldn’t see him. He was really creepy,” Carlos said. “Why couldn’t you see him?”

“Maybe because that’s not what I see when I look at you,” Ms. Plum said.

Carlos was almost afraid to ask, but he did. “What do you see?”

“I see someone very special who will learn and grow all his life,” said Ms. Plum with a smile.

“That doesn’t sound so special,” Carlos said quietly.

“Oh, but it is,” said Ms. Plum. “You’ll see soon enough.”

After a moment, Carlos asked, “Does this mean I’ll never get a chance at the closet?”

“There’s always another chance at the closet for everyone,” she said firmly.

Then Ms. Plum handed Carlos one of her plums. It was plump and purple and shimmered as if covered with a silvery dust. Ms. Plum didn’t give out her plums very often.

As Carlos hurried across the schoolyard, he bit into his plum. It filled his mouth with springtime, earth, and honey.

He took another bite. He could feel the prickle of grass and the lazy heat of a summer afternoon. He took another bite. Autumn leaves crackled and popped, tickling his mouth. He took his last bite. He could
taste frost sparkles and the blue shadows of snow.

It was the most amazing thing he had ever eaten.

Carlos grinned and ran for his school bus. It was still there! It was as if the bus and all the kids inside were waiting just for him.

When Becky Oh squinched up her eyes and put her hand on her hip, she could scold a wall if she wanted to. “Why do you have to stand there so still and flat?” she would complain.

“Stop being so hard,” she’d tell the floor.

“You’re always wet,” she’d grumble to water.

Becky could complain about just about anything. Today she was mumbling and grumbling because she thought Ms. Plum was being really boring. They were learning about grammar—nouns and verbs and adjectives. Becky usually liked words, but the day was boiling hot and Becky’s head felt heavy and dull. When Ms. Plum underlined the nouns in the sentence on the board, the chalk made a horrible squeak and broke in two.

“Becky, dear, could you please get me a new piece of chalk?” she asked.

Becky scowled. She could even complain about being picked for the closet!

She tromped up to the closet and slipped inside.

It was much cooler in there. And she could smell erasers and … lemon drops? She stood there for a long time, until she heard Ms. Plum calling.

“Becky, please, hurry up.” Even Ms. Plum seemed a little crabby today.

Becky grabbed a stick of chalk, then heard a tiny “hee-haw.” She looked down. There at her feet was a little donkey, about the size of squirrel. His coat was a soft gray. His eyes were bright. Strapped to his sides were two big yellow baskets that looked perfect for carrying things.

Becky tucked the chalk into one of the baskets and walked slowly from the closet. She didn’t want Ms. Plum to think she would hurry just because Ms. Plum had told her to.

The donkey carried the chalk to Ms. Plum and stood there while she bent down and took the chalk out of the basket. “Thank you, dear,” said Ms. Plum.

Then the donkey trotted after Becky to her desk.

Ms. Plum began to drone on again. Becky saw Tashala sigh and lay her head in her arms.

Becky scribbled out a note:

Ms. Plum is so B-O-R-I-N-G!

She put it in one of the donkey’s baskets, and he seemed to know right where to take it. He trotted over to Tashala and gave her a little nudge with his velvety nose. Tashala looked at Becky’s note, then scribbled out one in return:

It’s too hot for nouns.

The donkey trotted back to Becky, frisking his long ears and glancing up at her as he delivered the note.

Becky wrote out another note:

It’s not fair. Ms. Plum should give us extra recess.

Mindy saw the note over Becky’s shoulder, and she quickly wrote her own note:

I hat grammar and speling.

She stuffed it into the donkey’s basket along with Becky’s note.

Lucy saw what was going on and wrote her own note:

Ms. Plum shouldn’t use chalk. It squeaks and is dusty, which could be dangerous to your health.

Everyone began to write their own mean notes because it was hot and Ms. Plum was making them work too hard and the sun was too bright and the sky was too blue and the room suddenly had a funny, new smell.

The little donkey clip-clopped patiently from desk to desk as everyone crammed notes into his baskets.

Ms. Plum was too busy writing on the board to notice the donkey going from desk to desk. She was flushed and had a streak of chalk across her cheek.

The donkey got slower and slower with each note. The notes seemed awfully heavy for him. By the time he picked up Jovi’s note, the little donkey’s legs were trembling with the weight.

When the donkey limped past Becky, she noticed there was sweat crisscrossing his back where the straps for the baskets lay. His tiny head was bent low. He was working hard, and he didn’t look up at her with his once bright eyes.