Claudia and the Perfect Boy Read online

  “Would you write that down for me?” It made no sense to me right now, but I figured I’d run it past Stacey, the math ace, and let her explain it to me. “Would it be all right if Stacey McGill came in and helped me?” I asked.

  “Okay, but I’m depending on you to finish the column on time, and make sure it’s right,” said Emily.

  “No problem,” I agreed, although the sound of all that responsibility was scary.

  “In the announcement I told the kids to include an address or phone number so we don’t have to be involved with sorting through the responses to their ads. They can contact one another directly,” Emily told me.

  “Good idea,” I said. I hadn’t even thought about how that would work.

  “As the editor, I read the entire paper before it goes to bed,” she said.

  “Before it does what?” I asked.

  “Sorry, more newspaper talk. ‘Goes to bed’ means before it goes to the printer. Once it goes, no more changes can be made. We don’t have the time to check over a test copy before the final printing. Since I’m the editor and the last one to see the paper before it’s printed, if there’s any problem I’m the one who gets blamed. But I’ll need you to use your judgment and not put in any ads that are too weird.”

  “Do you think I’ll get weird letters?”

  “In my letters to the editor column I get some letters that I know are jokes, but I also get letters trying to gross me out, and once in a while a joke letter that some kid hopes I’ll take seriously and print even though it’s totally ridiculous.”

  “Like what?” I asked, really starting to worry.

  “One time I got a letter from a kid saying that he had seen a cockroach in the cafeteria and that he felt that the only environmentally safe way to solve the problem was to let roach-eating gecko lizards loose in the cafeteria. He insisted that this should be put to a school vote immediately.”

  “Oh, gross!” I moaned. “I’ve never seen a roach in the cafeteria.”

  “Neither have I,” said Emily. “And I wouldn’t want to see a bunch of geckos crawling around, either. It was sent in by Alan Gray, and I’ll bet he had a whole bunch of kids lined up to vote for gecko patrol.”

  “Alan Gray is a gecko,” I said. At the very least, he was one of the most immature guys in our class.

  “All I’m saying,” said Emily, “is keep your eye out for anything that could cause trouble.”

  “Okay,” I agreed. Just as the first bell rang, Emily showed me a photocopy of her announcement for Claudia’s Personals. “The paper comes out tomorrow, so you’ll be able to get busy right away,” she said. Then she grabbed a schedule of deadlines as we rushed out of the room together toward our first classes. “Try to meet these deadlines,” she said as we merged with a rush of kids. “It messes everything up if you’re late.”

  The next day, I hurried to the Express office at lunchtime to pick up the new issue of the paper. Stacks of it were sitting outside the office door and I lifted one from the top. “There it is,” I said to Stacey, who had come with me. I folded back the paper and showed her the announcement of my new column.

  “Cool,” Stacey said, reading it over. “You thought of this less than a week ago and here it is. Oh, and look at that!” Her eyes had traveled down to the cardboard box which had been set out in the hall for the letters for my column.

  Three envelopes were sitting at the bottom of it!

  “Already?” I cried as I stooped to gather up the envelopes. Excitedly, I ripped open the first one, a lavender envelope. Inside was written: “Roses are red, violets are blue, the BSC is real proud of you. Good luck with your new column. Love, All of Us.” It was written in Mary Anne’s neat handwriting. “Thanks. That’s nice,” I said to Stacey who was smiling. “Are the other two from you guys?”

  She shook her head. “I don’t think so.”

  The second ad was written in big, loopy handwriting. I want to meet a cute, nice guy who is interested in hiking, animals, and camping. My friends say I am pretty but I still find it hard to talk to guys. Most guys don’t even nodice me. I hope you do. (I’m in the 8th grade.) Write Shy Beauty at 12 Rose Court, Stoneybrook, CN, 10555.

  “This one is perfect,” I said, handing the letter to Stacey.

  “She spelled ‘notice’ wrong,” Stacey pointed out.

  “Do you honestly think I would know that? You promised to help me find spelling mistakes and stuff like that. Remember?”

  “I will,” she assured me.

  “And I need you to look over the spacing stuff Emily was talking about. It’s completely confusing.”

  “I’ll help you, Claudia, I promise.”

  The next personal said: Help! My parents are going Splitsville and it is messing up my head. Some days I feel like I’m going to explode with anger. Other days I want to crawl into a shell like a teenage, mutant, injured turtle. I want to find other kids with the same problem. I know you’re out there. Maybe it would help to talk. Contact Sixth-Grade Sean with the Messed Up Life. At the end he listed his address and phone number.

  “What do you think I should do with this one?” I asked Stacey as I handed it to her.

  “I sure know how he feels,” said Stacey as she read it. “Poor kid. I suppose you could print it.”

  “I don’t know. It seems too serious for this kind of column. My idea for Claudia’s Personals was that it would be fun, maybe even a little silly.”

  “You can’t just ignore something like this,” Stacey pointed out.

  “I know.” I tossed the two letters back in the box to look at later. “I’ll have to think about it some more.”

  My column had just been announced and already I had a sneaking suspicion that I was in for more than I had bargained for.

  “Aughhh! It’s an avalanche!” Stacey exclaimed two days later as we tried to keep the overflowing envelopes from sliding out of the box and onto the floor of the Express office. “Can you believe this?”

  “It’s pretty awesome,” I agreed.

  “And you were worried about getting mail,” said Emily, joining us.

  “I guess I didn’t need to.”

  “You’d better get to it,” Emily said cheerfully. “You’ve got your work cut out for you.”

  “Emily, we won’t be able to use all of these,” I said. “What should I do?”

  “You’ll have to pick the best ones and use them in the order they come in,” she suggested. “If this keeps up, the staff will have to meet and discuss giving you more space.”

  As Emily walked away, Stacey grabbed my arm excitedly. “More space!” she whispered. “You’re already taking over the entire paper.”

  “Don’t get carried away,” I said with a smile. “We might as well start reading these.”

  I thought choosing the letters would be a breeze. I would simply choose enough to fit the column and that would be it.

  Wrong!

  For starters, a lot of these kids didn’t know the meaning of the word short. Emily’s announcement had told them to place a short ad in the paper, but almost a quarter of the letters ran on for two pages. One girl went on for four pages! This is a bit of her letter: I don’t want to sound conceited because then you wouldn’t like a conceited person, and I’m not conceited but it’s very hard to write the good things about yourself without sounding stuck up, which I definitely am not. All my friends say I’m not. They even say I’m too unconceited which may be why boys don’t notice me. That might be it, because otherwise I really am pretty noticeable. For one thing I’m large and I have purple hair! Not actually purple, of course, but purplish. I put in this eggplant henna rinse and it didn’t exactly turn out the way I expected. I’m a big fan of Cleopatra and I wanted it to look like her hair. Let’s just say I’m still working on it. I don’t want you to think I’m fat (I could lose a few pounds I suppose). But mostly I’m tall and athletic. I’m on the girls basketball team and I like to play sports. My mother says big bones run in our family, so no shrimpy b
oys should answer. No offense to shrimpy boys but we might look odd together.

  This is how her letter went on for four pages! “This has got to be Liza Shore in the seventh grade,” said Stacey after I told her to look over the letter. “No one else could fit this description.”

  “I have to shorten her letter,” I said. “I’d hate not to use it after all the trouble she went to write it, but right now it would take up the whole column.”

  I took the letter home with me, and that evening I called the phone number Liza had included with her letter. “Hello, is this Big-Boned Beauty?” I asked, using the name which she’d signed to her letter. (I didn’t want her to know I’d figured out who she was.)

  “Yes,” she answered cautiously.

  “This is Claudia and I’d like to discuss your ad with you. It needs some work,” I said.

  Liza was agreeable and the next day after school I went back to the Express office and added Liza’s ad to the column. Unique, statuesque seventh-grade girl wants to get to know husky guy interested in sports and Ancient Egyptian cultures. For fun dates call Big-Boned Beauty at 555-7293.

  Liza hadn’t been the only one I’d called that night. I’d called eight other kids about their letters. By the next day I’d turned a girl who had spent three paragraphs trying to explain how she hoped to find a boy who didn’t mind a girl who talked a lot into: Skilled communicator seeks strong, silent type boy for long, meaningful discussions. Contact Rambling Rose at the following address….

  And the boy who went to great lengths (two and a half pages) to explain that he suspected girls wrongly thought he was a wimp just because he liked classical music and butterfly-collecting, was changed into: If you love classical music and nature’s beauty, this fun-loving boy seeks your company. Write to No Wimp at the following address….

  “You’re good at this,” Stacey commented as we sorted through letters on Friday afternoon.

  I blew a wisp of hair from my face. “I suppose, but it took me half an hour to figure out how to spell ‘statuesque.’ I was looking in the dictionary for something like ‘staduesk.’ I don’t know how you’re supposed to find the spelling of a word when you don’t know how to spell it! It doesn’t make sense. You know, Stacey, that’s going to be the hardest part of this job.”

  “What is?”

  “Spelling! I figured that the stuff kids sent in would be what we printed. I didn’t expect to have to rewrite so much of it.”

  “Emily will fix your spelling,” Stacey reminded me.

  “I know, but I don’t want her to think I’m an idiot. I told you working for a newspaper wasn’t something I’d be good at.”

  Stacey looked thoughtful. Then she said, “Don’t worry about it. I have something to show you which you’re going to love.”

  Stacey moved over to one of the computers. “I talked to Emily before you got here, and she said we could use this to write up your column.”

  “But I don’t know how to use a computer for writing,” I objected.

  “It’s easy,” said Stacey. “I’ll show you. My dad’s secretary has been showing me during my visits to his office.” Stacey turned on the computer and opened a new file. “This will make your life so easy,” she said. She typed in the sentence: Staduesk butey sekes cule guy for fun daytes.

  “You spelled ‘statuesque’ wrong,” I pointed out triumphantly. (The only reason I knew was because I’d just looked it up, of course.)

  Stacey rolled her eyes at me. “Is statuesque the only spelling mistake you see there?” she asked in disbelief.

  “Stacey, you know I’m not a good speller. Don’t bug me,” I replied, embarrassed.

  “You’ll be a good speller from now on,” she said gleefully. She hit a button and the word Spellcheck came up on the screen, then, one by one all the misspelled words in Stacey’s sentence were pointed out, the correct spellings were given, and they were even entered into the sentence. In minutes the sentence was correct.

  “This is so cool!” I said excitedly. “This will change my whole life! It’s beyond belief!”

  “I don’t know about changing your whole life, but as far as working on your column goes, you can check your spelling on this.”

  In an instant the impossible problem in my life had been nearly wiped away.

  Up until now I had seen computers as interesting if they could be used for graphic design or pattern-making or something like that. Otherwise, I didn’t have the slightest interest. But now I was seeing them in a new light. “This computer is the greatest invention on earth!” I said. “This spelling thing is, anyway.”

  “You have to learn how to use it first,” Stacey reminded me.

  “Oh, yeah.” I pulled up a chair. “Let’s get started.”

  Although other kids were in the office working on the paper, no one seemed to need our computer. So I sat and concentrated. Learning the commands wasn’t easy but I was determined to master them. I discovered that I really liked working with the computer, too. In fact, the time went so fast that I was shocked when Stacey showed me her watch.

  “Five o’clock!” I shrieked, jumping out of the chair. “We have to get out of here!”

  “We can make it,” said Stacey, giving the computer several commands that would prepare it to be turned off properly.

  “We can make it if we run all the way,” I said as I grabbed my jacket.

  Stacey and I flew out of the office.

  I avoided getting the Look from Kristy by a split second. (The Look is the deadly glare she gives to any club member who arrives late.) Stacey and I skidded into my room just in time to see the red digital number on my clock change from five-twenty-nine to five-thirty. Whew!

  “Where were you?” asked Kristy, who is used to finding me here when she arrives.

  “We were working on her personals column,” Stacey explained as she took off her jacket.

  “How is it going?” Mary Anne asked.

  “Great,” I said. “But it’s not as simple as I expected.” I explained how I had to reword a lot of the letters.

  “Did you get the letter from us?” Kristy asked.

  “I did. Thanks, you guys.” Thinking of that letter reminded me of the other letters I’d received in that first batch, especially the one from the boy who wanted to form a support group for kids whose parents were getting divorced. Right now it was on my dresser since I’d taken it out the night before when I’d been making my phone calls. I just couldn’t decide what to do about it. “I have a problem I’d like to run past everyone,” I told Kristy. “Can we take a second to talk about it?”

  “Sure, as long as the phone doesn’t ring,” Kristy agreed.

  I read the letter to my friends. “This is much more serious than any of the other letters I’ve gotten,” I told them.

  “It does sound serious,” said Jessi. “Maybe a group of kids talking about their feelings isn’t a bad idea. I think you should print it.”

  “But is that enough? This kid sounds pretty messed up over this. What if he needs more help than a support group of kids can give him?”

  “Maybe he should see a counselor,” Mary Anne suggested.

  “I thought of giving this letter to Sean’s guidance counselor,” I confided. “But I felt as if I’d be betraying his confidence.”

  “It’s not confidential if he wanted the letter printed in the school newspaper,” Kristy pointed out.

  “I know, but he’s turned to other students for help, not to adults. Maybe he doesn’t want to talk to someone older since his parents are adults. I don’t know,” I said, feeling pretty helpless.

  “Seeing Dr. Reese helped me a lot,” said Mary Anne. Earlier this year, Mary Anne was having a hard time. She was sorting through confusing feelings about some things, so with the help of her guidance counselor she started seeing Dr. Reese, a therapist. After seeing Dr. Reese for awhile, things seemed a lot clearer and more manageable to Mary Anne. Eventually, she stopped seeing her, but she says she hangs onto her pho
ne number, just in case she feels the need to talk with her again.

  “Dr. Reese,” I repeated softly. “I wonder if Sean would go.”

  “You’re not writing an advice column,” Kristy reminded me. “If you try to solve everyone’s problems you’ll drive yourself nuts.”

  “I know,” I admitted, “but something about this letter got to me. It was in my box the very first day. It’s like Sean is desperate to find help somewhere. Look how fast he wrote the letter.”

  That’s as far as the conversation went before the phone rang. The first call came from Mrs. Barrett. “Please, not me,” said Mary Anne when Kristy asked who could take the job. “I can’t face going over there again so soon. It’s too sad. All I’ll do is cry every time I look at Pow.” She checked her book. The only other person besides Mary Anne who was available was Shannon.

  “Sure, I’ll take it,” Shannon agreed glumly. “That poor dog.”

  “Those poor kids,” added Mary Anne.

  Shannon smiled sadly. “Them, too. But I guess I have a real soft spot for dogs.”

  Poor everybody! That’s how I was feeling by the end of the meeting. I was bummed out about the Barretts, like the rest of the club members were. And I couldn’t get Sean off my mind. Tomorrow was the deadline for my first column. I had to decide whether or not to print his ad.

  When the BSC members had left, I sat on my bed and poured some letters out of a large manila envelope onto my bed. I picked up Sean’s letter and tapped it on my hand thoughtfully. Then I picked up the phone and punched in the number he’d included in his ad. “Hi, can I speak to Sean, please?” I asked when a woman answered. “It’s Claudia Kishi.”

  “Hello?” Sean asked anxiously.

  “Hi, Sean, this is Claudia. I wanted to talk to you about your ad.”

  “Yeah?”

  Suddenly this seemed like something I should do in person. “Could you meet me at the Express office Monday after school?”

  “I guess so. Is something wrong with the ad?” He sounded incredibly nervous.