Election Madness (6 page)

"Yolanda is not even at school," Deja says to Nikki on the way to the tetherball court. "It's like she doesn't even care if she's nominated or not. I think it's because she knows she can't win."

"What makes you think she can't win the nomination?" Nikki asks.

"The kids who chose Yolanda are the ones who wanted to be nominated themselves," Deja explains as they approach the line of kids waiting to play tetherball. "So they didn't give their vote to someone who might be getting a bunch of other nominations. They thought that their nomination for Yolanda would be her only one. And so it was kind of safe. Get it?"

"Wow," Nikki says, but Deja wonders if she really followed her logic.

ChiChi gets out, and the line advances. Deja grows excited. She's good at tetherball. Ms. Shelby instituted all these hard rules like no holding the ball. You have to keep it going. And no slinging the ball by the rope. You have to keep it going by punching it with your fist or smacking it with your open hand. Ayanna is out, and then Rosario. At last it is Deja's turn. She's up against Keisha. Keisha's just as good as Deja. It's her serve. She hits it high so that it sails over Deja's head. She jumps to smack the ball back, but it's out of reach. It's winding high around the pole and Keisha is keeping it going. Finally, Deja jumps and smacks it hard to send it going the other way, unwinding from the pole. She punches it again, thinking she's got the upper hand. But Keisha is ready. She hits it back with both hands balled into a single fist. It's coming too fast and high for Deja to get at. It's moving so quickly around the pole that Deja is not able to send it the other way. Before she knows it, the ball has completely wound around the pole and she is out.

Deja moves to the back of the line, a little stunned. She had been sure she was going to win.

"Okay," Ms. Shelby says as soon as they've taken their seats and have settled down. "It is after recess and, as promised, we are about to have our runoff. It's a shame Yolanda isn't here, but she's home sick. Her mother called the office before school. So she's going to miss the excitement." The whole time Ms. Shelby is talking, she is passing out a slender ballot with just Deja's and Yolanda's names on it. Today she's not doing the "take one and pass it back" routine, which can cause so much confusion. She seems to be in a rush to get class elections over with so they can move on to more important matters.

Deja suddenly has butterflies in her stomach. Ms. Shelby skips over her as she passes out the ballots. She explains that since this is a runoff

between just Yolanda and Deja, they won't be voting. "Well, Yolanda won't be voting anyway, since she's not here," Ms. Shelby mutters, almost to herself. "So everyone, mark your ballots quickly, then fold them in half and hold them up."

Everyone does just as she says. They mark their ballots then hold them up so Ms. Shelby can come around and pluck them out of their hands. She quickly writes Deja's and Yolanda's names on the board. It seems she's going to do everything herself. Deja thinks she must be in a hurry.

When all the tally marks are placed beside each name, Deja has gotten sixteen votes to Yolanda's four. Deja knows two people voted for Yolanda: Antonia and her best friend, Casey. But who were the others?

Who cares?
Deja thinks. She is now the official nominee of Ms. Shelby's third grade class. Hah, hah, and
hah!

"So there's a meeting for all us candidates during afternoon recess tomorrow," Deja says to Nikki.

"Mmm-hmm," Nikki says. It is bedtime and they're sharing Deja's bed for the night. Deja is on the window side. She always sleeps on the window side of the bed. Auntie said Nikki might as well spend the night, since her parents are going to be late getting back from dinner.

"They're getting along really good now," Nikki says. "I'm so glad." She yawns.

"I told you. You were worried for nothing," Deja says. She really wants to get back to the election and her candidacy. "So at the meeting we're going to get all the rules for the election. Plus we have to give a speech on Tuesday in front of the whole school about why we'd be the best and stuff." Deja pauses for Nikki's response.

"Mmm-hmm," Nikki says.

"I'm going to ask Auntie Dee if I can get a new outfit for my speech. I want something lavender because it's my favorite color. What do you think, Nikki?"

Silence.

"Nikki?"

Silence. Nikki has fallen asleep.

Deja has a new sense of herself now that she is running for president of the entire school.
Her
entire school. As she and Nikki approach Carver Elementary, she actually feels a new kind of...
pride.
Yes, she has to call it pride—for the old brown brick building and broad cement steps. For the grass, even the dying patches, and the big sycamore tree with its huge exposed roots that look like boa constrictors hiding in the dirt. She feels important.
Important.
That's the word. The whole day she feels this way.

When Ms. Shelby reprimands certain students for waiting until after recess to raise their hands for permission to get water or go to the restroom, Deja feels as if she's on Ms. Shelby's side. She, too, can't understand why they continue to do this when they know better. She feels as put out as Ms. Shelby must. Being a candidate for student body president of Carver Elementary School has changed her. She now looks at her classmates as ... well, more babyish than she.

During lunchtime, as she sits gazing down the table at the kids of Room Ten, she can really see this. First of all, ChiChi, who is lunch monitor this week, isn't even recording in her special notebook that Ralph Buyer is, at that very moment, sticking his drinking straw up his nose and turning his head from side to side for all to see. No, ChiChi is busy talking to Keisha. In fact, they're exchanging Cherry Berries and Lemon Berries with each other under the table. What kind of lunch monitor is that? And Nikki, her own best friend, is laughing at something Ayanna has said while she's still eating. Everyone knows that's dangerous. That should definitely be reported so Ms. Shelby can remind them that people can choke that way. The whole lunch scene is disgusting to Deja.

It's so disgusting that as soon as students enter the classroom and settle into their seats to prepare for the next installment of
The Whipping Boy,
Deja raises her hand. Ms. Shelby doesn't notice. She just moves to the "How Am I Doing?" chart and says, "ChiChi, do you have anything to report to me?"

ChiChi looks caught off-guard. She makes a show of considering Ms. Shelby's question by taking out the lunch book and flipping through the pages.

Deja puts her hand down but sits forward in her chair and looks back and forth between Ms. Shelby and ChiChi. She needs to say something. Before she has even decided what to say, her hand flies up again.

Ms. Shelby turns to Deja. "Yes, Deja."

"Ms. Shelby, ChiChi is not a good lunch monitor. She wasn't even looking or writing anything down in the tablet when a whole bunch of kids were not showing good lunch table behavior. Ralph was putting straws up his nose—"

"It was one straw!" Ralph interrupts.

The class bursts into laughter and Deja looks around, frowning.

"Class, please. Go on, Deja," Ms. Shelby says with a sigh. She always does a lot of sighing in the afternoon.

Now the whole class has turned toward Deja. They seem to be filled with anticipation. A few have half smiles on their faces.

Deja begins again. "Okay ... Ralph put
a
straw up his nose. Keisha
and
ChiChi were eating Cherry Berries..."

"I was not eating Cherry Berries!" Keisha protests. "I had Lemon Berries and we weren't either eating them. We were just trading for
after school.
We weren't either gonna eat them. We were just trading!"

Ms. Shelby holds up her hand. "What are the rules about candy at school, Keisha?"

Keisha looks down. "No candy at school," she says in a quiet voice.

"That's right." Ms. Shelby changes Keisha's, ChiChi's, and Ralph's behavior cards from green to orange, the warning color. "ChiChi, if I get a report like this tomorrow, I'm going to have to get a new lunch monitor. Is that clear?"

ChiChi looks down. "Yeah."

"Pardon me?" Ms. Shelby says.

"Yes, Ms. Shelby."

"Thank you, Deja." Ms. Shelby picks up
The Whipping Boy
and opens it to where she left off the day before.

Deja waves her hand. "But I'm not finished, Ms. Shelby."

The whole class turns to Deja once again.

"Yes, Deja?"

"Nikki was doing something that was very, very dangerous. That
you
always tell us is very, very dangerous," Deja says, explaining herself, for now Nikki is staring at her. It gives Deja pause, but she continues. "Nikki was laughing really hard while she was eating. And you always told us that a person could choke if they do that."

When Deja finishes, she's surprised that Ms. Shelby doesn't say anything right away. It puts Deja in a funny spot. She can feel Nikki's displeasure and she isn't getting immediate approval from Ms. Shelby. Now she sits, waiting for Ms. Shelby to praise her for being the only one who noticed this hazardous activity, thereby preventing a big disaster in the future.

Finally Ms. Shelby turns to Deja and says, "Thank you again, Deja. Class, please remember that when you are eating you should refrain from laughing. You could choke." Then she picks up the book and begins to read.

Deja can't really concentrate on
The Whipping Boy,
though. She doesn't like the tone she heard in Ms. Shelby's voice. It sounded bland, not mad enough. She should have made what Deja told her more important. Deja's thoughts turn to Nikki. She wonders what she is thinking. Right then it seems like she can actually feel Nikki's thoughts. They seem to be hanging over the classroom like a big sour cloud. At one point, she chances a quick look over at Nikki. She is sitting with her chin in her hand, looking down at her desk. Is she frowning a little bit? Deja thinks that she is.

The same sour cloud seems to be following them after school as they walk home. Nikki is quiet, and Deja is chatty. First, she talks about the speech she has to give on Tuesday, five days away. Then she talks about what she will wear. When she notices that Nikki isn't commenting, she says, "What do you think I should wear, Nikki?"

Nikki takes a moment and then she says, "Wear what you want."

Deja looks over at her. "Why are you sounding like that?"

"Like what?" Nikki asks.

"All mad and stuff."

Nikki shrugs. "I'm not mad."

"Then how come you're acting mad?"

"I'm not acting mad. You asked me what you should wear and I said wear what you want."

Deja thinks about this for a bit. She opens her mouth to say something, but she can't think of anything to counter Nikki's logic. They walk the rest of the way home in silence. When they get to Nikki's house, Deja says, "You want to play some Ping-Pong?"

"Nah, I don't think so," Nikki says. "See you later, Deja." She turns up her walkway.

Deja feels a little bit at a loss. She was going to tell Nikki it was time to work on the campaign posters, but somehow she knows Nikki will enjoy refusing to help her. Auntie has already bought poster boards and everything. Deja guesses she'll have to do them on her own. Well, who needs Nikki, anyway? She can come up with the slogans herself. She nods her head confidently, but she wishes she felt more certain about it.

The next morning, bright and early—even earlier than usual—Deja knocks on Nikki's back door. "Oh, Deja," Nikki's mother says when she opens it. She's still in her pajamas and robe and she has a coffeepot in her hand. Suddenly, Deja feels silly standing there with her posters. At least they're in a large bag so that no one can easily see the not-so-good job she did on them.

Auntie Dee always says that Deja needs to develop more patience. But because she had to work on her campaign posters all by herself, she got a little bit hurried. She misspelled too many words on one, according to Auntie Dee, so instead of having three posters to hang up around the school, she only has two. She'll put one on the wall just outside Room Ten, and one by the front office. She had wanted to post one on the fence beside the schoolyard gate, but that's not to be.