Free Get Real by Betty Hicks Page A

for half a week. Mrs. Lewis is teaching me everything—even posture. Body centered. Elbows out just a little. Wrists flat.
    Mom and Dad said we should pay her, but at least I talked them out of that bad idea. Mrs. Lewis would be so insulted if I gave her money. Don’t they know that?
    So I take her something each week, like a loaf of fresh bread from the bakery, or a few flowers from the grocery store. All of which dents my allowance, but it’s worth it, because Mom and Dad will have to notice that I’m serious.
    Won’t they?
    Mostly they notice the stupid stuff, though. Not the important things.
    Like tonight, I’m cleaning up the dinner dishes while Mom gives Denver an emergency bath. He tried to juggle eggs. Dad hands me a dirty plate and asks me about my homework.
    â€œA few math problems, and a poem,” I say, squirting liquid soap into the sink, which is slowly filling up with water.
    Dad freezes in the middle of passing me a gunky casserole dish with baked-on chars of lasagna stuck to the sides. “What kind of poem?” he asks.
    I am so stupid! I have just informed my father, the poetry professor, that my homework involves a poem. I plunge my hands into the sink full of soapy water and know that I deserve whatever I get.
    â€œNothing much,” I mutter in the general direction of my navel.
    â€œWhat’s your assignment?” he persists. “Read a poem? Write a poem?”
    â€œWrite a poem,” I whisper.
    â€œWunderbar!” he exclaims. “They are teaching you something! What kind of poem?”
    â€œA sonnet.” I wish I could disappear down the garbage disposal.
    â€œAh,” he approves. “I have a book of Shakespearean sonnets. We can read them together after we finish the dishes. You can hear the meter, feel the rhythm—”
    â€œThanks, Dad, but Mrs. Macon gave us a bunch of guidelines, and—”
    â€œI thought Mr. Trimble was your English teacher.”
    â€œHe is,” I answer. “This poem is for History.”
    â€œYou’re writing a poem for History?” Dad puckers his mouth, making his beard twitch like a nervous red mouse.
    â€œOn Warren G. Harding,” I explain.
    â€œWarren G. Harding, the president?”
    â€œYeah.”
    â€œAnd that would be … because…” He waits for me to fill in the blank.
    â€œBecause everybody in the class got assigned a different president,” I say.
    He drops the plate he’s holding onto the counter. “No!” he cries out, clearly in pain. “You don’t write a sonnet about something assigned! You write a sonnet about something you feel in your soul.”
    â€œDad,” I say in my most convincing voice, “I love Warren G. Harding.”
    Dad glares at me and stomps over to the drawer where we keep the phone book. “I’m calling your teacher,” he says, picking up the phone with one hand. With the other hand, he jerks open the drawer so hard, the whole thing flies out and lands on the floor.
    Blam!
    Dried-up Magic Markers, green twist ties, dry-rotted rubber bands, and old refrigerator magnets spill onto the floor.
    Fiercely, he spits out a strange-but-powerful word that’s probably a curse in Greek.
    â€œPlease, Dad, no. Don’t call. You’ll embarrass me. Just let me write the stupid sonnet. It’s not important—”
    Dad staggers as if he’s taken an arrow through his heart.
    â€œNo. Wait,” I add quickly. “ Sonnets are important—just not this one. This one is for a History grade. Mrs. Macon thought it would be a fun way to learn facts. Something different. You know. Bring history to life.” I’m talking faster than Denver can find dirt.
    â€œFacts.” He exhales it slowly and sadly, the way someone might say their grandmother died. He’s staring at the telephone when it rings in his hand.
    If Mom were here, she would say, Saved by the