Free Tallahassee Higgins by Mary Downing Hahn

doing is working in some restaurant called the Big Carrot." I started swinging really hard again so Jane wouldn't see me crying.
    Jane didn't say anything, but she got her swing going too. Soon the two of us were flying back and forth, Jane up when I was down, me up when she was down. Then we started singing this dumb song we'd learned in music, "Little Red Caboose," until we were laughing too hard to pump our swings.
    On the way home we walked up and down Forty-first Avenue so many times that I got a blister on my heel, but we didn't see Mrs. Russell. Not once did she come to the window to observe her own granddaughter wearing out her shoes in front of her house.
    ***
    That night Aunt Thelma got two phone calls. The first one was from Mrs. Duffy, and Aunt Thelma was very angry when she hung up. She couldn't understand why I was doing so badly in school. "It's not as if you were stupid," she said. "You're lazy, that's what's wrong with you. Just like Liz, you think the world owes you a living."
    Then the phone rang again, right in the middle of the scene we were having. This time it was Dawn's mother.
    "You ruined a twenty-five-dollar blouse," Aunt Thelma said as she hung up, "and Mrs. Harper expects me to pay for it!"
    "She wrecked the picture I was painting!"
    "A picture?" Aunt Thelma stared at me. "You ruined an expensive blouse because of a worthless picture?"
    "It wasn't worthless! It was the best picture I ever painted!" Tears filled my eyes as I remembered the red-haired girl coasting down the perfect wave on her surfboard. "You know I get A's in art," I added, thinking of the value she placed on grades.
    "Art and P.E.," she said scornfully. "The only subjects you're passing, and they're not even important."
    "They are to me!" I glared at her and she glared back.
    "You go to your room," Aunt Thelma said. "I've heard enough from you for one night!"
    As I walked past the living room, Uncle Dan looked up. "What's the matter now?" He'd been so absorbed in the basketball game on TV that he'd missed the whole scene.
    "Nothing," I muttered, "nothing at all, except I hate living here!" My voice rose, triggering another outburst of barking from Fritzi. "Shut up!" I yelled at the dog. "Just shut up!"
    "Oh, Talley." Uncle Dan stood up and started toward me, but I ran upstairs to my room, leaving Fritzi barking at the bottom of the steps.
    Hurling myself down on my bed, I pressed my face against Melanie. "We've got to get out of here," I told her. "Every day it gets worse and worse."
    "You could run away," Melanie said. "Just like Liz."
    "Maybe I will," I muttered. "They think I'm exactly like her, don't they? So maybe I should do just what she did. It would serve Aunt Thelma right."

Chapter 12
    A COUPLE OF DAYS later Aunt Thelma, Uncle Dan, and I were sitting in my classroom. Mrs. Duffy began our conference by explaining that my math skills were at least two years behind my grade placement.
    "What does that mean?" Aunt Thelma frowned at Mrs. Duffy.
    "Well, it means that Tallahassee is working on a low fourth-grade level. She doesn't know her multiplication tables, she doesn't grasp the fundamentals of long division, and her fractions are very shaky. She should have mastered these skills before entering sixth grade."
    Mrs. Duffy sounded apologetic, as if she herself had something to do with my inadequacies.
    "It may be that the Florida schools have a different curriculum," she added uncertainly, rustling some papers on her desk.
    "It's more likely," said Aunt Thelma, "that Tallahassee was never made to do her homework. You do realize that she has attended at least half a dozen elementary schools before coming here?"
    Mrs. Duffy nodded. "I looked at her record." Smiling at me, she added, "Her language skills are excellent. She reads on a twelfth-grade level, and her book reports are a real treat. Very original and entertaining, and usually beautifully illustrated. She has a great deal of artistic talent."
    Uncle Dan smiled. "She