Excellent Emma by Sally Warner Read Free Book Online

chooses a cap, for instance, and puts it on backwards, making her look even cuter and cooler than before. And Stanley rolls up a kerchief and ties it around his forehead so that he looks like a Native American warrior, which is also cool.
    And finally, finally, it is time to begin! I get ready to prove to everyone—especially to my faraway dad—that I am excellent. This is big. For me, anyway, because there is so much at stake.

    I really need to win.

10
    The Jumping Contest
    The first contest—distance jumping—will be done four kids at a time, Ms. Sanchez tells us, with an adult volunteer measuring each kid’s jump. A math wizard will then somehow compare each kid’s jump to how tall the kid is, and then they will announce the first- and second-place winners for the boys and for the girls.
    “Okay, jump !” Ms. Sanchez shouts to the first batch of kids.
    Jared tumbles forward on purpose after he leaps, and he scoots his foot a few inches forward when he falls. “That’s cheating,” EllRay cries, because he was the next kid over, and he had a really good view of the whole thing.
    Most of us saw it, in fact, but Jared is not tossed out of Winter Games Day—which is what I would do if I were in charge of things.
    Grown-ups are never as strict as kids would be if they had that kind of power, that’s what I think.
    Instead, Jared’s measurer just marks the correct spot. But Jared accidentally-on-purpose shoves EllRay when they are trotting back to join the rest of the class at the edge of the big lawn, and In the second batch of kids, Fiona springs forward like a little cricket—and then crumples immediately to the grass, clutching at her ankle. But she lifts up her head to peek around and see whether or not everyone has noticed, so I know she’s faking.

    “Ow-w-w,” she moans loudly.
    “Oh, Fiona,” her mom cries out, streaking so fast across the lawn—like a gazelle!—that I’m glad she’s not in any of the contests. “Are you okay, my brave little sweetie-pie?”
    “I will be tomorrow, probably,” Fiona says, sounding courageous and wounded at the same time. “But, oh no!” she exclaims, like the thought just occurred to her. “This means I can’t do any more events.” And her mom and the volunteer measurer help Fiona limp back to the edge of the lawn, where Heather and Cynthia take over soothing her and staring at her ankle, waiting for it to swell.

    Don’t hold your breath, that’s all I’m saying.
    Kevin and Kry and Corey are in the next batch of kids in the jumping contest, and to our combined amazement, Kevin McKinley stuns us all by jumping really, really far. Corey and Kry jump far, too, but that isn’t such a surprise, because they’re both very good athletes. Nobody gets mad at them for doing well, of course, but for some reason, Jared is furious with Kevin. “What are you tryin’ to do, make me look bad?” he asks, sneaking a peek at the parents clustered on the sidelines.
    “I’m sorry,” a surprised Kevin says. “I don’t know what happened.”
    But he looks just a little bit proud.
    I am in the next batch of kids, along with Annie Pat, Cynthia, and Heather. “Good luck,” Annie Pat whispers to me.
    “Same to you,” I say back at her, rocking back and forth in place to get ready.
    And then it’s my turn, and— I jump !
    I slice through the cool December air, and when my feet finally hit the earth again, I try to dig in so I won’t fall forward like Jared, or collapse in a little heap like Fiona. And when I look around, I see that I have jumped farther than Annie Pat, Cynthia, or Heather.

    And I’m the shortest one of them all!
    “ Yes-s-s ,” I whisper to myself as the volunteer measures how far I jumped.
    Take that, Lettice Wallingford! You don’t need to be “just like a daughter” to my dad, because he already has a daughter.
    My batch of kids trudges back to the rest of the class. “Show-off,” Cynthia mutters to me. “You cheated. You practiced,