Help! Somebody Get Me Out of Fourth Grade by Henry Winkler Read Free Book Online Page A

his head on my lap and shook his leg like he was chasing something in his dream.
    â€œNo, dude, that doesn’t help us get him to Philadelphia, because your mom is here,” Frankie said.
    â€œWe could kidnap her and leave a note saying that he’ll find her in Philadelphia,” I suggested.
    â€œThat’s extreme, Zip,” Frankie said. “Use your brain. What else does he love?”
    â€œI don’t know,” I said.
    â€œWell, if you don’t know, who does know? You’re his son.”
    â€œI’m just stupid,” I snapped. “Maybe I deserve to stay back in fourth grade.” I scratched Cheerio behind the ears. Dogs are lucky, I thought. The only thing they have to learn in school is how not to pee on the carpet. I could learn that. It’s the long division I don’t get.
    â€œGuys, we don’t have time for you to argue,” Ashley said. “We have to keep our attention on the goal, which is to get your mom and dad to Philadelphia. And by the way, you’re not stupid, Hank.”
    â€œBingo,” said Frankie.
    â€œBingo. I like the sound of that! Bingo what?”
    â€œBingo, as in let’s come up with an idea,” Frankie said.
    All three of us stared at one another, trying to come up with an answer to the question—what would it take to change my dad’s mind?
    It was so quiet, I could hear car horns honking on the street ten floors below. I heard the elevator doors opening in the hall outside our door, footsteps, then the soft slap of the doors closing. It was probably our neighbor Mrs. Fink leaving for the painting class she takes over at the senior center on Amsterdam Avenue. Every painting she does is a picture of food. Her last painting was called Kebab: A Study of Meat on a Stick . It showed these really juicy chunks of meat on a skewer looking all spicy and delicious, just like they are in real life when Amir grills them on his cart on the corner of 74th Street and Columbus.
    â€œWhat’s going on, Hank?” Ashley asked. “You look like you have a good idea.”
    â€œI was wondering if Amir is making kebabs right now. I could sure go for one,” I answered.
    Frankie shot me a look I knew really well, because I’d been getting it from him my whole life.
    â€œGet with the program, Zip,” he said. “We’re thinking Philadelphia now, not roasted lamb.”
    Maybe he was thinking Philadelphia, but I was way, way down the roasted lamb road. Welcome to the inside of my brain. It goes where it wants, whenever it wants. There was no chance of pulling it back now.
    â€œI have a suggestion,” I said. “Why don’t we move on to Plan C?”
    And we did. In fact, we moved all the way to Plan M. We sat on the couch and thought. We flopped down on the living room carpet and thought. We stood in the hall and thought. We went into my bedroom and listened to the radio and thought. Every plan we came up with had something wrong with it. We just couldn’t come up with the perfect magnet that would attract my dad to Philadelphia.
    There it was—Philadelphia. That city where Benjamin Franklin flew his kite. Where the founding fathers wrote the Constitution. Where the Phillies and the Eagles play. And most importantly, where my parent-teacher conference was not.
    Only two little, tiny, measly hours from New York. So near, and yet so far.

CHAPTER 12
    FRANKIE AND ASHLEY had to go back to their apartments for dinner, and by the time they left, I still had no plan. I was left with no one to help me come up with an idea. No one but my sister Emily, that is, who probably wouldn’t want to help me, anyway. Besides, I don’t know if you have a younger sister, but even if you don’t, I think you’d agree that a person would have to be very desperate to ask his younger sister for help.
    Okay, I confess. I was desperate.
    While my mom was in the kitchen preparing dinner, I walked into