Gooney Bird and All Her Charms by Lois Lowry Read Free Book Online Page A

learned that it takes up to three days for food to go through your digestive system? It was just Saturday night that I ate muscles.”
    Everyone fell silent. They were murmuring, “Saturday, Sunday, Monday . . .”
    â€œDude,” Tyrone said in an ominous voice, “you may still have some muscles in there.”
    Mrs. Pidgeon was laughing. “Barry, Barry, Barry,” she said. “Look! Lift your head and look at the chalkboard!”
    In big letters she wrote:
MUSCLES
. Then, beside it, she wrote:
MUSSELS
.
    â€œTwo different things! Sound the same, spelled differently,” Mrs. Pidgeon explained.
    â€œWe’ll learn more about mussels when we get to the ‘Creatures of the Sea’ chapter in our science book.”
    â€œOh,” said Barry, brightening. “Good. Actually, I liked them quite a bit.”
    â€œHow shall we dress Napoleon for the gym?” Keiko asked. They had already removed his Digestive System outfit, the bow tie and the bib.
    â€œBaseball cap!” called Malcolm. “Yankees!”
    â€œRed Sox!” Ben said loudly. He was wearing a red shirt that said BIG PAPI on the back.
    Mrs. Pidgeon, aware that a serious argument was about to develop, quickly went to the piano and played the opening chords to a song the whole class knew.
“Take me out to the ball game,”
the children began to sing.
“Take me out with the croooowd . . .”
    They were still singing bits and pieces of the song at the end of the school day when they wheeled Napoleon into the gym, but by then they had agreed that a gym was not a place for baseball. Carefully they lifted the skeleton from his stand and sat him on the floor leaning against the bottom row of the bleachers with a basketball wedged between his knees. On his bony feet were an enormous pair of bright green sneakers that they had borrowed from Mr. Goldman, the boys’ gym teacher. And around his skull, across his forehead, was a sweatband.
    Napoleon looked as if he was waiting for the coach to send him into the game.
    The sign that Tyrone and Felicia Ann had made for the door of the gym read:
    Â 
    COME SEE NAPOLEON’S MUSCULAR
    SYSTEM! IT IS AMAZING!
    Â 
    Taped to the bleacher seat beside Napoleon, another sign read:
    Â 
    HE HAS MORE THAN 600 MUSCLES!
    THEY WORK IN PAIRS.
    THEY MAKE HIS BONES MOVE.
    Â 
    A sign beside one of his green sneakers read:
    Â 
    HE HAS 26 BONES IN EACH FOOT! AND 27 IN EACH HAND!
    BUT THEY WOULDN’T BE ABLE TO MOVE WITHOUT HIS MUSCLES.
    Â 
    There was one more sign taped beside Napoleon’s hip. It had an arrow pointing to Napoleon’s behind. It read:
    Â 
    HE EXERCISES A LOT
    SO HIS MUSCLES ARE STRONG.
    HIS LARGEST MUSCLE IS IN
    HIS BUTT.
    Â 
    Mrs. Pidgeon looked at that sign and frowned.

    Â 
    â€œI wonder if anyone might object to that one,” she said.
    â€œBut it’s
true
, Mrs. Pidgeon,” Felicia Ann pointed out. “We read it in our science book.”
    â€œBut the science book didn’t use the word
butt
,” the teacher said. “Anybody remember what it said instead? I wish I’d brought the book with me.”
    â€œMaybe it said
bottom
,” Keiko suggested.
    â€œOr
backside
,” Malcolm said. “But that’s not very scientific.”
    â€œGooney Bird?” Mrs. Pidgeon asked. “You’re the one with the photographic memory. What did the book say?”
    Gooney Bird was able to remember things by seeing them in her mind as if she were looking at a photograph. With her eyes closed, she took several deep breaths in and out. Then she reopened her eyes and said, “It just showed the big muscle and told its official name.
Gluteus maximus
. There was an arrow pointing to it and the label said it was the biggest muscle but it didn’t say the name of the body part it was pointing to.
    â€œOf course,” she added, “it was pointing to the butt.”
    â€œWell,”