Just Another Hero by Sharon M. Draper Read Free Book Online Page A

nerve enough to call her Spoon. Hers was the only class he’d put his hood down in, however. He sat at a table near the back of the room with Susan and Ram.
    â€œMy loaner laptop for you all is acting up again, Osrick,” said Mrs. Witherspoon. “Take a look at it if you have time, and see if you can get the peanut butter and jelly out of the motherboard. There’s no telling what these folks do to my stuff when they get it home. I couldn’t survive without you, kid.”
    â€œOkay,” Osrick agreed with a hint of a smile.
    â€œAnd Kofi,” the teacher continued, “if you can unwrap those arms from around Dana for a couple of hours, I’d like for you to take a look at my DVD projector—I think it might need a heart and lung transplant. Or maybe just a chip.”
    Feeling mellow from the Oxy, Kofi was about to makea smart remark, but he just nodded instead. Spoon often paid her “tech geniuses” (as she called them) out of her own money, and he needed the cash.
    Dana bounded into the classroom then, dressed in a red and gray Ohio State sweatshirt.
    â€œHow was the tour of Ohio State yesterday?” Mrs. Witherspoon asked her.
    â€œCool. But I think I want to go to Florida instead. I love warm weather, you know what I’m sayin’?”
    â€œYou need to stick around here and keep me warm!” Kofi yelled out. She blew him a kiss and signed in just ahead of Olivia and November.
    â€œHey, Spoon, November’s back. Remember her?” said Dana as November gave Mrs. Witherspoon her enrollment papers.
    â€œOf course I remember Miss November who took the helicopter adventure ride of the century! Almost gave us old folks heart attacks after that football game.”
    â€œYeah, that was a night to remember,” November said. “Plus, we almost beat Excelsior that day!”
    â€œDon’t be bringin’ up that ‘Pink Panther’ game, November,” said Jericho. “You be embarrassing me.”
    â€œYou all embarrassed yourselves,” she teased. “Running onto the football field in pink uniforms! That was just crazy!”
    â€œCheap uniforms. Not our fault,” Jericho reminded her.
    â€œSo, how’s the baby?” asked the teacher.
    â€œWell, she’s got a few problems,” November admitted. “It’s sure not as easy as it looks like in the movies.”
    â€œAnd how’s the baby’s mama? Are you getting enough sleep?”
    â€œNot really,” November told her, “but I’m managing.”
    â€œAre you going to be able to handle this, November? School? Doctors? Baby emergencies?”
    â€œI’m gonna try.”
    â€œWell, let me enter you in my computer system,” the teacher said. “And here is everything we’ve done thus far, as well as all your assignments for the rest of the semester.” She handed November a green zip drive.
    â€œEverything’s in here? You’re amazing,” said November.
    â€œNo, just technologically magnificent!” Mrs. Witherspoon said with a smirk.
    â€œHey, Spoon, give yourself a couple of points for those big words,” Jericho called from his desk.
    â€œI shall do that!” the teacher replied, laughing. She turned on the whiteboard that was connected to a third computer—the one with Internet access.
    The class were reading Beowulf , so Mrs. Witherspoon showed two video clips—one from the preview of the movie, and one from a cartoon about the monster named Grendel. Then she popped up a chart that talked about heroes and monsters and good versus evil, and brought up a website that told about Anglo-Saxon history—all in a twenty-minute span. Nobody ever went to sleep in Spoon’s class. In addition, everything she did in class was saved on a zip drive that students could take home. She talked, she teased, she questioned, she sang, she twirled.
    Finally, standing on a table in the front of