Skating with the Statue of Liberty by Susan Lynn Meyer Read Free Book Online Page A

Gustave looked over his shoulder desperately. There was the map. He felt a few English words rising up in his head. He took a step back and pointed at Germany. Then, feeling heartsick, he traced a route through Belgium, slipping over and around the MaginotLine, the line of forts meant to defend the French against the Germans, and down into France.
    “Germans come,” he choked out. “Nazis. Very bad. Not food. Not heat. Bad for the France. Bad…” Gustave paused. He wanted to say that it was bad in Europe for the Jews. Did Americans know about that? They should be letting more Jews come here. But was it really safe to let people know that his family was Jewish? Gustave hesitated, the opportunity passed, and then he felt ashamed of having missed it.
    “Well done, Gustave,” said Mr. Coolidge, patting him on the shoulder, and he made his way back to his seat.
    —
    By lunchtime, Gustave was exhausted, and the roar of noise in the cafeteria didn’t help. He spotted September Rose sitting with a small group of Negro students at the end of a long table, and he started toward her. When he got there, she had her head down and was busily unwrapping her sandwich, smoothing out every crease in the wax paper until it made a perfect flat square.
    The girl across from September Rose looked at him warily. He extended his hand. “Hello. I’m Gustave.”
    “Lisa,” she said, looking startled.
    She didn’t take his hand, so he pulled it back, flushing. “Hello, September Rose.”
    September Rose finally looked up, and he could tell from her face that she had known he was there all along.
    “Hi,” she said quietly. She glanced at him with a dark,intense gaze, as if she were trying to tell him something, shook her head slightly, and looked down.
    “Gus—tuv!
Gus
—
tuv!
” At the next table over, two boys from geography class were standing and waving. “Leo,” one athletic-looking boy introduced himself curtly. He kept running his hand through his blond hair as his eyes roved around the lunchroom.
    “I’m Frank,” said the tall, dark-haired boy with big ears who had passed out the literature textbooks. “What were you doing over there? Sit here with us.” Frank patted the bench next to him.
    Gustave reached out to shake hands. “I am called Gustave,” he said. The boys grinned at him in a friendly way. At the next table, September Rose was giggling with Lisa as they shared a package of thin, crispy crackers.
    The noise in the cafeteria was overwhelming. So many voices were talking, shouting out their strange words, and laughing all at the same time that it was like the roar of a storm, and Gustave could hardly understand anything at all. He unwrapped the sandwich Maman had made for him, weirdly orange cheese between pieces of too-pale, too-soft bread.
    Leo and Frank made a few attempts to talk with Gustave, but when he couldn’t answer, Leo turned away and yelled something else at a boy down the table, then hooted with laughter. The boy had bitten holes into a piece of bread for eyes and a mouth and then smashed it over his face, shaping it over his nose and letting his tongue stick through.
    When a group of girls appeared next to their table, theboy with the bread on his face wiggled his tongue, and the girls shrieked. The two in front pushed forward a very pretty girl with creamy skin, pink cheeks, hazel eyes, and golden-brown curls. It was the girl with the green hair ribbon from Mrs. McAdams’s class.
    “Gustave!” the girl called in a teasing voice. She put one hand on her hip and sashayed around the end of the table. When she got close, she flipped her hair back and pursed her lips.
    “Geef me a French keeess!” she murmured, in a fake French accent.
    “Comment?”
Gustave leaned back instinctively. Then he blushed when he realized he had spoken French.
    The girl wiggled her shoulders. “Come on, Frrrenchie!” she murmured again, winking, her voice low and throaty. She pursed her lips, making a kissy