Karen's Ducklings

  To everyone at Bedford Middle School,

  especially Pat Brown,

  … and to the real mother duck

  who raised her babies in the courtyard.

  Contents

  Title Page

  Dedication

  1 Springtime

  2 Spring Has Sprung

  3 The Cool Car

  4 Mama Duck

  5 A Name for Mama Duck

  6 Feather

  7 Bad News

  8 Sitting Around

  9 The Mysterious Bill

  10 Seven Duck Babies

  11 Make Way for Ducklings

  12 The Next Letter

  13 One Little Duckling

  14 Saying Good-Bye

  15 Karen’s Sad Day

  16 Spring Day

  17 Trouble

  18 A Home for Feather

  19 Good Luck, Feather!

  20 A Book for the Library

  About the Author

  Also Available

  Copyright

  Springtime

  I was looking out the windows in my classroom. I was not daydreaming, though. I was supposed to be looking out the windows. My teacher, Ms. Colman, had told us to watch for signs of spring.

  There were not too many signs yet. The branches of the trees and bushes showed some fat buds, but no little green leaves. The tips of flowers were just beginning to poke through the dirt in the gardens. And I had seen several robins. But … I wanted spring now.

  I am not a very patient waiter.

  This is what is outside my second-grade room: a courtyard. The classrooms at my school are arranged in a square. In the middle is the courtyard. My friends and I can go right into the courtyard through a door in our room. I just love looking into the yard. Flower gardens are everywhere. In the middle are some trees. There are lots of bushes, too, especially under the windows of the classrooms. Sometimes I see things moving in the bushes, usually birds and squirrels. Once I saw a chipmunk.

  My classmates and I were very busy getting ready for spring. We were studying the season.

  “What does spring make you think of?” Ms. Colman had asked us.

  “Plants,” said Hannie Papadakis. She is one of my two best friends.

  “Warm weather,” said Nancy Dawes. She is my other best friend.

  “Baby animals!” I shouted.

  “Indoor voice, Karen,” Ms. Colman reminded me.

  In my classroom were all sorts of spring projects. Ms. Colman had given each of us an empty milk carton, some dirt, and some seeds. We had planted zinnias. We were waiting for our flowers to grow. We were going to make a spring bulletin board. It would be very beautiful. (I said we should use cotton balls to make puffy clouds.) We were learning about animal families and animal babies. Ms. Colman had said we would make something called a terrarium, but I did not know what that was.

  Also we were writing stories and poems about spring. This was my best poem (I wrote it without any help):

  Ms. Colman put my poem on the wall. I was proud of that. In a few weeks, my class was going to celebrate Spring Day. The kids in the other second-grade class were going to come into our room. We were going to show them our spring things and tell them about them, too. Our bulletin board would be ready. Our zinnias would be in bloom (we hoped), and our terrarium (whatever that was) would be finished.

  Spring would not be just in our classroom, though. It would be everywhere in Stoneybrook, Connecticut. (That is where I live.) It would be in the courtyard outside our windows. It would be in parks and fields and woods. And it would be at my mother’s house and at my father’s house. Mommy has a little yard with lots of trees and a couple of gardens. Daddy has a gigundo yard with a few trees and tons of gardens. I like to watch spring come to both of my yards.

  Spring Has Sprung

  Why do I have two yards and two houses? Because I have two families.

  My name is Karen Brewer. I just turned seven. I love a lot of things, like the people in my families, and holidays, and animals. Also, I love school, and Ms. Colman, and spring. I could not wait to watch for signs of spring in both of my yards.

  Here is how I got two families. A long time ago, I had just one family — Mommy; Daddy; my little brother, Andrew; and me. Then Mommy and Daddy decided that they did not want to live together anymore. So they got a divorce. Daddy stayed in the big house we lived in. (He grew up in that house.) Mommy moved out. She moved into a little house. It is not too far from Daddy’s Andrew and I went with her.

  After awhile, Mommy and Daddy each got married again, but not to each other. Mommy married Seth Engle. He is my stepfather. He moved into the little house, and he brought along his dog, Midgie, and his cat, Rocky. Mostly, Andrew and I live with Mommy and Seth at the little house. (I have a pet rat there. Her name is Emily Junior.)

  But every other weekend and on certain holidays we live at the big house with Daddy and our stepmother. Our stepmother is Elizabeth. Guess what. Elizabeth has four children. They are our stepbrothers and stepsister — Charlie, Sam, David Michael, and Kristy. They are all older than Andrew and me. Even David Michael, who is seven. (He is almost eight, and I am not.)

  So many people live at the big house! There is also Nannie, who is Elizabeth’s mother, so she is my stepgrandmother. And there is Emily Michelle, who is my adopted sister. Daddy and Elizabeth adopted her from a faraway country called Vietnam. A bunch of pets live at the big house, too — a cat, a dog, and two goldfish.

  I have special nicknames for my brother and me. I call us Andrew Two-Two and Karen Two-Two. (Once, Ms. Colman read a book to our class. It was called Jacob Two-Two Meets the Hooded Fang. That’s where I got our nicknames.) We are two-twos because we have two of so many things. We have two houses and two families, two mommies and two daddies, two cats and two dogs. We each have two bedrooms, one at Mommy’s little house and one at Daddy’s big house. I have two bicycles, one at each house. I have two stuffed cats that look just the same. Moosie stays at the big house, Goosie stays at the little house. I even have my two best friends. Hannie lives across the street from Daddy and one house down. Nancy lives next door to Mommy.

  This is what would happen when spring came to my two houses. At Mommy’s, the pink flowers on the dogwood tree would bloom. The yellow flowers on the forsythia bushes would bloom. The big pink-and-white flowers on the magnolia tree would bloom. The bunched-up purple flowers on the lilac bush would bloom. (Lilac flowers smell gigundoly wonderful. I would pick a bouquet for Ms. Colman.)

  At Daddy’s, forsythia bushes would bloom, too. In his gardens, the flowers would poke up through the dirt. First would come little white snowdrops and yellow or purple crocus buds. Later would come yellow daffodils and yellow-and-white narcissus, and tulips and hyacinths in all sorts of colors. And even later, the azaleas would bloom, and so would the fat peony flowers. Maybe I would take some pictures of my two yards for Spring Day. Then I could show Ms. Colman lots of signs of spring.

  The Cool Car

  I really like the word grout. It sounds just like growl, except with a “t” at the end, instead of an “l.” You know what grout is? It is the white goo you use when you are making a picture out of tiles. It is the stuff you spread in between the tiles to hold them together.

  Mommy and Seth had given me some grout and a whole bunch of tiles. So one day after school I was busy making a spring mosaic. (A mosaic is a tile design.) I was working at the table in the playroom of the little house. Andrew was in the playroom, too. He was building a firehouse out of his red Legos. While he built, he made fire-truck noises. He sang, “Ooooo-eeeee-ooooo, Ning-ning-ning-ning. Oooo-eeee-ooooo.”

  In the background, Sesame Street was on the TV. Andrew just adores Sesame Street. But he was not paying attention to it.
Neither was I. We were too busy with our projects.

  “Ning-ning-ning,” Andrew sang.

  “Hum, de-hum,” I sang.

  My mosaic was growing bigger.

  So was Andrew’s firehouse. He was almost out of red Legos.

  Sesame Street ended. Andrew turned the channel on the TV. He turned it again and again. Flip, flip, flip.

  “Hey, Karen,” he said a moment later.

  “Yeah?” I did not glance up from my mosaic. I was working busily.

  “Karen, look! Look at the TV! Look at that car!” cried Andrew.

  I looked. On the TV screen was a commercial for a toy car. It was a remote-control car. The ad showed a boy and girl making the car zip all around their house. When the car ran into something, it flipped over. Then it zoomed off again. The headlights really turned on.

  “That is so cool!” exclaimed my brother.

  “I guess,” I said. I went back to my mosaic.

  “Hey, Karen, we can order the car through the mail! And — and we do not have to pay for it until it comes. Oh, please, let’s order it!”

  “Andrew, I — ”

  “They are going to put the address on the TV!” shrieked Andrew. “Karen, write it down! Write it down!” Andrew shoved a piece of paper and a green crayon at me.

  I had to write very, very fast. While I wrote, Andrew jumped up and down next to my table. “Did you get it?” he cried.

  “I think so,” I answered. I hoped so, because the commercial was over.

  “Goody. We have to send away for that car right now.”

  “I don’t know, Andrew. How much did it cost?”

  “Two dollars.”

  “Are you sure?” I asked. “That does not sound like very much money.”

  My brother looked offended. “I know a two when I see one,” he replied.

  “Sorry.” I stopped to think. Then I said, “I am not sure if kids can order stuff through the mail. I do not know if they are allowed.”

  “Oh, please? Please, please, puh-LEASE? Um, I think Seth might want the car. I really do. We could give it to him for Father’s Day.”

  “We-ell …”

  “Pretty please with a cherry on top?” begged Andrew.

  “Okay,” I said finally. Andrew and I had two dollars. That was no problem. But I still did not know if a seven-year-old could order the car. So I wrote a letter to the address on the TV. I ordered one car. Then I signed Mommy’s name to the letter. I figured that was safe, since Mommy is a grown-up.

  Mama Duck

  Early one Monday morning I stood at the windows in Ms. Colman’s room. I was looking into the courtyard. I had found more signs of spring. I saw the tips of some yellow crocus flowers. I saw the tips of some purple crocus flowers and also some white crocus flowers. The green daffodil shoots were growing longer. So were the tulip shoots.

  Something moved the bushes in one of the gardens. I pressed my face to a window. Maybe I would see another chipmunk.

  No. No little striped body ran out. The bushes kept moving.

  I kept watching.

  A breeze blew aside the branches of the shrubs. And I saw … a duck.

  “Hey!” I screamed. “There’s a duck in the garden!”

  “Oh, Karen,” said Hannie.

  “No, there really is! I just saw it. It’s in those bushes.”

  Hannie and about six other kids raced to the windows. They crowded around me. I pointed to the bush I had seen moving. “He’s right in there,” I whispered. But nothing moved. No duck waddled into the courtyard. Everything was still and quiet.

  “Karen,” said Bobby Gianelli, who is not my best friend, “there is no duck. There is nothing. You are just crazy.”

  “I am not crazy! And there is too a duck!”

  “Boys and girls?” said Ms. Colman’s voice. “What is going on?”

  “Oh, Ms. Colman!” I cried. I ran to her desk. Ms. Colman put her things down. She took off her coat. “There is a duck in the courtyard!” I exclaimed. “Honest. I just saw him. Only no one believes me.”

  “A duck,” repeated Ms. Colman. “What would a duck be doing here?” She peered out the window. “I don’t see anything.”

  “But it is there!” I cried.

  “Okay,” said my teacher gently. “Show me.”

  Ms. Colman opened the door to the courtyard. She went outside. I followed her. I walked right to the place where I had seen the duck. I pulled the branches of the bush aside. And there was a mommy duck sitting on a big nest of eggs.

  “Oh, my goodness,” said Ms. Colman.

  I stood and stared. I knew I had seen a duck, but I did not know I had seen a mother duck and her eggs.

  From behind me came a lot of noise. The kids in my class were running outside. They wanted to get a better look at the duck. But Ms. Colman said, “Inside, everybody! Right now. Don’t go near the duck. We do not want to frighten her.”

  Boy, was the rest of the day exciting. Ms. Colman told the principal about the duck. She talked to a lot of the teachers. One teacher said, “You should call SAPA. That is the Small Animal Protection Agency. The people at SAPA will be able to tell you about wild ducks.”

  So Ms. Colman telephoned SAPA. She told the man who answered the phone about Mama Duck. (That’s what my friends and I were calling her.) Then Ms. Colman said to our class, “Mama Duck must have gotten lost. She landed in our garden and began to lay her eggs. She has probably been here for awhile already. We must let Mama Duck hatch her eggs and raise her ducklings by herself. We cannot touch her or her babies. But we can watch the ducklings hatch and grow!”

  A Name for Mama Duck

  When I went into my classroom the next morning, a big sign was on the door to the courtyard. It said, DO NOT ENTER!

  “That is to remind us,” Ms. Colman told me, “not to go into the courtyard. We have to give Mama Duck her privacy. The only people who may go into the yard are a few teachers. They will bring Mama Duck water or anything she might need. They will be following special instructions from the people at SAPA.”

  Well, that was sort of disappointing. I had thought we could watch Mama Duck through the branches of the bush.

  “Can we open the windows and talk to Mama Duck?” I asked.

  “I’m afraid not,” Ms. Colman replied. “We cannot open the windows. We can watch Mama Duck, but mostly we have to leave her alone.”

  Boo.

  That morning we got to go to the auditorium. We were having an assembly. The whole school was there. I just love assemblies.

  This is how we sit at assemblies. In the very front are the kindergarten classes. Behind them are the kids in first grade. Behind the first-graders sit my friends and I. And so on. The big fifth-graders sit at the very back of the room.

  That morning I sat between Hannie and Nancy. We did not know why we were having an assembly, but Ms. Colman said it was for a special reason. She said we would feel very proud.

  When the assembly began, guess who walked onto the stage. Ms. Colman!

  “Good morning,” she said. “As many of you know, our school has an unusual guest. Our guest will be staying here for awhile.” Ms. Colman told everyone about Mama Duck. She even said that I was the one who had first seen her. Then she talked about calling the people at SAPA. She said we could watch Mama Duck from our classrooms, but that we could not go into the courtyard. She said it was very important to let Mama Duck raise her babies by herself. Mama Duck would know best.

  When Ms. Colman finished talking, the principal walked onto the stage. She said, “I have been thinking that it might be fun to give our mama duck a real name. Of course, since Karen Brewer found the duck, our guest officially belongs to Ms. Colman’s class. But we will all be watching her and her babies, so everyone should have a chance to name her. We are going to have a duck-naming contest. Right now. Your teachers are handing out slips of paper. I would like each of you to write down one name for our duck. No jokes, please. This afternoon I will put all the names in a box
and choose one. That will be our duck’s new name.”

  “Cool,” I said to Nancy. “I think our duck should be named Jemima. Like Jemima Puddleduck in the book.”

  “I think she should just be called Mama Duck,” said Nancy.

  Ricky Torres was sitting behind me. “I think she should be named Stinky,” he said. He began to laugh.

  I turned around. “Ricky,” I exclaimed. “That is not nice. Mama Duck isn’t stinky. And anyway, joke names are not allowed. Remember?”

  Ricky stuck his tongue out at me, and I stuck mine out at him. Then I carefully wrote JEMIMA on my paper. Nancy wrote MAMA DUCK. Hannie wrote QUACKER. I did not know what Ricky wrote, and I did not care.

  Feather

  “Attention, please. May I have your attention, please?”

  Our principal’s voice came over the intercom.

  My friends and I stopped talking. Ms. Colman stopped writing on the blackboard. Ricky took the spitball out of his mouth.

  It was Tuesday afternoon. Our assembly had been held that morning.

  “Boys and girls, our mother duck has a new name. I have just chosen a piece of paper. The winning name is Feather.”

  “Oh, cute,” I whispered.

  When the announcement was over, Ms. Colman said, “So Mama Duck is Feather now. What do you think of her name?”

  “It is perfect for a duck,” I said.

  “It is very nice,” said Pamela Harding.

  “It is easy to remember,” added Natalie Springer.

  I gazed out a window. I had not seen Feather all day. And I did not see her then. Ms. Colman had told me not to worry, though. “Your duck is hiding,” she had said. “She is busy taking care of her eggs. She has to keep them warm.”

  I understood that. But I wished Feather did not need quite so much privacy. I wanted to be her friend.

  I turned away from the window. I realized Ms. Colman was talking to us, and I had not been paying attention.

  “… another project for Spring Day,” she was saying.

  I nudged Ricky. “What?” I whispered.