Quack by Anna Humphrey

Author:Anna Humphrey
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Albert Whitman & Company
Published: 2020-09-15T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 10

Stealing the Show

Told by Pearl Summers

Elfina is the most important role in Santa’s Tree Trouble, this year’s holiday musical. Without her, Santa (played by Connor) would never realize the havoc being caused by Elves 1, 2, and 3 or learn to see the true beauty in the scraggly old pine tree (unfortunately, played by Pouya). Christmas would basically be ruined.

Also, Elfina has a solo and the most lines. It wasn’t surprising that Mrs. Carlisle chose me for the part. People say I have a beautiful singing voice and a natural stage presence.

Unfortunately, nobody was appreciating it that day at rehearsal. At first, it was all the duck’s fault, then it was all Pouya’s.

“Okay, let’s take scene one from the top,” Mrs. Carlisle said. “I need Santa, the elves, and the tree.”

I was already in my spot—at center stage. Elf 1, played by Rebecca, was sitting on the edge of the stage reviewing her lines, but everyone else was at the back of the gym watching the stupid duck who—I’m not even kidding—had her own film crew.

Shady’s sister, Manda, and her friend Pascale—an angry-looking girl wearing a huge, flowery scarf—were on their second day of filming some kind of movie. Mrs. Mackie said we were supposed to ignore them and carry on like usual, but kids were following them everywhere like they were big-shot producers or something.

I watched in disgust as the duck waddled across a big piece of butcher paper that Shady, Arjana, and Aisha were supposed to be painting to look like the outside of Santa’s workshop. If there were feathers stuck to the backdrop, I was definitely going to complain. Because this was just one more example in a long list of ways that Shady’s duck had been causing trouble since she’d started coming to school—and it was getting worse and worse.

For example, the Friday before, which was CandyGrams day, student council delivered the mini candy canes people bought for their friends only to find that there were already cherry candy canes on some kids’ desks. It was mostly the kids who never participate in things—like Aisha, Tamille, DuShawn, Tammy, and Jackson. And all the candy canes had tags on them that said they were from Svenrietta. Hello! CandyGrams are supposed to be a fundraiser for the food bank! And a sign of friendship! When a duck starts giving them out for free, for no reason, the whole thing falls apart.

Then, in gym class, a few of us said we didn’t want DuShawn on our relay team. (He was wearing his dress that day, and—I’m not being prejudiced—it slows him down.) And when we got back to the changing rooms, we found something gross and brown on the soles of our regular indoor shoes. Was it duck poop? I mean, I wasn’t going to touch it or smell it to find out, but probably.

Finally, just that morning, after Monica and I pointed out that Aisha’s hat came from Walmart and was probably produced by slave labor, we

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