EllRay Jakes and the Beanstalk Read Free Page B

I have to.
    â€œYou should learn,” Kevin is saying again, smiling at me like today has been perfectly normal. “It’s really fun, EllRay. And if you learned, we could all—”
    â€œMaybe,” I interrupt. “I
might
learn. I’ll think about it.”
    But it won’t be with Kevin and Jared, I promise myself.
    No. I’m counting on my neighbor Henry’s friend Fly to teach me, even though I’m not sure Fly likes me that much.
    See, my plan now is to surprise Kevin with how good a skater I am, once I learn. Then Kevin will remember that he’s
glad
we’re friends. Maybe then he won’t need to hang around with Jared anymore.
    Then things will go back to the way they used to be.
    Skating does have one thing going for it, I remind myself. The kids who ride their boards to school act like they have a secret nobody else knows: that freedom is there, waiting for them in the playground pen.
    It’s the same way Jack must have felt, sneaking out of his hut to climb the beanstalk.
Sure
, his mom was mad at him for selling their only cow.
Sure
, Jack didn’t know what he’d find at the top of the beanstalk. But he climbed it anyway. Didn’t he?
    So, not only do I want my old friend Kevin back,
I want that feeling.
    And I’m gonna get it!

5
    Henry Says
    â€œCan I use your shaggy rug?” I ask Alfie, my four-year-old sister. She is very cute, but please don’t tell her that. She’s bad enough.
    It is now Sunday afternoon, two days after my awkward talk with Kevin, and I am standing in the hall outside Alfie’s pink and purple bedroom. My new skateboard is tucked under my arm. I am trying to pretend that carrying it around is a normal thing, like how my dad carries his briefcase. But it still feels weird. And heavy.
    â€œWhat do you want my rug for?” Alfie asks. She is lying on her puffy bedspread, with a few plastic horses lined up in front of her. The horses are very un-horsey colors—orange, purple, blue. They also have long, silky manes and tails they would trip on in real life.
    Alfie is not big on real life, though, so that’s okay.
    â€œHenry says that first, I’m supposed to practice just standing on my board,” I say, wishing I didn’t have to explain this to Alfie. But maybe having to do stuff you don’t want to is part of reaching a goal. Alfie’s rug is almost like grass, it’s so thick—and I’m not about to practice on the front lawn where anyone could see me.
    Especially Henry and Fly, in case Fly calls me a POSER , which is what older guys call skaters they don’t like. Ones who don’t know what they’re doing. Or in case I fall off.
    Henry Pendleton is ten years old, and like I said, he is my very cool new neighbor. It will be hard living up to him. And Fly Reilly is Henry’s eleven-year-old best friend—his best skating friend, anyway. Henry says you should hang with kids who are better than you at what you’re trying to do.
    That shouldn’t be hard for
me
. So far, all I’m good at is holding my new board under my arm.
    It isn’t really new, by the way. Me and my dad found it for eight dollars at a yard sale yesterday. Yard sales are one of the things we like to do together on Saturday afternoons. Dad said buying a used board was the ecological and thrifty thing to do. He said that he and mom would get me a good one in a few months—if I learned to ride and be safe at the same time, and if I was still interested in skating then.
    That’s a whole lot of “ifs.”
    Of course, me bringing home even a bashed-up, eight-dollar used skateboard meant that my mom started to look up special shoes, helmets, and pads on the Internet almost the second we walked through the door. After her first freak-out, I mean. Dad said he’s not sure how economical this whole skating thing is turning out to be after all.
    â€œYou can’t
take
my