Беверли Клири - Dear Mr. Henshaw / Дорогой мистер Хеншоу. 7-8 классы

This is a new paragraph because Miss Martinez says there should be a new paragraph when a different person speaks. Mr. Fridley said, “Well, so it is. Would you like to turn him right side up?”

So I got to pull the flags down, turn the bear flag the right way and raise both flags again. Mr. Fridley said maybe I should come to school a few minutes early every morning to help him with the flags, but asked me to stop walking backwards because it made him nervous. So now I don’t have to walk quite so slow. It was nice to have somebody notice me. Nobody stole anything from my lunch today because I ate it on the way to school.

I am still thinking about what you said on your postcard about keeping a diary. Maybe I’ll try it.

Dear Mr. Henshaw,

I bought a composition book like you said. It is yellow and has a spiral. On the front I printed

DIARY OF LEIGH MARCUS BOTTS

PRIVATE – KEEP OUT

THIS MEANS YOU!!!!!

When I started to write in it, I didn’t know how to begin. I felt that I should write “Dear Composition Book” or “Dear Piece of Paper,” but that sounds stupid. The first page still looks the way I feel. Blank. I don’t think I can keep a diary. I don’t want to be a nuisance to you, but please tell me how to do it. I am stuck.

Dear Mr. Henshaw,

I got your postcard with the picture of the bears. Maybe I’ll do what you said and pretend my diary is a letter to somebody. I suppose I could pretend to write to Dad, but I wrote to him before and he never answered. Maybe I’ll pretend I am writing to you because when I answered all your questions, I always used the beginning “Dear Mr. Henshaw.” Don’t worry. I won’t send it to you.

Thanks for the tip. I know you’re busy.

Dear Mr. Pretend Henshaw,

This is a diary. I will keep it, not mail it.

If I eat my lunch on the way to school, I get hungry in the afternoon. Today I didn’t, so the two muffins Mom packed in my lunch were gone at lunch period. My sandwich was still there so I didn’t starve to death, but I surely missed those muffins. I can’t tell the teacher because it isn’t a good idea for a new boy in school to be a snitch.

All morning I try to keep track of who leaves his seat to go behind the partition where we keep our lunches, and I watch to see who leaves the room last at recess. I haven’t seen anybody chewing, but Miss Martinez is always telling me to face the front of the room. Anyway, the classroom door is usually open. Anybody could sneak in if we were all facing front and Miss Martinez was writing on the blackboard.

Hey, I just had an idea! Some authors write under made-up names. After Christmas vacation I’ll write a fake name on my lunchbag. That will fool the thief.

I guess I don’t have to sign my name to a diary letter the way I sign a real letter that I mail.

Dear Mr. Pretend Henshaw,

This is the first day of Christmas vacation. Still no package from Dad. I thought maybe he was bringing me a present instead of mailing it, so I asked Mom if she thought he might come to see us for Christmas.

She said, “We’re divorced. Remember?”

I remember all right. I remember all the time.

Dear Mr. Pretend Henshaw,

Still no package from Dad.

I keep thinking about last Christmas when we were in the mobile home before Dad bought the truck. He had to avoid the highway patrol to get home in time for Christmas. Mom cooked a turkey and a nice dinner. We had a small Christmas tree because there wasn’t enough room for a big one.

At dinner Dad said that when he was driving he often saw one shoe lying on the highway. He always wondered how it got there and what happened to the second shoe.

Mom said that one shoe sounded sad, like a country song. While we ate our mincemeat pie we all tried to make songs about lost shoes. I’ll never forget them.

Mine was worst:

Dad made this:

Mom’s song really made us laugh. It was the best:

Stupid songs, but we had a lot of fun. Mom and Dad hadn’t laughed that much for a long time, and I hoped they would never stop. After that, when Dad came home, I asked if he had seen any shoes on the highway. He always had.

Dear Mr. Pretend Henshaw,

Last night I was feeling low and was still awake after the gas station stopped pinging. Then I heard heavy feet coming up the steps, and for a minute I thought it was Dad until I remembered he always ran up the steps.

Mom is careful about opening the door at night. I heard how she turned on the outside light and knew she was looking out from behind the curtain. She opened the door, and a man said, “Is this where Leigh Botts lives?”

I was out of bed and in the front room in a second. “I’m Leigh Botts,” I said.

“Your Dad asked me to take this to you.” A man who looked like a trucker gave me a big package.

“Thanks,” I said. “Thanks a lot.” I probably looked puzzled because he said, “He asked over his CB radio for someone coming to this town who would like to play Santa. So here I am. Merry Christmas and a ho-ho-ho!” He waved a hand and walked away before I could say anything more.

“Wow!” I said to Mom. “Wow!” She just stood there in smiling while I began to take off the paper even if it wasn’t Christmas morning. Dad had sent what I always wanted – a down jacket with a lot of pockets, zips and a hood. I tried it on. It was the right size and felt great. Getting a present from my Dad in time for Christmas felt even better.

Today Katy invited us for Christmas dinner although this is a busy season for catering. She also invited some other women who work with her, and their kids, and a few old people from her neighborhood.

On the way home Mom said, “Katy has a heart as big as a football stadium. It was a lovely dinner for lonely hearts.”

I wondered if she was thinking about last Christmas when we tried to make songs about lonely lost shoes.

Dear Mr. Pretend Henshaw,

I got behind in my diary during Christmas vacation because I had a lot of things to do like going to the dentist, getting some new shoes, and a lot of things that I don’t have the time to do during school.

Today I wrote a fake name, or pseudonym, as they sometimes say, on my lunchbag. I printed Joe Kelly on it because that was the name of the boy in Ways to Amuse a Dog so I knew it was made-up. I guess I fooled the thief because nobody stole the chicken in bacon that Katy roasted just for me. It is good even when it is cold. I hope the thief watched me eat it.

Dear Mr. Pretend Henshaw,

Dad phoned me from a town in Oregon! I just looked in my book of road maps and saw where it is. He said he was waiting for a load of potatoes. I could hear music and some men talking. I asked about Bandit, and he said Bandit was fine, a great listener on a long haul even though he doesn’t have much to say. I asked Dad if I could ride with him sometime next summer when school is out, and he said he’d see. (I hate answers like that.) Anyway, he said he was sending the payment and he was sorry he forgot and he hoped I liked the jacket.

I surely wish that Dad lived with us again, but he said he would phone in about a week and to keep my nose clean. He had to go to make sure the potatoes were loaded.

This has been a good day. My lunch was safe again.

Mr. Fridley is so funny. Lots of kids are having their teeth straightened so when they eat lunch, they take out their retainers and wrap them in paper napkins while they eat because nobody wants to look at a retainer. Sometimes they forget and throw the napkin with the retainer into the garbage. Then they have to look through the garbage cans until they find their retainers because retainers cost a lot of money, and parents get mad if they get lost. Mr. Fridley always stands by the garbage cans to make sure kids put their forks and spoons on a tray and not in the garbage. When someone who has a retainer passes by, Mr. Fridley says, “Look out. Don’t lose your false teeth.” This helps them not to lose retainers.

Mom says that I am like Dad in one thing. My teeth are nice and straight which saves a lot of money.

Dear Mr. Pretend Henshaw,

My little cheesecake was missing at lunchtime which made me mad. I guess somebody noticed that Joe Kelly’s lunch was really mine. When I went to throw my lunchbag in the garbage, Mr. Fridley said, “Cheer up, Leigh.”

I said, “How would you feel if somebody was always stealing the good stuff from your lunch?”

He said, “What you need is a burglar alarm.”

A burglar alarm on a lunchbag! I laughed at that, but I still wanted my cheesecake.

Dad will phone any day now. When I said that at supper, Mom said I shouldn’t hope for it, but I know Dad will remember this time. Mom never really says much about Dad, and when I ask why she divorced him, all she says is, “It takes two people to get a divorce.” I guess she means the same way that it takes two people to have a fight.

Tomorrow I am going to wrap my lunchbag in a lot of Scotch tape so nobody can sneak anything out of it.

Dear Mr. Pretend Henshaw,

It’s funny how somebody says something, and you can’t forget it. I am thinking about Mr. Fridley saying that I needed a burglar alarm on my lunchbag. How could anybody put a burglar alarm on a paper bag? Today I used so much Scotch tape on my lunchbag that I couldn’t get my lunch out. Everybody laughed.

Dad should phone today or tomorrow. Maybe if he came home he would know how I could make a burglar alarm for my lunchbag. He was good about helping me make things in the past.

I reread your letter answering my questions and thought about your tips on how to write a book. One of the tips was listen . I guess you meant to listen and write down the way people talk, like in a play. This is what Mom and I said at supper:

ME: Mom, why don’t you get married again?

MOM: Oh, I don’t know. I guess it’s not easy to find a man when you are out of school.

ME: But you go out sometimes. You went to dinner with Charlie a couple of times. What happened to him?

MOM: A couple of times was enough. That’s the end of Charlie.

ME: Why?

MOM: (Thinks for a while.) Charlie is divorced and has three children. What he really wants is someone to help him.

ME: Oh. (Three sudden brothers or sisters was something to think about.) But I see men all around. There are lots of men.