Ban This Book Read online

  “What’s going on in here?” she asked.

  “Nothing,” I whispered, hugging Flot and Jet with both arms. Across the room, Alexis stared at me in horror.

  Mom frowned. “Whatever’s going on, I need lights out and for you both to go to sleep.”

  I nodded, and Mom left. I clicked my flashlight off and stuffed Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark under my mattress where I couldn’t see it. I finally got Flotsam and Jetsam settled back down and pulled my blanket up over my head, but I knew I wasn’t getting to sleep that night.

  Or maybe ever again.

  Our Own Little Book Club

  Danny Purcell brought Wait Till Helen Comes on Monday, and I read it that night. It. Was. Awesome. It was scary, but not Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark scary. The little girl in it, the one with the funny haircut on the cover, is so creepy! She hates her new stepbrother and stepsister, and she tells them a ghost she met in the graveyard is going to come after them and punish them for being mean to her.

  When Rebecca finished From the Mixed-up Files (which she liked, mostly I think because Mrs. Frankweiler is all the time talking to her lawyer), she read Danny’s copy of Wait Till Helen Comes while Danny read From the Mixed-up Files. It’s like we had our own little book club.

  Rebecca caught me at my locker at the end of lunch one day. “Amy Anne! I looked all over for you in the cafeteria. Where were you?”

  “I got a pass to go to the library instead,” I told her. Even though my favorite book still wasn’t on the shelf, there were lots of other library books I wanted to read.

  “Oh, I see how it is,” Rebecca said, pretending to be angry. “You love books more than your best friend. Well I don’t need you. I’ve got Helen. She’s my only real friend, even though nobody else can see her. You just wait till Helen comes, then you’ll be sorry!”

  We cracked up laughing together.

  Danny loped over to us and brushed his hair out of his eyes. “Hey! What’s so funny?”

  We could barely answer him we were laughing so hard.

  “Just wait till Helen comes,” I said, trying to sound spooky. “Then you’ll be sorry!”

  “Is that from that book?” Danny said. “No fair joking about it before I’ve read it! I only just finished Basil E. Frankweiler! And I want to read that Scary Stories book next.”

  I froze and shook my head, my eyes wide. “I hid it,” I told him.

  “Why?” Danny said. “Is it really scary?”

  I let out a little squeak.

  Danny pulled my locker door open wide. “Where is it? I want to read it!”

  The book wasn’t in my locker. It wasn’t under my mattress anymore either. I hadn’t been able to sleep knowing it was there. Right at that moment it was hidden in an old gym bag at the back of my closet, buried under a pile of clothes.

  I grabbed my locker door to close it and explain why Scary Stories wasn’t there, and that’s when I saw it.

  There was a note in my locker mailbox.

  A Notable Note

  I didn’t notice it right off, because I had gotten used to not getting any notes. But something white and folded was definitely sticking up out of my locker mailbox. I must have stood and stared at it for a long time, because Rebecca had to wave her hand in front of my face to get my attention.

  “Hey, earth to Amy Anne! You look like you just saw Helen’s ghost.”

  I pointed to the note. “Did you send me a note?”

  Rebecca shook her head. “Never leave a paper trail,” she reminded me. Then a horrible thought struck her and she turned on Danny. “You didn’t send her a note, did you?”

  Danny took a step back. “Hey, whoa. Send a note to a girl? No way.”

  Rebecca relaxed. If Danny had written me a note, I don’t know which of us she would have killed first.

  “Who else would send me a note?” I asked.

  “Well, I know a good way to find out,” Danny said. “You could, you know, read it and find out.”

  I pulled out the note and unfolded it. It was a piece of notebook paper torn out of a spiral notebook, with pink loopy handwriting on it.

  AA—

  Danny said you have The Egypt Game. Can I read it?

  —Janna

  “It’s from Janna Park,” I said. “She wants to borrow The Egypt Game.”

  “Oh yeah. I told her you had a copy,” Danny said.

  My heart skipped a beat. Janna Park had written me a note. Janna Park had written me a note and called me AA. No one had ever called me AA before.

  I liked it.

  Janna was one of the girls who was always following Danny around, like Rebecca. Janna probably liked Danny’s hair as much as he did. I was surprised he’d even mentioned The Egypt Game to her, since he’d only heard me talking to Rebecca about it on the bus. But I was excited that someone else wanted to read it. Good books shouldn’t be hidden away. They should be read by as many people as many times as possible.

  I wrote a note back to Janna and stuck it in her locker before going back in to class.

  Janna—

  Sure. I’ll bring it tomorrow.

  —AA

  Janna came to my locker the next day after lunch. I passed her The Egypt Game in secret, like we were in a spy movie.

  “Thanks,” she said. Then she stood there and didn’t leave.

  “You’re welcome,” I said.

  She still didn’t leave.

  “What is it?” I asked her.

  Janna looked around, then said quietly, “Do you have any of the other books? You know, if I wanted to read any of them?”

  “Oh. Oh, yeah!” I said. “I’ve got From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, and Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, but it is really, really scary. And Danny’s got Wait Till Helen Comes. But he probably already told you that.”

  “Oh,” Janna said. “Is that all?” She looked in my locker, as though the other books might be in there. She was disappointed, I could tell, and suddenly the only thing I wanted in the world was to please her. Because she had written me a note and called me AA.

  “Those are the only ones I have now,” I told her. “But if there’s another one you want to read, I can probably get it. I’m saving up.” I ran through the titles in my head. “Is it Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret?”

  She shook her head, and I felt a little relieved. I was still a little afraid of that one.

  “Is it … Harriet the Spy?”

  She shook her head.

  “Goosebumps?”

  No.

  “Junie B.?”

  No.

  “Matilda?”

  No.

  What else could it be? It couldn’t be Captain Underpants. That only left …

  Oh.

  Oh.

  She wanted to read that one.

  Rebecca popped up beside us, and Janna and I jumped.

  “’Kay thanks bye!” Janna said, and she hurried away.

  “What was that all about?” Rebecca asked.

  “Janna borrowed The Egypt Game from me. But I think she wants to read a different one of the banned books instead.”

  “Which one?”

  I whispered. “The sex book. It’s Perfectly Normal.” I grabbed a braid and held it close to my mouth. “But I can’t buy that one!”

  “That was on the list?” Rebecca said. “You don’t have to buy that one. I’ve got it.”

  My eyes went wide. She had a copy? “At your house?” I asked.

  “Yeah,” she said. She acted like it was no big thing. “My mom gave it to me. I think that way I couldn’t sue her one day for not telling me everything before I needed to know it.”

  “Have you read it?” I whispered.

  Rebecca leaned in breathlessly. “Some parts.”

  I wanted to ask her which parts, and what it said, but I was too embarrassed. I jumped as Mr. Vaughn called us into class down the hall.

  “Will you bring it?” I asked her as we ran to class.
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br />   Rebecca stopped at the door. “Okay,” she said with a secret smile, and she threw open the door and ran inside.

  With Rebecca’s book, and Danny’s book, and my books, I could have almost half the books Mrs. Spencer banned from the library sitting in my locker by tomorrow, where anybody could read them, not just me.

  Which is when I got an even bigger idea than the one I had before.

  The Bigger Idea

  I cleared out the shelf in my locker. On it I put my copies of From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler and Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark (shiver!), Danny’s copy of Wait Till Helen Comes, and Rebecca’s copy of It’s Perfectly Normal (which I had only peeked at). Janna let me have a couple of old Junie B. Jones books she had at home, and Danny got his friend Parker to donate his whole collection of Goosebumps books. When Janna gave me back The Egypt Game, I would have a total of fourteen books.

  Fourteen books banned by Mrs. Spencer and her friends, free to borrow for any student who wanted to read them.

  And that’s how the Banned Books Locker Library began.

  I still had four books to go to have all the banned books—well, more than that, if you counted all the other Goosebumps and Junie B. books and Captain Underpants books. But all I really still needed was Harriet the Spy; Matilda; Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret; and a Captain Underpants book. Then I’d have at least one of everything on Mrs. Spencer’s list.

  But Mrs. Spencer wasn’t done.

  When I went to the school library after school to hide out in my usual spot until the late bus came, Mrs. Spencer was there. Today she was wearing one of those pink matching track suits that nobody really goes running in.

  And she had another list of books.

  “More?” Mrs. Jones said. Her face turned the same color as her orange-and-white polka-dot dress. “Honestly, Mrs. Spencer. Have you read all these books? Have you read any of them?”

  I pretended to be interested in the magazine rack near the front desk so I could listen.

  “I don’t need to read them,” Mrs. Spencer said. “Once I took my concerns to the school board, a number of other parents brought other books to my attention. I looked up reviews of the books online and decided these books weren’t appropriate for an elementary school library.”

  “You decided,” Mrs. Jones said. “I didn’t realize you had a Library and Information Science degree.”

  Mrs. Spencer stood straighter. It added an inch to her height, but still not enough to come up to Mrs. Jones’s level. “I don’t need a fancy library degree to know what’s right and what’s wrong for children.”

  “I see,” Mrs. Jones said. “Let me just get you some Request for Reconsideration forms then.”

  “That won’t be necessary,” Mrs. Spencer said. “I’ve already spoken to members of the school board about these books, and they agree that they have no place at Shelbourne Elementary.”

  “Well,” Mrs. Jones said, “be that as it may, until I hear from the school board, these books will stay on the shelf.” She handed the list back to Mrs. Spencer.

  “I see,” Mrs. Spencer said. She looked at the list for a moment, then smiled sweetly. “You know, before I go, I think I’ll pick out some books to check out. For Trey.”

  Mrs. Jones smiled back. “Anything I can do to help?”

  “No thanks,” Mrs. Spencer said. She held up the piece of paper with the new books she wanted to ban written on it. “I have a list.”

  I knew what Mrs. Spencer was doing. So did Mrs. Jones. Mrs. Spencer was going to check out all the books on her new list so no one else could check them out until the school board told Mrs. Jones to take them off the shelf. And there was nothing Mrs. Jones could do about it. For the next fifteen minutes, Mrs. Spencer went through the shelves and collected every single book on her list. I couldn’t watch. But I also couldn’t hide out in my favorite spot.

  Trey was sitting in it, drawing in his notebook.

  I pulled up short, as shocked as I had been when Mrs. Frankweiler had gone missing. I felt the heat rise in my face. First Trey’s mom had banned my favorite book from the library, and now Trey was sitting in my library seat. And I still hadn’t forgiven him for what he did to me in third grade. My fists clenched at the hem of my skirt, but I slipped away down a row of books before he could look up and see me.

  Mrs. Spencer finally came up to the counter with a huge armful of books, and Mrs. Jones had no choice but to check them out to her in Trey’s name.

  “Trey, it’s time to go,” Mrs. Spencer said. He collected his stuff and left my spot at last. On the way out he glanced up and saw me watching him from behind a big potted plant. I stuck my tongue out at him, but he just chuckled.

  “That odious woman,” Mrs. Jones said when they had gone. “This all started when she didn’t like the Captain Underpants book Trey checked out.” She gave me an exasperated sigh, but then she seemed to get an idea. She smiled to herself and went into the office in the back, the one with all the windows, and got on the computer.

  While Mrs. Jones wasn’t looking, I snatched the list Mrs. Spencer had left on the counter and dashed out of the library. I needed it.

  Every time Mrs. Spencer took a book from the school library, I was going to add a book to my secret locker library.

  Violent Criminals

  Standing next to my locker a few days later was a third grader wearing a tan trench coat with the lapels turned up. He wore sunglasses, and his brown hair looked like a comb hadn’t touched the kid’s head in days.

  “Psst. Psst,” he said. “You Amy Anne Ollinger?”

  “Yeah. Who are you?”

  “Wiebe,” he said. “Nikoli Wiebe.” He leaned closer. “The red dog barks at midnight,” he whispered.

  “What?”

  He frowned. “It’s a code. A spy code.”

  “Well, it’s not a very good code if only one of us knows it,” I thought, but I didn’t say it.

  The boy sighed. “I’m looking for a book. A secret book. A spy book.”

  “You mean Harriet the Spy?”

  “Shhhh!” he said. He glanced around like there were spies everywhere.

  “It’s checked out,” I told him.

  I opened the B.B.L.L. (the Banned Books Locker Library) to show him. There were only six books left on the shelf. Everything else had been checked out. And even after I’d added another twelve books from Mrs. Spencer’s new list. Mostly with Danny’s help. He knew all kinds of people who had copies at home.

  “I can put you on the list,” I told Nikoli. I pulled out the clipboard where people could reserve a book and had him add his name. Whenever somebody turned a book back in, I went through the list and found the next person who wanted it, then left them a note in their locker mailbox saying it was ready for pickup. My own locker mailbox had three notes in it, all from different people in my class, and all asking to read one of the books.

  My locker mailbox was getting a lot more use lately.

  “You should have a list,” Nikoli said. “Of all the books you have. So people know what they can check out.”

  “And do what? Hang it on the outside of my locker with a sign that says, ‘Here are all the books we’re not supposed to read that I have hidden in my locker’?” I wanted to say.

  Instead I said, “I’ll think about it.”

  Nikoli pulled a pen out of his pocket and talked into it like it was a microphone. “Abort mission. Repeat: abort mission. Alert Ukrainian Intelligence the package is not in the locker. Repeat: not in the locker.”

  I closed my locker and saw someone watching me from behind another locker door farther down the hall.

  It was Trey.

  There really were spies everywhere!

  “Hey. I got you a new one,” Danny said, making me jump. Nikoli was gone, and Danny stood in his place. With one hand he combed his helmet of hair into the exact place he wanted it, and with the other he slid me a beat-up old paperback copy of My Brother Sam Is Dead.


  I squeaked and stuck the book up under my shirt. I glanced down the hall. Trey was gone. Had he seen Danny give me the book? If he did, the first thing he would do is run and tell his mom. I popped one of my braids in my mouth and sucked on it.

  “Sorry,” Danny said. “I thought you’d be excited.”

  “I am. Yeah. I’m sorry,” I told him. I pulled the book out and put it quickly into my locker. It was one of the books off Mrs. Spencer’s new list that I didn’t have.

  “Javy’s older brother had a copy of it,” Danny said. “He thinks he might have Bridge to Terabithia around somewhere too. He’s going to look for it this weekend. I’ll let you know.”

  I didn’t understand why Danny was so into finding all the books on the list. He wasn’t interested in reading them all like I was. I thanked him anyway and put the book in my locker. We had to get to class.

  “Have you read any of the Wayside School books?” I asked him. “I think you’d like them. They’re really funny.”

  Danny flicked his hair into place. “Cool. I didn’t know you had those. I’ll pick one up after school.” We went into Mr. Vaughn’s class, and he walked with me to my desk. Rebecca was already sitting in the desk beside mine.

  “Hey, you’ve got so many books now you need a list,” Danny whispered. “You know. To let everybody know what’s in the B.B.L.L.”

  “I know, I know,” I told him. “Nikoli said the same thing.”

  “Right. And what’s she supposed to do, tape it to the front of her locker?” Rebecca said. “She gets caught, and it’s lawsuit time.”

  I felt the quicksand opening up underneath me again. “Lawsuit time?”

  “Sure. From all the parents whose children you’ve corrupted. Why do you think they banned all those books to begin with? Because the parents think they’re going to rot our brains and turn us into violent criminals.”

  Danny ran his fingers through his hair. “I don’t know about you guys, but ever since I read Wait Till Helen Comes, I’ve been thinking about worshiping Satan. He’s got some really good ideas.”