Gooney Bird tied her bib. "Well," she said, "in that case, I will eat it all myself." She took a bite and said, "Yum."
"We told the story of the Little Red Hen!" Chelsea said. "Cluck cluck cluck!"
"I can't believe Mrs. Pidgeon thought my fable was going to be about a chicken," she grumbled.
"Here, have a piece of fried chicken," Nicholas said, and handed her a crispy wing from his lunchbox. "Can I have your orange, for a trade?"
Chelsea considered that. "Okay," she said, and handed him her orange. She bit into the chicken wing. "Nobody would eat a Chihuahua," she said. "None of our fable animals are edible."
"Bear is," Beanie pointed out. "Some people eat bear."
"Yuck. Well, not panda, though, or kangaroo, or—what others did we have?"
"Bunny, and tortoise," Tricia said. "People eat those."
"And bison," Barry added. "Bison is a very healthful food. You should eat bisonburgers instead of hamburgers. Less cholesterol."
"Nobody would eat a flamingo," Felicia Ann said. "I think it would make you thick."
"How about T. rex?" asked Ben.
Tyrone, whose mouth was full of tuna fish sandwich, began to wiggle rhythmically in his seat."Teee rex, Teee rex," he murmured. "See my muscles flex, if I munch on ol' T. rex..." He lifted his arm and tried to demonstrate the muscle.
"How about Malcolm?" Tyrone asked suddenly, interrupting his own performance. "You didn't do your fable yet, Malcolm. Want me to make you up a rap? What animal you gonna do?"
Malcolm grinned. "Not telling," he said. "Secret. Surprise."
"Well," Gooney Bird pointed out, "your turn comes right after lunch, Malcolm, so it won't be a surprise for long."
"How about Nicholas? Want a rap, Nicholas?" Tyrone was shifting back and forth in his chair, eager to dance.
"I'm going last," Nicholas said.
"You can't! Gooney Bird's going last! She already said so! The day go fast, and Gooney Bird be last—"
"Nicholas and I are doing our fable together," Gooney Bird explained. "Look what I have for dessert! A kumquat!" She held it up, and the other children examined it with interest.
"Kumquats are native to China," Barry announced, "although they are now cultivated in the United States. The kumquat tree is slow-growing and compact. Because of their thick rind, kumquats keep well and are easy to ship long distances."
"I thought you only read up through D in the encyclopedia, Barry," Gooney Bird said.
"I peeked into the K," he explained, "because I'm interested in kites."
"You're amazing." Gooney Bird bit into her kumquat.
"You can't do your fable with Gooney Bird, Nicholas," Ben said. "You're an N and she's a G."
"True," Gooney Bird replied. She grinned at Nicholas and Nicholas grinned back.
"Me and Gooney Bird have a surprise," Nicholas said.
Gooney Bird, imitating Mrs. Pidgeon, held up a grammar finger.
"Gooney Bird and I," Nicholas said. Then, to everyone's surprise, he chanted,"You and I, me and you, we gotta surprise, oh yes we do ... He collected his crumpled paper napkin and an empty plastic cup. Then he shuffled over to the trash can, still chanting. Bruno, the Saint Bernard, lay dozing nearby.
"But first," Malcolm announced, rising from the table, "ME! My turn! I'm doing my fable next!"
With Malcolm eagerly leading the way, the second-graders walked back to the classroom. Bruno yawned, stood up slowly, and followed behind, hoping not to miss anything. His antlers were a little tilted.
11.
When the class was settled at their desks and Gooney Bird had announced that it was his turn to present his fable, Malcolm picked up a thick red marker and colored his own nose.
"A clown?" Keiko murmured.
Then Malcolm stood and attached something to his belt, twisting it around to the back. The children all watched, puzzled.
He walked to the front of the room.
Then, with his back turned to the class, he began to write on the board. The children were all still puzzled by the costume: his bright red nose and the sheet of purple construction paper dangling from his belt in the rear.
"Why is your nose red?" called Tricia.
"Why is your backside all purple?" asked Ben.
"Shhhh!" Mrs. Pidgeon said, holding up her quiet-please finger. "Let's see Malcolm's animal, and then maybe we'll understand his costume."
Carefully Malcolm wrote an uppercase M. Then an A. Then an N.
"NO FAIR!" Tyrone called. "He can't be a man!"
"You have to be an animal, Malcolm!" Barry said loudly. "Remember you thought I was Thomas Jefferson and it wasn't an animal? Isn't that right, Mrs. Pidgeon? Isn't that right, Gooney Bird?"
Malcolm had turned around and was looking impatiently at the second-graders.
"Well," Gooney Bird said, "a man is a mammal. Maybe a fable can be about any mammal."
"But mine wathn't a mammal," Felicia Ann pointed out. "Flamingo ith a bird."
"Neither was mine!" Tricia announced. "I was a tortoise. That's not a mammal."
"You're right." Gooney Bird looked as if she were thinking. "I don't know if there is a rule about fables. If we can have a bird, or a tortoise, or a T. rex, as the main character, maybe we could have a man."
"I wonder what Aesop would say," Mrs. Pidgeon said.
"And anyway, what's that purple thing on your backside, Malcolm?" Chelsea asked. "It's weird. So is your nose."
Malcolm grinned. He wrinkled his nose and wiggled his bottom. Then, when the class grew quiet, he turned and added some more letters on the board.
DRILL
He turned back to the class, wiggled his bottom again, then lifted one arm and scratched with the other. "Oooh, oooh, oooh," Malcolm said, making an odd hooting sound.
"Mandrill!" Gooney Bird announced. "Malcolm is a mandrill!"
"But he's acting like a chimp, or a monkey," Beanie pointed out. Now Malcolm was leaping about, his legs bent, still making the sound.
"A mandrill is a kind of monkey, sort of," Gooney Bird explained. "Like a baboon, I think. I've seen them at the zoo. They're the ones with red noses and—"