Emma-Jean Lazarus Fell Out of a Tree (2 page)

ANTI-BULLYING DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

by Lauren Tarshis and Robin Friedman

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Copyright © 2007 by Lauren Tarshis • Illustrations © 2007 by Kristin Smith
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

eISBN : 978-1-4406-3138-2

[1. Interpersonal relations—Fiction. 2. Problem solving—Fiction.
3. Middle schools—Fiction. 4. Schools—Fiction.] I. Title.
PZ7.T211115Em 2007 [Fic]—dc22 2006018428

To my morn and dad
To David
To Leo, Jeremy, Dylan, and Valerie
with love

Chapter 1

Emma-Jean Lazarus knew very well that a few of the seventh-grade girls at William Gladstone Middle School were criers. They cried if they got a 67 on an algebra test or if they dropped their retainer into the trash in the cafeteria. They cried if their clay mug exploded in the kiln and when they couldn’t finish the mile in gym. Two even cried in science, when Mr. Petrowski announced it was time to dissect a sheep’s eyeball. Of course Emma-Jean had no intention of participating in such a barbaric and unhygienic activity. But crying was not a logical way to express one’s opposition to the seventh-grade science curriculum. Emma-Jean submitted a memo to Mr. Petrowski, detailing her objections to the dissection point by point. He had excused her from the project.

Colleen Pomerantz was not one of the criers. Which was why Emma-Jean was so surprised when, on a cold February afternoon, she walked into the girls’ room and discovered Colleen leaning over the sink with tears pouring down her face.

Emma-Jean’s first thought was that Colleen had been injured. The halls of William Gladstone were crowded and hectic. It was possible that Colleen had been struck in the head by a carelessly slung backpack, or accidentally elbowed in the eye by a rambunctious seventh-grade boy.

Emma-Jean approached Colleen, ready to administer basic first aid if necessary.

“Are you hurt?” Emma-Jean asked.

Colleen shook her head and said in a loud voice, “Oh no! I’m really fine.” She straightened her body and smiled.

Emma-Jean peered into Colleen’s freckled face. She saw no blood or bruising or swelling. Colleen’s pupils appeared normal. But even so, Emma-Jean was quite sure that Colleen was not fine. Certainly Colleen was not
really
fine. Emma-Jean spent much of her time observing people, trying to understand them better. Really fine people did not have blood-shot eyes and tear-stained cheeks.

“No,” Emma-Jean said. “I do not think you are fine.”

Colleen’s smile quivered, then collapsed over her braces.

“You’re right, Emma-Jean,” Colleen whispered. “The truth is I’m not doing well at all. I’m having some trouble, bad trouble, with some of my friends. . . .” Colleen shook her head. “Some people . . . aren’t nice.”

Emma-Jean knew this was true. People sometimes behaved unkindly toward one another, even at William Gladstone Middle School. Hurt feelings, bruised egos, broken promises, betrayed confidences— the list of emotional injuries her fellow seventh graders inflicted on one another was dismayingly long.

Of course, Emma-Jean was fond of her peers. In fact, she believed that one was unlikely to find a finer group of young people than the 103 boys and 98 girls with whom she spent her school days. But their behavior was often irrational. And as a result, their lives were messy. Emma-Jean disliked disorder of any kind, and had thus made it her habit to keep herself separate, to observe from afar.

Colleen looked at herself in the mirror and gasped. “Oh my gosh! Look at me! I look like a monster!”

Emma-Jean leaned forward and inspected Colleen’s reflection. She saw nothing monstrous. Colleen’s eyes were merely red and swollen, which was to be expected of a person in a distressed emotional state. Emma-Jean went to the paper towel dispenser and pulled out a length of the scratchy brown paper. She wet it, folded it into a perfect rectangle, and held it out to Colleen.

“Put this on your eyes,” Emma-Jean said. “It will minimize the redness and swelling.”

This treatment had always worked well for Emma-Jean’s mother, who cried for several hours every July 2 and for several more every November 3.

July 2 was the birthday of Eugene Lazarus, Emma-Jean’s father. November 3 was the anniversary of his death. He died two years, three months, and fourteen days ago, when Emma-Jean was ten, in a car accident on I-95. He had been on his way home from a math conference, where he had submitted his award-winning paper on the legendary French mathematician Jules Henri Poincaré.

Colleen accepted the wet towel and held it against her eyes. To promote an atmosphere of calm, Emma-Jean stood very still with her hands folded in front of her pressed khakis. All was silent except for the slow drip of the right-hand sink.

“It’s all Laura’s fault,” Colleen whispered. “Laura Gilroy.”

Emma-Jean nodded, for she too often found Laura Gilroy to be disturbing. She was bossy and loud and slammed her locker. Every day at recess, Laura led a group of seventh-grade girls, including Colleen, through a series of dance routines. If someone stumbled or did the wrong move (often it was Colleen who tripped or missed a choreographed kick or turn), Laura would laugh and call them unkind names, such as klutz or spaz. When Laura grew tired of dancing, she would run to the basketball court and snatch the ball from Will Keeler and his friends. Then she would gallop around the blacktop screaming, “Try to get me! Try to get me!”

Emma-Jean wasn’t the least bit surprised that Laura Gilroy could cause Colleen Pomerantz to cry.

“The thing is,” Colleen said, pressing the paper towels against her eyes, “Laura is trying to steal Kaitlin from me.”

Kaitlin was Kaitlin Vogel.

“Kaitlin’s my best friend, did you know that?”

Of course Emma-Jean knew. She knew just about everything about her fellow seventh graders.

“And every single February, the last weekend, I go with Kaitlin and her parents up to ski in Vermont. But Laura got it in her head that she should go this year. Instead of me. And Laura can be so . . . powerful that somehow she got Kaitlin to invite her.”

Colleen shivered, though the girls’ room was stuffy and warm.

“The thing is,” she continued, “I’m the one who loves to ski! I’m the one who loves Kaitlin! And I’m the one who Kaitlin really wants to be with!”

“That is obvious,” Emma-Jean said.

Colleen removed the paper towel from her eyes and regarded Emma-Jean with keen interest. “You think so?”

“Of course,” Emma-Jean said. “She always saves you a chair in the cafeteria, and won’t let anyone else sit there, even when you are late.”

“That’s true,” Colleen said. “She did that today.”

“Kaitlin has great affection for you,” Emma-Jean said. “I am certain.”

Colleen threw the used paper towel into the trash receptacle. She took a deep breath and exhaled a cloud of bubble-gum-scented breath that made Emma-Jean blink. “Thanks, Emma-Jean,” she said with a tremulous smile. “You’re really nice to say all that.”

The bell rang, signaling the beginning of last period. Emma-Jean picked up Colleen’s backpack, which was bright pink like most of the items in Colleen’s wardrobe. Emma-Jean handed the backpack to Colleen and then picked up her own schoolbag, the leather briefcase that had belonged to her father. The leather was worn in places, but it was roomy enough to hold Emma-Jean’s meticulous notebooks and sketchbook, her favorite pen and two sharp pencils, and a metal thermos containing her lunch.

Emma-Jean was turning toward the door when Colleen grabbed her by the hand.

“Oh gosh, I can’t. I can’t go out there. I just can’t. Oh . . . Emma-Jean, please help me.”

Emma-Jean froze, as startled by the warmth of Colleen’s hand as by her unexpected words.

Colleen dropped Emma-Jean’s hand and rushed back to the sink. She turned her back on Emma-Jean and cried with renewed vigor. Emma-Jean was unsure how to proceed. She maintained a general policy of staying out of the messy lives of her fellow seventh graders. But never before had one of them directly appealed to her for assistance.

Emma-Jean thought of Jules Henri Poincaré, her father’s hero. The legendary French mathematician believed that even the most complex problems could be solved through a process of creative thinking. It was true that Poincaré worked on chaos theory and celestial mechanics, not the interpersonal problems of seventh-grade girls. But what if a kind and cheerful seventh grader like Colleen Pomerantz had asked for his help? Emma-Jean believed Poincaré would have accepted the challenge.

An unusual surge of energy came over Emma-Jean, very possibly a thrill, as she took a step toward Colleen. She had the feeling of walking through an invisible door, the door that had always seemed to separate her from her fellow seventh graders.

Surprisingly, the door was wide open.

Chapter 2

An alarm went off in Colleen Pomerantz’s brain, and it was way louder than the Hello Kitty alarm clock that had woken her up at 6:30 that morning, when everything seemed really perfect or pretty good or at least okay.

Colleen held on to the sink. She took some more deep breaths, which were supposed to be relaxing but were not at all relaxing. A minute ago she thought she could pull herself together, that she could go out there and face the world.

But now . . .

Oh gosh, she felt sick.

She could faint!

Or throw up!

In the girls’ room!

People would laugh as she walked through the halls. They would stare at her and whisper things while she ate her turkey and nonfat cheese sandwich. They’d make up a horrible name for her, like Crazy Colleen, or Crazy Throw-up Colleen (Colleen was bad at thinking up nicknames, but some people were really good at it).