Girl Power (11 page)

By 8:30 the next morning, all three girls had stopped by Emily’s house to drop off their share of the entry fee. She thanked them and assured them that her mom would drop it off for them.

“What’s all that about?” asked Mom as she rinsed out her coffee cup and set it in the sink.

“The sandcastle contest,” said Emily, holding out the slightly rumpled application from the newspaper.

“Huh?” Mom glanced at it then looked surprised. “You mean the one at the resort?
This
weekend?”

Emily nodded. “Me and my friends want to enter.”

“My friends and I,” her mom corrected.

“You too?” teased Emily.

Mom smiled warmly and took the paper. “But there’s a fee, Emily. Twenty-five dollars.”

“I know.” Emily scooped out the bills and change that she’d been collecting in her pocket and set it on the counter. “We have most of it already.”

“Most?”

“All except for my share.”

“How much is that?”

“Six dollars and twenty-five cents.”

Mom nodded. “Well, how about if I cover you on that?”

“Really?”

“Sure. We’re not totally penniless, Emily. And you’ve been doing such a great job of helping out. I’m so proud of the work you and your friends did for the trailer court. Hey, I’m happy to contribute.”

“And we might win,” said Emily hopefully. “Morgan is our designer, and she’s really creative.”

Mom smiled. “Yes, she definitely is. But I’ve heard that some very experienced sand sculptors are coming to town. And some people are really serious about this competition, honey. They practice all year long and go all over the country.”

“But we’ll still have a chance,” said Emily with confidence. “Can you turn this in for us? Today is the deadline.”

“No problem. I just happen to be going that way.”

Emily put her arms around her mom. “Thanks, Mom.”

Mom laughed. “No problem.”

“I mean, for everything,” said Emily. “For getting us here to Boscoe Bay and for working so hard. I think it’s all totally worth it.”

Mom nodded. “I do too. It’s just been a little hard starting out with nothing.”

“Ready to go?” called Kyle from the backdoor.

And then they were gone, just like every other day, and Emily had the house to herself. She straightened up
the kitchen and wrote in her journal for a little while, but it was barely ten o’clock and she was already feeling bored. She wondered when Amy planned on holding their little election today. And since they still didn’t have a phone connected, Emily decided the only way to find out was to go to Morgan’s house. Of course, any excuse to go to Morgan’s was a good excuse. She felt more at home at the Evans’ than at her own home—mostly because there was always someone there. Plus, there was usually something good to eat.

“Come in, Em,” called Morgan when Emily knocked on the screen door. Morgan was sitting on the living-room floor with a large tray of beads between her legs. “How’s it going?” she asked, pushing her glasses up the bridge of her nose as she looked at Emily.

“Okay.” Emily sat down beside her. “Whatcha doing?”

“Well, it was going to be a surprise …”

“Oh. Want me to leave?”

“No. Why don’t you stay and help me?”

Then Morgan showed her what she was doing. She had some alphabet beads along with some colored ones. “First you put on two purple beads, then two blue, two green, then yellow, orange, red, and finally magenta. See.” She held up the leather string that was nearly half full of colorful beads.

“It looks like a rainbow,” said Emily.

“Yeah.” Now Morgan picked up a bead with the letter Y and slipped it on. This was followed by the letter A and N and another Y and finally L, which was really the beginning since Morgan had put the beads on backwards. Although it still didn’t make sense. LYNAY.”

“Who’s Lynay?”

“It’s a secret,” said Morgan as she handed Emily a piece of string. “At least for now. So, can you make another one just like it?”

“Sure. Easy.” And Emily followed the same pattern. Both girls worked quietly. Morgan showed Emily how to finish the pattern with another rainbow on the other side of the letters.

“That’s pretty,” said Emily. “But I’m curious about LYNAY.”

The girls worked until they had four short strings of beads. “Finished,” announced Morgan.

“What are they?”

Morgan wrapped one around Emily’s wrist. “Bracelets.”

“Cool.”

“But it’s a secret, okay?”

Emily nodded.

“Oh, yeah. Amy called and the big election is supposed to be at one o’clock today. Carlie had to babysit her brothers this morning. After the election, we’re going down to
the beach to practice our sand sculpture.”

“Practice?”

“Yeah, we need to work on the size and who does what. Three hours isn’t that long if we want it to look totally perfect. Want to see my drawing?”

“Sure.”

Morgan pocketed the bracelets, picked up her beading tray, and led Emily to her bedroom where she produced a sketch pad with a detailed drawing of SpongeBob lying on a beach blanket with all of his little friends nearby.

“That is so cool,” said Emily. “And it doesn’t even look that complicated.”

“But remember the sculpture is in 3-D.”

“Three-D?”

“You know, everything is carved and it has to have depth and dimension. It’s not like we can just draw it on the beach and be done. I’m guessing that SpongeBob will be about two feet high.”

Emily nodded. “Yeah, I can see how we might need to practice it.”

“Want to take these over to the bus?” asked Morgan as she held up some pillows that she’d sewn. Emily recognized the fabric squares that she had cut out. “I finished some curtains too. We can make a lunch and take them all over to the bus.”

“Sure.”

They made a quick lunch to take with them. Then, loaded up with pillows and curtains, they walked over to the bus. As Morgan unlocked the door, Emily asked if she thought it was okay to be at the bus when all four girls weren’t there.

“I don’t see why not,” said Morgan. “But I guess I don’t know how the others will feel about it. I suppose it does make sense to have this stupid election so that we can sort of know what to expect.”

“Well, we know that you’ll be the one elected,” said Emily. “I’m sure voting for you.”

“That doesn’t mean it’s a shoo-in,” said Morgan. “I mean, Carlie has a vote too. And Amy might make some really good points as to why she should be president. What if I voted for her?”

“You wouldn’t!”

Morgan laughed. “Probably not. But I’d have to be fair. If I was convinced that she would be best and if you guys were too … well, I’d have to vote for her.”

Emily shuddered to think what their club would be like if Amy were president. She imagined a horrible dictatorship where they’d all work hard, and Amy would sit around and tell them what to do. It wasn’t that she didn’t like Amy, but maybe she didn’t totally trust her.

“It looks pretty good in here,” said Emily after they’d hung the new curtains and put the new pillows on the couch.

“Yeah,” said Morgan. “But I’d still like to make something for the bed. That blanket on the mattress just isn’t cutting it for me. And I think it needs a whole bunch more pillows.”

Emily laughed. “Well, I’m sure by the time you’re done it will be so cool that Better Buses and Gardens will want to feature it in their magazine.”

“Hello in there,” called Carlie as she and Amy came into the bus.

“How long have you guys been here?” asked Amy.

“Just long enough to hang some curtains,” said Morgan.

“Looks nice.” Carlie looked around and nodded.

“Campaigning are we?” asked Amy.

“Are we?” replied Morgan, pointing to the button pinned on Amy’s shirt. “Go with Ngo?”

Amy laughed. “Just wanted to show you guys that I believe in myself.” She set an empty tissue box, a small pad of paper, and some pencils on the table.

“Should we get this over with?” asked Morgan as she picked up a pencil.

“Not so fast,” said Amy, snatching the pencil back. “We need to do nominations first.”

“I nominate Morgan,” said Emily.

“Wait,” said Amy. “We need to take notes.”

“Notes?” said Morgan. “What is this? School?”

“If we’re a club, we should take notes,” said Amy. “Actually, I mean minutes. We should take minutes. Do I
hear any volunteers?”

Emily held out her hand to take the notebook from Amy. “Here, I’ll do it. Let’s just get this show on the road. We need to get out to the beach and work on SpongeBob. You should see Morgan’s drawing. It’s really—”

“Not right now,” said Amy. “First things first.” She pointed to the couch. “Everyone sit down.” Then she pointed to the table. “Emily, you sit there so you can take notes.”

“Yes, sir,” said Emily.

“Don’t you mean minutes?” said Carlie with a snicker.

“You guys!” said Amy, losing her patience.

“Okay, okay.” Morgan held up her hands as if to surrender and then sat down on the couch. “Go ahead, Amy.”

“All right.” Amy continued to stand. “Let’s begin nominations.”

“I nominate Morgan,” said Carlie.

“For what?” said Amy with a scowl.

“For president, of course,” said Carlie impatiently. “I thought that’s what the election was for.”

“But we should have other offices too,” said Amy.

“Other offices?” Morgan frowned at her. “What is this now? The military?”

Amy nodded over to Emily. “We need a secretary to keep minutes. And we should have a treasurer,” she added.

“What for?” asked Emily.

“What if we win the sandcastle contest?” said Amy. “We’ll need to keep track of that money and how it’s spent. And we might want to start having club dues.”

“Dues?” Morgan frowned. “Why do we have to complicate everything?”

“Fine,” snapped Amy. “Let’s just elect you as president and you can call all the shots, Morgan.”

“No …” Morgan shook her head. “Let’s be fair.”

“And let’s get this over with,” said Carlie.

“Okay,” said Morgan. “I nominate Amy for president.”

Amy smiled. “Thanks, Morgan.”

“Okay,” said Emily in an official-sounding voice. “We have two nominations for president. Do I hear a third?” No one said anything. “So, shall we consider nominations closed?”

“Yes,” said Carlie.

“Hey, you’re good at this, Emily,” said Amy.

Emily smiled. “That’s only because I was in student council back at my old school.”

“Well, I nominate Emily for secretary,” said Amy.

“Thank you,” said Emily, writing down her own name. “Any other nominations?”

“I nominate Carlie,” said Morgan.

“But what if I don’t want to?” asked Carlie.

“Why not?” demanded Amy.

Carlie shrugged. “I don’t like to write.”

“You can decline the nomination,” said Emily.

“Then I decline.” Carlie grinned.

“Okay, then I nominate Carlie for treasurer,” said Emily, feeling bad that Carlie hadn’t been nominated yet.

Carlie frowned.

“You want to decline that too?” asked Emily.

She shrugged. “I guess not. But Amy is lots better in math than I am.”

“But Amy is running for president,” said Emily.

Morgan groaned. “And SpongeBob is waiting.”

“Okay, okay.” Emily looked down at the notebook. “Are nominations closed then?”

Everyone agreed that was enough, and so it was time for speeches. “You go first,” Morgan said to Amy. “Since it looks like you’re ready.”

“Thank you,” said Amy, standing up. “As you all know, I’m a little bit younger than you three. I won’t be twelve until August. But you can’t let my age or my size fool you. I skipped a grade because my IQ was extremely high and I was very far ahead of my class. As you know, I’m still ahead of our class. I’ve been the mental-math champion at our school for the past three years, and I’ve placed in district every year. I’ve won the last four spelling bees in our school as well as the last two years in district.” Carlie yawned, and Amy frowned at her but continued. “I’m a
gifted musician, playing flute, violin, and piano. I’m very self-disciplined, and I know a lot about business since my family owns a prominent restaurant downtown. I’ve lived in Harbor View Mobile-Home Court longer than any of you. I think you’ll have to agree that I have all the qualifications to be president. I am a natural leader.”

Emily looked down at her notebook and literally bit her tongue. Not hard though. Just enough to keep her from saying anything.

“Is that all?” asked Morgan.

“No,” said Amy. “If I am elected president, I will take you all to dinner to celebrate—on me. Also, I will make sure that our club is run efficiently and in a way that will be appreciated by all.” She made a little bow. “Thank you very much!”

Morgan started clapping and the other two followed.

“Next?” said Emily, looking at Morgan.

Morgan nodded without standing up. “Well, I think you guys know me. You know what I’m like and whether or not I’d make a good president. I encourage you to vote for whoever you think is right for the job. If you chose me, I’ll do the best I can. But, as you know, I’m not perfect. Thanks.”

“Is that all?” asked Emily. “You want to make a speech, Carlie?”

She shook her head.

“And I don’t.” Emily glanced at Amy. “Can we vote now?”

“Yes,” said Amy as she handed out pencils and pieces of paper. “Cast your votes for president, secretary, and treasurer and then put them in the box.”

“The Kleenex box?” teased Carlie.

Amy just made a face and began to write. Soon all ballots were cast into the Kleenex box.

“Why don’t you read them, Emily,” said Amy. “Since you are probably going to be secretary.”

Emily opened up the papers and read them. No big surprises, but she hoped Amy’s feelings wouldn’t be hurt.

“Carlie has three votes for treasurer,” she began. “And one is blank.”

“I’ll bet that was you.” Morgan looked at Carlie.

“I have been chosen as secretary,” said Emily. She looked at Morgan. “Unanimously.”

Morgan clapped and the others did too.

“And for president,” announced Emily, “three votes for Morgan and one for Amy, making Morgan Evans the first ever president of the Rainbow Bus. Congratulations, Morgan.”