3-2 Diary Of A 5th Grade Outlaw

Gina: Hi there. This is Donna Jean. I'm Gina Loveless, and I'm also the author of Diary of a 5th Grade Outlaw, and I'm going to read to you the first two chapters.

Um, first it starts with a note. And it says, if you are reading this diary, you need to know five things.

One. Mom and dad gave me this as a back-to-school gift. It took me a month to start writing, but here I go.

Two. You're about to learn a ton of cool basketball moves. Basketball is the best sport ever, and I've been playing it since second grade. I love it more than double chocolate fudge ice cream. Yeah, that much.

Three. I miss my best friend Mary Anne, but nothing will stop me from winning her back. Oops, that's number three.

Number four. Mom, I know this is you, please stop reading.

Five. Mom, since you're probably still reading, could you pick up double chocolate fudge ice cream at the store?

Chapter one. Monday, October 3rd. I need the first thing I write in this journal to be about something that happened to me today that first made me feel as good as red velvet cake, but then ended up making me feel like mud caked on my shoe.

See, I was at recess, walking by the basketball court, when I heard this boy say, "You guys don't get it. I'm without a doubt the best basketball player at our school. I can beat anybody, anytime, at any shot."

I stopped short. I folded my arms, and I couldn't help but stare at the kid. When the boy looked at me, his face turned the color of marinara sauce. "What are you looking at?" he said.

"It's just that..." I walked over to the court and flipped my hair. "How do you know you're the best basketball player at Nottingham Elementary if you haven't played everyone?"

The two boys next to Marinara looked at me like my hair was made of pasta. One kid was tall and skinny like a breadstick. The other looked like a ravioli. I wondered if they were still hungry from lunch like me.

"Who is she?" asked Marinara, jabbing a thumb at me. "I have no idea," said Ravioli. "I think she's in Miss Gaffe's class," said Breadstick.

"I'm Robin Loxley," I said, "and I challenge you to a basketball duel."

Marinara shrugged his shoulders. "Never heard of you. But I'll beat you at any shot." I pointed to the three-point line. "First shot is from there, with one hand behind your back, standing on one foot, and one eye closed."

"No way," said Ravioli. "That's impossible," said Breadstick. "You're on," said Marinara.

I stepped up to the half circle painted on the blacktop and put my hood up. "I'll go first." Marinara passed me the ball. It was showtime. I nailed the shot just like this.

It was a pretty cool shot. But they didn't seem to think so. None of the boys went "Woo-woo!" or "Yowza!" or other noises cartoon characters make.

Marinara walked up to my spot, and I got out of his way. Breadstick passed him the ball. Marinara dribbled it a couple of times. He passed it through his legs, then he put his left hand behind his back, closed his right eye, and stood on one foot and stuck his tongue out right at me. He launched the ball into the air like a catapult. I held my breath while it went like this.

I waited for the other kids to rush over and put me on their shoulders. I waited for Marinara to come over and say, "I'm so sorry, basketball goddess, you are the queen of these courts." I waited to even get a high five or a fist bump. But yeah, that didn't happen.

"You cheated!" yelled Marinara. "I don't know how, but you cheated!"

Now, if he'd said, "Whatever, I'm bad at losing and I don't want to see your face anymore," at least that would have been honest. I would have just walked away. But yeah, that definitely didn't happen. 'Cause nobody calls me a cheater.

"You saw me throw the ball and it went in," I said. I walked over to the grass and picked up the basketball. "Take it back," I said. "No, and give us our ball," Marinara yelled.

Okay, before I draw what happened next, I want to also write that I didn't mean for it to go down the way it did. Sometimes I get a little fired up when something isn't fair. I knew the right thing to do was take a long breath and walk away. But yeah, you guessed it, the right thing didn't happen.

Chapter two. Now Marinara's face wasn't red from being angry. It was red because I made his nose bleed. "Agh!" he yelled. I pulled back my hood. I felt horrible. "Hey, I am really sorry," I said. I may have been mad, but I didn't mean to hurt the kid.

"Aaron, you okay, dude?" asked Breadstick. Aaron wiped his tears with his hands. Then he used his sleeve to clean the blood from his nose. "I'm fine," he said.

"I didn't mean to," I started. Then all three of them turned and stared at me with eyes that said, "Get off our court now." "Get off our court now!" yelled Aaron.

At first my feet just wouldn't move, but when Aaron headed toward me, I found my legs and made my way to the back of the school. "I better never see you on this court again or there'll be trouble," said Aaron.

My walk of shame led me across the playground and past the jungle gym. Well, I tried to walk past it, but there was a swirly line of kids in the way, waiting to climb up the steps. At the top was Nadia. She's a girl in my class who likes to boss around any kid who will let her.

Nadia saw me from the top of the jungle gym. "Hey, no line jumpers, Robin," she said. "I'll charge you six times the price if you try to cut to the front."

She was talking about the playground tax. If you want to do just about anything fun during recess, you better cough up your bonus bucks to Nadia or one of her minions or else.

Bonus bucks are this thing Principal Roberta came up with. When you do something really good in class, like ace a quiz, use good manners, or help another kid with something, you get awarded bonus bucks.

Principal Roberta has all kinds of awesome prizes in her office that you can spend your bucks on, like ten extra minutes of recess, getting to wear pajamas for the day, or my personal favorite, a pass to get out of homework for a whole week.

Nadia isn't great with manners, and helping others is like a foreign language to her. Instead, she gets her bonus bucks from other kids. She and the other mean kids who work for her rotate at different stations all over the playground, making kids pay up bonus bucks to have any fun.

Want to play four square? Hand over three bucks. Want chalk to play tic-tac-toe on the blacktop? Better have one bonus buck for each color chalk you want. Stuff like that.

Nadia gets the big bucks by collecting them at the top of the jungle gym. She charges five whole bonus bucks for that. I know, I know, it's pretty crazy. The worst part is that Nadia can't even spend the bucks because it would give her away to the teachers and Principal Roberta. She just likes ruining everyone else's fun.

The teachers don't have a clue about what's going on because kids still spend some of their bucks on rewards. Plus, kids are afraid to tell the teachers. Not just because of what Nadia might do, but because they're worried that if anyone finds out, Principal Roberta will end it all and the bonus bucks will be taken away forever. So kids pay Nadia their playground tax and go on earning more bucks.

Unlike a lot of the other kids at my school, I'm not so easily pushed around by Nadia. And I wasn't even trying to get onto the jungle gym. I was trying to get past it. I wormed my way through the line. When I got to the other side, someone tapped me on the shoulder and said, "Hey," in an annoyed voice.

The hair on the back of my neck stood up. Was Aaron back to get even? I pulled my hood over my head and spun around on my heels with my fists up. I had to defend myself. I was ready.

So, find out what happens in the rest of the book with Robin by reading Diary of a 5th Grade Outlaw. And thanks so much.

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