[Part 2] "Frindle" by Andrew Clements
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CHAPTER X. FREEDOM OF THE PRESS
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JUDY MORGAN WAS a reporter for The Westfield Gazette, the local newspaper.
Westfield was a quiet little town.
There was the occasional burglary, the teenagers got rowdy once in a while, and there was some shouting at the town council or the planning board now and then.
But mostly, things were calm and orderly in Westfield, and every Thursday The Westfield Gazette proved it.
Ted Bell sold advertisements for the paper, and he had a daughter in fourth grade at Lincoln Elementary.
He told Judy that a bunch of fifth graders were making trouble and were not obeying teachers anymore, that there was something about a secret code word they were all using.
And half the students had been kept after school one day last week—including his own little girl.
The only other story Judy was working on was about eighteen new trees that were going to be planted along East Main Street.
The trees could wait.
This thing at the elementary school sounded like a real story.
So Judy Morgan showed up at Lincoln Elementary School at three o’clock the day after Mrs. Chatham had been to visit Nick’s parents.
The sign on the door said, “All Visitors Must Report to the Office,” and she did.
On the bulletin board outside the office, Judy saw Mrs. Granger’s notice about the punishment for using the word frindle.
She stepped back two paces, aimed her camera at the notice, and snapped a photo.
She read the notice once more, and then stepped into the office.
Mrs. Freed, the school secretary, looked up and smiled.
“May I help you?”
“Yes, I’m sure you can.
My name is Judy Morgan, and I work for The Westfield Gazette.
I’d like to know about that poster outside the office, the one about this word frindle.
Who should I talk to?”
Mrs. Freed stopped smiling.
She was sick and tired of anything to do with that word.
For the past week her phone had been ringing off the hook.
If it wasn’t a parent complaining about a child who had to stay after school, it was someone from the school board trying to get in touch with Mrs. Chatham or Mrs. Granger.
Mrs. Freed pursed her lips and narrowed her eyes.
She said, “You’ll have to speak with the principal.
Let me see if Mrs. Chatham is free.”
She was.
There isn’t a principal alive who won’t find the time to talk to someone from the local newspaper.
The reporter was invited into Mrs. Chatham’s office.
Judy noticed right away that the principal was not comfortable talking about this stuff.
When asked about the poster outside the office door, Mrs. Chatham laughed and said, “Oh, that?
It’s nothing really.
Some kids have been playing a prank, and it was time to put a stop to it.”
The principal’s laugh sounded phony to Judy Morgan.
“And did that notice put an end to the prank?
I heard that a lot of children were kept after school last week.
Would you tell me a little about that?
Parents would like to know what’s going on.”
Mrs. Chatham looked like … well, like a kid who had been sent to the principal’s office.
She squirmed a little in her chair and tried to smile.
She said, “Well, we do still have a little problem, but it’s under control.
Mrs. Granger may have overreacted a bit.
I don’t think the children have really been trying to be disrespectful.
They are just having some fun, and it’s more like a difference of opinion …”
And then Mrs. Chatham went on to tell the reporter what she knew about the word frindle, and how it had become popular among the students.
Judy Morgan took careful notes.
And when the principal had finished Judy said, “Would you mind if I asked Mrs. Granger a few questions?”
Mrs. Chatham said, “No, not at all.”
But Judy could tell that the principal wished she would just go away.
What could she say, though?
Mrs. Chatham couldn’t very well keep the reporter away from Mrs. Granger because, after all, America is a free country with a free press.
If Judy really wanted to, she would talk to Mrs. Granger sooner or later.
It was sooner.
In three minutes Judy Morgan was standing at the doorway of Room 12, looking in at Mrs. Granger.
There were about fifteen children sitting at desks scattered around the room, busy writing out their one hundred sentences.
She knocked and the teacher and students looked up from their work.
“I’m Judy Morgan from The Westfield Gazette, Mrs. Granger.
May I have a word with you?”
Mrs. Granger stood and came out into the hallway and closed the door.
Judy could see past her and saw that every kid in the room was straining to listen.
Judy noticed Mrs. Granger’s eyes right away—gray, maybe flecked with a little gold, and very sharp, but not hard or mean.
Just bright, and strong.
The reporter didn’t waste words.
“So I hear that you plan to stop the students from using their new word.
How goes the battle?”
Mrs. Granger did not smile, and her eyes got even brighter.
“First of all, it is not a battle.
I am merely helping my students to see that this foolishness should stop.
Such a waste of time and thought!
There is no reason to invent a new and useless word.
They should each learn to use the words we already have.
But of course, all of this is just a silly fad, and when you add an e to fad, you get fade.
And I predict that this fad will fade.”
Judy looked up from her note pad and asked, “Any idea how it all got started?”
Mrs. Granger’s eyes seemed to almost catch on fire at that question, and she said, “Yes, I have a very good idea how it all got started.
It was one young man’s idea, a fifth-grade student named Nicholas Allen.
And now you will have to excuse me, Ms. Morgan, for I have papers I must grade.”
And with a brief, firm handshake, Mrs. Granger ended the interview.
The reporter didn’t leave right away.
She walked back through the hallway and sat on a bench outside the office so she could look over her notes to make sure they made sense.
It took her about five minutes.
Then Judy stood up, put her notebook into her large black purse, waved good-bye to a frowning Mrs. Freed, and headed out the door.
As she walked to the parking lot, five or six kids who had just finished writing their sentences for Mrs. Granger came out another door.
Judy walked beside them, listening to them laugh and joke.
Then she asked them, “Why do you kids keep saying ‘frindle’?
Don’t you hate staying after school?”
A boy who was almost falling over from the weight of his backpack looked up at her and smiled.
“It’s not so bad.
There’s always a bunch of my friends there.
I’ve written that sentence six hundred times now.”
And then the kids said Mrs. Granger didn’t even look at their punishment papers anymore.
They were sure, because where you were supposed to write “I am writing this punishment with a pen,” everyone was writing the word frindle every fourth or fifth sentence.
And Mrs. Granger hadn’t said anything.
One girl bragged that she had written the word frindle forty-five times on her sheets today.
She grinned and said, “That’s a new record.”
“And this boy named Nick,” Judy asked, “has he had to stay after school, too?”
The kids giggled, and a tall boy with reddish-brown hair and glasses said, “Mrs. Granger has kept Nick after school so much that everyone thinks she wants to adopt him.”
The reporter smiled and said, “Do you think I could find Nick and talk to him this afternoon?”
The boy looked at Judy for a second, and then said, “I don’t think Nick would want to talk to you right now.
He might say something stupid and get himself in trouble.”
Then he grinned at his friends.
The kids laughed and poked and punched each other, and headed off down the block.
Judy drove back to her office and started writing.
The next morning a brown envelope arrived at the Gazette offices addressed to Judy Morgan, and below her name was written “Frindle Story.”
When Judy opened it, there was a class picture, the fifth grade at Lincoln Elementary School.
Mrs. Granger and the six other teachers were standing at the ends of the rows and the kids were dressed neatly, hair all combed.
But there was something odd about the picture.
The reporter looked closely and saw that each kid was holding up a pen, and each little mouth was puckered in the same way.
She was puzzled for a second, but then she said softly, “Of course!
They’re all saying ‘frindle’!”
Written on the back of the picture in neat cursive was “3rd row, 5th from left.”
Judy looked at the picture, and there she saw the same grinning red-haired boy with glasses that she had talked to in the school parking lot yesterday.
She chuckled and said, “Well, well, well.
Pleased to meet you, Mr. Nicholas Allen.”
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CHAPTER XI. EXTRA! EXTRA! READ ALL ABOUT IT!
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ON THURSDAY MORNING, The Westfield Gazette was delivered to all 12,297 homes and post office boxes in Westfield.
The story about Lincoln Elementary School was the first item on the front page.
And the headline?
Local 5th Grader Says,
“Move over, Mr. Webster”
It was quite an article.
Not that Judy Morgan didn’t tell the truth—every statement in the article was completely true.
It was the particular way she told the truth that got things hopping around town.
For example, take this sentence about Mrs. Granger: “Mrs. Granger, champion of the forces of order and authority, is battling hundreds of young frindle-fighters.
Neither side is giving in.”
Or this bit about Nick: “Everyone agrees that Nick Allen masterminded this plot that cleverly raises issues about free speech and academic rules.
He is the boy who invented the new word.”
Or this last sentence in the article: “One thing is sure: the kids at Lincoln Elementary School love their frindles, and no one seems to be backing off in this war of the words.”
And of course The Westfield Gazette published the class picture, too.
And Mrs. Granger and Nick were identified for all the world to see.
“What is the meaning of this?!”
That’s what Nick’s mother said, putting the article in front of Nick’s nose when he got home from school.
“Did you talk to this reporter?
She seems to know an awful lot about you and your new word, young man!”
“What is the meaning of this?!”
That’s what the school superintendent said to Mrs. Chatham, slapping a copy of the article onto her desk.
“Why did you have to talk to that reporter?
Don’t we have enough trouble getting the taxpayers to pay for the schools without articles like this banging around town?!”
“What is the meaning of this?!”
That’s what Mrs. Chatham said to Mrs. Granger, shaking the newspaper in front of her face.
“I know you had to talk to that woman, but did you have to say all these things?
It’ll be a wonder if we don’t all get fired!”
It was quite a Thursday for everyone.
And no one could figure out how Judy Morgan had gotten that fifth-grade class picture.
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CHAPTER XII. AIRWAVES
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WITHIN A WEEK after the article was published in The Westfield Gazette, the kids at the junior high and the kids at the high school had stopped using the word pen and had started using the word frindle.
They loved it.
Nick became sort of a hero for kids all over town, and he quickly learned that being a hero—even if you’re only a local hero—isn’t a free ride.
It has a price.
People noticed Nick when he walked into his dad’s hardware store or when he stood in line at the Penny Pantry to buy a candy bar.
He could feel it when someone recognized him, and it made him shy and awkward.
Kids at school started expecting him to be clever and funny all the time, and even for a kid as smart as Nick, that was asking a lot.
Every teacher, the office secretary, the principal, even the school nurse and the custodian, all seemed to be watching, always watching.
His parents were great about everything.
True, his mom had been upset when the article first came out, and so had his dad.
Nick had said, “But I didn’t do anything wrong, Mom.
And neither did that lady from the newspaper.”
And his parents could see that he was right.
The things in the article were true, and the truth is the truth, and nothing could be done about it now.
Even though it made them uncomfortable to have their boy talked about all over town, secretly, Nick’s mom and dad were pleased.
After all, a brand-new word is a pretty amazing thing.
Their Nicholas was quite a fellow—no getting around it.
Someone else in town thought this brand-new word was pretty amazing, too.
Bud Lawrence had lived all his life in Westfield, and when he was only nineteen years old, he had saved enough money to make an investment.
He looked around for a good idea, and then bought the first Dairy Queen in the state.
After a few years he bought a McDonald’s restaurant.
That was almost thirty years ago, and these two restaurants had made him rich, one of Westfield’s leading citizens.
When Bud Lawrence saw the article about the new word, he had his lawyer file a preliminary trademark claim on the word frindle.
Within four days he had set up a small company that was selling cheap plastic ballpoint pens specially imprinted with the word frindle.
He sold three thousand frindles the first week, and they sold so fast that stores all over Westfield couldn’t keep them in stock.
Then just as quickly, kids stopped asking for frindles.
The sales slowed down, and Bud Lawrence started thinking about other projects.
A week later it was Halloween, the leaves started falling, and it seemed like the town was going to quiet down.
And it would have—if it hadn’t been for Alice Lunderson.
Alice lived in Betherly, a town seven miles away from Westfield, and she worked part time for the local CBS-TV station in Carrington, a town of about 75,500 people.
When there was important area news—disasters like floods or tornadoes—or sometimes if she came across little stories that seemed cute or original, Alice would call the station news manager in Carrington.
If it was a good story or if it was a day when not much else was happening in the world, then the TV station would send out a van with a camera crew to shoot some videotape.
Alice subscribed to all the small-town newspapers in the area to keep up with local events.
Most of them were published on Thursday, and they arrived at her house by Monday or Tuesday.
Then it took her a day or so to look through them all.
On Wednesday morning she finally saw the article in The Westfield Gazette about the word war.
She read it through twice, and looked carefully at the class photograph.
She was sure that this story was a winner.
The TV station manager in Carrington agreed with her.
He called the CBS station in Boston, because sometimes Boston picked up stories from the Carrington newsroom.
The woman in Boston thought the story had some real zip to it, so she called the network news editor in New York.
When the fax of The Westfield Gazette article got to New York, the staff there loved it.
They looked over the schedule sheet for the week and decided it would be the perfect closing story for the CBS evening news for the next day, Thursday.
Orders flew back through the telephone links from New York to Boston to Carrington to Betherly.
By Wednesday at noon, Alice had a “go” order to take the story all the way.
It was her first piece to get onto the national news, and twenty million viewers would see it.
Alice Lunderson and her camera crew stood on Mrs. Granger’s front porch Wednesday after school.
Mrs. Granger was not impressed at all by the lights and the microphones.
She looked right into the camera and said, “I have always said that the dictionary is the finest tool ever made for educating young minds, and I still say that.
Children need to understand that there are rules about words and language, and that those rules have a history that makes sense.
And to pretend that a perfectly good English word can be replaced by a silly made-up word just for the fun of it, well, it’s not something I was ready to stand by and watch without a fight.”
“And have you lost that fight, Mrs. Granger?” asked the reporter.
Mrs. Granger turned her eyes up to nearly full power as she looked into the camera, and with a pale smile she said, “It’s not over yet.”
When Alice and the crew showed up at Nick’s house, the Allen family was ready for them.
Mom and Dad sat on the couch with Nick between them.
Nick squinted into the lights.
His mom had worked out with Nick what he could say and what he couldn’t say.
“You remember, young man,” she had told him as she combed his hair, “these reporters are just looking for a quick story that will make some excitement.
But you have to stay here and live in this town.
So mind your Ps and Qs.”
As they sat there on the couch, Mrs. Allen had her foot on top of Nick’s under the coffee table, and if she pushed down, it meant that the reporter had just asked a question that she was going to answer for him.
Mrs. Allen did not trust reporters.
“So tell me, Nick, why did you make up this new word, frindle?” asked Alice Lunderson.
Nick gulped and said, “Well, my teacher Mrs. Granger said that all the words in the dictionary were made up by people, and that they mean what they mean because we say they do.
So I thought it would be fun to just make up a new word and see if that was true.”
“And were you surprised when Mrs. Granger got mad about that?” asked Alice with a smile.
There was a push on Nick’s foot and his mother said, “We never felt that Mrs. Granger got angry.
When everyone started using the word frindle, it just got to be a disruption, that’s all.
She’s really a very fine teacher.”
“Yeah,” said Nick.
“I mean, I learned a lot about words, and without her, I wouldn’t have.”
“So what’s next for you and the new word?” Alice was wrapping it up.
She could see that Nick and his parents were not going to be pushed into saying anything controversial.
So she just kept it light and happy.
“Well,” said Nick, “the funny thing is, even though I invented it, it’s not my word anymore.
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Frindle belongs to everyone now, and I guess everyone will figure out what happens together.”
Alice also had a short chat with a worried looking Mrs. Chatham, and a smiling Bud Lawrence, maker of the official frindle.
Then she shot her opening bit and her closing bit, and the camera crew drove back to Carrington to edit all the pieces and put them together into a two-minute news story.
The next night, when all the serious news about wars and oil prices and world food supplies had been talked about on the CBS evening news, the anchorman looked into the camera and smiled.
He said, “It is believed by many that the word quiz was made up in 1791 by a Dublin theater manager named Daly.
He had bet someone that he could invent a brand-new word in the English language, and he chalked up the letters q-u-i-z onto every wall and building in town.
The next morning, there it was, and within a week people all over Ireland were wondering what it could mean—and a new word had been created.
Quiz is the only word in English that was invented by one person for no particular reason—that is until now.
Now there is a new word, frindle, and here is Alice Lunderson in Westfield, New Hampshire, with the story.”
Alice came on the screen with a short introduction.
Then, right there on TV, Mrs. Granger and Nick and Bud Lawrence and Nick’s mom were talking to twenty million people about frindles.
One of those twenty million people was a producer for the Late Show with David Letterman.
And another one of those twenty million people was a staff writer for People magazine, and another one was a writer for 3-2-1 Contact magazine for kids.
Dozens of other writers and producers and marketing people saw that story on the news—and all of them smelled a great story.
During the next three weeks every man, woman, and child in America heard about this funny new word that kids were using instead of the word pen.
And kids in Ohio and Iowa and New York and Texas and California started using it, too.
Bud Lawrence was suddenly flooded with orders for anything with the word frindle on it, and he quickly got interested again.
But there were complications.
Bud’s lawyer said, “You see that stack of orders there?
Trouble.
That’s what that is.
We got a trademark filed, but it’s only like an application.
The whole country knows that that little kid made up the word, and unless you make a deal with his dad, you’re going to end up with nothing—maybe even a big fat lawsuit.
That kid owns that word.”
When Mr. Allen came home at lunchtime, his wife told him that he had to call Bud Lawrence.
“It’s something about the new word.”
This was not good news to Tom Allen.
He was sick and tired of all the fuss.
And being away from the hardware store so much while all this nonsense was happening had put him weeks behind on his paperwork.
He’d be lucky now to get his Christmas order in time.
Even though he didn’t really want anything to do with it, Bud was an old friend.
So on the way back to the store, Nick’s dad went to Bud Lawrence’s office.
“Tom—good to see you,” said Bud.
He stood up and walked around his desk to shake hands.
“Have a seat.”
Tom sat down uneasily, and Bud pulled another chair over.
“Ever seen Westfield so stirred up about anything in your life?
You and Ginny must be pretty proud of … that boy of yours.”
Bud couldn’t remember Nick’s name.
Tom shifted in his chair and nodded.
“Yes, he’s quite something, that’s for sure.
But I tell you, Bud, I’m ready for it all to just die down and blow away—too much fuss.”
Instantly, Bud saw how to get what he wanted.
“Well, Tom, I’m afraid it’s not really going to go away.
Looks like something’s started up, and people are real interested.
You probably saw those bright red ballpoints around town with the word frindle on ’em?
That was my doing.
Just testing the waters.
But your boy he owns that word.
I got my lawyer to apply for a trademark a few weeks back, because that’s just the way I am.
New thing comes along, I like to be right there in the middle of it.”
He grinned at Tom Allen, and Tom smiled back weakly.
“Right now, I got a shirt printer in Massachusetts and another one in Chicago and another one in Los Angeles making T-shirts with the word frindle above a picture of a pen—I mean a frindle.
Each supplier has orders so far for over twenty thousand shirts.
Profit on every one of those is going to be two, maybe three dollars.
And I’m talking with some big pen and pencil companies in Hong Kong and Japan about a deal that could be worth some really big money.
They’ve seen this frindle thing in the media, and they want to buy the rights to the trademark and make a new line of frindles for kids.
I’m not kidding—this is a hot, hot idea!”
Bud guessed right.
Just the thought of all this made Tom shrink back uncomfortably in his chair.
It was way too much fuss.
“Tom, let me be direct with you.
As the boy’s guardian, you need to do the right thing about all this.
I’d like to see where all this is going to go.
I’m going to take some risks, spend some money, see what happens.
But I need your permission.
I need your signature on these trademark papers, and I need to strike a deal with you about permission to use that trademark.
I know it seems like a big ruckus about a word, but we just can’t tell what’s to come of it unless we take some steps.”
Bud pointed at the papers on his desk.
“That’s a contract, and it’s fair and honest.
It gives your boy thirty percent of whatever profits I might make.
That’s a fair royalty, generous for this kind of deal.
So what do you say—make sense?
Let me take care of all the fuss, and see if some good doesn’t maybe come of it all?”
The papers and a pen were there on the desk next to Tom.
He looked at Bud, then reached over, picked up the pen, and signed both copies of the trademark papers and three copies of the contract.
“I’ve got no reason to doubt you one bit, Bud, and I sure don’t want to mess with any of this myself.
Is that it?” he asked, standing up.
“Not quite, Tom.
Here.”
Then Bud Lawrence handed Nick’s dad a check for $2,250.
“What’s this for?”
“That’s what I owe Nick for the sales of frindles from the first three weeks,” explained Bud with a smile.
Tom looked at the check and said, “This is terrific, Bud, and I’m really glad about it because it’ll sure help with Nick’s college.
But I wish you’d just keep this between us.
If Nick knew, he’d probably stop mowing lawns and I’d never get him to save another penny.
So just between us, okay?”
Bud said, “Sure, Tom, I understand.
Just between us.”
And they shook hands.
Mr. Allen left Bud’s office and walked across the street to the savings bank.
He set up a trust account for Nick, and the bank manager said he could make arrangements with Mr. Lawrence so any other money would be deposited automatically.
That sounded good to Tom Allen.
If he never heard another word about it, that would be fine.
As Nick’s dad walked slowly back to the hardware store, he wondered if things were ever going to be the same again in his quiet little town.
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CHAPTER XIII. RIPPLES
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BUT LIFE DID SETTLE back to normal in Westfield.
More leaves fell, Thanksgiving came, then the first snow, then Christmas, and more snow.
Fall and winter seemed to calm everything down and drive everyone into their own houses.
Things were calmer at Lincoln Elementary School, too.
Frindle-mania was over.
But that didn’t mean the word was gone.
Not at all.
All the kids and even some of the teachers used the new word.
At first it was on purpose.
Then it became a habit, and by the middle of February, frindle was just a word, like door or tree or hat.
People in Westfield barely noticed it anymore.
But in the rest of the country, things were hopping.
Frindle was on the move.
In hundreds of little towns and big cities from coast to coast, kids were using the new word, and parents and teachers were trying to stop it.
What had happened in Westfield happened over and over and over again.
Bud Lawrence couldn’t have been happier.
There were frindle shirts and sunglasses and erasers and notebooks and paper and dozens of other items.
The new line of frindles imported from Japan were a big hit, and now there was talk of selling them in Japan and Europe, as well.
The checks that went into Nick’s trust fund got bigger and bigger.
Bud opened his own factory in Westfield to make frindle baseball caps, which created jobs for twenty-two people.
And in March the town council voted to put up a little sign on the post below the town’s name along Route 302.
It said, “Home of the Original Frindle.”
And Mrs. Granger?
She seemed to have given up, or perhaps she had been ordered to.
No one knew.
Her poster about the forbidden word had quietly disappeared from the bulletin board, and kids were not staying after school writing sentences anymore.
It was business as usual.
Except for one thing.
Everyone in fifth grade got at least one word wrong on his or her spelling test each week.
Every week, the first word at the top of Mrs. Granger’s list was pen.
And each Friday during the spelling test, every kid spelled it f-r-i-n-d-l-e.
Nick was sort of a celebrity for a while.
Everyone had seen him on The Late Show, and on Good Morning, America and two or three other TV shows.
John and Chris and all his friends kept asking about what it was like to ride in a limousine.
After a week or two, though, it was old news, and everyone seemed to forget it and move on.
The only person who couldn’t quite forget about everything was Nick.
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CHAPTER XIV. INSIDE NICK
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ON THE OUTSIDE, Nick was still Nick.
But inside, it was different.
Oh sure, he still had a lot of great ideas, but now they scared him a little.
For instance, Nick learned in social studies class that people who buy stuff are called consumers.
If consumers stop buying, stores and shops and restaurants go out of business.
Then—boom—a new idea hit him.
All the kids loved lunchtime.
But the awful part about lunch was the eating part—school food.
And the food was never a surprise—you had to smell it all morning and then go eat it.
The food was always bad.
Well, thought Nick, the school cafeteria is sort of a restaurant, isn’t it?
And the students are the consumers, right?
And we don’t really have to buy our lunches there, do we?
Nick could see it all: He would get all the kids to bring their lunches from home every day until the ladies who made the lunches cooked better food.
He was sure those women didn’t cook food like that for their own families.
The kids were the consumers with $1.35 in their pockets, and until the food was better, that’s where their money would stay.
Great idea!
Nick was sure it would work, and he got all excited about it.
But then Nick remembered what had happened with frindle.
It stopped him cold.
He was sure that if all the kids stopped buying lunch, sooner or later someone would figure out that it was all Nick Allen’s idea.
He would get in trouble.
People would write about it in the newspaper.
The principal would call his parents—anything could happen.
So for the first time in his life, Nick kept a good idea to himself.
He never even told John or Chris.
And that changed Nick.
His mom was the first to notice.
“Are things okay at school, honey?” she asked one day in early March.
He had seemed kind of down, a little sad.
It worried her.
“Sure,” said Nick.
“Everything’s fine.”
“Everything’s okay with your friends?
They haven’t been hanging around here very much.”
“Mom, honest.
Everything’s fine.
It’s winter.
Everyone’s really busy with hockey and basketball—that’s all.”
And Nick went to his room and shut the door.
Mrs. Granger noticed the change, too.
The clever little rascal who had looked her in the eye and said, “But I really didn’t have a frindle with me—” that boy wasn’t in her class anymore.
Now a quieter, more careful Nicholas Allen came into class every day.
He did all his work perfectly, didn’t speak unless she called on him, and didn’t laugh and joke with his friends like he used to.
School would be over in a few months, and it seemed like there was nothing she could do to help him.
Toward the end of the year, Nick remembered the letter that Mrs. Granger had asked him to sign on the back when the frindle business was just getting started.
The chess game was over, so he was expecting to get that letter from Mrs. Granger any day.
But all spring it didn’t come, so he thought she must have forgotten about it.
Nick was afraid to bring it all up again, but he was dying of curiosity.
So on the last day of school, Nick knocked on Mrs. Granger’s classroom door.
She was straightening up the textbooks on the bookcases below the windows.
Without turning around she sang out, “Come in.”
Nick said, “Hi, Mrs. Granger.”
Mrs. Granger stood up and turned to face him.
“Oh, it’s you, Nicholas.
I’m so glad you stopped by.
I’ve been meaning to talk to you, and this will save me having to send you a letter this summer.”
Nick gulped and said, “That’s what I came for—the letter.”
Mrs. Granger looked puzzled for half a second, and then she said, “Oh!
That letter.”
Then she paused.
“You will recall, Nicholas, that I said I would send you that letter when all this was over … and it’s not over.”
“It’s not?”
Nick tilted his head to one side, and asked, “When will it be over?”
Mrs. Granger smiled and said, “Oh, believe me, Nicholas.
You’ll know when it’s over.
I wanted to talk to you about something else.”
She walked across the room and stood about two feet from him.
Nick had grown during the year, and their eyes were almost on the same level.
Nick noticed that the eyes were softer, but just as powerful.
“I’ve noticed that you’ve been very quiet for the past few months.
You know, Nicholas, you didn’t do anything wrong this year.
I know a lot of things happened, and a lot of things were said, and you must have had some difficult days here and there.
But your idea was a good idea, and I have been very proud of the way you behaved—most of the time.”
Nick was embarrassed, but Mrs. Granger kept on talking.
“And Nicholas, you have great things to do in this life.
I’m absolutely sure you do, and you mustn’t let a few hard days trick you into clamming up.”
Then Mrs. Granger reached out and shook Nick’s hand, and looked him in the face.
Her eyes were turned up brighter than Nick had ever seen them before.
She said, “Nicholas Allen, I have enjoyed having you as a student.
Now you go out there and have a wonderful summer.
And I expect to hear remarkable things about you, young man.”
Mrs. Granger watched Nick start to leave.
But before he got to the door, he turned and said, “Thanks, Mrs. Granger.
You have a great summer, too.”
Then he grinned and said, “And don’t forget to buy some new frindles for next year.”
Thanks to his little talk with Mrs. Granger—along with a healthy dose of summer vacation—Nick made a full recovery.
He was proud that he had made up a new word, and he enjoyed thinking about all the commotion it had stirred up.
That one little word had made fifth grade a year to remember.
Before he started sixth grade Nick was Nick again, and all through junior high and high school and college, he proved it.
For example, two years later, all the school cafeterias in town were serving delicious food at least four days a week, all because of Nick the Consumer.
And the state superintendent of schools had made a special trip to Westfield to learn why this little town had the most successful school lunch program in the state.
And in high school, well, the stories about Nick’s other adventures could go on and on and on.
But that would delay the end of this story, the one that started when Nick was in fifth grade.
Because the end of this story came later—ten years later.
And what was happening to Nick’s word during those ten years?
Nothing fancy, nothing exciting.
Words don’t work that way.
Words either get used, or they don’t.
And frindle was being used more and more.
It was becoming a real word.
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CHAPTER XV. AND THE WINNER IS...
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TEN YEARS LATER, Nick Allen was a junior in college.
And during November of his junior year, two important things happened.
First, Nick turned twenty-one years old, and the frindle trust fund set up by his father became legally Nick’s.
Nick was rich.
Nick was very rich.
Nick was so rich he couldn’t even begin to imagine how rich he really was.
Nick wanted to give his parents some of the money, which they said they did not need and would not accept.
But Nick reminded them that they had always wanted to travel, and they should just think of this as a big birthday present or something.
So they accepted.
And Nick also wanted to give some money to his big brother, James—who said he did not need it and would not accept it.
But Nick reminded James that his two-year-old daughter would grow up and go to college someday—and besides, hadn’t James once given Nick his whole baseball card collection?
So James accepted the gift.
After that Nick went out and bought himself a fast new computer.
And about ten new games.
And a mountain bike.
Then he tried to forget about the money which is a hard thing to do.
But he managed pretty well and kept working on his college degree as hard as ever.
The second important thing that fall was the arrival of a package at the door of Nick’s apartment one day—a large, heavy package.
It was from Mrs. Granger.
There were three things in the package:
1) a brand-new eighth-edition Webster’s College Dictionary;
2) a short handwritten note taped to the cover of the dictionary;
and 3) a fat white envelope.
Turning the white envelope over, Nick saw the name—his name.
He had written it there one September afternoon in Mrs. Granger’s room after school.
Ten years ago.
Nick set the envelope down and gently peeled the note off the front of the dictionary.
My dear Nicholas:
Please turn to page 541 of this book.
Nick grabbed the dictionary and leafed to page 541, his heart pounding.
And there between Friml and fringe he read:
frin•dle (frin’ dl) n. a device used to write or make marks with ink [arbitrary coinage; originated by Nicholas Allen, American, 1987- (see pen)]
Nick went back to the note from Mrs. Granger.
This is a brand-new dictionary, the one I recommend that my students use for their homework.
And now when I teach them how new words are added to the dictionary, I tell each and every one of them to look up the word frindle.
And, of course, I have sent along that letter I promised to give you when our little battle was over.
And now it’s over.
Your teacher,
Mrs. Lorelei Granger
Nick’s head was spinning.
With shaking hands, he opened the fat white envelope.
He pulled out the ten-year-old letter and began to read.
Dear Nicholas:
If you are reading this letter, it means that the word frindle has been added to the dictionary.
Congratulations.
A person can watch the sunrise, but he cannot slow it down or stop it or make it go backward.
And that is what I was trying to do with your word.
At first I was angry.
I admit that.
I was not happy to see the word pen pushed aside as if it did not matter.
But I guess that if the Latin word for feather had been frindilus instead of pinna, then you probably would have invented the word pen instead.
Like the sunrise, some things just have to happen—and all you can really do is watch.
The word frindle has existed for less than three weeks.
I now see that this is the kind of chance that a teacher hopes for and dreams about—a chance to see bright young students take an idea they have learned in a boring old classroom and put it to a real test in their own world.
I confess that I am very excited to see how it all turns out.
I am mostly here to watch it happen.
But somehow I think I have a small part to play in this drama, and I have chosen to be the villain.
Every good story needs a bad guy, don’t you think?
So someday, I will be asking you to forgive me, and I hope you will.
Nick, I know you like to think.
Please think about this: When I started teaching, no one had landed on the moon, there were no space shuttles, no CNN, no weather satellites.
There were no video cassette recorders, no CDs, no computers.
The world has changed in a million ways.
That is why I have always tried to teach children something that would be useful no matter what.
So many things have gone out of date.
But after all these years, words are still important.
Words are still needed by everyone.
Words are used to think with, to write with, to dream with, to hope and pray with.
And that is why I love the dictionary.
It endures.
It works.
And as you now know, it also changes and grows.
Again, congratulations.
And I’ve enclosed a little present for you.
Yours truly,
Mrs. Granger
Nick remembered Mrs. Granger’s eyes, and now he understood what some of those special looks had meant.
The old fox!
She had been rooting for frindle the whole time.
By fighting against it, she had actually helped it along.
There was a flat, oblong case in the white envelope, the kind of case you get when you buy a watch.
Nick pulled it out and opened the lid.
Inside was something else Nick had not seen for ten years.
It was Mrs. Granger’s favorite pen, her old maroon fountain pen with the blue cap.
And under the clip was a little folded piece of paper.
It was another note.
A very short note.
Just one word: Frindle.
About a month later, something happened over in the old part of Westfield, over where the trees are huge and the houses are small.
On Christmas morning, Mrs. Granger’s doorbell rang.
Mrs. Granger opened the door, but no one was there.
Someone had left a package inside her storm door—a box wrapped in green paper with a red bow and a white envelope taped to one end.
She smiled as she stooped down to pick it up.
As she picked up the package she noticed a red, white, and blue Express Mail envelope sticking halfway out of her mailbox next to the doorway.
It must have been delivered late on Christmas Eve.
She opened the storm door plucked the envelope from the mailbox, and then shut both doors and went inside with a shiver.
Mrs. Granger went across the living room and sat on the couch.
The express envelope was from the Westfield School District office.
It looked important, so Mrs. Granger opened it right away.
It was a letter from the superintendent of schools, a letter of congratulations.
A permanent trust fund for college scholarships had been established with a donation of one million dollars “from one of your former students.”
It would be called The Lorelei Granger Students’ Fund.
Mrs. Granger was sure it was a mistake.
Or maybe a prank.
A million dollars?
Nonsense!
She had the urge to pick up the telephone and give the superintendent a call and straighten this out right away.
But this was Christmas morning, and even though the superintendent was one of her former pupils, Mrs. Granger decided to wait a day.
Couldn’t hurt.
Besides, the other package was sitting next to her on the couch, waiting impatiently with its red bow.
She opened the envelope first.
It was a little Christmas card with a sloppy note—obviously the work of a fifth-grade boy.
Dear Mrs. Granger;
Your one of my favorite teachers.
Here is somthing I want you to have.
Sincerely,
A student of yours
Mrs. Granger glared at the spelling mistakes, but then chuckled and shook her head.
Kids are always the same, year after year.
Here she was in her forty-fifth year of teaching, all set to retire in June.
She could hardly remember a Christmas day when she didn’t have a present from one of her students.
Mrs. Granger pulled off the red ribbon and tore off the paper and lifted the lid of the box.
She expected to find something made of yarn and popsicle sticks, or maybe curly macaroni and glue.
But instead she found an oblong case covered with blue velvet.
She opened the case and inside was a beautiful gold fountain pen.
She picked it up, and it was cool and heavy in her hand.
Words were engraved along the pen’s shiny barrel, and Mrs. Granger had to slide down to the end of the couch and turn on her reading lamp.
Then she could read the three thin lines of type:
This object belongs to Mrs. Lorelei Granger, and she may call it any name she chooses.
—With love from Nicholas Allen
THE END.