The clock seemed to tick at double speed as I waited for Gabe to come back. Jonathan finished reading his summer essay, and Melissa was next. They had finished their assignments early and had earned not only smiley faces, but double stars as well. I think I had finished one whole sentence.
Melissa droned on about her trip to Disneyland. I didn’t care how many rides she went on or what she had for breakfast, blah, blah, blah.
Everyone was clapping for Melissa, when I saw him at the end of the playground, and sure enough he had my math workbook in between his teeth.
Unable to think of anything else I started to cough again, and this time it hurt. Mrs. Mitchell looked over at me and frowned. I was going to raise my hand when what I saw stopped me dead in my tracks. I had seen it before, but I don’t think I would ever get used to it.
His wings were spread wide and he was four feet off the ground. When he got closer to the open window I realized there was no way those wings were going to fit, and if they did, everyone was going to see my notebook floating through the air all by itself.
But Gabe didn’t have to come inside at all. As he bounced towards the window a huge gust of wind burst into the classroom.
Pages in open books came to life. Hanging plants began to twirl. The notes on Mrs. Mitchell’s desk stood up and danced onto the floor and around the room.
As the breeze grew stronger, all the kids screamed. No one noticed my math book when it sailed through the window and landed on the floor. All I had to do was help pick up and grab my book at the same time.
As soon as I touched it the wind stopped.
“Okay, class, no more windows!”
I quickly looked down and opened my math book, using everything in me to keep from smiling.
When lunch arrived I went to the front doors and let Gabe in. I found a table away from everyone and he settled in underneath my chair.
Mom had made my favorite sandwich, roast beef. I took a big bite and looked down at Gabe, who had saved the day again. I handed him the other half of my sandwich and he munched it down in two bites.
I was gathering together my empty juice box and wrappers, and was getting ready to leave when Leslie slipped into the metal chair beside me, and dragged it a little closer. Feeling my face grow hot, I sipped at my empty juice box and tried to act casual.
“Hi Trevor, can I sit here?”
“Sure”
“Can you believe what happened this morning? Wasn’t that freaky? I was a little surprised to see you helping the teacher pick up her stuff. I suppose you were trying to get on her good side seeing as you forgot your homework. At least I thought you said you forgot your homework.”
“Well…I guess I didn’t forget it, it. It was kind of lost.”
“Lucky for you. What’re you going to write for your essay, or have you already written it, like John and Melissa?”
“Are you kidding,” I said, “I’ve barely started. I don’t even know what I’m going to write. How about you?”
“Well, I guess I’m going to write about making it to the Regional Swim Meet. We got to go to Clifton and set up tents in the park. It was great. At night when all the adults fell asleep, we snuck out and visited with everyone. Our team even came in first. You know,” she said, looking down and talking a little quieter, “I can teach you how to swim if you’d like.” This time she blushed. “There’s still lots of summer left, maybe we could go down to the lake on the weekend.”
“Ahh, sure, ahh, I gotta go to the bathroom, bye,” was my great response.
What a dummy, I thought, but I couldn’t wipe the smile off my face as I left.
Our first class after lunch was library, which I love second to Gym. I thought maybe I could find a good dog book and maybe one on angels. I was pretty sure that there wasn’t one on angel dogs. Mrs. Mitchell left us at the library door and headed for the staff room. I watched her scurry down the hallway. She kept looking back and forth and she jumped in the air when the janitor dropped a bucket.
It turned out to be a special day in the Library. All the Clifford books were on display. I remembered reading those in grade one, and I even remembered the author, his name was Norman Bridwell. The librarian announced that there was going to be a special visitor and I thought maybe that’s who it was going to be.
It turned out to be Clifford himself. Well, actually it was the principal dressed up as Clifford. 
He had on a big red dog outfit with long floppy ears and a big black collar, but we all knew it was Mr. Groenwald because we could see his bushy black mustache.
Gabe kept sniffing at Mr. Groenwald’s feet trying to figure out what he was, and Mr. Groenwald kept hopping around from one foot to the next and slapping at his ankles.
The kids were laughing, but the principal wasn’t smiling so much any more, so I patted my leg for Gabe to come. I found one book titled “The Encyclopedia of Dogs,” and another called “Angels.”
Gabe and I waited until everyone had left before we headed back to the classroom. On our way we could smell something sweet drifting down the halls. The home economics room was baking something delicious and we had to walk right by it on our way. I knew Gabe could smell it too because his nose was twitching and his head was raised.
Unfortunately Gabe’s nose took over his body, and before I could stop him he walked right into the Home Ec class. Entering the room behind him I saw the teacher swirling pink icing onto a cake as all the students watched. That wonderful smell was coming from six ovens all baking the same kind of cake.
I tried to get Gabe’s attention without disturbing the class. “Gabe, come on, Gabe! We gotta get out of here.”
All the grade eight girls turned around and giggled. The teacher frowned.
“Can I help you young man?” she asked, waving a spatula with pink icing on it.
“Oh, um, I’m looking for my sister, uh, Gabriella, I have to give her something” I said, totally embarrassed.
“You must have the wrong class, there is no Gabriella here and we are in the middle of a demonstration. You had better go check at the office,” she replied pointing towards the door.
I quickly escaped into the hall assuming Gabe had followed. The next thing I heard was an ear-splitting scream
I don’t know what it looked like in the home ec room, but watching Gabe saunter out licking pink icing from his mouth and nose, I had a pretty good idea of what happened. We ran down the hall smack dab right into Mrs. Mitchell who had just stepped out of the staff room.
“Trevor, what is going on? You should be back in class.”
“I’m on my way Mrs. Mitchell,” and I turned and ran.
“No running Trevor!” she shouted.
I patted at my leg and walked quickly down the hall. What a day! Gabe certainly made things interesting. I couldn’t wait til tomorrow.
Good dialogue seems natural, but in fact it is not. In natural speech, nearly all people repeat themselves, start over, stutter, etc. If you do this on the written page the character will sound boring or scatterbrained. Unless you want him that way you must change the speech slightly.
1. When writing your first draft, write down everything that comes to mind. 2. Read your work out loud. Does it sound like something your character would say? Is it too wordy or too choppy? 3. Edit – Experiment – Practice!
Nature lovers and regular kids will find this site awesome! It has information about animals, people and places, it has stories and videos, activities and photos.