8 Class Pets + 1 Squirrel ÷ 1 Dog = Chaos by Vivian Vande Velde Page B

asked, “Did you check the room with the snake?” (There are five grades in this school, and Mrs. Shaughnessey’s fifth grade, where the snake lives = the farthest room from Mrs. Duran’s room.)
    The dog growled, “I smell that squirrel here.”
    â€œAre you sure you don’t smell me?” I asked. “The squirrel and I are both rodents, and that makes us cousins. 1 squirrel + 1 hamster = 2 rodent cousins.”
    The dog sniffed at my cage. “Maybe,” he said.

    â€œWhere’s the room with the snake?”
    â€œFifth grade,” I said. “All the way down the hall.”
    The dog left, his rope leash still trailing him. But just when Twitch started to come out from behindthe dictionary, the custodian came in. Twitch ducked down again.
    â€œI thought I heard a dog,” the custodian said.
    â€œHe’s gone to the fifth grade,” I said.
    But even though animals can understand people, most people aren’t very good at understanding animals.
    The custodian looked around, scratched his head, and said, “Must be outside the building. Good. A dog in the school is the last thing I need with that art contest tomorrow.”
    As soon as the custodian was gone, Twitch climbed back down the bookshelves. “Thanks, cousin,” he said. “See you tomorrow.”
    He ran out of Mrs. Duran’s room but was back before I could climb into my exercise wheel.
    â€œOh no!” he said. “The human has left School—and he shut the door behind him. That dog and I are both locked in here. What should I do?”
    This was too much for me. I had thought of 1 plan, but I couldn’t think of 2. “Go next door and ask the rabbit,” I said. “She likes to order everyone around, but she’s smart. She’ll think of something.”

MISS LUCY COTTONTAIL
(second-grade rabbit)

    It’s not everybody that starts school in second grade.
    The children in Ms. Walters’s class went to first grade last year. They were in a different building in kindergarten the year before that. And most of them spent a year or two in nursery school.
    Not me. I came to second grade straight from the pet shop, so that shows I’m the smartest one here. Well maybe, except for Ms. Walters.
    But I’m not sure.
    Ms. Walters never talks about being in first grade,so I think she may have skipped first grade, too. But she does talk about last year’s second-grade class. I’m smart enough to know that means Ms. Walters was kept back. But I am polite enough not to mention it.
    I plan to finish second grade in one year. In fact, I think I may well skip third grade and go directly to fourth.
    Another way I know I’m the smartest one here is that Ms. Walters tells the children their job is to learn, but she says that my job is to be cute and cuddly and not bite. Obviously, I have already learned everything there is to learn.

    Sometimes the children forget to latch my cage. I help them learn by running around the classroomand hiding under things. I leave a trail of little poops to help them find me.
    Once, I made it all the way across the hall to Mr. Daly’s third-grade room. Mr. Daly has fish. The fish are in a tank, and the tank is on a cart with wheels. I don’t think the fish are very smart at all. They
never
escape and hide under things. They just swim back and forth, back and forth. I held my long, good-at-hearing-everything ears up against the glass to listen. But all they’d say was “We are in a school. We are in a school.”
    â€œI know,” I said. “We all are.”
    There’s a squirrel who lives outside. Sometimes he comes to visit after Ms. Walters and all the children have gone home. The squirrel sits on the windowsill and makes faces and says rude things like: “If you were really smart, the humans couldn’t catch you. I don’t let them catch me.”
    I point out to him that
I
don’t have