turned out the light and left, taking Wild Animals of Africa with him and leaving Ramona alone in the dark to worry about

the mysterious noises made by an old house

cooling off for the night. She wondered how

much of the six months was left before she

could return to her old room. She lay as flat and as still as a paper doll while she listened 120

to her father splashing in the shower.

Ramona had to think about her eyelids to

force them to stay open. Her father got into bed. Her parents were whispering, probably

talking about her, saying,What are we going

to do about Ramona, always getting into

trouble! Even her teacher doesn’t like her.

Everyone was asleep but Ramona, whose

eyelids grew heavier and heavier and heav-

ier. She was afraid of the dark, but she would not give up the new room. Only babies

were afraid to sleep alone.

The next morning, as Ramona took her

sandwiches out of the refrigerator and put

them in her lunch box, Mrs. Quimby asked,

“Does your throat feel all right?”

“Yes,” answered Ramona crossly.

“Sore throats are going around,” said Mrs.

Quimby. Since she had gone to work in the

pediatrician’s office, she looked for symp-

toms in her daughters. Last week it had been 121

chicken-pox spots, and the week before, swollen glands.

“Mama, I had a bad dream last night.”

“What did you dream?”

“Something was chasing me, and I

couldn’t run.” The dream was still vivid in Ramona’s mind. She had been standing at

the corner of the house where the zinnias

used to be. She knew something terrible was

about to come around the corner of the

house to get her. She stood as if frozen,

unable to lift her feet from the grass. She had been terrified in her dream and yet the yard had looked clear and bright. The grass was

green, the zinnias blooming in shades of

pink and orange and scarlet, so real Ramona

felt she could have touched them.

Beezus was rinsing her cereal bowl under

the kitchen faucet. “Ugh, that old dream,”

she remarked. “I’ve had it several times, and it’s awful.”

122

“You did not!” Ramona was indignant.

Her dream was her own, not something

passed down from Beezus like an old dress

or old rain boots. “You’re just saying that.”

“I did too have it.” Beezus shrugged off

the dream as of little importance.“Everybody has that dream.”

“Ramona, are you sure you feel all right?”

asked Mrs. Quimby. “You seem a little cranky this morning.”

Ramona scowled. “I am not cranky.”

“Another dream I don’t like,” said Beezus,

“is the one where I’m standing in my

underwear in the hall at school and every-

body is staring at me. That is just about the worst dream there is.”

This, too, was a familiar dream to Ramona,

not that she was going to admit it. Beezus

needn’t think she dreamed all the dreams first.