I Just Got a Letter from Allyson Pringle Read online

  © 2008 Anya Bateman.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without permission in writing from the publisher, Deseret Book Company, P.O. Box 30178, Salt Lake City Utah 30178. This work is not an official publication of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The views expressed herein are the responsibility of the author and do not necessarily represent the position of the Church or of Deseret Book. Deseret Book is a registered trademark of Deseret Book Company.

  All characters in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Bateman, Anya.

  I just got a letter from Allyson Pringle / Anya Bateman.

  p. cm.

  Summary: When Kendall Archer, Mormon straight-arrow, ends up becoming

  friends with the popular school clown, he discovers that she is a more complex person than pretends to be.

  ISBN 978-1-60641-028-8 (paperbound)

  1. Mormons—Juvenile fiction. [1. Mormons—Fiction. 2. Conduct of

  life—Fiction. 3. Interpersonal relations—Fiction. 4. High schools—Fiction.

  5. Schools—Fiction.] I. Title.

  PZ7.B29435Ial 2008

  [Fic]—dc22

  2008035744

  Printed in the United States of America

  Publishers Printing, Salt Lake City, UT

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  Table of Contents

  Acknowledgments

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  About the Author

  Acknowledgments

  A big thank you to Lisa Mangum and Chris Schoebinger, who initially read this manuscript and believed in it. Thanks to Lisa as well for her encouragement and editing help with this and my previous book, and to Emily Watts, who took the editorial reins on this project.

  Thanks as well to the many friends, neighbors, relatives, and ward members, “experts” in various fields, for answering my strange little questions such as “What’s an item a wholesale electrical company would be shipping out?” or “What’s a good science project?” Special thanks to my neighbor, Kristie Pitts, a busy teacher and a genuinely supportive friend, for once again providing me with the detailed information I needed in regards to high school schedules, class curriculum, and so forth.

  And how would I have made it through this without the people I can always count on for completely honest input—my children? In spite of their own busy schedules with babies, callings, jobs, and everything, they always seem happy and willing to read and critique my writing projects. I am constantly amazed at their diverse and exceptional talents, which help me see things from many angles. Thanks especially to Les, our family’s literary expert, who gave me some sound structural suggestions and who has a knack for seeing the whole picture when it comes to life as well.

  Most of all, thanks to my ever-constant husband, Vaun, who, even though he’s a go-to-bed-at-ten-and-get-up-at-six kind of guy, remains understanding and patient with my middle-of-the-night writing adventures and goes about his business of keeping our little boat afloat day in and day out without complaint.

  Chapter One

  “So how’d your day go?” my buddy Arnold asked when he caught up with me the first day of our senior year. Static electricity was playing havoc with his peach-red hair again, strands shooting from his head like tiny laser beams. His clothes hadn’t made it through the day in much better shape. My friend since third grade was kind of a dork by high school standards—but he was a cool dork in that he sincerely cared about others. Still does. He’s on a mission in Australia right now caring about Australians.

  “Oh, you know, your typical first day of school,” I answered, lowering my trombone case so I could readjust my backpack. “My gym stuff’s stuck in my locker, which for some reason doesn’t want to open. Then I spent half of second period roaming the halls looking for room 211. You’d think after being at this school for two years I would know where they keep the rooms. But, umm,” I grinned at this point and paused for effect because I had something to tell my friend that I knew could very well flip him into one of what you could call his exuberance convulsions.

  “What?” Arnold lifted his narrow chin.

  “Allyson Pringle’s in two of my classes.”

  My friend’s eyebrows shot up as his mouth dropped open. “You’ve got Allyson Pringle in two of your classes? Oh, man, you’re one lucky bloke!”

  Even back then Arnold peppered his language with Australian terms, when he couldn’t have known he would one day be called on a mission to the land down under. One of those things you wonder about.

  “Okay, how did you do that?” he continued. “How did you get two classes with the funniest and funnest girl in the whole school? You got connections or something? Wait—did Sister, I mean Mrs. Carru have anything to do with this?”

  Arnold was referring to one of our school’s assistant vice principals, whose real last name is Carruber with the accent on the u. Because she lived in our ward before she and her family moved to another ward in our stake, and even served as our Primary president, Arnold and I had a hard time remembering to address her as Mrs. and not Sister. Now that my brother and sisters and the Wanslot kids had graduated from Hollenda High School, Arnold, his sophomore twin sisters, Mrs. Carruber, and I were the only members of our Church who ambled through the halls of our mid-sized school on the outskirts of Kalamazoo, Michigan. The other high school age kids in the ward lived in the Central High boundaries.

  “Of course Mrs. Carruber didn’t have anything to do with it,” I said, laughing a little at the thought. When it came to her job, Mrs. Carruber was proper beyond belief and did everything by the book. “Hey, all I can figure is I must just live right.”

  “I believe it!” Arnold was panting now, reminding me of my dog, Lucky Duck. But a dog can get away with panting at close range. At least Arnold didn’t drool. “You gotta promise to tell me everything she says and does, and I mean everything!”

  “I’ll do my best,” I said, trying not to sound as pumped as I was feeling. I wasn’t about to let my feelings gush all over and out there like Arnold did.

  “No, I mean it, Kendall,” said Arnold. “Don’t just try. You gotta do it! Remember every word that comes out of Allyson’s mouth—everything she does. Maybe you should write it all down. I could use a good laugh too, you know. We can all use a good laugh!”

  “When I take notes in Thorndike’s, I think they’d better be history notes,” I let my friend know. Having heard years before that Mr. Thorndike was the toughest teacher at Hollenda and maybe even in all of Michigan, I’d put off taking AP American History until my senior year because I wanted to make sure I had the study habits and
experience required to make it in his class. Okay, yeah, I was being overly cautious as usual; I’d had good study habits since preschool. I probably would have done just fine if I’d taken history the year before. “Don’t worry,” I assured my friend. “I have the feeling it won’t be much of a problem remembering what The Pringle says and does. Let’s just hope she behaves herself in Thorndike’s.”

  Arnold didn’t look satisfied. “Man, I wish we could come up with one of those little recorders that the FBI and CIA use!” He stiffened his jaw and moved forward his teeth as if trying to come up with a source, but then he shook his head. “That’s okay, you can just video her on a cell.”

  “Yeah, I’m sure teachers would love that, especially Thorndike.” My friend was talking crazy now. Still, I was in such a good mood that I chuckled as I tapped at my right temple. “Don’t worry, I’ll record it all up here.”

  “A play-by-play?”

  “A play-by-play!” I was feeling oddly important—as if I somehow really did deserve credit for Allyson being in my classes. Maybe it was Arnold bouncing around me like a Whac-A-Mole Gopher that was affecting my grip on reality.

  Although Arnold’s reaction was definitely up there at the hyperventilating level, it didn’t surprise me. High interest and excitement were nothing new when it came to anything regarding Allyson Pringle. My buddy was only one of the hundreds at our school ravenous for updates on her jokes or antics. “Alysse,” as she liked to refer to herself (pronounced like the classic Alice in Wonderland), was Hollenda’s school clown—its jester—basically the top dog when it came to comedy. A professional comic couldn’t have had a more devoted following. Bottom line, just as Arnold had said, she was funny. You honestly never knew what crazy thing she was going to do next. That was why in the halls, in between classes, we’d hear things like, “Did you see what Alysse wore to the game last night?” or, “Did you hear what The Pringle said in the cafeteria?” and so forth. Information would be happily exchanged. Then giggling and chuckling and even loud whoops would follow. I doubt there was a student at Hollenda who wouldn’t have been eager to trade classes with me in order to spend those hundred or so minutes with Allyson Pringle every day. Having even one class with her could make not only your day but your semester and hey, as far as I was concerned, maybe even your life. Everybody clamored to be around this girl with the crooked smile and bright, mischievous eyes.

  When I say everybody I should probably make it clear that I’m referring to the other students at Hollenda—her peers, in other words. When it came to teachers and adult personnel, it wasn’t quite the same story. Even the normally easygoing Señor Alvarez, our Spanish teacher, hadn’t seemed nearly as thrilled as the rest of us at having Allyson in his third period class. Not at first, anyway. Now that I look back and think about it, had I been a teacher, I don’t imagine I would have been all that excited to find out I’d be dealing with the school clown all semester.

  “Alysse and Alvarez have already butted heads over the seating arrangements,” I told Arnold as we headed downstairs. “Alysse wanted to sit by Rhonda Pate and Dee Dee Smit.” My mouth twitched and I glanced at Arnold out of the corner of my eye before I added the next part. “She was cool about it, but I don’t think she was exactly overjoyed when Alvarez assigned her to sit next to me.”

  It took Arnold only a second or two to do the cartoonlike double take I was waiting for. His mouth popped open and he let out a “Whaaaaat! You’re telling me you even sit by her?”

  Chuckling happily as we reached the school’s ground level, I stepped back to let him move ahead of me. “Just in Spanish—at least I will be, starting tomorrow.” This time there was no hiding even my own excitement, and I could hear it in my voice. “Today she had to leave right after seats were assigned—some assembly practice or something. Then, in Thorndike’s, she’s across the room from me. But, yeah, in Spanish we’ll be sitting next to each other.” My excitement dimmed slightly at this point, however, because I was pretty sure I knew why Señor Alvarez had assigned Allyson to the seat next to me. He probably figured that if anyone in the class could have a subduing, maybe even dozing-off influence on her, it would be me. When I brought up this last part to Arnold, my voice lowered a few decibels.

  “Hey, don’t worry about why Alvarez put you next to her,” said my ever-optimistic friend. “Just count your lucky stars she’ll be sitting by you. You can be her straight man!” Arnold held the door open wide enough for me to slip through, then followed. “A comic can always use a straight man, right?” I knew he was talking about those old comedy duos where the more serious, sensible, and conservative sidekick lets his partner get all the laughs.

  “If you say so,” I muttered.

  Chapter Two

  One family home evening when I was around ten, Mom passed out three-by-five cards and had all of us write down the strengths we saw in each other. Thanks to Dad’s insistence that we keep our comments positive, things went fairly well.

  Kip got exciting descriptions such as confident and good at sports. Those are the ones I remember, anyway. My explosive brother, who’s six years older than I am, was already looking really good on the basketball floor.

  I’m sure my sisters each received their own impressive adjectives. I’m guessing we listed things like friendly or talkative for Lynette, the most socially savvy member of my family. Monica’s list would have included things like smart and athletic. Monica was taking gymnastics at the time, but later on, when she grew too tall to be a gymnast, she took up volleyball. I’m guessing I wrote kind or good friend on her card. Monica is the closest to my age, and unless she was in a really insecure mood at the same time I was in teasing mode, we got along amazingly well.

  I don’t remember exactly what family members listed for me at that family home evening, but I can guess. They were likely adjectives I had heard even at that young age and probably considered boring: responsible, conscientious, trustworthy—things teachers had been putting in the comments section of my report cards since kindergarten.

  Kip, just to give me a bad time, listed almost all of the thirteenth article of faith on his card to me: honest, true, chaste, benevolent, and so on. My brother always accused me of making him look bad, saying that my habit of getting to chores first thing even on Saturday mornings, for instance, was “sick.”

  “Get a life, man,” he would yell as I vacuumed past his room. What he didn’t realize was that doing what needed to be done when it needed to be done was my life. And it wasn’t as if I didn’t get recognition for that. Mom took me aside one day and said, “You know, Kendall, that I love all you kids, but someday you’ll understand how nice it is to have a child you can completely rely on just to quietly go ahead and do good and right things even when nobody’s looking over his shoulder.” What could I do when she said things like that? I tried even harder.

  “Maturity beyond his years” and “a serious approach to life,” teachers had also written through the years on my report cards, and finally: “an amazingly honest boy.”

  It was Mrs. Farnsworth in fourth grade who wrote that last comment, and I know why she wrote it. During one of the spelling tests, I happened to glance over just as the girl who sat next to me lifted her paper, and I accidentally saw the word pharmacy. I ended up getting 100 percent on that test, but the fact that I’d seen that word really bothered me because even though I was almost completely, maybe even 99.9 percent sure I would have remembered how to spell pharmacy even if I hadn’t seen it on my neighbor’s paper, I wasn’t 100 percent sure. I confessed this to Mrs. Farnsworth the next day.

  “But you consistently get hundreds on your spelling tests,” she argued. “You’ve gotten six hundreds in a row!” We were having a contest and she knew I was close to winning it. “But I’m not positive,” I said.

  When I entered the Porto Alegre North Mission in Brazil a few months after high school, I’d only been out two and a half months when President Phillips transferred me into the mission office to take
care of the finances. He told me I struck him as someone who would have the patience and integrity to handle this detail-oriented job. Why I struck him like that, I’m not sure. Maybe the adjectives were stamped on my forehead by that time.

  But we all have those lesser-known aspects or dimensions to our personalities as well. Nobody would have written sensitive on a card for my brother, for instance, but the guy sobbed his eyes out the summer after his high school graduation when Macey Hawkins dumped him for Ace Mackintosh (who was six years older and already had his own successful security systems business). I would never have guessed that my six-foot-five, macho brother could take anything so hard. Not that I blamed the guy for being upset. Macey was the first girl Kip had ever fallen for, and she was really cute. He freaked out when Dad said it was probably for the best. They’d had words over that. “Why do parents always say things like that?” he’d almost yelled. “It isn’t for the best!” Well, as things turned out, Dad was right.

  Without Macey to worry about, Kip ended up putting in his papers and going on a mission, which he maybe wouldn’t have gotten around to if he’d remained joined at the hip with Macey and her friends. Once out there, my brother worked like a plow horse. It wasn’t too long after he returned that he met my gem of a sister-in-law, Aubrey. To tell you the truth, I don’t think he would have come anywhere close to being in her league if he hadn’t grown so much during those two years, and I’m not talking about height. So things turn out. Aubrey can just look at Kip a certain way and he’s up and doing chores. I’ve even seen him vacuuming. And his two little girls? My brother is cream cheese around them.