THE BEAUTIFUL LADY By Liyi, age 8

Birds flew across an orange sky. Squirrels jumped through dead leaves on the ground. The sun was setting over the sea. Children climbed the monkey bars and grown-ups ate icecream on benches.

“Why are you crying?” Ann asked her sister.

Katy did not answer. She opened her notebook and wrote the words Beautiful lady.

Ann saw what she wrote. “Who’s that?”

“I don’t know,” Katy said.

“Come on, Katy, just tell me.”

“Let’s go home.”

“No!” Katy said. “Aren’t you going to tell our parents that you’re sad?”

Katy did not answer.

“Come on Katy, answer me. Just say something.”

Katy kept crying.

“Don’t cry Katy. It’s getting late. Let’s go home.”

Katy stopped crying and said, “Ok.” She turned left.

Ann pointed right and said, “Home is that way.”

“I know a short cut.” Katy tiptoed to the monkey bars without Ann.

Ann walked home alone. At the door, she felt a prickle at her back. She took it off and looked inside. She saw a porcupine climbing on her books. “How did that get there?” she said. She felt something wet on her back and it hurt a lot. “Mom!” she called.

Ann’s mom hurried over to her. “What happened?”

“A porcupine got in my backpack and it poked me!”

Ann’s mom carried her to the hospital. The doctor put medicine in the pokes and kept the porcupine and did some tests on it to see if it was poisonous.


When Ann returned home from the hospital she could not find Katy. She looked everywhere. She went outside and finally she found her at the park. “Where have you been? What are you doing out here?”

“Umm. Nothing, “ Katy said. “I just stayed here.”

“Let’s go home and go to bed.”

“Ok,” Katy said.

At home Ann asked Katy, “Can you please tell me who the beautiful lady is?”

“No,” Katy said.

“Just tell me Katy.”

“No.”

“I’m telling mom.”

“Then I’m telling dad that you are bothering me,” Katy said.

“Fine,” Ann said. “I won’t tell mom.”


At school the next day, Katy met a new kid named Jennifer. She was good at hula-hooping and she had smooth hair.

“Hi,” Katy said to Jennifer.

Jennifer did not say anything

“You did not even tell me your name,” Katy said. “Who’s your teacher?”

“Ms. Water. Who’s your teacher?”

“My teacher is Mr. Sock,” Jennifer said.

“Are you scared?” Katy said.

“No,” Jennifer said. “Why should I be scared?”

“Because Mr. Sock is so mean. Once he said GET OUT OF HERE to me and my sister, but we didn’t do anything wrong.”
The bell rang and everyone went home.

In the schoolyard Ann saw Jennifer. They stared at each other. They recognized each other from preschool. Ann remembered the first time she saw Jennifer. Ann and Katy were building a palace and a castle out of blocks. Jennifer came over to them and knocked over their kingdom then she grabbed Katy and said, “What do you want to play now?”

Ann and Jennifer said hi to each other on the yard and started to fight and shout. Then they went home and took baths. Ann went to bed and fell asleep. She had a dream that she hit Jennifer’s head and gave her amnesia. Ann was the master of Jennifer, but when Ann woke up she was not.


The next morning Ann and Katy got dressed. Their mom said, “Quickly, you’re getting late for school.”
Ann and Katy ate breakfast while their dad drank tea. They went to school. At recess they played tag. When recess was over their teacher gave them a math test. Ann gave Katy a note. It said, Katy, I know who is beautiful lady. Sophie told me Jennifer is beautiful lady.

Katy wrote a note back. It said, How did Sophie tell you? I told her not to tell anyone. I was so scared I cried. I knew Jennifer was coming, that’s the reason I cried too.

Ann read the note and wrote back: Why did you cry?

Katy wrote: I think Jennifer is going to make some trouble between us like in preschool.

Ann read the note and the girls quickly finished their math tests and gave them to their teacher. They put their chairs up and went home. Their mom was in the kitchen on the telephone. She hung up and looked at the girls. “That was the hospital,” she said. “They got the results of the porcupine tests. They found out the porcupine belongs to a girl in your class named Jennifer.”

“How can a test tell you that?” Katy said.

“I don’t know. It’s science.”

“I knew Jennifer did that kind of stuff,” Ann said.

The next day at recess, Ann pushed Katy on the swing. The girls talked and giggled. Jennifer was jumping rope. She stopped jumping and walked over to the where Ann and Katy were swinging. “Hey,” she said. “Could I play?”

Katy and Ann closed their mouths.

About the Author

Hi! My name is Liyi. I am eight years old. I live in San Francisco with my mom. I am good at math and hula-hooping. I want to be good at painting. When I grow up I want to be an astronaut because I want to see what everything in space looks like. I hate kickball. I’d rather get shots than play kickball. English confuses me when two different words sound the same. If I were a planet I would be Pluto because it is icy and I like to make people shiver. I wish I wasn’t so shy because sometimes I just stand there. The Beautiful Lady is my first published book.