Ellen Foster by Kaye Gibbons Page B

first sign my luck was changing. Some other girl and her mama could have snatched it up before I got to the store but no it was there waiting for old Ellen.
    I could pass for a princess in that dress I thought while I turned some more in the mirror.
    And the next day was Sunday oh the day I went to church and figured that woman with all the girls lined up by her had to be the new mama for me. And while everybody else was praying I looked over at my new mama to be and then up to the Lord and thanked him for sending me that dress.
    I said I look like I am worth something today and she willnotice the dress first and then me inside it and say to herself I sure would like to have a little girl like her.
    Right after the service I asked Dora what all I needed to know about the lady with the girls. Like who is she and do all the girls belong to her or are they nieces and friends of the family?
    Dora whispered back to me like she might be talking about special handicapped children behind their backs. She said they are the Foster family and that lady would take in anything from orphans to stray cats. Or so her mama said.
    That fit my description perfect and I started thinking hard about how to be her new girl.
    My new mama says sure Starletta can come stay with us and why doesn’t she just ride the schoolbus home with me on Friday?
    Have you ever felt like you could cry because you know you just heard the most important thing anybody in the world could have spoke at that second? I do not care if the president had just declared war although that is something to think about. I do not care if a thousand doctors had just said congratulations sir you are the father of a bouncing baby something. All that mattered in my world at that second was my new mama and the sound of yes in my ears oh yes Starletta is welcome here.
    I will bust before I get back to school to tell her to pack up her bags you are coming to my house this weekend and be sure to bring some of your little rubber bands because I will be asking you to plait my hair again.
    It is OK if you don’t own a suitcase. I use a box my ownself. Just put your pajamas and personal hygiene in a bag or box and bring it to school on Friday. Be sure and come to my class when the bell rings and we will ride the bus home together.
    And then the most important sight in the world like the sound of my new mama’s yes she can come is Starletta’s face looking up from her lunch plate and I see she wants to come to my house to check if I have some more scratchy carpet on the floor or just anything for her to touch all over again that is mine.
    You come to my house and I’ll give you anything you want I thought about telling her but I did not talk then about giving and receiving. I did not want her to think I was bringing her there to give her things she needed. It was just Starletta the girl I was after and she could tote my bed and my checkerboard curtains back to her house if she felt like it. But it is just Starletta I want to squeeze so hard she will remember that every time somebody loves her good. And I want her just to enjoy herself and let me give her without the talking all she has coming her way. Lord I do owe her. And all I want in return is to wake up on Monday knowing the two of us are even.
    Lord then we will all be straight.
    Then I will not miss her so bad. We will be even friends and I will not need to prove a thing to her ever again. And she will remember me good when she is old enough to think and sort through her own past to see all the ways I slighted her oh not by selling her down a river or making her wash my clothes but by all the varieties of ways I felt God chose me over her.
    And I will tell you it is hard and not one bit decent to keepon with that sort of thinking when you have seen all this world has to offer.
    So if Starletta is coming on Friday that does not leave me long to get my room ready. My new mama says she will do whatever she can get around to doing between