Melinda Runs Away E-Book

Porsche Ray

• Herausgeber: Fallen Leaves Publishing
• Kategorie: Für Kinder und Jugendliche
• Serie: Melinda
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 74

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

Beschreibung

Melinda, her father, and Teensie are back! This time, Melinda's tired of being bossed around.

Flu shot season has arrived and the only way Melinda and her friend Maria believe they can make their parents listen to them is by running away.

Will Melinda be able to talk with her father before he sets up the appointment or is she already too late?

Don't miss the adventure in Melinda Runs Away!

Melinda Runs Away is book 4 of the Melinda series.

MELINDA books feature a large vocabulary, but shorter chapters to keep younger readers engaged. Melinda is a socially awkward girl, however the problems she encounters have nothing to do with her gender.

Every Melinda book centers around a safe, wholesome adventure where Melinda must use the tools and skills she has previously developed to fix the problem.

NO catty girl drama

NO boy-crazy idolizing

NO children doing adult jobs

Clean. Safe. Fun.

Leseprobe

Melinda Runs Away

Porsche Ray

Fallen Leaves Publishing

Contents

Our Adventure So Far

Ebook Copyright

1.

The Vaccine

2.

The Note

3.

Ms. Hooey

4.

Mild Illness

5.

The Plan

6.

Packing

7.

Burgers and Milkshakes

8.

The Promise

9.

Low Stimulus Clinic

10.

Dad's Turn

11.

Elevator Ride

12.

The Code Team

13.

A Quiet Place

14.

Fire Exit

15.

Dr. Lynn

16.

Lost

17.

And Found

18.

Sixth Floor

19.

Decision Time

20.

The Injection

21.

Deadly Whiteboard

Our Adventure So Far

Alot has happened to my family recently. Our house was struck by lightning, and now my pet fish can speak. His name is Teensie and I take him practically everywhere, in a travel tank I designed.

Teensie told Dad and I about a treasure off the coast of Nova Scotia. We learned how to scuba dive, braved the cold water and the sharks, and had the adventure of a lifetime.

At least, I thought it was an adventure of a lifetime.

Shortly after, I found myself in charge of the house for a day while Dad recovered from the flu. I almost burned the house down making eggs and had a tad of a run-in with the police who thought I was shoplifting (I wasn’t!). Teensie was right there at my side that day too.

Then, Dad and I decided to take a break and head out to Vancouver Island for some R&R (rest and relaxation), but we did nothing of the sort. On the ferry ride over, we overheard a diabolical plan to murder some whales and had to get tangled up with the wildlife officers in the region to protect them.

With Teensie in our lives, things have become a lot more interesting!

Ebook Copyright

Copyright © 2022 by Fallen Leaves Publishing

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information, address the publisher: Fallen Leaves Publishing.

First Printing, 2022

ISBN: 978-1-990817-08-3

www.FallenLeavesPublishing.com

1

The Vaccine

Two things bothered Melinda about fall. Well, three things, actually.

One. School started again. A new year meant a new teacher and a new mix of classmates.

Two. The weather started to get colder, which meant she was about to lose all the freedom she’d gained over the summer with her bicycle.

And three. Flu shot season had arrived.

Like clockwork, every year summer ended, the weather changed, and Melinda’s father dragged her to the clinic to get her annual vaccine.

Melinda hated it.

Hated the needle more than the stinky diesel of the school bus.

Hated it more than the ear-piercing squeals of joy as her classmates recounted their amazing summertime adventures.

In fact, Melinda was pretty positive she hated needles more than anything she could think of. And she had a very active imagination. She figured she could think of pretty much anything.

“You really stopped a group of poachers?” asked her best friend, Maria.

Melinda stomped on some crunchy leaves as she stepped off the bus and turned to her friend. “Yeah. They were going to kill the whale and sell the body parts on the black market,” she said.

“Ewwww,” said Maria. “Why would people buy whale body parts?”

“Dad says some people use them as medicine, but it’s not the type of medicine that works,” said Melinda.

Maria frowned. “Did your dad give you the talk yet?”

“About the flu shot?” asked Melinda.

Maria nodded. “My parents sat me down this morning and told me it would be happening sometime this week. Apparently, since I’m a year older, they expect me to cooperate and ‘do my part,’ whatever that means.”

Melinda shook her head. “He hasn’t mentioned it. Not yet. But I don’t doubt it’s coming. Every year it’s the same thing. ‘Melinda, we need to get the vaccine to protect the people around us,’” she mimicked her father’s voice and rolled her eyes. “I don’t see how a needle protects anyone. We get our shots every year, but last spring, my dad still got sick.”

“Are you going to get it?” asked Maria.

“I don’t really have a choice,” said Melinda. “Are you?”

“Same,” said Maria. “Ugh. How old do I need to be before I get to decide what goes into my body?”

Melinda kicked at a few more leaves. She wished she had a good answer for Maria. Protecting other people sounded like a good thing, but surely there was a better way.

“So,” said Melinda. “Are you going to cooperate?”

Maria laughed. “We’ll see.”

That made Melinda chuckle. Even Teensie in his travel tank on Melinda’s tummy swished with what Melinda knew was silent laughter.

“That’s so cool that you get to bring your pet fish to school with you every day,” said Maria. “I wish they would let me bring Mittens.”

“It’s probably because he can’t do anything to anyone and nobody’s allergic to him,” said Melinda.

It had never occurred to Melinda that Teensie wouldn’t be allowed to come with her. In fact, she was pretty sure she had never asked. He had just started attending and nobody had told her to stop.

She wasn’t going to tell Maria that though.

She was glad Maria’s kitten Mittens wasn’t allowed at the school. That cat was vicious! Whenever Melinda went to Maria’s house, Mittens would attack her ankles and swipe at her from under the couch. It wasn’t just Melinda, Maria always had scratches up her arms and on her hands. Maria said the cat was just playing, but Melinda thought it was intentional.

Maria sighed. “Do fish need vaccines too? I know Mittens had to get some.”

Melinda shrugged. “Not that I know of,” she said. It wasn’t something she had ever thought about before. “Teensie doesn’t really come into contact with any other fish, so how would he get sick?”

Even as the words left her lips, she realized they were false.

Just a few weeks ago, Teensie had been swimming in the ocean. There were lots of other fish in the ocean. She made a mental note to ask her father if fish could get viruses too.

The bell rang and Melinda took a deep breath of the cool outside air before joining the crowd of overly excited kids into the school. The new year had just begun.

2

The Note

Carefully, Melinda unfolded the paper. It had arrived on her desk moments before, folded into a tiny envelope with Melinda scrawled on the front. Melinda was quickly realizing that the class rules the teacher laid out were often different than the rules followed by her peers.

Class rules included not passing notes.

Classmate rules included passing notes to whomever they were addressed to, and not peeking at the contents.

Even though it was okay with her peers to pass notes, Melinda didn’t want to get caught with it. The teacher wouldn’t be pleased and it still made Melinda uncomfortable to intentionally break a rule like this.

If the teacher caught her with a note, she’d read it aloud to the entire class. Without knowing what the note said, Melinda wasn’t comfortable with that happening.

Of course, the best way to ensure not getting caught was not passing notes. Since she hadn’t written this one, it wasn’t really up to her.

The second best way to avoid getting caught involved holding onto the note until recess. What if whatever was written in the note couldn’t wait until recess? She had to believe that if it could wait, the note wouldn’t have been sent in the first place. Right?

Melinda locked her eyes on the teacher at the front of the room, as crease by crease, she opened up the note.

Quickly glancing down, she read Maria’s familiar scrawl.

I’m going to refuse.

Melinda’s eyes narrowed. Refuse what? she wrote.

Silently refolding the paper, she scratched Maria under her name and slid it over to the desk next to her. The class would know that this was a note between the two of them and help pass it back and forth.

The vaccine! The note said when it returned.

How? wrote Melinda. There was a big difference between refusing to eat broccoli and refusing to get a vaccine.

I’m going to run away, said the note.

Melinda stared at it and blinked a few times.

Running away was a big deal.

She read Maria’s response over, and over, and over again, trying to make sense of it.

Then, she broke the number one rule of note passing. Melinda, turned to stare at Maria.

It was only for a second, half of a heartbeat really, but it was enough.

“Melinda!” called the teacher. “Maria!”