1 THE GYMNASTICS CLUB

IVY + BEAN AND THE GHOST THAT HAD TO GO by annie barrows

THE GYMNASTICS CLUB One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten—wham! Bean crashed into the grass.

"Ouch," said Ivy, peeking through a hole in her sandwich. "Doesn't that hurt?" "No. I'm just dizzy," said Bean. She sat up, and the playground began to tilt. Ugh. She lay down again. Now Emma stood up. She lifted her hands above her head, took a big breath, and began. She did nine good cartwheels before she fell on her head. "Are you all right?" Ivy asked Emma with her mouth full of peanut butter.

"Sort of" said Emma., Now it was Zuzu's turn. Zuzu was the best cartwheeler in the Gymnastics Club. She was also the best backbender. She could do seven round-offs in a row. Nobody else could do even one. Zuzu pulled down her ruffled pink shirt and raised her hands. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve cartwheels, and still Zuzu landed on her feet. Then she arched over backward. She flung her arms over her head and made a perfect backbend. She looked like a turned-over pink teacup. Then she rose back up—boing—like a doll with elastic in its legs. "Wow," said Ivy. Bean jumped up. She just had to do twelve cartwheels. "Stand back!" she yelled. "Wait," said Zuzu. "What about Ivy?

Aren't you going to do a cartwheel, Ivy?" "I'm guarding the jackets," said Ivy. "But Ivy, this is the Gymnastics Club," said Zuzu. "You can't just guard jackets." Why not? Ivy wondered. "We'll teach you how to do it if you don't know" said Emma., "She knows", said Bean. "She can do a cartwheel. I've seen her." Ivy looked at Bean in surprise. Why was

she saying that? Ivy had never done a cartwheel in her life. Slowly, Ivy put her sandwich down next to Emma's jacket. "There's just one little problem—" she began. "Hey, Leo!" yelled Bean suddenly. "You'd better watch out! If I get hit with that ball, there's going to be trouble!" Leo was the leader of the soccer kids at Emerson School. Before there was a Gymnastics Club, the soccer kids had the whole field to themselves during lunch recess. When Bean and Emma and Zuzu and Ivy started the Gymnastics Club, they kept getting hit with soccer balls. One day, Bean got clobbered in the stomach, and she declared war on the soccer kids. She came to school with a bag of ripe plums and chased Leo down. When she caught him, she sat on him and rubbed plums into his hair. Rose the Yard Duty had been really