"Now, who's ready to hear about the class play we're going to put on?" Ms. Moore sat up on her purple desk and waited. It's like she knew we were going to come running the minute we heard her ask. Seconds later, we were all sitting in front of the desk, cross-legged, completely excited.

"As you all know, it's winter, and so this seems only fitting. I was hoping all of you could help me put on a play about Christmas…now what do you think of that?"

Everyone cheered and there were smiles all around as Ms. Moore got out her notebook.

"What's it about, Ms. Moore?" Simon piped up from the side corner.

"She said it was about Christmas, Dimwit Middleton," Felicity snapped.

"Felicity!" Ms. Moore gave her a sharp look. "You know we will have none of that talk in my classroom." Felicity wasn't used to being scolded last year, because most of the teachers just let her have her way. Ms. Moore didn't really, though. She was fair with everyone, including her. Everyone knew Felicity didn't like it, but like most of them said, it was about time. It was actually funny, because she got her first time-out a few weeks ago, and she still hasn't stopped whining about it.

"Miss Moore, who's the star of your play?" Pippa tossed her curls.

"I'll explain right now, if everyone could give me their attention." At that, there was silence.

"Now, this play is one I wrote myself called Winter Miracles. It's about a land, a beautiful place where everything is perfect. There are four fairies who live there, one for each season. One day, one of the fairies finds a door leading someplace she's never been before, called the Winterlands. Everything there is dark and scary, and ruled by an evil queen who doesn't know the joys of the other land. The fairies, along with lots of other people I've written in the script, have to bring Christmas to the Winterlands and spread joy across the realms—I mean lands." She beamed and glanced around. "Well, what do you think?"

It sounded amazing! I couldn't wait to start!

"I have two questions, Miss Moore," Simon said again.

"Two questions? One at a time, if you please."

"What are the names of the characters?"

"I have a list here, which I'll gladly explain after your next question."

"Okay, well, my second one is, how do you pick who's who?"

"Both excellent questions, Simon. I'll get right on that." She flipped her pages until she got to her list and read. "Listen up, everyone. Do you want to hear girl parts or boy parts first?"

There were shouts of 'boy!' 'girl!' all around the room. Finally, Ithal snapped out of the daze he was in and commented, "the letter B comes before the letter G!"

"Did you just figure that out?" Cecily asked, open-mouthed.

"No, Ithal makes a good point. We'll read from the boy's list first."

All the girls grumbled under their breath, but were quieted by Miss Moore snapping the paper.

"For our main boy characters, we have Ivan, the male wizard who lives by the fairies, as well as Freeze, Ivan's friend, and Joseph, the music-player." She then listed the names of a few minor boy parts, then opened to the girl roles.

"And for our lovely ladies, we have Crystal, the winter fairy; Autumn, the fall fairy; Rose, the spring fairy; and Ray, the summer fairy. There are also a few smaller parts, like flower-gatherers and tree-decoraters."

"Those are good parts!" Simon squealed gleefully. "But how are you going to pick?"

"I'm going to have everyone choose what part they want, and everyone who wants the same one will have to read some of my script out loud and we'll see who does best. There are enough roles for everyone, remember." She smiled. "Now, who has a part in mind?"

"Ooooh! Me!" Cecily raised her hand. "I want to be Rose!"

"No, you don't," Pippa snapped. "You haven't got the right complexion for it, and besides, I'd probably look better in the outfit." Cecily lowered her hand, looking dejected.

"Pippa," Ms. Moore warned. "I might add that everyone has an equal chance."

"That's what they tell us all down at the modeling industry." Pippa tossed her hair. "And who's the one who always gets picked to advertise in the Sears catalogue?"

Ms. Moore gave her a strange look before quickly getting back to her paper.

"Ms. Moore?" Simon raised his hand. "If I felt I could bring more into the part of, say, Autumn or Crystal, would I be considered?"

"Simon, those are girl parts." She looked slightly appalled.

"This is a sexist system." He crossed his arms angrily and scooted back near Ithal. I think by that time Ms. Moore was wondering what exactly had possessed her to become an elementary school teacher.

"Let's, um…let's hold off on the questions for now and start assigning parts so we can begin working on it after lunch."

Everyone lined up by the desks and were called up in whatever order they'd come in. I was standing in between Martha and Ithal, and Pippa, of course, was first.

"Read these lines here, Pippa." Ms. Moore circled them with her pen and moved to her chair.

Pippa read very well, to most of our surprise. It was a little strange, because I guess we'd all expected her to think she was better than she was. I think, though, that she really liked the idea of acting. She was good.

Simon was next, and he grudgingly settled for reading for the part of Freeze. After he got done, he muttered something about needing a Vitamin Water and stalked off.

Everyone else in front of me got their chances to read, and I noticed most people gravitated toward the main characters. I shook my head. Boy, would they be disappointed. Almost half the girls in the class had tried out for Rose, and there was only one spot.

"Gemma!" Ithal poked me in the back. "You're next after Martha."

"Thank you, Ithal." I rolled my eyes. "I don't know what I would've done if you hadn't been here." He beamed.

"What part do you want?" he bounced back and forth.

"I don't know. Autumn, I guess."

"I want to be a flower-gatherer!"

"Really?" I was a little taken by surprise. Everyone else had a definite lead in mind. "Why, Ithal?"

"I arrange them great." He nodded with confidence. "My mom doesn't trust anyone else to put together a rockin' bouquet for her wedding planning business."

I stared. "Ithal, that sounded…smart!"

"And I don't blame her," he continued. "Half the people who work for her don't know the difference between a tiger lily and a pansy. Can you imagine?"

I couldn't.

Martha read for Ray, and then Ms. Moore called me up. She showed me her script and I pointed to the part of Autumn.

"Hardly anyone else has asked for that one," she smiled. "Go ahead."

I looked over the lines. It actually seemed like a pretty fun role. I read the highlighted lines out loud and actually smiled. Autumn had a lot of the good lines.

"That was excellent, Gemma." Ms. Moore put a check mark next to my name, like she did with everyone else who'd read already. "Okay, who's next?"

Ithal bounded up. "Ms. Moore, I was really hoping I could grab the part of the manliest flower gatherer on your list."

By now she knew better than to argue. "Well, I have Roy here," she said, checking the paper. "He's the only male one."

"I'll take it!" Grinning, he walked back to his desk.

"He didn't even try out," Pippa whined.

"I don't think anyone else is going to be fighting for that role," Ms. Moore affirmed.

I watched everyone else from my desk while I drew with my colored pencils. Kartik wanted to be Joseph, I could tell. When she'd mentioned him, he'd gotten an excited sort of snap in his eyes. He didn't smile though; it hadn't gotten him that worked up. I'd hoped it would have.

"And last but not least, we have Felicity."

"Best for last," she replied. "I'm going to be Autumn." I gasped from my seat. Was she doing that on purpose?

"We'll see." Ms. Moore gave her the highlighted lines.

Felicity struggled through some of the lines, even though she acted like she knew what she was doing. I wondered if that was how she got people to agree with her so much; acting like she believed everything she said was the absolute truth.

Once she finished, Ms. Moore picked up her checklist.

"Well, we finished just in time. You may all go out for your recess, and I'll have decided by the time you get back." The bell rang just then, and everyone ran for the door.

"I'm taking that part," Felicity sang as she skipped to the grass where Pippa, Cecily and Martha weren't actually playing, just sort of sitting there looking nice.

Ann stood next to me. "I think you did better."

"You did very well too," I said. I remembered her trying out for Ray, and she'd really come out of her shell for it. "She's going to pick you for that role."

"You really think so?" She beamed without meaning to.

"Of course!" I pulled on her arm. "Come on, let's go play on the monkey bars."

I actually forgot about the whole thing until Ms. Moore blew her whistle, and that's when everyone went nuts. It was like that stampede on the Lion King.

"Now, sit in your desks like civilized humans," she ordered. Once all of us were (more or less) sitting quietly, she pulled out the paper. "The part of Ivan goes to…"

The males in the room were silent.

"Simon!"

"He didn't even try out for that part!" Alex, one of the other boys protested.

"What can I say? I'm a leading man type of guy." He tossed his hair. I guess he'd forgotten about the sexist system, whatever that was.

"Alex, you get to be Freeze." Ms. Moore nodded at him. He also seemed to forget he'd been upset and lit up.

"Okay!"

"Our music-player will be Kartik."

Before he could stop himself, I heard a 'yes!' from the other side of the room. When I looked behind me, he was back to his usual serious self. "I mean—um…that's fine with me."

Ithal, as promised, was Roy the male flower-gatherer. I don't think I'd ever seen him happier. He stood up on his desk and promised Ms. Moore he'd arrange flowers for any of her upcoming special occasions. Then he fell off.

Ann, as I'd suspected, wiped the competition for Ray. Martha glared at her and she didn't even notice.

Also, as we'd all figured, Pippa got to be Rose. All the other girls looked sad, even when they were told they could be tree-decorators with lots of glitter.

"The role of Autumn will be played by…" Ms. Moore glanced around. All I could think was, please be me, please be me.

Felicity looked over her shoulder and gave me a smile that clearly said 'thanks for trying'.

"Felicity!" Ms. Moore shouted. I stopped breathing.

"Yes!" she bolted up.

Ms. Moore looked alarmed.

"No, no, Felicity, you were leaning back in your chair. You were about to fall. Please sit up."

She pulled the chair back and sat back down, waiting.

"As I was saying—Autumn will be played by Gemma!"

"Yay!" I wiggled in my chair a little. I couldn't wait to tell my mom.

"What?" Felicity looked from me to Ms. Moore and back again.

"Felicity, you get to be Crystal, the winter fairy instead."

"Were you typecasting, then?" I heard someone say. I turned around again, but no one was talking. I only saw Kartik smiling slightly.

"Well, that's the part I wanted anyway." Felicity slid back into her seat.

I heard Ms. Moore say something about an aspirin before she read off the rest of the minor roles. By the time she was done, most of the class was at least okay with what their parts were.

Now that that was finished—we had a lot of work to do.

For the next month or so, we all had to memorize lines and work on painting the set. I had never thought there was so much to do for one play. Everybody was really excited, because it was a lot of fun. Before we knew it, it was time for us to come to school at night to do the show. It was really weird being at school when it wasn't daytime, and everyone was rushing to get last-minute things done. Felicity thought her crown needed more glitter, and Pippa kept asking if her hair looked any good. Ithal was in his glory, because he'd gotten to help design the outfits. I liked what he'd done with mine. I had to hand it to Ithal; for someone who usually didn't know where he was, he was great with colors.

"Is everyone all set?" Ms. Moore asked, standing at the front of the room. "It's time to get to the auditorium." All the people around me got all bouncy and followed her into the hall and through the back door to the stage.

"Go see who's out there," Pippa nudged Cecily. She peeked behind the curtain and gasped.

"There must be a million people!"

"A million?" Ann swallowed hard.

"Ann, you'll be fine! You look really pretty." She did! Ithal was a genius, because her dress was a great shade of yellow.

"Do you think so?"

"Of course."

She smiled again. "I'm excited."

"Me too." I actually couldn't wait.

Ithal chased after Simon a moment, demanding he stop so he could fix that stray thread hanging off his shirt. After Ithal was satisfied, we heard Ms. Moore walk onto the stage and announce the show to all the parents. The whole audience started clapping!

"Break a leg, Gemma!" Kartik called.

"Why would you say something like that?" I loud-whispered back. Men!

"It means good luck," he hissed. "Just—oh, forget I said anything." He got back into the wings to wait for his turn to come out. I started to say it was fine, but then Ann nudged me.

"We're starting!"

The curtain came up and Cecily was right—there were a million people sitting there. At first I thought there was no way I was going to remember everything. I looked around to see if I could find anyone I knew, and I did! Tom was sitting right next to my mom, who was beside my dad. He gave me the thumbs-up, and my dad poked him.

I smiled and realized this was all going to work out great. Then I got ready—it was almost time for my first line.

Ah! I forgot I'd left this story hanging. Well, that does it for the third grade. Shoot! Two more years and they're out of elementary! What am I going to do when they start hitting puberty? Oh, perish the thought.

-Katie