The Caped 6th Grader Read Online Free PDF Page A

come in!” She swung her arm in a welcoming gesture and I stepped into the high-ceilinged foyer.
    “Here, let me take that backpack.…”
    “Uh … well … it's really …”
    Electra easily lifted the pack from my shoulder.
    “… heavy.”
    Electra paused, then quickly put my backpack on the gleamingmarble floor. “Yes. It is quite heavy, isn't it?” She gave me an extra-bright smile. “So, are you ready to get to work?”
    I picked up my backpack (easily) and returned the smile. “Yes, ma'am.”
    “Good. Studio's upstairs.”
    I followed her through the front hall and up the broad, winding staircase, taking in the half-emptied moving boxes, ladders, paint cans, and drop cloths strewn throughout the living room.
    “Pardon the clutter,” Electra said cheerfully. “I'm still moving in.”
    When we reached the first landing, I could see that the upstairs hallway was being redecorated. The walls had been stripped and had a gritty, chalky look to them. Stacked in the corner were several rolls of wallpaper.
    “Cool!” I cried, noticing the pattern.
    “Like it?” Electra picked up one of the rolls of paper and unrolled a section.
    “I love it!” I ran my fingers over the crisp paper, which was printed with hundreds of little lightning bolts!
Glittery
lightning bolts! The sunlight coming through a tall window above the stairs made each bolt twinkle. I would love to have my bedroom walls covered in a pattern like that one! When my mom redecorated the dining room last year, she lugged home about a trillion wallpaper books, and none of them had anything as cool as that.
    “Where did you find it?”
    “I had to custom order it,” Electra answered. “It was between the glittery bolts and glow-in-the-dark ones.”
    “I'm glad you went with the glitter,” I said.
    “Yes, the glow-in-the-dark just seemed a little too trendy.”
    I laughed. I was positive that Electra Allbright was the onlygrown-up on the planet who would ever pick out wallpaper like that.
    At the end of the hallway was another, less elaborate stairway, which brought us to her attic studio. For a minute, I just stood there, taking it all in.
    “WHOA.”
    “Pretty terrific, huh?”
    I nodded. The room was enormous—it was one huge, open space, the width and depth of the whole house, with extra-high ceilings and several windows. Some of the windows were oval, others were diamond paned, and still others were made of stained glass. The studio is sparsely furnished, with one wide, flat table and two smaller ones like desks with tops that can be adjusted to tilt upward. There were two sturdy office chairs and a big, comfy-looking one upholstered in a lightning-bolt-patterned fabric— another custom design, I was sure. Shelves hold sketch pads and other artist's tools.
    On the bigger table was a large piece of heavy paper, like a poster. When Electra saw me looking at it, she explained, “That's a storyboard.”
    The storyboard took up most of the tabletop; it was a rough sketch of an entire book, with all the ideas and actions either drawn or written into consecutive blocks. Electra explained that when the comic book was produced, this one large board would become several comic-book pages. This technique allowed her to see the whole story play out at a glance on one enormous page.
    “So,” I said, unable to contain my enthusiasm any longer, “where do I start?” I had visions of Electra teaching me how to draw Lightning Girl—I'd always wondered how she achieved that perfect almond shape that made Lightning Girl's eyes so distinctive. Maybe she'd let me come up with a new and unique supervillain.… Now,
that
would be a challenge!

    Electra tapped her chin with her finger. “I think I'd like you to arrange my colored pencils.”
    “Oh.” That didn't sound like much of a challenge. “Um … okay.”
    I put my backpack down and Electra pointed me toward a cupboard. Inside was a large plastic box filled with colored pencils in varying lengths