Reading Standards for Literature > Independent Reading (CCSS.RL.7.10) Practice Test

I learned the harbor by its sounds before I learned its streets. The gulls scissored the sky with their cries; the bell buoys tolled like sleepy clocks. On our first morning in Grayhook, fog pressed against the windows of Aunt Lina's bookshop, then peeled back like a translucent curtain. I watched the gray turn a cautious silver and wondered if new places always announced themselves this softly.

Aunt Lina's shop, The Gull & Lantern, leaned companionably between a tackle store and a bakery. Inside, the floorboards creaked in a way that made you feel noticed. Father called the shop "a good, pragmatic venture." He likes that word—pragmatic—because it feels steady in the mouth. He trusts things that can be stacked, counted, or mended with a screwdriver. Poems, he says, are a different sort of plank; you test them before you step.

I didn't tell him that I've been testing words since before we left the apartment with the window that faced a brick wall and the one pot of rosemary I kept alive. In Grayhook, the rosemary lives in Aunt Lina's front window next to a dish of smooth sea glass. When she pinned the sign for Open Mic Thursday with a seashell magnet, it looked like the ocean had signed its own name.

"You'll read, Mira," Aunt Lina said, as if she were stating the tide schedule. Father, shelving a stack of nautical charts, demurred—politely refused—before I could answer. "Let the kid listen first," he said. "Absorb the room." He smiled at me, but it was the careful kind he uses when he thinks I'm fragile glass. "I'll run the counter."

The day moved like a boat under low wind. We straightened shelves, untangled a string of pennants, and set out a tin of peppermint candies for the readers. Father polished a dustless patch on the counter with the edge of his sleeve. "For luck," he said, though he doesn't usually talk about luck. The harbor bells rang twice as fog lifted. A woman in a yellow coat bought a book of lighthouse stories and told me how the beam sweeps a rhythm you can learn by heart.

When evening gathered, the shop filled with faces and the air softened with the smell of paper and raincoats. A boy my age read a poem about a cracked oar and the water that holds you up even when you don't deserve it. An older fisherman told a story about a storm that braided ropes and tempers alike. I could feel my own words gathering, knot by knot.

Aunt Lina nudged me toward the small rug that served as a stage. Father's hands were busy at the register, though no one stood there. He said the store needed someone to mind the till, but I saw how he kept his gaze on the ledger instead of the stage. I unfolded the page in my pocket. It wasn't long—three skinny stanzas about fog, and how it hides everything but sound; about a kitchen spoon that remembers the soup after the bowl is empty; about a lighthouse and the moment between its sweeping light and its next arrival. I read, and the room felt taller.

When I finished, there was a space—like the shore pulling back before it sends the wave—then the room answered with soft applause. Aunt Lina clapped first, bright and quick. Father tapped the counter with two fingers, a rhythm like a heartbeat you don't want to admit you hear. He nodded once at me, then again at the jar of pens, as if the pens had done something commendable.

Later, when the chairs were stacked and the shop breathed its wooden breath again, we stepped outside. The harbor lights winked, and the path down to the pier glowed faintly. "You made the room quiet," Aunt Lina said. "That's not easy." Father didn't say much. He straightened the edge of the Open Mic sign so it hung square. "Good night's work," he said finally. It was the sort of praise he knows how to give.

We walked home by the water. The wind carried the scent of salt and something like metal. Grayhook didn't feel like a map anymore; it felt like a place a person could learn by heart. I touched the folded poem in my pocket. It felt like a key, thin and certain, to a door I hadn't known we were standing in front of.

I learned the harbor by its sounds before I learned its streets. The gulls scissored the sky with their cries; the bell buoys tolled like sleepy clocks. On our first morning in Grayhook, fog pressed against the windows of Aunt Lina's bookshop, then peeled back like a translucent curtain. I watched the gray turn a cautious silver and wondered if new places always announced themselves this softly.

Aunt Lina's shop, The Gull & Lantern, leaned companionably between a tackle store and a bakery. Inside, the floorboards creaked in a way that made you feel noticed. Father called the shop "a good, pragmatic venture." He likes that word—pragmatic—because it feels steady in the mouth. He trusts things that can be stacked, counted, or mended with a screwdriver. Poems, he says, are a different sort of plank; you test them before you step.

I didn't tell him that I've been testing words since before we left the apartment with the window that faced a brick wall and the one pot of rosemary I kept alive. In Grayhook, the rosemary lives in Aunt Lina's front window next to a dish of smooth sea glass. When she pinned the sign for Open Mic Thursday with a seashell magnet, it looked like the ocean had signed its own name.

"You'll read, Mira," Aunt Lina said, as if she were stating the tide schedule. Father, shelving a stack of nautical charts, demurred—politely refused—before I could answer. "Let the kid listen first," he said. "Absorb the room." He smiled at me, but it was the careful kind he uses when he thinks I'm fragile glass. "I'll run the counter."

The day moved like a boat under low wind. We straightened shelves, untangled a string of pennants, and set out a tin of peppermint candies for the readers. Father polished a dustless patch on the counter with the edge of his sleeve. "For luck," he said, though he doesn't usually talk about luck. The harbor bells rang twice as fog lifted. A woman in a yellow coat bought a book of lighthouse stories and told me how the beam sweeps a rhythm you can learn by heart.

When evening gathered, the shop filled with faces and the air softened with the smell of paper and raincoats. A boy my age read a poem about a cracked oar and the water that holds you up even when you don't deserve it. An older fisherman told a story about a storm that braided ropes and tempers alike. I could feel my own words gathering, knot by knot.

Aunt Lina nudged me toward the small rug that served as a stage. Father's hands were busy at the register, though no one stood there. He said the store needed someone to mind the till, but I saw how he kept his gaze on the ledger instead of the stage. I unfolded the page in my pocket. It wasn't long—three skinny stanzas about fog, and how it hides everything but sound; about a kitchen spoon that remembers the soup after the bowl is empty; about a lighthouse and the moment between its sweeping light and its next arrival. I read, and the room felt taller.

When I finished, there was a space—like the shore pulling back before it sends the wave—then the room answered with soft applause. Aunt Lina clapped first, bright and quick. Father tapped the counter with two fingers, a rhythm like a heartbeat you don't want to admit you hear. He nodded once at me, then again at the jar of pens, as if the pens had done something commendable.

Later, when the chairs were stacked and the shop breathed its wooden breath again, we stepped outside. The harbor lights winked, and the path down to the pier glowed faintly. "You made the room quiet," Aunt Lina said. "That's not easy." Father didn't say much. He straightened the edge of the Open Mic sign so it hung square. "Good night's work," he said finally. It was the sort of praise he knows how to give.

We walked home by the water. The wind carried the scent of salt and something like metal. Grayhook didn't feel like a map anymore; it felt like a place a person could learn by heart. I touched the folded poem in my pocket. It felt like a key, thin and certain, to a door I hadn't known we were standing in front of.