Judy Moody Declares Independence! Page 3

  Now all she had to do was find Mom and Dad and Stink.

  “The trail starts here,” said Judy. She pointed to the sign in front of a wilted, half-dead plant: YE OLDE LIBERTY TREE.

  “First I’ll make a speech at Ye Olde Liberty Tree. Hear ye! Hear ye!” called Judy, jingling Mouse again. “Give me liberty or give me more allowance!” Mom and Dad laughed. Stink snorted.

  “Listen, ye olde trail people. I’m Judy. I’ll be your tour guide. Follow the red footprints to freedom!” Judy led her family from room to room.

  On the dining room table, it said, JUDY MOODY DID HOMEWORK HERE.

  “I do my homework there every day,” said Stink. Judy gave him ye olde hairy eyeball.

  On the kitchen floor, Judy pointed to a sign that said, JUDY MOODY FED MOUSE HERE.

  “Isn’t that one of your chores already?” asked Dad.

  “Yes,” said Judy. “But nobody had to remind me to do it.”

  She pointed to the kitchen table: JUDY MOODY ATE PEANUT BUTTER HERE.

  “I don’t get it,” said Stink.

  “I ate it with a spoon, not my fingers, and I didn’t eat any in my room or get it on stuff,” said Judy.

  Judy opened the door to the laundry room: JUDY MOODY PICKED UP LINT BALLS HERE. She opened the door to the downstairs bathroom: JUDY MOODY WASHED THE SOAP HERE.

  “I hate the dope who thought up soap,” Stink recited, cracking himself up. “I wish he’d eat it. I repeat it. Eat it.”

  Stink was not helping on the trail to freedom one bit. “Stink, stop saying stuff,” said Judy.

  “It’s a free country,” said Stink.

  They followed the red footprints up the stairs to Judy’s room. A sign on the bottom bunk said, JUDY MOODY MADE THE BED HERE. One on the top bunk said, PRIVATE! DON’T LOOK UP HERE.

  “What are all those lumps up there?” asked Stink.

  “Next stop, Stink’s room,” said the tour guide. His door had a sign taped to it: JUDY MOODY WAS NICE TO STINK HERE.

  “Were not!” said Stink.

  “Was too!” said Judy.

  “Ha!” said Stink. “You told me I had a spider in my hair!”

  “Last but not least, the big bathroom!” said Judy. JUDY MOODY PICKED UP THE P.U. TOWELS HERE.

  “So what do you think?” Judy asked. “Wasn’t I super-duper, Sybil-Ludington responsible?”

  “This is great, honey. Everything looks really good,” said Dad. “You’re starting to show us that you can be responsible and do things independently.”

  “It’s nice when we don’t have to tell you all the time,” said Mom.

  “So I can have more freedoms now? Like not brushing my hair all the time? And staying up later than Stink?”

  “I want freedoms, too!” said Stink. “Chocolate milk for breakfast!”

  “We’re proud of you, Judy,” Mom said. “But these are all things we want you to do anyway.”

  “You already get an allowance for doing these things,” said Dad.

  Tarnation! Judy was in a nark again. The narkiest.

  The Freedom Trail was not free at all. The UN-Freedom Trail.

  She, Judy Moody, picked up P.U. towels and washed soap and ate peanut-butter-not-with-her-fingers for nothing.

  “It’s just plain ye olde not fair!” she cried.

  When Judy got home from school the next day, there was a mysterious package waiting for her.

  “It has queens on it!” said Stink.

  “It’s from Tori!” Judy tore off the tape. “Sugar packets! For my collection!” There were clipper ships and castles, knights and queens. Even famous London stuff like Big Ben and the World’s Largest Ferris Wheel, the London Eye.

  “Rare!” said Judy. “Here’s one in French. ‘Je vois le chat.’ Stink, can you read it?”

  Stink squinted at the sugar packet. “I think it says, ‘Your head is toast.’”

  “Does not!” said Judy. “Give it!” She read the back. “It says, ‘I see the cat.’”

  Judy found some that Tori had made herself, with funny British sayings like nuddy pants and stuff.

  “Can I have the pavement pizza one?” asked Stink.

  “You’re off your trolley, Stink.”

  “When was I on my trolley?” he asked.

  Judy read the Bonjour Bunny postcard.

  “There’s a bunch of tea bags here, too. Real English tea, like at the Boston Tea Party,” Judy said. “Tori’s barmy if she thinks I’m even allowed to drink all this tea.”

  “Only traitors drink tea from England,” said Stink.

  “I’ll be a traitor,” said Mom. “I’d love to try some English tea.” She selected one in shiny blue foil and headed for the kitchen.

  Wait just a Yankee-Doodle minute! Judy had a not-so-barmy, off-your-trolley idea. She was gobsmacked that she hadn’t thought of it before.

  Since Mom and Dad would not let her have more freedoms, she would rise up and protest. Brilliant!

  The next day at school, Judy passed notes to Rocky and Frank:

  On Saturday, Rocky and Frank rang the Moodys’ doorbell at exactly two minutes after twelve. Judy and Stink both ran for the door. Stink got there first. “It’s not a Toad Pee Club meeting!” he blurted. “Judy lied. It’s a Tea Party Club!”

  “No way,” said Frank.

  “I’m not drinking any old tea with a bunch of dolls,” said Rocky.

  “Not that kind of tea party,” said Judy, dragging them up to the bathroom. “C’mon. It’ll be fun. Ben Franklin’s honor!”

  “I see tea bags,” said Frank. “And a teapot.”

  “This is boring,” said Rocky.

  “Look! It’s the talking teapot!” said Stink. “From when Judy was little.” He pressed a button.

  “I’m a little teapot,” the teapot sang, “short . . . like . . . Stink.”

  “Did it just say ‘short like Stink’?” Frank asked. He cracked up.

  “No — it said ‘short and stout,’” said Stink. “The batteries are running out!”

  “Forget about the teapot,” said Judy. “This is a Boston Tea Party.” Judy explained about the real Boston Tea Party. “It’s a protest! Right here. In the bathtub!”

  “What’s a protest?” asked Frank.

  “You get to yell about stuff that’s not fair,” said Judy.

  “Then I protest having a tea party,” said Rocky.

  “And you get to dump tea in the bathtub,” said Stink.

  “The Boston Tub Party!” said Judy.

  “The Wig Guy said everybody dressed up and painted their faces so nobody would know who they were,” said Stink.

  “Way cool,” said Frank.

  Stink got a bunch of funny hats from his room. “I call the tricorn hat!” said Rocky.

  “I have face paints,” said Judy.

  Frank painted a not-cracked Liberty Bell on her cheek.

  “Did you know they rang the Liberty Bell when they first read the Declaration of Independence?” Judy told Frank.

  Stink got a mustache. Rocky got a beard. And Frank got a Frankenstein scar.

  Judy filled the tub with hot water. “Okay, everybody think about stuff that’s not fair. Ready? Now, on the count of three, throw your tea into the tub. One, two . . . WAIT!”

  “What’s wrong?” asked Frank.

  “It has to be dark. The real Tea Party was after dark.” She turned out the big light, and the night-light flickered on.

  “We can pretend it’s the moon,” said Rocky. “At midnight.”

  “THREE!” called Frank. He took the lid off the pot and dumped the tea into the tub. Rocky and Judy ripped open boxes of tea and tea-bag wrappers.

  “Hey, let me!” said Stink. “You guys are hogging.”

  “Stink, you be on the lookout. Blink the light if you hear Dad coming. One if by stairs, two if by hallway.”

  Stink stood by the door. “You forgot to hoot and holler and yell not-fair stuff,” said Stink.

  Everybody started yelling and thro
wing tea bags into the bathtub.

  “No more homework!” said Rocky.

  “More allowance!” said Judy.

  “More chocolate milk!” said Stink.

  “No baby-sitting! No garbage patrol!” said Frank.

  Stink took off his shoes and socks, hopped right into the tub, and started acting like a teapot. He made one arm into a handle and one into a spout. “I’m a little teapot, short and stout,” he sang. “When I get all steamed up, hear me shout, ‘Give me chocolate milk or give me death!’” He sprayed water out of his mouth.

  “Ooh, you spit on me,” said Rocky.

  “You’re getting us all wet!” cried Frank.

  Judy thought she heard footsteps on the stairs. “The British are coming! The British are coming!” she warned.

  A voice, a deep voice, a Dad voice, said, “Hey, what’s all the —”

  “Abandon ship! Abandon ship!” Judy cried.

  “What in the world is going on up here?” asked Dad, opening the bathroom door. “Sounds like an elephant in the bathtub.” He turned on the lights.

  Water dripped from the walls like a rain forest. The floor was flooded with giant brown puddles. Stink drip-drip-dripped like a short and stout wet mop.

  The tub water was a brown sea of murky, ucky, yucky tea. Tea bags bobbed up and down on the tiny bathtub waves. The Boston Mud Party.

  “Judy?” asked Dad. “Stink?”

  Stink pointed to Judy. “It was her idea!”

  “We were having a Boston Tea Party,” said Judy.

  “Judy,” said Dad. “Just a few days ago, you were showing off this clean bathroom.”

  “But Dad! It’s a protest! For more freedoms.”

  “A mess this size sure isn’t going to get you more allowance . . . or your own bathroom.”

  “Pretend this is Boston Harbor. We were just making history come alive. Like homework.”

  “Sorry. This harbor’s closed. Rocky, Frank, it’s time for you boys to go home. Judy, no more friends over for one week. And you’d better get this mess cleaned up before Mom gets home. You too, Stink.”

  “But I don’t even want independence!” said Stink. “Just more chocolate milk.”

  “The Patriots swept up after they threw tea in the harbor,” Dad said.

  No friends for one week! This was just like what the British did to the Americans — one of those Bad Laws they called the In-tol-er-able Acts. Dad was closing down the tub just like the Big Meanies closed down the harbor after the real Tea Party!

  Judy felt like stamping her feet (the Stamp Act). She felt like throwing sugar packets (the Sugar Act). She felt like declaring independence on the wall (in permanent marker)!

  But just like all the Bad Laws in the world did not stop the Patriots, the Clean-the-Bathroom-Again Law and No-Friends-for-One-Week Law would not stop her. And they would not, could not, put her in a nark. They were just bumps in the road on the Judy Moody March to Freedom.

  She, Judy Moody, would live by a Not-Bad Law, the Law of the Sugar Packet: If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again.

  When Judy got out of bed on Monday morning, she did not stamp one foot. She did not throw one sugar packet. Instead, she quietly-and-to-herself declared independence from brushing her teeth and taking a shower. She did not want to mess up the bathroom again. EVER.

  Her makeup book report from when she was in Boston was due today. A makeup book report was NOT going to put her in a bad mood. Even if she had waited till the last minute. Judy decided right then and there to make this her best-ever book report. That’s what a responsible person would do.

  She dressed up in her pilgrim costume — the one Grandma Lou had made for Halloween. Ye olde pilgrimme costoom had an apron and made Judy look just like a girl from the American Revolution. Judy wore regular-not-loony pants underneath the skirt for bloomers. And she made thirteen curls in her hair — one for each of the thirteen colonies.

  “Who are you? Heidi?” Stink asked at breakfast.

  “None of your beeswax,” said Judy.

  “Are you a nurse?”

  “N-O!” said Judy.

  “Hey, I know. You’re Priscilla Somebody! Like a pilgrim?”

  “No, I’m Revolutionary. The Girl Paul Revere. For my book report today.”

  “Oh. So you’re that Sybil La-Dee-Da?”

  It sure was hard to declare independence from bad moods when Stink was around.

  “Bye, Mom. Bye, Dad,” Judy called on her way out the door.

  “Hey, wait for me!” Stink yelled.

  “Sorry! I’m riding my faster-than-lightning bike to the bus stop!” Judy yelled back. And she was off.

  Right before the end of the school day, it was time for Judy’s book report. She asked Frank Pearl to help her. They stood up in front of the class.

  “Mr. Todd? I have a different kind of book report. It’s acted out. Like a play.”

  “Cool!” said Rocky.

  “The book I read is called Sybil: The Female Paul Revere,” Judy told her class. “It’s about the Girl Paul Revere. And this,” she said, pointing to Frank, “is the Boy Paul Revere. Frank — I mean Paul — is helping me, Sybil Ludington.”

  Judy started with a poem: “‘Listen, my children, and you shall hear / Of a girl who rode way farther than Paul Revere.’”

  SYBIL: Hey, Paul Revere? Why are you so famous?

  PAUL: Because, Sybil Ludington, I rode my horse all night. I warned everybody the British were coming.

  SYBIL: I did, too. My horse is named Star. It was dark. I was scared. It rained all night. I was brave. It was muddy.

  PAUL: It wasn’t muddy when I rode.

  SYBIL: Well, la-dee-da.

  “No fair! It doesn’t say that here!” said Frank.

  “I just added it,” said Judy. “Keep reading.”

  PAUL: I’m forty years old and I rode sixteen miles.

  SYBIL: I’m only sixteen and I rode almost forty miles.

  PAUL: I made it to Lexington to warn Sam Adams and John Hancock.

  SYBIL: Hey, Paul? Weren’t you caught by the British?

  PAUL: At first I wasn’t. Then I was.

  SYBIL: Didn’t Mr. Todd say they took your horse?

  PAUL: Yes.

  SYBIL: Aha! So you got caught and didn’t finish warning everybody. I, Sybil Ludington, DIDN’T get caught, and I warned everybody. I yelled, ‘Stop the British. Mustard at Ludington’s!’ All the British had to go back on their ships. Then everybody came to my house for hot dogs (with mustard). Even Mr. George Famous Washington. The end.

  “Did Sybil What’s-Her-Face really eat hot dogs?” asked Jessica Finch.

  “She ate mustard,” said Judy. “Ketchup wasn’t invented yet.”

  Mr. Todd chuckled. “Actually, the word is muster, not mustard. When Sybil rode her horse to warn everybody, she called them to muster, which means to get together.”

  “The other parts were all true,” said Judy. “I give this book five reallys. As in really, really, really, really, really good. It was so good, I stayed inside for recess to read it. It was so good, I read it to my cat and my Venus flytrap!”

  “Thank you, Judy,” said Mr. Todd. “Sounds like Sybil Ludington really inspired you.”

  “Everybody should know about the Girl Paul Revere. Most people never heard of her, because for some barmy reason they forgot to put girls in history books. I wouldn’t even know about her if you hadn’t told me.”

  “Maybe some others will want to read the book now,” said Mr. Todd.

  “Sybil Ludington should be in our social studies book for everybody to read about. Girls should get to be in history books, too, you know. Especially girls who did independent stuff, don’t you think?”

  “Yes, yes, I do,” said Mr. Todd.

  “Girls rule!” all the girls shouted.

  “Huzzah!” said Judy.

  On the bus ride home, Rocky told Judy how much he liked her book report. “When I first saw you looking like a pilgrim, I was sure it
would be boring. But it was WAY not boring.”

  “Thanks,” said Judy. “I hope I get a way good grade and it shows my Mom and Dad how grown-up and responsible I am.”

  “Just think,” Rocky said, “how super scary it must have been when Sybil rode through the woods . . . and it was dark and robbers were all around.”

  “But she had to stop the British from burning down the whole town of Danbury!”

  “Yeah. But if she got caught, the bad guys might think she was a spy!” Rocky said.

  Judy and Rocky talked about Sybil all the way home.

  When they got off the bus, Judy started walking, then said, “Oops, I almost forgot. I rode my bike to the bus stop today.”

  “Okay. See ya!” called Rocky as he loped off toward his house. Judy unlocked her bike. Behind her, the doors of the bus hissed and closed, and the brakes squeaked as it pulled away from the curb.

  Wait . . . something was not right.

  Stink?

  STINK!

  Stink did not get off the bus! Stink had never NOT gotten off the bus before.

  Judy could not think. She was sure she’d seen him get ON the bus. Should she yell for help? Race home and get Mom?

  “HEY!” yelled Judy. “Mr. Bus Driver! HEY!” she shouted. The bus was already driving off down the street.

  WWBFD? What would Ben Franklin do? Go to bed early? Save a penny? Judy did not think sugar packet sayings could help her now.

  There was only one thing to do. Chase the bus!

  Mom would worry if she didn’t come right home, but there was no time to go tell her. Not when her brother was being kidnapped by a runaway bus.

  She, Judy Moody, had to get her brother back. No matter how stinky he was, he was still her brother.

  Judy hitched up her pilgrim skirt and hopped on her bike. She pedaled hard. She pedaled fast. She rode like the wind. She rode like Sybil on Star. She chased that bus down the street and around the corner and up the hill and down the hill.