Judy Moody Gets Famous!

by Megan McDonald

  They sat in a line, one behind the other, like desks in a row. First Judy, then Frank, Rocky, and Stink.

  “Hey, I’m always last!” said Stink.

  “You’re the rear end,” said Judy.

  “Tie one shoelace to the person in front, and one to the person in back,” she called.

  “How are we ever going to stand up?” asked Stink.

  “On the count of three,” Judy began. “One, two . . .” Judy took the first step. Frank’s foot shot up and out from under him. Like bowling pins, Frank toppled sideways, Rocky fell over on his ear, and Stink crashed on his elbows.

  Frank snorted first. Rocky cracked up so bad he sprayed everybody.

  “Hic-CUP!” said Stink.

  When they were finally standing, without anybody falling or snorting or hiccupping, they each tried to take a step. One . . . two . . . three.

  “The human centipede!” called Judy. She pictured the human centipede in her imagination — growing longer and longer, all wiggly and squiggly with tons of legs, and she, Judy Moody, at the head with biting fangs and poison claws!

  “Hssss!” said Judy.

  “No hopping, Rocky,” called Frank.

  “My lace is all twisted,” said Rocky.

  “Hold up!” yelled Stink from the end of the line.

  That’s when it happened.

  Judy stopped, but the rest of the centipede kept going! They all began to fall. Crunch! Judy stepped on Frank’s hand. Frank’s other arm socked Rocky in the stomach. Stink’s foot landed in Rocky’s hair.

  Three steps, and they had crumbled into a human pretzel.

  “Hey! Watch it!” Stink yelled.

  “I’m all twisted,” Rocky said.

  “OWWWWWWWWWWWW!” Frank screamed. Frank was holding up his right arm with his left hand.

  Frank Pearl’s right pinky finger looked all floppy. It looked all floopy. Frank Pearl’s pinky was twice as fat as normal and dangled down the wrong way.

  “OOOH! What happened?” asked Judy.

  “It hurts . . . bad,” said Frank, tears streaming down his face. “Real bad.”

  “Stink, run and get Mom. Fast!”

  What if Judy had broken a finger, not a record? If Frank’s pinky was broken, it was all Judy’s fault.

  Judy no longer felt like a human centipede. She, Judy Moody, felt more like a human worm.

  “So which one of you’s the patient?” asked a tall man with a red beard in a long white coat.

  Frank held up his little blue sausage of a finger.

  “Ouch!” said the man. “How’d this happen?”

  Frank looked over at Judy. Judy stared a hole in the carpet.

  “We were playing,” Frank answered.

  “We were making a human centipede so my sister could be famous!” said Stink. “And she stepped on Frank!”

  Judy sent Stink her best troll-eyes stare, complete with stinging-caterpillar eyebrows. The man laughed. “Okay. Well. I’m Ron, the emergency-room nurse. I’ll take you back, and the doctor’s gonna fix you right up, Frank. Is your mom or dad here?”

  “My mom went to call Frank’s mom,” said Judy.

  “Okay. Tell you what. The children’s wing is right through those red doors. Why don’t you two wait in the playroom there. It’ll be more fun. I’ll tell your mom you’re there, when she comes back.”

  Too bad Rocky went home. Now she was stuck with Stink. They pushed through the red doors and into a long hallway. At the end of the hall was a room marked THE MAGIC PLAYROOM. Judy and Stink went in.

  The walls were papered with teddy bears in hospital gowns, holding balloons. Each bear had crutches or bandages or sat in a wheelchair. There was a couch, a table with crayons and paper for coloring, a plastic castle, and a bookshelf with books about going to the hospital. There was even a miniature operating table on wheels. The only kid in the playroom was a girl in a wheelchair.

  “How come you’re in a wheelchair?” Stink asked her.

  “Stink, you shouldn’t ask stuff like that.”

  “It’s okay,” said the girl. “I got a new heart. They can’t let me walk around yet. They have to keep me at the hospital for a long, long time to make sure it works.”

  “A whole new heart! Wow!” said Stink. “What’s wrong with your old one?”

  “Stink!” said Judy, even though she wanted to know too.

  “It broke, I guess,” said the girl.

  “Were you scared?” Judy asked.

  The girl nodded. “Guess what. My scar goes from my neck all the way down to my bellybutton.”

  “What’s your name?” asked Stink.

  “Laura,” said the girl.

  “That’s one brave heart you got there, Laura,” said Judy.

  “Daddy says I’m a brave girl,” Laura said. “I’m getting a hamster when I go home. Do you have a hamster?”

  “No,” said Judy. “I have a cat named Mouse.”

  “There’s nothing to do here,” said Laura, looking around.

  “They have doctor stuff,” said Judy.

  “Look! A real sling and stuff!” said Stink, kneeling next to a big cardboard box. He pulled out Ace bandages, boxes of gauze, and tongue depressors. Even a stethoscope and a pair of crutches.

  “Stink, can I put your arm in a sling?” Judy asked.

  “No way,” said Stink.

  “How about you, Laura? I know how. For real.”

  “I’m sick of doctor stuff,” Laura said.

  “What about dolls?” Stink asked. “There’s a bunch of dolls in this box.”

  “They all have broken arms and legs, or no heads,” Laura said. “And some of them have cancer.”

  “What do you mean?” Judy asked.

  “They’re bald, like Sarah, in my same room.”

  “That’s not fair,” Judy said. “They should at least have dolls to play with that aren’t sick.”

  The nurse came back just then. “Time to go back to your room,” she told Laura. “Did you kids meet our brave girl?”

  “Yes!” said Judy and Stink.

  “I hope your new heart works great!” said Judy, as Laura left with the nurse.

  “Bye!” called Stink.

  Judy looked through the doll box. Laura was right. All the dolls were dirty or broken or hairless or headless.

  Mrs. Moody poked her head in the doorway. “Hello!”

  “Mom!” said Stink.

  “Is Frank okay?” Judy asked.

  “His finger’s broken,” said Mrs. Moody, “but his mom is with him now. He’s getting a splint.”

  “Rare! A real splint!” said Judy.

  “He won’t be playing any basketball for a while, but he’s going to be just fine. So. Ready to go?”

  Stink and Judy followed Mrs. Moody out of the playroom. Halfway down the hall, Judy stopped, holding Stink back by his shirt.

  “Stink,” she said so her mom couldn’t hear. “Give me your backpack.”

  “What?”

  “Your backpack. I need it.” Stink made a face and handed over the pack.

  “Catch up with Mom and tell her I forgot something. I’ll be right back.”

  Judy dashed back into the playroom and over to the box of broken dolls. Looking around to make sure no one was coming, she stuffed the dolls into the backpack. Judy zipped it shut, flung it over her shoulder like a lumpy Santa Claus sack, and headed back down the hall.

  When Mom stopped to ask a question at the desk, Stink asked, “Hey! What’s in there?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Nothing does not make a big fat lump. Did you take that doctor stuff? You took stuff! You stole! I’m telling!”

  “Shh! You can’t tell anybody, Stink, or we’ll get in trouble for stealing.”

  “We? You mean you’ll get in trouble,” said Stink. “Are you crazy? Do you want to be famous for being the only third grader who ever went to jail?”

  “Swear you won’t tell, Stink.”

  “What will you give me?”


  “I’ll let you look at real spit under my microscope.”

  “Okay. I swear.”

  “You swore!” said Judy. “I’m telling.”

  As soon as Judy got home, she unloaded the backpack and spread the dolls out on her bottom bunk. She, Doctor Judy Moody, was in an operating mood. On her bed was a doll that didn’t talk or cry anymore, and one with no arms. There was a headless doll, and one that was bald.

  First Judy gave each of the dolls a bath.

  “I know just what I need,” said Judy. “Body parts!” She dug out her collection: long arms, skinny arms, brown legs, pink legs, middles with bellybuttons, one bare foot, a thing that looked like a neck, and all sorts of heads — small heads, fat heads, Barbie heads, bald heads! Judy emptied a whole bag of body parts onto her bed. “Rare!”

  Judy glued a red wig with yarn braids onto the doll with no hair and gave another one arms that bent. Judy bent the arm back and forth, back and forth, to test it out. “Boo!” said the doll each time Judy lifted her arm.

  “You don’t scare me!” Judy told the doll.

  “And for you,” she said to the headless doll. “A new head!” From all the heads on her bed, Judy chose one with brown hair and green eyes.

  “There you go,” said Judy, popping on the new head. But when she turned the doll upside down to put some shoes on her, the doll’s head flew off and bounced across the floor!

  “Whoa!” said Judy, running after the head. “That won’t work. Let’s try this one. How would you like eyes that can close and open?” Judy twisted the new head onto the doll’s neck and waved her up, down, up, down through the air a few times to watch the eyes open and close.

  “Voilà!” said Judy. She kissed the doll right on the nose.

  Next she dressed each doll in a blue-and-white hospital gown she made from an old sheet, and gave each of them a paper bracelet printed with a name: Colby, Molly, Suzanna, Laura.

  “Knock, knock,” called Stink, pounding on her door.

  “Go away,” said Judy.

  “Knock, knock!” said Stink.

  “Who’s there?” said Judy.

  “I, Stink,” said Stink.

  “I Stink who?”

  “I stink you should let me in your room,” said Stink, letting himself in anyway. He peeked behind the blanket hanging over the bottom bunk.

  “Aaagh!” he yelled, jumping back in shock. “Those dolls! The hospital — you stole! Those are . . . those aren’t . . . if Mom and Dad find out . . .”

  “Stink, you promised you wouldn’t tell.”

  “Yeah, but . . .”

  Judy was making a tiny cast out of oogey wet newspaper. “Look, if you keep quiet, I’ll let you help me.”

  “It’s a deal!” said Stink.

  Stink and Judy finished putting the cast on one of the doll’s legs. When it dried, they painted it white and signed it with lots of made-up names. After that, they made a sling for another doll, with a scrap of cloth. On a different doll Doctor Judy put tattoo Band-Aids from her Band-Aid collection all over its legs, arms, and stomach.

  “Double cool!” said Stink.

  Last but not least was a rag doll made of cloth. Judy took a pink marker and drew a scar from the doll’s neck down to her bellybutton. Then she drew a red heart, broken in two. With black thread, she stitched the broken heart back together, hiding it under the doll’s hospital gown.

  “Just like that girl Laura!” Stink said.

  When she was finished, Judy propped up all the dolls in a row on her bottom bunk and stood back to admire her work. She set her own doll, Hedda-Get-Betta, next to them.

  “Wow, you made them look really good!” said Stink.

  A little later Judy packed all the dolls into a box and secretly mailed them back to the hospital. Without a return address, no one would ever know that she was the one who had stolen the dolls.

  It’s like a real doll hospital, thought Judy. She, Judy Moody, was on her way to being just like First Woman Doctor, Elizabeth Blackwell.

  On Monday morning Mr. Todd asked, “Where’s Frank today?”

  “Absent,” said Judy.

  “Oh, that’s right. I heard that he broke his finger. Does anybody know how it happened?”

  “It’s a looooooooooooooooooong story,” said Judy.

  “As long as a centipede!” said Rocky.

  “I heard Judy Moody stepped on him!” said Adam. “CRACK!” He bent his finger back like it was breaking.

  “Okay, okay. We’ll ask Frank all about it when he gets back.”

  “He’ll be back tomorrow,” Judy said.

  Judy looked at the empty desk next to her. Without Frank, there was no one to snort at her jokes. Without Frank, she spelled barnacle with an i. Without Frank, she had nobody to tease about eating paste.

  To make matters worse, all morning Jessica Finch kept inching her desk a little closer, a little closer to Judy.

  “Is that the elbow that was in the paper?” Jessica asked.

  Judy drew a mad face on her famous elbow and pointed it at Jessica.

  “Hey, Judy? Want to come over to my house after school?” asked Jessica. “I could show you my glow-in-the-dark spelling posters.”

  “Can’t,” said Judy.

  “Why not?”

  “I have to feed Jaws, my Venus flytrap.”

  “How about tomorrow?”

  “I feed it every day,” said Judy.

  “How about after you feed Jaws?” asked Jessica.

  “Homework,” said Judy.

  The truth: by Friday Judy was almost bored enough to go to Jessica’s. Rocky had to stay at his grandma’s after school for a week because his mom was working late, and Frank could hardly do anything with a broken finger.

  Too bad she had finished operating on all the hospital dolls so quickly. Making a cast was the best!

  If only she could try making a bigger cast, on a human patient. But who? Stink would not let her near him with wet oogey newspaper.

  Judy looked back at Jessica Finch. Maybe she did not look like a Pinch Face. Maybe she did not look like an aardwolf. Maybe she looked like . . . a doctor’s dream. The perfect patient!

  “Hey, Jessica,” Judy asked, “how would you like to get your arm in a cast?”

  “It’s not broken,” Jessica said.

  “Who cares?” said Judy. “It’s just for fun.”

  “Sure, I guess. Does this mean you’ll come over? I can show you my spelling posters.”

  “How does today after school sound?” asked Judy.

  When Judy got to Jessica Finch’s house, the two girls went up to Jessica’s room. Judy looked around. All she could see were pigs. Pink pigs. Stuffed pigs. Piggy banks. A fuzzy piggy-face rug. Even Jessica’s bed looked like a pig wearing a pink skirt.

  “You like pigs!” said Judy.

  “What was your first clue?” Jessica laughed in her hyena way.

  Judy touched the spelling bee prize ribbons Jessica had hanging on the wall. Jessica showed Judy her scrapbook, with all the times her name had been in the paper.

  “Wow,” said Judy. “Did they ever spell your name wrong?”

  “Once. Jessica Flinch!”

  “Judy Muddy!” said Judy.

  “Look! Here are all the spelling posters I made.” Jessica pointed to the wall next to her bed.

  “Hey, they’re green. How come they’re not pink too?”

  “Because they glow in the dark. Wait.” Jessica pulled down the shades and turned off the light.

  The room lit up with glow-in-the-dark words. All the spelling words from Mr. Todd!

  BICYCLE

  ICICLE

  BREADSICLE

  POPSICLE

  RECYCLE

  MOTORCYCLE

  “What’s a breadsicle?” Judy asked. “Is that like pumpernickel?”

  “Hey, you’re good,” said Jessica. “See, I make up fake words and play a game to see if I can fool myself. Want to play? Or we could play the pig game. Instead of d
ice you get to roll little plastic pigs.”

  “What about making a cast?” said Judy.

  “You’re not going to break my finger or anything, like you did to Frank, are you?”

  “No! Besides, it was an accident,” Judy said.

  “Okay. So. What do we need?” asked Jessica.

  “Newspaper. Water. Glue.”

  “This comes off, right?” said Jessica.

  “Right,” said Judy. There must be some way to get it off, she thought. “We have to let it dry first. Then we paint it.”

  “Can we paint it pink?” asked Jessica.

  “Sure,” Judy said. Rare. A pink cast.

  “I’ll go get some old newspapers,” said Jessica.

  When she came back, she said, “All I could find was today’s, so let’s hope my parents have already read it!”

  Judy and Jessica tore the paper into strips. Judy could not wait to see the pink cast. This was her biggest operation yet!

  Judy dipped paper strips into the sticky mixture and carefully placed them one by one on Jessica’s arm.

  “Ooh. It feels icky,” said Jessica. “Are you sure this is going to work?”

  Jessica was as bad as Stink. “Here,” said Judy, handing Jessica more newspaper. “Tear up some more strips. I’m running out.”

  Jessica handed Judy a strip. At the top was the word PHANTOM. Jessica handed Judy another strip. STRIKES. A third. HOSPITAL.

  “Stop!” said Judy. “Where’s the rest of this story?” She peered at Jessica’s arm. “Page B six. Where’s page B six, huh?”

  “Oh. I think I already ripped it up.”

  Judy tried to read Jessica’s wet, oogey arm, but all she could make out were the words doll thief. “What did it say?” she asked in a panic.

  “Phantom strikes county hospital, or something.”

  “Or something, what?”

  “I don’t know. What’s the big deal?”

  Judy stood up suddenly, scattering paper strips everywhere. “I gotta go!”

  “You what? Wait! My arm! You can’t just . . . What about my pink cast?” But Judy was already out the door.

  She, Judy Moody, Doll Thief, would be famous all right. For going to jail. Just like Stink said.