Judy Moody and the Bucket List

by Megan McDonald

  Kick-the-Bucket List

  Electrikitty

  Antarctica or Bust

  Izzy Azumi, F.D.O.

  Can’tractions

  Drums Up!

  Bucket-List Buddies

  The Dud Ranch

  HypnoToady

  Do Not/Don’t-Kick-the-Bucket List

  Sunflower seeds. Sharpie. Superglue. She, Judy Moody, was pawing through Grandma Lou’s purse. Her bag was like a treasure chest. A treasure chest with snaps and zippers and hidden pockets and secret compartments.

  “Grandma Lou,” Judy called, “I can’t find the cards. We can’t play Go Fish without a deck of cards.”

  “Keep looking,” Grandma Lou called back. “Bring me my reading glasses, too, please.”

  Knitting, mini-flashlight, granola bar, cough drops, cards. Cards! Judy held up the deck. But finding glasses in Grandma Lou’s purse was like a game of Go Fish.

  While Judy was fishing around in the purse, she just happened to notice a folded piece of paper sticking out of an inside pocket.

  It was probably just a shopping list that said carrots and toilet paper. But it didn’t look scribbly. It had for-real handwriting in cursive. Maybe it wasn’t a shopping list. What if it was a treasure map? Or a love letter? Maybe Grandma Lou had a secret pen pal.

  Judy sneak-peeked a look at the paper. It was a list! But NOT a boring-old shopping list. Grandma Lou’s list said Bucket List at the top. What in the world was a bucket list?

  Judy was often in a list-making mood herself. She even had a list of her lists:

  • Nicknames to call Stink

  • Christmas list on toilet paper

  • Bummer Summer list of dares

  Maybe Grandma Lou liked lists, too. Same-same!

  Louise M. Moody’s Bucket List

  • Ride an elephant

  • See the pyramids in Egypt

  • Send a message in a bottle

  • Gaze at the northern lights

  • Sleep in a castle

  • Swim with dolphins

  • Learn sign language

  • Make a difference

  • Dance the rumba

  • Read War and Peace for the third time

  Judy rushed over to Grandma Lou. She held the list behind her back.

  “Grandma Lou,” said Judy, “if a person just happened to be looking in another person’s purse, and she just happened to find something interesting, would it be okay for that person to ask the other person about it even if it’s personal?”

  “Ask away,” said Grandma Lou.

  Judy dangled the paper in front of Grandma Lou. “I found a list that doesn’t say toothpaste or carrots and toilet paper. It says Bucket List and it has way-cool stuff on it like Ride an elephant. What’s a bucket list?” Judy asked.

  “A bucket list is . . .” Grandma Lou started. “Well, see, a bucket list . . .” Grandma Lou was biting her bottom lip. That meant she was thinking about how to explain it. “It’s like a wish list.”

  A wish list! Judy wanted to make a wish list, too. Judy wanted to ride an elephant!

  “But why not just call it a wish list? Why call it a bucket list?”

  “It’s a special kind of wish list. A list of all the things I’d like to do before I . . . you know. Kick the bucket.”

  Judy could not believe her ears or eyes!

  Kick. The. Bucket. As in croak. As in bite the dust, give up the ghost, take a dirt nap.

  Gulp. Judy did not want to think the thought. She put her head on Grandma Lou’s shoulder. “Grandma Lou, you’re not going to, um, die, are you?”

  “Well, someday, but not anytime soon. Don’t you worry, Jelly Bean. I’m going to be around for a good long time. But there’s a lot I’d like to do before that time comes. So I started a list.”

  “Phew,” said Judy, letting out the breath she’d been holding. She could not imagine her life without Grandma Lou in it.

  Wait just a kick-the-bucket second. Judy liked lists. Judy was the Queen of Lists. She, Judy Moody, would make her own list. Her very own kick-the-bucket list of all the stuff she wanted to do before she . . . went to fourth grade!

  Judy tore out a piece of notebook paper. She chewed the end of her pencil. She chewed it some more.

  “That pencil’s beginning to look like a shark attacked it,” said Grandma Lou.

  “Shark attack!” said Stink, running into the room. “What? Where?”

  “It’s just my pencil, Stink.” Judy held out her classic No. 2 Grouchy pencil.

  Stink examined it under the magnifying glass. “Yep. This looks like the work of a Japanese goblin shark. For sure.”

  Judy held out her hand. “Give it. I have a V.I.L. to make. Very Important List.”

  “V.I.B.L.,” said Stink. “Very Important Bucket List.”

  “Hey, how did you —?” Judy squinted a stink-eye at her brother. “You were spying on us this whole time!”

  “I spy with my little eye . . . something yellow, with words, on notebook paper.”

  “My bucket list!” said Judy.

  He handed back the pencil, squeezing in next to Judy on the couch. He pretended to read his Big Head Book of Scat.

  “Need some help?” Grandma Lou asked Judy.

  Judy nodded. “How did you know what to put on your list?” she asked.

  “Let’s see. First I dreamed of places I’d like to go. Then I thought about new things I might want to learn.”

  Judy scribbled a few ideas on her list.

  “Write down ‘Smell a corpse flower,’” said Stink.

  “P.U.,” said Judy.

  “Write down ‘Sleep with a shark,’” said Stink.

  “We already did that,” said Judy. “At the aquarium.”

  “Write down ‘Invent something,’” said Stink. Judy wrote it down so Stink would stop bugging her.

  “Just use your imagination,” said Grandma Lou. “Dream a little. And follow your heart.”

  Judy scribbled a few more ideas. She covered her paper with her arm so Stink couldn’t spy on her. At last she was done. Ta-da! Her way-official not-yet-fourth-grade kick-the-bucket bucket list.

  Judy decided to go fish one more time in Grandma Lou’s purse. She pulled out a granola bar and took a bite. A big bite. A Japanese-goblin-shark-size bite.

  She was going to need tons of energy for her big bucket-list adventure. She couldn’t wait to get started. Judy tried to turn a cartwheel down the hall, but she flopped and landed, plop, on the floor. No worries. Learning to cartwheel was on her list. A few more shark-bites of energy bar and she would be on her way.

  The next day, Judy went to find Mom. Mom was on the back deck, painting a chair blue.

  “Mom?” Judy asked. “Can I ride a horse or go to camp or see all of London from the tippy-top of the London Eye?”

  Mom did not even look up from her painting. “Ask your father.”

  Judy went to find Dad. Dad was under the kitchen sink, fixing a pipe. “Hey, Dad, can I ride a horse or go to camp or see all of London —”

  Dad did not even pop his head out. “Go ask your mother,” he said before Judy could finish her sentence.

  Sheesh. Weren’t moms and dads supposed to listen to their kids?

  Judy went out to the back deck. She sat on a bench, her head bent, studying her kick-the-bucket list. Cartwheel, invention, triple stickers . . .

  Her hair fell down over her face in a tangle. “Judy,” Mom said, finally looking up, “remember when you were in a good mood for a whole week and you brushed your hair every day? I liked that week.”

  Judy pointed to the mangle of tangles in her hair. “Show me a hairbrush that doesn’t hurt, and I’ll show you hair that is
brushed.”

  Lightbulb! She, Judy Moody, could not believe her own genius idea. A brush that doesn’t hurt! On her bucket list, it said Invent something. She, Judy Moody, would invent . . . the Ouchless Hairbrush. No more knots. No more hurt. Who wouldn’t want one?

  “Never mind about camp,” she said to Mom. She raced upstairs. Mouse was sitting on her brush. “Move it, Mouse,” she told her cat.

  Judy grabbed her hairbrush and pulled all the cat hair off of it first. She stared at the spikes sticking up out of her brush. So many spikes. No wonder hairbrushes were such a pain. Her brush was half porcupine!

  Judy tried to yank the brush through her hair. Youch! Attack of the Porcupine! If porcupines had thirty thousand spiny quills, Judy’s brush must have had at least three thousand spiky bristles.

  All she had to do was to get rid of all the hurty spikes. Pop! Pop! Pop! One by one, she popped out all the bristles.

  Wa-la! The Ouchless Hairbrush was born. No more porcupine! From now on, every day was Be Kind to Your Hair Day.

  Judy deserved to award herself a Bright Idea sticker for this invention. She would call it . . . the Spineless Porcupine. The Porcu-pineless. The Porcu-painless.

  Judy could not wait to show off her new invention. First to her family, then the world! She could already see the headlines:

  Showtime. Judy gathered her family on the couch, including Mouse. Mouse curled up on her mood pillow. Her invention sat on the coffee table, covered with a dish towel. But even a dish towel could not hide its genius. It was practically pulsing with possibility. And Judy was popping with pride.

  Mom and Dad sat on the couch. Stink sat on the edge of his seat.

  “Stink, tell me when it’s five o’clock. At five o’clock on the dot, we will have the unveiling.”

  Stink watched his watch. Mom looked sleepy. Dad seemed to be distracted. Stink counted down the seconds. “Five, four, three, two, one!”

  Judy wished she had a drum for a drumroll. She tried to make it sound exciting. “Mr. President. Mrs. President. Ladies and Germs.” She looked right at Stink. “Today, I present to you the World’s Newest Invention, from the brain of an eight-year-old girl in Virginia.” Judy took a deep breath. She reached down and pulled off the towel.

  “Ta-da!” said Judy, sweeping her arms through the air and pointing to her invention with a grand gesture.

  “Is that some kind of newfangled Ping-Pong paddle?” Dad asked.

  “What happened to your brush?” Mom asked.

  Stink just stared. “So your invention is . . . the Naked Hairbrush?”

  “No! Guys, guys. You don’t get it. Allow me to demonstrate.” Judy took another deep breath. “Behold the amazing, the never-before-seen, the ultimate . . . are you ready? Presenting . . . the Ouchless Hairbrush! I call it the Porcupainless!”

  Judy stopped and stared at her family. They were quiet. Too quiet.

  They must be stunned into silence with amazement!

  Wait till they saw this. “Now, I’ll show you the Porcupainless in action!” Wa-la! She picked up the brush and ran it across her hair. Of course, without any bristles, it didn’t really brush her hair. But it didn’t hurt or yank or pull either!

  “What do you think?” she asked her family.

  “I think you made your hair stand up on end!” said Stink, cracking up.

  Judy touched the top of her head. She ran and looked at herself in the hall mirror. Stink was right. Her hair was sticking up. Straight up! She looked like a dandelion puffball. She looked like a Chia Pet.

  “You know, Edison tried thousands of times before getting the lightbulb right,” said Dad.

  “I’m sure Ben Franklin didn’t invent the lightning rod in a day,” said Mom.

  Mom and Dad were just being Mom and Dad — saying nice parent stuff so Judy wouldn’t feel bad.

  Stink held up his Big Head Book of Inventions. “And I’m sure it took Margaret Knight tons of time to invent the square-bottom paper bag.”

  Judy looked her brother in the eyes. “Stink, tell me the truth. Isn’t the Ouchless Hairbrush a good invention?”

  Stink squirmed like a worm. “Um, well, maybe you could just change the name a little,” said Stink. “You could call it the Electro-Magnetron or something.”

  “Or something,” said Judy. She collapsed in an un-cartwheel heap on the floor. Mouse leaped into her lap.

  “At least Mouse likes it,” said Judy. She brushed the Ouchless Hairbrush along her cat’s back. Judy got a shock of static electricity. Mouse’s hair stood straight up like a scaredy-cat cartoon kitty.

  “She looks like a porcupine!” said Stink. Judy and Stink cracked up.

  “Instead of electricity, she’s Electrikitty!” said Judy.

  “The Ouchless Hairbrush,” yelled Stink, “turns any ordinary cat into Bride of Frankenstein.”

  “The Ouchless Hairbrush,” said Judy, “puts a spark in your hair and your cat.”

  She sprang up and hurried upstairs. “That’s it!”

  “Wait. Where are you going?” asked Stink.

  “To invent a shampoo that will get rid of static electricity,” said Judy. “I’ll call it . . . the Electrikitty Anti-Static Pet Hair Neutralizer.” Purr-fect!

  Judy misted Mouse with her purr-fect cat spray. (Water plus oil-spill-approved dish soap.) She crossed Invent something off her bucket list. Her eyes fell on the words Go to Antarctica.

  Judy poked her head into Stink’s room. “Hey, Stink, how much do you think it costs to go to Antarctica?”

  “I don’t know. One flunked spelling test? Two not-turned-in homeworks? Three times interrupting Mr. Todd when he’s talking?”

  “Not that Antarctica.” Stink thought she was talking about the desk in the back of Class 3T where you had to go to Chill Out. “The real one.”

  “Oh. Let’s see. More than you have in your piggy bank.”

  “Ha! I bet you didn’t know I have thirty-three dollars and forty-one cents saved up.”

  “It costs thirty-three gazillion dollars to go to Antarctica. You’d need forty-one winter coats, too.”

  The air went out of Judy. She slumped onto Stink’s bed like a sock monkey that had lost its stuffing.

  “It’s super far away, you know. Farther than it is to go to Santa’s house at the North Pole.” Stink spun his light-up globe and pointed to a continent at the bottom of the world that was shaped like a heart with one wing. “It’s all the way down here at the South Pole.”

  Judy searched her wildest imagination. “So maybe five hundred dollars?”

  “More.”

  “Seven hundred?”

  “More. Because they just found a giant squid down there that weighs seven-hundred seventy pounds and is as big as a minibus. Tons of people are going to want to go see it, so it will probably cost more now.”

  “A thousand?” said Judy. Stink nodded.

  Sheesh! One thousand dollars. That was a lot of scratch. Bones. Bread. Dough. Moola! She’d better get started right away if she had even a slim chance of raising that many dead presidents by the fourth grade!

  That night after dinner, Judy called everybody back to the couch. Emergency Family Meeting time. Stink looked around for another mystery lump under a dish towel. But he didn’t see any Judy inventions.

  “What is it this time?” he asked. “The Ouchless Band-Aid? The De-Electrifying Toothbrush?”

  “Ha-ha. Very funny, Stink. I called you all here to ask for a raise in my allowance.”

  “No,” said Mom and Dad.

  “No,” said Stink.

  “Not you, Stink.” Judy gave him the not-ouchless hairy eyeball stare. “You haven’t even heard my reasons. I have a whole speech and everything.”

  “You just got a raise, Jelly Bean,” said Dad. Judy hated it when Dad said no and called her Jelly Bean at the same time. It was so not fair.

  “She already got fifty more cents last month,” said Stink.

  “Thanks a lot, Stinkbug,” said Judy. For a litt
le brother, Stink sure had a big mouth. “You may be excused, Stink, if you want to go to your room.”

  “I’m fine here,” said Stink.

  Plan B. “Okay, what if I did some chores for some extra money. I could unload the dishwasher sometimes. Or I could maybe put away my own laundry pile without anybody telling me.”

  “That’s what the fifty cents was for!” piped up Stink.

  “Stink’s right,” Mom pointed out. “You’re already supposed to be doing those things.”

  “Fine,” said Judy. Time for Plan C.

  Judy made a poster-board sign that said ANTARCTICA OR BUST! She drew a thermometer. At the bottom she wrote $33.41. At the top she wrote $1,000 big ones.

  She sat on the curb for half of Sunday with a bucket for money. She told everybody who passed by about her bucket list. She told them she was accepting donations for a worthy cause: Antarctica!

  She could not wait to start coloring her thermometer in red. But at the end of the morning, all she had was two dimes, a Canadian penny, a paper clip, and a linty cough drop.

  Roar! She, Judy Moody, was in a mood, until . . . Stink hired her to pick up his Snappos. One whole dollar bill for picking up ten bazillion Snappos off the living room floor! And it was not even part of Plan A, B, or C.

  Plan D, here I come!

  Judy knocked on some doors around the neighborhood: 119 Croaker Road, no answer; 121 Croaker, no answer; 123 Croaker, Mrs. Soso was home!

  “Hi, Mrs. Soso,” said Judy. “I was wondering, um . . .” Judy looked around the yard, trying to think of a way to make a little money. No dandelions to pull. No leaves to rake. “See, I’m saving for a trip to Antarctica, and . . . maybe I could search for four-leaf clovers in your yard? They’re good luck, you know. And if I find one, you could pay me a dollar.”

  “No, thanks. I’m good,” said Mrs. Soso.

  Judy looked around some more. There was a big willow tree in the side yard. “I could climb that tree and tell you what it looks like from up there. Maybe there’s a bird’s nest. Or a squirrel’s nest. That would only cost you seventy-five cents.”