The Wishbone Wish

by Megan McDonald

  Wishbone Wishes

  Bossy McBossy

  Peace Treaty

  Flying Turkey Gizzards

  Mary Had a Little Piggy

  Freaky Frozen Football

  The First Thanksgiving

  Mary had a lit-tle lamb, lit-tle lamb, lit-tle lamb . . .”

  Judy Moody sang as she searched her closet up, down, and sideways. She looked in the dirty clothes pile. P.U.! She looked behind board games. She looked under Mouse the cat. She found her acorn collection, her Popsicle-stick collection, and her wishbone collection.

  But no Pilgrim costume.

  “Where is it, Mouse?” Judy’s cat stuck her paw under the beanbag chair. Judy reached in after her and pulled out an apron string.

  Eureka! “Mouse, you’re a genius!” There, in all its old-timey black-and-white glory, was her Pilgrim costume. Long dress? Check. Apron? Check. Pilgrim hat? Check. Shoes? Easy-peasy. She could make square buckles out of duct tape and attach them to her sneakers. Under her dress, she would wear her yoga-not-yogurt pants with the go-faster stripes!

  Judy could not wait. Only five more days until TTT. Triple T! Turkey-Trot Time. As in Thanksgiving! This year, she, Judy Moody, was going to win the Turkey Trot race. For sure and absolute positive.

  Let the countdown begin.

  Judy tried her Pilgrim costume on over her clothes to make sure it still fit. She ran downstairs to get the duct tape.

  Stink was making a map with . . . kitty litter? “Is that —?” asked Judy. “Never mind. I don’t think I want to know.”

  “It’s my desert habitat,” said Stink. “You can’t tell because it doesn’t have any cactuses or Gila monsters yet.” He looked up. “Why are you dressed like a Pilgrim?”

  “I’m not a Pilgrim,” said Judy.

  “Then why are you dressed like a girl Paul Revere?”

  “You mean Sybil Ludington? I’m not her either.”

  “Virginia Dare?” Stink asked.

  “Guess again.” Judy spun around in her dress. “I’m Sarah Josepha Hale.” She pronounced each word with importance.

  “Sarah Josepha who?”

  “Sarah Josepha Hale, inventor of Thanksgiving.”

  “Nah-uh. My teacher said that the Wampanoag people were the inventors of Thanksgiving or something.”

  “That was the first Thanksgiving, Stink. But then everybody forgot about it for like two hundred and forty-some years. It made Sarah Josepha Hale boiling mad. So guess what? She wrote a letter to the president and told him that Thanksgiving should be a holiday. And guess what that Zachary Taylor said?”

  “Yes?” wondered Stink.

  “N-O. For thirty-eight whole years she wrote letters. Millard Fillmore said no. Franklin Pierce said no. James Buchanan said no.”

  “Bummer,” said Stink. “That’s a lot of no.”

  “Then in 1863, she wrote a letter to President Abraham Lincoln telling him that everybody should eat turkey and give thanks and celebrate Thanksgiving. He listened and agreed to make a Thursday in November a holiday. So, see? Without Sarah Josepha Hale, there would be no Thanksgiving.”

  “Whoa,” said Stink. “How come I never heard of her?”

  “For your information, she also wrote ‘Mary Had a Little Lamb,’ Stink.”

  “You mean ‘Mary Had a Little Turkey’?” He cracked himself up.

  “This Thanksgiving, I’m going to be thankful for Sarah Josepha Hale. What are you thankful for, Stink?”

  “I’m thankful your big long story is over,” said Stink. He turned back to his kitty-litter map.

  “Don’t you want to know why I’m dressed like her?” Judy asked.

  “Do I have to?” asked Stink.

  “It’s for Gobblers-a-Go-Go. You know, the festival they have at school on Thanksgiving every year. We always miss it because we’re at Grandma Lou’s. I begged Mom and Dad to leave for Grandma Lou’s after the festival. So guess what. This year, we get to a-go-go!” Judy cracked herself up.

  “Gobblers-a-Go-Go!” Stink said. “Mrs. D. says they have footraces and relay races and a costume parade and a petting zoo and a cakewalk, only it’s with pie —”

  “Don’t forget the Turkey Trot, too. It’s a half-mile fun run. We get to wear crazy costumes. Frank is going to be Frankenstein, of course, and Rocky is going to be a blob of slime, and I’m going to be — ta da! — Sarah Josepha Hale.”

  “I want to run for fun, too. I’ll be What’s-His-Name, the first astronaut to walk on the moon.”

  “Neil Armstrong? Why?”

  “He ate turkey on the moon. Freeze-dried turkey.”

  “Weird,” said Judy. “But guess what else. The winner wins a for-real Thanksgiving turkey. No lie. I already called Grandma Lou and told her not to buy a turkey this year.”

  “Not even a backup turkey?” asked Stink. “Just in case you don’t win?”

  “I’ll win. I’ve been training for weeks. I ran around the block a million times. I ran in place every day on the playground at recess. And I’ve been eating super-healthy stuff so I’ll be in tip-top shape. No sugar. No junk food. And guess what else. I even gave up raisins.”

  “But you hate raisins —”

  “The point is, you have to prepare, Stink,” said Judy. “And think positive.”

  “I’m positive that Grandma Lou should get another turkey.”

  “No way.”

  “Not even freeze-dried, man-on-the-moon turkey?” Stink asked.

  “Not even,” said Judy.

  “I hope Grandma Lou has lots and lots of cranberries,” said Stink. “Or we’re going to starve like Pilgrims.”

  “Hey, I have an idea.” Judy ran upstairs and came back with a shoe box.

  “Shoes?” asked Stink.

  “Wishbones,” said Judy. “It’s my collection. I’ve been saving the wishbones from the turkeys at Thanksgiving and sometimes Christmas.”

  “And we get to make a wish?” asked Stink. He picked up the biggest V-shaped brown bone of the bunch. “I bet this is a T. rex wishbone. Or I bet it could be a velociraptor furcula.”

  “A veloci-what-huh?”

  “From a dinosaur. Dinosaur wishbone.”

  “Get real, Stink. A dinosaur wishbone would be as big as a house.” Judy grabbed it back. “Anyway, that’s my best one. Turkey wishbones only come about once or twice a year. Here, use this one.” She handed Stink a pale wishbone.

  Stink looked at the measly little bone. “But it’s so puny.”

  “So? It’s a chicken wishbone.”

  “Who ever heard of a chicken wishbone? You can’t wish on a chicken. No way will your wish come true.”

  “Yes, it will. Let’s think of a wish. I know! Let’s both wish that I win the Turkey Trot. That way I’ll be double-sure to win the Thanksgiving turkey.”

  “But a wish has to be a secret. My wish won’t work if you know what it is.”

  “Fine,” said Judy. “Go ahead. Starve like the Pilgrims.”

  Judy held one end of the wishbone. Stink held the other. They both squeezed their eyes shut, made a wish, and pulled.

  Snap!

  The wishbone broke in half. Judy opened her eyes. She held up the bigger half. “I win!” said Judy, grinning from ear to ear.

  “Lousy chicken wishbone,” said Stink. “I knew my wish wouldn’t come true.”

  “It doesn’t matter, Stink. We wished for the same thing. Right?” Stink dug his toe into the rug. “Right?” she asked again. Stink didn’t answer.

  “Never mind,” said Judy. “I won the wish, so Turkey Trot, here I come!”

  Stink put on his un-smelliest sneakers. He took out his Rapidfire Ultra XE 611M25 stopwatch and started pressing buttons.

  Start. Stink hopped on one foot. Stop. Ten sec
onds. Start. Stink put a pencil between his toes and wrote Stink. Stop. 36.7 seconds. Start. Stink stood on one foot and Hula-Hooped in the hallway. Stop. 16.3 seconds.

  “No Hula-Hooping in the house, Stink,” said Judy. “Mom says.”

  “But I’m practicing skills with my feet. For the footraces at Gobblers-a-Go-Go.”

  “Footraces just mean you run fast, Stink. Not do other stuff with your feet.”

  “Well, my feet will be ready for the Turkey Trot.”

  “Bad news, Stink. You can’t be in the Turkey Trot,” said Judy.

  “Why not?”

  “It’s for ages eight and up. But you can be in the peewee races. The Cranberry Crawl is for babies zero to four, and the Stuffing Strut is for ages five to seven. So you could be in the Cranberry Crawl,” Judy teased.

  “Hardee-har-har,” said Stink. “No fair. What do they have against shrimps?”

  “It has nothing to do with being short, Stink. The fun runs have age groups to make it more fair,” said Judy. “But you can enter any other contest or race you want. Hey! Want to be my buddy in the Triple Fun Relay?”

  “For real?”

  “Sure. Why not? It’s a relay race with three parts. First is the three-legged race, then the Jell-O race, and last is the human wheelbarrow.”

  “I like Jell-O,” said Stink.

  “Yes, but can you balance it on a spoon?”

  “Huh?”

  “That’s the race. You have to cross the soccer field while holding wriggly-jiggly Jell-O on a spoon, and then pass it to me. Then I have to do it.”

  “No sweat.”

  “Okay, then, listen up. We have to get you in shape for the Triple Fun Relay. I’ll be your trainer. I’ve already been practicing like crazy. Give me your stopwatch. I’m going to tell you what to do and I’ll time you.”

  “What is this, the Boss-Stink-Around relay?”

  Judy told Stink to hop down the hall. Stink hopped down the hall. Boing-boing-boing. Eleven seconds. “Faster!” said Judy. He hopped over to the stairs. Nine seconds. “Faster, Stink!” Stink hopped back to his room. Seventeen seconds.

  He plopped down on the floor, out of breath. “So. Much. Hopping,” said Stink. “I feel like a bunny.”

  “Aw. Poor bunny,” said Judy. “You’ll thank me when we win the three-legged race.” She handed Stink a Nancy Drew book. “Now walk across the room balancing this on your head, and I’ll time you.”

  “Why?”

  “It helps with balance, Stink. Trust me. This will prepare you for the Jell-O part of the relay. Ready?”

  “Ready, Freddy.”

  Stink put the book on his head and started to walk. Halfway across the room, the book went sliding off of his head and crashed to the ground.

  “Don’t you have a book that’s not so slippery?” Stink asked.

  “I don’t have any bumpy books, Stink. C’mon. Try again.”

  He crossed the room with the book on his head. Seven seconds. He crossed the room again. Five seconds. He did it again. Six seconds.

  “Good!” said Judy. “Now let me see you crawl up the stairs this time.”

  “Crawl? What for? The Cranberry Crawl is for babies.”

  Judy made a muscle with her arm. “Muscles, Stink-o. You have to have strong arm muscles to be a human wheelbarrow.”

  “Okay, Bossy McBossy.”

  Stink crawled up the stairs on all fours. Twenty-one seconds. Stink crawled down the stairs. Seventeen seconds. Stink crawled up the stairs. Nineteen seconds. Stink crawled down the stairs.

  “That’s it,” said Stink, plopping down on the bottom step. “I demand Jell-O.”

  “Hel-lo! Sugar!” Judy reached into her back pocket. “Here, you can have an energy bar instead.”

  “Energy bars taste like cardboard!” said Stink.

  “Get used to it, Stink. No sugar until after the race. And no junk food. And nothing that ends in -ose.”

  “Mmm. Now I want tacos. Or nachos. Or mangoes.”

  “I mean no glucose, fructose, sucrose, et cetera. Those are all just fancy-dancy words for sugar.”

  “But Jell-O is fruit. And it ends in O, not -ose. Jell-O is way cool. Did you know that the way it jiggles mimics brain waves? And it has a super hush-hush secret code on every box that I bet only the president of Jell-O knows? And it’s the official state snack food of Utah. No lie.”

  “Then I guess you’ll have to move to Utah.”

  “Not even one teeny-weeny cranberry Jiggler? C’mon. They only have that flavor once a year.”

  “Not even,” said Judy. “Tell you what. We can practice with tofu on a spoon. We’ll race down the hall and back.”

  “Tofu is gross,” Stink said.

  “Well, we’re not going to eat it,” said Judy.

  “I’m pooped,” said Stink. “How about if I time you for a while?”

  “No chance, Lance.”

  “Then give me back my stopwatch,” said Stink.

  “No way, McNay.”

  “But it’s my Rapidfire Ultra stopwatch!”

  “You’re ultra cuckoo if you think I’m giving this back. We need it to get ready for the Triple Fun Relay, and you said you’d do whatever I say.”

  “That was before you turned into Bosszilla!” said Stink.

  “Did not!” Judy said.

  “Did too!”

  “Not!” said Judy.

  Judy held the stopwatch in the air, high over Stink’s head. Stink jumped up and tried to grab it. “Gimme!”

  If only Stink were taller. He got up on a footstool. He tried to jump, but the stool tipped over and Stink landed on the floor with a crash. He knocked a framed photo off the table and the glass broke.

  “Uh-oh,” said Judy.

  “Kids!” said Mom, coming into the room. “What in the world’s going on in here?”

  “Judy thinks she’s the boss of me and she won’t let me have Jell-O and she won’t give me back my stopwatch.”

  “Stink said I could use it. We’re getting ready for the Triple Fun Relay,” said Judy.

  “Okay, both of you need a time-out. Go to your rooms. And I want you to stay there for one hour,” Mom told them in her I-am-not-kidding voice.

  Judy stared at the floor. Stink stared at the stopwatch in Judy’s hand.

  “Stink, let’s see how fast you can get to your room,” said Judy. “I’ll time you.”

  Yoink! Stink snatched the stopwatch out of Judy’s hand. He raced up the stairs and down the hall and into his room and slammed the door.

  Slam! Judy slammed her door back. Her Stink-Free Zone doorknob doohickey fell to the floor.

  4:35 p.m. Judy’s room

  Judy looked around her room. One hour! What was she going to do stuck in her room for one whole hour? They should call this time-in, not time-out.

  Judy practiced running in place in her not-Pilgrim costume. As she ran, she thought about Stink, WMAB. World’s Most Annoying Brother. Why was he always bugging her? Look what he did. He went and got her into big trouble.

  4:37 p.m. Stink’s room

  Stink looked around his room. One hour! What was he going to do stuck in his room for one whole hour? He might as well be in not-Monopoly jail. Do not pass GO. Do not collect two hundred dollars. They should call this time-in, not time-out, Stink thought.

  If only Judy, aka Bossy McBossy, had not gotten him into big trouble. He could be eating Jell-O (with tacos, nachos, or mangoes) right now.

  4:39 p.m. Judy’s room

  Judy played checkers with Mouse. Judy speed-read a whole chapter of Nancy Drew to Mouse. Mouse curled up in her lap while Judy finger-knitted two inches onto her giant yarn chain.

  4:46 p.m. Stink’s room

  Stink snapped the last of 253 pieces in place on his motorcycle made of Snappos. Stink fed Toady. Stink played Hide-the-Undies with Astro. Stink made Charlie the dummy talk without moving his lips. But nobody was there to hear.

  4:52 p.m. Judy’s room

  There was nothing le
ft to do but homework. On a Saturday. At least it was fun homework. Judy took out the shoe box from under her desk. She, Judy Moody, was making a Thanksgiving diorama for Social Studies. It was due Monday. Her teacher, Mr. Todd, was going to put all the dioramas on display at Gobblers-a-Go-Go!

  Judy’s diorama did not have a turkey. It did not have a Pilgrim. It did not have a pumpkin or a squash. It had miniature acorn people!

  Judy drew a face on an acorn. The acorn people were Abraham Lincoln and yours truly, Sarah Josepha Hale. She made a teeny-tiny acorn-hat for Sarah J. and a teeny-tiny stovepipe hat for Abe.

  While the glue dried, Judy made a teeny-tiny 1863 calendar and circled the last Thursday in November. She wrote a teeny-tiny letter, just like the one that Sarah Josepha Hale sent to Abe Lincoln. A letter asking him to make Thanksgiving a national holiday. And guess what — Abe Lincoln said Y-E-S yes!

  Eureka! Mr. Todd was going to flip when he saw this. A giant red A-plus-plus danced before Judy’s eyes.

  4:57 p.m. Stink’s room

  There was nothing left to do but homework. Stink got out his worksheet from Mrs. D.

  List ten facts about turkeys.

  Wild turkeys sleep in trees.

  Judy is a turkey.

  One turkey has about 5,000 feathers.

  Judy is a turkey.

  A wild turkey’s call sounds like “turk-turk-turk.”

  The ugly thing that grows over a turkey’s bill is a snood.

  The ugly thing that hangs from the turkey’s neck is called a wattle.

  Judy is a snood.

  Judy is a wattle.

  Judy is a turkey-lurkey.

  5:12 p.m. Judy’s room

  Judy opened her door a crack, trying not to make a sound. She did not want Super-Spy Stink to catch her. If she got caught, she’d have to do more time-out.

  She stuck her head out the door. She looked up and down the hall. The coast was crystal clear! She tiptoed past Stink’s room. She tiptoed into Mom and Dad’s room. She picked up the phone to call Grandma Lou.

  5:13 p.m. Stink’s room

  Stink thought he heard something in the hall. He opened his door just a crack, trying not to make a sound. He looked up and down the hall. Nobody and nothing. Not even Mouse.