by Emma Wunsch
“It was you, right?” Miranda asked when they were outside. “You got Principal Fish to forbid tag.”
Maude grinned proudly.
“How?” Miranda asked.
Maude looked to her left. She looked to her right. She looked behind her and then down at the ground. When she was sure the coast was clear, she took the sling and eye patch out of her bag and grinned. “I simply reminded Principal Fish of rule eighty-one in the Official Rules of Mountain River Valley Elementary.”
“But I’ve seen you get way more hurt roller-skating or sliding down a tree too fast. Donut didn’t mean to hurt you. And he didn’t hurt your eye or your arm.”
“Principal Fish doesn’t know that.” Maude sounded proud.
Miranda didn’t know what to say. Sure, Donut had crashed into Maude, but people bumped into people all the time. Just last night, her father, King Dad (or KD, as she called him), had crashed into Chef Blue right before a boring, fancy royal dinner. Tomato soup had drenched both the chef and the king, but both had said sorry about a million times. In the end, it hadn’t been that big a deal. Except they’d had pea soup, which was nobody’s favorite. And yes, Miranda understood that Maude had been annoyed when everything fell out of her bag. But it didn’t seem right that Maude had pretended to be hurt just to stop a game.
But then, almost like she was reading Miranda’s mind, Maude said, “I am truly hurt by Donut’s words. He can’t forbid Desdemona from tag! Just because I don’t like tag doesn’t mean I shouldn’t stick up for my fellow girls. We must all stand and work together. Actions speak louder than words, and in the words of Elizabeth Cady Stanton, ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men and women are created equal.’”
This also made sense. Unlike Miranda, Maude knew all about rights and standing up for oneself. Was Maude right to wrap a sling on her arm and put a patch on her eye? Maude was her best friend, after all. Was this just the Maude way of doing the right thing? By the time Miranda got back to the castle, not only did she feel that particular Monday-afternoon exhaustion, she also felt extremely confused.
8
THE BOY IN THE TREE
It was true that before Maude showed Miranda her injury props, she had looked to her right, to her left, behind her, and down at the ground. But she hadn’t looked up. If she had, she would’ve seen Donut breaking rule eleven, sitting up in the big tree in front of school.
Donut was in the tree because he was no longer allowed to play tag. Tree climbing wasn’t his favorite after-school activity, but he had nothing else to do but sit there, feeling mad.
He was too high up to hear what Maude was saying, but once he saw her grinning and showing Miranda the eye patch and sling, he knew exactly why Principal Fish had decided to suddenly enforce rule eighty-one!
9
THE FIRST BOYS-ONLY MEETING
Without tag, the Mountain River Valley playground was strangely quiet Tuesday morning. Miranda and Maude were swinging, Hillary was balancing, and the rest of the girls were playing seal soccer, but the 3B boys just stood there until Donut arrived, wheeling a small suitcase.
“Meeting,” he said to the group of boys. “Boys only. At the sandbox.”
“The sandbox?” Saeed said. “That’s where the littlest of the littlest kids go.”
“I don’t want the girls to hear us,” Donut said.
The boys shuffled over to the sandbox, where, as Saeed had said, the littlest of the littlest kids were happily playing. Once the littlest children saw the serious 3B boys, they fled.
“I have called this boys-only meeting,” Donut said quietly, “because we need to get back at the girls. The girls are the reason we’re not playing tag right now.”
“The girls?” Fletcher asked. “But Principal Fish made the announcement.”
Donut nodded. “But the girls made it happen. Well, one did at least.” Then he explained how he’d seen Maude with her eye patch and sling after school. And although he could only see the back of Miranda from his perch, he was pretty sure that she had been nodding and laughing, so she was probably most definitely in on it too.
“It’s not fair,” Fletcher said. “Tag is the best part of school.”
“I know,” Donut said. “Maude is a faker. But don’t worry. I can fake better!” He opened the suitcase. “I knew there was a reason why my mom was a nurse!”
10
ANOTHER MEETING WITH PRINCIPAL FISH
After he finished his Tuesday-morning practice exam, Donut told Miss Kinde that he needed to talk to Principal Fish.
“Principal Fish?” Miss Kinde was shocked. No one else was shocked, though, because the rest of the class had already gone to art.
“Yes,” Donut said.
“Is there anything I can do?” Miss Kinde asked.
“No,” Donut said. “And rule forty-seven says students are allowed to speak directly to the principal if they feel one hundred percent certain that their teacher would be unable to help them.”
“You’re sure?”
Donut nodded. “One hundred and twenty percent.”
Miss Kinde looked a little confused and hurt, but she said okay.
Donut wheeled his suitcase into the bathroom. Unlike Maude, he didn’t break rule nineteen. He’d remembered to ask for the bathroom pass.
11
BY ORDER OF PRINCIPAL FERDINAND F. FISH
Tuesday morning flew by for Maude. Not only did Mr. Van Der Zee praise her fruit still life in front of the whole class, but now that the boys were no longer playing inside tag, she’d finished her practice exam without distraction and in record time and was able to spend the rest of the period reading her new book: Training Your Chicken in Three Easy Steps by Patrice P. Poulet. And, to make a great morning even better, her dad had packed her another extraordinarily delicious Limburger cheese sandwich.
After lunch, as usual, 3B went out for recess.
“What should we do today?” Desdemona asked. “Sloth soccer? Monkey marbles?”
“Let’s play regular soccer today,” Agnes said. “I’m tired of kicking so slowly.”
“Actually, now that it’s not allowed, I wanna play tag,” Agatha said.
“I’ll be on my bal—what?” Hillary’s voice cracked. “Where’s my balance beam?”
“Oh, Hillary. You’re so funny. Ha ha,” Maude said without looking up. Even though it broke rule eighty-three, she was reading her chicken-training book while walking across the playground.
“It’s gone,” Hillary croaked. “My beautiful beloved beam.”
“Wow,” Miranda said. “It is gone!”
Maude put her book down. “That’s bananas. Who would take your beam?”
“We would,” said three exceptionally tall men with long beards wearing fancy suits, sunglasses, hard hats, and tool belts.
The girls looked up, way up, at the tall men.
“We removed the balance beam before lunch,” the shortest of the tall men said.
“My beam!” Hillary wailed.
“Why?” Maude asked. “Personally, I find balancing tremendously boring, but Hillary’s competition is soon.”
“We were instructed to remove the balance beam,” the second-shortest tall man said. “By order of Principal Ferdinand F. Fish.”
“By order of Principal Fish?” Maude asked.
“And now we will remove the swings,” the tallest of the tall men said.
Maude opened her mouth but said nothing.
“Why?” Miranda asked.
The men didn’t answer, since she’d spoken quietly.
“Why are you taking the swings?” Miranda asked louder. “What were Principal Fish’s orders?”
“There was a report of multiple injuries,” the shortest of the tall men said as he hoisted up the left side of the swing set.
The girls looked at one another. Then they looked over at the sandbox.
“The boys,” Maude croaked.
“How could they do such a thing?” Hillary moaned.
“Rule eighty-one,” Miranda said sadly.
“Correct!” the men said as they hoisted the right side of the swing set over their shoulders and began walking across the playground.
“Stop! This isn’t fair,” Maude hollered. “This injustice will not be tolerated!”
The three tall men kept walking.
Desdemona, Agnes, and Agatha clutched their soccer balls.
“Now what?” Hillary asked.
Maude closed her eyes and imagined all the brave women who had come before her. Perhaps some of those courageous women had also stood on playgrounds trying to figure out what to do when their swings were taken away. “Follow me, recess rebels,” Maude commanded.
The girls followed Maude across the much emptier playground and over to the sandbox.
“How dare you have Principal Fish’s gigantic men remove our swings!” Maude shouted at Donut.
“And balance beam,” Hillary squawked.
“But you stopped tag,” Donut said.
That’s right, Miranda thought. Maude had stopped tag, so the boys had stopped balancing and swinging. Now Maude could go explain to Principal Fish that she’d made a mistake, and the boys would do the same thing, and everything could go back to normal. Miranda was about to say all this, but Maude had climbed on top of a rusty metal lunch box that was lying around and was shaking her fist.
“Tag is stupid!” Maude shouted. “So so so stupid!”
“Tag is not stupid!” Donut hollered. “Balance beams are stupid! And swings are the stupidest thing of all. This dumb rope is better than the stupid old swings!” He picked up a long yellow rope that was on the ground.
“Hey! That’s my rope,” Maude said. “It must have fallen out of my bag when you pushed me!”
“He didn’t push you,” Miranda said quietly. “He just bumped into you.”
“Don’t call my rope dumb!” Maude yelled. “It has zillions of purposes!”
“Like what?” Donut asked.
Maude was so angry she couldn’t think of a single purpose. She didn’t say anything. No one said anything. For several moments, the playground was, once again, strangely quiet.
“Tug-of-war,” Saeed said. “We could play tug-of-war!”
“Great idea,” Donut said.
Maude still didn’t say anything.
“Are you chicken?” Donut asked. “Too chicken to play tug-of-war?”
“Don’t say anything bad about chickens!” Maude said, getting her voice back. “Chickens are the greatest bird of all! We will play tug-of-war. And we’ll beat you! Girls versus boys!” She picked up one end of the rope and slid it to Hillary, who passed it to Miranda, who passed it to Desdemona, who hesitated but dropped her soccer ball to pass it to Agatha, who passed it to Agnes.
The boys picked up the other end.
“Wait!” Hillary hollered. “We need an impartial referee.”
“I’ll do it,” said one of the littlest children, who was standing at the very edge of the sandbox. The boy was very small with extraordinarily large ears and a backpack that looked like it weighed more than he did.
Everyone was surprised. Had he been there the whole time?
“I never take sides,” the boy said seriously. “I can’t. I have four older brothers and five younger sisters.”
The big-eared boy was an excellent choice, because the first thing he did was take a ruler out of his backpack and measure Maude’s rope. Then he drew a line on the ground with a piece of chalk and made sure that each team was the same distance from it. Then he put on a referee shirt, hung a whistle around his neck, and explained the rules. Finally, he blew his whistle and said, “Begin!”
The boys pulled hard. The girls pulled harder.
“Hold your ground!” Hillary shouted.
“Toe the line!” Felix panted. “I mean, keep your toe behind the line.”
“Girls rule, boys drool,” Desdemona said.
“Boys rule, girls drool,” Norris shouted back.
“Tug!” Maude screamed. “Tug your hearts out, ladies!”
“Keep going, boys!” Donut cried.
“Take no prisoners!” Maude shouted.
“No pain, no gain!” Saeed yelled.
“Don’t give up the ship!” Hillary commanded as her left toe inched slightly closer to the chalk line.
“Never surrender!” Donut screamed.
Prisoners, Miranda wondered. Ship? Pain? Surrender? Weren’t they playing a game?
“Remember, failure is . . .” Maude chanted, trying to remember the last word of the quote her dad had told her that morning. Susan B. Anthony, the social reformer, had said, “Failure is . . .” Maude couldn’t remember. Her dad told her so many quotes, she sometimes got them jumbled. “Failure is . . .” Maude said again, trying desperately to remember.
“Impossible!” Hillary screeched as she turned to look at Maude and, in doing so, loosened her grip, which let the boys pull her big toe across the line.
Fweeeeeeeeeeeeeet! The big-eared referee blew his whistle. “The team to my left has officially crossed the demarcation line at thirteen hundred hours.” He sounded official.
“Ha ha!” the boys hooted.
“It was that Susan B. Anthony quote,” Hillary whined. “If you’d remembered the last word was impossible, I wouldn’t have turned around to tell you!”
“Ugh,” Maude grumbled, both because they’d lost and because it was such a silly word to have forgotten.
The boys shouted, “We won! Boys beat girls! Boys beat girls!”
“Don’t worry, girls,” Maude said. “I’ll come up with something. I’ll organize the greatest plan in the world. The boys won’t win.”
From their side of the rope, the girls glared at the boys. The boys glared back. And then the bell rang, so everyone went back inside.
12
NO MORE CHICKENS
The first thing Maude did when she got home that tug-of-war Tuesday was scoop up her beloved Frizzle chicken, Rosalie, who was waiting on the bottom step outside the house. Rosalie was the official house chicken, but due to her peeing in the house, Maude’s dad, Walt, and her brother, Michael-John, had officially declared that she could only be in the house when Maude was there, too. That way Maude would always be around to clean up.
“My loveliest ladybird!” Maude sang. “There’s nothing chicken about you except that you’re a chicken!”
“Maude!” Michael-John called out of an open window. Her brother was already home, because he was homeschooled. “Bring up the newspaper. Dad wants it.”
Maude nodded, tucked Rosalie into her armpit, grabbed the newspaper, and bounded up the twenty-seven slightly crooked steps into her house.
“I am home,” she announced. “Here’s your paper of news.” She handed Walt the Mountain River Valley News and bowed. Rosalie, still under her arm, squawked.
“Many thanks, my beautiful biscuit beetle,” Walt said, taking the paper. “As the poet ‘Stanislaw’ Jerzy Lec said, ‘The window to the world can be covered by a newspaper.’”
“‘Stanislaw’ would make an excellent chicken name.” Maude looked at her dad hopefully.
“No more chickens,” Walt and Michael-John said.
“And don’t let that chicken near my dictionaries, Maude.” Michael-John pointed to one of his dictionaries, which lay open on the windowsill. “Rosalie peed on all the p pages.”
“Maybe she’s learning to read,” Maude said hopefully.
Her brother gave her a look.
“I’m training her,” Maude said. “I’m reading a long book about it.” She whispered into what she thought was her chicken’s ear, “Let me know if you have to pee.”
“How was school?” Walt asked.
“School . . .” Maude said, as if she’d forgotten where she’d been all day. She thought for a minute. The removal of the swings and losing tug-of-war had been horribly horrible, but on the plus side, now the other 3B girls were just as mad at the boys as she was. And becau
se she had so much social justice experience, she would naturally be their leader. “School was school,” Maude said. “Some good parts and some extremely not-so-good parts.”
“I like the good parts. Do you want to talk about the extremely not-so-good parts?”
“No can do,” Maude said. “I’m too busy. The people look to me for a plan!”
For the rest of the afternoon, Maude tried to come up with a plan. She took several breaks to sing to her chicken, ignore her homework, walk her beloved dog, Rudolph Valentino, scratch her cat behind his ears, eat dinner, and crush both Walt and Michael-John in a vicious game of Parcheesi. It wasn’t until she got into bed that she remembered she was supposed to be planning, and then she promptly fell asleep without a plan. (And without brushing her teeth!)
But, much to her delight, after an odd dream about Susan B. Anthony, a poet, a chicken, and a very heavy newspaper, when she woke up, she had one!
13
THE GIRLS GAZETTE
“We’re starting a newspaper,” Maude told the girls Wednesday morning before the first bell rang. They were sitting with their backs against the fence as far as they could get from the boys, who were once again at the sandbox on the other side of the playground. Desdemona, Agnes, and Agatha, afraid their soccer balls would be the next to go, sat on them.
“A newspaper?” Desdemona asked.
“Yes! A one-hundred-percent-official, girls-only newspaper!” Maude saluted the air. “As long as the castle has a printing press. It does, right?” She looked at Miranda.
“I think so,” Miranda said. “Are printing presses very large with ink fountains and grippers?”
Maude nodded. “Excellent! You’re the publisher.”
“Why a newspaper?” Agnes asked.
Maude jumped up onto the rusty lunch box that had somehow traveled across the playground. “Freedom of the press! The power of print! It will be by women, about women, and for women! And by women, I mean girls only!” Just as Maude finished her speech, the bell rang, so the girls ran to line up.