Girls Don't Have Cooties (3 page)

“You are?” Katie asked him.

Andrew looked a little annoyed. “We decided this morning, remember?”

“You ready, Jeremy?” Kevin asked Katie. “I want to get out to the field before recess is over.”

“Yeah, sure,” Katie mumbled nervously. “I think we should go to the bathroom before the game,” George suggested. “No time-outs for pee breaks.”

“Good idea,” Kevin agreed. “Besides, I like the boys’ room. No cootie-carrying girls are allowed in there.”

Katie gulped. Kevin was right. Not about the cooties, of course. He was only right about girls not being allowed in the boys’ room. Boys weren’t allowed in the girls’ room, either.

Katie wasn’t quite sure
which
bathroom she belonged in anymore. After all, she was only Jeremy on the outside. She was still Katie on the inside. The thought of going into the boys bathroom was absolutely,
positively
gross!

Good thing Katie didn’t actually
have
to go.

“Not me,” Katie said quickly. “You know me, I can hold it forever. I’m like a camel!”

George shrugged. “So you go get the soccer ball. We’ll meet you on the field.”

Phew!
That was close!

Katie had gotten out of that one. But she was pretty sure things weren’t going to be that easy once they were out on the field. Katie wasn’t a very good soccer player. Her only hope was that Jeremy’s body would know what to do once she started playing.

Or, better yet, maybe the magic wind would change her back before the soccer game began.

“Hey, that took you long enough,” Kevin said as he and George caught up to Katie on her way to the soccer field.

Katie was walking very slowly. She was in no hurry to get onto that field.

“Pick me first, Jeremy,” George pleaded. “I want to be on your team. Andrew’s team never wins.”

“Yeah,” Kevin agreed. “Andrew and his friends play like girls.”

“So what?” Katie asked. “Some girls are great at soccer.”

George laughed. “That was funny, Jeremy,” he said. “I didn’t know you liked to tell jokes.”

“I’m not kidding,” Katie said.

“Yeah, right,” Kevin answered. “Could you just see us playing against the girls? They’d probably want a time-out to fix their hair.”

“Or because they broke a nail,” George added. He made his voice sound high and squeaky. “Time out for a nail-polish emergency!” he joked.

Katie watched as Kevin and George laughed. They were making her really mad.

Then, suddenly Katie got an idea.
Let them laugh,
she thought to herself.
I’ll show them!

“Okay, let’s choose up teams,” Andrew said, once all the boys were on the soccer field. “Okay if I go first, Jeremy?”

Katie nodded.

“I choose Kevin,” Andrew said.

“Oh, man!” Kevin moaned as he moved over next to Andrew.

“I choose George,” Katie said.

“Yes!” George cheered. He gave Katie a high-five.

“Now I’ll take Billy,” Andrew told them.

Katie looked at the crowd of boys standing in front of her. They all wanted to be on Jeremy’s team. Slowly she turned to face the playground—where the girls were.

“Hey Mandy!” she called out. “You want to play soccer?”

Suddenly, everything stopped. The girls dropped their jump ropes. The boys stared in surprise.

“Jeremy, what are you doing?” George asked.

“I’m choosing up teams,” Katie told him.

“But you can’t pick Mandy,” George said.

“Why not?”

George looked amazed. “Because she’s a girl!”

Katie sighed. “Yeah. But she’s also a really good soccer player. Maybe the best in the class. She could win the game for us.”

“Sure,” George moaned. “We’d win because the other team would be laughing too hard to play!”

“I still choose Mandy,” Katie told him.

“I’m not playing with her,” George said. “I’m going over to Andrew’s team.”

“Andrew’s team is the
only
team,” Kevin said. “No one wants to play with a girl.”

“Except Jeremy,” Andrew pointed out.

“Jeremy the
girl lover
!” George shouted.

“Girl lover, girl lover!” The other boys began chanting. “Jeremy’s a girl lover!”

Kevin lifted his hand and sprayed some imaginary cootie spray. We want all girl lovers to go away. Blast them hard with cootie spray!“ he shouted.

“Let’s get out of here, you guys!” George told the others. “We don’t want to get cooties from Jeremy the girl lover!”

The boys ran over to the playground.

“Get ‘em!” George shouted, as he ran straight toward Suzanne and blasted her with imaginary cootie spray.

Katie stood alone on the soccer field and watched the boys chase the girls. She’d wanted to fix things between the girls and the boys. That’s why she’d picked Mandy for Jeremy’s team.

“I hate you, George!” Suzanne cried out.

Katie sighed. Instead things were worse than ever.

It was lonely on the soccer field. All the other kids were running around on the playground. They didn’t even notice that one of their friends was standing there, all alone.

These days, the worst thing any boy in 3A could be called was a girl lover! Katie knew that when Jeremy found out what had happened, he was going to be upset. And it was all Katie’s fault.

Usually, when the magic wind turned Katie into someone else, she couldn’t wait to become Katie Carew again. But this time was diferent. Katie didn’t want to turn back into herself. She wanted to stay Jeremy for a little longer. At least long enough to fix things.

But the magic wind never seemed to care what Katie wanted. Suddenly, a cool breeze began to blow. Katie looked over toward the trees. The leaves were still. She glanced over at the flag post. The flag wasn’t moving.
The magic wind was back.

Once again, wild winds began to circle around Katie. The magic wind was so strong that it whipped off Jeremy’s glasses. Katie reached out to grab them, but the glasses flew across the field.

Oh, no! Jeremy wouldn’t be able to see without his glasses. Katie tried to run after them. The magic wind wouldn’t let her move. It was holding her prisoner.

And then it just stopped. Slowly Katie opened her eyes. She looked around. She was still out on the soccer field.

Okay, so now she knew where she was. But she still didn’t know who she was.

Nervously, Katie looked down at her feet. There were her purple shoes and her pink glitter pants.

She held up her hands. She was still wearing the same electric green, glow-in-the-dark nail polish she’d put on the day before.

Katie was back.

And so was Jeremy Fox. He was standing just a few feet from Katie on the field. Jeremy looked kind of funny without his glasses on. Katie hardly ever saw him like that.

“Where am I?” Jeremy mumbled to himself. He squinted his eyes and tried to find his glasses.

Katie spotted Jeremy’s glasses by a tree. She picked them up and handed them to him. “Looking for these?” she asked him.

“What happened?” Jeremy asked. “I mean, I sort of remember coming out here, but ...”

Katie gulped. How was she going to explain what happened? She couldn’t just say that the magic wind had turned her into Jeremy. He’d never believe her. If it hadn’t happened to her, Katie wouldn’t believe it, either.

“What do you mean you ‘sort of remember’?” Katie asked him.

Before Jeremy could answer, George’s teasing voice rang out over the playground. “Hey! Look at the girl lover talking to Katie Kazoo!”

Jeremy’s face turned beet red.

“Jeremy’s a girl lover! Jeremy’s a girl lover!” the boys all began to chant.

Jeremy’s put his glasses on and stared at the boys angrily.

“Who are you calling a girl lover?” he asked them.

“You!” Kevin shouted back.