Stink and the Shark Sleepover

  CONTENTS

  There Will Be Sharks

  Shark Sleepover Time!

  Rotten Eggs vs. the Sharkfinders

  Beware the Stinger Finger

  Awesome Jawsome

  Frankensquid

  Looking for Mr. Crab Cakes

  Bloody Mary, Bloody Mary

  Tooth and Claw

  Sleepy.

  Sleepier.

  Sleepiest. . . . NOT!

  Stink had to wait. Wait and wait and wait some more for Mom and Dad to come home from their fancy dance. Chloe, the babysitter, was pop-pop-popping popcorn in the kitchen.

  “Trying to stay awake is worse than holding your breath underwater,” Stink told Judy. He yawned.

  “Why don’t you just go to bed?” Judy asked.

  “Because Mom and Dad went to a thingy.”

  “Uh-huh. A fund-raiser thingy.”

  “And it raises money for your heart.”

  “So?”

  “So they get to bid on prizes and they might win stuff.”

  “And?”

  “And if they win the best prize, I get a trip to Montpelier.” Stink yawned.

  “The capital of Vermont?”

  “No, not Vermont. James Madison’s house. Right here in Virginia.”

  “I should have known,” said Judy.

  “You get to cook on a fire and dig for old stuff.” Stink yawned some more. “And make a brick.”

  “Vermont would be cooler,” said Judy. “Vermont has teddy bears and maple syrup and Vermontasaurus.”

  Stink did not hear a word Judy said about Vermont. He had fallen asleep right smack-dab in the middle of the family-room floor, curled up next to Charlie (creepy puppet), Astro (guinea pig), Toady (toad), and Mouse (cat). And Hoodoo, Voodoo, Gilgamesh, and Fred (yarn zombies).

  Chloe came back with the popcorn. “Aww. He looks so sweet when he’s asleep.”

  “A sleeping Stink is a good thing,” said Judy.

  “We’re home!” called Mom and Dad. “Anybody up?”

  Stink popped up as if he’d never been asleep. “Did we win?”

  Mom rubbed her feet. Dad took off his tie. Mom hung up her purse. Dad and Mom said good-bye to Chloe. Chloe waved good-bye to Judy and Stink.

  Stink looked from Mom to Dad. “So, did we win? Did we, did we, did we?”

  “We won,” said Dad. “I won an antique doorstop.”

  Stink’s face fell.

  “Dad’s kidding,” said Mom. “I won. An autographed cookbook.”

  “What?” said Stink. “The only thing worse than a doorstop is a cookbook!”

  “Good-bye, Vermont,” said Judy. “Hello, meatloaf.”

  “So no trip to James Madison’s house?” asked Stink.

  “We did win a trip,” said Dad.

  “But not to James Madison’s house,” said Mom.

  Stink’s heart sank. “To where, then?”

  “The aquarium!” said Mom in a much too chipper voice.

  Stink’s shoulders sank. “The aquarium? The aquarium is not Montpelier. The aquarium is not James Madison’s house.”

  “Although you could say James Madison is sleeping with the fishes,” Dad joked.

  “But this trip,” said Mom, “is a sleepover.”

  “Uh-oh,” Judy said under her breath.

  “You get to see the aquarium after it closes,” said Dad. “And spend the night.”

  “Double uh-oh,” Judy mumbled.

  “You sleep there the whole night?” Stink asked. “Till the next morning?”

  “Stink’s afraid of sleepovers,” said Judy.

  “Am not!” said Stink.

  “What about the time you tried to sleep over at Webster’s, and his glow-in-the-dark Star Wars poster freaked you out so bad, you came home at eight o’clock?”

  “So? Vader was staring a hole right through me.”

  “And the sleepover at Grandma Lou’s? The time you heard a ghost?”

  “There really was a chipmunk in her attic!” said Stink. “You were scared, too.”

  “Kids,” Dad warned.

  “Besides,” said Stink. “I was only seven then.”

  “You’re still seven.”

  “Seven and three quarters.” Stink turned to Mom and Dad. “Will there be sharks?” Stink asked eagerly.

  “There will be sharks,” said Dad.

  Stink took in a breath. “Yippee!” he yelled. “A shark sleepover!”

  “No fair,” said Judy. “How come I never got to go on a big-deal, fancy sleepover?”

  “We’ll tag along, too,” Dad told Judy. “It’s for the whole family.”

  “Double yippee!” said Judy.

  “And Stink can invite a friend,” said Mom.

  Stink ran upstairs. He came back with his arms full of stuff. Shark stuff.

  “What is all this junk?” Judy asked.

  “It’s for the big sleepover. There’s my shark sleeping bag and Leroy my stuffed tiger shark that I use for a pillow sometimes and my Big Mouth Book of Sharks.”

  “Is that all?” Judy teased.

  “Oh. Yeah. I can’t forget to wear my shark-tooth necklace.”

  “The sleepover’s not till Friday,” said Dad.

  “So?” Stink ran upstairs again and came back wearing slippers on his hands. “Check it out. Shark slippers.”

  Just then, the phone rang. Judy answered it. After a little while she said, “Stink, it’s for you.”

  “For me? Who is it?”

  “It’s Sophie the Shark-Sleepover Stealer,” Judy whispered.

  “Huh?” Stink grabbed the phone. “Hello?”

  “Guess what?” said Sophie of the Elves. “I just found out I won a trip to the aquarium. A sleepover!”

  “But I just won a trip to the aquarium,” said Stink.

  “I know! My mom said there were two prizes. We both won! And guess who I’m inviting? Webster!”

  “I was going to invite Webster, too,” said Stink.

  “Yay! So all three of us get to go on the sleepover together!”

  “Sweet,” said Stink.

  Stink slipped the shark slippers on his feet this time. He rubbed his shark-tooth necklace. “Shark Sleepover, here we come!”

  Finally, it was Friday. Shark Sleepover night!

  When the Moodys got to the aquarium, Stink spotted Webster right away. He was waiting outside with Sophie of the Elves, Sophie’s mom, and her little sister. “Sophie! Webster!” yelled Stink. Sophie waved, holding her Big Head Book of Elves, Faeries, Mermaids, Pixies, and Other Wee Folk in one hand and her little sister, Mimi’s, hand in the other. The Moodys joined them in line.

  Stink hauled his shark sleeping bag under one arm and slung his backpack, stuffed to the gills with shark stuff, over his shoulder.

  “What did you bring, Webster?” Stink asked.

  “I brought Go Fish and Critter Concentration in case we get bored. A baloney sandwich and ketchup packets in case I get hungry. And one of my Hug Uglies in case I get scared.”

  “Wow. You thought of everything.”

  “I also brought my blue-shark Tooth-Fairy pillow,” said Webster. He grinned, wiggling his loose tooth for his friends to see. “For my looth tooth.”

  “Your looth tooth?” Stink and Sophie cracked up.

  “It’s hard to say looth tooth when you have a looth tooth!” The letter S came out funny. They cracked up again. “This way I’m ready for the Tooth Fairy, in case my you-know-what falls out tonight at the you-know-where.”

  “Whoa. Did you know sharks lose around thirty-five thousand teeth in their lifetime?” Stink asked.

  “That’s a lot of Tooth Fairy,” said Webster.

  “If we were sharks, we??
?d be rich!” said Stink.

  Sophie’s little sister poked Stink. “You’re Stinky,” said Mimi.

  “I’m Stink,” said Stink. “Not Stinky.”

  “Stinky, Stinky, Stinky,” said Mimi, dancing around in circles in her tutu.

  “Are you ready for the Shark Sleepover?” asked Webster.

  “Don’t say shark around You-Know-Who,” said Sophie, nodding at Mimi.

  “Well, don’t say sleepover around You-Know-Stink,” said Judy. Stink gave Judy a stop-saying-I’m-afraid-of-sleepovers-in-front-of-my-friends look.

  Tons of people crowded outside the side entrance. There were kids and families, Cub Scouts, a Brownie troop, and a soccer team. Webster nudged Stink and nodded to a group of noisy girls holding sleeping bags.

  “Oh, no,” said Stink, “It’s Riley Rottenberger. Quick, make yourselves invisible.”

  But it was too late. Riley came over. “Hey! Who knew you guys were going to be here?”

  “We knew,” said Stink. “But what are you doing here?”

  “I’m here with my FINS group.” She waved a bunch of girls over. “This is Hannah, Anna, Emma, Olivia, and Maisy.”

  “Fins?” asked Sophie.

  “Friends in Nature Study,” said Riley.

  “But you hate nature,” said Stink. Emma and Maisy looked shocked.

  “Do not,” said Riley. “Well, maybe outside nature. But this is inside nature.”

  “This is our third FINS sleepover,” said one of the FINS.

  “Our last one was a Flower Power sleepover at the Flower Palace,” said Riley.

  “Uh-huh,” said Stink, nodding. He craned his neck, trying to see through the glass doors into the aquarium.

  “We saw plants that ate bugs.”

  “Uh-huh.” Stink was hardly listening.

  “And made duct-tape flowers.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “And we ate worms in dirt.”

  “Huh?” said Stink.

  “Gotcha!” said Riley. “It was really gummy worms in chocolate pudding.” Riley turned to her friends.

  “Stink is my study buddy from school,” Riley told the FINS. “Right, Stink?”

  Stink gulped. “I am?”

  “He likes Pluto and stuff,” Riley told them. “And we like to bug each other.”

  “We?” asked Stink. “You bug me.”

  “Yuck, yuck, yuck. See? Isn’t he funny?” Riley cackled. “Hey, guess what, Stink! I got a good game for you. It’s called Would You Rather. Would you rather . . . freeze your butt off on Pluto at minus three hundred degrees or get your insides sucked out by a giant sea anemone?”

  Riley’s friends giggled. Webster shivered. Sophie made a sourball face.

  “Riley Rottenberger,” said Stink. “With friends like you, who needs anemones?”

  As soon as the aquarium doors opened, all the sleepover groups rushed inside. Tour guides in blue aquarium shirts passed out name tags and packets of information.

  “Stink,” said Dad, “we’ll go with Sophie’s family to stake out a good spot for our sleeping bags. Judy, do you want to stay with Stink and his friends?”

  “Second graders? No way,” said Judy, shaking her head.

  “Have fun, Stink,” said Mom. “We’ll catch up with you later.”

  Stink, his friends, and the other groups sat on the floor in the center of the rotunda, just outside the Turtletorium. A milky-green sea turtle with a lost flipper munched on a head of lettuce.

  “My name is — well, you can call me Miss D.,” said their tour guide. “Tonight, we’ll explore a touch pool together and go on a sea-creature scavenger hunt. There will also be an indoor campfire with snacks later. I’ll be your guide for the evening. If you have questions, just ask me or anybody with a blue shirt on.”

  “Will there be sharks?” asked Stink.

  “There will be sharks,” said Miss D.

  “Do we really have to go to sleep?” asked Riley.

  “Yes, you really have to go to sleep. But not till we’ve had a fun evening.”

  “What does the D stand for?” asked Sophie.

  “Excuse me?”

  “Your name. Miss D. Does the D stand for Dolphin?”

  “The D is not for Dolphin.”

  “Is it for Dungeon? How about Dragon?” asked Webster.

  “Sorry,” said Miss D. “Now, if you’ll all follow me, we’ll start with —”

  “Sharks?” asked Stink, crossing his fingers. “Please say sharks.”

  “Touch pools,” said Miss D. “Follow me to the Starfish Enterprise.”

  They left the sea turtles and went past the gift shop. Stink could hear dolphins splashing in the next room as they came to two large open tanks.

  Groups of kids peered into the tide pool. Sea stars clung to rocks. Anemones waved tentacles. Crabs skittered, and snails slithered.

  “Baby octoputh!” Webster shouted. But the octopus was just a rock with spots. “False alarm,” he said.

  “See all those shells?” said Sophie. “Are those hermit crabs?”

  “Sure are,” said Miss D., picking one up. Tiny red legs, one big purple claw, and two antennas poked out of the shell.

  “Hermit crabs are my favorite,” said Sophie. Just then, Mimi ran up to Sophie.

  “Crabby, crabby, crabby,” she said, pointing.

  “These guys are ocean hermit crabs,” Miss D. told everybody.

  “Do they change shells?” asked Sophie.

  “They sure do. When they get too big for their shells, they find a bigger home to move into, like an empty snail shell. But sometimes a hermit crab can’t find a shell, and it moves into something like an old can or bottle.”

  “I had a hermit crab.” Riley talked a mile a minute. “One time, my dad dropped his pen cap in the tank and the hermit crab used it for his home.”

  “Is that true?” asked Stink. Riley Rottenberger told tall tales.

  “Of course it’s true, Stink Moody.”

  Stink looked at Riley. “A noisy noise annoys an oyster,” said Stink.

  Webster and Sophie cracked up. “Ha, ha,” said Riley. “But you’re not an oyster. So how can I annoy you?”

  “Okay, then, a noisy noise annoys a boy-ster.”

  “Listen up, people,” said Miss D-is-not-for-Dungeon-or-Dragon. She passed out maps and scavenger-hunt sheets. “Who’s ready to be a detective?”

  “D is for Detective!” said Sophie. “Miss Detective?”

  “Afraid not,” said Miss D. “But S is for scavenger hunt.”

  Everybody got into teams.

  “Our team is gonna beat you, Stink Moody,” said Riley Rottenberger. “We’re the Rotten Eggs — for Rottenberger. Get it?”

  “I get it. The last one to finish will be a Rotten Egg,” said Stink. He cracked himself up. Riley and the Rotten Eggs headed off.

  “Let’s be Team Sharkfinder,” Stink said. “We can be the ones to find Sharkzilla on the scavenger hunt.”

  Sophie shivered. Webster wiggled his loose tooth. “Who’s Tharkzilla?”

  “Don’t you guys watch Shark Week?” Stink asked. “Sharkzilla is a megalodon. He’s like the world’s biggest shark that lived around ten million years ago.”

  “What did he look like?” asked Webster.

  “He was more than fifty feet long and he weighed as much as a house. And he had two hundred and fifty teeth. They say he would be able to bite through a car.”

  “Yikes,” said Sophie. “But he’s not real, right?”

  “He was. He was like a dinosaur shark,” said Stink. “They made a model of him for Shark Week. Like a shark robot with giant chompers made of steel. He bit through a mini fridge, a Jet Ski, and a red couch in one bite.”

  Webster felt for his loose tooth to make sure it was still there. “Is he here?”

  “I wish! But I read they have one of his fins here. It’s seven feet tall and you can get your picture taken with it.”

  “This is megalo-not-boring,” said Sophie. “B
ut everybody else already started the scavenger hunt.”

  “First we have to find something that looks like a horse,” said Stink.

  They followed the map, turning it this way and that until they came to Sea Horse Alley — a dark hallway lined with glass aquariums. There were spiny sea horses and pygmy sea horses. There were sea horses with fat tummies and sea horses that looked like they had the measles.

  “What took you guys so long?” Riley and the Rotten Eggs called.

  “Looks like Team Rotten beat us here,” said Webster.

  “What’s next?” asked Sophie.

  “Next we find something that looks like a bat,” said Stink.

  They wandered past the Sponge Zone and the Octopus’s Garden. They gazed up at wolf eels and schools of sardines and señoritas swimming through the swaying fronds of the kelp forest.

  At last, they came to Manta Ray Magic.

  In no time, they spotted the bat ray. “Na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na — Bat Ray!” sang Stink and Webster.

  “Bat rays lose tons of teeth from crushing shells to eat stuff,” said Stink.

  “Just like me!” said Webster.

  Riley walked past the Sharkfinders on her way out of Manta Ray Magic. “We are the Rotten Eggs,” she said to them, trying to sound like a bad guy from a Batman movie. “Learn it well, Stink Moody. It is the sound of your doom.”

  Stink turned to his friends. “Hurry up, guys. Now we have to find something that looks like a brain.”

  “Half the stuff in the aquarium looks like a brain,” said Webster.

  Seals barked in the background as Team Sharkfinder entered Nemo’s Reef. Wall-to-wall fish tanks held colorful clown fish playing hide-and-seek among sea anemones and neon-bright coral. One looked just like a floating brain!

  They all took a moment to gaze in amazement at the eerie, greenish, glow-in-the-dark brain coral.

  But Riley and her Rotten Eggs had beaten them to it again.

  “What did one brain say to the other brain?” asked Riley.

  Stink shrugged.

  “I’m going to outsmart you, Team Sharkfinder.”

  Clue by clue, the Sharkfinders found a porcupine fish, a fairy penguin, and an electric eel.