Judy Moody Saves the World! (9 page)

All the next week, Class 3T piled up a mountain of bottles in the multipurpose room. Bags of bottles, boxes of bottles, bins full of bottles. “Great teamwork, class,” said Mr. Todd. “Did you know we throw away two and a half million plastic bottles every hour in this country? In three months, we throw away enough bottles to circle the globe.”

“Look out!” said Rocky. “Bottles are taking over the earth!”

“People should recycle them,” said Jessica Finch. “My dad has a jacket made out of recycled plastic bottles. My socks are made out of bottles, too.”

“No way,” said Judy. She turned around to take a look at the plastic-bottle socks. They looked regular. They did not look plastic at all.

“It’s true,” said Mr. Todd. “All that plastic can be recycled to make toys and coat hangers and picture frames. Even recycling bins!”

“How many bottles do you think we have so far?” asked Jessica.

“Let’s pile them up all together to see how high they go,” said Brad.

Class 3T spent their Math class piling up bottles and more bottles.

“We should call it Bottle Mountain,” said Rocky.

“Double cool,” said Frank. “It looks like a giant igloo.”

When they had added every last bottle, Mr. Todd said, “Tomorrow’s the big day. Tomorrow we’ll find out the grand total number of bottles we have. Our principal, Ms. Tuxedo, will make an announcement to tell the school how much money we’ve raised. Now let’s hurry back to class so nobody misses the bus.”

“Tomorrow!” said Judy. “That’s twenty-four more hours!” She couldn’t wait to find out how many trees would be planted in the rain forest for the Virginia Dare School.

When Judy and Rocky stepped off the bus on Friday morning, Ms. Tuxedo was standing outside the school doors. “How’s it going, you two?”

“Pretty good, I guess,” said Judy.

“Today we find out how many trees we’re going to plant,” said Rocky.

“That’s right,” the principal said. “You both have a good day.” And she winked. Judy looked at Rocky. Rocky looked at Judy. In Judy Moody’s entire third-grade life, she was sure she had never seen the principal wink at anybody.

Judy and Rocky hurried to the multipurpose room before class to look at the mountain of bottles again, but the doors were locked. When they got to 3T, Mr. Todd was standing in the doorway. “Isn’t it a lovely Friday?” he said. Then he winked. In Judy Moody’s entire third-grade life, she had never heard Mr. Todd say the word
lovely
. And for sure and absolute positive, she had never seen him wink.

“Something’s up,” she told Rocky.

Judy sat down next to Frank. “Know what? Something’s funny. All the teachers have a winking disease today.”

“A winking disease?”

“Yeah, you know, when they wink at you and say nice things.”

While Judy waited for the day to begin, she looked around the room at all the kids in her ecosystem. Not one third-grader was absent. And every single person in Class 3T had pitched in and collected bottles.

“Class,” said Mr. Todd, blinking the lights to get their attention. “Announcements. Listen up.”

Judy Moody squirmed all through morning announcements. A Mexican jumping bean could have done a better job of sitting still.

“And now,” came Ms. Tuxedo’s voice over the PA system, “the moment you’ve been waiting for . . .” Judy Moody sat up super straight and used her best third-grade listening ears.

“As you know, Mr. Todd’s room, Class 3T, has been collecting bottles this week to raise money for the rain forest. This money will go, on behalf of the Virginia Dare School, to plant trees in the Children’s Rain Forest in Costa Rica. Thanks to Class 3T, the Virginia Dare School has collected 1,961 bottles. That means we will be planting ninety-eight trees to help save the rain forest.”

Ninety-eight! Suddenly, Judy remembered the dollars from her dad. Two more dollars meant two more trees. One hundred trees! Class 3T went wild, jumping up and down, clapping and whooping and hooting like owls.

“We’d like to show our appreciation to our third graders in a special assembly today at 2:30. This will provide the whole school with a chance to give them a big hand and show them how proud we are of their hard work and their efforts for such a good cause.”

“Lunch today is Sloppy Joes,” Ms. Tuxedo continued. “Tickets go on sale Monday for the school fair. And will Judy Moody please report to the front office?”

“Uh-oh. Judy’s in trouble,” Jessica Finch said.

“Nobody’s in trouble,” said Mr. Todd. “Judy’s going to represent our class at the assembly today. After all, she got us thinking about our pencils, and before we knew it, we were planting trees in the rain forest. Judy, go ahead down to the office and find out what Ms. Tuxedo would like you to do.”

Judy walked as fast as she could without running down the great green halls of the Virginia Dare School to the front office. The third-grade papier-mâché masks outside the classroom seemed to wink at her. The second-grade self-portraits grinned. And the first-grade sunflowers on the wall stood up prouder.

Ms. Tuxedo took Judy into the multipurpose room. The principal showed Judy where to sit in the front row and told her when to come up on stage.

“When I call you up on stage, I’ll hand you something for your class. You accept it, then walk across the stage and rejoin your class.”

“Is it a certificate?” asked Judy.

“It’s a surprise! It’ll be fun. You’ll see,” said the principal. And she winked. So
this
is what all the winking is about, Judy thought.

At 2:25, Mr. Todd’s class hurried to the multipurpose room. Judy took her seat in the front row.

The room was dark. The curtains went up. A single spotlight shone on Ms. Tuxedo. Everybody clapped.

“Today, boys and girls, we are here to show how proud we are of Class 3T. They showed excellent teamwork on a project raising money to plant trees in the Children’s Rain Forest in Costa Rica. Because of them, one hundred trees will be planted for the Virginia Dare School. Margaret Mead says, ‘Never doubt that a small group of concerned people can change the world.’ Our special thanks to 3T for helping to change the world!”

Everybody cheered and clapped some more.

“Ranger Piner is here as our special guest from the County Parks Department. They have donated a cedar tree, like the ones in the rain forest, to the Virginia Dare School. Right after the assembly, Ranger Piner will help Mr. Todd’s class plant the tree in front of our school.

“To show our appreciation, I have here, for every member of the class, a T-shirt and a gift certificate for one free Rain Forest Mist ice-cream cone from Screamin’ Mimi’s.” Ms. Tuxedo waved an envelope in the air, and held up one of the T-shirts. It said TURN PLASTIC INTO TREES under a picture of a tree made out of bottles.

Judy’s class jumped up and down and hooted some more. A T-shirt with words! And the kind of certificate that got you a free ice cream! Saving the world was even better than Judy thought.

“There’s one person who proved to be a good friend to the whole planet and I’d like her to come up on stage — Judy Moody!”

Judy looked back at Mr. Todd. He motioned for her to go up on stage.

Judy Moody stood in the bright beam of light and tried not to squint. She looked out at all her classmates from 3T who had helped plant trees to save the rain forest. They waved their hands in the air and gave a howler-monkey hoot.