Stink and the Freaky Frog Freakout (Book #8) (7 page)

“Ta-da!” Stink pulled off the Spider-Man pajama top in one swoop.

Webster stuttered. “H-h-h-he . . . it’s . . . f-f-frog . . . n-n-not . . .”

“Bl-bl-blue!” shouted Sophie, pointing. “Frog!”

Webster’s eyes were as round as quarters. “Smurf city!”

“Meet King Otto the Third! Radioactive mutant ninja frog!” said Stink.

“So, you mean, he glows blue because he’s
radioactive
?” asked Sophie.

Stink nodded. He told them all about finding the freaky frog. He showed them the spot on his arm that he would never ever wash.

Stink told them about his newfound frog tendencies. He stuck out his tongue and touched the tip of his nose to prove it.

“Look!” Sophie pointed to Stink’s feet. “Your toes. They’re part webbed!”

“You’re turning into a frog from the feet up,” said Webster.

“Just my second and third toes,” said Stink. “I got it from my Grandma Lou. She has the same thing. Judy, too.”

“Phew,” said Webster.

“But . . .” Stink wiggled his toes. “Now that you mention it, it
does
look a little more webbed than normal.”

“And how else do you explain the raisins, and the worms, and swimming in the sink and —”

“And you have a best friend named
Web
-ster,” said Webster.

“And your favorite color is
green
,” said Sophie. “Yipes! We gotta do something. Before you start
glowing.”

“We better go talk to Jasper,” said Stink. “Stat.”

“Huh?” said Webster.

“Huh?” said Sophie.

“That means pronto, super-quick, right away!”

“Do you think your mom or dad will take us?” asked Webster.

“Let’s ask,” said Sophie.

“Tally ho!” said Stink, just like Peter Parker.

*   *   *

Stink told Mom he had an A-1 super-important frog mission. Mom dropped Stink and his friends off at the nature center.

Jasper O’Farrell told Stink he’d seen his share of frogs. He’d seen two-toed and three-legged frogs. He’d seen frogs with extra legs and frogs with extra eyes and frogs with no legs and frogs with only one eye. He’d seen frogs with shrunken heads and frogs with kinked tails. He’d even seen albino frogs.

But never-ever-ever in his long-legged life had Jasper O’Farrell seen a true blue frog up close and personal.

He squinted at the blue frog from every angle. He scratched his little beard. He peered at the frog with a magnifying glass.

“Well?” Stink rocked back and forth on his feet.

Jasper scratched his tiny beard some more.

“What do you think?” asked Stink. “Is he a mutant? Is he radioactive?”

“If the frog is radioactive, and the frog licked Stink, is Stink going to start glowing in the dark?” asked Sophie.

“Are we going to have to start calling Stink
Smurf
?” asked Webster.

“I have to say, I’ve never seen anything like it,” said Jasper.

“Freak of nature!” said Webster.

“Maybe he’s a rare blue poison dart frog,” said Stink. “Who hopped all the way here from South America.”

“Nope. I don’t think so. I don’t want to leap to conclusions, but —”

“
Leap
to conclusions. I get it!” said Stink.

“I’m almost sure this guy’s a mutant. My professor taught me about abnormal colors in frogs. I bet this froggy’s color got messed up. He’s probably missing his yellow.”

“Huh?” asked Stink.

“Okay. Think of art class,” said Jasper. “If you mix blue and yellow paint, it looks green, right?” All three kids nodded. “It’s the same for a frog. They have three kinds of pigment cells, and the top one is yellow. If they’re missing the yellow, they look blue to us.”

“Cosmic,” said Stink.

“Thanks for bringing him in, Stink. This is better than a barking tree frog! I’d like to show him to my professor. Then we’ll see if we can release this little guy safely back into the wild.”

“Sure,” said Stink. He looked at the Frog Logs all over Jasper’s desk. “Hey, did we count a lot of frogs last night?”

“We sure did,” said Jasper. “More than I thought. That’s the good news. The bad news is that there are three kinds of chorus frogs, and we only heard two kinds.”

“Bummer,” said Stink. “Should we count again?”

“We were going to wait till next year,” said Jasper. “But now we just might have another frog count this summer.”

“Sweet,” said Stink. “That’s only eighty-something days away.”

Jasper laughed.

“Plus,” said Stink, “It gives me time to knock on doors and get the neighbors to stop using fertilizers and stuff that’s messing up the frogs.”

“Good thinking,” said Jasper, tapping the side of his head.

“We’ll help you, Stink,” said Sophie.

“Yeah, we want to save the frogs, too,” said Webster.

Jasper walked Stink and his friends to the door. “Bye, King Otto the Third,” Stink and his friends called.

“Be careful he doesn’t lick you,” Sophie warned Jasper.

“Yeah,” said Stink. “You might suddenly start eating raisins or get the urge to make mud pies or sleep in the basement or go swimming in the sink.”

Jasper raised one eyebrow at Stink.

“I’m just saying.”

Stink turned to leave. “Bye, Jasper. If you start to glow in the dark, call me.”

The next day, when Sophie and Webster came over, Stink was sitting on his bed, wearing his swim goggles.

“What’s he doing?” asked Webster.

“I don’t know,” said Judy. “He hasn’t moved his head for like an hour. And he wants me to call him Frog Eyes.”

“Frogs don’t move their heads,” said Stink. “Just their eyes.”

“Why are you wearing goggles inside the house?” Sophie asked.

“No swimming today,” said Webster. “It’s Sunday.”

“It’s my third eyelid,” said Stink. “Frogs have an extra eyelid so they can see underwater.”

Judy snorted. “He still thinks he’s turning into a frog. No lie.”

Webster shined a flashlight in Stink’s eyes. “He is blinking a lot. Frogs blink a lot, too.”

Sophie touched his arm. “His skin does feel a little cool. And slippery.”

“But who ever heard of a frog that doesn’t swim?” said Judy. “You won’t even put your head underwater, Stink. Face it. Once a Polliwog, always a Polliwog.”

“For your information,” said Stink. “A polliwog is a tadpole. And a tadpole turns into a frog.”

Judy shrugged.

“And I’m blinking because that’s what frogs do,” said Stink. “Frogs use their eyeballs to swallow bugs. No lie. They don’t have teeth, so their eyes push back in their head to force the food down.”

Webster looked at Sophie. Sophie looked at Webster.

“But you don’t eat with your eyeballs,” said Webster.

“And you definitely don’t eat bugs,” said Sophie.

Stink got up. He air-swam over to his desk. He fished inside his desk drawer till he found something. Something better than an Almost Joy candy bar. Better than a box of Milk Dudes. Better than a jawbreaker!

A lollipop. Not just any old lollipop. A real-live dead-bug lollipop! A bright orange, sugar-free lollipop with a for-real cricket inside.

Blink. Blink-blink.

“You’re not really going to lick that, are you?” asked Webster.

Blink-blink-blink.

“Please tell me you’re not going to eat a cricket,” Sophie said.

“Where’d you get that thing?” Judy asked.

“Had it. Since last Halloween. I just never wanted to eat it before.” Stink took off the wrapper and stuck out his tongue.

L-i-i-i-i-ck!

Stink slurped his sucker. He licked that lollipop with his long tongue. He got sticky stuff on his nose, and he licked that, too.

When he got to the cricket inside, he took a bite.
Munch-munch!
He took another bite.
CRUNCH!

He swallowed.
Blinkblinkblinkblink-blink. GULP!

Stink smiled, showing off a tiny cricket leg stuck in his teeth!