The Reinvention of Moxie Roosevelt Read Online Free PDF

I had her by the arm and was leading her out the door.
    “It’s right there in the schedule—the important . . . It has to do with . . .” Oh, what was the word I needed? What was it?
    “Orientation?” my mother asked.
    “Exactly!” I cried.“Yes. Gotta get to Educational Enrichment orientation—cannot miss that. So important. And I’m already late.”
    Now all four of us were standing in the center room. My father was checking his watch and adjusting his glasses. Spinky was watching me and my mother with a small smile on her face.
    “I’ll call you tonight,” I said.
    My father, never comfortable with situations that involved a) possibly emotional good-byes, or b) proximity to a green-haired teenage girl, spoke up.
    “Well then, we better get going. Mox, take care of yourself.”
    He gave me his signature hug-noogie hybrid, rubbing the top of my head with his knuckles.
    “Bye Dad.”
    I gave my mother a hug. When I felt tears in my eyes, I thought about my plantar wart again.
    “Bye, Mom.”
    Okay. I was making progress. Hugs and good-byes had been exchanged.
    “Drive safely,” I added, because it looked like they needed a touch more help getting out of the room.
    I was getting ready to put my hand on my mother’s back and physically usher her into the hallway when my dad suddenly took her hand and started leading her out.
    “Okay then, Mox. Call if you need anything, anything at all,” he said.
    “Bye, honey,” my mother said from the doorway.
    I waved. I felt bad to have basically ejected them from my room, but I had clearly ended up with the coolest new kid in school as my roommate, and I couldn’t let my mother turn it into a federal case.
    When they were safely out of sight, I made an explosive sound of irritation. Spinky looked thoughtful.
    “They didn’t seem that bad. Well, your mom was a little tense, maybe. Hey, do the tuna need to be saved? I thought it was the dolphins.”
    I sighed.
    “It said Save the Tundra ,” I told her wearily.
    Spinky’s expression told me that explained a great deal.
    “She didn’t like me. That’s for sure.”
    I stared at Spinky in alarm, thinking fast.
    “It’s actually because . . . you . . . look a lot like this other girl who was . . . you know. I’m not really supposed to talk about it—but this other girl who kind of . . . also had to choose between community service and boarding school.”
    “Ah, the Bad Influence,” Spinky said, grinning.
    “Yeah. Anyway, she chose community service. And my mother kind of has a . . . thing about her.”
    “Righteous. Doesn’t bother me, Mox.” Spinky waved her hand like she was swatting away a fly. “I stopped worrying about that stuff a long time ago. But speaking of parents, I gotta go Graham Bell the Aged Ps.”
    I hesitated. What? My stomach started rumbling again.
    Spinky gave me a leprechaun grin.
    “I gotta go call my parents. I actually flew out of Oregon last night, and I was supposed to check in with them first thing this morning. They get anxious.”
    I nodded, a little relieved Spinky was leaving. It was a lot harder than I’d thought to maintain the DUCKI personality for more than a few minutes at a time. It wasn’t just coming up with stuff to say, but actually saying it out loud that was tricky. But so far, I felt like I’d done okay after a few false starts. I felt pretty confident that to Spinky, I appeared to be an edgy, cool, detached, and possibly criminal person—minus my current outfit of Dockers and a faded pink T-shirt that said “I Love Tofu.” Hopefully, she’d decided that I was a worthy roommate for her, that Moxie Roosevelt Kipper was Trouble.
    Spinky walked out into the hallway, then stuck her head back in the door.
    “I forgot to ask. How’s your butt?”
    Zounds.

Chapter Four
    I hadn’t invented the “required thing” I’d used to ward off my parents. There really was something on the schedule from 3:00 to 4:00—new students’ Educational Enrichment