Katy Kelly_Lucy Rose 01 by Lucy Rose: Here's the Thing About Me Read Free Book Online

kids around.”
    She said, “It's a deal.”
    And I said, “If you get to be a principal don't make the just-starting teachers feel nervous, okay?”
    And he said that was a deal too.
    On the last day my dad and I had room service muffins and they came with the tiniest jar of strawberry jam that is the cutest thing in America. I saved it for my mom for a present. Then, while we were eating, I asked my dad, “Can you move to Washington and can we go back to being unsepa-rated?”
    But he said, “I'm sorry because I know you would like that, but no. Your mom and I talked it over a lot, Lucy Rose, and this is what we need to do.”
    I am sorry too but that is what I had the feeling he would say. He also said he loves me and misses me and that my mom is one good mother and I said, “I am one person who agrees with that.”
    And he said, “I'll come see you on Presidents' Day weekend for sure.”
    And I told my dad, “You are one good pal and one good pal-indrome.”
    Then I told him that came from original thinking.
    And he agreed.

JANUARY

January 8
    If I was the writer of “Dear Lucy Rose” this would be my best recommendation for kids: Do NOT eat licorice before breakfast, especially if you have the kind of mother that is firm about breakfast and not wild for sugar, and I do have that kind exactly
    Here is why I know this is good advice: Back at Halloween I made a deal with myself that I would eat one piece of candy every morning. I also made a deal that I would not tell my mom because it is for sure that she would not approve. So, I have been keeping all my candy under my bed in a party shoe box from the Payless store which is a secret from everybody except Jonique. Every morning after I brush my teeth I eat one piece, usually while I put on my socks and if it is chewy it lasts until I tie on my cowgirl bandana if I am wearing it which I usually am. In November I ate the Twix bars and the Skittles and the peanut M&M 's. And in December I ate the plain M&M's and the Snickers and Reese's Peanut Butter Cupsplus the chocolate Santa that was in my stocking.
    So now that winter break is over the only things left are the not-so-hot ones like Goldeberg 's Peanut Chews and stretchy orange circus peanuts which I actually hate and one teensy box of hard raisins and some stuck-together black licorice. And since I am going from best to worst and I like licorice better than raisins, I ate it. Actually I ate all the pieces because since they were stuck they only count as one. And when I got downstairs my mom said, “Lucy Rose, what is the matter with your teeth?”
    And I said, “Nothing.”
    But she said, “Did you eat something?”
    So I said, “No,” and kept my lips down so she couldn't look. And then I sat down at the new table for a V8 juice which I love but this is the thing I never knew before: When your mouth tastes like black licorice and then you drink V8, it turns into the worst flavor you could ever think of. I mean the absolutely, extremely worst. And I couldn't spit it out. And that was the very minute I started to learn the hardest lesson.
    We were having a rushing morning because we were late like anything which is rather usual for us.My mom was putting cream cheese on a bagel so I could eat it on the walk to school, and right then she said, “Shake a leg, Lucy Rose. Drink your juice so we can hit the road.”
    I did not want to tell her about the lie so I swallowed it up and it tasted so bad it made me feel woozy in the stomach and in the head. I was still trying not to talk on account of not wanting to show my teeth but nodding my head to say yes made it feel even spinnier. And then we had to rush into our coats and I smooshed my feet into my cowgirl boots and we got going but I felt terrible like you could not believe. We walked down Fourth Street, past Mrs. Greeley 's house which has a SOLD sign in the front yard and past an old, used-up Christmas tree someone put out for the trash and then we turned on