by Linda Opp –
Thursday was spaghetti and meatball night at Amanda’s house.
Amanda loved spaghetti. She loved the spicy tomato sauce and chewy meatballs. She loved the long loopy noodles and the extra cheese. She loved the buttery garlic bread.
But there was one enormous problem.
Spaghetti was messy. It was wild and unpredictable. Even when Amanda fought back by using her best manners, spaghetti won.
On the first spaghetti night, Amanda carefully lifted a forkful of spaghetti to her mouth. Unfortunately, a river of slurpy red tomato sauce dribbled off her chin and splashed onto the front of her pink ballerina tee-shirt.
“Whoops,” said Amanda.
“Gross,” said her older brother, Thomas.
On the second spaghetti night, Amanda got the first forkful of spaghetti and sauce all the way into her mouth. Unfortunately, she had to sneeze suddenly. Noodles and tomato sauce flew out of her mouth and landed on her white skirt.
“Sorry,” said Amanda.
“Disgusting,” said Thomas.
On the third spaghetti night, Amanda reached for the basket of garlic bread. Unfortunately, her elbow mashed the meatball already on her plate. The meatball left a mushy red blob on the sleeve of her lavender sweater.
“Oh no,” said Amanda.
“Yuck,” said Thomas.
Spaghetti was not only messy and wild and unpredictable. It was dangerous. And Amanda was running out of clothes that hadn’t been ruined by spaghetti sauce.
On the fourth spaghetti night, Mom and Dad asked Amanda and Thomas to clean out their closets while dinner cooked. Mom gave them each a large paper grocery bag to fill with clothes they couldn’t wear anymore. Amanda folded the stained pink ballerina tee-shirt and the splattered white skirt and the splotched lavender sweater and put them in her bag. Then she went to Thomas’s room to see what he was cleaning out of his closet.
Thomas had stuffed his bag full of pants and jeans that were too short and shirts that were too small. A long red sleeve hung over the edge of his grocery bag. Amanda tugged on the sleeve, and out came the rest of Thomas’s old red shirt.
Amanda spread the shirt on Thomas’s bed. She looked at it for a long time.
“Wow,” she said. “Can I keep it?”
“What for?” Thomas asked.
Amanda tried on the red shirt over the top of her green dress. The shirt hung below her knees and buttoned up tight under her chin. The long sleeves flapped over her fingertips.
“Perfect!” said Amanda.
“Ridiculous,” said Thomas.
“Dinnertime!” called Dad.
Amanda got to the table first. She settled in her chair and smoothed the long shirttails over her lap. She rolled up the cuffs to her wrists.
Now she was ready for wild, messy, dangerous spaghetti. Sneezes and splashes could not hurt her wonderful red shirt. Mashed meatballs could not defeat it.
The red shirt caught every drip, slurp, drop and splatter. Under the shirt, Amanda’s green dress stayed perfectly unstained.
“Clever,” said Thomas.
“Thank you,” said Amanda.
the end.
Question Time:
1. What are some things Amanda loves about spaghetti?
2. What happened on the second spaghetti night?
3. On the fourth night, what did Mom and Dad ask Amanda and her brother to do while dinner was cooking?
4. What was Amanda’s spaghetti solution?
