Free Boys Rock! by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor Page A

think it’s a fun idea. It’s the principle of the thing,” said Eddie. “They tricked us when they named the paper. Now we should get what we want. They are so immature. There must be a way. …”
    “Maybe if we stall long enough, they’ll get tired and go home,” Caroline suggested.
    Mr. Malloy appeared in the doorway again. “I mean
now
!” he thundered, and Caroline knew he meant it.
    “Listen,” Beth said to her sisters. “There’s a swing vote here. Peter’s.”
    Eddie and Caroline began to smile.
    “And you know what will change his mind,” said Beth.
    “Cookies!” Eddie and Caroline said together.
    They walked to the end of the driveway, where the boys were parading back and forth between the mailbox and the lilac bush. Peter marched like a soldier, his back straight, his sign high over his head.
    “You want to negotiate?” Eddie asked Jake.
    “What’s to negotiate?” Jake answered. “We don’t want our baby pictures published,
period
!”
    “Well, why don’t you come up to the house where it’s cool and we’ll discuss it,” Eddie told them.
    The boys seemed ready for a break.
    “All right. A fifteen-minute break, that’s all,” said Josh.
    Up the driveway they went. Mr. and Mrs. Malloy were in the living room talking about the job contract back in Ohio. Eddie led the Hatford boys to the kitchen, and they all sat around the big table.
    “Now, we just want to discuss this calmly like intelligent human beings,” said Eddie. “A newspaper needs to please its customers, and readers enjoy things like crossword puzzles and quizzes and matching names and stuff. You know how magazines often have pictures of famous people—movie stars and basketball players—and you’re supposed to match them with their high school graduation pictures?”
    “We’re not famous people,” said Wally
    “Yet!” said Caroline.
    “So if we want to please our readers, we need to lose a little pride,” said Eddie. “Beth and Caroline and I are certainly ready to do
our
part. Here are three pictures of us when we were babies.”
    She went into the dining room and returned with three photos:
    Eddie at eighteen months in baseball pajamas, with a much too large baseball cap all but hiding her eyes. Cute as the dickens.
    Beth in an adorable pair of overalls, holding a huge storybook on her lap, bigger than she was, almost, her mouth open as though reading the book to herself. Absolutely precious.
    Caroline dressed as an Easter bunny, huge ears towering over her head. Utterly charming.
    “Yeah? And where are the pictures you tricked Mom into giving you?” asked Jake.
    Eddie went back into the dining room and returned with four more photos. She held them up one at a time, out of the boys’ reach:
    Jake in a waterlogged diaper standing out under the sprinkler.
    Josh sound asleep in a laundry basket, his T-shirt pulled up, showing his round belly.
    Wally with both hands plunged into a birthday cake, half the frosting on his face.
    And Peter staring wide-eyed at the camera, a pacifier stuck in his mouth like a cork in a bottle.
    “They’re cute!” Caroline insisted.
    “No!” said Jake. “They’re embarrassing and stupid.”
    “And we
don’t
want you to put them in our paper,” said Josh.
    “I know!” said Beth. “Let’s vote! But first, does anyone want some lemonade?”
    “I do!” sang out Peter, swinging his legs in anticipation.
    “Yeah, I’ll take some,” said Josh.
    Eddie got down the glasses and then the ice. She poured each boy a large glass.
    “Cookies?” said Beth.
    “Yes!” Peter said loudly, starting to grin.
    Caroline and Eddie exchanged knowing glances as Beth got the cookie canister and opened it. Her face fell. There was only one broken cookie left, and it was stale. That, and a handful of crumbs.
    “Didn’t Mom bake yesterday?” Beth asked in dismay.
    “Apparently not,” said Eddie.
    Peter stared sullenly down at the piece of cookie in front of him.
    “Let’s vote!”