Dodger for Sale by Jordan Sonnenblick

and hoisted me out of the tub. I looked at him. Lizzie looked at me. He looked at Lizzie. Although he was still looking kind of dazed and was rubbing the top of his head with one hand, he sounded like he was back to normal as he said, “So, Lizzie, am I a great kisser, or what?”
    She elbowed him in the ribs and said, “I swear to you, Dodger, if I get warts on my face from this, I’ll—”
    “Wait a minute, you two!” I said. “Dodger, what happened? Where’s my sister?”
    Just then, there was a POOF! and Rodger appeared next to Lizzie. The bathroom was getting rather crowded. “Dodger,” he said, “did you send out a distress call? Are you all right, safe, A-Okay, peachy-keen, hunky-dory—?”
    Dodger put his other hand on his head and sat down next to me on the edge of the tub. “No, I’m not okay. Dudes, it was horrible! I tried to protect Amy, but they zapped me too fast. And there were so many of them. They burst into the house without even knocking. They were screaming and yelling at each other, blowing whistles, barking orders that didn’t make any sense as they came clumping up the stairs. Amy was in her room, and they stormed straight in there and started bossing her around. I tried to talk to them, but they wouldn’t listen to anyone but themselves. They had no mercy. They had no pity. They had really clunky, old-fashioned footwear!”
    “Oh, no,” Rodger exclaimed. “It can’t be! Willie’s sister has been kidnapped—by a bunch of elementary-school principals?”
    “Worse than that, Rodger.” He took a deep, shuddering breath, and I could see Rodger wondering what in the world could be scarier than a pack of principals.
    Then Rodger said, “Lunch ladies?”
    Ugh. That
would
be worse. But Dodger shook his head.
    “No, bro, I
wish
it had been lunch ladies. But it’s even more totally horrible-riffic than that.”
    “Dodger,” Lizzie said, “I don’t think ‘horrible-riffic’ is a word, actually.”
    “Can we please focus?” I asked. “Dodger, just tell us: Who took my sister?”
    Dodger shuddered and said, “Sprites, Rodger. The dreaded sprites.”
    “Sprites? Amy was kidnapped by a group of sodas?”
    Lizzie chimed in. “No, Rodger. Sprites are mythical woodland creatures. You know, pixies, elves, fairies …”
    “Leprechauns,” Dodger added.
    “All right,” I asked, “so what’s so scary about the leprechauns? They’re only, like, a foot and a half tall.”
    Dodger fired back, “The leprechauns might be small, but they’re totally tough. And tricky—if you look away from one for even a second, he goes POOF!”
    Yes, we had already noticed that. “All right, so what happened after they came in?”
    “I told you, they zapped me and I turned into a frog. They also cast a Shoe Spell on your mom.”
    “A Shoe Spell?”
    “Yes, the dreaded Curse of the Comfortable High Heel. Your mom is sitting downstairs now, staring at a magical, perfectly comfortable high-heeled shoe—hypnotized. Don’t worry, she’ll be fine once we wake her up, although she may develop a strange dissatisfaction with all of her dress shoes. Anyway, then they grabbed Amy. Their leader guy kept saying, ‘She is the chosen one! She is the chosen one!’ She was kicking and yelling, but they did some kind of magic spell thing and she fell asleep. The next thing I knew, like, twelve of the little dudes picked her up on their shoulders and carried her out the door. I tried to go after them, but I couldn’t turn the doorknob!”
    “So what DID you do?”
    Dodger looked a little sheepish. “I, um, ate a fly.”
    Lizzie’s eyebrows shot up. “You ATE a fly?”
    “Dude, for your information, flies happen to be delicious. They have this thin, crunchy outer coating, and then on the inside there’s this juicy, zesty burst of flavor!”
    Lizzie just looked at him.
    “What? Was I supposed to just let him fly around annoying everybody all day? And waste all those essential vitamins and