Author's Note
Hello, friends and fans!
While experiencing a recent case of writer's block during my revising and rewriting the last chapter of "A Tattler's Wail of a Tale", I happened to come across an airing of "Potty Mouth" on TV. Though I'm glad to say it got my creative juices flowing again, it was for a completely different idea. And I felt this opportunity was too good to pass up.
That being said, I hope you enjoy the first part of this brief two-shot set after the bleep heard at the end of "Potty Mouth".
The Loud House, including its characters, episodes, and dialogue are the property of Nickelodeon and Chris Savino.
—
Chapter 1: Grawlix In the Family
With a baker's dozen inhabiting the residence located at 1216 Franklin Avenue in Royal Woods, Michigan, the Loud House has always lived up to its namesake.
But today was one of the very rare instances where the Loud House was, in fact, silent. At that moment in time, you could've heard a pin drop.
This was because the youngest member of the extensive Loud family, 15-month-old Lily, had just angrily blurted out a very colorful expletive. It just so happened that the expletive in question started with the same number of letters it contained.
Following the toddler's outburst, twelve jaws had dropped in pure, unadulterated shock. As if to exemplify said shock, a picture frame had also dropped to the floor and shattered on impact.
Once the shock value of the situation finally wore off, the matriarch of the Loud family, Rita, walked over to Lily, picked her up and handed the toddler over to her husband, Lynn Sr.
"Honey, take Lily upstairs," she spoke in a firm, fuming voice. Recognizing his wife's sudden change in tone, Lynn Sr. silently and obediently brought Lily upstairs.
Once Lynn Sr. left the room, Rita turned back to her other 10 children. Lori, Leni, Luna, Luan, Lynn, Lincoln, Lucy, Lana, Lola and Lisa noticed that their mother had now furrowed her eyebrows, angrily pursed her lips, and was red in the face. "The rest of you . . . in the dining room . . . now." She extended her arm and pointed to said location.
This caused the ten Loud children to nervously gulp in unison.
—
It was dead silent all around the dining room table. At the head of the table sat Rita, with her hands folded and her head bowed in deep concentration, almost as if in prayer. She inhaled sharply through her nose and slowly exhaled through her mouth. She repeated this process a few more times before finally raising her head, opening her eyes and surveying the scene before her. Her children were watching and waiting with bated breath; fear was etched in their faces and evident in their body language. Beads of sweat had promptly begun to form on their foreheads. It was painfully obvious that the suspense was killing them.
At long last, the Loud matriarch broke the silence.
"Does anyone have anything to say about that . . . colorful expletive . . . I just heard come out of my 15-month-old daughter's mouth?"
Lincoln chuckled sheepishly and hesitantly spoke up. "Uh, what, um . . . makes you . . . think it was us, Mom?"
Rita, however, was not impressed with her only son's attempt at deflection. " 'Please don't blame Lily for saying the D-word—it's our fault'?" she parroted. Lincoln nervously rubbed the back of his head and turned his gaze away from his mother.
Rita then turned to her eldest daughter, Lori. " 'She was literally just imitating our bad behavior'?" Lori bit her lip nervously and, like her brother, turned away from her mother's judgmental glare. "Lana, Luna, Lynn, does that include your earlier meddling during Lily's interview?"
The three aforementioned Loud girls exchanged uncertain glances with each other. Unfortunately, it served to confirm in Rita's mind that there must have been a reason for the meddling in the first place.
"That's what I thought. Now, who wants to tell me what happened while your father and I were gone?"
In response, each of the Loud sisters touched their noses with their index fingers. "Dibs, not it!" they collectively shouted.
Realizing what was going on, Lincoln quickly followed suit. Unfortunately, he was the last one to do it. "Daaa-arn it!" he shouted, quickly stopping himself at the last minute. "I always lose that!"
Lincoln shot daggers at his sisters, who looked back at him apologetically, before turning his attention to his mother. She had now crossed her arms and was tapping the index finger of her right hand methodically against her left arm.
With another nervous chuckle, Lincoln once more worked up to nerve to speak. "Well, you see, it's kind of a long story, Mom."
"Then make it short," Rita curtly demanded.
"Um, o-okay, then. When we first thought Lily had cursed, we enacted 'Operation: Delete the D-word', and spent the hour before Lily's interview trying to extract said word from her vocabulary by trying to have her imitate better behavior. We orchestrated different, uh, events that would've led to us saying the D-word. But we ended up substituting the results for something more . . . age appropriate in hopes that Lily would imitate that instead." Once Lincoln finished, he again chuckled nervously.
Rita, however, showed no emotion and retained her stone cold glare. She looked to her right. Then she looked to her left. A long, tense minute passed before she spoke up again.
"Well, then. It would seem as if we have an epidemic on our hands. Which means, there's only one thing to do."
The Loud matriarch leaned to her right, reaching under the table and then pulled up a small white bowl. Inside the bowl were what looked to be a plethora of multicolored hard candies. Rita set the bowl in front of Lori.
"Ooh, candy!" Leni said excitedly.
"Take one and pass the bowl around," Rita instructed.
Lori obeyed, taking a light blue hard candy and popping it in her mouth before pushing the bowl down to Leni. Leni then copied her older sister, taking a turquoise hard candy and then moving the bowl over to Luan, who extracted a yellow hard candy from the bowl before sending it on its way. This process repeated in a counterclockwise fashion, with each Loud child taking their respective colored hard candy and transporting the bowl around the table. When the bowl finally got back to Rita, it was empty.
All around the table, the Loud children savored their sweet treat. Maybe this wouldn't be so bad, after all.
"Mmm. Are these supposed to be jawbreakers?" Lincoln asked.
"It's unlike any jawbreaker I've had before," Lynn replied.
"It's got this distinctive flavor I literally can't put my finger on," Lori inputted.
"If my taste buds are correct, they're starting to detect a bitter, salty taste to this confectionary," Lisa analyzed.
"Yeah, I'm noticing that, too, dude," agreed Luna, her expression slowly changing from delight to disgust. One by one, the rest of the siblings conjured up the same looks on their faces.
"Holy shamoley!" exclaimed Lola with revulsion. "What kind of jawbreaker is this, Mom?"
"Well, I hate to jawbreak it you, kids, but this isn't candy," Rita told them humorlessly.
"Ha, ha, ha, good one, Mom!" Luan laughed aloud. "But seriously, if these aren't jawbreakers, then what are they?"
"They're bath soap beads."
Ten sets of eyes widened in horror.
—
And now, the real soap opera is about to begin!
Reviews, comments and concerns are always welcome!
Thanks again for reading!
