Pottymouth and Stoopid

1- Stoopid: The Origin Story

     Okay, the first time I met Tommy Innit was in the second week of preschool. I remember that, even back when we were just four years old, Tommy could crack me up like nobody else. What can I say? He always had a way with words.

     "Poop!" he leaned over and whispered to me as our teacher doodled an example of a vocabulary word on the whiteboard. "Blue poop."

     That, of course, made me giggle. So I told him my name. "I'm Tubbo!"

     "I'm Tommy!"

     Our teacher, Ms. Puffy- who was usually very nice, just always busy- wasn't really watching us or paying much attention to anybody. Except her favorite kid, George Absens, a boy who came to pre-K every morning in matchy-matchy pretty blue outfits with matching white sunglasses perched on top of his perfect brown hair. George sat attentively at the front of the class, listening eagerly to everything she had to say.

     Tommy leaned over again and whispered, "Green poop," as the teacher switched marker colors. I giggled again. Someone turned around to shush us. We were sitting at the very back of the rug, which is where you only sit if you don't want to pay attention to the lesson. Tommy and I were doing exactly what was expected of two people who sit on the back of the rug.

     Ms. Puffy wrote out a three-letter word on the board underneath her doodle of a blue stick figure with its legs all bent up drawn under the canopy a green squiggly tree.

     She turned to the class, where we sat on our rainbow rug on the floor, and pointed at the word. "I need a helper to read this word out loud for me. Any volunteers?"

     Of course, George's hand immediately shot into the air, waving around frantically just to make sure he couldn't be missed.

     My big brother always tells me that, in order to do good in class, you had to participate more often. When I asked him what that meant, he just said to raise my hand more and be nicer to the teacher.

     So I raised my hand.

     Ms. Puffy, who was not used to other kids besides George answering question, looked surprised and pleased that I had done so. She happily called on me. "Tubbo?"

     I squinted at the word. The letters seemed to swim around and switch places so I couldn't read them. Ms. Puffy's phone started ringing, which did not help my concentration levels.

     I looked at the doodle for a clue as to what the word could possible be. I saw the stick figure's bent up legs, and an idea popped into my head. I didn't know why there was a tree, but it was my best guess, so I said "Yoga?"

     Ms. Puffy blinked. The room was silent other than the sound of her Pirates of the Caribbean ringtone. No one said anything, except for Tommy.

     "Sit. It says sit," he whispered. I felt my face get hot as other kids started to snicker.

     George whipped around to look at me. "You're so stupid, Tubbo. It says 'sit'!" he cried. "You're just a stupid-head. You're so stupid, stupid, stupid! You're the stupidest boy ever!"

     Everybody in the class started laughing and pointing and chanting "Stoopid," drawing out the oo sound. Ms. Puffy was busy trying to find her ringing phone in her bag so she didn't have time to remind everybody that name calling was strictly forbidden.

     I, of course, wasn't laughing. I read a word wrong, which was an accident, but it didn't make me stupid.

     Except it kinda did. It made me Stoopid. With a capital S.

     Well, to everybody except my new friend, who was angrily glaring at the people teasing me.

     "You're not stupid, Tubbo," Tommy told me. "You're my best friend!"