Bean needed some rope, and she needed something to tie it to. But the first thing she needed was Ivy. Bean looked out the window again. Ivy was dropping another rock into mud. Splat. Her lips were still moving. How was Bean going to get her attention? If she screamed out the window, Nancy would hear. Smoke signals would be perfect, but Bean’s mother always said that if Bean used matches, she would live to regret it.
Then Bean remembered a movie she’d seen when she was little. In it, a bunch of raggedy people on an island had waved a flag printed with the letters SOS. Then an airplane had come to rescue them. Bean’s mother explained that SOS stood for “Save Our Souls.” People write it on flags when they want to be saved— after a shipwreck, for example. Bean didn’t see why they didn’t write SM, for “Save Me,” but she wrote SOS anyway. She wrote it on an old undershirt. Then she taped the undershirt to her flagpole. Okay, it wasn’t really a flagpole. It was a long silver pole with a hooked end that opened the window in the bathroom ceiling. It was much taller than Bean, and she wasn’t supposed to play with it.
“But this is an emergency,” Bean said to herself.
Bean rattled the screen on her window until it fell off. Unfortunately, it fell out the window into the front yard, but there was nothing Bean could do about that. Being extra careful not to smack the pole against the glass, Bean edged her flag over the windowsill. Her SOS undershirt fluttered in the breeze. You’d have to be blind not to notice it.
Hey! There was Ivy, walking along the sidewalk! She was going home! She was about to walk right in front of Bean’s house! Bean could have called out, but she had gone to all that trouble, making an SOS flag. She didn’t want to waste it. She waved the flag gently back and forth.
Ivy didn’t notice.
Bean waved the flag up and down.
Ivy just walked along.
Bean jerked the flag in and out.
Ivy didn’t look up.
So Bean threw the pole at her.
It landed with a terrible crash at Ivy’s feet. Ivy squeaked and jumped backward. Then she looked up at the sky. “Wow,” she said. She bent down to touch the pole. “An alien.”
“It’s not an alien! It’s an SOS!” Bean said.
Now Ivy saw her. “Oh. Hi. Did you throw that at me? Are you mad at me?”
“No, I’m not mad. Don’t you see the flag part? It’s an SOS. See the letters?”
Ivy looked at the pole again. “Cool.” She came to stand under Bean’s window. “How come you need to be saved?”
“Because of Nancy,” Bean said. “My mom and dad let her babysit me.”
Ivy looked shocked. “She’s not a babysitter. She’s your sister.”
“And she’s getting twenty dollars for it!”
Ivy looked even more shocked. “That’s totally not fair.”
“That’s what I said. But nobody ever listens to me.”
Talking to Ivy, Bean began to see just how unfair it really was. Super-duper unfair.
“Did she lock you in your room?” Ivy asked.
“Well, no,” admitted Bean. “But she won’t let me go outside. I’m a prisoner in my own home.”
“Do you want some food?” asked Ivy. “You could pull it up in a basket.”
“No. I don’t want food. I want freedom,” said Bean dramatically. “I’m going to escape down a rope ladder.”
“Neat-o,” said Ivy. “Can I help?”
“Do you have any rope?” asked Bean.
“For sure! I’ll go get some!” Ivy whirled around, ready to run.
“Wait!” Bean said. “Listen. I’m going to have to sneak you in.” Of course, her mother had said that Ivy could come over, but it was much more fun to sneak. It seemed more like a real jail that way. “So come around to the back door when you’ve got the rope.”
“Okay! I’ll meow like a cat. That’s how you’ll know it’s me.” Ivy gave a little hop.
Bean nodded. “Okay. And then we’ll have to find a way to get past Nancy.”
Ivy was already running toward her house.
