The Loud Sisters Strike Back

The Prank

"No, I can't wait to see you more!...No, I can't wait to see you more!"

Twelve-year-old Lincoln Loud paced back and forth in the living room, sounding like a broken CD, repeating the same phrase over and over again.  His ten sisters were in front of the TV, switching their attention back and forth between the newest episode of The Dreamboat and their brother's lovesick gushes to his new sweetheart.  They honestly didn't know whether to be excited over their brother's new romance, or grossed out by his mushy love talk.

"Okay, you win!"  And he finally hung up.

Lynn Loud Sr, the kids' father, came in with a homemade pie fresh out of the oven, beaming at his son from ear to ear.  "Big night tonight, buddy!  Baked a special treat for your little treat!"

"Dad!  Gross!", the kids groaned.

Rita came into the room, also wearing a smile.  "I'm curious to know, Lincoln, where did you meet this girl?"

"Oh, I haven't actually met her yet.", Lincoln explained.  "Her cousin Colleen O'Sullivan goes to our middle school."

At the name, Lynn jolted.

"Colleen O'Sullivan?!  Did you say Colleen O'Sullivan?!"

Lincoln smiled, the harsh, unforgiving tone of Lynn's voice seemingly not sinking in.  "Yeah!  Colleen took her cousin Patty as a guest to the last school dance we had, where I did my magic act for the school as entertainment.  Sally loved my magic tricks!  She's into magic, too.  We've been discussing our favorite illusions and slights-of-hand for two weeks now!"

"A girl is actually into your whole magician bit?!", Lori exclaimed.  "Lincoln, you literally have to hold onto this girl!"

Lynn stood up on her cleated feet.  "Colleen!  O'Sullivan!  You got hooked up by Colleen!  O'Sullivan!"

The girls all glanced over unsurely at Lynn Jr.

"Wow, Lynn.  I didn't know you had such bad memory.  I mean, you can't even remember her name after ten seconds!", Leni said.

Lisa pushed up her glasses.  "Unless you have severe short-term memory loss, I'm going to make an educated guess that you carry some sort of personal emotional negativity, street name; beef, with this Colleen O'Sullivan character."

"Oh, yeah, Colleen has sort of a...reputation at school.", Lincoln said nervously, rubbing the back of his neck.

"Yeah, a reputation as a snake!", growled Lynn.  She had the same look on her face as she did when she was about to start in a football game.

"Is there a legit reason you don't like her, Lynn?", Rita asked her fifth child.

"Heck yeah, there's a good reason!", Lynn barked.  "She's the one who put a melted chocolate bar on my bus seat in sixth grade!  When I got off the bus, I walked through school for four hours looking like I'd pooped my pants before I realized what happened!  For two months, people in the halls would loudly ask if I needed to go and change my diaper!  It took me beating up the last guy who asked me into a bloody pulp to get them off my back!"

"Wait!  Was the last guy Jimmy Denkins?", asked Luan.  "The guy whose jaw you dislocated?!"  She remembered the incident from when she was still an eighth grader and she went to the same middle school as Lynn, but had never gotten an answer to why she had done it.

"The very one."

"Seriously?!  That's why you beat the crap outta him?!", asked Luan.

"Lynn Loud Jr!  You got suspended for five days for that!", Rita scolded.