Luna Howls at the Moon

by Kristin O'Donnell Tubb

  “Dude, I would so open that box if I worked here,” Beatrice says. Amelia giggles.

  More turns, and the light fades from blue-black to yellowy-orange. We pass a set of bookshelves that, my ears tell me, is hollow on the other side; it opens into another room. A small human head with odd, stretched skin and frizzy hair perches behind glass. Fingers and teeth and oddly shaped animals are all on display. It is frightening and confusing and I growl at each turn, but my humans don’t seem to be scared. They cringe and stare at these objects, but they seem to be as fascinated as a dog with a bone.

  Beatrice stops short in front of a display of a piglet with one eye and no snout. It has an odd trunk-like thing sprouting from its forehead. She is apprehensive; her scent is like oniony grass. And yet she stays planted, staring.

  Amelia peers around the corner ahead and, seeing no one, whips her blue screen out of the bag resting on her hip. She taps on the screen several times, then shows it to Caleb.

  “Hector has an Instagram account?” he says. “He looks younger than thirteen. But good thinking.”

  They flick the screen with their fingertips, Caleb leaning tall over Amelia’s shoulder; he has to hunch to see. The screen turns their faces blue.

  Meanwhile Beatrice tightens and tightens, staring at this pig. Her throat closes. Her teeth clench. Her fingernails dig into her palms. I nudge her. Hey, you okay? She scratches the top of my head but never looks away from this odd tiny pig with its one eye, its small, elephant-like trunk.

  Sometimes at home, Tessa tries to open a jar of pickles, and the lid is on so tight, it takes all of her might to open it. And when she does, the jar shouts pop! That same pressure builds inside Beatrice, I feel.

  Amelia gasps suddenly, a tiny peep of inspiration like a balloon squeak, and points at several things on the screen. Caleb nods.

  “I see what you’re saying,” he says, which is funny because Amelia says nothing. “That tower. That’s the moonlight tower in Zilker Park. Looks like Hector flies a drone there a lot.”

  Amelia beams, nods. My soul sings alongside hers. It’s been a long time since someone has understood her like that.

  They scroll and point, point and scroll. They nod their blue faces. Beatrice stares at a pig and builds toward a pop. That scares me, so I lick her knuckles. She doesn’t seem to notice.

  “Look at that one,” Caleb says, pointing to the screen. “He posted it yesterday. I can’t read Spanish though. This word here, mañana. That means tomorrow. So . . . today.” Caleb tosses over his shoulder: “Hey. Beatrice. Can you read Spanish?”

  She shakes her head. “French . . .” she says in a murmur, eyes never leaving the display.

  Amelia’s lips purse. She is suddenly stubborn, like a mosquito buzzing near your ear. I can smell her frustration: Why didn’t Caleb ask her if she can read Spanish? She pokes at the screen.

  “Oh, the hashtag!” Caleb says as the screen flickers. “Good idea. Let’s see what this Bad to the Drone Piloting Club is all about.”

  They scroll a bit more, and Caleb gasps. Points. Amelia grins.

  “They’re doing a thing! Tonight! Hector will be at Zilker Park tonight! Starting at seven, until nine, it looks like? They’re doing a nighttime photography meetup.” His eyes rise to Amelia’s. “Do you know how to get there? I have a general idea, but . . .”

  Amelia pokes the screen a few more times, and I gag, thinking how dirty that screen must be. Human fingers are the grossest. She turns the screen toward Caleb.

  “Google Maps. Nice. Okay, so according to this”—Caleb squints at the screen—“Zilker is about three miles away. Not bad. We should be there in less than an hour?”

  Caleb looks at the collar strapped around his wrist. “It’s almost seven now. If we hustle, we’ll get there right in the middle of the meetup.”

  Amelia slides her phone back into the bag on her hip and jerks her head toward the whiter light at the front of the building. She wisps around a corner. The Shadow is gone.

  Caleb nods once, reaches out to wake Beatrice. As his fingers inch closer, closer to her, I realize: this is the pop. I try to step in between them, but—

  “Hey, we know where we’re headed,” Caleb says. And just as his fingers graze her arm, she—pop!—slams her fist back and up, directly into Caleb’s nose. A sickening crack fills this tiny space.

  Blood spatters everywhere, all at once, like a firework. “What the heck?” Caleb covers his nose, but blood seeps through his fingers. “What’d you do that for!”

  Beatrice jams her fists against her cheeks and swipes furiously. Tears? I’m so confused by all these emotions swelling into this small space, filling it like thick smoke, choking us. None of this is what I’ve trained for. I spin and twist, trying to decide who to comfort first.

  Beatrice mutters a word that makes Caleb blink even more than the punch. “Dude. Reflex. I—I—here.” Beatrice grabs a corner of the musty velvet curtain lining this space behind the displays. “Sit. Tilt your head back.”

  Caleb sinks to the sticky wooden floor and Beatrice mops his face with the curtain. He can’t help it: his face contorts. She pinches his nose, tilts his chin to the ceiling. Words are clogged in her throat: I’m sorry. They’re making her as sick as a cat with a hair ball. But she doesn’t cough them up.

  Through his pinched nose and the velvet curtain, Caleb’s voice sounds squeaky and muffled. “Were you crying?”

  The Knot pulls tight. “Do you want me to—”

  But here’s the thing: the Knot breathes, loosens, and stops herself from saying the rest of that sentence, punch you again?

  Tessa was smart to start this group. It’s already changing them.

  Tessa! My heart twinges, thinking of her, shouting my name. But I know I’m supposed to be here, with these three. I know they need me by their side. This is my duty, I’m sure of it.

  “Ugh, where is this curtain from?” Caleb says through a swollen nose. “It smells like a coffin.”

  Beatrice laughs one short burst. “You know what a coffin smells like?”

  Caleb holds up a corner of the blood-soaked, dusty velvet. “This. I’m certain it smells like this.”

  Beatrice beams at him. We—she and I—feel grateful that Caleb isn’t the kind of person who holds too much of a grudge after getting socked in the nose.

  “Zilker Park,” Caleb says, his voice muffled. “Hector will be at Zilker Park tonight. Until nine.”

  Beatrice leaps to her feet, her boots loud on this floor. She re-knots the flannel shirt tied around her waist, offers Caleb a hand up. He eyes it. But he takes it.

  They glance back at the bloodstained curtain, the drops of blood on the floor.

  “They should charge folks extra to see that,” Caleb says. Beatrice throws her head back and guffaws. Laughter through tears. In a matter of minutes, Caleb has loosened the Knot.

  I am tail-chasing confused by all this. But you know what also happens when you chase your tail? Besides confusion, I mean? Joy. Joy, sweet and juicy as lemonade.

  9

  Hope Is a Star

  We wind our way to the front of the Museum of the Weird, passing a woman with bright pink lips perched behind a desk like a parrot. We freeze. She shouts, “Where’d you kids come from? Hey! Did you pay?”

  Amelia, Beatrice, Caleb, and I push and trip and fall over each other to get away from this angry-eyebrows woman. She grabs a bat from under the desk and dashes around it, chasing us. “Hey!”

  We leap and tumble through the front door. Another plastic human is perched at the storefront: a pirate made of bones, sitting on a treasure chest, swigging from a bottle. Beatrice nicks him on the chin as we dash past: “Quite the crew you got in there, matey!”

  We runrunrun down the street, the woman waving the bat over her head and yelling, “Cheapskate kids!” She doesn’t chase us far, though. We duck into a shady alley to catch our breath, and Beatrice looks down at me.

  “Should we take Luna with us?” she asks. �
�Is that like stealing, if she comes with us all the way to Zilker Park?”

  Caleb’s forehead wrinkles. “Maybe.” He stoops to my eye level, points back up the hill, to the steeple poking above the rest of the buildings. “Luna, head back, okay? You’re not our dog.”

  I don’t know why they keep saying that. Of course I’m their dog. And I’m not leaving them. I know my duty.

  We stumble out of the alley. Amelia stops short, gasps. I follow her eyes up, into the pale orange sky now tinged with soft purple. Glimmering ahead, down the hill, over the lake, is a massive shimmering rainbow. It is almost a full arch, stretching from the shiny silver skyscrapers to the lush green park on the opposite side of the water.

  Caleb twitches. Scratches his head. The neck of his crisp T-shirt underneath his crisp button shirt is stained with blood. He tugs at it absentmindedly. He doesn’t like wearing this stained shirt. “It is nice, isn’t it?”

  Beatrice slides her eyes at Amelia, and they share a secret smile. “Yes, indeedy, Mr. Rogers. It sure is keen.” Beatrice’s voice has a tease tied to it, like a bacon treat stuffed deep inside a Kong toy.

  But Caleb doesn’t notice. He twitches again. Stretches the neck of his shirt farther. “It’s just a trick of light. Isn’t that wild? It’s not even there, but we can see it. How can something both exist and not exist?”

  Beatrice blinks. It takes a lot to make Beatrice blink. This is like a tennis ball ping! on this moment. “I know how,” she says. The tease in her voice is gone.

  That rainbow, it somehow reminds me of the many colors of feelings Beatrice just went through inside: from blue through purple, to pink, into yellow. A rainbow is just like that. A rainbow is laughter through tears. It’s all the colors of a day, crammed into a few moments.

  The Shadow, the Knot, and the Waterfall take a minute to figure out which way we’re headed. They look at Amelia’s screen, then up at the street signs.

  “Left,” Beatrice says.

  “No, that’s east,” Caleb says. He gently turns Amelia’s wrist to point her phone down the street. “We need to head west. Southwest, actually. I think.”

  “You don’t know?”

  “Well, no, I’m not certain. But I think.” Caleb bites his lip. He looks at the map on the screen again.

  “So we’re headed in a direction you think is right?”

  “You got a better idea?”

  Beatrice cracks her knuckles. “Well, yeah. We take off in the direction I say. And FAST.”

  “Going fast in the wrong direction won’t help,” Caleb says, head cocked. “Hector will only be at Zilker until nine. We don’t have a lot of time here, Beatrice. . . .”

  While they bicker, I take the opportunity to open up my nostrils and taste the air. Rain is hanging nearby. Cigarettes. More food and humans. And . . .

  Cat.

  He slinks up to the four of us. One-eyed, he is, like the pirate made of bones behind us. The cat would be orange, I think, if he weren’t so dirty. He is sticky and thin, but not sickly. He does all right for a cat.

  Greetings, dog, he purrs. Might you have tuna?

  Tuna? Cats are so annoying. No, of course I don’t have tuna.

  My trio of clients begins walking down a street they call Sixth, checking the map Amelia has on her blue screen. I follow. The cat, unfortunately, does the same.

  The street is gritty, dusty, and lined with small trees. Dozens of pigeons strut bravely up to us, warbling, French fry? Got a french fry? French fry? When we don’t offer them food, they scowl and poop and flutter to the next group of humans: French fry? Got a french fry?

  The cat hisses at them. The birds cuss and strut away. The cat weaves in front of me. So what’s the story here, huh? he purrs. You and these kids. Are you part of a revenge story? A fable? A mystery? The cat swishes his ratty tail at my humans. A group of kids and their dog, solving crimes. So cliché.

  I do not answer because I do not like the way this cat rolls his one eye at the word cliché. Also I do not know the word cliché.

  Where are you headed? The cat’s voice sounds like sandpaper.

  Southwest, I say, pretending I know exactly what that means. In my experience, you can’t let a cat see your weaknesses. Zilker Park.

  Ah, a true destination! the cat says. He looks over his shoulder, like he’s leaving something behind. It appears we have a quest!

  A quest? The question slips from me before I can stop myself. Drat!

  Indeed, a quest! The cat scans my humans with his one eye. By the look of things we are currently near the beginning of Act Two, correct? Solidly in the Belly of the Whale, as old Campbell would say. Ha! An excellent time to introduce a new character. Pssst. That’s me, dog.

  My forehead crinkles. Act Two?

  The cat ignores my confusion. And have we had our Call to Adventure? Did you heed it? Or did you leap into this voyage without much forethought?

  This cat speaks pure gibberish. He makes me feel agitated, itchy and jumpy like I’m loaded down with fleas.

  The cat sighs at my silence. What are we seeking on our quest, Protagonist?

  I don’t know what that word means, protagonist. I reckon it has something to do with dog tags. So I stall. What do you mean, seeking?

  The cat rolls his one eye again. We are trotting down Sixth at a nice clip, and I don’t really have time for this conversation.

  Seeking! the sandpaper cat says. He darts in and out behind things: garbage cans and small trees and newspaper stands. He is good at remaining hidden. What is our goal on this quest? When I don’t answer right away, Sandpaper sighs heavily and says, Why are we going to Zilker Park?

  We? I huff.

  Well, yes, Sandpaper says, darting behind a bike rack, then out again. Your quest needs a narrator, obviously.

  A narrator, I say. Again, I’m as lost as a dog with no scent trail, but I can’t admit this to a cat.

  Yes, a narrator! The one who tells the story long after you’re dead and gone?

  Dead? I croak. Gone? How long does this cat think this . . . quest . . . is going to take? I choke: KAK!

  Amelia turns back at my cough. Sandpaper darts behind the leg of a bench, unseen. Amelia smiles, I smile, we keep walking.

  Sandpaper catches up to me. You’re not really familiar with how quests work, are you?

  I guess not.

  So what is it we seek, Protagonist?

  My name is Luna. And . . . um . . . a boy. A Hector Vasquez.

  Sandpaper pauses for a half beat. Hector Vasquez. I see. Is he missing?

  Missing? I repeat. I guess to Beatrice, yes. He is.

  We walk for another moment in silence before I hear it again, floating on the edge of the wind: “LUNA?”

  Tessa!

  My heart yanks me backward toward her voice like a pop of a leash.

  Sandpaper must’ve heard it too, because he grins wide, whiskers showcasing his catty mirth. Ah yes. Entering our story just in time. Followers of our fair quest, may I introduce: our antagonists.

  Ants? What are you talking about? I ask.

  Sandpaper flicks a fluff of spiderweb from his whisker. Here we are, on the lam—

  Now you’re talking about sheep? I interrupt.

  Protagonist, the cat says, our Merry Band of Five is being pursued by the bad guys.

  FOUR, I snap at this cat. It’s a Merry Band of FOUR, thank you. And those aren’t bad guys.

  No? Sandpaper asks. Then why are we running?

  This cat asks hard questions. Tessa is not a bad guy. But I look at my clients and they’re most definitely running. I don’t know, I say at last.

  The cat slithers between the ankles of people who don’t even notice he’s there. Well, one thing’s for certain. This group needs a hero. Lucky I came along.

  Me! I bark, then I lower my voice to a growl. The hero is going to be me, cat. I can’t explain to this cat about duty right now.

  The cat blinks. Or maybe, because he has only one eye, he winks? Good news, dog. T
he protagonist usually IS the hero of the tale.

  I nod decisively. Then that’s me. I’m the protag . . . that one.

  The cat smirks, whiskers askew. I said USUALLY, dog.

  “LUNA!”

  Beatrice stops short, grabs Amelia’s wrist. “Did you hear that?”

  “Bea?” a woman’s voice calls.

  “Amelia, where are you?”

  Amelia nods.

  Caleb scans the area. “The Driskill hotel—duck in here!” There are a handful of steps nearby, and he takes them in one long stride. He pulls open the wood-and-glass door, and the four of us—minus Sandpaper, who has disappeared—dash inside.

  It’s fancy, with glittering lights and colorful glass art hanging on the ceiling. The marble floors are slick and cool under my paw pads. The kids tuck behind a large leather couch, crouch low like small pups in tall grass. From the sidewalk, we are invisible. Their hearts pound like the plastic drums we heard earlier. Beatrice grabs Amelia’s hand. It’s a sweaty grasp, I can smell, but Amelia doesn’t seem to mind.

  Tessa and the other adults pause on the sidewalk outside. They are only a few leaps away, but on the other side of a thick wall. I don’t think my young humans with their tiny, ineffective ears can hear their talk.

  Worry sears Tessa around her edges like a slow-burning, smoky fire. “I just can’t believe they left.”

  “Oh, I can. Have you met my Beatrice?”

  “You’re going to be in a lot of trouble for this, Ms. Greene.” This is the man’s voice from earlier. Caleb’s father. “I am definitely going to report you to the state board for this. What a bunch of attention-seeking kids.”

  I can feel the tears that sting Tessa’s eyes from here. But her emotions are a swirl of dark paint, a mix of blues and greens and purples and blacks, like Amelia’s art from last week. A bomb. I can feel her frustration at this man, who will get her in trouble even though she was just trying to get him to stop yelling in front of her kids. I can feel her sadness that she doesn’t know where her clients are. I can feel her disappointment in herself.

  I peek over the top of the couch. Maybe if Tessa sees me . . .

  Tessa nods. Wrings her hands. “Yes, I suppose you should report me. I’ll let my mentor know too, of course. I imagine I’ll lose my license over this.”