Rex looks at me innocently.
We run home as the rain comes down hard.
Lily smiles when I tell her Rex cleaned up my parents’ bedroom.
“Your father has always liked Rex,” she says. “Rex knows that.”
“And Father gave Rex snacks,” I say.
“The L’s feed him snacks,” Lily says. “And he’ll never let them know he has magical powers.”
“True.”
“I think your father won’t think of Rex as ‘magical,’” says Lily. “Just very talented. And I know one thing about Rex that you may not know yet.”
“What?”
“Rex is kind and smart and magical. He has humor.”
“Yes.”
“But Rex is also sly.”
I look closely at Rex.
“Sly?” I ask. “Like sneaky?”
“I think of it as a sneaky truth with a bit of humor,” says Lily.
Rex yawns, then gives me a new look. He goes over to the computer. He pushes the button for a blank page. He writes:
I like to surprise people.
Sly. With a little humor.
12.
A “Wondrous” Thing
Things are happening all at once.
School will be over in a few months.
I will turn eight years old in the summer.
My parents are better and are back at work. They look at Rex in a different way now, especially my father. The word “amazing” is an everyday word for Rex.
“My life is getting big,” I say to Lily.
“I think you mean ‘full,’” says Lily.
“Maybe I don’t want it full,” I say. “Maybe I want it to stay the same.”
Lily looks at me for a moment.
“Nothing stays the same forever, Grace,” she says. “It changes in ways that only you will know.”
“I don’t like that, Lily.”
“I know, Gracie. I know.”
Rex continues to be Rex, though I now know he is sly as well as smart and kind, and magical.
I also know that things will change.
On the last day of school there is a picnic to celebrate. Lily and my parents are there, and Rex, who plays with other dogs in the park.
Ms. Luce pins all our writing on a large bulletin board.
Book Dreams
When I was just a baby my mother and father read books to me.
I loved books, the smell of them, the smooth, bright pages that I loved turning.
And the words.
In my crib one night my mother and father found me turning pages in my sleep.
I had book dreams then.
I have book dreams now.
—Grace
When my mother and father read “Book Dreams,” they get tears in their eyes, remembering.
I read Daniel’s “kind of” poem, as he puts it.
Running over Sheep
My white dog runs over the flock of sheep—
White over white
Cloud over cloud—
A small, fierce, loyal protector.
—Daniel
“I like this,” I say to Daniel. “‘Cloud over cloud.’”
“Thank you,” says Daniel. He thinks for a moment.
“I always knew you were a writer, Grace,” he says, almost in a whisper.
I look to see if he’s joking. He isn’t.
“Maybe you’re a writer, too,” I say.
He smiles and shakes his head.
“I’d rather run over a flock of sheep,” he says.
My parents drive us all home before they head off to work, Rex with his muzzle out the window, ears flying back.
“There’s a man with a tall hat walking up to your door,” my father says to Lily as he stops.
“That’s my friend Maxwell,” says Lily, getting out of the car.
“Does he have a chicken in his arms?” asks my mother.
“It’s probably not real,” I say.
My words startle me. I don’t want to say where Rex began and why he’s with Lily now.
“Are you sure?” my mother asks.
My life is full of half-truths and secrets these days, I think. Maybe I’m sly like Rex.
We wave goodbye.
It is Maxwell carrying a live bright-red-and-orange chicken.
He stops to pat Rex.
“Come in, come in,” says Lily. “And this is?” she continues, stroking the chicken.
“It is Lucy-Lou, my hen,” says Maxwell. “I didn’t name her,” he adds.
“I hope not,” says Lily. “Can’t you just call her Lucy?”
“I do,” says Maxwell. “Bow, Lucy.”
Lucy bows her head to us and eats corn from Maxwell’s hand.
“Bark to the dog, Lucy,” he says.
Lucy opens her beak and makes three short squawks at Rex.
Rex barks back.
And Lucy shows us she can count—“one squawk, two squawks, three squawks”—and on.
“She’s affectionate,” says Maxwell.
He hands her to me, and she nestles in my arms. She is warm.
“I’ve never held a chicken before,” I say.
Lucy is quiet.
“Never,” I add with a smile at Maxwell. “This is a wondrous happening.”
“Ah yes, wondrous! I can’t begin to count all the new and wondrous things that will happen to you,” says Maxwell. “And you will know what to do with them. Keep that like a whisper in your head.”
Maxwell pretends to whisper in my ear. Lucy lays her head against me. And I think of his words.
He has given us Rex. Rex is a wondrous thing.
Can there possibly be any other wondrous thing?
It is evening, and my parents are working late.
Tomorrow the L’s come to writers’ group again.
Rex will sit in their group. He will listen and every so often push the glass doors open for me so I hear more clearly.
I think about Maxwell’s words to me. They sounded like a promise. I also remember Lily saying things don’t stay the same. But things will change in ways only I will know.
I go to my laptop computer and press the key for a blank page. I write:
Wondrous Things
Rex comes into the dining room and watches.
“Blank screen,” I say to Rex.
Rex does what I secretly hope he will do. He nudges me off the chair.
He sits and writes:
You know. The whisper.
I know?
Rex gets down and goes into the kitchen to drink water. I know? What is it Rex knows that I know?
I think of Maxwell’s words.
And I suddenly know what it is I know!
I write:
I am seven years old.
I am a writer.
But I know things don’t stay the same.
I know a wondrous thing.
When I am grown, I will not have Rex.
But so that doesn’t make me sad
I will have
a whisper in my head—
who finds me quotes—
who sends words that untangle
and shape a story—
I will name that whisper “Rex.”
—Grace
I go to bed. I know that Rex will come.
And he does. He lies next to me and puts his front leg around me. Like a hug.
A wondrous thing.
About the Author
Photo credit John MacLachlan
PATRICIA MACLACHLAN is the celebrated author of many timeless books for young readers, including Sarah, Plain and Tall, winner of the Newbery Medal. Her novels for young readers include My Father’s Words, The Poet’s Dog, Word After Word After Word, Kindred Souls, and The Truth of Me; she is also the author of many beloved picture books, a number of which she cowrote with her daughter, Emily. She lives in Williamsburg, Massachusetts.
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B
ooks by Patricia MacLachlan
Sarah, Plain and Tall
Skylark
Caleb’s Story
More Perfect than the Moon
Grandfather’s Dance
Arthur, For the Very First Time
Through Grandpa’s Eyes
Cassie Binegar
Seven Kisses in a Row
Unclaimed Treasures
The Facts and Fictions of Minna Pratt
Word After Word After Word
Kindred Souls
The Truth of Me
The Poet’s Dog
My Father’s Words
Copyright
Katherine Tegen Books is an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.
WONDROUS REX. Text copyright © 2020 by Patricia MacLachlan. Illustrations copyright © 2020 by Emilia Dzubiak. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
www.harpercollinschildrens.com
Cover art © 2020 by Emilia Dziubak
Cover design by Amy Ryan
Library of Congress Control Number: 2019944596
Digital Edition MARCH 2020 ISBN: 978-0-06-294102-2
Print ISBN: 978-0-06-294098-8
2021222324PC/LSCH10987654321
FIRST EDITION
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