Bat and the End of Everything

by Elana K. Arnold

  Hearing Suzette calling Dad by his first name gave Bat an uncomfortable feeling in his stomach. Maybe he was getting sick too.

  CHAPTER 13

  Planning for the Future

  “Remember,” Mom said, looking at Bat in her rearview mirror, “Laurence is the boss, okay? You do what he says.” They were on their way to Mom’s vet clinic. The first week of summer, Bat and Janie had spent the mornings at home together while Mom worked, but this week Janie was taking a class at the pool, and Bat got to go to the clinic with Mom.

  “What if he tells me to let all the dogs out of their pens?” Bat asked.

  “Laurence would never do that. You know he wouldn’t.”

  “I know,” Bat said. “But what if he does?”

  Mom smiled. “Do whatever Laurence says, within reason. Okay?”

  “Okay,” Bat answered.

  Mom turned on her blinker, waited for a break in traffic, and turned left into the parking lot.

  There was the small redbrick building with the neat sign that read “Valerie Tam, DVM.”

  Doctor of veterinary medicine. That was what Bat was going to be too, one day.

  But today he would be assistant to veterinary technician Laurence, which was also a pretty good thing to be.

  Mom parked the car in her usual spot and turned off the engine. Bat, whose hand had been resting on top of Thor’s carrying case, unlatched his seat belt, opened his door, and scooted out of the car, bringing Thor with him.

  “He’s getting heavy,” Bat told Mom as they headed for the clinic’s front door.

  “He’s getting big,” Mom agreed, but Bat was glad that was all she said. He was in a particularly good mood, and he didn’t need any reminders that Thor was almost old enough to be released.

  The low brick building had a heavy glass door, which Mom opened. Bat angled through it, being careful not to bang Thor’s carrying case on the way in.

  It was difficult for Bat to put into words the feelings he had about the veterinary clinic. It was a lot of wonderful feelings, mixed together like soup ingredients.

  He could feel his face stretching into a grin as he looked around the clinic waiting room. It smelled like lavender and peppermint because of the cleaning spray they used to clean up pet accidents. Then the phone rang, and Suzanne answered it from her spot behind the counter. “Dr. Tam’s office,” she said cheerily.

  And that made Bat feel proud. Because Dr. Tam was his mom, and this was her clinic.

  From somewhere in the back, Bat heard a dog bark. And that made him feel excited, because it reminded him that this building was full of animals, and there was nothing that Bat loved more than animals.

  Suzanne finished her phone call and said, “Good morning, Dr. Tam. Good morning, Bat. Good morning, Thor.”

  Bat lifted Thor’s carrying case and set it on the counter so that Suzanne could get a good look at the skunk kit, who was awake and rustling around. She rubbed her fingers against the mesh door to scratch Thor’s face; he pressed his leathery dark nose flat against it and sniffed her hand. “My, what a handsome skunk you are,” Suzanne said admiringly. That was something Bat really loved about coming to the vet clinic; everyone here loved animals—almost as much as Bat did.

  “My dad’s new friend’s name is Suzette,” Bat told Suzanne.

  “Oh?” said Suzanne. “That’s almost the same as my name.”

  “Almost,” Bat said.

  “Your dad has a new friend, Bat?” his mom asked.

  He nodded. “We met her at the doughnut shop, but only for a minute, because Janie felt sick. We took our doughnuts back to Dad’s apartment and ate them there instead.”

  “Janie didn’t tell me she felt sick when you guys were with your dad,” Mom said.

  “She felt a lot better when we got back to the apartment,” Bat said. “She ate two doughnuts.”

  Bat looked up at Suzanne and saw that she was looking at his mom with her eyebrows raised in two arches. “Don’t worry,” he said, “I don’t think it was contagious. I feel fine.”

  Suzanne looked at him and smiled. “Thank you, Bat. I’m not worried about getting sick.”

  Mom cleared her throat. “Okay,” she said, “let’s head back to the kennels. Suzanne, do I have any messages?”

  Suzanne handed Bat’s mom a small stack of thin rectangular yellow sheets.

  “Thank you,” Mom said, and she pulled open the door that led into the back.

  Bat picked up Thor’s carrier and followed her through the door, watching as she took her white coat from its hook, just like she always did, and put it on. He read the words embroidered on it: “Dr. Tam, DVM.” And he let himself imagine that he was the one putting on the coat for a day of seeing patients.

  “When I grow up and become a vet,” Bat said, “maybe we could both work here. And we could put a second hook on the wall, and we could hang our coats next to each other’s, and it wouldn’t matter who wore which coat, because we would both be Dr. Tam, DVM.”

  Mom’s fingers were buttoning her coat, but they stopped when Bat spoke. She reached over and put a hand gently on top of his head, a warm soft weight that Bat liked. “There is nothing that would make me happier,” she said.

  Bat had his mom’s warm hand on his head, and Thor’s carrier in his hand, and a whole day of helping at the vet clinic in front of him. He took in a deep breath of lavender-peppermint, and he felt wonderful.

  CHAPTER 14

  An Assistant’s Assistant

  In the back room, in front of the row of kennels, Laurence stood looking over a list on a clipboard. He had a pencil in his hand.

  “Hi, Laurence,” Bat said. “We’re here!”

  Laurence looked up and smiled. “Bat Boy! I’ve been looking forward to seeing you and Thor. I haven’t gotten to babysit him since summer started.”

  “It’s been nice staying home,” Bat said. “I’ve had lots of time to work with Thor. I’m trying to clicker train him.”

  “Are you?” Laurence said. “How’s it going?”

  “Pretty good. I can get him to wait for a treat for ten seconds or so.”

  “Hmm,” Laurence said. “Are you sure it’s a good idea to spend time training him? After all, pretty soon he’s going to be out on his own.”

  Bat changed the subject. “What are we going to do today?”

  Laurence looked at his list. “Let’s see . . . Mrs. Herrera will be dropping off Pumpkin this morning for a bath and a nail trim. Want to help me with that?”

  “Yes,” said Bat. “It will take at least two people to give Pumpkin a bath. He’s enormous!”

  “He’s too big for the washbasin,” Laurence agreed. “We’ll have to use the big tub.”

  “I think he’s pure mastiff,” Bat said happily. He took Thor’s carrier over to the far kennel, where Laurence had already laid out fresh towels for him. He set the carrier on the ground and unzipped its door. Thor peeked out his head, snuffed around a bit, and then waddled slowly out of the carrier, straight toward Bat.

  Bat picked him up, one hand under each of Thor’s armpits, and brought the skunk up to his face. “Hello, little buddy,” he whispered, and then he kissed the very beginning of Thor’s white stripe, just above his leathery dark nose. Thor nudged Bat’s face with his nose and tucked his head into the crook of Bat’s neck, so Bat hugged him close and rocked a little, the way that Thor liked.

  “Wow,” said Laurence. “Thor really does like you!”

  “I like him, too,” Bat answered.

  “Well,” said Laurence, “we all like Thor, but he never snuggles with me like that when I’m taking care of him.”

  Bat didn’t say anything to this, but he felt pleased to hear that Thor snuggled with him more than Laurence. Smiling, Bat turned to the kennel and tipped Thor toward it. Obligingly, the skunk kit waddled inside and began to snuff around in the blankets.

  Bat shut the kennel door, double-checking to make sure it was latched.

  And just in time, too—Su
zanne’s voice came over the intercom, sounding a little panicked. “Laurence,” she said, “Pumpkin is here! Please come get him . . . right away!”

  “What do you say, Bat Boy? Want to fetch Pumpkin with me?”

  Bat did.

  In the waiting room, Mrs. Herrera held tightly to Pumpkin’s thick leather leash. On the other end, Pumpkin strained forward, toward the counter, where he must have smelled the treat dish. Slowly, Mrs. Herrera was towed forward, her feet sliding across the linoleum.

  “Oh, good,” said Suzanne when Bat and Laurence came through the door. “That was fast.”

  Laurence unwound the leash from around Mrs. Herrera’s hand. She sighed with relief, and Bat noticed that her hand was blotchy red and white from where the leash had pinched it.

  “Pumpkin,” said Laurence, his voice gentle but stern, “sit.”

  Pumpkin’s dark-tipped ears perked up, and he flopped his muscular haunches down, looking up at Laurence. A thick, clear ribbon of drool stretched toward the ground.

  “He’s always so good for you,” Mrs. Herrera said.

  “I can’t believe it,” Bat said, “but I think Pumpkin is even bigger than he was when Janie and I came over!”

  “No,” said Mrs. Herrera quickly. “He hasn’t grown any more.”

  “We’ll weigh him today when we give him his bath,” Laurence said.

  “No need for that,” Mrs. Herrera said.

  “Well, we keep a record,” Laurence said.

  She sighed. “Weigh him if you have to, I guess, but he isn’t an ounce heavier, I can tell you that.”

  “He’s not an ounce heavier,” Bat said, “because he’s pounds heavier!”

  Laurence and Suzanne both laughed, but Mrs. Herrera sighed again. “I’ll be back to pick him up this afternoon.”

  She left through the glass door, and Bat took one of the treats from the dish on the counter and held it out to Pumpkin, whose long pink tongue scooped it out of Bat’s hand in one lick.

  “What do you say, Bat?” Laurence said. “Are you ready to get to work?”

  Bat was. But just then, the glass door slammed open, and a voice said, “Something is wrong with Babycakes!”

  CHAPTER 15

  Head Tilt and Snuffles

  It was Jenny. She’d burst through the door, her hair wild, her face wet with tears. She seemed surprised to see Bat standing there, but she repeated, “Something’s wrong with Babycakes.”

  “Is Babycakes your pet, dear?” Suzanne said from behind the counter.

  “Babycakes is our class pet,” Bat said. His head began to buzz as if it were filled with angry bees, and his stomach twisted. “Suzanne, go get Mom.”

  Suzanne stood up from her desk and disappeared into the back. Laurence left too, to take Pumpkin to the kennels.

  An older lady pushed through the door. She held Babycakes, wrapped in a towel. Bat could see thick streams of mucus coming from the rabbit’s nostrils and noticed that Babycakes’s head was sort of flopped over to one side.

  “Is the vet available?” said the lady—maybe she was Jenny’s grandmother.

  “Okay, I’m back,” said Laurence. “What seems to be the problem?” Bat felt a grateful wave of relief that Laurence had come back so quickly.

  “It’s Babycakes,” Bat said. Jenny was crying loudly now. She’d dropped down onto the vinyl bench and had her head in her hands.

  Laurence stretched out his hands. “May I?” he asked.

  The lady who was probably Jenny’s grandmother handed him the bundled-up bunny. “She’s had a cold for a couple of days, but we thought it was just a case of the sniffles. And then this morning she was holding her head funny—tilted to the side like that.”

  Laurence took Babycakes and held her gently.

  “Hey there, little lady,” he cooed.

  Bat came up close and peered at the bunny. He could only see her head, since the rest of her was swaddled tightly, but he noticed that Babycakes’s eyes looked kind of dull and watery. A bubble of mucus grew out of her left nostril.

  “I shouldn’t have let you be Babycakes’s caretaker,” Bat said.

  Jenny cried louder.

  “Let’s focus on the patient, Bat Boy,” said Laurence.

  Laurence was right.

  “Here I am,” said Bat’s mom, emerging from the back, followed by Suzanne. “Hello, Babycakes. Feeling a little under the weather, are you?”

  “She’s congested and her eyes are watery and she’s tilting her head to the left,” Bat said.

  “Okay,” said Mom. “Let’s take her to the exam room.”

  Laurence led the way. Bat followed. His mom had dropped her arm around Jenny’s shoulders, and Jenny sniffled and hiccupped and wiped her eyes. The lady who was probably Jenny’s grandmother brought up the end of the line.

  It was a very crowded exam room.

  Laurence set Babycakes down on the metal exam table and unwound the towel she was wrapped in. He kept a hand on Babycakes’s back to keep her from hopping away, even though Babycakes didn’t look like she wanted to hop anywhere.

  Mom had taken her stethoscope out of her pocket and placed the ear tips in her ears. She pressed the other end, called the bell, to Babycakes’s side. She would listen to the bunny’s heart and lungs, Bat knew.

  He couldn’t help with the listening, but he could pay close attention to Babycakes’s condition. He noticed that Babycakes’s fluffy coat was smooth and well brushed, without any matting or tangles. That meant that Jenny had been grooming her every day.

  And it was hard to tell without holding the bunny, but it didn’t look like Babycakes had lost much weight, if any.

  And her paws were clean, which meant that Jenny had been keeping her enclosure nice and fresh.

  Bat’s mom took the stethoscope off and placed it back into her pocket. “Her lungs sound clear and her heart is strong,” she reported.

  “Jenny’s parents are out of town, and I’ve been taking care of her and her brothers for the last few days,” said Jenny’s grandmother. “We didn’t notice anything wrong with the bunny until the day before yesterday, when she started to look like she had a little cold, and then this morning when we went to feed her, she was doing this funny thing with her head, so we brought her right in.”

  Jenny kept crying.

  “Rabbits don’t get colds,” Bat said.

  Bat’s mom shone a light into Babycakes’s eyes. Her head was still tilted, and when the light hit her left eye, the one on the low side of her head, she didn’t blink.

  “They don’t get people’s colds, but they do get respiratory infections that can look like a cold,” Bat’s mom said. “It’s called the snuffles.” Laurence still stood with his hands gently holding Babycakes. The bunny was so fluffy that his fingers disappeared into her fur.

  Bat’s mom lifted Babycakes’s right ear and shone the light inside. “Ah,” she said. “It looks like the snuffles has caused an ear infection. That’s what’s causing the head tilt. Bat, Jenny, do you want to take a look?”

  Bat did. He walked over to the exam table and peered into Babycakes’s ear. It was red and swollen looking.

  “Is she going to be okay?” cried Jenny.

  Bat’s mom turned off the light and stroked Babycakes’s tilted head. “I think she’ll be fine,” she said. “We’ll keep her here for a few days to monitor her and start her on a course of antibiotics. She’ll need eye drops for her left eye too; she won’t be able to blink that eye until the head tilt resolves.”

  “Bat was right,” Jenny said quietly. “I shouldn’t have been the one to take Babycakes home. It’s my fault she’s sick.”

  Bat looked again at Babycakes’s smooth, tangle-free coat. Her clean, unstained feet. Her nice plump body.

  “You are a good caretaker,” he said. “You’ve taken good care of Babycakes.”

  Jenny wiped her eyes. They were red and swollen, and her nose was dripping.

  “Babycakes’s coat is brushed, and her feet are clean, and
she’s been well fed,” he continued. “It’s not your fault she’s sick.”

  Jenny took a deep, ragged breath, and then she smiled. “Thank you, Bat,” she said. “That’s nice of you to say.”

  “I said it because it’s true,” Bat answered.

  CHAPTER 16

  House Call

  It turned out that Babycakes had to spend four nights at the vet clinic. Mr. Grayson came that very first day, as soon as Jenny’s grandmother told him what had happened. He’d come to the clinic straight from soccer practice, and Bat thought he looked sort of funny in knee-high socks and shorts. He even had a sweatband on.

  Bat’s mom had told him not to worry about payment; Babycakes was a “pro bono case,” she said, which Bat knew meant that his mom was taking care of the bunny for free, the way she had for the hawk who had been shot with a BB gun and had a broken wing.

  And Bat went with his mom to the clinic every day for the whole week. He had a nice routine: after settling Thor into a kennel, he put drops in Babycakes’s eye and spent some time combing her coat and giving her gentle pats. Then he’d help Laurence with whatever Laurence needed: mostly baths and nail trims and walks for dogs who were boarding overnight while their people were out of town. He and Laurence would eat lunch together at a nearby park, and twice Mom joined them, on slow days. After lunch, Bat would take Thor out of his kennel into an unoccupied exam room to give him some food and let him snuff around. Then Thor would curl up in Bat’s lap while Bat read a book from the library.

  It was pretty perfect. Bat couldn’t think of a better way to spend his summer.

  On Friday, Babycakes was well enough to go home to Jenny’s house. The bunny was holding her head almost straight again, and she could blink both of her eyes.

  Jenny and her grandmother came to pick her up with a carrier that had a fresh, soft towel in the bottom of it. Jenny held open the door while Bat gently guided Babycakes inside. When the carrier was safely locked, Bat said, “She doesn’t need the eye drops anymore, but you still have to give her antibiotics twice a day for another ten days. And if she starts to look worse or tilt her head or get mucusy, you need to bring her back right away.”