by Cynthia Lord
“You have to give it a chance,” Mom replied. “It’s only been a day.”
Wait. What? That wasn’t what I thought she’d say. “But when I said I wanted to go, you said it my choice,” I said. “Remember? You even seemed a little disappointed that I wanted to go.”
“That’s because I knew I’d miss you,” Mom said. “But you can’t choose to give up when something gets hard, Emma. Everything has hard parts, especially when it’s new. So we can talk about it after you get through those first hard parts.”
“But how long will that take?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” Mom said. “Certainly more than a day.”
Owen nodded. I looked away from him. I wanted him on my side.
That’s when I saw the pet carrier beside the door—a rotten cherry on an already-terrible-day sundae. In the relief of being home, I’d forgotten.
We were taking Lapi to the shelter.
Carrying Lapi, I followed Dad across the parking lot to the Rangeley Animal Shelter. In the race, both Excited and Scared had sat down on the sidelines now. Sad was the only one running.
Lapi had put his paws up on the side of the pen when I went to get him, so happy that I was home. Holding him had made the whole day better, but then I had to put him in the carrier.
The shelter’s lobby was bright with orange puffy chairs. There were colorful displays of leashes and collars, pet beds, and bags of food for sale. Soft music was playing, but a few dogs were barking somewhere beyond the doors.
Behind the counter, a woman smiled. “Good afternoon. Can I help you?”
“My daughter and I rescued a stray rabbit last night,” Dad said.
As I lifted Lapi out of the carrier, the woman smiled. “What an adorable bunny! It’s not easy to tell exact age with rabbits, but he doesn’t look very old. Maybe a year or two. Let me check the lost-pet database and see if anyone has reported a gold-colored bunny missing.”
As she typed on her computer, I stroked Lapi. I wanted my hands to remember everything about him—the size of his paws, the roundness of his back, and how his ears felt like soft flower petals.
I had wanted to believe that Pépère had sent Lapi to me with some rabbit magic for my first day of school. But today hadn’t turned out anything like I’d hoped. And now, even Lapi was leaving me.
There was a hamster in a cage along the wall. Behind the cage was a window that looked into another room with more small-animal cages. Inside one was a white rabbit. His cage didn’t look big enough for him to jump or twist or run very far.
“None of the lost bunnies match yours,” the woman said. “So what would you like to do? Do you want to surrender him to us?”
The word surrender did it. Lapi twitched as my tear hit his nose.
“Oh, Emma,” Dad said gently. “It’s all right.”
I hate when adults say it’s all right when you’re sad. Some things just aren’t all right. “He won’t be able to hop around in those little cages.”
“The rabbits get playtime outside their cage every day,” I heard the woman say. “We’ll take good care of him, I promise.”
“Hear that, Emma?” Dad said. “He’ll get playtime.”
“Can’t we keep him? Please?” I was begging, but I didn’t care. “You and Mom won’t have to do anything. I’ll feed him and clean up after him and play with him each afternoon and every weekend so he won’t be lonely.” I talked super fast so Dad didn’t have time to say no. “It would make school lots better, because I’d have something to look forward to at the end of the day. Please? Please?”
The woman and I both waited for Dad to say something. But he just rubbed his chin, thinking.
Finally the woman said softly, “Did you give him a name?”
“Monsieur Lapin,” I said quietly. “But I nicknamed him Lapi.”
I knew with each passing second, Dad’s answer was more likely to be no. I kissed the back of Lapi’s neck and concentrated on his smell: warm and rabbity.
He doesn’t know what’s coming. When we walk away, will he think I didn’t like him? Or he did something wrong?
Surrender is a terrible word.
“His name comes from stories my father used to tell,” Dad said. “He was a farmer up in Quebec.”
I glanced over and saw tears in Dad’s eyes, too. “But this rabbit simply doesn’t belong to us, Em.”
And right then I realized a funny thing about surrendering. Sometimes when you finally give up trying to make your first idea work out, you think of a second one.
I looked over at the woman. “Could Lapi stay with us until someone claimed him? And if no one ever did, could we keep him?”
She looked at Dad. “I do check the lost-pet listings every day. I could call you if his family reports him missing. Usually, though, if someone has lost a beloved pet, they report it right away. And from what I can see of his fur and nails, he’s been on his own for a while.”
Dad took a long breath.
The woman gave Lapi a sad smile. “The truth is that sometimes people get tired of taking care of pet rabbits and just let them go. They think they’ll be able to survive in the wild and that’s not true.” She turned to me. “Rabbits can live up to twelve years, though. It’s a real commitment.”
“I promise that I’ll take care of him every day,” I said. “And if no one ever claims him, I’ll still take care of him, even when I’m older and in high school. And if he can’t come to college with me, I’ll take online courses!”
Dad cracked a smile. “You don’t need to do that. But here’s what I’m worried about, Em. It’s harder to give up something the longer you’ve had it. If someone does claim him, you’ll have to return him. Are you sure you want to take that risk?”
I nodded.
“He’s completely your responsibility,” Dad added.
I nodded harder.
“Mom is gonna kill me,” he muttered.
As Dad gave the woman our phone number, Lapi nuzzled against my neck. I laid my cheek on his ears. Even if I hadn’t made a kid best friend yet, I had a rabbit one.
My knees felt like collapsing from having something finally go right today. Maybe Excited had just needed a break, because suddenly she was back in the race, even if she was way behind and limping.
Lapi was mine, at least for now.
That night, I put Be Yourself and You Got This! back on the windowsill with the rest of my rock collection. I felt I’d failed at both of them. I didn’t “get” school at all, and it didn’t even feel possible to Be Yourself.
For tomorrow, I needed something easier. Maybe Keep Going? That rock came from the top of Mount Katahdin. Dad, Owen, and I climbed that mountain one day, and it was a hard hike at the top. I wanted to give up and sit by the trailside and wait for them to come back down. But Owen said, “Keep going,” and I did.
Keep Going felt like work, though. Don’t quit—even if you want to.
I wondered how long Mom would make me go to public school before I could change my mind and go back to homeschooling.
Lapi hopped over to a sweatshirt I’d left on the floor and dug at it until it was bunched up like a nest, then he flopped in it. It felt warm and safe to have Lapi here, like I didn’t have to face all these hard things by myself.
Mom had said not to get attached to him, but I’d been carrying a hole inside me since Owen went off to school last year and this little rabbit had jumped right into that hole and made himself at home.
I smiled at Lapi chewing the tag off my sweatshirt. Maybe Pépère really had sent me some rabbit magic. Tomorrow if I got scared or sad, I could just think of him waiting for me, like my own little furry happy ending.
I imagined the people at school as characters in Pépère’s stories. Ms. Hutton would be a beaver, always working hard. Ms. Martel would be a hummingbird flittering around the classroom. Iris might be a skunk, friendly but not always. Leah seemed like a pretty deer.
And Jack? He was a hard one. Maybe a bobcat hunting
by himself. Or a red squirrel chattering about things he liked.
Somehow, imagining them as animals made things easier. I tossed Keep Going on my bed next to my backpack for tomorrow and settled down to do my homework.
In my assignment notebook, our group project was first on my list of things to do. I still felt annoyed that I hadn’t had much chance to contribute to my group’s ideas, but Iris had a point. A video would be easier on the day we presented, because the other kids would be watching the screen, not us. Also we could film more than one take if we messed up.
I tapped my pencil on my assignment notebook. We’d probably have to shoot the video outside of class, though. When would we do that?
I smiled as an idea formed in my mind. What if I invited my group over to my house? Even if we introduced each other in pairs on the video, there was no reason we couldn’t film it together.
We’d get the project done and the other kids would be in my world instead of me trying to fit into theirs. I could ask Mom to get us some good snacks and they could meet Lapi! Now that Lapi was mine, I could tell the other kids about him. We’d have such a great time that it’d bounce us right over the friendship bump.
It was a perfect plan!
When I came downstairs to ask Mom about the snacks, Owen was talking to her in the kitchen. “If I make the soccer team, Jordan said I could ride home with him. I’ll text you, but if I don’t come home on the bus, it’s good news.”
“Okay,” Mom said. “Fingers crossed! I’ll be anxious to hear all about it.”
“Mom, I’m going to invite my group-project kids over,” I said. “Can you buy some good snacks?”
“Sure!” she said. “What day are they coming?”
“I hope tomorrow.”
I was so excited to invite Iris, Leah, and Jack to my house. We’d have fun and they’d fall in love with Lapi, just like I did. After all, who wouldn’t want to spend time with a cute rabbit?
He’d be my furry secret weapon!
I was determined to make the second day of school better than the first.
To help me Keep Going, I made a list in my assignment notebook of all the things that would be easier on the second day. By the time I got off the bus, I already had four things written down.
Easier the Second Day
1. I know where my room and desk are.
2. I know some of the kids’ names.
3. I brought a bag lunch.
4. I have a plan to invite my group to my house.
I was so excited about the last one that I didn’t even wait until Leah, Iris, and Jack had unpacked their backpacks. “So I was thinking about our project.”
“Two Truths and a Lie!” Jack said.
“School hasn’t started yet,” Iris said.
Leah nodded. “I’m not even awake. I stayed up too late watching baby goat videos! My sister showed me one, and then we just kept clicking on more!”
“That sounds cute,” I said, but inside I felt deflated, like when I’m excited to go on a hike and wake up to find it pouring rain outside. Don’t worry, I told myself. There will be a right time to talk about the project.
To help me learn kids’ names, I kept another list in the back of my assignment notebook and put a star next to any potential best friends. I loaned a pencil to a boy named Matt and sat next to Sarah on the rug for morning meeting. Brandon liked to talk in class, which meant Ms. Hutton said his name a lot. So I knew six names out of the twenty-two kids in my class:
Leah*
Iris*
Jack
Matt
Sarah*
Brandon
I didn’t want to have extra homework when my group came over. So as the morning went on, I tried to finish everything. Whenever Ms. Martel wanted Jack to move on to the next thing, she made a little circle spinning motion in the air with her index finger. If I caught my mind wandering, I’d secretly do that motion under my desk with my finger.
Move on. Keep going.
When lunch came, I still hadn’t had the chance to ask Iris, Leah, and Jack over. But at least I had a plan for the cafeteria. I hoped the bag lunch would help me find a seat faster.
The chairs were already filling up when I walked into the cafeteria. I saw Iris and Leah’s group had no extra seat for me. Sarah wasn’t at any table yet. Matt had one seat open at his table, and even though the table was mostly boys, I figured he owed me for loaning him the pencil.
“Hi,” I said, putting my bag lunch down at the seat next to him. I held my breath, in case he told me it was taken.
“Hey,” he replied. “Thanks for the pencil.”
I smiled. “No problem.”
“Time for lunch,” I heard behind me.
I turned around. “Oh, hey, Jack. Today I’m sitting here. Okay?”
“Yes.” He didn’t seem upset, but as he walked away, I felt bad. Jack had been nice to sit with me yesterday.
“If you had to choose one, would you rather never take a shower again or never brush your teeth?” a boy across the table asked Matt.
“I could just go swimming instead of taking a shower,” Matt replied. “So I’d keep my toothbrush. Would you rather have smelly feet or smelly breath?”
“Smelly feet!” the boy said.
It wasn’t much of a conversation, but it was one. I was trying to decide what I’d pick when the first boy said, “Hey, did you have time to watch that video I sent you about the bugs that live in your pillow?”
“Yes!” Matt said. “It was disgusting. It reminded me of last year. Remember when Mr. Patten—?”
The other boy laughed and slapped the table. “I know exactly what you’re going to say!”
Around me, kids were talking and laughing. I never knew you could be surrounded by so many kids and still feel alone. I tried to stay focused on the boys at my table, but out of the corner of my eye I could see Leah and Iris were making funny faces at each other and laughing. Sarah was sharing her French fries with another girl. Jack was talking to Dustin and another boy at the back table.
When I got back to the classroom, I crossed out I brought a bag lunch on my “Easier on the Second Day” list. Today’s lunch was just a different kind of hard.
In the afternoon, Ms. Hutton took us to the school library and told us we were allowed to choose any two books to take home. Going to the library was always one of my favorite things to do, and this library was so bright and beautiful. I couldn’t believe it was all for kids! Tissue-paper tropical fish hung from the skylights and there was a big terrarium with a real live lizard in it. There were tables with chairs and bean bags and even some big balls to sit on at the banks of computers. And so many rows of bookshelves. I took a deep breath of that wonderful book smell, trying to hold in my excitement.
“After you choose your books,” Ms. Hutton said, “you can spend the rest of the period reading or working on your Two Truths and a Lie presentations.”
Finally! Now it would be the right time to invite the other kids over to my house. “I’ll save us some seats,” I said to Leah, Iris, and Jack.
I figured I’d be done choosing books first, because I knew what kind of books I wanted and where to find them. I’d spent a lot of time at our small public library and recognized the Dewey decimal numbers on the nonfiction shelves. I headed for the 630s. This time I wasn’t learning about pet rabbits for a homeschool report, though. Lapi was depending on me, and I wanted to do everything right so Lapi would always love me best. Not like Maggie and Molly, who liked me fine until they had a choice. Then they always picked Mom.
I found two good books on rabbit care and took them to the desk to sign them out. On my way, I passed Jack. “Hey, after you get your books, meet me at one of the tables by the window,” I said. “I have a plan.”
He pulled out The Encyclopedia of Animals from the stacks without even looking at me. “Yes.”
I picked a table with four seats and put extra books on the empty chairs to save them for Jack, Iris, and Leah. It f
elt nice to be the person saving seats for a change.
I opened the first rabbit book and began reading the chapter “Understanding Your Rabbit.” I had read and taken notes on the whole section before Jack sat next to me.
At another table, I could hear Brandon talking in a fake a British accent. Matt and another kid were smiling and laughing at him.
Jack opened The Encyclopedia of Animals and showed me the table of contents. “Chapter Twelve is Lagomorpha: rabbits, hares, and pikas.”
“I’ve never heard of a pika,” I said. “I’ll have to look that up.”
Jack flipped the pages. I hadn’t meant now, but when he swung the book around to show me, the animal was adorable! Like a guinea pig with mouse ears.
“Wow!” I said. “That’s so cute!”
“A pika barks when it’s scared,” Jack said. “Its nickname is ‘rock rabbit.’ ”
“It doesn’t really look like a rabbit,” I said. “More like a—”
“You wascally wock wabbit!” Jack said in an Elmer Fudd voice.
The other kids stopped talking. They glanced sideways, frowning. How come when they talked differently, it was funny, but when Jack did it wasn’t?
I guess when you already belong, it’s easier to be different. “That’s funny!” I said loudly, like we were joking and the other kids were wrong if they didn’t think so.
“Pikas collect vegetation to store underground for the winter,” Jack said. “They don’t hibernate.”
The other kids were definitely paying attention to us now. I could feel my face getting red, but talking to Jack was like sledding down a steep hill. Once the momentum kicked in, I’d be lucky if I could steer.
“They live in the mountains and need cool temperatures. As temperatures rise, they have to climb higher. With climate change—”
“Hi, I saved you a seat!” I waved to Iris and Leah. I knew it was rude to interrupt Jack, but he wasn’t stopping on his own and that was rude, too. Maybe Owen’s advice to Be Yourself was really too simple. Maybe there was a point where being completely yourself stopped being a good thing and just became a lonely thing.