by Mike Litwin
“Where are we?” Chuck asked. “When did I get so wet?” He looked down at Dakota. “And when did you get so small?”
Dakota gazed up at Chuck but couldn’t manage any words. All his open jaw could do was sputter out: “Hububbubba…”
Chuck spotted the trophy on the table. “Whoa!” he mooed, picking it up. “Are we inside Wahu’s shack?”
“Hububbubba …” Dakota repeated, pointing at the mirror.
“What is it?” Chuck looked in the smudgy mirror. But the reflection he saw didn’t look like himself. He blinked a few times and took a closer look. No, he definitely didn’t look like Chuck.
He was huge.
He was blue.
He was Wahu Brahman.
Chuck panicked at the reflection in the mirror. He dropped the trophy and the shell, both clattering to the floor. His eyes went wide as coconuts as he let out a long and loud moo.
“What did you do?” he bellowed at Zephyr with his nostrils flared. “I wished to be like Wahu Brahman. I didn’t say I wanted to be Wahu Brahman! What am I supposed to do now?”
“My sincere apologies, sir,” Zephyr droned. “I thought this would be the best way to make you just like the one you think so highly of. And I must say, you look quite impressive.”
“Relax—it’s no big deal,” Dakota said, picking up the shell. “All you have to do is just wish to be yourself again.”
“Oh. Right,” Chuck said, calming down a little. He took a deep breath and looked in the mirror again, this time with less panic. He couldn’t help but agree with Zephyr. He did look impressive. Chuck never was the biggest or toughest calf on the island. But now he wasn’t Chuck anymore. Now he was …Wahu Brahman. He was strong and massive. He was the Big Cowhuna. He raised his brow over one eye and flexed his giant arms in the mirror.
“Chuck!” Dakota snapped. “You should wish yourself back!”
“Oh … um … yeah,” Chuck agreed. “Yeah, I know. Okay.” But before he could say another word, there was a sudden knock at the door of the shack.
“Who’s that?” Dakota asked, jerking his head around. “Are you expecting company?”
“How can I be expecting company?” Chuck asked. “I’m not even me!”
Dakota pulled the quilted blanket from the hammock and fanned Zephyr toward the shell. “Quick, Zephyr! Hide!”
“As you wish, sir,” Zephyr said, quietly shrinking back into the shell with a gentle hiss.
Dakota covered Zephyr’s shell with the quilt. He stuffed it under the stool as Chuck opened the door. Outside they found nearly every calf they knew from school mobbed around Wahu’s beach box. They all excitedly chattered at once:
“Wow, Wahu! That was a-moo-zing!”
“Would you teach me how to surf like that?”
“Can I have your autograph?”
Chuck felt very overwhelmed by the stampede of attention. He knew he didn’t deserve any of it. After all, it wasn’t really him who won had the Cowabunga Classic. “No, no … really,” he said in Wahu’s deep voice, holding up an enormous set of hooves. “It was no big deal.”
Chuck’s modesty was met with a throng of protests from the starstruck calves:
“What do you mean?”
“Of course it’s a big deal!”
“Wahu, you’re the greatest!”
Chuck froze. No one had ever called him the greatest before. Usually he was the weirdo cow who didn’t fit in and didn’t have a lot of friends. Now he was suddenly “the greatest”? He looked down at all the calves. They were all so much smaller than him now. They seemed so far beneath him. Chuck had been an outsider for so long … what was wrong with finally being everyone’s hero for a change?
“You’re right.” He nodded to the crowd as a smirk grew across his snout. “I am the greatest.”
Dakota saw the gleam of pride burning in Chuck’s eyes as he signed autographs. Dakota knew right then that Chuck would not be wishing himself back anytime soon.
That night, Chuck and Dakota built a small campfire on the beach outside Wahu’s shack. There they sat, bathed in flickering orange firelight that sent shadows dancing all over the sand. Around them were piles of more and more chocolate-covered bananas. Chuck was a full-sized bull now, so he figured he could eat more bananas without getting sick like last time. He stuffed his face full as he polished the dusty trophies from Wahu’s shack. The warm light from the fire flashed across the line of Brahman surfboards stuck in the sand next to the shack. They’re all my boards now, Chuck thought to himself.
“I wonder why Wahu had all these trophies sitting in a box,” Chuck wondered aloud.
“Maybe he didn’t care so much about the trophies,” Dakota offered. “Like Angus said. He just loved the thrill of the ride.”
He thought about how these wishes kept bringing unexpected results. “Have you noticed that every time we wish for something we want, it also comes with something we don’t want?” he noted. “We wished for tons of chocolate bananas and we ended up with stomachaches. I wished to be a real cow, and now no one recognizes me. It’s like every wish has a downside.”
“Downside? What downside?” Chuck asked, munching on a banana. “I’m Wahu Brahman, for mooing out loud. The greatest surfcow who ever rode a board. And you? You never have to hide behind a costume again. So where’s the downside?”
Dakota didn’t answer. He could see that arguing would be difficult when Chuck was so pleased with himself. “Where do you suppose the real Wahu is?” he asked instead.
“I am the real Wahu,” Chuck answered, pounding his oversized chest. He tugged on a tuft of his new blue hair. “See? This is real.”
Dakota was becoming annoyed. “Are you going to wish yourself back or not?”
“I don’t know.” Chuck shrugged, admiring his huge new arms. “Maybe. Probably. But not yet.”
“What are you going to do about school tomorrow?” Dakota asked.
“Nothing.” Chuck laughed as he gobbled down another banana. “The Big Cowhuna doesn’t go to school.”
Dakota wished Chuck would take this a little more seriously. But Chuck was really enjoying all the attention he was getting as Wahu.
“What are you going to do about school?” Chuck asked him back, wiping chocolate from his big blue mouth.
Dakota hadn’t thought about that. It was obvious that none of the calves had recognized him on the beach that day. He couldn’t go to school like this, and he certainly couldn’t go back to the Porter House. He took a chocolate-covered bite of banana, but he didn’t enjoy the sweet taste anymore. Every delicious morsel just reminded him of how he was, once again, without a home. Gazing into the campfire, he began to wonder if he should wish to be hu’man again. But he had wanted for so long to walk around without wearing cowmouflage. Was he really ready to give that up now? The more he thought about it, the more his head began to hurt the same way his stomach had that morning.
“I’m going to sleep,” he told Chuck, climbing the three small steps to Wahu’s door. “Maybe everything will make more sense in the morning.”
The next morning, Chuck and Dakota awoke to a familiar voice calling both of their names.
“Chuuuuuuuuck! Dakoooooooota!”
They rushed outside and found Patty Porter patrolling the beach with her hooves cupped to her mouth, calling their names over and over again. She spied Dakota right away, recognizing the odd calf who had showed up at the Porter House the day before.
“Hey, you! Sheldon!” she called, huffing up to them. “Have you seen them?”
“What’s going on?” Chuck asked.
“We’re looking for my brothers, Chuck and Dakota Porter,” Patty babbled. “They didn’t come home last night. They didn’t show up at school this morning either. The whole island is looking for them.”
Chuck and Dakota saw dozens of familiar Bermo
odans combing the beach. Cornelius, Leatherneck, Angus … Even Chopper Bullock, who left yesterday’s contest in disgrace, was helping the search.
“Last anyone knows, they were with Sheldon here at the Cowabunga Classic,” Patty went on, pointing to Dakota.
“I honestly haven’t seen them since yesterday,” Dakota said. That wasn’t a total lie since they’d both been in different bodies then.
“Will you help us look for them, Wahu?” Patty pleaded. “Chuck looks a lot like Sheldon here, except he’s white with brown spots. Dakota is brown with blue eyes, and he looks kind of … well … lumpy and tattered.”
“Of course,” Chuck said. “I’m the ‘Big Cowhuna.’ What kind of local hero would I be if I didn’t offer my help?”
Dakota fumed and rolled his eyes. Real heroes didn’t call themselves heroes. He glanced past Patty and saw Mama Porter pacing circles in the beach grass, wringing her hooves and looking more frantic than he’d ever seen her. Tears of worry rolled from her normally cheerful eyes. Dakota grabbed the edge of Chuck’s orange shorts and pulled him behind the shack.
“Okay, this has gone on long enough,” he said, craning his neck up. “We have to wish ourselves back.”
“But I’m not ready to go back!” Chuck whined, which sounded funny in Wahu’s deep voice. “I haven’t gotten to ride any of my boards yet. Or finish polishing my trophies!”
“They’re not yours!” Dakota scolded. “You didn’t work for any of that! You just wished for it!”
“Oh yeah?” Chuck said. “Well … you didn’t work to be a real cow either!” Chuck knew that made no sense, but he was running out of arguments.
“You’re crazy!” Dakota yelped. He reached for the shell. “That’s it. I’m wishing us back.”
“Oh, no you’re not,” Chuck said, holding the shell high over Dakota’s head. Dakota jumped up and down, swiping and grabbing at the shell dangling just out of reach. But it was no use.
“Look, you’re not Wahu,” Dakota said. “You’re nothing like him. He didn’t love attention like this.”
Chuck’s face drooped a little. He wondered if he was enjoying the fame to much.
“Do you think Mama wants Wahu to come home?” Dakota continued. “Think about how much it would take to feed you! Mama deserves to have the real Chuck at home.”
Chuck scratched his head with an enormous hoof. All he had wanted was to be popular and talented. He hadn’t thought about what it took to get that stuff. And he certainly hadn’t wanted to hurt anyone, especially not his own mama.
For a minute, Dakota thought he was finally getting through. But then he saw Chuck’s new blue tail twitching furiously.
“I have an idea! She can have the real Chuck at home!” Chuck squinted into the distance, like he was looking for something. “Remember last night when you asked where the real Wahu is? Well, if I’m in Wahu’s body, he must be out there in mine somewhere!” He knocked on the shell. “Psst! Hey, Zephyr!”
Zephyr breezed out from the shell. “Good morning, sir. I almost didn’t recognize you.”
“No one does,” Chuck said. “They’re all looking for us. So I wish for Wahu—Chuck—whatever … to show up here. Right now.”
Dakota thought this was Chuck’s worst idea ever. But Zephyr was happy to help.
“As you wish, sir,” he said.
A sandy cloud swirled up from the beach just a stone’s throw away from the shack. Out of the cloud stumbled Chuck—rather, Wahu in Chuck’s body—with a puzzled look on his face. He appeared to have wandered the island all night.
“See?” Chuck said. “There he is! Now, when we ‘find’ him, Mama will be happy and we’ll be heroes! We can have our bananas and eat them too!”
Dakota hated this plan. He wondered if Chuck’s brain had not come along when he got swooshed into Wahu’s body. As it turned out, they didn’t have to find the little calf—he found them. Wahu spotted his own big blue body just as Zephyr disappeared inside his shell.
“Hey!” Little-Wahu cried out in Chuck’s tiny voice. “Hey, brah! What are you doing in my skin?” He stormed over to them, a very big bull in a very small body.
“Hey, relax.” Big-Chuck put his hooves up. “It’s cool.”
“It’s not cool, brah!” Little-Wahu yelled. “Get out of there! Give me back my body!”
“Shh! Calm down!” Big-Chuck said. He dropped the shell to the ground, put his hooves under the little calf’s arms, and picked him up to eye level.
“Hey! Hooves off, brah! Put me down!” Wahu, who was always so calm and cool, was now throwing a world-class fit. He carried on so loudly that Patty overheard.
“Look! It’s Chuck!” Patty shouted. Everyone searching the area turned and looked. But instead of seeing a missing calf being rescued, they saw him kicking and screaming and thrashing in a big bull’s arms while hollering, “Let me go! Give me back my body!”
“Uh-oh,” Big-Chuck muttered. This was not the outcome he had hoped for.
“There you are!” Mama said as they rushed to the shack. She scooped up Little-Wahu from Big-Chuck’s arms and kissed him on the head.
“Wait a minute,” Little-Wahu said. “Who are you?”
Mama looked shocked and even more heartbroken than before.
“What’s going on here?” Papa Porter demanded.
“What did you do to him?” Patty asked. “Why doesn’t he remember us?”
“This poser stole my body!” Little-Wahu screeched. “He’s not the Big Cowhuna!”
Now, the talking cows of Bermooda may have been remarkable, but they were still cows … and cows get spooked easily. The search party began to whisper and wonder. Was there more to Wahu than they knew?
“See?” Chopper Bullock said. “I told you this blue galoot can’t be trusted!”
More and more folks joined the crowd. The very same cows who had praised Wahu yesterday now surrounded him, filled with suspicion. As the thickening mob started to raise tough questions, Dakota slipped away and crept under Wahu’s shack with the magic shell.
There wasn’t much room under the shack. Hunched over in the sand with Wahu’s floor just above his head, Dakota knocked on the shell three times: Clank … clank … clank!
Zephyr slithered out of his shell into the tight space. His cloud coiled like a snake around Dakota, who crouched down on his hooves.
“Zephyr, things are getting out of control here,” Dakota whispered into the surrounding cloud, not sure where to look while he was speaking.
“It certainly looks that way,” Zephyr replied. “But I must ask, sir, is life ever really in control?”
“Maybe not,” Dakota uttered. “But it sure seems like these wishes have some drawbacks.”
“Well, things rarely come free, sir,” Zephyr chuckled. That chuckle bothered Dakota. Was Zephyr enjoying this mess? The crowd outside grew louder and more heated.
“Listen, we just need everyone to chill out so I can figure out what to do next,” Dakota said.
“Gladly, sir,” Zephyr agreed. “Would you kindly make that an official wish?”
“Fine, whatever!” Dakota snapped. “I wish for everything to just … cool down.”
Zephyr’s magical wind went to work. “As you wish, sir,” he crooned.
Dakota didn’t like the way Zephyr had said sir. It sounded like he knew something Dakota didn’t. But his thoughts were soon shattered by a shriek: “What is that?!”
Dakota scooped up the shell as Zephyr poofed back inside. Scurrying out from under the shack, he looked around and saw exactly what was causing such a panic. The air had suddenly gotten much colder, and the sky—which normally burned bright blue—was now full of frozen white flakes that fell from the clouds.
“Impossible!” Dakota whispered.
Bermooda, the warm and sunny tropical island, was being covered in snow.
Snowflakes twinkled as they fluttered onto the beach, making the sand dunes sparkle like diamonds. The oleander bushes shimmered as cold white fluff piled up on their hot pink flowers. The palm trees were all capped with stacks of snow as though the trees were wearing soft white hats. It actually looked rather pretty. It reminded Dakota of a tropical snow globe, where a palm tree on a tiny plastic island would be flooded with impossible snowflakes that could never actually happen.
But cows, as you know, get spooked easily. They didn’t appreciate the beauty of Bermooda’s first snowfall. Instead, they panicked.
“What is it?”
“It’s cold!”
“It stings! It stings! Owowowowow!”
“It’s okay!” Dakota assured them, stashing the shell in his shirt pocket. “It’s just snow.”
“Snow?” Patty squealed as she shivered. “What’s snow?”
“It’s like tiny ice falling from the sky.” Dakota held out his hoof to catch the flakes. “It’s fun. You can throw snowballs, make a snow fort, build a snowma—er, snowcow …”
“Ice?” Leatherneck interrupted.His face, which usually sported a wide smile, was drawn into a frown. “That’s impossible! Do you know how hard it is to make ice? That kinda stuff don’t just fall out of the sky!”
Chopper Bullock suddenly recognized Dakota as the little brown calf who had embarrassed him at the Cowabunga Classic. “Wait a minute,” he sneered. “How do you know so much about this ‘snow’?”
“Who are you, anyway?” Patty chimed in. “I asked around yesterday about a brown calf named Sheldon, and no one’s ever even heard of you!”
It was now Dakota’s turn to face the mob. They fired a flurry of questions at him, not giving him a chance to answer any of them:
“Where did you come from?”
“Who is your kine?”
“Why hasn’t anyone seen you before?”