Quinny pulls at the phone so she can hear, too. She squeals and hops up and down at this good news. Her hair tickles my cheek, but it’s the good kind of tickle.
“He can’t get around too well since he took that fall down the stairs,” Grandpa Gooley says. “I know his sister’s been back here a couple of times trying to catch that chicken, but it won’t go near anybody but him.”
“That’s what Mrs. Porridge said!” cries Quinny. “But there’s got to be a way!”
“It’s a miracle Freya’s still alive, what with all the foxes out there,” he says.
“Please oh please won’t you help us, Grandpa Gooley?” Quinny begs. “Pleeeease?”
“He’s not your grandpa,” I point out.
“Well, I’d be happy to give you a ride up there,” Grandpa Gooley says, chuckling. “But you’ve got to catch that chicken first.”
Nineteen
How on earth am I going to catch a chicken?
I put on my sneakers. I do some stretches to warm up.
But chasing her doesn’t work. Freya’s too fast.
So I try sitting still. I fill a bowl with dried corn and sit very calm and gentle outside my kitchen door. I hold out the bowl and cluck as chickenly as possible.
“Bock bock bock,” I bock sweetly. “Bock bock bock.”
Hopper opens his bedroom window and looks out at me. “Freya doesn’t know she’s a chicken,” he says. “Mr. McSoren always talked to her like a regular person.”
“Dear Freya!” I call out. “You are the most stylish, most beautiful zebra-chicken-person in the world! You are special, you are spiffy, you are fan-fluffy-tastic!”
That doesn’t work, either.
“Maybe not so loud,” says Hopper.
Mrs. Porridge walks by with Walter on his leash. “Goodness gracious, we could hear you hollering all the way up the street,” she grumps. Then she sees what I’m holding. “You’ll have to do better than plain old corn. That persnickety chicken likes worms and freshly killed grasshoppers.”
My insides shiver. Freshly killed what?
“Freya eats from our songbird feeder, too,” says Hopper. “And once I saw Mr. McSoren feed her potato chips right out of his hand.”
Potato chips? We’ve got a big bag of those in the kitchen! So I make a trail of chips starting at the bird feeder in Hopper’s yard and leading over to my house and into my kitchen. But squirrels and birds gobble those chips up before Freya even notices them.
I keep trying.
I make a trail of Cheerios, mushy grapes, and string cheese. I set out stale marshmallows and leftover spaghetti and croutons. Broccoli, tortilla chips, and a big, stinky red onion, too. Piper even hands over a few icky, half-rotted wormy bits from her collection of backyard gunk.
Every morning, I put food out.
Every morning, Freya keeps coming by to peck at it. But she won’t come into the kitchen and she always runs off before I can get close enough to grab her.
So I make a lasso out of an old jump rope. I practice lassoing on Hopper.
It turns out he’s much easier to catch than Freya.
Still, I don’t give up. I’m going to catch that chicken if it takes me all summer.
Grandpa Gooley comes to visit Hopper one morning in the middle of August. “Freya can sense you coming from a mile away,” he tells me. “You’ve got to sneak up on her.” He gives me a big net on a stick from his car. “Technically, it’s for catching fish. But I’ll bet it works on chickens, too.”
“Thanks, Grandpa Gooley!” I swing that net through the air. I pretend I’m sneaking up on a chicken. This could work!
But what’s sneakier than sneaking up on someone? Sneaking down on them, of course. So I build a pile of gummy worms (the next best thing to real worms) in Hopper’s bird feeder. Then I climb the big tree next to it and sit on a long, thick branch. Now I’m high enough over that bird feeder so Freya won’t see me, but low enough to reach down and scoop her into the net.
“What makes you think chickens don’t look up?” Hopper asks from down on the ground.
“Shhh,” I tell him. “Get up here.”
Hopper climbs the tree and keeps me company as I wait. It’s fun, at first. We can see my whole yard from up here. His, too. But we can’t talk or we’ll scare away Freya. Pretty soon my bottom gets sore from sitting on this pokey tree branch. And my mouth gets twitchy from not talking. And my stomach grumbles of boredom.
“Shhh,” I tell my stomach.
Just when I think I can’t wait in this tree a minute longer, Freya finally shows up. She looks around, all careful and suspicious, and then hops up onto the bird feeder and starts pecking away at those gummy worms.
This is it! I reach down to catch her with the net. But I’m so excited that I guess I reach a little too far. My balance wobbles and my grip slips, and no, no, no—I get that quick-sicky roller-coaster feeling in my tummy as I tumble off that tree branch.
I’m falling…I’m falling right onto Freya!
Twenty
I catch Quinny by her ankle. She dangles upside down off the tree branch, swinging the net around like crazy while Freya clucks at her head and then runs away.
“Let go of me!” Quinny shouts. “I almost caught her!”
“You almost crushed your skull,” I tell her.
Both of our moms come outside to see what all the noise is about. They help Quinny get right side up again.
“Quinny, please! Your head is more important than a chicken,” says her mom. “I hate to think what would have happened if Hopper hadn’t been here.”
“I would’ve caught that chicken, that’s what would’ve happened.”
“Quinny!”
“But I was so close!”
“What do we say to Hopper?”
“Thank you for saving my head’s life,” she mutters.
“Nice try, Quinny.” My mom chuckles. “Too bad we can’t just hypnotize that chicken.”
“What?”
Then my mom explains how Mr. McSoren used to hypnotize Freya all the time. “It was amazing the way he could control her.”
Quinny looks at me all excited now. “Hopper, why didn’t you tell me that? I’ll hypnotize Freya, too! Then she’ll do whatever I want!”
“It’s not that simple,” I warn her.
“That’s okay. I’ll practice on you first so I can get really good,” she says. “Hold still, pretend you’re a chicken, and look into my eyes.”
“Quinny—”
“You are getting sleepy.”
“That’s not—”
“You are getting very, very, extra-very sleepy—”
“No, I’m not. I’m wide awake and standing here talking to you.”
Quinny takes a good look at me. She realizes that I’m right. “Great,” she sighs. “If I can’t even hypnotize a boy, how will I ever hypnotize a chicken?”
“How about some ice cream?” I suggest, changing the subject.
“Great idea! I’m starving!”
Quinny’s always starving. She follows me into my kitchen. I scoop chocolate ice cream onto two plain cones. Quinny crunches into her cone before I even finish licking the top of mine.
“Quinny, if you ever catch Freya—”
“You mean when we catch Freya,” she corrects me. “We’re a team, remember?”
A team.
I can’t believe Quinny said that. Maybe it’s even true.
“Fine…when we catch Freya,” I say, “how are we going to keep her caught long enough to bring her to Mr. McSoren?”
“I don’t know. She’s pretty wiggly,” she says. “That’s a good question.”
Then I take Quinny down to my basement and show her a good answer.
Twenty-one
In a dark, dusty corner of his basement, Hopper shows me a big metal cage called a dog crate. He tells me his family once had a dog named Score that slept in this crate in their kitchen, but then the dog died when Hopper was just a toddler, so they didn’
t need the crate anymore.
“That’s so sad,” I tell Hopper. “I’m sorry about your poor dead dog.”
“He was really old. I don’t even remember him.”
I can’t imagine not remembering the first dog I ever had. “Well, I’ve been wanting an alive dog for ages now,” I say. “But my parents keep bringing home little sisters instead.”
Then I notice that this dog crate has a door that locks with a latch. And it looks like it would fit in the backseat of a car.
The good news is, Freya can ride in this crate all the way to Mr. McSoren’s new house!
The grumpy news is, we’ve still got to get Freya inside the crate.
Early the next morning, Hopper and I drag that crate upstairs and over to my yard. We push it right up against my kitchen door, which is still Freya’s favorite clucking spot. We stick tons of scrumptious food inside: a watermelon lollipop and a plate of crispy orange cheese doodles, which look kind of like worms, if you ask me, plus a bunch of barbecue potato chips, because we haven’t tried that flavor yet. Then I make Piper sprinkle a few boogers from her nose onto the whole pile of treats. Because you never know what a chicken will eat, and I’m getting kind of desperate here.
Then Hopper ties some rope to the crate’s open door. We hide behind a nearby bush and hold that rope.
And then we wait.
The plan is, when Freya steps into the crate to peck at all those booger-flavored treats, we’ll pull the rope to shut the door, and—poof—we’ll have ourselves one caught chicken!
After waiting a long time behind that bush, we keep waiting. It turns out that sitting quietly behind a bush is even more boring than sitting quietly up in a tree.
“What if Freya doesn’t like boogers?” I whisper to Hopper.
“Shhh, here she comes.”
It’s about time. Freya chicken-hops over to the crate. She bock-bocks at it, like it has no right being there by her kitchen door.
“Bock bock BOCK!”
Then Freya sees the cheese doodles inside the crate. She sees those intriguing barbecue-booger potato chips.
“Bockbockbockbockbockbockbock!”
But instead of hopping into the crate to gobble up everything, that chicken squeezes her skinny, stretchy head through the bars, and her sneaky little beak reaches all the food no problem.
“Hey, no fair!” I yell at that cheating chicken.
Freya turns and glares over at us behind the bush. “Boooooooooooock!”
(I’m pretty sure that means “Nice try, stupid humans” in chicken-talk.)
And then she runs off with the watermelon lollipop in her beak.
Hopper laughs. Which is the first time I have ever seen that boy laugh.
But it’s not funny. We’re back to where we started.
“Any more bright ideas?” I ask him.
“I guess we need a new plan,” he says.
“Before Freya gets eaten by a fox,” I add. “We’re running out of time.”
Then I hear Mom start to play the accordion, from inside my house. Which means she’s trying to get Cleo to go down for her nap again. She’s playing “Yellow Submarine” by the Beatles, one of my favorite songs.
Then Hopper touches my arm and points across my yard, to below Cleo’s window, where something very, very, extra-very amazing is happening.
It’s Freya. She’s standing there, listening to Mom play.
I creep over to that chicken. Slowly. But the music stops before I get there.
“Boooooooock!” Freya clucks, and runs away again.
“Hopper! Did you see that? Freya loves music!”
“Mr. McSoren used to play the harmonica.”
“He did? Well, did you know that I play the accordion, too?”
“I think the whole neighborhood knows that.”
“An accordion sounds just like a giant harmonica! I bet Freya will come closer if I play! She’ll be so amazed by my amazing accordion that she’ll follow me right into the kitchen!”
“Maybe,” says Hopper. I can tell he really means maybe not.
But I try to think positive because then maybe positive will come true.
“So what songs did Mr. McSoren play?”
“I don’t know. A whole bunch.”
“Like what? Tell me!”
“He played ‘Home on the Range’ sometimes…and ‘On Top of Old Smokey.’”
“Did he ever play any songs by the Beatles? Because I know a ton of those!”
“I don’t think so,” says Hopper. “But I remember, on the Fourth of July he would always play ‘Yankee Doodle Dandy,’ and Freya would cluck and dance around to it.”
Hey, I actually kind of almost know that song! Part of it, at least. I run inside. I find my big book of accordion sheet music. I flip and flip the pages until I find it—“Yankee Doodle Dandy.” I go over all the notes.
Then I get my accordion from Mom and slide it on and stand in the kitchen by the open door to our yard. Hopper grabs the net and hides behind the door, ready to catch Freya once she steps inside.
Then I play “Yankee Doodle Dandy.” And I even get most of the notes right.
Then I play it again. And again.
I look over at Hopper. He peeks outside and shrugs. No Freya.
I play it again. And again. And again and again.
But I guess that chicken is not very patriotic after all.
Finally I slip the accordion off and slump down to the floor. My arms hurt. My engine is out of gas. “I give up,” I tell Hopper. “Freya’s doomed.”
Twenty-two
I look down at Quinny frowning on the floor. “We can’t give up now,” I tell her.
“Easy for you to say. You’re not the one whose arms are falling off from playing ‘Yankee Doodle Dandy’ a gazillion times.”
“But, Quinny, look.” I point outside.
Freya’s peeking out from some bushes at the back of the yard. She seems confused.
“She’s listening!” cries Quinny. “She wonders why the music stopped!”
Quinny slides the accordion back onto her chest and starts playing again. Freya hops closer to the house. I hide behind the kitchen door again. I’ll push it closed right after she hops inside and then I’ll scoop her into the net.
Freya hops closer and closer. She’s only a few feet away now.
Today is the day we’ll catch her. I can feel it.
Quinny feels it, too. I can tell. She smiles as she plays her accordion louder and faster. The beat of her music thumps inside my chest. Being with Quinny feels like being by myself, only better. We’re a team.
I wish this summer would never end.
Freya’s at the door now. She’s getting ready to hop inside. Quinny keeps playing. I keep gripping the net. This is it. We’re about to catch that chicken.
But then, we don’t.
Just as Freya steps into the kitchen, Quinny’s little sister runs in, wearing only her underpants and waving an envelope. “Snail mail!” she screams. “You gotted snail mail!”
And Freya hops back outside and runs away. “Bockbockbockbockbock!”
Just like that, she’s gone. My whole body feels like a flat tire now.
“Piper, how could you!” Quinny cries. “We almost had her!”
“Look, you gotted snail mail! Open it, open it!”
“Go away. You ruined everything!”
Quinny takes the envelope from Piper. It’s addressed to Eleanor Quinston Bumble.
“Who’s that?” I ask.
“It’s me,” says Quinny. “Eleanor’s my real first name.”
I didn’t know that about Quinny. Then I notice the return address on that envelope: WHISPER VALLEY ELEMENTARY SCHOOL.
And I get a bad feeling in my stomach. Even worse than how it felt to lose Freya.
Quinny rips open the envelope and reads the letter.
Slowly, her teeth start smiling. Her dimples dig deeper into her happy cheeks. I turn away and close my eyes. Because I know what�
�s in that letter.
I wish this summer would never end. But it just did.
Twenty-three
I’m very, very, extra-very mad at Piper for scaring off Freya, but the next-best thing in life to catching a homeless zebra-chicken is getting actual, real-life SNAIL MAIL.
“What does it say? What does it say?” Piper bounces like a little maniac.
“Calm your engine down.”
I hold the letter so she can’t see, because it’s none of her beeswax.
Dear Eleanor Quinston Bumble,
Welcome to the third grade at Whisper Valley Elementary School.
Together we are going to have a wonderful year! My name is Ms. Yoon and I will be your teacher
I stop reading and turn to Hopper. This news is too juicy to keep to myself!
“Hopper, look! School’s going to start, and I have Ms. Yoon for third grade. Look, she says it’s going to be a wonderful year and—wait, if I got a school letter, maybe you got one, too!”
Hopper just stands there, blinking slowly.
“I bet you got the same letter! Let’s check! Let’s go check right now.”
I grab Hopper’s arm, which feels heavier than normal, and pull him over to his house and open up his mailbox, and sure enough, there’s an envelope in there from Whisper Valley Elementary School. “Hopper, it came! Look!” I cry. “Open it! Who’s your teacher? Who?”
Hopper is being a slowpoke, so I help him open that envelope and, YES, he’s in Ms. Yoon’s third-grade class, too! This really is my luckiest summer ever!
“Yippeeeee! Hopper, we’re going to be in the same class! Starting in just two weeks. How cool is that? You can introduce me to everybody. I’m so excited to meet your friends—hey, should we find out if any of them got Ms. Yoon, too? I bet everyone got their letters today.”
Hopper doesn’t answer. He looks tired all of a sudden. A little queasy, too. But then I turn over the letter and discover something else that will perk him up for sure.
“Plus look, Hopper! On the back of this letter is a fabulous list of school supplies we need. How convenient! Let’s go shopping right now.”
Quinny & Hopper Page 5