Luca Junior Novel Deluxe Edition

by Disney Books

  Ercole shoved Luca’s face toward the water, and the boy panicked.

  “No, no, no, no, no!” he shouted. As he got closer and closer, little droplets hit his face, causing patches of it to turn green—revealing his true sea monster self!

  But before Ercole could really give Luca a bath, he was distracted by someone shouting, “Hey! Ercole, basta!”

  Ercole turned to see a girl on a bike pulling a cart full of fresh fish. She barreled through and Ercole jumped out of the way, releasing Luca. Luca quickly dried his face and hid behind the girl’s fish cart.

  “Oh, look who’s here,” Ercole said. “Spewlia’s here. Wow. That’s how you’re training for the race?” He pointed at the girl’s fish-cart bicycle.

  “Si certo! Your reign of terror is coming to an end!” said the girl, whose name was most certainly not Spewlia.

  “You mean, like a year ago?” Ercole said. “When you quit in the middle of the race? Because you couldn’t stop throwing up?

  “I didn’t quit,” the girl said. “They made me stop.”

  Ercole smirked. “I think that is worse. Now go away. I’m having fun with my new friends.”

  “They’re coming with me,” the girl replied. She turned to Luca and Alberto. “Hop on. I could use the extra weight.”

  She faced Ercole, stuck out her tongue, and unleashed an epic raspberry. “THHHPPPPBBBBBBTTT!”

  She began to pedal as the boys hopped onto the fish cart.

  “Fine! Go start a club! For losers!” Ercole shouted at her. “Ha! I’m kidding!”

  Meanwhile, the adults were ignoring Ercole completely. There was something else going on.

  “Another sighting, Maggiore,” the fisherman Giacomo said. “In the harbor this time.”

  “I know,” Maggiore replied, holding up a poster. “We’re setting a reward. Someone’s gonna win a nice prize .…”

  Ercole snatched the poster. “Me! I win the prizes! Ciccio, get your daddy’s harpoon! We’re gonna catch a sea monster!”

  Luca and Alberto exchanged nervous looks as the girl pedaled away. Even with their added weight, the girl was going very fast. She turned a corner and groaned loudly.

  “Sto imbecille!” she said. “Thinks he can be a jerk, cuz he keeps winning the race, which he shouldn’t even get to do anymore, cuz he’s too old and too much of a jerk!”

  The boys stared at her.

  “You know we underdogs have to look out for each other, right?” she said.

  They just stared, wondering what she was talking about.

  “What’s under the dogs?” Alberto asked, genuinely curious.

  “Underdogs,” the girl explained. “You know. Kids who are different, dressed weird…” She raised her arm, revealing a glistening, sweaty armpit. “Or are a little sweatier than average.”

  She had stopped pedaling, and the boys jumped off. Luca stood behind Alberto, not sure what to do next.

  “Too much? Too much,” the girl said. “So, are you in town for the race?”

  Luca and Alberto had no idea what she meant.

  “The Portorosso Cup?” she continued, but they still didn’t say anything.

  “Well, good talk,” said the girl. “I gotta deliver these. Always be training, you know.”

  But as she walked away, Luca realized something. He grabbed Alberto.

  “We should ask her about the Portorosso Cup race. That’s how the loud, scary human said he got his Vespa.”

  Alberto understood.

  “Hey, uh, Spewlia,” Alberto said tentatively.

  The girl whose name was most definitely not Spewlia whirled around from her first delivery and gave Alberto a look that stopped him where he stood.

  “Giulia. My name is Giulia,” she said. Then she turned around and set out for her next delivery.

  “Uh…when you…race…in a cup,” Alberto began, not wanting to upset Giulia any more than he already had, “what do you get?”

  Giulia reached into her pocket and pulled out a handful of shiny coins. “Soldi,” she said. “Prize money.”

  “Oh,” Alberto said, not impressed.

  “Okay…,” Giulia replied, shaking her head.

  Giulia walked ahead, and the boys followed. At once, Alberto and Luca started arguing with each other.

  “No, no! Keep going!” Luca said.

  “What? Why?”

  “Ask her about the prize money!”

  “But that stuff is useless!”

  “Maybe it becomes a Vespa!”

  “How does that become a Vespa?”

  “Just ask her!”

  “Fine, fine, fine!”

  “Hello, again,” Alberto said, returning to Giulia’s side.

  “Ciao.”

  “Can we turn the money into something else?” he asked. “Like, something like—”

  They rounded a corner and passed a garage. Parked right in front was a bright, shiny, new Vespa scooter.

  “That!” Luca exclaimed, pointing at it.

  “Pffft. No,” Giulia said. “But it could get you that.”

  Giulia pointed to a very rusty, very used Vespa standing right next to the bright, shiny, new one. To Luca, it still looked like the most amazing thing in the world. He gasped, imagining himself and Alberto as a cascade of gold coins showered down around them, and then a moment later, taking the wheel of their very own Vespa, which they had paid for with all those gold coins.

  “It’s so beautiful,” Luca said quietly.

  “Yes,” Alberto agreed. “We need it.”

  Giulia hopped back on her bike and began to pedal as the boys walked alongside.

  “Great! So we’ll just win the race!” Alberto said.

  At those words, Giulia hit the brakes. “You’ll have to beat Ercole,” she said.

  “Okay, so we’ll beat Ercole.”

  Now Giulia hopped off her bike and walked right up to the boys, glaring at Luca. “Huh. Really?” she began. “Thinks he’ll beat Ercole, this guy. First of all, get in line! Every summer, that jerk makes my life miserable. So no one’s taking him down, unless it’s me!”

  Alberto realized he had chosen his words quite poorly. Before he could apologize, Giulia said, “Second, this isn’t any old race. It’s an epic, grueling traditional Italian triathlon: swimming, cycling, and eating pasta.”

  The boys were speechless.

  “So you’d need a teammate,” Giulia added.

  “Well, we’ll figure it out,” Alberto said. “Thanks, human girl.”

  They watched as Giulia pedaled her bicycle and cart away. Alberto started to walk in the opposite direction, and then Luca suddenly stopped his friend.

  “Hey, hey, wait, Alberto,” he said. “What if we join her team?”

  Alberto frowned. He wasn’t used to other people stopping him and suggesting ideas. Ideas were kind of his thing. But he thought for a moment, then said, “Better idea.”

  He turned and yelled to Giulia, “Hey! Congratulations! You’re joining our team!”

  Giulia laughed and called back, “I race alone.”

  Then Giulia’s cart got stuck and she couldn’t pedal. The boys ran over to her, helping to push her bicycle and cart forward.

  “But we could be under the dogs, too,” Luca said as he pushed the cart with great effort.

  “Hey, it’s okay, Luca,” Alberto said, playing it cool. “She’d rather do the whole race alone again. Maybe this time she won’t throw up as much.”

  “Uh, hang on,” Giulia said. She fixed her gaze on the boys, like she was staring into their souls. “You wanna be on my team, eh?”

  The next thing Luca knew, he found himself sitting on Giulia’s bicycle.

  “Let’s see what you got,” she said.

  Luca sat on Giulia’s bicycle, which she had disconnected from the fish cart. He was nervous yet thrilled to be sitting on an actual bicycle.

  “Whoa!” he said as he put his foot on a pedal and pushed it down. The bicycle moved forward slowly, catching him by surprise
. He looked around and saw people walking around the piazza, staring at him.

  Feeling self-conscious, Luca took a big gulp and tried to ride. He wobbled a bit, and glanced at his feet to see how he was doing. He fell right over. And unlike in water, it hurt when he hit the ground.

  “All right, try jumping on it!” Alberto suggested.

  Luca tried, and fell.

  “No, no, no, you gotta show it you’re the boss!”

  Luca was unable to show the bicycle that he was the boss, and fell. Again.

  “It can tell you’re afraid,” Alberto said with authority. “Wrestle it into submission!”

  “Santa Mozzarella,” Giulia muttered, having had quite enough of this. “Eyes up!” she said to Luca.

  “Huh?” Luca said.

  “Looking down is what’s making you fall,” she said.

  That made sense to him, so he started to pedal the bicycle. This time he looked forward, not down. To his great surprise, he was doing it! He was riding a bicycle! And not falling!

  “Oh yeah, I was gonna say that, too. About looking down,” Alberto said, knowing he totally wasn’t going to say that. “So, can we be on the team?”

  Giulia looked annoyed. “Aspetta! Can you dodge obstacles? What if an old lady crosses your path?”

  Then Giulia imitated one and got in Luca’s way. He barely managed to avoid her.

  “Can you withstand passive-aggressive verbal assaults?” Giulia shouted. “Nice bike, number one, and number two—I was kidding, your bike is a disgrace! Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha!”

  Luca cowered, but he kept riding.

  “And finally,” Giulia said, leaning some wooden planks on some barrels to make a very tight obstacle course, “can you handle the course’s fiendishly difficult terrain?”

  “Silenzio, Bruno,” Luca said as he maneuvered the bicycle through the course. He wobbled all the way—but he was doing it!

  Well, he was until he looked down to check his feet. That was the end of that—he went right over. Luca stood and picked up the bicycle. He was going to try it again.

  “Stop,” Giulia said to Luca. Then she turned to face Alberto. “What about you? Can you swim, at least?”

  “Yeah, I’m amazing—” Alberto said, and Luca gave him a sharp jab with his elbow. “—ly bad at swimming.”

  “You can’t swim, you can barely ride a bike…siete un disastro!” Giulia moaned. “I mean, where are you even from?”

  “Wouldn’t you like to know?” Alberto said. “We’re runaways!”

  “Runaways? I dunno, ragazzi,” Giulia said, thinking.

  “Please!” Luca begged. “My family was going to send me somewhere horrible, away from everything I love. But if we win this race, well, we can be free!”

  Giulia looked at Luca and her face began to soften. She faced Alberto, who said, “My life’s great. I’m just helping him out.”

  “Just give me one more chance,” Luca pleaded. “I know I can do it this time.”

  He was about to ride when Giulia stopped him. “No. You guys want it just as bad as I do. You have the hunger. That’s the most important thing.”

  “I’m definitely hungry,” Alberto said.

  “Perfetto!” Giulia exclaimed. “You eat, you bike, and I swim.” She indicated Alberto, Luca, and herself, respectively.

  Luca couldn’t believe it. This might actually work! He looked at Alberto, who smiled.

  “Underdogs?” Giulia said.

  “Underdogs!” Luca and Alberto cheered.

  “Now we just need money for the entry fee,” Giulia said. “From my dad.”

  The boys followed Giulia through town and all the way to her house. They had never been to a land monster’s house before, so it was at once exciting and utterly terrifying. Inside, Luca saw a heavily tattooed man with one arm making dinner in the kitchen. He was singing loudly.

  “All right. Just let me do the talking,” Giulia said. “And act casual. He doesn’t do well with fear.”

  Neither do I, Luca thought.

  “Hey, Papá!” Giulia called. “I brought some friends for dinner. Is there enough for four?”

  The huge man with one arm turned around, holding a massive cleaver in his hand. “Hmmm?” he said.

  Luca felt like he was going to pass out.

  “Whoa,” Alberto said.

  The man glared at the boys, looking them up and down. Then, without a word, he nodded, turning around to continue making dinner. Giulia gave Luca and Alberto a thumbs-up.

  A few minutes later, the boys found themselves seated at a table. Luca was terrified. Alberto looked around the small room and spotted harpoons hanging on a wall.

  “What do you think he kills with those?” he whispered to Luca.

  The big tattooed man, whose name was Massimo, chopped off the head of a fish with his cleaver. He overheard Alberto. “Anything that swims,” he said.

  Luca laughed nervously.

  “Visto the giornale today?” Massimo asked, handing the local newspaper to the boys. The headline said mostro avvistato all’isola and featured a blurry photo of a sea monster with its tail peeking just above the water.

  “Ugh, that photo’s a fake, Papá,” she said. “Everyone in Portorosso pretends to believe in sea monsters.”

  “Well, I’m not pretending,” Massimo said. He tore the photograph out of the newspaper and stuck it to the wall with a knife. Then he went back to cooking. Giulia helped.

  Luca and Alberto got a good look at the wall, and saw it was completely covered with similar photos of sea monsters, all torn from newspapers. He was drinking a glass of water, and immediately did a spit take. In that moment, Luca wanted nothing more than to crawl back into the sea.

  The water hit Alberto on half of his face, which promptly transformed into its sea monster form!

  Luca grabbed Alberto and pushed him to the floor under the table.

  “Huh?” Giulia said as she and her father turned around.

  Luca quickly wiped Alberto’s face with his shirt. He was glad that neither Giulia nor her father could see them, or knew what had just happened. But there was another pair of eyes watching them.

  It was a cat.

  The cat had seen it all. The cat knew their secret.

  With a nervous laugh, Luca returned to his seat, and so did Alberto. They pretended that nothing out of the ordinary was going on. Giulia shrugged and continued cooking with her father.

  Luca noticed that the cat was still staring at him.

  Then Massimo said, “Dinner’s ready. Trenette al pesto. Mangiamo.” The man plopped onto his chair, and it felt like the whole room shook.

  Staring at the pasta on his plate, Luca wondered how the land monsters ate. He saw there was a small stick with pointy things at one end, which he later learned was a fork. He picked it up, and Alberto did the same. Then both boys glanced at Giulia and her father to see what they would do.

  This was a fine plan, except Giulia and her father were waiting for their guests to start first.

  Luca smiled and laughed awkwardly as Alberto took the lead. Alberto set his fork down and reached right into the pasta with his hands, shoving it into his mouth.

  Massimo shot Alberto a look.

  Then Luca picked up some pasta with his hands, too.

  “Uhhh…,” Giulia started to say.

  The boys ate with gusto, ramming handfuls of pasta into their mouths as Massimo furrowed his brow. They didn’t seem to notice him as they kept on eating.

  At last, Massimo asked, “Where did you boys say you were from?”

  Luca didn’t know what to say, and felt even more uncomfortable when he noticed the cat was still staring at him. It was now sitting on Massimo’s shoulder, watching.

  “They’re uh, classmates!” Giulia said, thinking fast. “From Genova. Luca and ahhhh…”

  “Alberto,” Luca said softly.

  “…Ahhhhlberto.”

  “And what brings you to Portorosso?” Massimo asked.

  “Oh, uh, fu
nny you should ask,” Giulia replied. “They came for the race.”

  “The race?”

  “Yeah,” Giulia said. “Uh, you know what? Don’t worry about it.”

  “Don’t worry about it?” Massimo said, wondering what his daughter didn’t want him to worry about.

  “Mmm-hmm, don’t worry about it.”

  Of course, this made Massimo feel he should definitely worry about it, so he set down his glass, sighed heavily, and said, “Giulietta? A word?”

  “I don’t want you doing the race again,” Massimo said, gesturing for Giulia to speak with him privately. “You get so upset—”

  “Papá, per favore,” Giulia protested. “I have a team now.” She gave Massimo her most determined look.

  Her father sighed again. He knew that when his daughter set her mind to something, there would be no changing it. “There’s also the entry fee,” Massimo said. “Money’s tight.…”

  “I’ll work double shifts at the pescheria,” Giulia said quickly. “Whatever you need—”

  “I can’t sell what I don’t have,” Massimo insisted. “What I need is more fish in my net. Mi dispiace, Giulietta.”

  “Um, excuse me?” Luca said, interrupting their conversation. “We could help.”

  “You know fish?” Massimo asked.

  “Oh, we know lots of fish,” Alberto chimed in.

  Massimo thought about it, and saw the look on his daughter’s face. There was no possible way he could say no to her, not this time.

  “You want to work, I’ll put you to work,” Massimo said.

  “Really?” Luca replied, excited, pumping a fist in the air.

  “Oh, grazie, Papá!” Giulia said.

  At this point, the cat had settled on the table, glaring at Luca. To say this was unsettling would be an understatement.

  Giulia said, “Machiavelli! Psssssst!”

  Machiavelli yowled. He bared his teeth, hissed, and showed his claws.

  “Don’t you…No!” Giulia shouted. But Machiavelli pounced on Luca!

  “I’m so sorry about the cat,” Giulia said as she and the boys hurried out of the house and into her backyard. “I don’t know what got into him.”

  “It’s fine,” Luca said. “We’re gonna head back to, uh…”