by Adam Sidwell
It thundered across the road into the bus’s headlight beams, turned, and then opened its jaws in a deafening roar.
Guster gasped. In the yellow light he could see the creature’s true form. It was covered in shaggy white fur. There was no discernable head on top of its hulking shoulders. Instead, its tiny orange eyes were set in its round chest, nearly invisible behind its knotted, tangled brows. A large mouth spanned across the top of its torso, with teeth like rhino horns protruding from its gums.
Yummy.
Mariah screamed. Then the passengers up front screamed too, their bodies frozen in place, their eyes wide with horror.
“Bu . . . bu . . . bu . . . bu,” said Zeke, his mouth popping open and shut like a trapdoor.
“It is him! It’s Yummy! The Insatiable!” Gaucho cried.
“What the . . .” muttered the bus driver.
Yummy took two giant strides forward and swung his massive arms at the bus’s grill, stabbing his claws into the metal.
“GO!” cried Mariah.
The bus driver hesitated, then unlatched his safety belt and shot like a bullet out of the driver’s seat and down the aisle toward the back of the bus. “What is that thing?” he screamed. He dove into the tiny bathroom next to the last row of seats and bolted the door shut.
Metal scraped and groaned as the bus rocked back and forth.
“Zeke!” shouted Mariah, pushing Zeke out of his seat. He fell onto the floor with a thud. “Go! Drive!” she shouted. She picked him up off the floor with a surprising burst of strength, and shoved him toward the front.
Zeke hesitated. “But I don’t . . .”
“You’re the only one of us who can!” she shouted.
Yummy’s claws raked across the front windshield. This was no time to think or make plans. Guster slid out of his chair, setting his shoulder onto Zeke’s back next to Mariah and pushing him to the front. Zeke had gained a lot of muscle from so much football practice; he wasn’t easy to push. His limbs were flailing and digging into whatever they could find: the floor, the seatbacks, the luggage shelves overhead.
“I don’t know how to drive a bus!” he stammered, his face pale.
The bus rocked backward as the monster slammed into its front.
“You’re the one with the license! It’s just a big van!” hissed Mariah. She pounded his back with her fists.
The bus shook as Yummy smashed into it again.
“Alright! Alright!” said Zeke, breaking into a run and jumping into the driver’s seat. He shoved the shifter on the column into gear and set his feet on the pedals. “Which one?” Zeke asked, staring bewildered out the front windshield. The shaggy white beast stepped back to get a running start before ramming the tops of its shoulders into the front grill again. Guster stumbled as the bus shook.
“Oh please, Zeke! This one,” said Mariah, shoving Zeke’s right leg down onto the gas pedal.
The bus lurched forward, throwing Guster back onto the nearest seat. There was a thump as the creature bounced off the front bumper and fell to the side, rolling into the brush and snapping branches as it tumbled away.
Gaucho rushed to the front of the bus, and, before they could stop him, yanked the lever to open the door as the bus picked up speed.
“Gaucho, no!” Guster grabbed the collar on Gaucho’s armor and yanked him back.
Gaucho ignored him, struggling to get to the door of the bus as the asphalt sped past. Guster lost his grip on Gaucho, and the little man stuck his head out the door.
He raised his head to the night and, closing his eyes, hummed a long, low melody back toward the place where Yummy had fallen.
A loud moan of anguish came from the woods. Gaucho hummed again, this time with a higher pitched tune that burst into spurts, then ended long and low like a whale’s song.
Yummy moaned once more, and then was gone as Zeke drove the bus into the night.
Chapter 5—Not Everyone’s Your Friend in New York City
It took Zeke only one more hour to make it to the New Orleans Union Passenger Terminal in the middle of the city. By the time he pulled in to the station, he was sitting tall in the driver’s seat. The grin across his pimply face was as wide as a frog’s.
The driver didn’t unlock the bathroom door until after the bus had come to a complete stop. He opened it a crack and peered out as the two passengers leapt from the bus, screaming as they ran into the terminal. Guster, Mariah, and Zeke did not wait for the driver to open the door all the way. Rather than get a scolding for stealing the driver’s bus in the middle of the night, the three of them scrambled off the bus and disappeared into the terminal with their backpacks, cooler, and Gaucho in hand.
“Did you see that thing?” asked Zeke. “It was like . . . all white and shaggy. Just like the Abominable Snowman! You know, the Yeti? From way high up in the Himalayas. The first cousin of the Bigfoot, and just as ferocious.” He flipped open the guidebook and pointed to a pencil drawing that looked nothing like the monster they’d seen on the road. “Exactly kind of like the one in my book! Yummy is Yeti!”
“The City of El Dorado is not in the Himalayas,” said Mariah, rolling her eyes. “It has to be something else.”
“And did you see how bad he wanted to eat Guster?” said Zeke. “He’s not the Abominable Snowman. He’s the Insatiable Snowman!”
Guster sighed. He did not like the way his day was turning out.
Mariah bought four train tickets to Penn Station in New York City. The train left at 7am, so they had to wait several hours for it to arrive. There were a few scraggly, rough-looking characters wandering through the train station, but no one gave them trouble. Perhaps because they had Gaucho with them. He did have a sword.
When the train arrived, the four of them were able to find two rows of seats that faced each other so they wouldn’t be disturbed. The train was supposed to take a full day to get from New Orleans to New York City. That would give them time to rest. Guster was so tired, he leaned his head up against the window and fell asleep almost as soon as the train left the station, visions of golden streets and snarling beasts flitting across his dreams.
***
Guster woke to Zeke whispering intently to Gaucho.
“What does he eat?” Zeke asked. He was jotting down notes in a tiny spiral-bound notebook.
“Mostly sweet things. He likes vanilla and cinnamon too,” said Gaucho. “They like the cold very much.”
“Mmmhmm,” said Zeke, chewing on the end of his pencil. He turned to his book, flipping furiously through the pages, and then folded the corners on a few to mark his place. “Very interesting,” he muttered. Guster had never seen Zeke so studious in his life.
Guster’s stomach told him that breakfast time had already passed. He opened his cooler and fished out a bit of cold omelet that Mom had stuck in the fridge. Mom put leftovers in the fridge, no matter what. She never let the smallest scrap of food go to waste. It was more than just saving money, she’d say in her most mom-wise moments. It was being thankful for what you have.
Right now, Guster was very thankful he had a mouthful of rubbery eggs for breakfast. It wouldn’t have been his first choice, as cold and chewy as they were, but it was home cooking, and that’s what he’d bonded with. It was filling at least.
“Oh good! Eggs!” said Zeke. He reached for the plastic bag.
Mariah batted his hand away and gave him a few dollars. “Go buy your own,” she said. She seemed to understand what Guster needed. He was glad he didn’t have to explain it to her.
It seemed like it was taking a whole decade to get to New York, the train rattling by endless miles of green countryside. Alabama, Georgia, North Carolina, and Virginia. The further they traveled from home, the safer Guster felt. At Mariah’s suggestion, he jumped off the train at each stop and hugged a tree or rubbed his hands all over a bench or spit in a garbage can.
“You have to leave your scent to draw Yummy away from home,” she’d explained.
He didn’t like leaving a trail for the creature to follow, but he had to get him away from the farmhouse somehow. He had to protect Mom, Dad, and Henry Junior. That was the whole point.
The train sped on through that day and into the night. Guster, Zeke, Mariah, and Gaucho all slept when it got dark.
Finally, after an entire day, a night, and a whole morning—thirty-two stops in all—when Guster could take no more of Zeke’s air guitar or Gaucho’s snoring, the humongous skyscrapers of New York City peeked out over the horizon.
The train rumbled over a few bridges, passed underground, then slowly rolled to a stop, its bells clanging and brakes hissing. It was completely full of passengers by now, and Guster, his siblings, and Gaucho had to press their way through the crowd of bodies. It felt good to stretch his legs.
They came out into an underground terminal with row after row of trains. It was a good thing they had Mariah with them, and that she’d planned ahead, because the platforms and maze of stairs would’ve sent Guster wandering in circles for hours.
“This way.” Mariah led them up a set of stairs and out toward the open street. The city was all jammed together, with cars honking, dirty sidewalks, and very old brown brick buildings, the kind Guster had only seen in movies. There were billboards everywhere. One for shaving cream, another for a new car. There was even one with Felicity Casa on it, smiling down on them from above with a roast in her hands. There was a tagline below her picture:
Roofs
Season 7
This time, dinner gets serious.
Guster could even see the Empire State Building a few blocks away. It was enormous.
“I printed off directions to get to Aunt Priscilla’s,” said Mariah, pointing at her map. “If we walk a few blocks this way, we’ll find her apartment.”
She led the way, and they walked, crossing what seemed like two dozen crosswalks, passing under scaffolding and awnings and over metal grates that blasted air upward into Guster’s nose.
Guster sniffed. Mariah was right. The city was full of smells. There were two doughnut shops across the street—both with a pretty tasty maple bar smell—a deli with salty corned beef, a diner serving a very strong and fishy clam chowder around the block, and a fresh and creamy slice of cheesecake hiding somewhere down the street.
It would have been heaven if all the smells had been so delicious. There was also rotting cabbage in the alley nearby, and a puddle of strange mixtures soaking into the sidewalk at their feet smelled so strongly of sewage Guster had to scramble to the next crosswalk to keep from throwing up.
And then there were the hot dogs—they were everywhere! Nearly every corner had a hot dog vendor with a red, yellow, and blue umbrella overhead, the smell of roasting weenies and vinegar-steeped mustard piercing Guster’s nostrils.
The perfect camouflage, thought Guster.
A horn honked and a cab screeched to a halt inches away from his leg. Guster leapt back onto the sidewalk.
“Keep your eyes up,” said Mariah.
They walked for another mile, absorbing the sounds and smells of the city, until finally they came to a clean street lined with trees poking out of the sidewalk at regular intervals and stone-carved buildings so grey they were almost white.
Mariah stopped at the steps of one of them and looked up. “This is it,” she said.
“Now hold on a second,” said Zeke. “Are we just going to stroll up there and ask Aunt Priscilla for a place to stay? It’s not like Braxton works for her anymore. We haven’t even seen her since we blew up her jet last year. I’m not so sure she’ll be happy to see us. She’s going to tell Mom we’re here.”
“And what if she does?” said Guster, a thought suddenly occurring to him. “At least she and Dad will come looking for us. That’ll get them away from the house.”
Mariah nodded. Zeke folded his arms. “Then we shoulda just brought Mom in the first place,” he said.
That never would’ve worked. Guster knew Mom. She always had layers upon layers of irrefutable reasons for things. “You try convincing her,” he said. “You know it would take years.”
Mariah nodded in agreement. “We’re not turning back now. Don’t you get it? We’ve run away from home. There is no going back. At least not until we’ve figured out what to do about Yummy.”
She was right. This was still the best plan they had. There was nothing to do but knock. “Go ahead,” said Guster. Maybe Aunt Priscilla would give them something to eat. She always had a nose for the finer things.
Mariah found a buzzer outside the glass entrance to the building. She pressed a black button next to Priscilla McStock, and the speaker crackled. “Yes?” said a gruff man’s voice.
“Hello and good afternoon, we’re here to see our Aunt, Mrs. Priscilla McStock,” said Mariah calmly.
“I’m afraid she doesn’t have any nieces,” said the voice. “You’ll have to come back later when she does.”
Mariah looked confused. “This is Priscilla McStock’s residence, is it not?” she asked.
A shrill, high-pitched voice came through the speaker, “Oh, Dermont! You silly man. Yes, I do have a niece. Certainly I must have told you about her. You’ve been working for me for almost a year now. Mary, is that you?” It was unmistakably Aunt Priscilla.
Mariah frowned. “Yes, it’s me, Ma-ri-ah,” she said, sounding it out carefully for Aunt Priscilla to hear. “Guster and Zeke are here too.”
“Oh my, what an unexpected surprise.”
“We’ve travelled all the way to New York to see you,” said Guster.
There was a pause on the other side of the intercom.
“Can we come in?” Mariah asked.
Guster was positive Mom had already told her about her jet getting blown up by the Gastronimatii. He was there for the phone conversation. But it should be water under the bridge by now. They had sent her some of the Arrivederci chocolate for Christmas that they’d gotten from Braxton. That alone was worth thousands of dollars. Besides, she was family. She’d even sent Guster a card on Zeke’s birthday.
Maybe she hadn’t heard them.
“May we come in?” Guster repeated.
“Oh my. Well, I have puppies, dears,” Aunt Priscilla said. “They’re a pair of new Chow Chows, just picked up from the breeder last month. Very fluffy. Very expensive. In fact, one of the most pricey breeds out there.”
“We’d love to see them,” Mariah said eagerly.
“No, I’m afraid you don’t understand,” said Aunt Priscilla. “Their psychologist said they are not to be disturbed for the first few weeks in their new environment. It takes time to settle in, you know.”
Zeke shoved his face forward, his lips parted and his eyebrows rammed together in a look of disbelief. Psychologist? He mouthed at Guster.
Guster shrugged.
“We’ll be out on the street. We’ve got nowhere else to go,” said Mariah.
“Oh, and I’m very sorry about that, dears. So are the Chow Chows, believe me. You’ll understand someday when you have dogs of your own. You ought to know, raising those chickens or possums or whatever it is your kind do out on the farm there. Goodbye.” The intercom crackled, and then went silent.
Zeke and Mariah stared at each other in disbelief. They’d come so far. Aunt Priscilla was Mom’s sister. She’d always been a little condescending, but she’d never turned them away.
Mariah rang the buzzer again. No one answered. She buzzed it over and over, finally pressing the button for a full minute until the intercom clicked and said, “No one is available to take your call.”
She slumped down onto the step, dumbfounded. “But she’s our aunt . . .” she said.
“What do we do now?” asked Zeke.
Mariah, for once, didn’t have any answ
ers to that question. She just stared into the street. Her brilliant plan had hit a deadend.
“She didn’t even come down to see us,” she said.
Gaucho sat down on the steps near the sidewalk, sighing as he did so, like he was setting down a heavy sack. “That is fine. Let us rest here on these marvelous flat stones you make here,” he said, taking off his metal helmet and holding it upsidedown in his lap. He looked very odd there, with his striped balloon-pants and metal armor.
A man dropped some change into Gaucho’s helmet as he passed. It clinked as it settled to the bottom.
Gaucho plucked a pair of quarters from his helmet and looked at them in confusion. “Can I eat them?” he asked.
Guster shook his head. He was getting hungry too. He plunked down next to Gaucho and opened his cooler. The ice was still cool. He popped the lid off a plastic container and stuck a plastic fork into the leftover beef stroganoff. It was cold, but it was familiar, and that was exactly what he needed right now in this faraway city with no place to stay.
“The least we can do is find some dinner,” said Mariah, her eyebrows crossed. She stalked off, back up the street from where they’d come.
Zeke grabbed Guster and Gaucho by the shoulders. “Come on,” he said.
Guster stuffed one last bite of stroganoff into his mouth. He didn’t want to be left behind, especially since Mariah had all the maps. He jammed the Tupperware into the cooler and trailed after Zeke. Gaucho was right on his heels.
Mariah weaved her way back toward the busier streets. “The arrogance!” she muttered.
“I think I’d need a psychologist too if I were stuck in that apartment with Aunt Priscilla all day,” said Zeke. “I knew we should have gone to California.” he whispered toward Guster in a low voice.
And now they were stuck in New York City, alone and with nowhere to stay.
Chapter 6—Fatty Bubalatti’s
They crossed two crosswalks, turned left, darted down a narrow one-way street, took a right, and rounded another corner until Mariah bumped right into a man in a black business suit with bright blue ankle-high socks.