Chihuawolf

by Charlee Ganny

  A red blush crept up Tommy’s neck and spread roses into his freckled cheeks. “I brought a leash and some dog treats too.” He gave her a dreamy look for just a second before his voice filled with command. “Get on your bikes, gang! We’d better get going.”

  Olivia still didn’t move. She heard something, and it wasn’t Tommy. “Shhhhh. Wait a minute. Listen. What’s that sound?”

  “That’s just a chickadee,” Tommy dismissed her. “It’s nothing! Come on!”

  “No, not the dee dee dee. Listen again. Is it a cat? Not quite like a cat, but something crying—oh, look up!”

  The children lifted their faces toward the sky.

  A big gray gull flew over the housetops and circled above them. He was calling in a high-pitched mewing voice. Another gray gull quickly appeared, calling back. Then two more. Then a squadron of ten. Soon, the sky turned dark with the gulls. Their cries filled the air.

  “I never saw this many gulls above my backyard before.” Sandy’s voice held a hint of wonder.

  “I once saw this many at the seashore,” Victoria remembered. “A little boy tossed cheese doodles in the air. Dozens of gulls came out of nowhere and started fighting for the food. And all of a sudden—”

  Before she could finish, a large gull folded back its wings and dove low over the children. Something went splat on the payment. Another gull swooped down toward Tommy. A white blob hit the fender of Tommy’s bike.

  “Hey! Quit that!” he yelled. A third gull flew directly above his head. Something wet smacked down on his hair.

  Then blobs of white started dropping from the sky like a hailstorm.

  One hit Sandy’s shirt. He stared at it. Understanding hit him like the flash from a camera. “It’s bird poop! They’re pooping on us! Run! Run for the garage!”

  “My hair!” Victoria screamed. She dropped her ten-speed and raced toward the garage door. White blobs streaked her long golden tresses.

  “Euccch. I’ve got bird poop on my arm!” Olivia cried. She pushed her bike as fast as she could toward shelter while poop rained onto the ground, turning it white.

  The seagull poop attack lasted only a minute or two, but the damage was done.

  As soon as the gulls flew away, Sandy hurried into the house for wipes and paper towels. He handed them out. The children cleaned themselves and their bikes.

  The minutes ticked by.

  Victoria held back tears as Olivia wiped the white stuff out of her hair. “Can you get it all?” she whimpered. “It’s so gross.”

  “Don’t worry. It’s coming out. But you know, that was very weird,” Olivia said when she finished helping Victoria. She cleaned her bare arms where the poop had landed and wiped the blotches off her shorts. “They seemed to be aiming at us.”

  “It’s a bad omen.” Sandy sounded terribly serious. “We’ve already lost some time. Maybe I shouldn’t go.”

  “You are such a wimp.” Tommy’s voice held disgust. “It was just a lot of bird poop. Nobody got hurt.”

  Victoria turned her violet eyes filled with pleading toward Sandy. “Please go with us. I’m so worried about Natasha. We won’t be long.”

  “I know, but—I don’t like sneaking away. I told my Dad I was going to Victoria’s.”

  “So what?” Tommy responded. “The rest of us said we’re taking a swim in your pool. Look, nobody will know we’re gone. We’ll be home safe and sound before dark—and maybe we’ll have Natasha with us! I bet we do.” Tommy sounded confident.

  Sandy pushed aside his worries. “You’re right. Victoria needs us. Let’s get going.”

  Tommy mounted his bike. The other children got on theirs. They pedaled out of the yard and into the quiet, tree-lined street.

  “It’s this way,” Victoria called out. She took the lead.

  Nobody noticed the lone chickadee flying behind them all.

  Never give up. Never. Never. Never.

  Trotting up the white road toward the junkyard, B-Boy stayed at Paco’s side. The cats scampered behind in fits and starts. The evening light weakened, but the sun had not yet set. The way was bright and easy, but oh so very long. They had short legs. There was nothing they could do about it.

  Finally the dank, dark tunnel of trees appeared ahead. They were approaching dangerous ground.

  “Alto!” Paco yelled. Everyone stopped. “Let’s review the plan before we get closer.”

  “I know it.” Little Annie raised her hand. “Once we find Natasha and the werewolf, Norma-Jean and I will go off and find a very tall tree. Then we come back and get close to the werewolf. We make sure he spots us. We make sure he chases us. Then we make sure we climb all the way up to the top of the tree. To be safe. We tease him from there. We keep him busy while you get Natasha and escape.”

  “And how will you know that Natasha is free?” Paco prompted.

  “You’ll give a signal—three short yips and one long bark. That’s Morse code for V…V for victory.” The cats and Paco watched shows about World War II on the History Channel quite a bit.

  “Sí! Claro! You got it,” Paco agreed. “Then what?”

  “We stop teasing the werewolf. When he leaves, we get out of the tree. We run behind you down the white road and catch up to you at the highway,” Norma-Jean added.

  Paco frowned. When he leaves… He had thought the cats could keep the werewolf busy until he and B-Boy had safely rescued Natasha. But now something felt heavy in his belly, like a cannonball of doubt. What if the werewolf got suspicious and didn’t stay by the tree? What if he spotted the dogs? What if he chased them—before the rest of Paco’s plan could be put into place?

  And what if Pewy didn’t arrange the most important piece of the whole operation?

  Paco gave himself a shake, and his dog tags jingled. He puffed out his chest. He straightened his tail. He must keep up morale. He must look like the commander-in-chief of this rescue mission.

  He nodded. “Sí. Claro. That’s it. We’d better get going.”

  And they did.

  They entered the tunnel of trees. The daylight disappeared. Paco hadn’t brought a flashlight. He had forgotten it. He was almost blind. He and B-Boy held on to the cats’ tails as Norma-Jean and Little Annie, who could see very well in the dark, led the way.

  They went deeper and deeper into the gloom. The nasty trash of the junkyard lurked along the edge of the road. Paco was back in the place of broken things. Then a glimmer of light appeared ahead. They saw the end of the tunnel.

  Right before they returned into the light, where they could see but also be seen, Paco signaled that the group of four should stop.

  He stood up on his hind legs and sniffed. He smelled something terrible, as terrible as the smell he and Coco had whiffed the other night. The creature—the werewolf—must be somewhere close. But Paco searched for another scent, one he knew very well: the sweet shampoo of Natasha’s fresh-washed fur and the lovely odor of her doggy self.

  His nose twitched. He inhaled deeply. The rank and rotten odor of the werewolf made him gasp, but underneath the ugliness lay a hint of something beautiful. With a tremble of excitement, he realized Natasha must be there.

  “Straight ahead,” he whispered.

  The trees with their overhanging branches quickly thinned out. The dogs could again see in the weak evening sunlight reflected by the white road. Using their noses, they followed the awful smell down a narrow path that snaked through piles of broken household appliances, cement culverts big enough for a man to walk through, and smaller drainage pipes that lay like pick-up sticks in huge heaps.

  When the smell—like rotten eggs and rotten cabbage and musty basements—became very strong, they knew the werewolf must be close. The four friends got down on their bellies. They crawled forward. Inch by inch, they moved forward until they got to the edge of a clearing. In the clearing, an old easy chair sat ne
xt to a potbellied stove. Next to that, a three-legged table held a huge pile of bones.

  Paco and his friends froze where they were and didn’t dare move. Fear raced through Paco’s blood like a lightning strike. This was the lair of the werewolf, and the werewolf was right there in front of them! It sat on a three-legged stool in front of the three-legged table. It was munching, crunching, and wolfing down a bone.

  Snap went the bone. Slurp went the werewolf.

  Ay, ay, ay, went Paco.

  The creature looked nothing like a real wolf. Wolves were handsome canines. The werewolf was loathsome. Dirty, tangled hair like curling gray wires covered it from head to toe—except where single coarse strands sprouted from the gigantic warts on its face. Long, brutal fangs glistened white in a huge, gaping mouth, and from these terrible teeth, spit dripped down in strings. Cruel, beady eyes shone red in the firelight. And at the end of a nose as square and black as a lump of coal were nostrils as wide as the barrel of a shotgun.

  Ugly the werewolf was, but it was also as big as a grizzly bear—and even scarier. Hard muscles rippled under its wiry coat. A big, curved knife hung from a belt around its protruding belly. And while the little animals watched, not daring to even breathe, it stood up and looked around. It grabbed a bone from the pile and used it as a toothpick to clean its cruel white teeth.

  Then it paced to the far side of the clearing. It stood up on its two back legs. Its front legs hung down like a gorilla’s long arms and ended in hairy knuckles that touched the ground. It growled a growl that made the ground shake. It hacked, coughed up a gob as big as a teacup, and spat it onto the ground. Then came a rumble from the werewolf’s big belly, followed by the trumpet call of the loudest, longest, and stinkiest fart Paco had ever experienced.

  This was not an ordinary animal.

  This was a monster.

  Ay, caramba! I wouldn’t want to be anything like that! Paco thought. He was grateful he hadn’t drunk rainwater out of a werewolf’s footprint as the Internet had instructed him to.

  Then he heard a whimper, and his heart nearly broke. Tied to a stake by a thick rope attached to her collar, Natasha lay at the far edge of the clearing. Her beautiful long coat hung down, matted and dull. Her eyes held a heartbreaking sorrow. She clearly did not want to stay here. Her whimper said she wanted to go home.

  But how could he and B-Boy get her loose? Paco hadn’t thought to bring a knife when he devised his wonderful plan. He suddenly realized that plans could be made, but they sometimes could not be made to work.

  And time was running out. The children were on their way. They must be getting close by now. Paco needed to come up with an idea in a hurry. But the harder he tried to think, the less he thought of anything helpful.

  Just then, one of the cats poked him on the shoulder. She used sign language to show him that the sisters were going off to look for a very tall tree—and then she pointed. The only trees in view were the ones that lined the white road.

  Paco nodded, and the two felines scampered off.

  Another problem with the plan! How could the dogs sneak back to the road if the werewolf were already on it? Paco shrugged. He didn’t have a solution. Yet he couldn’t let that stop him. They were so close to saving Natasha, they just had to succeed. Determination fueled his courage. He needed the heart of lion, not a dandelion.

  His body trembling, his nerves tight, but his will strong, Paco hunkered down behind some pipes with B-Boy to wait for the cats to make their move.

  And he looked around for the help he had requested from Professor Pewmount. He didn’t see anything. He listened carefully. He didn’t hear anything. He needed that help. And he needed it now.

  Paco’s nerves danced a jig inside his skin. His mouth became parched, his tongue dry. He was very thirsty. He had not only forgotten a flashlight and a knife, he had forgotten bottled water. He sniffed. He looked around. He noticed clear water dripping into a puddle from one of the pipes right behind them. He crawled over and began to lap it up. It was cool and wet on his tongue.

  “Paco! Stop!” B-Boy whispered as loudly as he dared.

  Paco picked up his head and whispered back. “Why? It’s just rainwater. It’s a little rusty, but it tastes fine.”

  “No, not that. Look!” B-Boy pointed. “Look at the puddle.”

  Paco did. He stared for minute, until he realized he wasn’t drinking out of a puddle at all. The water was pooled in a footprint—a dog-like footprint, but much bigger than a dog’s paw.

  “You’re drinking from the werewolf’s footprint!” B-Boy hissed.

  Paco’s eyes got very wide. His heart thudded. “Oh no! What have I done?” he gasped. “What have I done?”

  Meanwhile, in town, an elderly woman was sweeping her front walk. She had almost finished when she noticed four children riding bikes down the street. She stared at them. They lifted their heads and stared at her too. One raised a hand to wave.

  The old woman hoped they weren’t out to make trouble. She gripped her broom tighter.

  They came closer and closer. They stopped at her gate and got off their bicycles.

  She peered through her spectacles at them. They didn’t look like bad children, except maybe the red-haired boy with a face covered with freckles. He might not be bad, but he carried mischief in his eyes. She meant Tommy Thompson, and of course she was right.

  “Hello,” Tommy called out through a megaphone, which made his voice very loud.

  The old woman leaned on her broom and gave him a sour look. “I ain’t deaf. I can hear ya, boy.” Her voice was sharp. “What do you want?”

  Tommy lowered the megaphone. “Sorry. We’re trying to find my friend’s dog.”

  “She’s missing,” Victoria added. “A policeman said someone who lived on this corner saw her. Was it you?”

  “That was your dog, was it now?” the old woman asked, suspicion in her voice. “Did you give her a reason to run away?”

  “Oh no!” Victoria cried. “I love her very much. I take very good care of her. The policeman said another dog was with her. I think she was dog-napped!”

  “You do, do you?” the woman said. “Well, I saw her, and the ugly big dog too. I don’t think he was a dog. Never saw a dog like that, anyway. Looked more like a wolf, you know.”

  Olivia glanced at Sandy. Sandy returned her look. A wolf? Olivia mouthed, her face going pale.

  “Where were they going?” Tommy became impatient to leave.

  “Hard to say,” the woman snapped at him. “They didn’t stop to chat.”

  “Did you notice which way they ran?” Victoria jumped in with her sweet voice. “We’re trying to find Natasha—that’s my dog’s name—before it gets dark.”

  “You think that’s a good idea, little girl? You children, all alone, following those dogs? The one looked pretty mean.” The old lady frowned.

  Olivia felt uneasy. She thought the same thing.

  “We’ll be careful. We promise,” Victoria pleaded. “Just tell us which way they went, please. It means a lot to me.”

  “Since you’re asking nice,” the woman said, “they was running toward the highway, going north toward Mount Diablo.”

  Neither the old woman nor the children paid any attention to a very small bird calling fee beee, fee beee right over their heads.

  The children got back on their bikes. “Thank you,” Victoria called to the old woman. “We’d better be going.”

  “Don’t look like you’re going nowhere.” The woman pointed to the street. “Now ain’t that something.”

  The children turned their heads, and their eyes opened wide. The street was filled with a huge flock of wild turkeys: Hen turkeys; tom turkeys; and lots of chicks, all going gobble gobble gobble.

  More than two hundred wild turkeys covered the sidewalks. They crowded onto the lawns. They blocked the corner in both directio
ns.

  A car coming down the street braked to a stop and blew its horn. The turkeys didn’t move. A man stuck his head out of the car window. His face got very red. He yelled at the birds. A tom turkey stretched out his neck, fanned out his tail feathers, and gobbled angrily. The man beeped the car horn again. The turkeys didn’t budge.

  The car finally backed up, turned around, and went off the way it had come.

  “Can we get through those birds?” Sandy asked.

  “Do they bite?” Victoria looked at the turkeys’ dark beaks.

  “I don’t know if they bite,” Tommy admitted. “But I bet they kick. The big ones have sharp bony spurs on the back of their legs. We’ll have to backtrack just like the car did and make a detour. We can ride a couple of streets down, then come back on the other side. It shouldn’t take too long.”

  “Another bad omen.” Sandy shook his head. “We’re losing more time.” He looked at the sky. The sun sat closer to the horizon. Evening was falling. Dark would come soon. He didn’t want to be in the woods when nighttime arrived.

  “You’re acting like a wimp again, Sandy,” Tommy shouted. “Come on, we can ride fast.” And the four children, pedaling hard with their backs hunched down over their handlebars, rode their bikes back down the street.

  The old woman watched the children until they turned the corner and disappeared from sight. Then she looked at the turkeys, who stopped gobbling and started to move into a line. As if following a signal, they suddenly flapped their large wings. Like a squadron of jet fighters, one after another, they lifted from the ground and flew upward, as high as the rooftops. They turned to the left and took to the open skies, and within a moment they had vanished into the deepening blue. All they left behind as proof that they had been there was a feather, or maybe two.

  Back in the junkyard, up on Mount Diablo, Paco and B-Boy waited for the cats to come back. To make the most of the time, they decided to crawl around the edge of the campsite. They wanted to come up behind Natasha and get as close as possible.