Mousemobile
Page 17
“Talking Mouse Seven,” he said. “Approach.”
Savannah was not awed. Now that she was strong enough, she even managed a sashay across the picnic blanket on her rear feet.
“You, Mouse,” said the Big Cheese, “have already earned the rank of Mouse Hero First Class. But I still intend to sentence you. You will be exiled, forthwith.”
Exiled! Being put on a Greyhound bus and sent away as far as that bus would go—it was a punishment that all mice dreaded. Savannah froze, and mouse jaws dropped open. A gasp went up from all the humans except Megan’s mom, who was grinning.
The Big Cheese made the “Laughing out loud” sign.
“I sentence you to exile at Camp Green Stars,” he said. “You have always worshipped movie stars? Perhaps when you see such stars at close quarters, you will realize that they are no different from other humans. With the approval of Miss Susie, I officially designate you as her mouse companion, to accompany her at all times.”
It took a moment for the implication to sink in, but when it did, Savannah rushed up to the Big Cheese to embarrass him with a quick kiss, saying, “Thank you thank you thank you YES!” Then she sprinted over to Megan’s mom and jumped on her knee.
“You’ll have to promise not to talk to anyone but me, at Green Stars,” said Susie, reaching out to tickle Savannah behind an ear. “And not to sing. Ever!”
“Oh, I promise, I promise, I promise,” said Savannah. “When we’re with those movie stars I won’t say a word. I’ll let them think I’m really, really dumb!”
Which almost finished off Trey and Joey and Megan, who rolled off the picnic blanket into a huddle, whispering about the sharpest crayons in the box and the brightest bulbs in the chandelier, until Trey said, “Know what?”
“What?” they asked, seeing that he looked serious now.
“She might not be as dumb as she looks.”
And watching Savannah, they had to agree that Trey could be right. From the few words they could hear, she was talking seriously about the climate and how great it was that all those lovely movie stars would help to fix it.
Now all that remained was for all five humans to squash into the Prius and drive up to Camp Green Stars, where the campers poured out of their cabins to greet them, bubbling over with ideas for Daisy’s new Web site. Everyone wanted group photographs, and it was Daisy who insisted on getting the photo printed up so all twelve stars could sign copies for Megan and Joey.
And then it was time for Megan and Joey and Jake and Uncle Fred to leave, and to puzzle the stars a bit when they all said fond good-byes to Susie Miller’s new mouse, as well as to her.
t wasn’t long before Megan and Joey and Jake were flying over the Rockies on their way to Oregon, speculating about what was going on down there in the two settlements that they could just make out from the plane. Jake pointed out that the track between the two valleys looked quite well worn now, as Jeeps must have gone back and forth with their cargo of movie stars, helping the WATCH guys set up Creaturebook, which would soon be ready to launch. Indeed, the Big Cheese had put together a task force to coordinate it even before the Mousemobile rumbled into Cleveland, and the task force hardly missed a beat as the humans unloaded mice by the boxful, and set them up in the new Headquarters at Planet Mouse.
Headquarters filled three rooms on the second floor of the main house. The humans split up the area with little dividers of balsa wood to give each department its own space, with a larger office for the Big Cheese himself, right next to a small balcony. Uncle Fred drilled a hole in the wall so that for the first time in his life, the Big Cheese could step outside whenever he liked and sniff the air while his muscle mice kept watch for hawks.
And Oregon? Oregon was great. Even greater than Megan had expected, because it began raining brothers.
The first brother came into her life, more or less, when Annie took her up to her old bedroom in the back of the house on Cherry Street. Megan burst out with the surprised reaction she’d been practicing.
“Oh, thank you thank you thank you! You painted it for me,” she said.
Then she went perhaps the deepest red of her life when Annie said, “I’m so glad you like it, honey, but actually it’s for him.” She patted the belly that had been hiding under a loose shirt but now revealed itself to be quite pregnant.
Which was wonderful, because even though Megan would have to share her dad, she had always wanted a brother or sister. But really, should she have been blindsided by such a big surprise? When she had mice?
“We knew,” admitted Trey later that day, when Megan had finally managed to get away from Annie with all her excited plans for cribs and names and playpens and even maybe a new house with more room for both kids. “Right, Julia?”
“Of course we knew,” said Julia. She’d kept in touch with the mice who had moved into 253 Cherry Street last winter to keep Megan company when all her other mouse friends had gone to Cleveland. “But when humans have secrets from each other—good secrets that won’t hurt anybody—we can’t tell. It’s a mouse rule.”
Megan had to admit it had been a good secret, an excellent secret, one that made her dad and Annie exceptionally happy.
And the second brother? Two mice had a hand—a paw—in that. And not just any old mice. Savannah and Julia.
It happened right at the end of a great backpacking trip in the Cascades with Joey and Jake and the four mice, two days before they were due to fly home to Cleveland. They’d almost made it back to the car when Jake saw something that got his attention and he took off down the hill, bounding in great leaps, taking short cuts where the trail switchbacked, leaving the kids gaping at each other.
When they saw Jake again, he was walking slowly back up to meet them with his arm around Megan’s mom.
“I was all set to turn east when we closed down the camp,” she explained, after she hugged Megan. “Toward Cleveland. Then my friend here—” She reached up and stroked Savannah, who was wearing a cute little sun hat and tiny sunglasses that a famous star had made for her. “My friend here said… Oh, you tell them, Savannah. Something about a little bird?”
“Well, it was really a little mouse,” said Savannah. She jumped onto Megan’s shoulder and pointed at the other shoulder, where Julia was riding. “That little mouse. She e-mailed me about a conversation she’d overheard, soon after you guys got back to Cleveland.”
“Oh, no!” said Jake, and actually went a bit pink. “Me and Fred?”
“That’s right!” said Savannah. “You and Mr. Fred, talking one night until about two in the morning.”
“So what did he say?” asked Joey. “What did my dad say?”
“He said he wanted to marry Susie more than anything in the whole world!” said Savannah, leaping back onto Susie’s shoulder. “And I happen to know she wants to marry him because that’s what I heard her telling a movie star when she thought I wasn’t listening!”
Jake went a little dithery, as if he had no clue what to do next.
“Is that true, Dad?” said Joey.
“Yes,” he said. “Oh, yes. But only if it’s okay with you guys.”
Joey and Megan looked at each other, and the silence stretched out a bit as they both came to grips with the notion of being a few steps closer than step-second-cousins.
Megan went first. “Fine with me, bro,” she said.
“Me too, sis,” said Joey, grinning.
“In fact, it’s great,” said Megan, reaching out to hug both adults at once.
“See?” said Susie to Jake. “It’s unanimous, and there’s no way you can wriggle out of it now.”
There were two ceremonies in Cleveland. First came the boring public one in front of friends from Susie’s job, and people who’d known her and Uncle Fred since childhood.
The next day a ceremony took place in the main office of Planet Mouse. Savannah and Julia had been given special permission to wear pink bridesmouse dresses as they rode on Susie’s shoulders, under the glow of a tho
usand solar blobs fastened to fine netting, which transformed the front office of Planet Mouse into a magical bower.
The Big Cheese stood on a pedestal, facing the couple as he intoned in large, slow signs:
“By the authority vested in me by the Mouse Nation, I pronounce you husband and wife.”
Then Trey translated the song from the youth chorus:
Oh, let mice sing and let bells ring.
We’ll all have a mousely fling.
What a party, what a doozy,
When our Jake gets wed to Susie.
It’s our nation that began it,
Making partners for the planet,
So hear ye, men, and hear ye, mice:
Married humans—twice as nice.
And afterward, when Jake and Susie had gone off on their honeymoon to the rain forest of Costa Rica? That’s when the Big Cheese took steps to repair any damage that the recent closeness to humans might have done to his nation.
In a memo to the Headquarters staff, he wrote:
Lest our proximity to humans should give any mouse a desire for human comforts, let me remind you that the events of this past summer, which could have ended tragically, began with such desires. As a reminder of those unfortunate events, I have ordered one doll bed, which will serve as a form of punishment. Mice who appear to be coveting human goods, or aping human ways, will be sentenced to time in bed, so that others may mock them for their pretensions.
The first mouse to undergo punishment by bedtime was a volunteer—the Director of Purchasing. He felt he had not been punished enough and chose to lie in the bed for one whole day while every mouse at Headquarters paraded past, all making the signs for “Laughing out loud.” And the foremouse of the factory organized director-viewing field trips for each shift as they came off work.
It was a great reminder, as the Big Cheese told his humans. Attempts to adopt human comforts won’t work, and will make you look very silly indeed.