Amphibian

by Carla Gunn

  I keep looking in Fiddledee’s litter box for red in her poop but so far, so good. My mom thinks that the red we saw before might have been from something she ate. But I’m still a bit worried about her.

  After Fiddledee had calmed down from playing with the new cat toy, she climbed up onto my lap and lay down and purred really loud. Fiddledee always seems happy but I wonder if she ever gets depressed, like my mom did after my parents got separated and after Granddad died.

  I bet Fiddledee’s brain had the happiness chemical when she was on my lap purring. Animals have the exact same emotion chemicals in their brains as humans. I patted Fiddledee as I thought about this and she looked up at me and slowly blinked. Along with happiness, I’m sure she had love in her eyes.

  I think it’s weird that scientists do all sorts of experiments on animals to learn more about humans, but some of them think that the stuff we know about humans doesn’t apply to other animals. That’s like bumping heads with someone super hard and even though it really hurts, you say you can’t believe that the other person’s head hurts too.

  I think that since humans evolved from other animals, it only makes logical sense that emotions are gifts to humans – gifts from the other animals.

  Tomorrow is Wonderful Wednesday. It’s the day to put Mission Amphibian into action. Tomorrow Cuddles will be freed by Bird and me!

  When I first went to bed tonight, I lay thinking about how I hope nothing goes wrong. I went over the plan sixteen times in my head. I got up out of bed and triple-checked what Bird and I had written down. I got back in bed and went over it six more times in my head. It was driving me crazy – it felt as though I was caught in a thought maze and couldn’t get out.

  I considered going into my mother’s bedroom so that I could just stop thinking and go to sleep. Even though she’s making me more worried, at night she makes me feel calmer. But then I thought how she wants me to stay in my own bed and that she and Dr. Barrett say that I am too old now to need to sleep with somebody. But then I thought about how all other young mammals sleep with their mothers. And then I thought about how even human adults get to sleep with somebody, like when they’re married. How come kids don’t get to sleep with somebody too?

  I gave in and went into my mother’s room. She was reading a book with her eyes closed. I sneaked quietly into her bed, but not quietly enough. She said, ‘For the love of God, Phin, why can’t you just stay in your own bed?’

  I said, ‘Because I’m worried and you make me feel better.’

  She didn’t say anything.

  Then I said, ‘Mom, I’ll give you a loonie if you let me stay.’

  She sighed but then she turned off the light, pulled me toward her and hugged me.

  But I still couldn’t get to sleep.

  Mission Amphibian was slated for very last period. All day long my stomach was jumping around so much I thought it might get loose and fall into whatever’s below it – my bowel, I think. I just couldn’t get frog off my brain.

  I kept looking at Bird at the front of the classroom, and he kept half standing up and turning around to look at me.

  Once he got in trouble for that. Mrs. Wardman said, ‘Richard, sit still and concentrate, and stop looking all agog!’

  Bird said, ‘I wasn’t looking at the frog, Mrs. Wardman, honest.’

  Mrs. Wardman just gave him a funny look. Bird obviously had frog on his brain too.

  I also kept sneaking peeks at Cuddles, who was behind me in his aquarium. I made mental comparisons between him and the rubber frog we were going to put in his place. Although they were both about the same size, I was concerned about the rubber frog being brown. I sure hoped none of the kids or Mrs. Wardman would notice it was a fraud frog before Bird and I managed to get out the door.

  I was also concerned about my lunch bag. That morning while my mother was in the shower, I poked holes in it with a sharp pair of scissors. They went through the black outside part easy enough but then I had to push hard to get them through the inside silver part. I only had time to make four holes before I heard the bathroom door open. I quickly put my lunch bag into my back-pack. I figure that when my mother sees the holes I’ll be in trouble. I’ll have to think of a reason for them that has nothing to do with a frog.

  At recess, Bird and I went through our plan again. Actually, we went through it eleven times. We both had to memorize the steps. Bird was worried about the fake fraud frog too, but he figured nobody will notice. The kids were excited about Cuddles when we first got him, but lately pretty much nobody bothers to look at him except for me and sometimes Bird.

  At noon hour, Bird and I pre-enacted what we were going to do. We made a square with some rocks and put a large rock in the centre and pretended that was Cuddles in his aquarium. We filled a pop can that we found in the soccer field with sticks and put it about four feet away from the aquarium and pretended that it was the jar of paintbrushes that Bird is going to knock over to create the diversion. Then Bird gave me the signal – which is sticking his pointer finger in his right ear – that he was about to knock over the can. This meant that I should walk over to Cuddles’ pretend aquarium and get ready for the exchange by reaching into my pocket for the fake fraud frog, which was another rock. I waited till Bird pushed over the can, and then I quickly put the fraud frog rock down and scooped up the Cuddles rock.

  We didn’t pre-enact the next part but I knew it by heart. I’m supposed to go out to the cubbies while Mrs. Wardman is busy with the paintbrushes and put Cuddles into my lunch bag and then sneak back into the classroom. By this time, the bell should ring and Cuddles should be free. As long as we time this to happen exactly at 2:55, the bell and the sounds of all the kids getting ready to go home should drown out the noises that Cuddles may make inside my lunch bag.

  The classes after lunch were in super slow motion. The only out-of-the-ordinary thing that sped it up a little bit was Becky getting sick in the classroom sink and all over the floor. The custodian came in and sprinkled some white powder on it and then mopped it up. It had a horrible smell, and Becky looked like she was going to cry, especially after Lyle said, ‘Ooooh, I’ll never use that sink again. Disgusting.’

  Maybe nobody will use that sink again. That wouldn’t surprise me because once a fifth-grader threw up in the water fountain by the lobby and now nearly everybody still fights to use the water fountain by the gym – even though the kid who threw up in it is likely in eleventh grade by now. Every new kid who comes to our school is told about the barf that used to be in the lobby water fountain.

  I watched the clock tick to 2:00, time for Wonderful Wednesday. Mrs. Wardman said, ‘Okay, boys and girls, let’s get our smocks on.’ Bird and I looked at each other. I couldn’t tell that he was nervous, and I hoped nobody could tell that I was. My palms were so sweaty that I doubted I’d even be able to hold on to a paintbrush.

  Mrs. Wardman gave us all big pieces of thick paper and told us the theme today was to illustrate a song from music class that we liked. I thought and thought, but I couldn’t even think of a song we did in music class, let alone one I liked – my brain felt like it was bouncing and bits of thoughts didn’t have a chance to stick in one place long enough to form into whole ones.

  After a few minutes, I looked over at what Laura was painting. She had written the words ‘You Are My Sunshine’ and was painting a sun. On the other side of me Jane was drawing a rabbit with long ears because her song was ‘Do Your Ears Hang Low?’ It was then that I felt the crazy laugh in my chest.

  When I get really, really stressed out, I start to crazy-laugh. For example, when my mother told me that my grandfather was really sick and was going to die, I started crazy-laughing. I don’t know why – it wasn’t that I found that the least bit funny – it’s just something really weird that happens to me. And when I start to crazy-laugh, it’s like I’m floating up above myself with a bird’s-eye view, watching and thinking, ‘Stop it! Stop it!’ but I can’t. And if someone looks at me like I’ve g
one crazy, that makes me crazy-laugh even harder.

  When I looked at Jane’s rabbit with its ears on the ground, I could feel the crazy laugh starting in my belly and working its way up my esophagus and into my throat. I puffed my cheeks and tried to swallow it back down, but it was no use. I started to laugh really hard.

  Everybody looked at me and Mrs. Wardman said, ‘Phin! Why are you laughing?’ But I was laughing so hard I couldn’t say anything – and I wouldn’t have known what to say anyway. Mrs. Wardman said, ‘Phin! Stop that right now and get to work.’ This made me laugh even harder. I laughed so hard my face was covered in tears and my chest was starting to hurt. A lot of the other kids started laughing too, which made me laugh even harder, even though it really hurt. Even Mrs. Wardman started to laugh.

  Then Mrs. Wardman said, ‘Phin, okay, that’s enough. Now please go out and get a drink to calm yourself down.’

  I got up and ran to the water fountain in the lobby – even though I prefer the one next to the gymnasium too – because it was closer. I took a big gulp of water and then laughed again, which made the water run out of my nose. Finally, I stopped laughing. Water up your nose hurts, and it makes your eyes water. I once saw a show where a man who didn’t have an eye could stick his finger up his nose and wiggle it through his eye socket.

  After a few minutes, I went back to my classroom. Everybody was looking at me, but I had stopped laughing and was acting as normally as I could. The good thing was that all that laughing gave me an idea as to what song to use for my picture: ‘Kookaburra’!

  The kookaburra call sounds like human laughter. It sings to warn other kookaburras where its territory is. My dad and I once listened to a whole bunch of kookaburras on the internet. It made us laugh too. You just can’t listen to kookaburra calls without laughing. This is kind of ironic because the kookaburras don’t mean to be funny at all – they’re being quite serious.

  As I painted a kookaburra on top of a eucalyptus, I kept a close eye on the clock. The minutes ticked by like they were hours. Bird and I kept looking at each other. Then at 2:47, right on schedule, Mrs. Wardman told us it was time to clean up – only three minutes to rescue time.

  I was so nervous I could barely breathe. I patted the pocket of my cargo pants to make sure the fake fraud frog was still there – like he might have jumped out or something. He hadn’t.

  We all took off our smocks and stuck our paintbrushes in the big jar of water. But then something completely unexpected happened! Something Bird and I never thought of in our wildest imaginations: Mrs. Wardman picked up the jar of paintbrushes and put it in the sink! How could Bird knock over the jar to create a diversion if it was in the deep sink? It’s not like he could pick up the jar and put it on the counter and then knock it over and still have it look like a complete accident!

  I looked at Bird, and he looked at me, and we both just stared at each other. There was only one minute to go until action time, and we had no way of getting everybody to look in one direction! I felt like my chest was going to explode.

  Then Bird smiled at me and did something that really surprised me – he stuck his pointer finger in his right ear. That was the signal for me to get ready for the switch! I didn’t know what he was going to do, but I knew this meant I had better get into place. I walked over to Cuddles’ aquarium, patted my pocket again and got ready to lift the lid.

  Then all of a sudden Bird started making sounds like a dog! He went, ‘Arrf, arrf, arff,’ loud and then louder. Everybody looked in his direction. Before I had a chance to change my mind, I put Cuddles’ jar of crickets in my pocket and then opened the lid to the aquarium and reached my hand in to pick him up. I could hear Mrs. Wardman say, ‘Richard, what are you doing? Stop that this instant!’

  In my mind I kept telling Bird to keep on barking, and he did. That was a good thing since picking up Cuddles was harder than I imagined because my hands were so sweaty. I had Cuddles in my hand twice, but both times he jumped right out.

  I glanced up to make sure nobody was watching me. They weren’t. They were all looking down under the art table. Mrs. Wardman was standing where Bird was originally standing and saying, ‘Richard! Get out from under there. Right now!’

  Then Bird started howling like a wolf, and the kids were laughing and laughing and Mrs. Wardman was saying, ‘Children! Don’t encourage him. Richard, come out from under there this instant and march yourself down to Mr. Legacie’s office!’ Bird just kept on howling, growling and barking, and the kids kept on laughing.

  Finally, I got a hold of Cuddles in one hand and put in the fake fraud frog with the other. Then I shut the lid to the aquarium and closed my hands over Cuddles and made a fast walk for the door. I couldn’t believe nobody had caught me! I was almost frog-free!

  As I was walking, I could feel Cuddles trying to jump. Thankfully, this was one part Bird and I had thought about beforehand, and I had left my lunch bag on top of my boots with the lid open. I quickly put Cuddles in and zippered the lid.

  Then just as I turned around to go back into the classroom, Bird and Mrs. Wardman were walking out. Bird smiled at me, but I didn’t smile back in case Mrs. Wardman was watching.

  Mrs. Wardman said, ‘Phineas! Get back in the classroom; it’s not time to go yet.’

  She marched Bird down the hall. I knew Bird was on his way to a misbehaviour, but I also knew it wouldn’t bother him as much as it would bother me. It would likely just mean he would lose his Game Boy for a week. I would tell him it was worth it to save a life.

  When I got back into the classroom, I kept looking around to make sure nobody was looking at Cuddles’ aquarium. Thankfully, they were still all laughing and talking about Bird.

  When Mrs. Wardman came back, she told us to put our agendas and homework into our backpacks and get our outdoor clothes on. When Bird didn’t come back, I started to get worried again. Then, as I was putting on my jacket, Bird came down the hall with a misbehaviour in his hand. He whispered, ‘Did you get him?’ and I nodded my head.

  As we stood in line to leave, my heart was jumping around so much it felt like Cuddles was in my chest. I really, really hoped Mrs. Wardman wouldn’t notice that he’d been replaced by a fraud frog before we got out of the school. I knew someone would notice tomorrow morning, but by then Cuddles would be on his way to Australia.

  When the bell rang for us to leave, Bird and I felt like running to my house, but we couldn’t because of Cuddles and shaken frog syndrome. Bird carried both of our backpacks and I carried my lunch bag. I could feel Cuddles moving around, which was a good sign.

  Bird said, ‘What are we going to do when they notice Cuddles is missing tomorrow?’

  I shrugged. I had been so worried about the first part – the rescuing Cuddles part – that I really hadn’t really thought about that part. It just hadn’t seemed important at the time. Now it seemed a little more important.

  Bird said, ‘But aren’t you not supposed to bark up the wrong tree until all your ducks are in a row or something like that?’

  ‘How about we don’t do anything,’ I said. ‘Nobody will know it was us.’

  ‘But we’ll be the first to be questioned because we acted so weird,’ said Bird.

  ‘That doesn’t prove anything,’ I said. ‘And besides, you act weird lots of times, and a frog hasn’t gone missing before.’

  ‘But this was the first time you ever acted so weird,’ said Bird. ‘You looked crazy like my grandfather after he shot at the squirrels through his living room window without even opening the window.’

  ‘Crazy people don’t go around stealing frogs. But I heard sometimes they lick them because there’s a chemical on frog and toad skin that makes them go crazier – or was that just a myth? I can’t remember.’

  ‘But just in case, maybe we should be the ones who scream out, “Cuddles is gone! Cuddles is gone!” tomorrow morning. That way Mrs. Wardman won’t think that we did it because who reports their own crime?’

  ‘Remember Jacob a
nd Sean and their fire?’ I asked Bird.

  And then Bird said, ‘Oh. Right.’

  Jacob and Sean who are in fifth grade set a fire in the woods last fall and then reported it themselves. When the fire trucks got there, they asked the firefighters for a reward for reporting the fire. That made it seem suspicious, and they got found out. For punishment, they had to go to every class and talk about fire safety. That would be like Lyle having to talk about being nice.

  ‘But it might work if we don’t ask for a reward,’ said Bird.

  ‘I don’t think it would work,’ I told him. ‘Lots and lots of guilty people report things because they think that it will make them look less guilty. It doesn’t work.’

  ‘Well, then maybe we should go back to the school and open the lid of the aquarium so that Mrs. Wardman will just think that he escaped.’

  I thought about that for a moment. That made sense. At least then Mrs. Wardman would just be looking for the kid who opened the frog lid and not for one who actually took the frog.

  ‘How about you wait here and hold Cuddles. I’ll go back, and when I see Mrs. Wardman leave, I’ll sneak into the classroom and open the lid,’ I said.

  Bird thought about this. I could tell because when he’s thinking, he rubs the soft spot just under his nose. That part is called the philtrum, and it’s not for snot to flow down like Bird thought before I told him what it’s really for. It’s to allow humans to move their lips lots of different ways to talk and to show emotions on their faces. Some other primates like lemurs have this spot too.

  ‘I think I should go back because I can run a lot faster than you,’ said Bird. ‘And besides, I don’t want to be responsible for Cuddles. You stay here and hold him.’