by Bobbie Pyron
Just as he settled down in a dark corner behind the wooden crates, Trouble heard a flap and a thump.
“Ow, ow,” Mischief said. “I’ll never get used to these tin cans.” He hopped over to the coyote.
“Is Vetch still looking for me?” Trouble asked anxiously.
“Nah,” Mischief said. “He won’t be following us. I dropped his car keys down a storm drain.”
Trouble relaxed. He was so, so tired.
“I must now bid you adieu,” said the familiar voice of the Professor.
Trouble stood and walked to the tailgate of the truck, where the Professor perched. He looked into the great, round eyes of the owl, so much like twin moons.
The owl extended the tip of one long wing. Trouble touched his nose to the Professor’s wingtip. “Safe travels, my peripatetic friend,” the owl said.
“Thank you,” Trouble said.
Just as the owl prepared to take flight, Trouble said, “Professor?”
The owl turned his head around without moving his body, something that never failed to astonish the coyote. “Yes?”
“Please look after Rosebud for me.”
Trouble curled up behind a jumble of boxes. Really, he couldn’t remember ever feeling so very tired.
Mischief hopped over to the coyote and settled in the crook of his shoulder.
The crow popped a stray blueberry into his mouth. “Did I ever tell you about the time I—” and “Have you heard the one about—”
Between the warmth of the truck and the endless stream of crow stories, Trouble drifted off into a deep sleep. Later, he did not wake when the human loaded the unsold produce back into the truck. He did not wake when the truck engine coughed and grumbled to life.
Instead, he dreamed. He dreamed of his friends and the moonlit glen. He dreamed of home. His real home in the woods, as the truck took him closer, mile by mile, to his family.
36
North Star
Trouble felt a sharp tap, tap, tap on his head. “Wake up!”
Trouble blinked in the dark. He sat up and shook his head. How much time had passed? “Are we here?” he asked.
“Shhh,” the crow said. “Listen.”
The truck made a terrible grinding, coughing sound. It lurched this way and that until it finally stumbled to a stop.
“That’s not good,” Mischief muttered.
They heard the human lift the hood of the truck. They heard the human yell and plead and curse.
The back of the truck opened. The crow and the coyote cowered in the corner.
“Dang good-for-nothing hunk of junk,” the human muttered. He grabbed a toolbox and stomped out.
“What do we do now?” Trouble asked. “Are we close to home or still in the city?”
Mischief thought this over. “I don’t know,” he admitted. “Let me go take a look and see if I can figure it out.”
Mischief hopped to the end of the truck and flew into the early-evening sky.
Trouble listened and waited.
Finally, he heard a flutter and a thump. “Mischief?” Trouble whispered.
“Yeah, it’s me,” a dispirited voice answered. A voice that did not sound like Mischief.
Trouble eased from under his hiding place and studied the crow. “What’s wrong?” he asked.
Mischief’s wings drooped. “Trouble, I have no idea where we are.”
“None?” Trouble gasped.
“None. Nada. Zip and zero.” Not looking at the disbelieving coyote, the crow said, “I’ve let you down. And not just you, but your family too.”
Trouble smelled the sadness and defeat in Mischief’s heart. He nudged the bird gently with his nose. “I couldn’t have made it this far without you.”
The human slammed the hood of the truck closed and climbed back in. The stowaways heard him say, “Come on, baby.” The engine groaned. The engine sputtered. The engine roared to life.
“Yes!” the human and the crow and the coyote cheered.
The engine died.
“No,” Mischief croaked.
The human let loose a string of words that almost blistered the bark off the trees.
An evening breeze scurried through the truck, bringing the scent of the wild: moldering earth, sweet grass, the rich aroma of birth and death.
Trouble had had enough. It was time to go home.
“Let’s go,” he said to the crow.
Without a backward glance, he leaped out of the back of the truck. Silent as the moon, the coyote trotted along the dirt road. His muscles and spirit sang as he picked up speed. Finally, looming just ahead, silhouetted by the moonlight, the forest awaited. With a yip of joy, he bounded off into the woods.
Trouble stopped and listened. Gone was the constant clang and clatter and roar and rumble of the city. He heard wind in the leaves, the high piping of bats, and the tiny rustlings of night in the forest. He heard the beat of his own heart. He felt his muscles relax.
Trouble searched the wind with his nose, looking for home. Where was the smell of Singing Creek? The perfume of the old apple orchard?
“I’m not sure where I am,” he whimpered.
“I’m no help,” Mischief sighed.
Trouble looked up into the darkening night sky. And there it was, shining bright, just like it always had: the North Star. Hope flooded Trouble as he remembered Twist’s words.
“This way!” Trouble yipped.
They wove their way through the woods following old deer trails and, always, the North Star. They crossed one stream and then another, trotted past and flew above surprised (and slightly alarmed) cows just bedding down for the night.
Finally, Trouble came to a fork in the dirt road they had been traveling along. He looked up at the sky. The North Star stood high in the sky, and right between the two roads.
“Which way now?” Trouble wondered.
He threw back his head, closed his eyes, filled his lungs, and sang a coyote prayer to the rising moon.
37
Coyote Moon
For the first time since Trouble had left home, his song was answered. First his father’s low, deep voice, intertwined with his mother’s beautiful, heartbroken howls. And then the sweet, perfect song of his sister, reaching as high and wild as the stars.
“This way!” Trouble barked.
They wove their way through the cornfield, past a scarecrow (which gave Trouble a bit of a fright), and to the edge of the forest. Trouble entered the dark woods, the crow always just above him.
They climbed a hill and followed a ridgeline. The stone beneath Trouble’s feet and the ledge he easily hopped over reminded him of the time, so long ago in his memory now, when he had earned his name.
Trouble stopped in the moonlight. He called to his family. Before his howl had finished, he heard an answering call.
“This way!”
The crow and the pup plunged back down to the forest. Trouble’s nose worked the night air. There. He knew that scent: apples! His heart quickened.
The sound of his family grew closer.
Trouble flew as fast as any bird. Mischief would later tell Rosebud and the fox and the owl that he was quite sure Trouble’s feet never touched the ground as his family sang him home.
Then Trouble stopped. There, he heard it as familiar as the sound of his own heartbeat: the wild, ceaseless music of Singing Creek.
He loped with joyful bounds through the woods and burst into the moonlit meadow.
The yipping and howling stopped. Six pairs of amber eyes flashed with surprise.
“Trouble!”
“Twist!” Trouble yipped with utter joy. “Star! Pounce! Swift!”
The young coyotes chased and wrestled and licked one another in happiness. Trouble thought his heart would surely burst, he was so happy, despite the one or two nips on his ears from his father.
“Trouble,” his mother called.
The other coyotes moved away from the pup as their mother slowly approached, her black-tipped tail
held high. She sniffed the trembling pup from one end to the other and back again.
“I’m not letting you out of my sight for a hundred and one full moons,” she growled.
Trouble rolled onto his back, tail tucked between his legs. “Sorry, Mom,” he whined.
Trouble’s mother trotted over to the old oak tree and looked up at Mischief. “I can never thank you enough,” she said.
Mischief shuffled his feathers. “It was nothing, ma’am. No trouble at all.”
“Somehow I doubt that,” Mother said, glaring at her wayward son. “Nonetheless, the Singing Creek Pack is forever in your debt. If there is anything, anything, we can ever do for you, we will.
“You have our word,” she said.
“Our word,” the coyotes echoed.
And then, the coyotes resumed their joyful reunion.
After a time Trouble saw the crow stretch his wings and look up at the sky. He knew that look.
He trotted over to the tree. “Hey,” he called up to Mischief.
Mischief fluttered down to the ground. “Hey yourself,” he said. The two friends looked at each other for a long time.
Finally, Trouble said, “I think I’ll miss you most of all.”
Mischief searched for something suitably smart-alecky to say. Instead, he found the truest thing within him. “I’ll miss you too, you crazy coyote.”
Nose touched bill.
And with that Mischief rose into the night sky. He circled once, then circled twice above the meadow. “Stay out of trouble, kid!” he cawed.
Trouble watched as the crow rose high above the forest, his black silhouette seeming to brush the face of the moon—the full moon. So many things he had learned from his time in the city: lessons in friendship, bravery, love, forgiveness, belonging, and home. Things he would carry with him for the rest of his life and, one day, teach his own children. Like the crow said, curiosity can take you a long way, but Trouble now knew love brought you home.
Back in the city, in the wild, green heart of that city, a fox and an opossum played in the light of the full moon, watched from above by a particularly clever owl.
Three blocks west, a curious young girl slept in her moonlit bed, dreaming of coyote eyes.
And that same moon shone through the window where a poet slept and a poodle composed a poem in the moonlight.
Coyote Moon
When the wind howls and
the moon shines high in the sky
always, you are there.
Acknowledgments
Like Trouble, I’m very fortunate to have a pack of friends and family who support me in so many ways.
My agent, Alyssa Eisner Henkin, deserves the Agent of the Decade award for her unflagging patience and optimism.
Huge thanks and coyote yips to my delightful editor, Maria Barbo. She embraced Trouble’s story and was every bit as curious as I was to see what was just around the next corner. And to assistant editor Rebecca Aronson, two paws up!
I am so lucky to have these insightful members of the Writing Clan encourage me and give me invaluable feedback: Jean Reagan, Lora Koehler, Chris Graham, Becky Hall, and Kelley Lindberg. Thank you! I couldn’t do this without you!
And many thanks to Emily Adler for opening her home to me and showing me all around Central Park and the wilds of New Jersey.
I couldn’t have asked for a better group of folks to work with at HarperCollins. Thanks to copy editors Andrea Curley and Jon Howard for keeping me from looking like an ignoramus. Thanks to Andrew Hutchinson for bringing Trouble to life with his beautiful art, and to designer Andrea Vandergrift for creating a beautiful book. And heartfelt thanks to Katherine Tegen for giving Trouble a home.
Although they don’t know me, I want to thank all the wildlife biologists, conservationists, and researchers who are champions of the coyote. I’d particularly like to give a howl-out to Stan Gehrt, Mark Bekoff, Jonathan G. Way, the Urban Coyote Initiative, and the Urban Coyote Research Program. Thanks to Dan Flores for his important and fascinating book Coyote America.
Finally, to my husband, Todd, whose love always brings me home.
Critter Notes
Want to know more about coyotes, crows, and opossums? Read on!
Coyotes: An American Original
In 1999, folks in New York City’s Central Park encountered a particularly curious sight: a coyote trotting through the park—“wild and unleashed!” according to one area newspaper. The media named him Otis and followed his every move. The coyote was eventually caught and taken to a zoo in Queens. Several years later, another coyote showed up in Central Park (nicknamed Hal by the spellbound media), and in 2010 a female coyote lived for several months in Central Park before being captured.
What in the world are coyotes doing in New York City?
Coyotes have lived in North America, Mexico, and Canada for over a million years. They can be found in every type of environment, from the deserts of Mexico to the mountains of Colorado; from the lush forests of Alabama to the city streets of Chicago. Wherever they are, they’re at home.
Like humans, coyotes are extremely adaptable and are experts at surviving. They will eat almost anything—rabbits, rodents, birds, grasses, frogs, eggs, fruit, and animals killed by other predators. They’re excellent swimmers and very fast on their feet!
As humans have taken over more and more animal habitats, many large predators—wolves, cougars, and grizzlies—are disappearing. That is hardly true of the coyote. Despite hunting, trapping, and other human efforts to decrease the coyote population, they’ve not only survived, they’ve thrived. Scientists estimate there are now more coyotes in the United States than there ever have been.
The coyote’s range now includes almost every large city in the United States. They’re spotted in city parks, cemeteries, and on golf courses. Any sort of green space will do. Coyotes have been seen playing at night in sprinklers in Chicago’s famous Wrigley Field. They’ve been photographed riding trains in Portland, Oregon. And yes, one was chased into an office building elevator in Seattle, Washington, by a crow.
Coyotes are normally active during the day and at night. However, coyotes living in cities have changed their routines to avoid humans. City coyotes have become mostly nocturnal, keeping their activities confined to night. Rather than raising their pups beneath the roots of an old oak tree, city coyotes make dens in (and under) abandoned buildings, inside storm drains, on the edges of golf courses, and under bridges.
As with humans, family is the most important thing to coyotes. A male and female coyote stay together for life. They have pups once a year, usually between mid-February and late March. The size of a litter of pups is determined by how much food is available that year. If food is scarce, they have fewer pups than when food is abundant.
Although coyotes mostly hunt alone, they live in family groups, led by the alpha male and female. The pack will often include one or two offspring from earlier litters (like Twist) who help raise the young. Everyone in the pack helps feed, protect, and educate the pups in all things coyote. Like all families, they play, love, squabble, and learn together.
The coyote is one of the most amazing wildlife stories in North America. Coyotes have become our hidden neighbors. They’re here to stay.
Crows: Einsteins of the Bird World
Like coyotes and humans, crows are adaptable critters. They can be found in just about any country, on any continent in the world.
What makes crows more adaptable than other birds? Their bird brains! They can reason, imagine, set goals, invent, create, and have an uncanny ability to remember.
Crows eat a wide variety of things. This enables them to live in many different types of places. In a given day, a crow might eat worms, grasshoppers, a mouse, nuts, berries, and Chinese takeout.
Most young birds are chased away from the nest by their parents as soon as they can fly. Not so with crows. The young may stay at home for years. They help guard their family territory, build next year’s nest, an
d help raise the next batch of youngsters.
Crows are one of the few species of animals that use tools and manipulate their environment to get what they want. In Japan, crows have been observed setting walnuts in the middle of intersections so that passing cars will crack open the hard shells. When traffic stops, the crows saunter out to the street to eat the nuts. In Minnesota, crows watched ice fishermen pulling up fish through holes in the ice. When the men stepped away from their lines, the crows pulled the lines out of the water and ate the bait and fish right off the hooks.
Like Mischief, crows are known for their playfulness and, well, peskiness. A family in Russia videoed a playful crow using a metal lid to sled down a snow-packed roof. In the wild, crows love to tease wolves, coyotes, and even bears. They can imitate all kinds of sounds: the meow of a cat, a squeaky door, a dog’s yelp, the growl of a snowmobile.
The crow is often referred to as the “common crow.” But with its keen intelligence and remarkable memory, crows are anything but common!
Opossums: Misunderstood and Unappreciated
Like our friend the Professor said, opossums are widely misunderstood critters.
Opossums and possums are not the same animal. Opossums live only in the United States. Possums live in Australia and the surrounding islands.
Opossums are the only marsupials who make their home in North America. Just like kangaroos, opossum babies live in their mother’s pouch. When they are about two months old, they climb out of their mama’s pouch and spend much of their time riding on her back. When they are three months old, they strike out on their own. Opossums are solitary creatures and do not live in family groups. They are most active at night.
Like Rosebud, opossums are peaceful animals. They prefer to avoid a fight if at all possible. When cornered, an opossum will hiss, growl, and even snap its fifty teeth. But when the stress of danger becomes too great, an opossum faints in shock. This shock induces a comatose state that can last from forty minutes to four hours! While “dead,” the little critter’s body is limp, its front feet curl into balls, and drool runs from its mouth. It even produces a smell that is, well, icky.