The Chicken Dance

He told me to calm down and I told him back, “But I’m going to fall. I’m going to fall and die,” and Stanley said, “No, you’re not. Just do like Leon did and put your feet on the wall and walk down.”

  I tried to do like he said, but I couldn’t and I didn’t feel like I could hold on much longer, so I yelled, “Stanley, I’m falling.”

  “Dance!” he yelled at me.

  “What?” I asked, and he yelled, “Kick, step, step, kick.”

  I didn’t know if it would work, but I thought I might as well try or fall. So I stared at my left foot, and then kicked, and then stepped and it landed on the wall. The next move that I should have done was to step again, but that didn’t make sense to me so I kicked again, but this time with my right foot. Then I stepped, and it landed on the wall too, and I was standing on the side of the hotel. It felt kind of cool, but I wanted to get down, so I put my left hand below the knot, and then my right, and then walked backward all the way to the ground.

  When my feet touched the grass, I felt dizzy but kind of excited because I felt like James Bond again or Batman, even though I think they both probably would have jumped from the second floor. But I still thought it was cool and wanted to tell Leon all about it, so I went and looked for him.

  I didn’t see him at first, but then he walked out from behind some bushes, drinking a soda, and said, “I thought you’d chickened out.”

  “Actually, Leon,” I told him. “Chickens can be very brave animals when they need to be.”

  He said, “Whatever. What took you so long?”

  I told him about Mrs. Forest and how I’d climbed out of the window, and he said, “No way. Good going, Don. That means we have the whole night to tear this town apart.”

  I looked at Leon and said, “Leon, we’re twelve years old. How are we going to tear this town apart?”

  “I don’t know,” he told me. “Come on, let’s walk around.”

  “Leon,” I said. “Can you help me find someone?”

  He took a sip of soda and said, “Sure. Who?”

  I didn’t like lying to him because, besides my chickens and my make-believe twin brother, he’d been the closest friend I’d ever had. I wasn’t ready to tell him the truth, though, so I told him, “My cousin. I think she’s a dancer at a theater called Bill’s Broadway.”

  Leon pulled his head back like someone had scared him, and said, “All right. I knew you were a little too goody-goody to be real. Who would have guessed that the family who keeps their chickens for ambience has a relative who’s a dancer?”

  “I don’t know,” I said, and Leon laughed and said, “Dude, that was rhetorical question.”

  I said, “Oh,” and Leon asked, “So where is this place?”

  I pulled the map out and opened it up, and then looked at the street in front of the hotel, which was Lobdell Boulevard. I figured that we needed to go left, so I pointed and said, “I think it’s that way.”

  Leon started walking and said, “Let’s go.”

  Then I asked him, “Leon. Are you scared?”

  He took his backpack off, opened it up, and said, “Don’t worry, man. I have a flashlight, a knife, and some Mace in case anyone messes with us.”

  Leon pulled a flashlight and a small can out of the backpack he’d been carrying. He handed them both to me and said, “Here, you can hold these.”

  “What’s in this can?” I asked him.

  “It’s Mace,” he said. “Like policemen carry. My uncle is a cop and he gave it to my mom, in case someone tries to steal her purse.”

  That didn’t make any sense to me so I asked, “What does it do?” and he said, “If you spray it in someone’s eyes, it burns and blinds them for a few minutes.”

  I thought to myself that I was real happy that his mom hadn’t caught me trying to steal money from her purse at the Dairy Festival chicken-judging contest, because I don’t think that I would have liked it if she had blinded me. I didn’t tell Leon that, though. I just smelled the can and he told me, “Don’t spray it unless you have to, though. I don’t want to use too much because I don’t want my mom to find out that I took it.”

  Then Leon pulled a box out of his backpack, opened it, and pulled out a big hunting knife.

  “I had this in my backpack when I went hunting last week and forgot about it,” he said. “I’m glad I brought it, though. We might need it in case someone messes with us.”

  I was a little worried about Leon and that big knife, but then I was kind of glad that he was with me. Although I didn’t want him to stab anybody, it made me feel a little better to know that we had protection. Especially when we started walking down Lobdell Boulevard, which was kind of dark and spooky. I started talking to Stanley in my head and he told me that someone should bring Benjamin Franklin to this street so that he could introduce it to electricity. I thought that was pretty funny so I told Leon.

  “Someone should introduce this street to Benjamin Franklin.”

  “Who?” he asked.

  “Benjamin Franklin,” I told him. “He discovered electricity.”

  Leon looked at me like I’d asked him what time two trains would meet if they left in opposite directions at fifty miles per hour.

  “He’s the guy who was flying a kite and got struck by lightning,” I told him.

  “Oh, yeah.” Leon smiled. “That’s pretty funny.”

  Then we heard a noise and Leon swung his knife around and almost hit me.

  “Be careful,” I told him. “You almost jabbed me with it.”

  “I know what I’m doing,” he told me. “Don’t worry.”

  A few minutes later we turned onto Tom Street. The buildings seemed a little older and more run down than the ones on Lobdell Boulevard, and there were a few people walking down the sidewalk talking really loud. Most of them walked by Leon and me like they didn’t even see us, but this one guy stopped and asked, “What are you kids doing out here?”

  He looked like he was about my dad’s age, but he had all his hair and it was long and blond. Leon and I didn’t say anything because the man was really big, and I guess we were surprised that he was talking to us. He leaned toward us and asked, “What are you, deaf? Answer me. What are you doing out here?”

  I was waiting for Leon to say something and I guess he was waiting for me to say something because neither one of us talked. The man stood up straight and burped, and when he did, it smelled really funny. Then he said, “I think you boys snuck away from home and your parents don’t know where you are.”

  We still didn’t say anything, and the man said, “Give me some money and I won’t tell them that I saw you out here.”

  I was going to give him the ten dollars I had in my pocket, but before I could, he grabbed Leon by the shoulders and said, “Give me your money, boy.”

  I thought Leon was going to stab him with the knife, but he just stood there while the man shook him. It looked like he was hurting Leon, so I hit the man in the head with the flashlight, and then with the can of Mace. The man screamed and let go of Leon, and then came toward me, so I took the can of Mace and pointed it at him, and then sprayed him in the eyes. The man screamed and cursed and grabbed his eyes.

  Then Leon grabbed my arm and said, “Let’s go!”

  We ran away from the man and kept running for what seemed like forever, but I think it was only five minutes. I’d never run so fast in my whole life, and I thought my side was going to fall out of me because it was hurting so bad. I had to stop, and when I did, I turned, but I didn’t see the man anywhere near us. Leon stopped a little bit in front of me and we both leaned over and took deep breaths for a few seconds. Then Leon stood up and pointed and said, “Look! There it is! There’s Bill’s Broadway!”

  Thirty

  Bill’s Broadway was a small brown square building with a parking lot on the right side of it with about ten cars. When Leon and I were standing in front of it, we stared at it like Dorothy, the tin man, the lion, and the scarecrow had stared at the Wizard of Oz. Even w
hen Leon asked me, “What’s her name?” he didn’t stop staring at it. But when I said, “I don’t know,” he looked at me and asked, “You don’t even know her name?”

  “No,” I said. “I’m not even sure if she still works here. I guess it’s going to be kind of hard to find her, isn’t it?”

  “Yeah,” he said. “It’s going to be hard, but we’re going to have a good time looking for her,” and then he slapped me on the back and walked to the front door. I followed him and asked, “Why are you talking like that?”

  “Like what?” Leon asked.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “You’re just saying things that grown-ups would say. I don’t know which grown-ups, but I know you’re not talking like a twelve-year-old.”

  Leon shrugged his shoulders and said, “We got cable and I’ve been watching a lot of Rated R movies when my parents go to bed.”

  I said, “Oh. Okay,” and then looked at the knife in Leon’s hand and said, “Maybe you should put that knife away so we don’t scare anyone.”

  He said, “Yeah, you’re probably right.”

  He put it back into the box and into his backpack while I walked to the sidewalk and looked down the street to see if the man I’d sprayed with Mace was coming. I didn’t see him, so I walked back to the front of Bill’s Broadway and saw Leon looking at a board with a bunch of pictures on the wall next to the front door.

  “What are you looking at?” I asked him, and he told me, “It’s pictures of the dancers. Maybe we can find your cousin. You know what she looks like, don’t you?”

  I said, “Of course,” even though I didn’t, really. I knew what Dawn looked like twelve years before because of pictures, but I didn’t know what she looked like now. I started to look at the pictures, but then we heard a siren.

  “Come on!” Leon shouted, and we ran to the back of the building.

  It was really dark back there and so I couldn’t see anything, but I know that there was a doorknob because I hit my elbow on it and it kind of hurt. I didn’t say anything, though, because I didn’t want anyone to hear us. Although I don’t think the policeman could have heard me over the siren.

  Anyway, when we couldn’t hear the siren anymore, Leon turned to me and said, “It’s so dark back here. Someone should bring Benjamin Franklin here.”

  I laughed even though I didn’t think it was as funny as when Stanley had said it. And then Leon said, “I never understood what he was doing with that kite.”

  I told him, “I’ll tell you later. Right now, let’s go back and look at those pictures.”

  When we got to the front, I looked at the pictures one by one so I didn’t miss Dawn. I had only looked at a couple of them when Leon asked, “Do you see her?”

  “No,” I said. “But I think Dawn just started working here so they might not have her picture up yet.”

  “Who’s Dawn?” he asked

  I froze because I remembered that I had lied to him. I tried to cover myself, though, and said, “Uh. She’s my, um, cousin.”

  “Don’t you have a dead sister named Dawn?” Leon asked.

  I said, “Yeah, I do. She and my cousin have the same name.”

  “That’s a little strange,” Leon told me.

  “Yeah,” I said. “I guess it’s strange, but don’t you have a cousin and an aunt that both have the name Laurie?”

  “No,” he said. “My cousin’s name is Laurie, L-a-u-r-i-e, and my aunt’s name is Lori, L-o-r-i.”

  I said, “Oh, sorry,” and started looking at the pictures again.

  Some of the pictures on the board had the dancers’ names underneath them. The first three were Trudy Garland, Marilyn Monthroe, and Candy Grand. The last one had a candy cane in her mouth and was winking her left eye. I was about to ask Leon why a dancer would take a picture with a candy cane in her mouth, when he said, “That’s a stupid name for a girl. Curly Temple. That’s a Three Stooges’ name. And who wants to see a girl with a baton?”

  “Where do you see that?” I asked him.

  He pointed to the picture and underneath it was written, “Featuring Curly Temple and Her Baton.”

  I looked at the picture, and even though she was older and had curly blond hair, I recognized Dawn right away because she looked so much like my mother. I was so shocked to see her that I yelled, “That’s her! That’s Dawn!”

  Leon put his face closer to the picture and said, “No way! That’s your cousin, dude? That’s so cool! So let’s go in.”

  I took a step toward the door, but then remembered what Mr. Munson had told my mother in New Orleans about the theater not having too many women customers. If they didn’t have many women customers, they probably didn’t have many kid customers, either.

  “They won’t let us inside,” I told Leon.

  Just then an old man walked out of the front door. He looked at us for a minute and then walked over to a truck, got in, and drove off. Leon grabbed my arm and said, “We have to do something before someone sees us and makes us leave.”

  I thought about what we could do and then I remembered that I’d hit my elbow on a doorknob when Leon and I had run to the back of the building. So I told Leon to follow me and we went to the back again and I turned the flashlight on and shined it on the doorknob. Leon grabbed it and turned it, but it was locked.

  He looked at me and said, “Don’t worry about that,” and then he pulled a small knife out of his backpack.

  It was a Swiss Army knife and it had a spoon, a fork, a corkscrew, and a metal toothpicklike thing. I couldn’t figure out what he was going to do with it, but before I could ask he said, “Hold the flashlight on the knob and watch.”

  He stuck the metal toothpicklike thing in the lock of the door and moved it around a little.

  “What are you doing?” I asked.

  “I’m picking the lock,” he said. “I saw a guy do it on one of the Rated R movies on cable I told you about and I’ve been practicing on the doors at my house.”

  “That’s so cool,” I said. “When we get back to Horse Island, can you teach me how to do it?”

  “Yeah, sure,” he told me.

  Then he looked at me and asked, “Hey, what are you going to tell your cousin if she’s in there?”

  I didn’t know what I was going to tell her. I mean, I kind of had an idea, but I didn’t know the exact words I was going to use. I was going to tell her that I was her brother and that I wanted her to come home with me and that the two of us could travel to different parish fairs and she could compete in the dance contests and I could compete in the chicken-judging contests and we’d become famous like Donny and Marie. I didn’t tell Leon that, though, because I thought that he’d think it was stupid.

  So I told him, “I’m going to tell her, ‘Hi,’ and ask her how she’s doing.”

  “That’s it?” Leon said. “You came all this way just to tell her ‘Hi’? That’s kind of stupid.”

  “Yeah, you’re right,” I told him. “Maybe I’ll tell her that I’m her cousin and that I want her to come home with me and that the two of us can travel to different parish fairs and she can compete in dance contests and I can compete in chicken-judging contests and we can be like Donny and Marie.”

  “I doubt you’ll become famous like Donny and Marie,” Leon told me. “But it would be cool if you told her that.” Then Leon pulled the pick out of the doorknob and wiped it on his shirt. Then he looked at me and said, “Wait a second. Donny and Marie are brother and sister, not cousins.”

  I started to realize that maybe I should tell Leon the truth about who Dawn really was. I didn’t know if he’d get mad at me, but I figured that he would find out sooner or later if Dawn came home with me.

  So I told him, “Dawn’s not my cousin. She’s my sister, and my parents said she was kidnapped when I was a baby, but I think she might have run away.”

  Leon turned and looked at me and asked, “Was she kidnapped with your twin brother?”

  “Oh, yeah,” I said. “I was wrong about
having a twin brother. It was my sister the detective was looking for. I found this out over Easter break.”

  Leon said, “Wow! Your life is like the ones on TV.”

  I didn’t know what television programs Leon was watching, but I’d never thought that my life was like The Brady Bunch or The Waltons or Eight Is Enough. The more I thought about it, though, it was kind of like Soap or Dallas, but I didn’t ever remember seeing chickens on either one of those shows.

  Anyway, then Leon said, “Got it!”

  He shook the doorknob and turned it and opened the door. We saw this big room with mirrors and tables and chairs and racks with clothes hanging from them and on the tables there were brushes, hair spray, perfume, and makeup.

  Then we heard another police siren, and Leon said, “Go in there and find her so I can meet someone who ran away or was kidnapped or maybe both. This is going to be so cool.”

  I looked at Leon and asked, “Aren’t you going to come with me?”

  “No,” he said. “It’s better if one of us waits out here in case something happens. If you’re not out in fifteen minutes, I’ll go in after you.”

  I handed him the flashlight and Mace, but he said, “Keep them. You might need them.”

  I said, “Okay,” and then walked into the room and closed the door behind me.

  There wasn’t anyone in the room, but all the lights were on. I didn’t hear anybody talking, but I could hear music coming from behind this big red door. I thought about opening it and seeing where the music was coming from, but I was getting a little scared. I thought about getting Leon to come with me, but then I heard something that really freaked me out. You see, I heard the song “Rock Around the Clock” playing, and that was the song Dawn had danced to when she won her ballerina trophy.

  Thirty-One

  When I heard “Rock Around the Clock,” I wasn’t scared anymore and I got kind of brave and felt like James Bond again and I walked up to the door where the music was coming from, opened it, and then went through.

  I was in this dark room with a few chairs in it, and there were these two big curtains hanging, and a little light was coming through where they met. There were stairs that led up to them and since I didn’t see anyone, I walked up the stairs to the crack in the curtains and looked through it.