by David Blaze
My stomach churned. I was afraid she had found Fox stuffed like the other animals. She led me to a small metal table with papers and pictures on it. But one piece of paper stood out from all the others.
It was a flier, like the ones posted on the walls at school. Only, this one wasn’t about a dance, party, or fundraiser. Fox’s picture was on the flier.
THE TALKING FOX was printed above the picture. It went on to explain Fox would be at the Grand Vulpine Hotel in Las Vegas giving a live performance that night at 8pm.
“I’m sorry,” Tater repeated. “Mr. Connors paid me ten thousand dollars to capture the fox.” He looked at Dana like he had to explain himself to her. “I needed the money to help my mom keep this house. I didn’t mean to hurt anyone.” He seemed truly sorry. And I knew a thing or two about trying to save a house.
Tater pointed to his ears and complained, “Everyone makes fun of me. I have huge ears that look like potatoes.” I was confused. His ears looked normal to me but his hotdog nose was the right size for a hotdog bun. I wondered if any of us see ourselves the way we truly are.
“That’s how I got the name Tater.” He shook his head and sighed. “I don’t want to be a mean person. I just want people to like me.”
I wondered if that was why Shane had grown three times meaner. I had embarrassed him with that homework assignment I wrote for him. Everyone made fun of him for the first time in his life, and his reputation was never the same.
“We’ve got to stop them,” Melissa said. She was talking about Mr. Connors and Shane. “They’re going to exploit Fox.”
I hoped Mr. and Mrs. Hunter were ready to leave. “We need to get out of here. I’ve got to talk to my mom.” We were running out of time and I had to explain all of this to her. We had to find a way to get to Las Vegas and save Fox.
SUNDAY LATER
I jumped out of Mr. and Mrs. Hunter’s car when we got to my house and ran to the front door, screaming, “Mom! Mom!” The door swung open and her eyes bugged out of her head like she thought I was being chased by an alligator.
I couldn’t breathe when I reached her, so I handed her the flier I brought back. She didn’t say anything for a minute, then stared at me and asked, “Is this a joke?”
“It’s not a joke,” Melissa confirmed as she joined me with Dana by her side. “We got it from Tater the Exterminator.”
My mom’s hair turned gray right then and there. “You did what?”
“He’s a nice guy,” Dana added. “He’s just misunderstood because he has potato ears.”
My mom looked more confused than ever. She took a deep breath and tried to process what we told her. “Let me see if I understand this correctly…”
I knew right away we were in big trouble.
“You kids somehow met with Tater the Exterminator — when you clearly told me the Hunters were taking you out to eat?” Her face was turning red.
“We had hot chocolate around a nice fire,” Dana said defensively.
We all jumped when Mr. Hunter honked his horn from the driveway. He and his wife waved at us like they just had the best time of their lives. They drove out of our driveway and into theirs across the street. I wanted to be in the car with them. I wasn’t sure it was safe around my mom.
She glanced at the flier again and sighed. “Everyone inside,” she ordered. “We’ve got a lot to figure out.”
My uncle was sitting on the couch, watching wrestling again. I laughed when I pictured Fox there the day before flexing his puny arms and calling himself Mr. Awesome Muscles. I missed the little guy. “Everything okay?” my uncle asked, not paying attention to us.
My mom handed him the flier. He glanced at it then set it down on the couch next to him. We all thought it was odd he didn’t care while the wrestling match was still on. But then he jumped up, grabbed the flier again like he just realized what it said, and shouted, “What the heck?!”
“This is not what Fox wants,” I said to all of them. “He’s scared and alone.”
My mom stared at my uncle in a way I’d only seen them do a few times. They had some type of secret communication between them that no one else could decipher. They developed it growing up as brother and sister. I wished I had the power to read peoples’ minds.
My uncle nodded and said, “Las Vegas, huh? We need a plane and I’ve got a friend who owes me a favor.” He winked at me. “Let me go make a call.” He disappeared into the kitchen.
My mom took his place on the couch and patted the cushions for all of us to take a seat next to her. She laughed and couldn’t stop. “This is not the weekend I had planned.” We laughed with her. Everything was different with Fox in our lives. But everything was better.
“I hope he’s okay,” Dana said when the laughter died down. Her voice was sadder than I’d ever heard it.
Melissa wrapped an arm around her. “He will be. Joe will make sure of it.” She smiled at me and it made me feel woozy. You would think the saying ‘butterflies in your stomach’ meant you felt awesome like you were flying. Nope! It felt more like I was trying to fly but instead doing a belly flop on the kitchen floor.
“Okay,” my uncle said, standing in front of us now. “The good news is my friend can fly us to Vegas and get us there before the show starts. The bad news is he can only take two of us.” He studied all of us on the couch. “Who’s it gonna be?”
Everyone looked at me like it was my decision. I had to go because I couldn’t let my best friend down. While everyone in that room wanted to help Fox, there was only one other person who loved him as much as me. “It looks like we’re going to Vegas, Mom.”
“Alright,” my uncle agreed. “It’s settled. My friend will meet you at the airport in twenty minutes. You need to leave now if you’re going to make it in time.” He shoved us out the door.
“Wait,” my mom said to him. “What’s your friend’s name?”
I swear my uncle chuckled. “You’ll know him when you get there. And don’t worry about anything. Me and Dana will take Melissa home, and we’ll lock up here.”
He stopped me before I got to the driveway. “Bring him home, Joe. Whatever you have to do, bring Fox home.”
The airport was extra windy when we got there. And my uncle was right. We knew his friend.
“Hope you didn’t eat any of those eggs,” Mr. Jim Bob joked. I wondered how that straw hat stayed on top of his head. Maybe it was glued. “They don’t taste any good coming up a second time.” He had plenty of experience with that after eating Old Nelly’s rotten eggs.
“How safe is this plane?” my mom asked, knocking on it. The plane looked like it was made of plastic and weighed less than me. Okay, that’s an exaggeration, but it didn’t look like any plane I’d ever seen on TV. It was much smaller and there was a good chance it would tip over if the wind blew hard enough.
“This plane is safer than safe,” Mr. Bob assured her. “I’ve been flying her for thirty-five years, and she’s only crashed thirty-four times!” My mom didn’t laugh. “C’mon now,” he pleaded. “It’s a pilot’s joke. It’s funny.”
My mom grabbed my shoulders and made sure she had my full attention. “This is not going to work. We’ll find another way.”
We had less than six hours to get to Las Vegas. This was our best chance of making that happen. “We can’t give up on Fox. He’s part of our family.”
She cracked her neck and rolled her shoulders back. “Let’s do this.”
Five minutes later we were on the plane, riding down the runway, waiting for it to take off. The end of the runway was coming up fast, and we were still on the ground driving at a million miles an hour. I tasted my hot chocolate a second time that day. My mom shrieked.
Mr. Bob laughed hysterically when we took off at the last second. He shot the plane straight up into the air like a rocket. “Going up high to touch the sky! Yeeeeeeehaw!”
SUNDAY NIGHT
Four hours later I was standing in front of the Grand Vulpine Hotel in Las Vegas with my
mom. Well, not exactly in front of it. More like half a mile away because the line to get inside went on forever.
The hotel was like a mirrored tower. It was dark outside so I couldn’t see myself in it, but I saw the one thing that took my breath away. It was a huge image of Fox lit up in lights along the front of the hotel. The lights flashed on for a minute to show my best friend, then they flashed off. Every time they came back on I was amazed at how spectacular it looked.
“I hope we get inside,” said the lady in front of us. “This is the hottest show of the year.”
The big guy with her shrugged his shoulders. His hair was spiked and he had a tattoo of a spider on his cheek. “If we don’t, then we don’t. There’s another ventriloquist across the street.”
I asked my mom what a ventriloquist was. She said it was a person who made things that can’t speak look like they were talking. It was like magic. This was good news. I wondered if everyone else thought Fox was controlled by a ventriloquist.
My mom glanced at her watch and said what I was thinking. “We can’t just stand out here. We may never get inside.” She pulled me out of the line and we walked around everyone like we were just passing by. There were young people and old people, but no kids. Tall people and short people. White people, black people, Hispanics, Orientals. The whole world had come to see Fox.
A huge man covered with muscles was walking toward us. He muscles were so huge that his tank top barely fit across his chest. He was bigger than Mr. Awesome Muscles! He stopped every few steps and said something to the people in line. I heard what it was when we got closer to him. It was the one thing I didn’t want to hear.
“Show’s sold out,” he barked. “Everyone go home.”
My heart sank. My best friend was trapped inside the building in front of us. I don’t want to sound weird, but I could feel how scared he was. He was just a kid who wanted to go home.
My mom marched right up to the muscle man and said, “We need to get inside. We’ve got a friend trapped in there.”
He shook his head. “I couldn’t let you in — even if your name was Donald Trump. There’s not a seat left in the house.” He stepped around us like we were invisible and kept telling people to go home.
I felt like crying but I refused to do it. I marched behind the big muscle man and tugged on his tank top. He seemed as tall as the hotel when he turned and faced me.
“What?” he barked.
“Please,” I begged him. “We’ve got to help Fox.”
He rubbed his eyebrows like he had a headache. “Sorry, kid. Even if every seat was empty — I still couldn’t let you in. You have to be at least twenty-one and have a picture id.” He squinted his eyes. “You don’t look twenty-one to me.” He started to laugh but stopped when I stared into his eyes.
“It’s you,” he said, his expression softening. “You’re the kid in the video, the one who talks to the fox. What are you doing out here?” He motioned for me and my mom to follow him to the hotel. “We’ve got to get you on stage. This is your big night.”
We weaved through hundreds or thousands of people to get to the back stage. “Out of the way!” the muscle man kept shouting at everyone in front of us. “Superstar coming through!”
It seemed like hours before we were waiting in the wings to see Fox on stage. I peered through the curtains and saw the audience staring back. Some people were standing and some were sitting. There were more people than I’d ever seen in my entire life. I wondered how long was left until Fox was on stage and if we had time to stop it before it happened.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” someone announced over the speakers above and around us. “Welcome to the Grand Vulpine Hotel and the hottest show on earth. Here he is — the talking fox!”
The crowd went wild with cheers, whistles, and claps. I started to rush on stage and stop this but another big guy stepped in front of me and blocked me. “We need you up front,” he said to the muscle man next to me. “There’s a fight.” They both rushed away without saying anything to me.
When I looked back at the stage, I saw Mr. Connors pulling Fox on a leash to the center. Fox was thrashing all around, trying to break free. I wanted to run out there, grab Fox, and fly right back to Alabama, but my mom stopped me.
“Not yet, Jonah,” she said. “If we do anything rash, they’re going to kick us out of here.” I hated that she was right.
“So, Fox,” Mr. Connors said into a microphone. “How do you like Las Vegas?” That was an odd question. Maybe Mr. Connors and Shane had practiced a whole routine with Fox, but I doubted Fox agreed to any of it.
Fox didn’t respond and laid down on the floor. He was shivering. A lot of people from the audience booed.
Mr. Connors yanked on the leash. Fox had to be choking. “I said, how do you like Las Vegas?”
Fox still wouldn’t say anything.
My heart raced when Shane marched onto the stage from the other side. He walked right up to Fox and kicked him in the side! Fox yelped in a cry of pain that shattered my heart.
“Leave him alone!” someone shouted. The boos from the crowd got louder and louder.
That was enough. I couldn’t stand by anymore. My mom nodded approval. Right before I set foot on stage, someone else grabbed my shoulders and stopped me. Really? Now?
I turned and saw the one face I didn’t expect to see. It was Tater the Exterminator! He was toting a huge plastic bag over his back.
“Get your hands off my son,” my mom growled.
He set the bag down and put his hands in the air. His hotdog nose stuck out like sore thumb.
“Why are you here?” I asked him. If he had never come into our yard and our house, Fox wouldn’t be on that stage. He was just as guilty as Mr. Connors and Shane.
He put his hands down and sighed. “I made a mistake. I came to fix it.” He looked back and forth from me to my mom. “You’ve got to let me go out there and make this right.”
I was about to tell him no because it was my responsibility, but my mom put a hand on my shoulder. “Go on, then,” she told Tater.
He grabbed the huge bag from the floor and nodded. “Thank you.” He brushed past me and right onto the stage.
“Stop!” Tater shouted at Mr. Connors and Shane. They both glared at him. “I came to return this.” He opened his bag and dumped its contents on the floor. It looked like a lot of money. I guessed it was the ten thousand dollars Mr. Connors had paid him to capture Fox.
Mr. Connors handed the leash to his son and walked over to Tater. “You fool. Do you think you’re better than me? You’ll never be anything more than a freak with potato ears.” He faced the crowd and laughed. No one laughed with him. He returned his attention to Tater. “This is my world. There’s nothing you can do about it.”
Tater took a deep breath and looked back at me. I figured he was going to walk away and say he was sorry. I didn’t know why any of us thought we could stop this. “I may not be able to do anything,” he admitted, “but these guys can.” He pointed to someone behind me.
Two cops passed me and marched onto the stage. “Charles Connors and Shane Connors,” one cop said, “you’re under arrest for kidnapping and animal cruelty.” They slapped cuffs on both of them. “You have the right to remain silent,” the second cop said.
Mr. Connors wouldn’t stop laughing. He spit on Tater when the cop ushered him toward the stage exit. “You’re going down with me!” he shouted. “You’ll pay for this!”
“Maybe,” Tater said, “but at least I tried to make things right.”
I rushed onto the stage to get Fox. I couldn’t wait any longer. My friend was scared and hurt. He had to know I was there for him. I kneeled next to him on the floor, unhooked the leash, and hugged him. He hugged me back.
“I knew you’d come for me,” he whispered, smiling. He didn’t want the audience to hear him.
I stood back up. “Was there ever any doubt?” He shook his head. “Let’s go home, Fox.”
My mom was tal
king to Tater when we joined her. “Why did you help us?”
He looked at Fox and smiled. “I forgot who I was. I forgot why I got into this business in the first place.” He gazed into the crowd. “I love animals.”
It was at that moment I realized they could hear everything we said. The crowd cheered for Tater and clapped. He had a huge smile on his face.
“I’m glad you’re okay,” I said to Fox. “Let’s get you out of here.”
“Wait,” Fox whispered to me. I bent down close to him so I could hear. “There’s something I want to say to them.” His eyes were pleading like it was something important that would change the world.
I wasn’t sure if it was a good idea or not. Everyone already knew he could talk. Now he could say whatever he wanted, and not what someone was trying to force him to say. If he was brave enough to say something in front of thousands of people, I wouldn’t be the one to stop him.
Fox walked back to the center stage on four paws. He faced the crowd. They gasped when he stood up on his two hind legs. He looked at me one last time and winked. Whatever he was going to say would be life changing.
The crowd was silent, waiting for his words.
That’s when he shouted the one thing no one expected.
“I love Las Vegas!”
The crowd went crazy and chanted his name. “Fox! Fox! Fox! Fox! Fox! Fox! Fox! Fox! Fox! Fox! Fox! Fox! Fox! Fox! Fox! Fox!”
It had to be the greatest moment of Fox’s life. I was so proud of him. Everything was exactly the way it was always meant to be.
I never expected it all to fall apart.
MONDAY MORNING
We got home early that morning. Like six o’clock in the morning early, thanks to Mr. Jim Bob’s plane. My mom had suggested we get a hotel room in Las Vegas for the night, but I wanted to get Fox home so he could be comfortable in the den I made for him. And I had those bad memories about the last time we were in a hotel room.