I saw squirrels chasing one another around the little plot of lawn and through flower beds. Others scampered up the walnut tree or along the lip of the high fence. A pair darted mischievously back and forth around a garden gnome. Occasionally, a squirrel ran up to a feeder—there were several in the yard in addition to the two in the tree—and took a peanut. I thought many of them looked quite fat and satisfied.
“This is a lot of squirrels,” I said.
“It has been a very prolific year,” said Mr. Severin, with pride in his voice. “A mild winter, a damp spring, and, voilà, a bumper crop of the little devils.”
I saw no traps or cages. “So how do you get them?” I asked. “Slingshot?”
Mr. Severin laughed with a high pitch. “Nothing so inefficient and primitive. Here, let me show you.”
He led me across the yard to a shed, which was padlocked shut. He pulled a large ring of keys from his pocket, snapped open the lock, and slid the metal door back.
Inside the dark shed, I saw a stack of wire and wood boxes. They were traps, I realized, with feeders on the inside and little doors at one end, presumably that opened in only one direction.
“Once we have a group that is really quite comfortable here, feeding happily with no worries, Hortense and I close up the open feeders and put out the new feeders—the ones inside the traps. They fill up over a few hours, just like lobster traps.”
“And then comes the fun part,” said Ms. Severin, who had edged up behind me.
“What happens?” I asked, though I had an idea.
Mr. Severin grasped my arm and turned me around. “Now you have to see the basement.”
We walked back across the patio, Mr. Severin still speaking. “We have that old cellar door there.” He pointed to a horizontal door that jutted out from the cement patio along the edge of the house. “But we’ll just go in through the house.”
We crowded back into the hallway. Mr. Severin closed and locked the back door, then removed his keys again, and turned a deadbolt in the other door. He swung it open. A dank and musky odor wafted into the hallway. He snapped a light switch, and a single naked bulb on a wire illuminated a wooden staircase.
Mr. Severin headed down the stairs. I followed cautiously, with Ms. Severin bringing up the rear. I didn’t know if I wanted to see what happened in the basement, but I had already come this far. Before I even reached the cellar, I heard the sound of small feet and bodies shaking wire cages. I followed Mr. Severin into the dim space.
I had never been in a tannery or visited a furrier, but this area of the basement appeared to have been converted into a place for processing and shipping animal hides. Stacks of pelts lay on a wide table, along with unassembled shipping boxes and a postal scale. Some of the animal skins were small—about the size of pressed squirrels—but I also saw larger furs, raccoons, and what looked like—I wasn’t quite sure—a coyote, or maybe even a dog.
Ms. Severin rushed past me toward an open door on the far end of the basement. I caught a glimpse of a metal table and a large steel pot. She pulled the door shut and turned to smile at me.
“After the pelts are dried, we ship them home,” said Mr. Severin. “They fetch a reasonable price.”
I turned toward Mr. Severin to ask where exactly home was, but then I stopped. Behind him, in the shadows at the other end of the basement, I saw the cages. They were stacked nearly to the ceiling. I stepped around the old couple and approached the rows of cages. They held mostly squirrels, dozens of them, running back and forth in the tight space. The animals pushed against the doors, which rattled but were held tight by spring fasteners.
“This is where we fatten up the thin ones,” said Mr. Severin. “The peanuts run down from the trough above.” A long wooden tub, presumably filled with peanuts, was fastened along the top row of cages. Small chutes fed peanuts into the cages.
Near the far corner of the room, I saw cages in other sizes, too, holding other animals. A large mangy dog slept in the corner of one. Others held raccoons, rabbits, and even a fat, bucktoothed nutria. Another section of wire compartments was filled with a half dozen cats. I stepped closer. One orange tabby looked a lot like the Bentons’ missing cat, Sissy.
I kept moving down the row of cages, shocked to see all these trapped animals. Below two stacks of cat cages sat a larger, empty cage, strewn with wood shavings. I put my head up against the mesh and saw that in the far corner of the cage, instead of a water bowl, there was a can of soda, a box of orange juice, and a bag of potato chips. A few comic books and a worn paperback—I think it was a Harry Potter book—were stacked alongside the snacks. My heart skipped a beat when I realized that this cage wasn’t for an animal.
I turned quickly, and saw that Mr. and Ms. Severin were carefully sneaking up on me. He held a long pole with a loop on its end. It was the type of contraption that I’d seen an alligator hunter use to catch a big bull gator on an Animal Planet show.
“Just relax, Duncan,” said Mr. Severin softly, in the tone a dogcatcher might use with a cornered stray.
I took a step back, and then another. In a few feet I’d be pinned against the far wall, with no way out. I continued to backpedal, when I stepped on a water bottle that must’ve fallen off a cage. My ankle rolled, and I fell into a bank of cages, grabbing them for support. The cages—the whole stack all the way to the ceiling—swayed precariously. They weren’t bolted to the wall.
I stood straighter, meeting the eyes of Mr. and Ms. Severin, who had frozen in place. They looked worried, as if I had just figured something out.
I bent my knees, stretched my arms wide, and grabbed the wire mesh of two cages. With all my might—and I’m big and strong for my age—I leaned back and rocked the stack of cages forward. Metal shrieked. The whole bank of cages tumbled all around me and over the Severins. The trough of peanuts ripped loose, and peanuts poured everywhere.
The basement was hazy with dust, and broken cages covered the floor. Escaped animals—mostly squirrels—ran loose throughout the basement. I still had to get out of this place.
Two groans rose from beneath the mass of upended and broken cages. I wove my way through the jumble and headed toward the cellar door. I could barely see Mr. and Ms. Severin through the pile of debris pinning them down.
I climbed a few concrete steps into the darkness beneath the cellar door. I could barely see the door’s slide bolt, but I got ahold of it and slid it back. I pushed with all my strength, and the metal door screeched open. Daylight poured into the basement.
While I shielded my eyes against the brightness, a warm, furry body threaded its way between my legs. An orange tabby—Sissy—nuzzled her face against my leg.
“You!” Mr. Severin yelled from back in the basement. “Stop!”
I picked up Sissy and scrambled up the cellar steps and out into the backyard. Down in the basement, Mr. Severin’s angry face peered up from the bottom of the stairs. I slammed the cellar door closed on him. Without even looking for a gate, I set Sissy on the thick top rail of the fence and climbed over. I landed in a strip of grass along the sidewalk.
I got to my feet and grabbed Sissy. I ran for two blocks, the cat clutched in my arms, before stopping to catch my breath.
The street was perfectly quiet, but a moment later, Nathan Benton rounded the corner on his mountain bike. He slowed down as he approached, and his eyes narrowed warily.
“What are you doing, Duncan?” Nathan asked as he got closer. His eyes widened. “Is that Sissy?” He stopped a few feet from me. “What’re you doing?” he repeated. “And why do you have my cat?”
I took a deep breath and raised a triumphant finger. “I believe I have just solved the mystery of the neighborhood’s squirrel problem.”
The Necklace and the Monster
by Jeff Soloway
TIMMY SCREAMED. I DON’T KNOW why; I was the one about to get pulverized.
Oscar Edelman grabbed me by the shirt with two hands. His lunkhead friends crowded in behind him.
My third day at the new school was not going well.
“Gimme my phone.” His breath was like the bottom of a Dumpster.
“I told you,” I said. “I didn’t steal it.”
Who’d be crazy enough to steal a phone from Ox Edelman? He was only one grade ahead of me, but he’s built like a refrigerator. Kids warned me about him my first day. Then they all stopped talking to me—except to ask about my dad.
His fingernails dug into my chest as he grabbed bigger handfuls of my shirt. Why does everyone say bullies are cowards? All the bullies I know love to fight, and they’ll take on anyone—big or puny, tough or wimpy—because fighting is what they’re good at. Kids say Ox practices on a punching bag at his dad’s gym. I think he gets enough practice on sixth-graders after school. Like me.
“Does that hurt?” Ox asked.
“Yeah.” If I said no, he’d only rake my skin harder.
“Then why don’t you hit me?”
“Because I don’t want to hurt you.”
Everybody laughed, both the lunkheads and the regular kids who had gathered to watch the action. I was lying, but not the way they thought. I wanted to throw a punch, just one, just to show him that beating me up wouldn’t be a total breeze. But I’d just moved in with my aunt a week ago, and if she found out I was fighting . . .
“Your dad’s a thief,” Ox said. “Just like you.”
“He is not!”
“Then why’s he in jail?”
It got so quiet you could hear the leaves flitting around the playground behind us. Everyone wanted to hear my answer. Ox had just insulted my dad. But it wasn’t an insult. It was true, and everyone knew it. My dad had even been on TV.
Ox laughed. His teeth were big and yellow like slabs of cheese. He drew back one dirty fist. I could hear Timmy smack his hands over his face. He can’t even handle the scary parts in a Toy Story movie.
“Aide!” somebody yelled.
Ox’s fist froze in midair. His lunky friends turned and shoved through the crowd of kids behind them.
One of the school aides was marching toward us. Everyone scattered except Ox.
“What’s going on?” The aide was only barely taller than Ox.
“Someone stole my phone,” Ox said.
The aide squinted at me and looked me over from head to toe, like the phone might be bulging out from my clothes. She must have seen my dad on the news too.
Ox leaned closer to me. “See you tomorrow,” he whispered. “Bring my phone—or face the consequences.”
Probably the biggest word he knew.
Timmy and I walked home. His elementary school is next door to my middle school, so Aunt Mina has me pick him up. It’s the least I can do after all she’s done for me.
“Did he hurt you?” Timmy asked. He’s only six.
“No way.” I wished I was back at my old neighborhood, where I had friends. But I didn’t have a home there anymore. When my dad got arrested, I had to move in with my aunt Mina and Timmy.
It can’t get any worse than this, I told myself, but I knew Ox would make it worse. Tomorrow he’d have a plan to keep the aide distracted while he tried to batter my brains through my ears.
If only Dad were around. He always knew what to do. It had only been a week since his arrest, but it felt like years.
That night, when Aunt Mina came into our bedroom, Timmy started jumping up and down on the bed in his Curious George pajamas. He looked like a whole roomful of monkeys at the zoo. He made me stay and listen to his bedtime story.
“Tell me a story like the one last night!” He loved his mom’s stories. “About the cell phone that turns into a frog! Or another one about how Uncle Dave got rich?” Uncle Dave is my dad. “That one was classic!”
Aunt Mina has dark brown hair that she poufs up on her head like a serving of soft-serve ice cream. She frowned and tilted her head sideways until it looked like the ice cream was going to slide off the cone. Her stress relief necklace dangled over her shoulder.
“Not that one.” She didn’t want to talk about my dad in front of me.
Timmy plopped himself down on the bed. He could tell right away that he’d said the wrong thing.
Aunt Mina’s got a temper. That’s why she bought the necklace. Just after I moved in last week, she stepped on one of Timmy’s Legos while she was clearing space for my bed. Her face got red and her forehead wrinkly. She screamed: “This mess makes me sick!”
That’s why I’m so terrified of getting in trouble at school.
“Any story is fine.” Timmy put on a big fake smile. “But not a scary one. Tell me one about how me and Peter karate-chop the bad kids before school!”
Aunt Mina frowned. “Are you two having trouble?”
“No way,” I said. “Nobody messes with Timmy. He’s the toughest kid around.”
“I give them the monkey chop. Hiya!” Timmy wiggled his butt.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“Monkeys karate-chop with their tails.”
Aunt Mina laughed. I’ve always loved her laugh—it sounds like three or four sneezes in a row.
She sat on Timmy’s bed and started the same way she does every story, with a “Once upon a time . . .” Then she told a story about a kid named Timmy, also known as “Monkey Man,” who could jump higher than an elephant and had karate-master moves he learned from a wise old chimpanzee in the Congo. While she told it, she kept fingering the crystal on her necklace. She told me it replaces her anger with creative energy. She bought it a few weeks ago, when some old woman in a New Age shop saw her yelling at Timmy on the street.
Timmy loved the story. There wasn’t a scary moment in it. As soon as it was over, he lay down and shut his eyes, but I knew he wasn’t ready to sleep. He wanted to imagine the story again.
Aunt Mina and I left him. Out in the living room she said to me, “I don’t want you fighting. No matter how much those kids are bugging you.”
Bugging. As if Ox Edelman was an ant you could flick off with your finger and not some kind of human rhinoceros.
“What if someone attacks me?”
“Back away and find an adult.”
Adults were never around when you needed them.
“Fighting almost killed your father,” Aunt Mina said. “He was always coming home with bloody knuckles or a black eye or worse. I always had to bandage him up afterward. Once, somebody smashed a beer bottle over his head. I thought he was going to bleed to death before I got him to the emergency room. Some nights when he was out, I couldn’t sleep. I was afraid he’d get himself killed or kill somebody else. When he moved out of our parents’ house it got even worse. You know what saved him? You. After you were born, he got a job. He stopped going out late. He never fought again. The idea of you or Timmy fighting . . .”
“I know. It makes you sick.”
Her face turned bright pink. She was about to get angry. I wished I hadn’t said it.
But she rubbed the necklace between her fingers and calmed down. “Yes,” she said. “It makes me sick to my stomach. Peter, your life is like a story that you’re telling everyone. People think they already know how your story will end up, because they think it’s the same as your dad’s. But it’s not. It’s your story. You control it, just like I control the stories I tell Timmy. You can make your own ending. I’m already proud of you. You had to change schools. You had to move in with us. I know your dad is proud too.”
If only I could control my dad’s story.
“When do you think he’ll be able to come home?” I asked.
She sighed. “I just know we love him no matter what he did.”
The cops found a whole mountain of cash in my dad’s car. He swears he didn’t steal it. I believe him, but no one else does—not even Aunt Mina.
I went to bed. It was early, but I needed time to think. My mattress is next to Timmy’s bed. He was still awake. Some toy was glowing under his blanket.
“Good story, Timmy?” I whispered.
&nbs
p; The glow disappeared. The room was pitch dark.
“My mom’s stories are the best,” he said. “They come true.”
Next morning I hustled out the door early with Timmy. I was hoping I could drop him off and scoot inside my school before Ox was ready for me.
No luck. Ox and the lunkheads were waiting for me by the basketball court a block away from the elementary school. They were all grinning like they were excited for Christmas. No adults were anywhere near. Someone was jackhammering down the block on Second Avenue. The crossing guard would never hear us.
Other kids came running up, filling up the spaces between the lunkheads. They knew what Ox was planning to do to me. I looked over their faces. Some were excited. Some were laughing. A few looked sorry for me.
“Timmy,” I said. “Go on to school.”
Ox swaggered up to me. “Got the phone? Or should I smash your face and then ask?”
“None of the above,” I said.
Ox had to think for a minute. Multiple-choice tests weren’t exactly his thing. He gave up. “Hand it over or I start pounding!”
“Make him cry!” one of his friends shouted.
Aunt Mina would never forgive me if I got into a fight. But I couldn’t just stand there again and get clobbered.
Timmy giggled. He had a weird grin on his face. I figured he was so scared he was losing his mind. “Timmy, get to school now.”
The lunkheads had formed a circle around me. I couldn’t run. No one was going to help me. I was afraid of Ox, but I was also feeling like Aunt Mina when she flips out—sick of all this. Sick of these kids, sick of being afraid, sick of hearing people whisper about my dad behind my back. I wanted to throw a punch, even if Ox destroyed me afterward.
But Aunt Mina had laid down the rule. How could I break it? She was the only parent I had left.
“Say cheese!” Timmy pulled something out of his pocket: a yellow cell phone. He held it up and mashed his finger into the screen to take a picture.