“Go, Limpy—they need you still. Tonight, they need you. Fears are best faced with friends and family.” Mr. José’s milky eyes didn’t make her shiver now. “You soon may free more than yourself.”
Lies bind, truth frees.
Her brothers and father were gone already. She climbed as fast as she could after them. Limpy struggled to keep her fears at bay. It was dark and a monster roamed. A monster that had tossed the tiller aside and shoved the truck back into the field. Limpy needn’t have worried about losing sight of her family—tracking Tufts was easy.
Trammeled potato plants revealed its path. Claws scored deep rents into soil. It stood silhouetted by a full moon, having climbed the hillock where their mother was buried. Its tusk seemed to pierce the moon’s globe. The glimmer of a flashlight wove up the same hill and she heard her father yelling.
“Wait!” she screamed after them.
She sprinted, sensing what she needed to do. Tufts stood at the edge of the property. Before it entered the shielding forest into which it could be lost, it rounded on her father and raised claws as long as baseball bats.
“Dad? Dad!” Limpy shouted. He turned, frustration, fear, worry etched on his face.
“What is it, Limphetta?” he asked, taking a step back and stumbling over a rock to land on his buttocks.
“Can I go?” Her voice quavered. She struggled to still it.
“What are you blabbing on about?” On the ground he held his forearms up to protect himself from Tufts’ imminent blow.
“Can I try to get that scholarship? If not this year, maybe the next? Can I go to Hillcrest?”
Even with the chupacabra before him, he hesitated.
“Now’s not the time,” he said.
“But don’t you see? It is! You’re afraid of our leaving. Like Mom left. Of being left alone. Let us go.”
Dylan had gone as pale as bone. But Connor wasn’t dumb. He understood what he needed to say.
“Me too, Dad. Just to a city for a while. Or to get a job. Limpy’s right, I won’t know anything, if I don’t try.”
Their father whipped his head back and forth as if he didn’t know where to look. “Do you? Do you all want to leave me? You too, Dylan?”
Dylan just stood and shook.
The chupacabra towered above the trees. Limpy tried to keep her voice calm.
“I will leave, eventually,” she said. “But I’ll come back, too. And I’ll call and email, and I’ll still . . . I’ll still love you.”
Tears glistened in her father’s eyes.
Tufts ceased growing, but brushed aside a stand of pines with a swing of tusks and started off.
“Not me, Pa, I don’ want to leave,” Dylan finally blurted. “Maybe I’ll try some new stuff though. That would be good, right?”
His father stared at him and slowly smiled. “Yes, lad, that would be good to learn new things.”
“I dunno, Dad, I dunno if I want to leave,” Connor said. “But I love you, too. We’re a family and there ain’t no leaving a family. We’d be leaving the farm, not you. We all will be soon anyway. That horse has run.”
A choking sound escaped her father and he nodded, swiping at his eyes. “Can’t leave a family even if you wanted to, can you?”
Just like that, the chupacabra was gone. It had shrunk where it had loomed. Not even to the size of a fuzzy chick. But an egg shining like a pearl in a nest of pine needles.
In the silence after, a roar came from the barn.
“Mr. José!” Limpy cried, and they all ran to help.
Chapter 34
At the bottom of the hole, the creature’s jaws burrowed into Mr. José’s side. Emmanuel lashed out at it with his pitchfork, but nothing seemed to mark the creature.
“Mr. José!” Limpy shouted, and his eyes fluttered. “We have it, all of them.”
But nothing happened. Even knowing the creatures couldn’t escape didn’t help.
“José,” her father scolded, showing him the white egg. “Snap out of it. We’ve won. You did it.”
Still the creature fed on him.
Connor clapped his hands. “It must not be his fear. We got it wrong. He doesn’t fear the chupacabra escaping.”
“Connor’s right,” Limpy said. Connor seemed to grow a foot himself. “What could his real fear be, Emmanuel?”
Emmanuel shook his head. “I don’t know.”
“What does he never want to do? What does he fear most?” she asked.
“Los chupacabra,” he said and pulled at his hair. “He’s always waiting for them, looking for them. They are his everything. He’s obsessed. That’s what he’s afraid of and now they’re here, so he’s scared, right? Doesn’t that make sense?”
The silver chupacabra gorged on Mr. José’s fear. But what fear? Limpy considered Emmanuel’s idea, but shook her head. If Mr. José feared the chupacabra, his would have hatched and grown long before now. Connor couldn’t reach around the circumference of its chest. Emmanuel pulled at one of the creature’s arms and Dylan the other. Her father rode its shoulders, banging with his fists against its head as if it were a drum. But nothing was working, and Mr. José’s breathing slowed and grew shallow.
“You said he’s obsessed,” Limpy said. “What if he’s scared of being done?”
“What are you talking about?” her father asked. “Help us get it off José.”
“I am helping. What if he’s worried about a world where he’s caught his chupacabra and the others cannot escape? His whole reason for the last twenty years of his life would be gone, right?”
Emmanuel nodded. “That’s it!”
Mr. José feared losing his life’s purpose.
Emmanuel bent to grip his father’s shoulders and shook them. “Dad, listen to me. We’re free now. You’ve done it. You’ve caught your chupacabra. We saved Limphetta and her family. Let’s bury it now. You can . . . you can go back home to Puerto Rico.”
Mr. José’s eyes sprang open again. The white parts seemed to fall away like scales. Limpy could almost see the lush jungle, the ocean, and beaches of his homeland in his eyes. His chupacabra shrank in an instant and chupped in his lap. Only the marks from the chupacabra’s teeth remained. But the creature was the size of a sparrow.
“You did it,” Emmanuel said.
Limpy pressed into his hug, taking strength from it. Then came the arms of her brothers and father. In that moment, she knew what she’d said to her father was the truth. She did want to leave, but would also want to come back, some day.
“We did it,” she said. “We did.” Limpy knew her path through the thorns had parted—if only she had somewhere to go.
Her bones ached with fatigue. All she wanted to do was sleep in her family’s embrace, but work remained to be done.
“Come,” she said and picked up the knife Mr. José had used to cut open the sacks. She sawed at the burlap until they were free of the giant sock. Each of their chupacabra was placed in the freezer.
“Five,” she said. “Where’s the sixth?”
Emmanuel slapped his forehead. “Sorry, sorry.” He reached into the pocket of his sweatshirt and pulled out the green egg. It had never even cracked.
“No fear?” she asked.
“No, I fear, but it’s just small, I guess,” he said as he lowered it into the freezer to mingle with the fur balls. “If you keep fears small enough, they can be good things. Healthy fears. It’s only if you let them grow that they can take over your life. But I think they always start small, like an egg.”
That made sense to Limpy too. Fear of leaving, of being left, of accomplishing her dreams, these were all good fears if held in check. Connor never had a healthy fear. The fear of being thought stupid wasn’t a good one—and it could never be small enough.
The chupacabra chupped sweetly as they closed the lid. Ghost was already shrouded in a thin film of red, the start of a shell.
The first spray of dirt fell on the freezer.
“Wait,” Limpy said.
Using the knife tip, she scratched a message into the freezer’s lid.
Chupacabra. Do not open.
But, if you do, remember that the greatest monsters are those we create ourselves. Be brave.
Then, for good measure, she sewed the giant sack up tight. All over it, on every potato bag, was written the same warning: Keep in a cold, dark place.
With a nod of satisfaction, Limpy signaled for Connor and Dylan to bury it.
Epilogue
For the rest of the night, they took shifts on guard duty, watching the buried freezer. Whoever wasn’t on guard slept. Limpy was so tired she could have fallen asleep on the mattresses covered in shattered glass. Her hands throbbed from sewing, but she took the time to pick off the shards before drifting into a dreamless sleep.
As dawn broke, the light revealed the wreckage of her art. She’d never be able to make a new tapestry in time for submission. Even her small pieces had been destroyed. Oddly, she was okay with that.
They spent the next day in a haze, repairing the barn planks and living room windows. They helped Mr. José, who was packing up his and Emmanuel’s belongings to prepare for a trip to Puerto Rico. Limpy even sold a few sacks of potatoes after cleaning the kitchen. As she cooked dinner, the sun fell beyond the horizon and they set a new watch for the night. It passed without a single rattle. Everyone began to relax. The chance for her scholarship had come and gone.
The next day, Emmanuel and Mr. José invited them to dinner at The Restaurant. A going-away party. Emmanuel’s face shone, but his hands fidgeted as he told her about the trip. He was nervous, fearful, but in a good way. Limpy had never gone out for a meal except on the day she had turned ten. And everything, even the sun, looked a little different. She could even see the beauty in the craggy hills that her mother had so loved.
What should have been a celebration, however, was overshadowed by the sale of the farm. Mr. Sotheby had been by and told her father that all offers on the farm were due by day’s end and the farm would be sold the next. They needed to start packing too. No one even mentioned Lady Luck.
The next morning, as Limpy scratched at the pan with a spatula and potatoes sizzled in oil, the phone rang.
“Who would be calling this early?” her father asked as he sipped a mug of black tea.
The phone rang again and Connor looked from Dylan, who shrugged, to Limpy, who couldn’t possibly see why the call could be for her.
Finally, Connor pushed back his chair and picked the phone up off the wall. It was weird to hear him speak.
“Hello?” he asked and then nodded to Limpy. “It’s for you.”
Limpy glanced to her father and then shuffled to take the phone.
“Yes,” she asked. “This is Limpy . . . I mean, Limphetta.”
“Hi, Limphetta, this is Mr. Krikey.” There came a pause during which Limpy wasn’t sure if she was supposed to speak. “From the Hillcrest selection committee?”
“Oh, yes, I know who you are. I’m sorry about not sending in my submission,” Limpy said.
Connor sniggered at the table.
“Well . . . we received your submission . . . and I wanted to call directly.” Limpy stared at the phone; why the call? And what submission? “We would like to extend to you a full scholarship.”
“You would?” she blurted. “Why?”
Mr. Krikey seemed to gather himself. “The truth is . . . we’ve never seen an art project quite like yours.”
“My art project?”
“Yes, the embroidered backpack and stuffed . . . what was it you called it? Chup—”
“Chuppie, but how’d you . . .” Connor was laughing now; he knew something.
“Yes, the chuppie, and then to reproduce it in the fields as crop circles as a part of your presentation—quite brilliant, really. Personally, I’d been fascinated by your potato sack tapestry, so was quite surprised by your submission.”
“But I didn’t—” Connor was waving his hands and glaring as if ready to strangle her. “I—thank you,” she finished.
Another pause came during which Limpy looked from her father to her brothers, finally settling on Connor, who grinned. Then she recalled him breathing hard in their laneway on the day he’d gone missing, just as her artistic statement had gone missing. He had been running to the post office to drop it off. Her father hadn’t taken it; Connor had, and the knapsack with the stuffie—she’d left that with Emmanuel.
“Yes, well, it’s not my custom to call the students, but there’s something more. A member of the committee would like to discuss the option of licensing your creation.”
“Licensing it?”
“Yes, she’d purchase the rights to recreate it. Quite a sizable check.”
“Uh . . .”
“You can thank Ms. Goldstone, who runs Toys ’n’ Toys. Can she speak with you later today?”
Limpy held the phone to her chest to muffle the receiver. “Dad, someone wants to talk to me about buying a stuffed animal I made.” Her father merely raised an eyebrow and held out his hand to her.
Something cold twisted in Limpy’s stomach. An image of a chupacabra egg rattled in her mind. “What should I do?”
Her father scowled and said, “Don’t be acting a maggot . . .” And her face fell. “. . . of course they want to buy your art,” he finished. “You do what you want, it’s your art.”
“Really?” she screeched and then spoke into the phone. “Sorry, sorry, yes, yes, I’d like to talk to Ms. Goldstone.”
Mr. Krikey said that he hoped to see her next year and hung up.
“Good one, Connor,” Dylan said. “Smart.” He gave his brother a nudge on the shoulder.
“I only sent in the letter; it was Emmanuel who sent in the art.”
For the first time in her memory, everyone in her family smiled. As they waited for Ms. Goldstone’s call, the breakfast of potatoes had never tasted quite so good.
But Ms. Goldstone didn’t call. She arrived in person at the farm and negotiated with Limpy. Her father offered Limpy advice, but always left the decision to her. It was both terrifying and energizing. When the negotiation was over, Ms. Goldstone presented Limpy with a check. It was more than enough to cover four years of books, uniforms, tuition—everything.
Limpy handed it to her father. “Is it enough to keep the farm?”
“No, lass, you earned it,” her father said. “You deserve it.”
She shook her head. “I have everything I need, Pops. Right here. Just didn’t see it.”
The fringe of pines, pushed around by Tufts. The boulder beneath which her mother rested at peace. The barn under which the chupacabra lay trapped for another generation. Good could come of anything. Life was hard. But it was good, too. She saw it all with fresh eyes, an artist’s eye. Not as a prison, but a home. The center of a wheel from which she could take so many spokes. Her father took the check and held up his hand for her to wait. A few minutes later he returned.
“The bank needs half the amount.”
Her eyes widened.
“We can keep the farm,” he said, his eyes gleaming with tears. Limpy felt lifted up in the crushing hug of her father. “And you, my Limphetta, you can follow your dreams.”
A thrill shot through Limpy as she handed her stuffed chupacabra to Ms. Goldstone.
In Limpy’s stomach a new fear hatched, a tiny one, a trepidation about what came next, but it was a good one that she’d keep close to her heart and one that she’d keep nice and small. Limpy would follow her dreams. Even if they included more potato picking. Her entire family would.
The farm wasn’t such a cold, dark place after all.
The End
Acknowledgements
This book rattled around in my brain like a chupacabra egg wanting to hatch ever since I read the directive on a bag of potatoes to Keep them in a Cold, Dark Place. But once the story was brought into the light of day, it was blighted and moldy, requiring much peeling, chopping, and mashing to get it into the shape you r
ead here.
I need to thank my editors Catherine Adams of Inkslinger Editing, and Stephanie Parent and Graeme Hague of Polgarus Studios. As well as my literary agent Gina Panettieri and, although she may not realize it, Arianne Lewin both of whom pushed me to dig deeper. Martin Stiff gets full credit for the Amazing15 cover and Polgarus Studios for the exquisite formatting.
Like a potato needs water, earth, and sunlight, I need the support of my Writer’s Group at Sunnyside Library, the Odyssey Writers Workshop alum, and the intrepid Inkbots. Thank you!
Last and never least, to my wife, first reader, and best friend, and to my baby potatoes, for whom I write, thank you all. I love you. You always deserve your cookup.
Dear, Reader, thank you for reading. May all your fears stay small and your dreams grow big.
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About the Author
Michael is an award winning author who lives in Ottawa, Canada. His graphic novels, novels, and readers have been published by Rubicon Publishing and distributed by Pearson Education, Scholastic, and Oxford University Press. To learn more about Michael and his projects, visit his website at www.michaelfstewart.com.
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