Aliens on Vacation

by Clete Barrett Smith

  The cloud cover from earlier that morning had broken up, and it turned out to be the first really warm day since I had arrived. It was almost five o’clock, the warmest part of the day here, and after dragging the wagon around, I found the temperature bordering on hot, even.

  We hiked until my legs ached, and finally we heard the muted roar of white water as the trail met up with the Nook-sack River. I had avoided the river trails near Grandma’s place and Forest Grove—too many potential hikers around there—but I figured we were deep enough in the wilderness to safely join the Nooksack again.

  The forest grew right to the edge of the river, small trees and blackberry brambles hanging out over the water. We walked along the trail, which now followed the natural curves of the river. Sometimes we came to clearings that allowed us to walk down to the water’s edge, the ground here completely covered with smooth white river stones the size of footballs. We stopped at one of these, and I taught the aliens how to skip a flat rock across the surface of the river. Their fingers—or digits, or tendrils, or whatever you wanted to call them—were perfect for wrapping around the rocks, and they unfurled with a snap to send the stones skipping all the way across the Nooksack.

  Those aliens sure liked to play in the water. Actually, they liked to play on the water; they were able to splay their feet-tendrils into flippers, and with a running start from the riverbank they could run on top of the water for a while. They chased each other, feet slapping against the little white ripples that formed as the water churned over the rocks, until gravity caught up with them and sucked them underneath the surface. At first I was nervous they were going to drown, but the river wasn’t very deep, and they always came bounding out onto the riverbank, shaking themselves dry like dogs.

  Lots of trees had fallen into the water, creating natural bridges. The aliens liked to chase one another on these as well, running down the length of a trunk with scary good balance, then jumping off and diving into the bushes to hide from each other.

  For all of their energy and crazed activity, I had to admit they were pretty well-behaved. Every time I yelled to them that it was time to get on the trail, they ran back to me without any argument. It was weird to tell aliens what to do; I felt like a babysitter. I kept expecting them to get tired and lie down on the riverbank for a rest, but they never seemed to run out of steam.

  I was getting plenty tired myself, though, pulling that stuffed wagon over the exposed tree roots that crisscrossed the trail like huge pythons. After lugging our gear through the woods all this way, I figured we were far enough away from civilization to start looking for a place to set up camp.

  But what was that? The river was calm here, more murmur than roar, and I thought I heard something. “Shhhh! You guys, be quiet. Now!” I stage-whispered. The Jungle Boys froze. I leaned forward, straining to pick up a noise, my heart seeming as still as the aliens.

  There! A burst of sound—a laugh, or maybe a cough. And then a bit of a song, the words unclear, but the tune floating over the sound of the water. It came from straight ahead, where the trail followed a bend in the river and disappeared from sight. Someone was headed our way. Maybe a bunch of someones.

  I looked around frantically. My heart started back up and was beating way too hard. In front of us was a clear area of the forest, not much underbrush to use as cover and lots of open space between the trees. A thicket of blackberry brambles grew between us and the water, but there was no way we could wedge ourselves in there. It was way too dense, and I’d be a bloody mess if we tried that.

  Nowhere to hide.

  Our only option was to run back down the trail the way we had come, but we’d have to ditch our gear to get any speed.

  Besides, the trail was a straight shot behind us; whoever was coming would be around the curve in the path soon and would certainly see us.

  “Quick, you guys, over here!” I stepped off the trail, getting closer to the blackberry thicket and shielding us from sight behind a couple of trees. They would give us partial cover from this distance, but when the group walked by on the trail we would be totally exposed.

  I peeked from behind a tree, my cheek pressed against the rough bark. The bend in the river was about half the length of a football field away. Someone walked around the curve, stepping into view. I shielded my eyes from the sun, squinting for a better look. And no, there’s no way it could be—

  But it was. Sheriff Tate, walking down the trail. Wearing his uniform and carrying a huge hiking stick.

  I whipped my head around and stood with my back jammed up against the tree. “Get down!” I whispered to the aliens.

  I scanned the area—my head on a swivel, checking every square inch of our surroundings—as if that would miraculously make a hiding place appear. My knees got jittery and sweat dripped from my forehead to sting my eyes. My brain decided to get lost inside a cloud of panicky thoughts instead of helping me find a way out of this. What have I done? How did Tate find us out here? What will he do to me out here in the wilderness? He’ll be here any second and he’ll find us and there will be nothing that I can say to try to explain it rationally and Grandma will lose her business and WHAT AM I EVEN DOING HERE IN THE FIRST PLACE???

  The aliens huddled around me, wordlessly picking up on my fear. They peered all around, looking at each tree, their eyes opening and closing rapidly and their bodies shaking. Seeing things from their perspective helped me get myself under control. How scared would I be if I were on another planet and suddenly my guide lost it and started acting like a total spaz? I thought of the promise I had made to Grandma and knew it was time for me to act. “Come on. Don’t be a screwup,” I muttered to myself.

  “Don’t be what?” one of the aliens said.

  “Never mind. Take off those clothes, quick!” I whispered. I shoved the wagon over to a cluster of knee-high fern bushes and dumped it over on its side, spilling the camping gear behind the green leaves. The bushes did a decent job of hiding our gear, but as they stood only a couple of feet high, they weren’t nearly enough cover for the four of us.

  I could hear separate voices now but couldn’t make out the words. What was Tate doing out here with other people? Was it a search party, looking for us?

  The Jungle Boys peeled off their sweatpants, T-shirts, and headbands. “Give them to me!” I said, and threw their clothes into the ferns with the camping gear. Tate and his posse were close enough that I could hear the sticks snapping under their feet. We only had a few seconds before they walked right by our little clearing. I moved in very close to the aliens. “Okay, listen to me,” I whispered. “You need to close your eyes and just stand there, perfectly still, like this.” I pressed my legs together and stuck my arms out at different angles. They copied me, and I felt a brief spark of hope that this might actually work. “That’s great. That looks great. Now, whatever happens, don’t move. Okay? And don’t say anything until I tell you to. That’s very, very important. Don’t move.”

  I ducked behind them and scrunched myself up as small as I could. There was a slit of daylight between the aliens, enough for me to use as a peephole to watch the trail.

  Tate walked into view, only a few yards from where I was hiding behind the Jungle Boys. I felt horribly exposed. Walking right behind Tate were Eddie, Brian, and Greg. And to my horror, they were wearing uniforms too.

  That’s it, I thought. It’s over. If Tate is actually going to deputize teenagers and hunt us down in the forest, then there’s nothing I can do. It’s over.

  But before I could think about surrendering or praying for mercy, I saw more people walking into view behind the high schoolers. There were about a dozen of them, and they were just kids. Maybe nine or ten years old.

  I shifted my position, blackberry thorns digging into my back, and took a closer look at Tate. He was wearing a uniform, all right, but it wasn’t his usual sheriff’s uniform. It was some sort of Scout troop leader getup. The smaller kids had dark blue uniforms—I remembered them from the one year
that Tyler and I tried Cub Scouts—while Eddie, Brian, and Greg wore tan-and-green uniforms. Probably Eagle Scouts, at their age.

  My muscles relaxed a bit and I exhaled. It must have been the first time in quite a while, because I almost fell over and passed out. This was still a close call, but I’ll take Cub Scouts over grown-ups with guns and bloodhounds any day.

  Besides, it looked like they were all going to just walk right by us anyway. Hopefully the aliens were blending in with the tangle of foliage behind us. I crouched into a little ball again.

  The group filed slowly past us. All of them were wearing heavy-duty backpacks with a sleeping bag attached to the top. The long brown stock of a hunting rifle poked up out of Tate’s pack and extended over the top of his hat.

  All of a sudden Tate stopped, and the whole line of Scouts halted behind him. Tate looked around the forest, then backtracked a few steps. I held my breath again.

  “Now, boys, be sure to write this stuff I’m telling you down in your nature journals,” Tate said in his slow drawl. “This here’s a cedar tree. You can tell by the stringy bark.” He stepped off the trail, getting even closer to us, and patted a tree. “This is a western red cedar, if you want to get specific. Cedars were the most useful tree for the Indian tribes around here, years ago.” Tate peeled off a short length of the bark and held it up. “See this? They could weave this bark into hats, baskets, all manner of things. And did I ever tell you boys what a hardy and durable tree this is? A healthy cedar can live to be over one thousand years old.”

  “What a coincidence. He’s told us that over one thousand times,” Eddie muttered to his buddies. Brian and Greg snickered.

  “What’s that?” Tate asked.

  “Nothing, sir.”

  Tate moved on to another tree, his back turned to us as he faced the Scouts. “And this here? It’s a bigleaf maple. This is a deciduous tree, so those leaves will fall off in autumn, unlike the conifers, or ‘evergreens,’ like all of these Douglas firs that keep their green needles all year round. Pay attention to your troop leader now, and hopefully some of you will be able to earn a wilderness badge when we’re finished up out here tomorrow.”

  Just when I thought they were going to move on out of sight and I could start breathing normally again, one of the kids pointed straight at the aliens. “What kind of trees are those?” he asked.

  Perfect. Just my luck, to get stuck with the little Scout who wanted to bypass the wilderness badge and go straight for his space alien identification badge.

  I watched through the slit between the aliens, not daring to breathe, as Sheriff Tate strolled up to the Jungle Boys. He came really near us, studying the “bark.” He got so close that his belly, which plopped right over his belt, was pressing up against Zardolph. I was afraid that he’d hear me breathing.

  And was Zardolph moving? His torso slowly slithered away from Tate. I thumped him in the back to remind him to stay still, and prayed he would remember to keep quiet.

  Tate squinted up and down the length of the “tree,” that soggy toothpick lolling from one side of his mouth to the other. “Hmmmm. What have we here?” he muttered. He ran his hand over one of the Jungle Boys’ arms, and I prayed that aliens weren’t ticklish. “What indeedy do we have right here?”

  Some of the scouts behind Tate elbowed each other in the ribs and smiled. “What’s the matter, Mr. Troop Leader, sir?” Brian said. “Don’t you know what kind of tree that is?” The smiles grew wider all around.

  Tate stepped away from the aliens. “What? Oh, no, of course I do. Of course I do.”

  A few boys pulled out their nature journals and stood there looking at Tate innocently. “Could you please tell us, sir? So we can write it down? In detail?” Eddie said.

  Tate took one more hard look. “These here are madrona trees, boys.” He stepped forward and gave one of the aliens a few hard taps. “Yep, madrona trees, mark my words. I’ve lived here all m’life and I’d know a madrona tree anywhere. They only grow in the Pacific Northwest. They’re usually found by the coast, but occasionally you see them near fresh water. Good-looking trees, eh, boys?”

  “Yes, sir,” a few of them mumbled. They tucked their journals back into their packs, clearly disappointed that this session of stump-the-troop-leader hadn’t worked out.

  As Tate returned to the trail, he glanced back over his shoulder at the “trees,” his eyebrows lowered and a scowl on his face. He hesitated for a moment, and I almost thought he was going to walk back for further inspection. I held my breath.

  Finally he turned back and joined his Scouts on the trail. I let out another relieved sigh, and my legs went so watery I nearly fell over.

  My relief didn’t last long. “Can we set up our campsite here, Mr. Tate?” one of them asked. “I’m tired.”

  “Yeah, me too.”

  “We’ve been hiking out here forever.”

  Tate surveyed the area. What would we do if he stayed? No way did I trust the Jungle Boys to stay still much longer.

  “Nope,” Sheriff Tate said. A chorus of groans rose from the group. “Now look here, boys. There’s a clearing just up the hill from the riverbank a little ways down the trail. We’ll set up camp there. Be easier to fetch water and find driftwood for our campfire.” There was some minor grumbling. “It’ll just take a few minutes to get down there. Now, are we real Scouts, or what?”

  “Yes, sir,” some of the boys mumbled.

  “Then let’s get a move on.”

  This time I held my breath until they were down the trail and out of sight. I finally exhaled and started shaking all over.

  “That was great, you guys. I’m really proud of you.”

  The aliens all spoke at once, babbling over each other and biting off the ends of each other’s sentences.

  “—my arms were so tired that I—”

  “—did you see how close he got to me, with his big belly pressing—”

  “—his breath made my eyes water when—”

  “—did he actually think we were one of these Earth plants that—”

  “—I had the worst itch when—”

  I finally quieted them down. Tate may have been gone, but that didn’t mean he would never come back.

  “Come on, you guys, we should probably put some distance between us and those Scouts before we make our camp.” I pushed the wagon back on its wheels and piled on the camping gear. When I got back on the trail, the Jungle Boys were already racing ahead of me.

  I sighed. Not only did I have to keep these three rowdy aliens alive, but they had to stay hidden from the suspicious sheriff and a dozen curious Scouts.

  Somehow I didn’t think I would find any helpful tips in Grandma’s copy of So You Think You Can Camp?

  It took forever to get the big tent set up. I tried to consult the beginner’s camping book, but it was way too complicated. Apparently I needed a manual aimed at whichever skill level was just below “moron.”

  Sometimes I wish they would teach practical skills in school. Setting Up Tents 101, maybe, or Talking to Girls: A Course for Beginners.

  But you have to learn the useful stuff by actually doing it yourself. So I wrestled with tent poles and layers of canvas until they resembled something that you could crawl inside of and would maybe keep you dry while you slept.

  Zardolph and his brothers didn’t make things any easier. They tried to help for five minutes or so, but then a family of deer wandered by, and the Jungle Boys chased them around our clearing. I had never seen deer up close before. They could do these cool jumps where they sailed through the air, then landed for just a split second before they shot back into the air again, like they had springs for legs. The aliens got on all fours and did a perfect imitation of those bounding leaps, racing around in circles with the deer. And what’s even weirder is I think the deer liked it. They kept coming back to jump around with the brothers from outer space.

  Until one of the aliens jumped on a deer’s back and tried to ride it like a rodeo co
wboy. That didn’t end well.

  After the deer took off, a couple of raccoons showed up. Those things are pretty creepy. They crawled right into the middle of our camp, not the least bit afraid of human or alien. The raccoons sat back on their haunches and stared at us, calmly making a hand-washing gesture with their front paws, like they were showing off their opposable thumbs. Zardolph introduced himself, but the raccoons hissed and swiped at him with their claws. The alien jumped up in surprise and smacked his head on a tree branch while his brothers laughed. They spent the rest of the time climbing trees, chasing squirrels along branches, and trying to catch woodpeckers.

  After camp was set up, we sat around on fallen trees and I tried to have a conversation with the Jungle Boys. You’d think this would be pretty fascinating; after all, with three aliens to talk to, you might be able to figure out some of the mysteries of the cosmos or whatever. But our conversation went something like this:

  ME: So…how is Earth different from your home planet?

  ALIEN #1: There’s nobody like us here.

  ALIEN #2: Yeah. And our house isn’t here or anything.

  ALIEN #3: I’m hungry. Mom lets us eat whatever we want on vacation. When are we going to eat?

  ALIEN #2: What’s that? [points at a rabbit]

  ALIEN #3: Let’s chase it!

  ALIENS #1, 2, AND 3: Yeah! [all of them race into the bushes]

  They were just too young, I guess. I shouldn’t be too hard on them. If a kindergartner transported to another galaxy, he wouldn’t be too great at answering a bunch of alien questions about Earth, either.

  By early evening I got so hungry, I actually considered the tofu dogs in the cooler. If they were going to be halfway edible, I needed to build a fire. And to be honest, I wanted a fire for other reasons. It was going to be nighttime in a few hours, and I was a little nervous about being out here in the dark. The wild animals that had stopped by our camp all afternoon were sort of freaking me out. Not by themselves, of course. But I’ve seen enough Discovery Channel to know that in a place deer and rabbits called home, there also lived things that liked to eat them. Like coyotes. And bears. I figured a nice bright fire would discourage any wild beasts with sharp teeth from visiting.