CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
TO HAVE A HAPPY LIFE
WHEN THE SEA GIANTS descended into the Pacific Ocean, the tops of their heads became the Farallon Islands again. There would be no press conference. Any rumors of just how close Los Angeles came to annihilation would be denied. All evidence to the contrary would be blamed on an imaginary earthquake.
Bailey missed Henry. Every day since he’d returned home, he sat on Whalefat Beach twirling a Frisbee on his finger, looking out at the waves. Way out there, Henry was underwater with his parents doing whatever sea giant families do. Did they play games? Did they hunt sharks and eels? Did Henry miss the whole raw chicken lunches the Bucklebys used to feed him? Maybe Bailey would visit him someday, or maybe their childhood friendship would be a nice memory for just a while, and they’d soon forget about each other altogether.
In a way, he was angry at Henry, and he knew that wasn’t right. Henry had been reunited with his parents while Bailey had now lost both of his. It didn’t seem fair.
Bailey still hoped that Buckleby and Son’s Very Strange Souvenirs would one day again be a father-and-son business, but in the meantime, Bailey made the executive decision to sign on Nikos Tekton, the famous Labyrinthian of the Mojave Desert, and Savannah Mistivich, the sword-wielding heroine of the goblin tunnels. And if the citizens of Whalefat Beach called Nikos a freak or a demon or even a monster, then they would have to answer to him. Nikos was a bit apprehensive about taking such a public role in the business, but when Bailey told him his days of living in secrecy and shame were over, the minotaur couldn’t help but smile.
“You do me a great honor, Bailey Buckleby.”
They combined the leftover goblin gold to pay off Nikos’s debt, which the minotaur tried to insist was not Bailey’s concern. Bailey said, “We are business partners now, so it just makes good financial sense for us all to be debt-free.”
“And Bullheads help Bullheads!” Savannah said proudly.
“Besides,” Bailey said, “I have a very good idea that will require your special skills. It’s an idea I think you’re going to like.”
There was still plenty of gold left over after paying Nikos’s debt, and Bailey used it to purchase the store next to Buckleby and Son’s Very Strange Souvenirs, which had been an unpopular hand-knitted sock shop for many years. Bailey wanted Nikos to transform the lot into the most artistic, most beautiful, most mind-challenging micro-maze he could imagine.
“Micro-maze?” Nikos asked, his eyes lighting up.
“Yes,” Bailey said. “A micro-maze. A maze that has to fit into the small space next door. It can be only three stories high, and only as big as the lot, but it can have secret passages, and hidden levers, and trapdoors, and dark crawl spaces. Whatever you want. We could even hang faeries in lanterns throughout the maze to scare the crap out of customers. We’ll connect the maze to our souvenir shop and charge twenty dollars for admission.”
It was all Bailey had to say, because he and Savannah saw the light in Nikos’s eyes burn bright as his minotaur brain started revving into high gear.
“It’s an absolutely excellent idea,” Nikos said happily, and he began drawing up the blueprints that very day.
Savannah taught introductory sword fighting in the shop on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons after school. She took lessons herself and had great plans to organize a Bullhead Brigade reunion. On other days, after school, she and Bailey went hunting for faeries.
One October Wednesday, Savannah suggested Bailey write an article about their adventure for Peculiar. He had never thought of himself as a writer, but he started working on a possible article during Mrs. Wood’s class, because sometimes social studies wasn’t all that exciting to a seventh grader who had flown into a sea giant’s ear canal and lived to tell the tale.
After several weeks, his article for Peculiar nearly complete, he and Savannah had collected more than forty sugar-crazed faeries to sell in the infamous back room, and he was getting used to the idea that he might never see his parents again. He went to the beach every night to stare out at the ocean, but every night he returned to the store a little sooner than he had the night before.
“Listen,” Nikos said one Saturday morning after cooking and serving Bailey a breakfast burrito, because it turned out Nikos was as skilled at making breakfast as he was at building mazes. “I want you to know how much I appreciate the life you’ve given me.”
“I know,” Bailey said.
“I want you to have a happy life, too.”
“Thanks,” Bailey said, barely looking at him, slightly embarrassed. “That’s a nice thing to say.” Bailey guessed that many orphans did have happy lives, but he figured if he was meant to be happy, it probably wouldn’t happen until after high school. High school was an ugly obstacle for everyone—even kids with parents.
“I’ve been wanting to tell you something,” Nikos said. “I threw the ratatoskers over the side of the yacht.”
“What?” Bailey asked, even though he had heard the minotaur quite clearly. His mind was already racing.
“I threw the two ratatoskers into the whale’s mouth as it was diving back into the sea. I did it really without thinking, but I guess I was hoping George would swallow them so that your parents would have a way of communicating with you. I don’t know if the ratatoskers were swallowed or if they even survived. I didn’t tell you until now because I didn’t want you to expect anything, but I think maybe you could use a little bit of hope.”
Bailey smiled politely and said, “Thanks.” Nikos had given him a nice fantasy. He liked the idea of his parents penning a message on a very tiny piece of paper to pierce on a ratatosker tusk to deliver to him. But did they have an article of his clothing so the rodents could pick up his scent? Did they even have paper and pen? Bailey doubted it, and the ratatoskers had probably drowned or been eaten by sharks or speared by mean-spirited mermaids.
But at night, under his baby-blue blanket, he thought about this remote possibility and played out an entire scene in his head, imagining what his parents might write to him. In the mornings, he told himself it was foolish and childish to make up such dreams and he really should get on with life and finish editing his article for Peculiar.
His article covered everything that had happened in September, which he began as the son of a monster hunter and ended as the parentless partner of an upcoming micro-maze attraction. He described faery hunting with his father, how he had discovered their pet troll was actually the baby son of the sea giants that destroyed San Francisco (all of Peculiar’s readers knew that sea giants were real no matter what the government said), how he was imprisoned by goblins, escaped a giant hoop snake, fought off carnivorous mermaids, and defeated a genuine cynocephaly. He described, too, how his parents were swallowed by a whale. The article ended with an invitation from Bailey to all of Peculiar’s readers to come visit Buckleby and Son’s Very Strange Souvenirs and to accept a real minotaur’s micro-maze challenge, which would open in the spring. If anyone could appreciate a minotaur’s labyrinth and the importance of its historical place in Western culture, he knew Peculiar’s readers could. All in all, when he had finished writing the piece, he was happy with it, although the story was so packed with monster encounters he feared it might come off as unbelievable. But it couldn’t hurt to send it off to the editor. Besides, a publication might look good on his college resume.
By mid-December, when John Muir Middle School had let out for the winter, and Whalefat Beach had grown even more foggy and gray, Bailey began to feel restless and even—somehow—bored. He was running a store and helping his minotaur partner buy building materials. This might have been an unusually interesting life for many seventh graders, but for him it was already becoming quite routine. Was this it? Was it silly and childish to want anything more? Every evening he walked to the beach to look for whales and ratatoskers, but was that a huge waste of time? Because with each passing night, Bailey realized that a reunion with his parents was becoming less
and less likely.
Until one Thursday evening when he was sitting behind the cash register and a single envelope slid through the slot of the shop’s front door.
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
THE ANSWER
BAILEY’S HANDS TREMBLED as he opened the letter. He wanted it so badly to be from his parents, telling him they had found their way to a foreign shore and for some reason couldn’t call or email or text but could only send him this letter. Who else would send him a letter by snail mail? Only his technologically challenged father. He took a deep breath, unfolded the letter, and read it slowly, one word at a time.
Dear Mr. Bailey Buckleby,
It is my honor to write you. If you are getting this letter, I know the story you submitted to Peculiar is at least partially true. I must admit that even for a seasoned monster hunter like myself, your story seemed fantastical, and because you are a mere twelve years of age, I wondered if you were prone to exaggeration. But when the editor of Peculiar sent me your story, I found it so well written and with such marvelously accurate renditions of North American tunneling goblins, I knew that you were clearly a monster hunter coming into his prime. More than that, the story of your lost parents moved me, and I knew instantly that the gigantic whale that you describe is quite likely the descendant of the great basilosaurus, a dinosaur that my colleagues in paleontology have always suspected still swims our seven oceans. To think that a young man like yourself stood before such a creature! I truly envy your encounter.
Perhaps it is selfish of me to make such a request, but I wonder if you would like to collaborate on another article. The editor of Peculiar is a good friend of mine, and I’ve already suggested the possibility. He envisions your article as the cover of the January issue and the beginning of an adventure reported in a monthly series as we live it.
Bailey—I say this with no degree of certainty but with utmost hope—I think we may be able to find your parents. I am currently researching and photographing the Eight-Pointed City of the octopeople, which lies beyond a great coral reef just west of Isla Cedros. I know you would find it as fascinating as I do. I wonder if you have plans for the holidays. If not, would you care to join me? You would see no snow on Christmas Day, but the fantastic phosphorescent city of the tentacled octopeople might just make up for it. The octopeople are well aware of monster traffic beneath the waves and have told me that a giant whale swims by their city routinely and is due to come by any day now. I can’t help but wonder, Bailey, if this is the same basilosaurus that swallowed your mother and father. Perhaps together we can find the answer you seek. My phone number is 555-246-8421. Please call me, Bailey. Two monster hunters are better than one.
Quite sincerely,
Dr. Frederick March
Bailey read the note once more and then again. What would his father think? His disdain for Dr. March might be forgotten if he knew he had helped his son earn the cover story of his favorite magazine.
He packed everything he needed in one backpack—clothes, Frisbees, and Dr. March’s In the Shadow of Monsters. He smiled to himself, knowing he would soon be working with his hero and not just reading his book and dreaming. He went online and bought a plane ticket to Mexico. His flight would leave that night.
He gave the keys to the store to Nikos, who was surprised to hear of Bailey’s sudden plans but understood that he had to do what he had to do. He asked Bailey if he would tell Savannah that he was leaving Whalefat Beach.
“I’ll text her,” he said. “I won’t be gone for long.”
Bailey knew that spending winter vacation with Dr. March would be dangerous and full of monsters, and finding his parents would be difficult—if not impossible. But like seven generations of Bucklebys before him, Bailey was a brave monster hunter, so danger and difficulty were not serious considerations. Was it ridiculous to think a scientist he had never met and octopeople he had only read about would be able to help him find the whale that swallowed his parents? Bailey knew his mother would approve when he decided he must follow Dr. March’s example, go out into the world, and see for himself.
Acknowledgments
This story could not have been told without my first editor, Julie Scheina, who introduced me to my agent, Sarah Davies, who introduced me to my editor at Macmillan, Julia Sooy. They are three wonderful giants who help put the stars in the sky.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
George Brewington makes his middle-grade debut with The Monster Catchers. Four days a week, George writes middle-grade and adult fantasy fiction, having been published most recently in an anthology titled Dark Magic: Witches, Hackers, and Robots. The other three days he is a respiratory therapist at a hospital in Charleston, South Carolina. He lives with his wife and baby daughter in Folly Beach, South Carolina. georgebrewington.com, or sign up for email updates here.
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Contents
Title Page
Copyright Notice
Dedication
Chapter One: Pft
Chapter Two: Catch-and-Keep
Chapter Three: ;)
Chapter Four: The Infamous Back Room
Chapter Five: The Cynocephaly
Chapter Six: One Real Memory
Chapter Seven: The Stars Are Not Yours
Chapter Eight: You have Determined Your Own Fate
Chapter Nine: The Wonderful Lighted Paintbrush That God Uses Every Night
Chapter Ten: Baboon Butts
Chapter Eleven: The Bullhead Brigade
Chapter Twelve: Chirp Chirpety-Chirp
Chapter Thirteen: The Universal Currency
Chapter Fourteen: Punks
Chapter Fifteen: This Wrong Must Be Righted
Chapter Sixteen: The Machetes
Chapter Seventeen: The Truth
Chapter Eighteen: Do Not Eat that Faery
Chapter Nineteen: The Famous Labyrinthian of the Mojave Desert
Chapter Twenty: An Honorable Duel
Chapter Twenty-One: We Vow we will Give You Back the Night
Chapter Twenty-Two: Lamps, Lamps, Lamps
Chapter Twenty-Three: Come Back to Me, Boy
Chapter Twenty-Four: Aaron Aackerman’s Sixth-Grade Graduation Party
Chapter Twenty-Five: Try or Die
Chapter Twenty-Six: Greed Has Driven the Demon to Madness
Chapter Twenty-Seven: In Danger Once Again
Chapter Twenty-Eight: Punks
Chapter Twenty-Nine: The Sweet Tooth
Chapter Thirty: Betrayed
Chapter Thirty-One: Hit the Gas
Chapter Thirty-Two: Should a Son Jump?
Chapter Thirty-Three: A Pleasant Dream to Comfort Him While He Drowned
Chapter Thirty-Four: Alive
Chapter Thirty-Five: George
Chapter Thirty-Six: Man to Dog
Chapter Thirty-Seven: A Big Favor
Chapter Thirty-Eight: Small
Chapter Thirty-Nine: Zzt
Chapter Forty: a Happy, Inconvenient Truth
Chapter Forty-One: To Have a Happy Life
Chapter Forty-Two: The Answer
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Copyright
Text copyright © 2019 by George Brewington
Illustrations copyright © 2019 by David Miles
Henry Holt and Company, Publishers since 1866
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First hardcover edition 2019
eBook edition March 2019
eISBN 978-1-250-16579-4
The Monster Catchers--A Bailey Buckleby Story Page 19
