by Lois Lowry
No. The real worst was when beets touched something.
Sam poked at his peas. "Anastasia got to have gerbils," he grumbled.
The whole family groaned. Sam giggled. The gerbils had been terrible. They had had babies, and then they had all gotten out of the cage, and there had been gerbils all over the house for a while.
The Krupniks had all been very glad when they finally gave the gerbils away.
Carefully Sam removed three peas from his squash mound and tried to de-squash them with his finger. It didn't work. No one was looking at him, so he put the squashy peas into his pocket. He could throw them away later.
He gnawed on his chicken leg and wished that he could have a pet. If he had a pet, it would be sitting under his chair right now, right this minute. And he could drop peas down and his pet would eat them and no one would ever know but Sam. A good pet would even eat broccoli, Sam thought.
"You stay in the yard, Sam," his mom said. "And after I finish the dishes, I'll bring you in for your bath. It's almost bedtime." She buttoned his sweater.
Sam nodded. His mom closed the screen door, went back into the kitchen, and left Sam alone on the back porch. It was boring, being outdoors after dinner. There were no kids around. At school, there would be lots of kids yelling and shoving and grabbing and running. Nicky would be biting people, and Adam would be dropping bombs on the castles that other kids would be building in the sandbox, and Skipper would be going down the giraffe slide headfirst, and it would be a whole lot of fun.
But being alone in the back yard was boring. Sam sat for a minute on his tricycle. He pushed the pedals with his feet, rode the tricycle into a bush, got off, and left it there, mashing the rhododendron.
He watched a squirrel climb the side of a tree trunk. Squirrels couldn't be pets; they always ran away very fast if you came close. A pet should be willing to sit beside you, eat your peas, and listen quietly while your mom read you a story. A squirrel wouldn't do any of those things.
He wandered over to his sandbox, sat down on the triangular corner seat, and reached for a big spoon that was partly buried in the sand and dirt.
When he picked it up, he saw a worm.
Sam wasn't afraid of worms. Sam wasn't afraid of anything much, except maybe the Terrible Twos, which he still had never seen. And Nicky at school, who bit, and left little pink circles of teeth marks on your arm.
But he had never thought very much about worms until now. He picked this one up and examined it. It was long and fat and glistening, and it wiggled in the palm of his hand.
Could a worm be a pet? Sam wondered. He had never heard of anyone who had a pet worm. But maybe no one had thought of it yet.
A worm was small, the way a pet should be.
It was alive.
No one was allergic to worms. He was pretty
sure of that. Daddy was allergic to dogs and cats. Sam's friend Adam was allergic to orange juice, so at snack time at school Adam always had tomato juice instead. And Sam's mother was allergic to ironing; he had heard her say that lots of times.
But no one was ever allergic to worms, Sam was quite sure.
And a worm would never surprise you by having lots of babies the way Anastasia's gerbils had. Worms didn't have babies. In his whole entire life, Sam had never once seen a baby worm.
A worm would never ever run out into the street and get squooshed flat by a car the way a cat might. Because worms didn't have legs. Sam lifted the worm and dangled it in the air, checking. No legs.
And Sam thought of something else good about worms. Sometimes, when they were walking to the store, his mom would grab Sam's hand and say, "Watch out. Dog mess." Sam would have to walk very carefully around it.
But she never once said, "Worm mess." So that was another thing that worms didn't do and another problem that a pet worm wouldn't be.
A worm would sit quietly beside you while your mom read a story, Sam was sure. This worm was sitting quietly in his hand right now.
Would a worm eat peas? Or broccoli? Probably not. Sam wasn't even sure that a worm had a mouth. He held this one up and examined each end of it carefully. There were things that might be a mouth, but he wasn't certain.
But he was certain of something: it wouldn't bark or whine. That would certainly please his parents, who didn't like barking and whining one bit. There was a dog across the street—Mr. Fosburgh's poodle, Clarence, who barked and whined a lot—and sometimes Mrs. Krupnik said that she wished Mr. Fosburgh would move to Australia and take Clarence with him.
"Saaaammmm!" He could hear his mother call him from the kitchen door. It was time to go in for his bath.
"I'm coming!" Sam called back. Carefully he rolled his worm into a ball and put it into his pocket, where it would have three peas to eat just in case it was hungry, just in case it did have a mouth, just in case it was willing to eat peas.
Trotting to the house, he tried to think of a name for his new pet. He had wanted to have a dog and name it Prince. But he had named one of Anastasia's gerbils Prince, so that name was taken, even though they didn't have the gerbil anymore.
What was a better name than Prince?
King, Sam thought, with satisfaction. He grinned, climbing the porch steps. He patted his pocket.
King of Worms, he thought.
9
Sam was at the public library with his sister and his mother late one afternoon. The public library was one of his very favorite places.
He liked to call it the liberry, even though everybody—his mom, his dad, his sister, and the librarian herself—had all told him about a million times that liberry was wrong. He knew that. He knew it was really library.
So he said it correctly, aloud. But to himself, Sam always said "liberry." He liked the sound of it better.
Sometimes on Saturdays, the librarian showed children's movies. The Red Balloon was the one that Sam liked best. It had no scary parts at all.
Winnie-the-Pooh was pretty good, too, but Sam always got a little nervous when Pooh was up in the air, dangling from the balloon, and bees came along. Sam was just a teensy-weensy bit frightened of bees.
After he had chosen his books, and the librarian had checked them out, Sam went to the bulletin board by the library's front door. He wanted to see if they would be having a movie soon. He looked all over the bulletin board for a picture of Dumbo, or Bambi, or Willy Wonka.
None of those things was there.
But Sam did see a sheet of pink paper with some drawings of dogs and cats. They weren't very good drawings, but you could tell they were dogs and cats.
And there were some words on the paper.
Sam screwed up his face and began to sound out the letters.
P was easy. "P, p, p," Sam sounded in a whisper.
And "T, t, t," he said.
"Pet," Sam read aloud.
Then he started on the second word. Sam knew that "Sh" was the sound of being quiet, and the second word began with "Sh."
"Pet Shhhhh," Sam said quietly. He looked at the next letter. An O.
"PET SHOW!" Sam yelled.
Everyone in the library turned to look at him. A man with a newspaper scowled, but most people smiled.
"That's right, Sam," the librarian said. "We're having a pet show for children on Saturday morning. With prizes. Do you have a pet to bring?"
Anastasia was at the counter, checking out Gone With the Wind for the fourteenth time. "You can't take my goldfish," she said hastily. "Frank the Second is not one bit interested in being exhibited."
"I'm afraid he doesn't have a pet," Mrs. Krupnik said to the librarian in a sad voice. "My husband is allerg——"
"I do!" Sam said. "I do! I didn't tell you! It was a secret!"
Back at home, he raced up the stairs to his room, with his mother and sister behind him. He opened his closet door, pushed aside the boots and sneakers and slippers on the floor, and found the little box he had hidden in the corner.
His mother was looking very nervous. "Sam, what
do you have in there? If it's a snake or something, I really don't think I can—"
Sam took off the lid. "Shhh," he said. "He may be asleep."
"Yuck," Anastasia said, peering into the box. "It's just dirt"
"No, no, it's in the dirt! Look! I'll find him!" Carefully Sam poked through the dirt until he found his pet. "Here he is! His name is King of Worms!" Sam held the earthworm in the air.
His mother and sister stared at it. They didn't say anything.
"I could tie a ribbon around him for the pet show," Sam suggested.
"Yeah, right," said Anastasia. "Cute."
"I have to get dinner started," Mrs. Krupnik said. "Sam, be sure to wash your hands carefully after you put your, uh, your pet away. Anastasia, make sure he washes, would you?"
Anastasia nodded.
"Funny," Mrs. Krupnik murmured as she headed down the stairs. "I was going to cook spaghetti for dinner. But now I've changed my mind."
Anastasia walked with Sam to the public library on Saturday morning. Their mother and father had decided to stay at home.
"Dad would have liked to come," Anastasia told Sam, "but you know with his allergies, he was worried about being around dogs and cats."
Sam nodded. He was carrying his worm box very carefully.
"And Mom was afraid there might be rodents," Anastasia said.
"Yeah. Mom hates rodents."
They both remembered how much their mother had hated Anastasia's gerbils.
"Good thing a worm isn't a rodent," Sam said, patting his box. "Mom likes worms okay."
"And fish," Anastasia added, thinking of Frank.
They were almost at the corner, where the small brick library building was set in the middle of a big green lawn. The pet show would be on the library lawn, under the trees.
Sam could hear the sound of barking.
"A dog won't win first prize," he said confidently to his sister, "because dogs are ordinary."
"Let me tie your shoe tighter, Sam," Anastasia said suddenly.
She knelt on the sidewalk, and Sam looked at her in surprise. "Nobody needs to tie my shoes," he reminded her, "because Mom bought me Xerox shoes. I mean Velcro," he corrected himself.
"I really only wanted to talk to you for a minute," Anastasia explained, as she knelt beside him. "Sam," she said, "don't be disappointed if you don't win the prize. Prizes don't matter."
"Yeah, they do!" Sam told her. "Prize means best. I think King of Worms will be the best pet! I washed him. And I changed his dirt."
"But, Sam, every child thinks his pet is the best. And we don't really care what the judges think, do we? As long as we know King of Worms is the best, that's the important thing, isn't it?"
Sam shook his head. "No," he said. "The really important thing is to win the prize."
Anastasia sighed. "Come on," she said. She stood up and took Sam's hand, the hand that wasn't holding the worm box. "Let's get it over with."
The library lawn was very noisy. Dogs were barking, babies were crying, children were shouting—Sam recognized some of his nursery school friends—and a lot of people were standing around a tree, looking up and calling to a cat, asking it please to come down.
The librarian recognized Sam and Anastasia. She gave Sam a number on a square of cardboard. "There you are," she said. "Your pet is number seventeen. And your place will be over there. Do you see the seventeen on that table? Better get in your place because the judging will start soon. Then we'll have refreshments, afterward."
Anastasia nudged Sam over to the empty card table with the 17 taped to it. They placed the little box on the center of the table and removed the lid.
Sam poked gently in the fresh dirt until he found King of Worms. "Stick your head out," he whispered, "and look beautiful when the judges come around."
"Hey, look, Sam," Anastasia said, "somebody did bring a goldfish. See over there?"
They checked to make certain that Sam's worm box was safely situated on its table, and then wandered over to look at the goldfish in a bowl nearby.
"Not as good as Frank the Second," Anastasia whispered to Sam, and Sam nodded in agreement. "Not as bright-colored, not as big. And Frank's face is more intelligent."
Sam tugged suddenly on Anastasia's jeans. He pointed. "That's Nicky from my school," he whispered. "Remember Nicky the biter?"
"Well, Nicky wouldn't dare bite anyone at a pet show," Anastasia reassured Sam. They strolled over and looked into the huge box beside Nicky.
"Forty-seven gerbils," Nicky said in a loud voice.
"Nice," Anastasia said politely, and she and Sam moved away.
"And there's my friend Adam with his cat." Sam pointed. "Adam's cat is named Squeaky."
"Shhh," Anastasia said. "Look. There are the judges!"
The three men and one woman were stopping in front of the first pet, a rabbit in a cage, and discussing it. Sam could see them talking quietly to each other. One man was carrying a shopping bag. He reached into it and took out a bright blue ribbon with a badge attached to it. He wrote something on the badge and attached it to the rabbit's cage. The girl standing beside the cage grinned proudly.
"No fair!" wailed Sam. "They're giving the prize and they didn't even look at King of Worms!"
The judges had moved on to the next pet. Anastasia grabbed Sam's hand, and they ran over to the rabbit cage.
"I won!" the girl was saying happily. "My rabbit won!"
Anastasia read the words on the blue ribbon. "First Prize," she read aloud, "for Nose-wiggling."
Sam brightened. "King of Worms couldn't win that," he said, "because he doesn't have a nose."
"Look, Sam," Anastasia said. She had moved to the next pet. The judges had gone on ahead, moving from table to table, cage to cage.
"First Prize for Yellowest Pet," Anastasia read, leaning over a canary cage.
"First Prize for Largest Sleeper," she read, almost tripping over a snoring Newfoundland dog.
"First Prize for Wettest Pet," she read on the goldfish bowl.
"First Prize for Best Climber," she read on the ribbon attached to a tree trunk. From a limb above, the cat still looked down.
"First Prize for Most Pets," said the award on Nicky's huge box of gerbils.
Sam and Anastasia stood and watched quietly from a distance as the judges came to the table with the 17 on it. They saw the judges lean over the worm box.
"Maybe he'll be roundest pet," Anastasia suggested.
"I bet he'll be dirtiest," Sam said cheerfully.
They could see the judges poke gently in the dirt. One of them lifted the box. They talked some more.
"They can't decide," Anastasia whispered to Sam. "It must be a truly tough decision."
"They probably never had to do a worm before," Sam whispered back.
Finally, while they watched, the judge with the marking pen wrote on one of the blue ribbons and attached it to the worm box. Then the judges moved on.
Sam and Anastasia dashed to their table.
"Read it to me," Sam begged. "I can't read fast enough because I have to sound out all the words."
Anastasia had the ribbon in her hand and a horrified look on her face.
"First Prize," she read slowly, "for Most Invisible Pet."
And it was true. King of Worms was gone.
"He's bait!" Sam yowled. "I know he's bait!"
"What on earth are you talking about, Sam?" Anastasia asked. They were walking home from the pet show.
Sam couldn't stop crying. "King of Worms! I know there must have been someone there who wanted to go fishing tomorrow! And was looking for bait! And they saw King of Worms and took him!"
Anastasia leaned over and held a crumpled Kleenex to Sam's nose. "Here," she said. "Blow."
Sam blew his nose. "They'll put a hook through him," he wailed.
Anastasia shook her head. "I don't think so, Sam. I think he ran away. He just didn't want to be in a pet show."
"Worms can't run," Sam muttered. "They only crawl."
"Well, that's true. They crawl and slither. But that makes them very good at escaping."
"Why?" Sam asked.
"Because they go underground, and no one can see them. Hey, Sam, you know what? I bet King of Worms is underground right now, maybe right under our feet."
Sam sniffled, and his face brightened. "You think so? Under the sidewalk?"
"Sure," Anastasia said. "Probably slithering along down there, faster than a speeding bullet. Heading home."
Sam looked down the street, toward their house. "Probably he did want to go home, so he wouldn't have to be in a dumb pet show," he said. "Would he know the way home? Because I took him in the box, and he couldn't see anything."
"Oh, sure," his sister told him. "Worms have an excellent sense of direction. They're used to finding their way underground, where they can't see."
"Yeah," said Sam, starting to smile. "I bet he's slithering under the street right now. He doesn't even have to stop at the corner and look both ways for cars."
"He'll probably beat us home," Anastasia said.
At the corner, they stopped. Sam looked down at the drain that caught the rainwater. He knelt beside it and cupped his hands around his mouth.
"Hey, King of Worms!" he called. "I know you're down there!"
He listened for a moment. "I think I hear him," he said to Anastasia. "I hear slithering noises."
When they got to their yard, they went directly to the sandbox where Sam's big tin shovel was lying beside a dented kitchen pot.
"Where do you think he might be, Sam?" asked Anastasia.
Sam thought and then pointed. "Right here," he said. "By this bush."
Anastasia dug very carefully with Sam's shovel. Sure enough, just a few inches below the surface, they found King of Worms.
"He beat us home," Sam said happily. "He should have won First Prize for Fastest Slitherer."
10
"It's Monday, Sam," Mrs. Krupnik said at breakfast. "Show-and-Tell day at nursery school. Are you going to take your blue ribbon from the pet show?"
