Imagination According to Humphrey

by Betty G. Birney

  “GREAT-GREAT-GREAT,” I squeaked.

  “Make yourself at home,” Papa said. “Mi casa es su casa.”

  “Thanks,” Joey said, putting his skateboard and backpack on the floor next to the table.

  “I’m glad you remembered your skateboard,” Rosie said.

  “Why’d you ask me to bring it?” Joey asked. “And my notebook?”

  Rosie’s eyes were sparkling. “The skateboard, because it’s nice outside. And the notebook, because . . . well, you’ll see.”

  Just then, Diego chased Elena through the room.

  “Whoa!” Rosie’s father said. “Stop and say hello to Joey.”

  “Hi, Joey,” Diego said.

  Elena giggled.

  “Hi,” Joey said.

  “Now you’re it,” Diego said to Elena and she chased him out of the room, squealing with laughter.

  Papa shook his head. “Those two. Do you have brothers or sisters?”

  Joey shook his head. “No. It’s just me. And my dog, Skipper.”

  Thinking about Skipper made me glad I didn’t get to go to Joey’s house after all.

  Rosie and Joey got busy cleaning my cage, with Papa’s help.

  First, Rosie took me out of the cage. She held me in one hand and gently stroked my back with one finger. It felt like a soft breeze on my fur and I shivered with delight.

  Rosie put me in my hamster ball and set me on the floor.

  When I started to roll, Papa chuckled. “Look at him go!”

  They put my bedding in a bag and cleaned almost everything in my cage with warm, soapy water.

  I was HAPPY-HAPPY-HAPPY they didn’t move my mirror and find my notebook. I don’t think warm, soapy water would do it much good. I was glad they didn’t wash me in warm, soapy water, too. (Hamsters should never get wet.)

  When everything was dry, Rosie filled the base of my cage with fresh bedding. She remembered to mix a little of my old bedding in with it before Joey slid it back into place.

  Then they put all my things back, too.

  Papa filled my water bottle and Joey put some food in my dish.

  “Humphrey, I think it’s time to move you back into your house,” Rosie said.

  I sniffed here and I sniffed there. It smelled fresh and familiar all at the same time.

  I was so happy, I hopped on my wheel and started spinning.

  Joey and Rosie went off to wash their hands again. When they came back, they watched me.

  “How’s your story coming along?” Rosie asked.

  Joey shrugged. “Not so great. I sure can’t write like Cameron Cole and his great dragon story. Mrs. Brisbane wants me to make it more descriptive, but I don’t know what to write. How about you?”

  “I don’t know,” Rosie said. “I think mine’s going well. Want to hear it?”

  Joey wanted to hear it and so did I.

  “One day, I turned into a graceful bird and rose up out of my chair, high into the air,” she began. “Against the blue sky, I felt the wind in my feathers and saw the green earth below. As fast as my wings would carry me, I flew above the Nile River and then to the Egyptian desert, where the Great Pyramids and the Great Sphinx stand. I landed right on top of the statue of the Sphinx, which has the body of a lion but a human head. I looked down at the statue and said, ‘I’m sorry for you, Sphinx. You are stuck in the sand and can’t travel. But I have wings and I can fly!’”

  For a moment, I felt like a bird landing on the Sphinx!

  “That’s really good,” Joey said. “That’s great. Mine is nothing like that.”

  “Would you like to read it?” Rosie asked. “Maybe I could help.”

  “I don’t think anything would help me,” he said. “I don’t have an imagination.”

  Rosie smiled. “Everybody has imagination! Come on, read it to me.”

  Joey slowly opened his backpack and took out his notebook. “I’ll read it,” he said. “But it’s no good.”

  I HOPED-HOPED-HOPED he was wrong.

  Joey began to read. “I flew like a hawk to Africa and saw animals in the wild. I saw elephants, giraffes, lions, rhinos and monkeys. I’d especially liked the elephants. They were amazing.”

  He lowered his notebook. “That’s it. Pretty bad, isn’t it?”

  Rosie shook her head. “It’s not bad. You just need to put some zing into it.”

  “Zing? What’s that?” Joey asked.

  I’d never heard of zing, either, but I thought my writing could use some!

  “It’s like cooking dinner,” Rosie explained. “Mama puts in the meat and the potatoes and the vegetables and then she spices them up. Pepper, salt, garlic, hot sauce. That’s the zing.”

  I don’t know about Joey, but I was suddenly hungry!

  “I don’t get it,” he said. “Can you show me?”

  Rosie thought for a moment. “Well, you told me what you saw. But you need to make me see it, too.”

  “Oh, I can see it,” Joey said. “I see a monkey in a tree.”

  “Doing what?” Rosie asked.

  Joey was silent for a long time. A little too long, I thought.

  I knew what monkeys did. I saw them in a video in the library. (Sometimes at night, I sneak into the library to read and watch videos.)

  I scrambled up the side of my cage and took a giant leap onto my tree branch. I hung there from one paw and bounced up and down.

  “SQUEAK-SQUEAK-SQUEAK!” I tried to sound like a monkey.

  Rosie saw me first and giggled. “Look! Humphrey’s acting like a monkey.”

  Joey leaned in and watched me, so I swung from the branch to my ladder and climbed it to the tippy top of my cage. I hung there by one paw, swinging back and forth.

  “He is like a monkey, swinging from branch to branch,” Joey said. He bent over his notebook and started scribbling.

  “Here’s the monkey,” he said as he held up the page for Rosie to see.

  I could see it, too. It was an unsqueakably great drawing of a monkey swinging from a tree.

  Rosie’s eyes opened wide. “That’s great! I can almost see him moving. Can you write the words to describe it?”

  Joey thought for a bit and then he wrote, “The playful monkeys swing from branch to branch.”

  Rosie clapped her hands. “What else would you see?”

  Joey stared at the page and then he said, “What about a lion?”

  Oh, dear. Hamsters aren’t like lions at all. But I thought about the video.

  I raced up to the side of the cage, faced Joey and said, “ROAR!”

  I tried my best, but I know it sounded like a great big “SQUEAK!”

  “Ha-ha,” Joey laughed. “Humphrey’s roaring like a lion!” And he started scribbling again.

  “Humphrey’s so funny! It’s like he understands you,” Rosie said.

  When he showed Rosie the drawing, she clapped her hands again. “You’re a great artist!” she said. “Can you describe what you drew?”

  Joey thought for a long time, but then he wrote something down.

  Joey stared at his notebook again. “Maybe there would be . . . a rhino?”

  “Rhino?” I squeaked. “I’ve got it.”

  I scurried to one side of my cage and then lowered my head and ran as fast as I could to the other side of the cage. “Charge!” I squeaked.

  Joey chuckled and quickly wrote something down.

  “What about elephants and giraffes?” Rosie asked.

  Small furry hamsters have nothing in common with elephants and giraffes. I was thinking about how to help Joey, but it turns out he didn’t need my help.

  “I know what to do,” he said as he wrote.

  Whew! That was a HUGE-HUGE-HUGE relief.

  Joey wrote and wrote and wrote some more. At last, he was finished
.

  “How’s this?” he asked. Then he read from his notebook. “With the eyes and the speed of a hawk, I flew to Africa and saw amazing animals in the wild. I watched the playful monkeys, swinging from branch to branch. Then I saw a mighty lion and heard its powerful roar. From a safe place, I watched a rhino charge with its great, sharp horn and a giraffe eating leaves from the top of a tree. My favorite part was seeing elephants in the wild and hearing their loud trumpeting. I decided to stay in Africa and never come back.”

  Rosie clapped loudly. “That was great! It has loads of zing!”

  I couldn’t clap my paws, but I squeaked, “Good job, Joey!” at the top of my tiny lungs.

  “Just one thing,” Rosie said. “I think you need a descriptive word in front of ‘hawk.’ Mrs. Brisbane asked for that.”

  “Oh,” Joey said. “How do you spell ‘magnificent’?”

  Rosie helped him out and Joey wrote it down.

  “Tomorrow, I’m going to illustrate the whole thing,” he said. “That’s the fun part.”

  Both of them were smiling happily. I think I was smiling, too.

  “What do we do next?” Joey asked. “I don’t have to be home for a while.”

  Before I knew it, we were all heading outside. I was in my hamster ball, sitting on Rosie’s lap.

  Joey pulled his helmet and knee pads out of his backpack as he followed with his skateboard.

  There were orange cones down the middle of Rosie’s driveway, but they weren’t in a straight line.

  “It’s an obstacle course,” Rosie said. “You can try it on your skateboard. I’ll try it in my wheelchair. And Humphrey can try it in his hamster ball.”

  “Great!” Joey sounded really excited.

  “Great!” I squeaked, because I LOVE-LOVE-LOVE obstacle courses.

  First, Joey zoomed down the driveway, weaving between the orange cones.

  At the very end, he managed to do a “wheelie,” which means the front wheels of the skateboard lifted up off the ground.

  “Way to go!” Rosie gave Joey a high five.

  Her turn was next. Rosie wheeled between the cones without knocking any of them over, just like Joey. She may not have wings, but she made that wheelchair fly!

  And just like Joey, she managed to pop a wheelie on the rear wheels of her chair.

  “That was amazing!” Joey said, giving Rosie a high five. “Now it’s Humphrey’s turn.”

  Joey picked up my hamster ball and set it at the end of the driveway.

  “Go, Humphrey!” Rosie and Joey shouted.

  I think a skateboard and a wheelchair are easier to control than a hamster ball. I managed to get around the first cone, but I got stuck when I ran straight into the second cone.

  “That’s okay, Humphrey,” Joey said as he moved my hamster ball away from the cone.

  I decided to forget about the cones. I starting running in a straight line.

  My hamster ball picked up speed.

  “That’s the way, Humphrey!” I heard Rosie shout.

  Then I heard something else. “He’s going to roll into the street!” Rosie shrieked.

  “Eeek!” I shouted. I don’t think anyone could hear me from inside the hamster ball.

  I heard a RATTLE-RATTLE-RATTLE coming up behind me and my hamster ball came to a sudden stop.

  “It’s okay, Humphrey,” Joey said. “You’re safe.”

  Joey had skateboarded down the driveway and stopped me just in time.

  I hate to think what might have happened if I’d ended up in the street!

  “Thanks, Joey,” I said.

  “Thanks, Joey,” Rosie said as she wheeled her chair next to us.

  Joey picked me up and handed the hamster ball to Rosie.

  She opened the top and smiled at me. “You did a great job, Humphrey,” she said. “But you didn’t pop a wheelie.”

  How could I have? My hamster ball has no wheels.

  But it was still a great day. I was pawsitively happy that Joey’s story was better. And Joey and Rosie had tons more fun making up new obstacle courses—using their imaginations!

  MY WRITER’S RAMBLINGS

  I’d like to pop a wheelie

  almost more than anything.

  But I was very happy

  to help Joey’s writing zing.

  Special Guest

  Og, Joey’s story is great! Rosie helped him a lot, and I helped a little, too!” I squeaked to my neighbor when I returned on Monday morning.

  “BOING!” Og twanged with excitement.

  The rest of the week was BUSY-BUSY-BUSY as my friends finished writing and illustrating their stories. They worked on special paper and made them into little books.

  At night, I finished my story and tried to add lots of zing. I was pleased when I could write: “The End.”

  “When is our special surprise?” Cassie asked one day. “Is it a person, place or thing? And what are we supposed to do?”

  “Calm-Down-Cassie,” Mrs. Brisbane said. “The surprise is on Friday and all you have to do is show up.”

  Cassie looked calmer after she said that.

  Once the books were finished on Thursday, Mrs. Brisbane placed them all on the table where Og’s tank and my cage sit.

  Wow! They looked unsqueakably wonderful! They had illustrations and fantastic covers and everything!

  I guess my story was a little plain, but at least I’d finished it.

  Later that night, when Aldo came in to clean, he saw the finished books.

  “What’s this?” he asked. “Your class wrote books?”

  “Yes,” I squeaked. “Do you like them?”

  Aldo began to thumb through the books. “These are really good,” he said. “Leave it to Mrs. Brisbane to teach her students to write so well.”

  Aldo looked through a few more. “When I get to be a teacher, I want my students to write like this,” he said.

  Then he looked right at me. “And Humphrey, I am going to be a teacher before long! A very good teacher, I hope.”

  “I know you will!” I squeaked.

  Aldo is so good at sweeping and dusting and going to school and being a friend . . . I’m sure he’ll be a GREAT-GREAT-GREAT teacher, too.

  Later, while he dusted Mrs. Brisbane’s desk, he said, “Well, what do you know?”

  He was looking at a piece of paper. “I’d like to be here for this,” he said. “I don’t have class then. I’ll ask Mrs. Brisbane if I can come.”

  “Come to WHAT?” I squeaked, but he didn’t answer.

  I’m happy that Aldo was coming to our class. I wasn’t happy that I didn’t know what the surprise was!

  Once Aldo was gone, I had two things on my mind—getting a good look at all of the books and finding out what that note said.

  I jiggled my lock-that-doesn’t-lock and opened the door. Then I strolled along the table, looking at each book lined up there.

  “Oh!” I exclaimed when I saw Sophie’s book. The parrots looked colorful, but their sharp beaks looked a little frightening.

  “Gee!” I said as I looked at Small-Paul’s book. His time travel machine was awe inspiring and the adventure he wrote about was exciting and even a little scary.

  Kelsey’s book was all pink and purple and she did a wonderful job of describing a ballet. And to think that Be-Careful-Kelsey once thought she was clumsy!

  Simon’s book about Italy made me a little bit hungry. Luckily, I had some celery stored in my cheek pouch.

  When I got to Joey’s book, all I could say was, “Wow!” His descriptions of the animals in Africa were fantastic, but his drawings were like something out of a library book. Yet I knew they’d come from his own brain.

  “Og, Joey is very talented!” I squeaked.

  “BOING!” Og agreed before making a spectacular leap
into the water.

  My friends had done something wonderful! They’d become writers.

  It was a lot of work, but their books were beautiful.

  All that reading made me tired and I knew it would be a lot of work to climb up Mrs. Brisbane’s desk.

  I decided not to go. It would be fun to find out about the surprise at the same time as my classmates.

  When I returned to my cage, I took out the little notebook from behind my mirror.

  I knew my story wasn’t as great as the ones my classmates had written. And I knew none of my friends would ever know I wrote a story.

  But when I read about Flying Hamster Airlines, I could picture myself flying all my friends to the places they loved most.

  And I felt a special feeling. I think it’s called “joy.”

  The next day, everyone in Room 26 was jittery and excited, because we knew we were going to have a special surprise.

  I didn’t want the surprise to be the return of Pearl!

  I didn’t want the surprise to be something terrible, such as Mrs. Brisbane leaving!

  I did want the surprise to be something wonderful. And it was.

  After morning recess, strange things started to happen.

  First, Mr. Morales came into Room 26. He doesn’t come here too often, because he has so much to do as principal of the school.

  Next, my dear friend Ms. Mac entered with her entire first-grade class.

  The biggest surprise was that she brought Gigi with her!

  “I think it’s time for Humphrey and Og to meet our class guinea pig,” she said as she set Gigi between Og’s tank and my cage.

  Of course, Gigi and I had already met, but Ms. Mac didn’t know that.

  “Gigi, meet Og,” I said. “Og, meet Gigi.”

  “BOING! BOING! BOING!” Og hopped around his tank.

  “Nice to meet you, too,” Gigi squealed.

  “I knew you’d like each other,” I squeaked happily.

  Once the students from Room 12 were seated, Mr. Morales came to the front of the room.

  “Boys and girls, I know you’ve been working hard on your writing,” he said. “And you’ve done a very good job. So we have a special guest today.”

  I turned to the back of the room, where a tall woman with red hair stood next to Mrs. Brisbane. And surprise—Aldo was there, too!