Mama stopped laughing. “Sorry, Birdie. I’m not helping. It’s just that talking to you makes me happy. I got carried away.”
Birdie turned back to the screen. “That’s okay,” she said. Then she just looked at Mama. I had an amazing thought: Was Mama looking at her from wherever she was? Wow! I was understanding things like never before. It actually made me a bit uneasy, so I chewed my tail for a moment or two, got myself back to normal.
Mama took a deep breath. “Here goes, Birdie. Maybe this is bad parenting, but I’ll tell you what I really think. There’s a big stage in life, a big stage very few people get to play on. If you get a chance and you can do it without hurting people—at least not too much—then you should grab it. I know you’re awfully young, but that’s not so unusual in the music world.”
“Am I really any good at singing?”
“I love your singing, although I’m no judge. But this Nashville producer is a judge, so why not hear what he has to say?”
“Because what about Nola and Junior?”
“This may sound harsh, but they’ll get over it.”
“And we’ll still be friends afterward? Or not?”
“That’s the big unknown.”
Birdie bit her lip.
Mama spoke softly. “Want me to take a guess, Birdie?”
“Yeah.”
“It will hardly affect Junior at all. Nola’s a different story.”
“How do you know?”
“Just a guess, like I said. And, of course, I’m not in a position to really know them, not like you.”
“Because they’re kids?”
“Partly. But I’m pretty sure Junior’s the type who won’t get knocked off track very easily.”
“Junior’s on a track?”
Mom nodded. “The big stage I mentioned? It’s already on his radar. You getting a … what would you call it?”
“Nibble?”
“Exactly! You getting a nibble like this will only convince him he’s not just dreaming.”
“And Nola?”
“She’ll be upset,” Mama said. “Tempting to say that if it’s a good friendship, it will survive, but that’s just a kind of trickery.”
“So there’s no telling what will happen with Nola?”
“I’m afraid not.”
In the background a man said, “Jen? We’re up.”
“Got to go.” Mama blew Birdie a kiss. Not just to Birdie, of course, but to me, too. How nice of her!
We went into the kitchen. Birdie drank a limeade and gazed out the window.
Very softly she began to sing. No words—at least that I could pick out—but just sounds like da-da-da-da-da-dah. I found myself thinking of moonlight. And what was this? Moonlight seemed to shine from Birdie’s eyes? I got the feeling she was far, far away, and I was happy when the singing stopped, even though it was so beautiful. Birdie being far, far away from me was out of the question.
Birdie took a deep breath and looked my way, her eyes clearing.
“Come on, Bowser. Let’s try Junior first.”
We left 19 Gentilly Lane and headed down toward the Lucinda Street Bridge. There was a single customer at Wally Tebbets’s food truck, a big dude with black hair down to his shoulders and an earring in one ear. He kind of reminded me of a movie pirate we’d seen on TV, me and Birdie. On rainy nights we liked to watch movies. Watching movies means popcorn. I love popcorn. Popcorn has a way of falling to the floor.
Junior was down by the bayou, dangling his feet in the water and playing a harmonica. He saw us, played something real fast, and then said, “Hey!”
“You’re learning the harmonica?” Birdie said.
“Just about got it perfected,” Junior said. “And don’t call it a harmonica.”
“It’s not a harmonica?”
“Of course it’s a harmonica. But we call it a harp in the music business.”
“Why?”
“Harmonica’s not cool.”
“But a harp’s a kind of instrument you pluck, like in classical—”
Junior held up his hand. “I’m just saying how it’s done in the music business, okay? So if you’re ever in the music business you won’t embarrass yourself.”
From up in the food truck came Wally’s voice. “One catfish po’boy with everything and a Red Bull. Anything else?”
“Um.” Birdie gazed down at her feet. I myself heard a faint sound from out in the bayou, not quite a splash. I saw a little ripple on the surface, moving our way. Junior wiggled his toes, kind of small, like little white worms in the water. “Funny you should mention that,” Birdie said, “because—”
At that moment came another voice from the food truck. “Nope, that’ll do it.” This was a very deep voice, maybe familiar to me.
Birdie whipped around and stared at the food truck. From where we were, we could only see its rear side. In the space underneath we had a view of the big pirate dude from the knees down. He wore sandals and had very wide, strong-looking feet with thick, round toes, so different from Junior’s puny ones.
“Who’s that?” Birdie said.
“Who are you talking about?” Junior said.
“The guy who just ordered from your dad.”
“Yeah?”
“Do you know him?”
Junior gazed up at the food truck. “Don’t recognize those feet.”
Birdie started up the gentle slope toward the food truck. Junior rose and followed her. The ripple in the bayou, now close to the bank, subsided. I went after Birdie and Junior, soon got ahead of them, and reached the food truck first. The pirate dude was on the street, climbing into a pickup, possibly green in color, but I’ve heard I’m not at my best when it comes to colors. He fired up the engine and drove across the bridge.
Birdie and Junior arrived.
“Where’d he go?” Birdie said.
“Who?” said Junior.
“That customer.” She glanced around. The pickup had crossed the bridge and was making a turn. I barked and barked, trying to help.
“Bowser? What is it?”
I barked some more and Birdie finally looked in the right direction. Too late. The pickup was gone.
Birdie went up to the food truck counter. Wally was busy at the grill, his back to her.
“Mr. Tebbets?”
He turned. “Hey there, Birdie. What’ll it be?”
“Nothing, thanks. But who was that customer?”
“The last one?” Wally scratched his forehead with the edge of his spatula.
“Yeah?”
“Don’t know him—leastwise not his name. Been in once or twice. Always orders the catfish po’boy.”
“Wouldn’t mind one of those right now, Dad,” Junior said. Then he saw a look on Wally’s face and added, “If you’re not too busy.”
“Why in heck would I be too busy?” Wally said.
“Off the top of my head?” Junior said. “Can’t think of any reason.”
“Top of your head, huh?” Wally raised the spatula and smacked Junior right on top of the head. Actually not. It was a very slow swing and Junior had plenty of time to duck before scampering away.
“Care for a snack, Birdie?” Wally said. “On the house?”
“No, thanks, Mr. Tebbets,” Birdie said. “But I was wondering if he paid with a credit card.”
“Who?”
“That customer with the deep voice.”
“Deep voice? Didn’t notice that. But I don’t take credit cards. Never have, never will. Cash, Birdie. Cash makes us free.”
“It does?”
Wally nodded and was about to say something when he noticed Junior sitting in the grass, taking his harmonica apart with a screwdriver. Wally sighed. “What am I gonna do with him? Did you know he’s got his heart set on making it in the music business? How come he can’t be a sensible kid like you?”
“I’m really not,” Birdie said.
“Tell me another one,” said Wally.
We walked away, at firs
t going at a steady clip in the direction of home. Then Birdie slowed down, almost came to a stop.
“This is so frustrating, Bowser. We know his voice. We know what he looks like. But we don’t know his name. How are we going to find him?”
Hang around the food truck until he came back for another po’boy? That was my only idea.
“We could go back to Snoozy’s and this time search through all the messages. Maybe the guy left more messages that might give us a clue.”
I liked my idea better. My mind occupied itself with food-truck thoughts like po’boys, sausages, and bacon all the way to Snoozy’s double-wide. Then I saw the gnome and decided that Birdie’s idea was probably just as good as mine, possibly even better.
We went up to the gnome. Birdie fished around in the pipe bowl and went still. “It’s not here.”
She glanced at the double-wide. “Is Snoozy back? His car’s not in the driveway.”
We walked to the door. Birdie raised her hand to knock and then paused. “Would Snoozy use the gnome key?” she said, her voice low. “Or is it just for backup?” She put her finger across her lips. That meant we were being quiet. Always fun, especially for brief periods. Keeping real quiet, we walked around the double-wide to the back, hearing nothing from inside. There, parked next to a rusted washing machine, stood a green pickup with nets and buoys in the cargo bed.
Birdie’s eyes widened. “Moss green,” she said, very softly. She checked the double-wide again, still silent. Then, on tiptoes, Birdie approached the pickup. Way up front in the cargo bed sat a big white cooler with writing on the side. “‘Property of Snoozy LaChance,’” she whispered, and turned to me. “Stay right here, Bowser. Stay. In fact, sit.”
I sat. Birdie scrambled up onto the cargo bed and made her way, sort of crouching, past all the fishing gear to the cooler. She was just about to open it when the back door of the double-wide opened and out came the deep-voiced dude with shoulder-length black hair. Birdie ducked down real quick, disappearing in the little space between the cooler and the rear of the cab.
The man strode to the pickup, almost not seeing me. But then he did.
“Huh? What’re you doin’ round my truck? G’wan! Get outta here.”
But I couldn’t, not with Birdie up there in the cargo bed.
“Don’t listen good?” The man picked up a stone and threw it at me. The stone got me right in the shoulder and bounced off. A pretty hard throw, but it takes more than that to hurt ol’ Bowser. Still, it got me real mad. When I’m real mad my teeth like to show themselves. I added in some growling, and all at once, there was nothing on my mind but charging this stone-throwing dude and showing him what’s what.
“Last thing you’ll ever do.” He slid a gun out of his pocket. I’m no fan of guns, don’t like the noise, for one thing. I hesitated. And in that moment of hesitation, the man hopped behind the wheel of the pickup and drove off, around to the front of the double-wide, down the driveway, and onto the road.
SOMETIMES IN THIS LIFE THE BODY TAKES over and you don’t think. You just do. This was one of those times. Lucky for me, doing is what I do best.
For the next little while, my mind pretty much shut down, except for a kind of shouting it kept up inside my head. Birdie! Birdie! Birdie! Those shouts made me run even faster than I was already running, which was at top speed—meaning that now, for the first time in my life, I topped my top speed. That kind of over-the-top top speed makes your eyes water, your ears and tail stand straight back, and your paws hardly touch the ground. Was there something called the speed of light? I’d heard of it once or twice, a total mystery, but now I understood it completely. I ran at the speed of light, out around from the back of Snoozy’s double-wide, across the driveway, and down the street.
Snoozy’s street was the curving type, winding through the abandoned trailer park. I caught sight of the pickup through some trees and left the road, taking the beeline route. Don’t get me started on bees, but the beeline was a brilliant invention on their part because in situations like I was in, it gets you where you want to go much sooner. Plus I was in a stinging mood myself, although knowing how to actually deliver a sting was something of a puzzle.
Birdie! Birdie! Birdie!
The pickup disappeared beyond a thick row of bushes, and when I saw it again it wasn’t where it was supposed to be, but way off at an angle, raising a dust cloud. Had it turned onto a dirt road? I changed my beeline and started closing the gap. And crazily enough the gap seemed to be closing from the other end as well. How was that possible? Could the dirt road have been curving my way? Or was it something about the speed of light? I had no idea, just ran and ran and ran and—
And with no warning I suddenly burst through a thicket of sharp, spiky bushes and onto the dirt road! There, not far ahead, was the pickup, maybe slowing down a bit on account of all the potholes. Potholes don’t bother me! I just kept running, heard some gasps, like maybe someone was fighting for air, poor guy, and closed that gap more and more.
Birdie! Birdie! Birdie!
There she was! I could see her head, raised slightly over the top of the big white cooler, a cooler belonging to Snoozy, if I had the details right, no guarantee. Birdie looked scared. How I hated to see that! And now the pickup began to speed up. Why? Because all at once there were no potholes? We were on pavement? Oh, no! The gap was starting to grow. I was going to need more than all my strength. I’d never had to summon more than all my strength in my whole life, but now I did. Bowser! More! More strength and right now this very second!
And what do you know? It was there for me, more strength than I actually had! Birdie saw me, and she half rose behind the cooler. I dug in, running so hard that my claws dug up the pavement, sent chunks flying. I narrowed the gap again, got closer and closer, glimpsed the road widening and straightening up ahead, meaning this was my last chance, and launched myself in a tremendous leap, up, up, up—and onto the cargo bed of the pickup.
At that very moment, the deep-voiced dude—pirate, boat captain, whatever he was—hit the gas for real, and right away I found myself sliding backward, right off the edge of the truck and—
But no. Somehow I’d gotten myself caught in a tangle of fish net, which stretched and stretched and stopped my slide, leaving me hanging off the back of the truck, swinging this way and that, like … like some creature caught in a trap. I tried pawing, I tried squirming, I came close to trying panic—never a good idea, no matter what—and only got myself tangled more. Meanwhile, there was so much noise—the roar of the engine, the clatter of something loose under the truck body, the wind screaming past. I hardly heard the first grunt—and then another and another. That was Birdie’s grunt! I knew every sound she made. Grunt, grunt, and slowly, one grunt at a time, Birdie hauled me back up onto the cargo bed.
There was time for one big hug—Birdie hugging me right through the net and making everything worthwhile, and then the truck made a sharp turn, hurling us right across the floor and wham against the side. Through the back window of the cab I saw the pirate glance in the rearview mirror, but he didn’t see us, maybe because we were covered in nets and buoys and tarps and all sorts of gear.
We lay together, bouncing around and getting bashed by this and that. “Oh, Bowser, you’re such a good boy.” Which I knew, of course, but always nice to hear. I gave Birdie a lick through the netting and she gave me a pat in the same way. She spoke to me, almost in my ear. That tickled. I was so busy enjoying the tickling, I didn’t really hear what she said. “We’ve got to get free of the netting, Bowser—that way we’ll be ready to jump when he slows down.” Or something like that. It was then I noticed how scared she was. The poor kid was shaking! Someone was going to be real sorry for that. I couldn’t wait to find out who.
We got to work freeing ourselves from the netting, Birdie using both hands and me using all my paws. You might think that I’d be better at work like that, but Birdie did not. She hissed in my ear. “Bowser! Stop! You’re making it worse.�
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Me? How was that possible? Birdie must have been under stress. So my job was to help get rid of the stress, even if that meant doing something that made no sense. I lay absolutely still, apart for some panting that may have been going on, and let her take over.
I must have done a good job, because not long after that we were both free. Birdie crouched beside me, gave me the finger-across-the-lips signal, which meant … which meant … silence! That was it. I was so happy to have remembered I almost howled for joy, something I hadn’t done in way too long. But this might not have been the moment. Instead we rose slightly, stuck our heads over the side of the cargo bed, and took a look-see.
Whoa! We were by the ocean? I hadn’t been expecting that. Flat blue sea gleamed on and on in the sunshine, dotted here and there with low green islands and slow-moving fishing boats. On the land side lay one of those tree-filled swamps, with trees growing right out of the water. We had the road to ourselves, we meaning me and Birdie, which was always best, plus this pirate dude at the wheel, which was not so good. Was the plan to wait until he slowed down and then jump out? I thought so, but he was showing no sign of slowing down. I could see the back of his head and his thickly muscled shoulders through the narrow rear window of the cab. He was muttering to himself. I caught a few of the words, none of them the kinds of words you’d want to hear.
Staying very low, Birdie crept over to Snoozy’s cooler, opened the lid just a little, and peeked in. Somehow I was already right beside her, helping her look. Always exciting to open something and see inside, but this was kind of disappointing. All Snoozy had in his cooler were cans of soda and some sandwiches in baggies—ham and cheese, salami and mustard, BLTs, all of which I knew from a single whiff. Birdie closed the lid, slow and careful, and—
“What the—” said the pirate up front. The truck swerved, slowed down, came to a stop. Birdie and I crouched behind the cooler. The cab door opened and closed. I heard the pirate climb out and start walking, but not around to the back of the truck, not in our direction. Instead, he seemed to be walking away.
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