Zucchini Out West Read online

  “O.K.,” said Billy. He didn’t want to hurt his stepfather’s feelings by telling him he didn’t want to go.

  Inside the small post office several people were lined up in front of the counter.

  Emma burst through the door. “Have you got a potbellied pig around here?” she asked.

  The post-office clerk, a serious-looking woman with a ring of keys at her belt, looked up from where she was weighing a package. “You’ll have to wait your turn,” she said.

  Mr. Ferguson handed Emma the slip. “Get in line,” he said.

  Billy was disappointed to see the line of people waiting. He was eager to get to the recycling station and back to Zucchini.

  When it was Emma’s turn, she reached up and handed the yellow slip to the clerk. The clerk took the slip, then disappeared behind a partition. She reappeared almost immediately with a medium-sized rectangular box wrapped in brown paper. “Here you go,” she said. She handed the box to Emma, who took it, moving away from the counter to a spot near the door. There she stood, clutching the package, tears welling up in her eyes. Her lower lip began to tremble.

  “Let’s see what it is,” said Mr. Ferguson.

  Emma began to cry. “There’s no room,” she said.

  “Open it,” said Mr. Ferguson.

  “There’s no room for a pig.”

  “Want me to help you?” asked Billy.

  “I can do it,” said Emma. Tears flowing, she took the package, sat down on the floor, pulled off the paper, and opened the box. Inside was a furry kangaroo suit, just her size.

  Recycling

  Zucchini was just waking up. He stretched in the bright ray of sunshine that slanted in through the window. Then he stood up on the comforter, shook himself, and looked about the room. Pictures of animals covered every wall.

  Above Billy’s bed was a poster of a timber wolf standing on a rock in the Alaskan wilderness. At first Zucchini had found the wolf a bit scary, but he had gotten used to it. He liked the stillness of the snow.

  At the side of Billy’s desk hung a long strip of paper with a list of all the endangered and threatened species in the world. The strip was taller than Billy, with small print on both sides. Zucchini knew it was Billy’s dream to help shorten that list. He had heard Billy say he wanted to help save the lives of the animals on the list, but he didn’t know how he was going to do it.

  Zucchini jumped down off the bed and hurried to the window. He jumped onto the windowsill, looking out at the clear, cool day. Two crows circled excitedly just beyond the oak tree. They cawed to each other, trading bits of information, good news of some sort. He watched until they flew off in search of food.

  I’m hungry, he thought.

  Then he remembered.

  My food is in my cage. My cage in the playroom. One-Day Service is in the playroom. She’ll be running on her wheel. She’ll tell me about cheese. I’d rather stay here.

  As they pulled up to the recycling station, Emma was playing with the stuffed baby kangaroo in her pouch. Only Emma’s face showed from inside the fuzzy suit. The costume was a present from an actor friend of her father’s who was making a film in Australia.

  Billy got out of the car, went around to the trunk, opened it, and picked up one of the blue carrying crates filled with glass and plastic containers. Mr. Ferguson joined him, picking up two stacks of papers, then following him up the wooden stairs to the platform. Large garbage Dumpsters lined each side. GLASS AND PLASTIC, said the sign on one of the Dumpsters; CANS, said another; PAPER, said the next.

  The recycling coordinator stood on the platform. He knew Billy well. “Hello, Billy,” he said.

  “Hello,” said Billy.

  “You never miss a Saturday,” said the recycling coordinator.

  “No,” said Billy. He wanted to say more. He wanted to say, “Glad to see you, Mr. Nordman. Thanks for letting me help last week,” but he couldn’t. He was too shy. He dumped the glass and plastic containers into the appropriate Dumpster. Then he went back down the stairs to get another crate.

  Emma was coming up the stairs in her kangaroo suit, carrying three aluminum cans. “Kangaroos like to carry cans,” she said.

  “A kangaroo recycling garbage,” said Mr. Nordman. “I’ve seen everything.”

  “Maybe not,” said Emma.

  “Do you take these?” A small, dark-haired woman put the question to Mr. Nordman. She carried a broken toaster.

  “Sorry, no,” said Mr. Nordman.

  The woman looked confused. Billy headed up the stairs with his last load as she turned to leave. He wondered why she was so upset. Did she love the toaster? Was she afraid of putting it in the wrong place? He knew what it was like to worry about little things. It was happening to him now. There was a recycling drive next week. Billy wanted to ask Mr. Nordman if he could help, but he didn’t have the nerve.

  I’d probably be in the way, he thought as he dumped the cans into the Dumpster.

  As he turned to leave, Mr. Nordman waved good-bye. “There’s a drive next week,” he called. “Hope you can help.”

  Black-Footed Ferret

  When Billy got home, the first thing he did was to bring Zucchini a bowl of food.

  Thank you! thought Zucchini.

  He jumped off the windowsill and began to eat, his tiny teeth breaking up the kibbles of dry food. Billy lay down on the bed to watch him. Zucchini’s yellow-buff fur shone in the sunlight that streamed in through the window.

  Zucchini was nineteen inches long, with a five-inch black-tipped tail. He weighed about two pounds. Although he was only six months old, he was already full grown, as ferrets mature quickly. He had a long, thin body with short legs, a long neck, and short, rounded ears.

  Billy had read a lot about ferrets. He knew they were members of a group of weasellike mammals known as mustelids. He knew there were different kinds of ferrets. There was the domestic or European ferret, the kind sold in pet stores, and there was the black-footed ferret, one of the rarest mammals in the world. There was also the Siberian ferret, which resembled a black-footed ferret but wasn’t.

  Zucchini looked up suddenly from his food bowl. He stared at Billy with bright eyes.

  Billy loved Zucchini’s black face mask, his pale-tipped ears, his shiny black nose set in a circle of near-white fur.

  Could you be a black-footed ferret? he wondered.

  The woman who ran the children’s zoo at the ASPCA had said he was. Her name was Miss Pickett and she knew a lot about animals. She said black-footed ferrets were endangered. She said they lived out west. She said it would be unusual to find one on Ninety-second street. Zucchini looked like a black-footed ferret, she said. She would do some research to make sure.

  Billy got up and went over to his desk. He picked up his favorite issue of Defenders of Wildlife, the one with the black-footed ferret on the cover. He had studied the picture many times. He liked to compare it to Zucchini. Both had the same dark, bright eyes, the same black face mask, the same black feet and black-tipped tail.

  “Look at this,” said Billy, sitting down next to Zucchini. The ferret on the cover was perched halfway out of a prairie-dog burrow, its front paws on the ground, its rear half below. With sharp eyes it stared into the distance, still and watching. The great expanse of prairie stretched out in all directions.

  How beautiful, thought Zucchini. It looks like my dream.

  A dog barked. It was Sonya, the German shepherd who lived next door. She was barking at the short woman in men’s slacks who had come to read the gas meter.

  Zucchini stood suddenly on his hind legs, tall, alert, completely still. He looked exactly like the picture.

  You can’t be a black-footed ferret, Billy thought. It’s against the law to keep endangered animals. Miss Pickett knows that. Why would she have let me keep you?

  He thought of writing her a letter, but he decided against it.

  She wouldn’t remember me, he reasoned. Maybe she didn’t say you were a black-footed ferret anyway. I
must have heard her wrong.

  Tim Clark

  Billy opened the top left-hand drawer of his desk, reached in, and took out a small wooden box. It was a present Billy’s father had brought him from Spain. The lid was hand carved and showed a medieval soldier on horseback. The horse had a long mane and the soldier carried a spear. It was the most precious thing Billy owned.

  Zucchini jumped onto Billy’s desk.

  Nice box, he thought.

  Inside the box Billy kept his most valuable belongings: a shark’s tooth; an ancient coin from Mexico; a tiny black pocketknife his stepfather had given him; a picture of himself holding Zucchini at the ASPCA; his National Audubon Society membership card; three purple marbles; and most important of all, his letter from Tim Clark.

  Tim Clark was a hero of Billy’s. He was a professor at Yale University who was an expert on mammal ecology and behavior. Dr. Clark had researched many mammals, but the black-footed ferret was his favorite. He had spent years searching for the animal, studying its habits, and gathering information that could help the survival of the species.

  Billy had written Dr. Clark a letter as part of a report he was doing at school. The assignment went like this:

  Career Report

  1. Choose a person whose work you admire.

  2. Tell what problems you would face in his or her line of work.

  3. Tell what you think would be the rewards.

  4. Write this person a letter asking at least two questions. (If he or she writes back, include the answers in your report.)

  It had taken Billy days to get up the courage to write his letter. When the answer came, he could hardly believe it.

  Zucchini watched as Billy sat down in the chair at his desk, opened the box, and took out the letter.

  Dear Billy,

  Thank you for your letter.

  I am pleased to learn of your interest in the black-footed ferret.

  I enclose the answers to your questions. I hope they will be of help to you in completing your report.

  Best of luck to you.

  Long live ferrets,

  Tim Clark

  On a separate page were the answers to Billy’s questions, written in Dr. Clark’s own hand. Tim Clark had actually written to him! He could hardly believe it. Billy folded the letter carefully, then returned it to the box. He was going to keep this letter forever.

  Phone Call

  At lunchtime the phone rang. It was Billy’s father calling from Florida, where he was making a movie. “It’s your father,” said Mrs. Ferguson. “I have to go to the bathroom,” said Emma. She sat on a high kitchen stool, wearing her kangaroo suit and eating french fries. She was still mad at her father for leaving and wouldn’t talk to him when he called. She climbed down off the stool and headed for the hall. “Get me out of this kangaroo,” she said. She hurried into the bathroom and closed the door.

  Zucchini was curled up next to the phone. He watched as Billy sat down and picked up the receiver. “Hello,” said Billy.

  “Ready for spring vacation?” asked his dad.

  “Sure,” Billy answered.

  Billy missed his father a lot. He and Emma spent their school vacations with him. Often they would travel to different movie locations to visit. They had been to Mexico, Los Angeles, Canada, and Alabama. Billy enjoyed his time on movie sets. The crew was friendly and often taught him rope tricks.

  “Where would you like to go?” his father asked.

  “I don’t know,” said Billy.

  “Think about it. We’ll go somewhere fun.”

  “O.K.,” said Billy.

  While Billy was talking, Mrs. Ferguson tried to get Emma to come out of the bathroom. “Daddy wants to talk to you,” she called through the closed door.

  “I’m not available,” said Emma. “You’ll have to take a message.”

  After Billy hung up the phone, he went to the refrigerator to get some milk. Zucchini watched as Billy took out the milk, closed the refrigerator door, and returned to the table.

  “What time is it when the elephant sits on the fence?” asked Emma. She came into the kitchen, zipping her kangaroo suit up the front. “Give up?” she added.

  “I give up,” said Mr. Ferguson.

  “Time to get a new elephant.”

  “A new fence,” said Billy. “You always tell it wrong.”

  “It’s my joke,” said Emma.

  “It’s everybody’s joke,” said Billy.

  “So I can tell it how I want.”

  “What are your vacation plans?” asked Mr. Ferguson, biting into the second half of his cheese sandwich.

  “I don’t know,” said Billy. He didn’t like to talk to his stepfather about his father. Although he loved his stepfather, he felt a special closeness with his father. He worried that his stepfather would sense this, that it would hurt his feelings.

  “Will your father be picking you up?” asked Mr. Ferguson.

  “If his shooting doesn’t run over.”

  “Like a bath?” asked Emma.

  “No,” said Billy.

  Emma dipped a french fry into the ketchup and popped it into her mouth.

  That night Billy lay in bed, his mind full of plans. There were so many places he could go with his father. They would have to take Emma, of course, but they would have fun anyway. Times with his dad were special. There were always surprises. With his stepfather it was different. He liked to eat at the same time every day and sit in the same chair and read his electronic-equipment magazines and listen to classical music and go to ball games and fix things around the house. Billy’s father liked to leave dishes in the sink sometimes and go out driving at midnight and go to the movies on weekday afternoons and wear shoes without socks. Once they had pizza for breakfast.

  Where will we go? thought Billy as he lay awake, the covers pulled up to his chin. We could go fishing, or camping, or climb the Adirondacks. Dad could carry Emma.

  Billy’s mind raced with ideas of the wonderful places they could go. Then all at once a thought struck him.

  Zucchini! I can’t leave him! How can I go?

  Hopeless

  That same night Zucchini had a talk with One-Day Service. He watched from the windowsill as she ran on her wheel. She had been running for hours and Zucchini needed some peace. He moved to the edge of her cage. After a moment, he spoke. “Where are you going?” he asked.

  “Places,” said the mouse, picking up speed. Her tiny paws moved too quickly, almost, to be seen.

  “What kind of places?” asked Zucchini.

  “No time,” said the mouse.

  “You’re in a cage.”

  “I know that,” said the mouse.

  “What are your options?”

  “My options?”

  “Your choices?”

  “No time,” said the mouse.

  “I could open your cage,” said Zucchini. “I let a crow out once. He went to Staten Island.”

  There was no response from the mouse. Ears flat to her head, she ran, staring straight through the orange plastic of her cage at the wall on the far side of the room.

  “There are wonderful places,” Zucchini continued. “You could go to the prairie. You could go to the woods.”

  “I like it here,” said the mouse.

  “Then why do you keep running on your wheel?”

  “Don’t be late,” said the mouse.

  “Late for what?”

  “You never know.”

  Zucchini sat down. “Let me get this straight,” he said. “You’re hurrying to get you don’t know where, so you don’t miss you don’t know what. Is that what you’re saying?”

  “Pretty much,” said the mouse.

  “I don’t understand.”

  “You never know what you’re missing.”

  “You’re missing what’s here!” said Zucchini. “You’ve got a den, you’ve got food, you’ve got a family that loves you.”

  “Have to hurry. Lots of cheese.”

  “Emma gi
ves you cheese.”

  “There’s always more,” said the mouse.

  “Enjoy the cheese you have.”

  “Have to hurry. No time. Lots of cheese.”

  Zucchini turned and looked out through the window at the moon, a large white circle high above the oak tree in the yard.

  It’s hopeless, he thought. I’ll never understand her.

  Painting

  Billy had planned to take Zucchini to Oppermans Pond on Sunday, but it rained, a heavy, freezing March rain, and they had to stay inside. In the morning Billy and his mother painted furniture. Mr. Ferguson had taken Emma to the library, so Billy and his mother were working by themselves.

  Billy was quiet. He was often quiet, but this was different, not a comfortable, everything-is-in-order kind of quiet, but a silence, heavy with concern. Billy’s mother wondered about it, but she didn’t say anything.

  Billy had two things on his mind. First there was the vacation.

  What will I do? he wondered as he stirred the paint with the wooden mixing stick from the paint store. I want to go with Dad, but I can’t leave Zucchini. He wouldn’t understand.

  He was also worried about his report. He had to turn it in tomorrow and it wasn’t finished. He wanted it to be good, and now he couldn’t concentrate.

  “Is something wrong?” Mrs. Ferguson asked at last.

  “I’m O.K.,” said Billy. He didn’t like to make a big thing about his feelings.

  After lunch Billy took Zucchini into his room and closed the door. He sat on the edge of the bed holding Zucchini close. “I don’t want to leave you,” he said.

  Leave me? thought Zucchini. Panic shot through his tiny body like a knife.

  “I can’t,” said Billy.

  Thank goodness, thought Zucchini. What would I do without you?

  “I love you,” Billy said quietly.

  I love you too, thought Zucchini.

  Billy got up and set Zucchini down on the floor next to his favorite toy. Billy had made it from a plastic gallon water jug that Mr. Ferguson had bought at the market. When the family finished the water, Billy cut several ferret-sized holes in the plastic, making it into a kind of playhouse. Zucchini loved it. He would climb in and out, hide inside, or sit, peering out the top hole, watching things and feeling cozy.