She quickly slid down the side of the muddy ditch and stepped through shallow pools of water where green moss hugged the edge of a ditch like a shaggy blanket.
“Ugg,” she murmured as she trudged through the mud. The mud made a funny sound as she walked. Slug, slug, slug, swoosh, slug, swoosh, slug swoosh. The sound reminded her of the last sounds of a dying dishwasher.
She stopped, feeling a weird prickling sensation like something was crawling up her leg. Eek! The prickly feeling gave Amy the creepiest of crawlies. The kind of creepy crawlies that send shivers up your spine. The kind of creepies you get when someone has just told you that you have a big, ugly spider dancing, and spinning webs in your hair.
Amy rolled up her pant leg and discovered an earwig. Its long, nasty, yellow-red body, and its mean black pinchers were hooked to her soft skin.
“Yug! You evil little yuck!” Amy said, flicking it off, and rolling her pant leg back down.
As Amy walked, she could hear the far-off cry of a crow and the little chirps and whirring of bugs and living creatures. Except for these sounds, and a slight breeze, Amy felt like she was quite alone. The feeling wasn’t the kind of lonely you feel when you feel sad and misunderstood. It was the lonely feeling where you can think loud thoughts and dream big dreams and nobody can hear you think. She closed her eyes, listening as the call of the lost summoned her to it. In her minds eye she saw something brown with long ears and dark eyes, trapped in the mud.
“A baby fawn!” she breathed, suddenly tripping on a nasty root and falling to her knees.
“Blast this mud,” she said, shaking the mud out of her short brown hair. She looked at her muddy pants, in annoyance.
“Stupid mud,” she said, wishing the mud could say, “Ouch! Or pardon me, miss. I’ll just scoot out of your way.”
Normal mud was okay to walk in if it smelled like normal mud. But the mud in this ditch smelled like rotten leaves, mixed with baby diapers that had been sitting in a remote garbage can for a month. In places, the mud was especially gushy, causing her to have visions of being completely swallowed up. Amy wished that she were taller so she wouldn’t run the risk of such a grim prospect.
“Too short,” she sighed. Too short was the way she felt most of the time. She couldn‘t reach things most twelve-year- olds could reach. She was too short for basketball, and too short for sun visors in cars to shield her eyes from the sun. Too short to reach high shelves in grocery stores, and too short to see over people’s heads when she sat down to watch school plays.
Amy paused to examine her surroundings. “Where are you?” Her body felt warm and tingly, which meant she was close to whatever it was that was lost. She was standing in the exact spot she had seen a fawn in her mind’s eye. The fawn should be here. Where was it? She took another step forward and let out a cry of dismay, nearly stepping on the creature.
“Oh,” she exclaimed, bending down and pulling the fawns head up, level with her blue-gray eyes. “I just about stepped on you. You beautiful creature.”
The deer shivered fearfully and tried pulling away from her. But it only fell back into the mud.
“Here, hold still and I’ll help you,” Amy whispered, touching the baby deer behind the ears. It was cold and wet and stiffened at her touch.
“You poor, poor thing,” Amy cooed as she stroked its neck. “How am I going to get you out of
here?”
The baby deer looked at Amy with big, black, innocent eyes that held a list of silent questions. In that instant, a bond of mutual understanding seemed to form between them. Both had been abandoned and left to fend for themselves. Amy was going to take care of it, love it, feed it, watch over it, and somehow give it the love its mom could no longer give it.
Amy tried to gently pull the fawn out of the mud. But as the front of its body came up, his bottom didn't wish to follow.
“Okay,” Amy puffed. “If I didn’t think you were so scared, I’d say you liked sitting in this stinky mud.”
She tried lifting the deer’s back end up, “Com'mon.”
The deer still wouldn’t budge. It was firmly stuck, like a melted tootsie roll embedded in the treads of a shoe. Amy was amazed that such a small fawn could be so hard to move.
“Gosh,” Amy said, “I‘m going to have to lift you out one leg at a time.” More determined than ever, she bent over and lifted one little hoof up, two hooves up, three hooves up. Unfortunately, the fourth hoof kicked out. Startled, Amy lost her balance, and slipped face first into the mud.
“Yuggg!” Amy groaned. Mud was in her eyes, nose, mouth, and ears. Even her belly button was no longer a button. Her brown hair was stuck to her muddy face, hiding her cabbage-patch dimples. Little, gritty, gravel pieces and small twigs clung to every part of her, as if she were angel candy coated in coconut and raisins.
To top things off, thunder rolled and it starting to rain. She heard laughing that sounded like a sneezing train engine. She looked up, expecting to see a demon, or God laughing at her.
It might have been all those things, for that’s what Mr. Heckler seemed like. He stood there, safe from the rain, under a big, black umbrella.
“Mr. Heckler,” Amy said. “How long have you been watching me?”
“Long enough.”
“Are you going to help me?”
“I don’t know. Am I?”
“Please. It needs us.”
“Humph. It’s so small.” He rubbed the stubble on his chin, thinking.
“That’s why we need to help it,” Amy said, staring at him with pleading eyes.”
Mr. Heckler nodded. “Yeah, I guess so. But if it dies, please don’t cry, and gush, and do all dat girly stuff. I can’t stand to see girls cry. Makes me feel awful.”
“It won’t die,” Amy assured him.
“But you von’t cry if it does?”
“Fine. I promise. I ‘Von’t’ cry. Now will you help me?”
“What does it look like I’m doing?” Mr. Heckler said, making his way into the ditch, and easily hefting the fawn onto his shoulders.
“Cute ting,” he murmured. “Vhat are you going to name it Amy?”
“Name? Uh…I don’t know. I haven’t ever really named anything before.”
“Well zats a shame. Every kid needs to name zometing. It gives a sense of ownership. After you name zis fawn, you can name ze chickens.”
“Well, thanks.”
“So, vhat are you going to call it? It’s going to need a name before vee take it home.”
“I’m thinking. I’m…”
“You vant zome help?”
“Yeah. I guess.”
“Vhat about Flotzam?”
“Flotsam?”
“Yeah. Dat’s ze first ting I thought vhen I laid eyes on you.”
Amy looked puzzled. “First thing you thought when you saw me? Why?”
“You were standing under ze rain gutter, looking lonely, afraid, and lost. Like zometing vashed up after a big storm at sea, chust like this fawn.”
“Isn’t flotsam stuff people find after a shipwreck, like debris and things like that?”
“Yeah. It is.”
Amy looked thoughtful for a minute. Mr. Heckler did have a point. She did feel like washed up seaweed, or rotten logs from a ship that had wrecked in a horrible storm.
“Flotsam,” she murmured. “I like it.”
Chapter Three
---Secrets---
Mr. Heckler showed Amy how to milk Dorothy, the goat, so they would have some milk for the fawn.
It was weird, milking the goat, at first. It felt like Amy was milking two balloons that would pop if she squeezed too hard. When Mr. Heckler could stand Amy’s slow progress no longer, he took over and milked a small pail full of milk. Afterward, he went to the house to get a baby bottle to put the milk in.
“Hungry?” Amy wondered, kneeling next to the deer. Flotsam lay curled up on a comfortable pile of old blankets next to the barn. He looked small, fragile, and weak.
/> “Bet you miss your family.” At the sound of her voice, Flotsam’s long, jackrabbit-like ears twitched, and his dark eyes filled with fright.
“It’s okay,” she went on. “I’m an orphan too.” Her voice trailed off, as she looked into the woods behind Mr. Heckler’s house, searchingly. “I’ll bet your mom’s looking for you. And you know what? I’ll find her for you. I’m good at finding things.”
“Got it,” Mr. Heckler said, ambling up to her with the bottle in hand. Trailing behind Mr. Heckler was a boy, probably about three or four years old. He had blond hair and a big grin on his face.
“Who's he? Another kid you bought?
“Nope.” Mr. Heckler handed her the bottle. “But he might as well be. Bet I see him more zan his parents do. He has peen pestering me ever zince I got here. He’s an urchin zat spends all his free dime trying to make my life miserable.”
“Hi,” Amy said, waving to the little boy behind Mr. Heckler. “What’s your name?”
The boy smiled, and blushed. “My name’s Nate. And your name is Amy, and the deer’s name is Flotsam.”
Amy looked surprised. “Wow. How do you know all that?”
“Mr. Heckler told me. Can I watch you feed the baby deer?”
“Sure,” Amy murmured, gently trying to ease the nipple into the fawn’s mouth. As the nipple slipped through its toothless gums, and onto its tongue, she waited for Flotsam’s sucking reflex to kick in. But Flotsam shook his head and squirmed in protest. Amy tried squeezing the nipple with her fingers to force the milk to come out on its own. The milk slowly dribbled onto Flotsam’s tongue. Amy did this for several minutes, but the deer refused to swallow. The milk just dribbled out of the corners of its mouth and onto Amy’s pants.
“Stop! You’re doing it wrong,” Nate said, anger crossing his face.
“I am?”
“Yes. You are. Here, let me show you how.” He took the bottle from Amy and whispered something in Flotsam’s ears. He smiled, placed the bottle in his own mouth and sucked.
“M-m-m-m,” Nate said. “Oh, it tastes so good. Yum. Love milk. Now don’t you want some?”
He stopped sucking on the bottle, and held it in front of Flotsam’s face. The deer looked interested, maybe even a little jealous.
“You know you want some,” Nate said, squirting some milk in his own mouth. “Here, I’ll even share.”
He placed the bottle in front of the fawn’s face, and it instantly latched onto the nipple.
“See, Amy,” Nate said, looking proud. “I told I you you were doing it wrong.”
Amy nodded. “Yeah, I guess so.” She watched Flotsam drink for several minutes, until the bottle was empty and the deer was full.
“Guess he’s off to a good zart,” Mr. Heckler said, sauntering off. “You really ought to come in ze house, in a couple more minutes, to have zome zupper. Or is it lunch? Lupper is probably more like it.”
“Guess, I better go home,” Nate said, sighing sadly, as he watched Flotsam curl up and close its eyes. “Mr. Heckler isn’t a very good cook. I feel bad for you, Amy. Maybe sometime you should come over and eat with us.”
Amy shrugged. “I don’t know…”
“Oh, look,” Nate said, lifting on of the deer’s closed eyelids. “He’s having dreams.”
Amy pulled Nate away from the deer. “Don’t do that. He can’t have dreams when you’re holding his eyelids open.”
Nate, stepped back, tilted his head, thinking. “I dream with my eyelids open all the time. And you want to know another secret?”
“Sure.”
“I wet the bed.”
“Nice.”
“You want to know something else?”
“Yeah, whatever.”
“I eat my boogers, and sometimes I even mix them with gum so it tastes better.”
“That’s gross.”
“No. It’s cool. Now you need to tell me a secret so we can be friends.”
Amy folded her arms, and looked off into the distance. “A secret. Ah. Let’s see. Okay. Here’s my secret. I can find just about anything. If you lose something just ask me to find it, and I will.”
“Really, you can find anything?”
“Just about. But you have to make sure you don’t tell anyone. Okay?
Nathan zipped his lips. “I won’t tell. I won’t tell not even a shadow.”
Chapter Four
Miss Rackbith
There are polka dots spots on shirts, which make your eyes go crazy. There are cool-looking cheetah spots, and leopard spots. There are dogs that have spots around their eyes, and there are spots on clothes, caused from grease stains. Then there are little white spots on baby deer that look as if God planned on making a checkerboard on their backs, but thought better of it, and left room for people to play connect-the-dots, instead.
That was what Amy was doing with her fingers, drawing invisible shapes between Flotsam’s dots, and wondering what a deer could say if it could talk. Flotsam looked so much better after getting some food in him.
“Amy!” Mr. Heckler shouted, from the porch steps. “Get in ze truck, and I’ll take you to ze bus stop. Don’t vant to be late on your first day of zchool, do you?”
Amy reluctantly left Flotsam and got in the truck, next to Mr. Heckler.” Doesn’t matter if I’m late. Schools are all the same everywhere you go. Boring.”
Mr. Heckler snorted. “Zchool boring? I don’t believe you.”
“Yes. It is. So the slower you drive, the less time I’ll spend being bored.”
Mr. Heckler smiled, and pushed the gas pedal. “Nope. I’m going to get you zere as fast as I can.” The truck shot forward, and sent a spray of mud into the air as they went speeding down the wet dirt road. To Amy’s dismay, they got to the bus stop much sooner than Amy had anticipated
“Learn zometing,” Mr. Heckler called to Amy as she got out the door, “zo you can teach me later.”
“Yeah,” Amy murmured as she stepped into the bus. “Learn all about being bored so I can teach you how to feel like your brain is going to self destruct.”
Amy stood in the middle of the bus, surveying the seats with a critical eye. The bus was stuffy. The windows were foggy with fingerprints. The seats looked sticky, and the floor was slippery from muddy shoes. The bus driver was a kind of shifty-eyed man who looked more like a bank robber than anyone else. He was tall and skinny, like a dried-up tree, with gray hair and darkish eyebrows.
“Take a seat,” the bus driver commanded, giving Amy an irritated glance.
Amy nodded, sat down on the nearest empty seat, stared out the window, and started drawing pictures on the foggy windows with her finger.
“Hey, midget mouse,” a voice called from behind.
Amy turned around and faced the speaker. The boy was thickly built, with dark hair and dark eyes that looked like two caves containing bats, drippy rocks and carnivorous creatures. If he wiped the sour, curdled expression off his face, Amy thought he might have looked quite handsome. But as far as Amy could tell, his mean expression looked permanent.
“Who are you?” she asked, with narrowed eyes.
“Tristan.”
“Tristan?”
“Yeah, you got a problem with that, shorty?”
“No. I just thought that...”
Tristan stared at her with hard eyes. “Thought what?”
“Nothing. Never mind.”
Amy turned back around in her seat, but Tristan’s intense gaze on the back of her head made her feel very uncomfortable.
“Hey you, runt! Yeah, I’m talking to you,” Tristan went on.
“My name is Amy. If you wish to address me by my proper name, then I might talk to you.”
“Fine then, Amy.” Tristan poked her shoulder, with the sharp end of his pencil. “Look at me while I’m speaking to you.”
“Fine!” Amy shouted, twirling round in her seat. “You’ve got my attention. I’m looking at you.”
Tristan smirked, chewing on a wad of bubble gum,
as he leaned up against the seat, next to Amy’s face, making awful chomping sounds. “I’m…” he said, between chews, “just dying to…know what you’re doing…living with that old Hitler- lovin, German, skunk.”
“Don’t say things you know nothing about, jerk.” Amy shot back.
“Me, a jerk?”
“Yes. You are.”
Tristan laughed, and faced his friends in the back of the bus. “Did you hear that? She called me a jerk. Should I let her get away with that?”
“No,” his friends in the back seat shouted. “Let her have it. Take her stuff.”
“See, Amy,” Tristan went on, “I’m no ordinary, run-of- the-mill jerk. You mess with one of us---you mess with all of us. You could say that my merry band of men, and I, are outlaws. All for a good cause, of course.”
“Oh, really?” Amy asked, raising her eyebrows. The boys in the back seat were lighting cigarettes, and coughing. They looked like they were really trying hard to look older. But you can’t hide immaturity in a cloak of cig smoke. It just accentuates it.
“Really?” Amy said. “You don’t really look like Robin Hood. You don’t look like men at all. In fact you look more like the wicked Sheriff of Nottingham, and his band of thugs.”
“Ha,” Tristan laughed. “You see, that’s funny because that’s who we try to avoid. Sheriffs, you know. So you see, if you ever happen to poke your nose around where you shouldn’t---say if you were to tip off anyone about our cigs and booze, my scouts will hunt you down like a deer. Got that?”
Amy nodded. “Sure, whatever. I’ll keep quiet. It’s not like I care what you guys do with the small part of your brain that’s still left.”
“Good, then,” Tristan said, taking the wad of gum out of his mouth and pressing it into Amy’s hair. “Take this gift, and treasure it always. You have just been initiated into my realm. Oh, and just one more thing. My men will gladly collect your taxes, before every lunch, to be evenly distributed to the needy. I hope you enjoy your stay at our school.”