Turn Left at the Cow (11 page)

“You have to come see if you win.” I let her pull me along.

Once we made it outside, we followed the crowd to the back corner of the parking lot. Everybody was gathering around this big square area marked off on the pavement with red paint.

Deputy Dude was directing traffic. “Pick a side, folks. Just stand back of the paint lines. We want everybody to get a view of the fun.”

Linnea hauled me through the horde of bodies up to the front of the crowd. Somehow we got separated from Iz and Krissy, but Linnea squeezed the two of us into a spot along the paint marks. In front of us, inside the square, was a small area with a little fence around it. Inside the fence, lying on the pavement, was a big piece of plywood with a bunch of numbered squares. Next to the fenced-in area was the cage full of chickens.

“Just what exactly is this game?” I asked Linnea, nervous about being trapped up front where they could easily grab me when the tar was hot enough. But Deputy Dude held up his arms for quiet before she could answer.

“Folks,” he said. “First round's the blue tickets. Tell the good folks about our blue ticket prize, Delbert, and then grab yourself a bird.”

Apron Guy from the grocery store stepped up. “First round is the ice cream prize, everybody. You win this round and you win yourself a quart of ice cream every week for the next year.”

The crowd clapped real loud while Apron Guy went over and grabbed himself a chicken. The bird squawked and fanned its wings, and somebody yelled out, “Don't let it drop the big one before the big game, Del,” and everybody laughed.

Apron Guy carried the chicken over to the fenced-in area and set it down inside. The bird kind of pranced around, pecking at some seeds or something on the plywood, while the crowd went nuts. People were yelling out numbers and waving blue tickets in the air. Every so often the bird stopped and posed its head like a chicken supermodel. When that happened, eve-rybody shut up.

Suddenly the bird dropped an A-bomb on number seventeen. The crowd let out this big disappointed sigh, except for one lady who started leaping up and down and squealing, “Seventeen! He hit seventeen! That's me! I'm the winner!”

“Tiffany Tinboldt's got herself some ice cream, folks. Let's all give Tiffany a round of applause.”

Tiffany ran around and around the inside of the square, raising her fists up over her head like Rocky and whooping while everybody else cheered.

Holy crap, dodo—I don't think we're in California anymore
.

I gaped over at Linnea. “That's it? That's the whole game? A chicken takes a poop and somebody wins some ice cream?”

Linnea giggled. She'd certainly gotten over her shyness around me. “We're supposed to call it chicken-drop bingo, but Kenny calls it chicken-poop bingo. Once he even said chicken-sh—you know, that word we're not supposed to say.”

The chicken was back in the cage with its buddies while a guy mopped up the plywood. The Hannah Montana–wannabe and some of her friends jumped around in the middle of the square waving pompoms in the air while the rest of us waited for round two.

Then Deputy Dude shooed us all back behind the paint marks again. “Time to get out your pink tickets, folks. Velma, come on up here and tell everyone about the pink ticket prize.”

Velma told us all about the big bowling bo- nanza at the Bowl-O-Rama. Then she grabbed herself a clucker and set it loose on the plywood. Turned out pink wasn't so lucky for Krissy after all; that chicken crapped almost instantly for some guy in a baseball cap who looked as if he'd already swallowed a bowling ball. We worked our way through most of the crayon box and most of the chickens without anybody I knew getting crapped on, but then Deputy Dude waved for quiet again.

“Purple tickets, folks. Last round of the night is the purple round. One more big prize left to go.” Linnea squeezed my hand. I looked down and saw her clutching her ticket for purple seven in her other hand.

“Milo, come on over here and give us the rundown on the purple prize.”

King Svengrud trotted front and center. “Our last lucky winner gets to come on down to the Big Store and pick themselves out a new bicycle. We've got all the latest models on hand.” I heard Linnea give this excited gasp, and her grip on me tightened even more. It was like holding hands with a python.

The King latched on to a chicken and plunked it down onto the plywood. This last clucker was a real ham. It milked its moment of glory like it was Miss Piggy in front of the paparazzi. Every time it paused and cocked its head, there'd be this big intake of breath from the crowd, as if everybody figured there was no way the bird could hold it in any longer. But then it would get back to prancing around. Finally, just when I thought maybe it was going to keep its little chicken legs crossed forever, I swear the thing looked straight at me with its beady eyes and then laid down a giant green glob on number fourteen.

“Fourteen,” called out King Svengrud. “Step on up, lucky number purple fourteen.”

People were turning their heads to look one way and then the other, trying to see who was going to step forward and claim the Big Store bike. Meanwhile, I was rethinking that whole invisibility versus flying thing. It had just never occurred to me to plan ahead for the day when a chicken would poop on my bingo square. And I was definitely feeling too chicken to go ahead and claim my prize. The whole town already thought I had spoiled their years of digging fun by coming up with the pirate loot and spending it myself. Now I was going to waltz right up and ace them out of their chicken-crap prize? Right. Invisibility would have been really useful in that moment.

But since I couldn't become invisible and Jesus still hadn't levitated me, I just turned my head from side to side like everybody else and pretended I didn't have a clue who the winner was. Except I had forgotten about Python Girl.

Linnea suddenly dropped my hand. She was turning around and raising her finger to point at me, her mouth a big round
O
, when I figured out what she was up to. I grabbed her finger midair and leaned over close to her ear.

“You're the real winner. You picked purple fourteen for me. You take this ticket up there and tell them you won that new bike.” I stuck purple fourteen into her hand, spun her back around, and gave her a big shove forward into the center of the square.

“Linnea?” called out Deputy Dude. “Do you have the winning ticket? Step on up, little lady—don't be shy.”

Linnea nodded and held up the ticket for purple fourteen high over her head.

And then she opened her mouth and said, as loud and clear as a foghorn, “Here it is. Purple fourteen. Bank-Robber Boy gave it to me.”

Even the chickens stopped clucking while everyone turned to stare.

Until somewhere in the back of the crowd, on the other side of the square, a man's voice called out, “That's my kid. My kid's the winner! Hold up there, kiddo—here comes Daddy!”

For just a second I think I really believed that the crowd was going to part and my father was going to come rushing out to help me claim my prize. That some guy dressed in a military uniform like the one I'd seen in the newspaper—somebody with the same eyes as mine—was going to come over to me and—

I didn't know what I thought. What exactly would back-from-the-dead Daddy do the first time he met me? I didn't have a clue.

I stood there frozen in place, watching as people got knocked to one side or another because the Daddy Voice was barreling his way forward through the crowd, still yelling out things like, “Hold on, kiddo, I'm coming.”

Except, when the Daddy Voice finally reached the front, I could tell right away that it wasn't
my
family reunion that was busting up the bingo fun. The party pooper in this case was a drunk guy who didn't match up with my pappy's photo in any way. I heaved in a big breath.

The Daddy Voice staggered into the row of chicken-poop cheerleaders, knocking Hannah Montana sideways so she tripped over the girl beside her, and next thing we knew, there was this tangle of little girls and pompoms thrashing around on the ground, and mothers were running forward and people were hollering and everybody was generally getting in the way of Deputy Dude, who was clearly trying to catch up to the Daddy Voice before he caused any more multi-tween accidents.

Even though it was clear he wasn't my daddy dearest, the Daddy Voice was still headed straight for me. Or as straight as somebody in his condition could head. And he didn't look like he was planning to give me a welcome-to-the-village hug when he reached me. Maybe this guy was one of Crazy Carl's friends? The town loons generally seemed to have it in for me around here.

I suddenly took in the fact that Linnea was as frozen in place as I was, and she was standing directly in front of me. A few more seconds and the Daddy Voice was going to roll right over her on his way to me.

I leaped forward. Somehow I scooped up Linnea and hauled us out of there. I didn't stop until we were back behind the church building with nobody else in sight.

I set Linnea down and leaned over at the waist, letting my head hang and resting my palms on my knees while I sucked in air. Python Girl wasn't as light as she looked.

Linnea made this little hiccupping sound, and I turned my head to check her out. Snot streamed down her chin as big round tears rolled out of her eyes.

“Is Daddy gone?” she said.

“Daddy?” I repeated. “You mean—you mean that guy back there was your dad?”

Linnea nodded and wiped her nose on her bare arm.

Great. I'd just rescued the kid from a reunion with her own father.

But that waste case was Linnea's dad? And Iz's dad too?

And I thought I had father problems.

I really had no clue what to do next. I wanted to just start walking until I fell off the world, like those explorers used to think would happen if they sailed too close to the edge of the map. But I knew I couldn't leave Linnea there all alone and dripping snot.

Fortunately, just then Kenny loped around the church and pulled to a stop in front of us. He didn't look like his usual jolly self. Linnea flung her arms around him and wiped her face on his shirt.

“Bro, touché,” he said to me.

“You know, dude, I'm not sure you really understand what that word means.”

He shrugged and kind of hoisted Linnea up. She swung around to hang on his back like a spider monkey and buried her face in his neck. “Whatever. Gotta get Squid here back to my folks. They're kinda worried about her.”

“Is everything okay now?” I asked. “Is Iz okay?”

He looked at me but didn't answer. I guess that
was
his answer.

He finally said, “Deputy Anderson is taking care of . . . you know, the mess in the parking lot. Everybody else is heading home. Your grandma said to tell you she'd meet you at the truck in a few minutes. She went downstairs to finish cleaning up the food.”

I nodded and he fist-bumped me. “Coach wants to meet you. Said you hauled Linnea out of there like some all-star running back carrying a pigskin on fire.”

“Yeah, I'm an all-star something, all right.”

Kenny turned and started walking away, but Linnea suddenly shimmied down his back and ran over to me.

She held out the winning ticket for purple fourteen. It was all bent-up and crumpled from being clutched in her fist. I was pretty sure it was snotted up, too. “You want your ticket back now?”

“Nah, kid, I already got a new bike. I want you to have it.”

She nodded. “Thank you, Bank-Robber Boy.” And she walked away holding Kenny's hand.

I hung back awhile after they left, figuring maybe by the time I hit the parking lot, most everybody would have cleared out. But I didn't want Gram to have to come looking for me, so I finally headed to the truck at a fast trot. The parking lot was almost empty, but Gram wasn't there yet.

I still hadn't gotten over how people in the boonies never bothered to lock their car doors. I mean, if they were anything like Gram, they left the doors to their houses standing wide-open too. I guess to make it easier for the ax murderers to get inside. But this time that lack of safety first was working to my advantage; the truck wasn't locked. I slid into the passenger seat and closed the door.

Something crinkled as I settled onto the seat. I reached under my butt and pulled out a wrinkled-up piece of paper. The first side I saw had this weird drawing. It took me a minute, but I finally figured out it was a map—of the island! That jagged-topped stump, Fingers-to-Heaven or whatever goofy name Iz had given it, jumped right off the page at me. Not far away was a big
X
. Was this somebody's idea of a joke?

But then I turned the map over. It was covered with words made from cut-out newspaper letters, like a project I had made for Mother's Day in first grade.

Or like ransom notes in those old movies.

I read it through once, straining to make out the words in the falling darkness. Then I reached over and locked the doors, one at a time because the truck was the old-school type without automatic locks.

I read the note again:

 

I know you have the $$$. Bury it on the island within 24 hours. Location marked on map. Do it or you'll be sorry!

It grew steadily darker as I sat there with the note in my hand. I shivered despite the fact that the windows were all rolled up and it had just turned July. The note had to be a joke, right?

Although the photo of a hunting rifle glued below the words made it hard not to take the whole thing seriously. Somebody was after me.

Suddenly the door handle rattled. I about jumped through the ceiling of the truck. When I could breathe again, I looked over and saw Gram gesturing at the lock. I stuffed the note into my back pocket and then leaned over and unlocked her door.