Nuts to You Read online

  DEDICATION

  For B, L and F. Also, V.

  And U. NQ. xo, lrp.

  CONTENTS

  dedication

  author’s note

  1: the squirrel who cried “wolf!”

  2: up in the air

  3: meanwhile, back at the grove

  4: the squirrels they left behind

  5: the squirrel who fell to earth

  6: as the hawk flies, as the squirrel travels

  7: dreams

  8: in the blink of an eye

  9: what it was

  10: no time to lose

  11: where was Chai?

  12: a human conversation

  (untranslated, because you already speak human)

  13: a hard question

  14: looking for Chai

  15: ill winds, chill winds

  16: Tchke’s tale

  17: bobcats happen

  18: something was different

  19: getting squirrel-y

  20: the set-up

  21: the game

  22: story first, fight later

  23: unbelievable

  author’s endnote

  epilogues

  acknowledgments

  about the author

  credits

  copyright

  about the publisher

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  ONE mild day in early November, I took my lunch down to the waterwheel park. I had been scribbling away on a project, so it was mid-afternoon by the time I got there. As I sat down on the bench, a few kids wandered through the park on their way home from school. They stopped to drop sticks into the stream above the waterwheel, then ran around to watch them fly off on the other side. I waved to Rose, who was walking someone’s dog down the alley below the park. A couple of high school boys pulled up in a car and headed for the tennis court. Soon, I heard the pock-pock of the tennis ball, interspersed with shouts of the score.

  Some birds were excited about the wild grapes hanging in thick clusters from their vines, which were supported by a different kind of bush that had tiny red berries that I would certainly not eat without finding out first what they were. They didn’t look that tasty anyway. But they were pretty. Squirrels raced to and fro, the way squirrels do.

  I was watching the carefree squirrels when, all at once, one of them jumped onto the end of the bench where I was sitting and looked with interest at me, and then, meaningfully, at my sandwich. Quite calmly, he stepped closer. That’s bold, I thought. A little too bold. I tore off a bit of my sandwich and was about to chuck it as far as I could, figuring he would take off after it, when he spoke.

  “Please, don’t throw it,” he said. “Would you mind just setting it on the bench? I’m not as spry as I once was.”

  While I was gathering my wits, he sniffed the air and spoke again.

  “It’s peanut butter, isn’t it?”

  I nodded. I didn’t speak. I have not reached the point of talking to squirrels, I thought to myself. Not yet. But I did set the piece of sandwich down on the bench between us. The squirrel took it up and nibbled. He closed his eyes, as if savoring the taste.

  “I love this stuff,” he said. “I love the taste of it. And the chunks. I’m glad it’s the chunky kind.”

  “You speak,” I said. “Human. English.”

  “Are you sure you’re not speaking squirrel?” he asked. Straight-faced. Deadpan. And then he laughed.

  “Yes,” he said. “Yes, I do. I am an old squirrel, and I have lived for many years in the vicinity of humans. We have shared homes. One picks things up. Habits. Language.”

  He took another nibble.

  “What I love most about peanut butter,” he said, “is how it transports me to my youth. The first taste always takes me back to the very first time I had it. For an instant, I am young again, and strong. And probably foolish.”

  He bit. He chewed and swallowed.

  “It was just after a great adventure,” he said. “That made it taste even better. It always does, don’t you find?”

  “Oh, yes,” I said. “Always.”

  I tried to think whether I had ever had a great adventure. I decided that I had. It’s all in how you look at it. I took a bite of my sandwich and tore off another piece for the squirrel. Still working on the first bit, he nodded his thanks.

  “It was just this time of year, too,” he said.

  He seemed to want to talk about it. I glanced around the park. Everyone had gone: no kids, no dogs or dog walkers, no high school boys playing tennis, no birds. No squirrels, except for this one.

  “So what happened?” I asked. “What was your great adventure?”

  He cleared his throat.

  “Amid the thick and intertwining boughs, among the limbs, branches, and leafy twigs of our grove,” he began, “the buzzpaths ran. . . .”

  He said this as if he had said it many times before. He spoke formally, almost as if he were reciting a poem.

  “Actually,” he said then, in his normal voice,* “I think I’ll start with the wolf this time.”

  IT’S true that there was a wolf. Or wolves. There may have been more than one. Maybe they were actually coyotes, who knows? They all look pretty much the same to a squirrel. Huge. Shaggy. Terrible yellow eyes. Red slobbery mouth with big sharp pointy teeth.

  And it’s true that if you are a squirrel on the ground and a wolf (or a coyote) strolls into the neighborhood, running up a tree is the best plan. No one’s going to argue with that.

  The problem was the squirrel called Jip. He kept yelling, “Wolf!” just to see everyone run. He had been doing it all day. He thought it was funny. And, a little bit, it made him feel important. Because most of the time no one listened or paid any attention to him. But when he shouted, “WOLF!” up the trees they all went.

  Except for Jed. Jip looked at him, annoyed.

  “WOLF!” he shouted again. But Jed stayed put. He was busy. He had nuts to bury. Winter was coming. The first frost was long gone, and the air felt cooler with each passing day. Leaves were falling into crispy yellow piles on the ground. Any day now, there would be snow. Just a little at first, then mountains of it.

  “Wolf, wolf, wolf,” Jed said irritably. “Is that the only word he knows?”

  Jed did look around to see if there was a wolf. Because he was irritated, but you just never know. Sure enough: no wolf in sight. He shook his head and went back to his work, muttering and nattering.

  “WOLF!” shrieked Jip.

  “Wolf, wolf, wolf,” Jed muttered. “There is no wolf.”

  And then, the foolish Jip saw something. Not a wolf, but something very real. Something dangerous. In his fright, he blurted out the first word that popped into his head. The one he had been saying all day.

  “Wolf?”

  Muttering and digging, Jed did not notice until the very last instant how the air above him had gone suddenly still and silent.

  “Oh,” he said in surprise as a set of talons tightened around him and lifted him up, up, up, past every whorl of branches, up above the treetops into the vast reaches of sky. Cold air rushed over his face, forced his eyes to squeeze shut. Every muscle in his body tensed up. He may have peed a little bit. Who wouldn’t? All four of his paws curled and clenched. His mind raced. A mighty wave of fear rolled in and filled him up. And somehow, even through the roaring of the fear and the rushing of the air, he could hear a small voice inside him saying, “This is it, then.”

  Jip watched the fearsome bird swoop down, snatch his cousin Jed, and swoop back up.

  “Hawk,” he said, correcting himself. “I should have cried, ‘Hawk!’” So he did it now.

  “HAWK!” he cried. “HAWK! HAWK!”

  THERE was Jed, dangling inside a hawk’s clenched talons
, high above the earth. And yet, when the little voice inside him told Jed to give up, to let go of his life, another little voice said, “Nope. I don’t think so.”

  He opened his eyes. He had to tilt his face downward to do it.

  The world whizzing by was so far below. Jed was used to heights, being a squirrel and a leaper, but he didn’t usually look down much. He had never looked down from this far up, and he felt queasy. Were those treetops or small bushes?

  He was tempted again to give up. The situation did seem hopeless. Could it be any more hopeless?

  Actually, amazingly: yes. He realized that it could. He could have been pierced by talons or torn asunder.

  But Jed couldn’t help noticing that while he was in a death grip and terrified, he seemed to be intact. In one piece. Unpierced. This went against everything he had been taught about hawk snatchings. So he did a quick inspection of himself to be sure. It was easy to tell that his heart was still beating. It was drumming as loud and as fast as a grouse in springtime. He wiggled his fingers and toes: all there. He flicked his tail and it moved. He couldn’t see it, but he could feel it.

  “So there is hope,” he said to himself. “But don’t be dazzled. You are definitely in a fix. Pay attention. Use your knowledge of the enemy.”

  (A note: “Enemy” is such a strong word. It might be more sporting to say “adversary,” or “the other team.” Sometimes the thing to do is to invite your adversary for cake and lemonade, and see if they can become your friend. It can save a whole lot of grief later on. But when you are Team Squirrel and the other team is Team Hawk, this is not a good idea. Because as far as the hawk is concerned, you are the cake. And also the lemonade. When a hawk says, “I love squirrels!” it says it in the way humans might say, “I love potato chips!”)

  “What do I know about our friend,* the hawk?” Jed mused, as he was carried through the air at fur-flattening speed. “I mean, what do I really know?” Because squirrels have a lot of ideas about hawks that are not accurate.

  Like “All hawks are strong and powerful, but not very bright.” Which is something we like to think about creatures who are stronger than we are. Or “Hawks are slobs.” Or “Hawks can’t smell.” That one is true. They don’t have a good sense of smell. Speaking of which, Jed observed that the hawk was itself smelly. But he did not see how that information could be useful. They do have sharp eyesight, of course. Everyone knows that. “Hawkeye.” “Eyes like a hawk.”

  But what else? Jed felt there was something in the back of his brain, on the tip of his tongue. He was usually a cool customer, but he was flustered by his predicament. Think, think, think! he said to himself. All he could think of was mice. Hawks like to eat mice. That was one thing he knew for sure. An idea formed in his mind. It was a lame idea, but it was the only one he had.

  “Mice!” he squeaked.

  “What?” said the hawk. “What did you say?”

  Talons tightened, then loosened. Not enough, though.

  “Nothing,” Jed squeaked. Making his voice sound frightened this time. Which wasn’t hard. Then, in what he hoped was a different voice, he called out, “The field is full of mice today!”

  He did not know if there were mice in the field or not. But most fields have mice. Mice are everywhere. Anyway, that wasn’t the point. It was a tactic. A trick.

  For an instant, the hawk, scanning for mice, eased his grip, ever so slightly.

  And in that instant, Jed relaxed his muscles. It was a technique from the ancient squirrel defensive martial art of Hai Tchree, not well known because it doesn’t work most of the time. Because it is so hard to do when your situation is not relaxing.

  But Jed concentrated and completely relaxed his muscles—like the great Houdini escaping a straitjacket—and he slipped like water* through the distracted hawk’s talons.

  The hawk, truth be told, was mostly distracted not because Jed was shouting about mice, but by the fact that Jed was still alive. Food was supposed to be limp at this point. This food was not limp, and when it started speaking, it gave him the heebie-jeebies. He lost his focus, just for a moment.

  In any case, Jed slipped from the hawk’s grasp and plummeted through the air to earth. Or almost to earth. At the last possible moment, a porcupine walked beneath him. Followed by a curious dog. Jed bounced off the dog, who was headed for some serious trouble, and landed in a pile of autumn leaves.

  (Do we feel sorry for the hawk, who has just lost his supper?

  Yes. A little. This is what is called “a hard truth.” But we feel sorrier for whoever became his supper. That is a harder truth.

  As for Jed, he had landed in something soft, but not before bumping his noggin on the dog. He lay unconscious within the fragrant pile of drying leaves.

  P.S. We also feel sorry for the dog. Because porcupine needles hurt like no other thing. But that is a different story.)

  TSTS* watched in disbelief as Jed was snatched up by the hawk. Through a thin thicket of raspberry canes, she saw the blur of brown and white feathers, the all-too-clear scaly bands of the powerful yellow talons as they curled around Jed’s middle. She saw the surprise in her friend’s eyes as his paws were lifted from the earth. She stared at the empty space where Jed had just been and for a moment, TsTs was frozen. No, she thought. No. Not Jed. She shook her head slightly. She shook it again, and this time the movement freed her. She shot out of the thicket. She raced to the top of the nearest tree, out to the precarious tip of a limb that had lost its leaves. From there, she could see her dear friend being carried swiftly, so swiftly away. His form was a silhouette, a small shape with a long tail, suspended below the larger hawk shape. Her heart began to fill with sorrow. Tears pooled in her eyes.

  But wait.

  What now? Were tears blurring her vision, or was the small form separating from the hawk shape? It was! It was falling away like a drop of water from the tip of a leaf, like a nut from a tree, like a . . . like a squirrel! And if her eyes were not fooling her,* the form did not fall like a limp, lifeless squirrel; it seemed to stretch out and then to curl up tight. The curled-up squirrel shape fell into some trees, where she could no longer see it. But hope pushed its way into her heart. Stubbornly, it took its place beside the sorrow.

  Now Chai joined her in the treetop. The slim limb dipped lower with his weight. He, too, had seen the capture of Jed. Following TsTs’s gaze, he watched the tiny silhouette of the hawk swoop and soar. He furled his tail over her shoulder in sympathy.

  “Let us go eat a nut,” he said, “and remember our friend.”

  “I think he escaped,” she said.

  Chai pushed back his cap and peered quizzically at her.

  “TsTs,” he said gently, “no one escapes from the talons of a hawk.”

  “I saw him fall, Chai,” she said. “The hawk dropped him. Just past the unnatural shape.”

  “Which unnatural shape?” asked Chai. He could see three of them without even twitching his head: the huge silvery egg, the tall frozen spiderweb, and the great beak that sometimes sings but never opens.

  “The spiderweb,” said TsTs. “But not the closest one. The one after the one after that.”

  Chai looked toward the point she was describing. It was a long way, a very long way away. Out of their realm. Three, maybe four realms* away. And from a flying hawk in the air down to the earth was a very long way to fall.

  “If Jed escaped,” he said to TsTs, “no one is happier than I am. But we will never see him again.”

  “He won’t know where he is,” said TsTs. “He probably had his eyes shut the whole time. We need to go find him and bring him home.”

  “Are you nuts?” asked Chai.

  (To squirrels, “Are you nuts?” is a combination of “Have you lost your mind?” and “You remind me of the most wonderful thing I can think of.” “Nuts” by itself can actually mean many things, like “Hello,” “Good-bye,” or “Wow.” Kind of like “Shalom” or “Aloha” or “Cheers.” In this case, “Are you nuts?”
also meant, “My friend, what you want to do is not even possible.”)

  From far below, they heard Jip cry, “Hawk!” They looked at each other and rolled their eyes. Then they looked all around, and also straight up, just to be sure.

  “How would we even begin to find him?” asked Chai.

  “We can go on the buzzpaths,” said TsTs. “They connect the frozen spiderwebs. Hold them together or something.”

  “They do?” asked Chai. “How do you know?”

  “I went to the first one once, kind of by accident,” said TsTs. “They’re attached. The buzzpaths and the spiderwebs.”

  “I’ll be,” said Chai. “I didn’t know that.”

  (Probably you have already guessed that “buzzpaths” are utility wires and “frozen spiderwebs” are towers that hold them in the air. In this part of the forest, the trees had grown up around the buzzpaths in a friendly, welcoming way. But their grove, or neighborhood, was midway between spiderwebs, and Chai had never set foot on one. )

  “So the buzzpaths should take us right to him,” said TsTs. “We just have to count to the third spiderweb.”

  Chai studied his friend’s face. He could see that she meant to go. He immediately felt he should go with her. Jed was his best friend, too. Also, two heads are better than one, the buddy system, and all. But he had never done anything like it. He had never traveled so far from the Grove. Plus, it seemed to Chai that even if Jed had survived the fall, he would not have stayed put. He would have gone looking for food, shelter, and whatnot. Scattered.

  “He’s not going to just sit there waiting for us,” he said.

  “That’s why we have to go right away,” said TsTs. “Now. Are you coming?”

  “I’m coming, I’m coming,” said Chai. But he said it to thin air. TsTs was already on her way, dropping from branch to branch.

  “I’m coming!” he yelled down after her. “Wait!”

  “Come on, then,” she called back over her shoulder, her voice already dimming with distance, muffled by the laced fingers of the trees.

  Chai glanced down into the Grove. Everyone was running around, back to normal. Chai loved everyone running around. He loved normal.

  “Bye, all,” he said fondly, though no one could hear him. There was no time for real good-byes. “We’ll be back,” he said. “I hope.”