Notebook for Fantastical Observations (12 page)

List of practical responses:

Creature trading cards:

Friend trading cards:

“The Black Dog of the Night. . . .
An ass or perhaps merely a sprite.”

FROM
B
OOK
3: L
UCINDA’S
S
ECRET

I used to get beat up a lot at school.

On the playground, I got hassled when the lunch monitors were looking the other way—but it wasn’t too bad because no one wanted to get in too much trouble. The worst was actually before I even got to school and when I got home. A bunch of guys at my bus stop would push me and throw my backpack out into the street. One time they filled my mouth full of dirty snow and I tasted the grit all day long.

I think some people are born knowing the right things to wear and like to make themselves fit in (or be invisible). Not me. I have a loud, braying laugh, and when I’m nervous, I talk and talk and talk. But back then, no matter how cool I thought something was, no one else agreed with me. Like UFOs
and aliens —I know tons about them, but whenever I said anything, the other kids would roll their eyes.

Things got so bad that I started pretending to be sick. I would look up diseases online and pretend to have them. The first day my stomach would hurt, the next day I would claim I saw purple spots in front of my eyes. At first my mother was worried and kept me home, but after a while she got skeptical. I had to resort to hiding in my room so she’d think I already left for school. The best spot was the hamper. No one ever looked in there. Eventually, though, she got wise to that, too, and — inevitably —I had to go to the bus stop again.

That morning I wound up in a headlock with a bunch of kids giving me knuckle-burn noogies.

By the bus ride home, I was weighed
down with books for make-up homework and dreading what might happen as soon as I stepped onto the sidewalk. One of the other kids—Marcus—squinted his eyes at me and then cracked his knuckles. I looked away.

At my stop, I got off the bus really slowly. I gathered up my stuff like a sleepwalker, hoping the other kids would just go home and leave me alone. They didn’t, but something else was there too—a huge dog.

Its fur was a glossy black and its pink tongue lolled from between its teeth in a way that made it seem like the dog was smiling. As soon as Marcus stepped toward me, the dog growled.

“He yours?” one of the other kids—a guy named Kenny—asked.

I shook my head and took a step back. The dog seemed just as likely to bite me as to bite them. But when I started walking
home, the dog walked at my side cheerfully. It walked right up to my door and then ran off.

The next day, when I started toward the bus stop, the dog was there again. It sat next to me while I waited for the bus and growled at anyone that bothered me. And so it went for weeks and weeks. The dog was my constant at the bus stop, guarding me from any harm. After a while, the other kids seemed to forget that they hated me and moved on to amusing themselves other ways.

One afternoon Kenny walked next to me and the dog on the way home. He told me about the book on spaceships he’d just read. I tried really hard not to correct his information.

“Does your dog have a name?” Kenny asked.

I petted the dog’s soft fur and shook my head.

“You should name him.”

“How about Shadow,” I said, looking at the dog. “Would you like to be called Shadow?”

Shadow barked once. I didn’t know if that was a yes or a no, but he walked me to my door just like he always did. The next morning, though, he wasn’t waiting for me and I never saw him again.

—David T.

ANALYSIS: Phookas take the form of a black goat, rabbit, or dog. Although often tricksters, on some occasions phookas have been known to help people avoid danger.

—H. B. & T. D.

This creature is both scary and cuddly: