"Look out!" Tigger yelled as he streaked from his trapdoor to his hammock where he proceeded to lie down and pile every fur and blanket he could get his hands on, on top of him.
"What's wrong?" I asked, figuring something horrible had happened. I'd have thought pirates, but Tig wouldn't be hiding from them. It must be something totally awful.
"It's Thursday the nineteenth," he said in a muffled voice from under the covers. This brought a general moan from pallets and hammocks around the common room as the other Lost Boys repeated the same process that Tig had just completed. I looked at Roo who was sitting across from me at the common room table.
"Thursday the nineteenth?" I asked.
Roo shrugged. "Not only is it Thursday the nineteenth, but the moon's also full. Both of them. The sun's full too." I continued staring at him wondering what he was talking about. "You know. Black cats, mirrors, dragonsbane? Bad luck? It's worse when the moons and sun are full."
"Don't you mean Friday the thirteenth?" I asked scratching my head. Not only was I confused, but I was pretty sure I had fleas again.
"Are you nuts? That's nothing. The best thing to do is hide 'cuz when Thursday the nineteenth shows up, all that happens is doom and despair." He held up a finger and made a slashing motion across his throat. "That's what I'm going to do."
"But I'm hungry and I found a strawberry patch the other day that should be ready by now. I don't want stew for breakfast again." I'll admit it came out just a tiny bit whiny.
"I heard that," a muffled voice said from beneath a pallet.
"Anyway, Friday the thirteenth ain't ever bothered me. I've always had good luck on that day. Sorta. And you know… Strawwwwwwwwberries."
For a moment Roo looked tempted at the thought of strawberries, but then just shrugged again. "This is Thursday the nineteenth, not Friday the thirteenth. You do what you have to, but don't say you weren't warned. Ain't no way I'm leaving the Tree unless it's falling down."
I looked around the common room at the five bodies hidden under blankets and furs. "This is a joke, right? Tig put you all up to this, didn't he? I'm going to spend the whole day cowering for nothing." Sadly, it wouldn't have been the first day I spent cowering, but I'd had pretty good reasons, at least for me, the other times.
No one said a word. Roo continued to stare at me and then shook his head in a sorrowful manner. I always hated it when Roo was part of a practical joke because it was impossible to tell if he was pulling your leg or not. He had the most serious expression no matter what was going on.
I ducked under the common room table and rummaged through the chest by my pallet. I grabbed a slingshot and my wooden sword. Next I went to one of the small holes in the wall and pulled out a small bag of pixie dust. It was a little heavier than usual, which I figured was a good sign since it took a bunch of pixie dust to get me off the ground. "I'm going now," I called out, waiting to see if anyone would try to stop me or start snickering. Neither one happened and I noticed with a bit of alarm that Roo had buried himself beneath his pallet too.
A few minutes later I was outside and wondering how anyone could have thought I'd fallen for such an attempt at a joke. There was no way anything bad could happen. The sun was indeed full and shining brightly. There was a breeze full of the smells of honeysuckle and a few other things that was causing the branches of the trees to sway gently and make an awesome noise as it moved through the leaves. All-in-all it was a perfect day that had me thanking the powers that be once more that I'd been rescued from the 'real' world and made a Lost Boy. On that note, I started out for the strawberry patch I'd found the other day.
Lost Boys are lost in a lot of ways but when it comes to the Island, we can usually tell exactly where we are and how to get where we want to go. Even I had the ability a lot of the time and it had been about a month since I'd managed to misplace myself. It was near the apple orchard too, so I wasn't sure that it really counted since nothing seemed to work right near there. This time I couldn't blame it as after walking for awhile I suddenly realized I had no idea where I was. It wasn't the 'I've never been here before' feeling, but the feeling that shows up when you are positive you have absolutely no idea where you are. I tried retracing my steps and ended up being even more confused than before. I'm not real sure why, but whenever I get lost I end up walking faster. It doesn't make a lot of sense, but I guess if I move faster I figure I might come out at a place I'll recognize faster. That's why when the ground suddenly dropped off in front of me I couldn't stop in time. I might not move real fast, but once I get going sometimes it's hard to stop. I think inertia has a grudge against me.
The ground ended and I continued going and fell tumbling down the side of a pretty steep bank. If it had been the bank of the Little Bear or the Great Bear Rivers everything would have been okay. If it had been some nameless creek, that would have been fine. Even if it had been the cliffs on the eastern edge of the island that overlooked the sea and I'd broken my neck and all my bones it would have been better. Maybe. Instead I ended up in the middle of a skunk-mud bog. As the name implies, skunk-mud doesn't smell real nice. In fact to say it reeks would probably be understating the point greatly as evidenced by the withered condition of the plants and grass around it. Normally skunk-mud bogs are about three or four inches deep and about a foot or so wide. It would have been nice if this one had been normal. Instead it was about ten feet around and about four feet deep. It's not like quicksand, so you don't have to worry about drowning or anything if you can touch the bottom. What it is, is very clingy and sticky. I landed in the middle of the bog and quickly became covered in the stuff from head to paws. With a lot of struggling I managed to pull myself out and stood on one side of the bog. I felt like there was about fifty pounds of mud attached to me. The good news was that the flea that had been snacking on my scalp was gone.
Before I could even begin to think of where to start trying to go there was a crashing in the brush around me. It was one of those types that seem to be coming from everywhere at once and I whirled around in dramatic fashion trying to find out where it was coming from. In front of me a rather large tree was shoved over and a figure appeared. It looked to be about 8 or 9 feet tall, stood on two legs and was covered in fur, sort of like those pictures of Bigfoot or Sasquatch. It stood there staring at me for a moment and then said, "Bah," and began walking towards me.
Having used up all my courage last week and there not being enough time to have replaced it, I took off as fast as I could gallop in the opposite direction, just managing to avoid the skunk-mud bog. It turned out that not only was whatever it was bigger than me, it was a lot faster too. I suddenly felt myself hoisted off the ground and slung over the beast's shoulder.
"What are you doing? Put me down. HELP! Stop it. I don't belong to you." My whole collection of useful phrases for unknown beasts carrying me away was accomplishing nothing. The entire time I was yelling, all she said was, "Bah," over and over again while making abrupt nods with her head. Slung over her shoulder, I could only see those places we'd been and the trail of destruction that was being left behind as she pushed through trees, plants and rocks. I couldn't believe I'd never seen a trail left behind by the thing carrying me before.
She came to an abrupt stop and dropped me to the ground. The smell of the skunk-mud that was all over me was mixed with something else now. Something that smelled a little like rotten eggs. I peered around her legs and saw where she'd brought me. "No way!" I tried to get up and run at the same time but only managed to kick up great clods of dirt before she grabbed me around the middle. "I'm not taking a bath," I yelled. "You can't make me. Lost Boys don't take baths."
"Bah," she said emphatically before tossing me underhand into the bubbling pool. I had just enough time to close my eyes and hold my nose before I hit the surface of the water. Not only did it smell like sulfur but it was hot. Very hot. Not boiling hot, but 'feel like you were getting scalded' hot. I tried to get out but was casually thrown back in by the beast. I guess trying to get out of the 'tub' upset her because on my second attempt she grabbed a rock and waded in with me. She put me in a headlock and for the next hour proceeded to scrub me with the rock. I yelled, pleaded, begged and threatened, but none of it made any difference. By the time she was finished with everything from my neck down, I felt like a huge giant bruise. I was pretty sure there were new rips in my pelt and new scrapes in my skin. In fact I was a little surprised the water I was in wasn't tinged with orange. By the time she got to my head, I was suffering in silence since my throat was now killing me. She released me from the headlock and started scrubbing my head. She started with the top of my head and caused the hood of the pelt to come off my head. Her eyes got huge and she started yelling, "Na mn. Na mn." She turned and ran out of the water and disappeared into the woods.
I stood in the middle of the pool, listen to it bubble around me, wishing that I'd thought to do that a lot earlier. I thought long and hard before finally dunking my head underwater and washing my face off. I figured if I'd had 95% of a bath, I might as well get rid of the rest of the skunk-mud. I just hoped no one would ever find out.
After finishing the rest of the dreaded bath process, I started walking in no specific direction. I still didn't have any clue where I was or how to get to somewhere that I'd know where it was. As if that wasn't enough, my stomach was still rumbling because it had been cheated out of strawberries. The day was still warm, but there was a strong wind blowing that cut right through the wet bear pelt and caused me to start shivering. I thought back to the dire warnings concerning Thursday the nineteenth. I'd had some bad luck today, but it was pretty much a coincidence. I mean it wasn't really bad, bad luck or anything that would deserve its own day. In fact, from what was in front of me, my luck was about to change.
Walking had brought me to a big open meadow full of buttercups and clover. The wind died down and as I walked across the field, the sun was nice and warm. I reached the middle of the field and threw myself down in the middle of the flowers, which is what every Lost Boy knows is what you're supposed to do when you find yourself in such a place. Instead of snoozing in the sunlight, though, I got up as quickly as possible. I felt like I'd been poked by a bunch of sandburs or something. I bent down and took a close look at the buttercups and discovered they had thorns on them. They were little but very strong and sharp. I checked two or three other places around the meadow and found the same thing.
Sighing at the loss of snoozing in the sunshine, I headed back towards the woods, my stomach complaining even more loudly that it needed feeding. I tried arguing back that there was no way I was ever going to starve in a day's time. My belly was neither convinced nor impressed and continued letting me know about it. That's when my luck really changed. The first tree that I came to had a big hollow in it from which came the sound of buzzing. I carefully peered inside to see that it was a bee colony with a great number of honeycombs inside. While I'd had my mind set on strawberries, honey would do just as well. I took a few steps back and studied the situation.
While I may be the clumsiest Lost Boy, one of the things I can do really good is steal honey from bees. I had been made the chief honey raider by Pan and hadn't gotten stung yet. I eased my way back to the hive so the bees wouldn't get suspicious and carefully stuck a hand in. Another moment and I gently pulled it out holding a handful of honey. I was getting ready to eat it when a voice behind me said, "Bear."
I whirled around, honey flying everywhere, but didn't see a thing. That is until I looked down. Standing about ten feet away from me was a group of ten chipmunks. There wasn't anything extraordinary about this group of chipmunks if you didn't count the fact that they were standing on their hind legs, were dressed in some sort of military uniform that looked like it was from the 1800s, and the fact that nine of them were holding tiny bows loaded with arrows and pointed at me. The tenth one held a sword in the air. As I watched he lowered his sword and nine arrows flew towards my legs. A lot of them bounced off but a couple of them made it through pelt and skin. I howled and then brilliantly stood there and watched as they reloaded and repeated the whole thing. This time after howling, I started galloping away from the tree. I'd have thought that would have been good enough for them to call it quits, but instead I heard the sound of a bugle call. I turned around to see if this meant I was about to be swarmed by chipmunks.
It was not chipmunks that were swarming, but bees. Loads of them. My mind, being a bit overwhelmed at the sight of a zillion bees bearing down on me, pointed out that at least they weren't wearing uniforms. Under other circumstances that might have made me feel better, but about the time that thought ran through my mind, I got stung by one on my nose. I got stung on each cheek and a hand. While fear may give you wings, that's nothing to what fear and pain provide when it comes to galloping. I was galloping blindly since I was looking back to see how close they were when I tripped over something. I went tumbling down an embankment and ended up in… Yup, the skunk-mud bog. It should have been impossible since I absolutely, positively know I was running in a different direction, but there was no mistaking the trail of destruction leading away from the place. I might have whimpered.
It was at that point I entered full panic mode. I got out of the bog, not at all sure what's-her-face wouldn't suddenly reappear to give me another bath, and fled. I trotted up hills and… up hills. There were no downhill places. I jumped over streams and creeks and even tried to jump over a river (which didn't work at all). I fell and tumbled and made my way across blackberry brambles and thorn-bushes. By the time I stopped I had scrapes and cuts all over myself. I could barely see around my swollen nose and cheeks and I was missing about half of my bear pelt. I stank. I hurt. I was not as happy-go-lucky as I usually am.
It was while I was stood trying to catch my breath that I saw it. Strawberries plants as far as the eye could see loaded with red, ripe, juicy strawberries. Somehow I had managed to stumble across the place I'd been looking for all along. It wasn't a whoop of joy I gave, but more of a croak. My stomach rumbled in very major interest as it had long since given up on getting anything. I limped over to the nearest bush, picked one of the strawberries and took a bite. A second later I was spitting it out. "Gross, this isn't a strawberry," I said out loud in disgust.
"Of course it's not a strawberry you liltzrot." I turned to see an elf standing behind me. "This belongs to his lordship Sir Fragum. In order to enhance his environment, his lordship has put in a grove of wax strawberry plants. The deer don't eat them. Nor should extremely corpulent Lost Boys," he added unnecessarily. "You'll have to pay for that."
I gave him a shilling that I found in my pocket. He frowned mightily at the fact it took several shakes of my hand to get it loose since it was the paw that had been in the honey. "By the way, are you aware of the fact that you are extremely odious," he said as he stood there to make sure I walked away in case I decided to have another wax strawberry. I couldn't argue with him.
"The rest of the guys are pretty impressed that you actually survived," Red said, handing me a handful of sand to use to scrub the pelt again. I had managed to make it back to Hangman's Tree yesterday, but I stank so bad that I was told I wouldn't be allowed in until I didn't smell quite as 'odious'. "It's one thing to smell, but that just stinks," Peter himself had told me. I had decided not to risk another bath on Thursday the nineteenth, so I had waited until today to take one. Red had come along to make sure I didn't drown myself.
"I didn't know. I figured it was just a joke or something," I croaked out. My throat was still sore and I could still barely see anything through swollen cheeks and nose. Fortunately I'd been able to just pull out the tiny arrows from my legs and Roo said, from a distance, that none of the other stuff looked as though it would kill me right away.
"We wouldn't do that. Not about Thursday the nineteenth. That stuff you just don't kid about."
As I suffered through my second bath in two days, I heartily agreed with him and knew exactly what I'd be doing the next time Thursday the nineteenth wandered by.