chapter two

Dad usually sings when he walks into the store. Dumb songs mostly, like “How Much is that Doggie in the Window?” He also stops to say hi to everyone—even strangers— and to pet the animals. He’s often got dog biscuits or cat treats in his pockets.

Not today.

Today Dad rushed by all of us and headed straight to his office at the back of the store. I was cleaning out the rabbit pen, but I saw him go by. When he slammed the door behind him, Cottontail went to hide underneath a log. All I could see of her was the end of one brown floppy ear.

I reached under a clump of hay until I found a small red wool ball. When I rolled it in Cottontail’s direction, she peeked out from under the hay, her nostrils quivering. Cottontail’s obsessed with cat toys.

“Everything okay this morning?” a soft voice behind me asked.

“Hey, Amy,” I said, turning around. Amy’s our bird girl. She looks like a punk rocker, but she’s actually studying to be a vet tech.

“Birds fed?” Amy asked.

“Yup.”

“Elmo still here? Nobody stole him?”

“Still here.” Amy made the same joke every morning. She knew how much I loved Elmo.

“We’re expecting a shipment of fledgling lovebirds. I could use a little help when they get here.”

After Amy left for the aviary, I finished changing the hay. Rabbits don’t just sleep in hay, they eat it. It would be like us eating our sheets.

Once I’d finished in the rabbit pen, I walked over to Dad’s office. On the way, I passed the fish department. Trout, our aquarium guy, was skimming the deads, using a gauzy strainer to remove the fish that had died overnight. Dead fish are part of aquarium life, but they don’t make a good impression.

I knocked.

When Dad didn’t say anything, I knocked again.

“Who is it?” Dad sounded tense.

“It’s me, Tim.”

“Come on in.” Though he’d invited me in, I had the feeling he didn’t really want me hanging around.

Dad was hunched over his computer. There was a spreadsheet on the screen. That meant he was working on the budget. Realco—the real estate company that owns the Lasalle Mall—had offered us six months’ free rent as incentive to move Four Feet and Feathers.

I knew Dad was worried about what would happen next month when we had to start paying rent. It was going to be way more expensive than the old location, and it didn’t take an accountant to know that sales this summer had been kind of slow.

Dad hadn’t asked my opinion about the move. It was his store, and I was just a kid. If he had asked, I’d have told him I wasn’t worried about money. I was worried about the animals. A bigger store meant Dad had brought in more animals, but he hadn’t hired extra staff to take care of them. That meant more work for all of us and less attention for the animals.

“Everything okay, Dad?” I didn’t know what else to say. For the first time I noticed Dad’s hair—it’s the same brown as mine— had some silver in it.

“Uh-huh,” Dad said, without lifting his eyes from the computer screen.

“Want anything from the food court? Coffee? Blueberry muffin?”

“Nah.” Dad waved me out of his office. “Just trying to balance these books,” he muttered. It sounded more like he was talking to himself than to me.

When I let myself out of Dad’s office, I practically tripped on a piece of shiny black material.

“Rodney! You’ve gotta be more careful with that cape.”

Rodney looked up at me with sad brown eyes. I’d hurt his feelings.

“Er...Phantom of Doom, I should say.”

Rodney lips curled up a little at the sides. He loved it when people called him Phantom of Doom.

“Whatcha doin’ here, Phantom?”

Rodney’s eyes dropped to the tile floor. “My mom needed cereal. So she left me here. Said she’d be back in half an hour.”

I’d never met Rodney’s mom. But she must have bought groceries one item at a time, because she was always leaving Rodney at Four Feet and Feathers. I guess she hadn’t read the sign posted out front: All children under age ten must be accompanied by an adult.

“Okay then, Rod—er...Phantom,” I said, “let’s go see how the Red Ears are doing.”

As Rodney followed me to the terrarium where the Red Ear turtles live, his cape dragging on the floor, I thought he was kind of like a puppy. And if Rodney had a tail, he’d be wagging it.