The Goat E-Book

Anne Fleming

• Herausgeber: Pushkin Children's Books
• Kategorie: Für Kinder und Jugendliche
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2018

Seitenzahl: 154

Beschreibung

A kid named Kid, a dog named Cat, and a goat on a roof A blind skateboarding writer, an old man who can't speak (and his wife), a smartly dressed non-hamster-owner, plus Kid and her parents, are all apparently sharing their Manhattan apartment building with a mountain goat. But in all the wonders and marvels of New York City, who has time to see this impossible goat? How did the goat even get there? And is the goat really capable of something a little like magic? In this tender and hilarious tale of a misplaced animal, a road trip, and a Broadway show, neighbours who were previously strangers may find the goat is just what they needed... ANNE FLEMING is the author of Pool-Hopping and Other Stories (shortlisted for the Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize, the Danuta Gleed Award and the Governor General's Award), Anomaly and Gay Dwarves of America. She is a long-time and highly regarded teacher of creative writing who has taught at the University of British Columbia, Emily Carr University of Art and Design, Douglas College, Kwantlen University College and the Banff Centre for the Arts. The Goat is her first full-length work for young readers. Anne lives in Vancouver.

Leseprobe

For Kaden

Contents

Title PageDedication  123456  AcknowledgementsAbout the AuthorAbout the PublisherCopyright

1

Once there was a mountain goat who lived in New York City. The building he lived on had great views and many sturdy ledges to stand on high above the metropolis.

Unfortunately, not much grew on the building. Not much a goat could eat.

True, there was that bucket of hay that appeared on the upper ledge each morning. And there were cedars on the penthouse deck, and people put out window boxes every now and then.

But the bucket was a snack, he’d eaten the cedars down to the bark, and geraniums don’t go far when you’re a goat.

One or two tenants persisted in planting and replanting, determined to have success with one hardy breed of plant or another. But at last, even Mrs. Fenniford-Lysinski had to concede defeat.

For a while it seemed as if wheatgrass had done the trick. It grew faster than any plant Doris Fenniford-Lysinski had ever met. But Doris’s wheatgrass never grew past two inches, and one day she discovered it chewed right down to the roots.

“How can grass un-grow?” Doris asked her husband, Jonathan.

“I o o,” said Jonathan from behind the paper.

Doris kept a keen eye on her wheatgrass, but she never saw anything eating it. That’s because the goat waited for Doris to go to the bathroom before he mowed the wheatgrass with his teeth.

“O,” replied Jonathan, when Doris came back and asked how on earth her grass had un-grown while she was in the loo.

“O” meant “goat,” but unfortunately Doris could not understand Jonathan because Jonathan had had a stroke that impaired his speech. Since he could not make Doris understand, Jonathan went back to the paper.

In truth, Jonathan liked knowing that the goat had eaten the wheatgrass and that Doris did not know. He could have written it down (as he was wont to do when he absolutely had to communicate with Doris), or rather typed it on the little tablet computer she had bought him, but he didn’t feel like it.

Jonathan didn’t feel like much, these days.

One morning, a kid named Kid moved into the building. Kid knew nothing about the goat. How could she? She was from Toronto.

“We’re in New York!” Kid’s mom said when their plane landed. “Where we’re going to live! For a very short time! Because our show will close within a week!”

Actually, regardless what happened with the show, they were staying at least four months — maybe six — depending on the cousin.

The cousin was a distant one. Wealthy, older, prone to popping off to pleasant climes for four to six months at a time. Normally he took his dog with him. But this time he was going to England, where they didn’t allow dogs.

“What?” Kid said. “They don’t allow dogs in England?”

“Well, they do, obviously,” said her dad. “Walkies and everything.” Here he imitated a famous British dog trainer from before Kid was born. “But they quarantine them. If you want to move to England with a dog you have to leave it in a kennel for half a year.”

So they were looking after the cousin’s dog. While leaving Kid’s cat at home with Nana. How was that fair?

They were also staying in the cousin’s apartment. Near Central Park. Where they were pulling up right now.

Her mother was just about falling over with excitement.

“Look! It has an awning,” cried Kid’s mom.

Kid looked. Yes, a narrow green canvas canopy stretched from the door across the sidewalk to the curb. Woo.

“That’s great, Lisa,” Kid’s dad said. “Can you pay the cab driver?” He got out of the cab. Kid roused herself enough to do the same.

It was early. They had got up at four in the morning to catch their flight. She was very sleepy.

“I’m paying a cab driver in New York!” Kid’s mom said, then folded up her wallet and got out of the car.

A man with a maroon captain’s hat and matching jacket with brass buttons opened the door under the awning.

“There’s a doorman!” Lisa said in a stage whisper. “Doorman!” she said in a regular voice. “Hello!”

“Lady!” said the doorman as he intercepted the suitcases from Kid’s dad. “Can you get the door?”

“I’m getting the door for the doorman!” said Lisa. “In New York!”

Kid was too tired to pay much attention, but as she rolled her eyes, she thought she saw a blur of white at the top of the building, like a tiny low-hanging cloud.

The tiny low-hanging cloud was the goat. The goat was hungry. Hungry, hungry, hungry.

Just over the way, just over there, was food. A valley full of it. Grass. Flowers. Leaves. Reeds. Bark. All kinds of stuff.

All he had to do was trip to the back of the foothill, zip down the clangy black cliff, drop to the ground, tuck around the corner, navigate the gray purposeless ledge — who needs a ledge on the ground? — and cross the black river of giant moving clumps.

He would go do it right now. Yes, he would. Yes, he was doing it. He was trotting along the ridge to the clangy cliff. He was looking down the clangy cliff, the only thing that lay between him and all the food he could eat …

Except for the gray purposeless ledge down in the valley. Oh, and the noisy tree-ish creatures that roamed the ledge. Plus the river of giant moving clumps.

If only he could brave the clangy cliff at last. The clangy cliff and the purposeless ledge and the river of clumps.

Could he?

Yes. He could. Definitely. Today. Right n —

— later. Right now he needed to eat.

He leapt a zig — clang — and a zag — clang — of the cliff. The clangs, it must be said, were the lightest of clangs. His hooves had soft inner pads that cushioned each landing. The noisy tree-ish creatures did not even seem to hear them.

But they were still clangs. The goat paused and danger-checked after each one.

He leapt to the bucket ledge. Paused. Danger-checked. Went on. Turned the corner.

There it was, the bucket. Full, said his nostrils. He trotted closer, danger-checked.

Was the cave-cover closed?

Yes. Yes, it was.

All right. It was safe. Safe-ish. Mm, the smell was so good. The taste so good. Eating was so good. So so good. So so …

Over. The bucket was empty.

Time to check the grass. The grass was back around the corner and one ledge down.

Had it grown back yet? Had it?

It had not.

Back up to the roof. Back along the ridge. Back to the cedars. Up on his hind hoofs.

Could he reach? He could not. He’d have to jump. Jump and bite. Jump and bite.

He spent the next hour jumping for cedar. With each jump he felt a tiny inner memory of gamboling, his early days with his mother on the cliffside.

One day he would gambol again. One day. When his stomach was full. When he was safe.

Safe-ish. You were never entirely safe.

Here came the soft-footed friendly wolfish thing.

Good morning. It feels good to pee, doesn’t it?

The soft-footed friendly wolfish thing was a seeing-eye dog, a yellow lab named Michigan. Michigan went back inside through the doggie door off the penthouse deck and nosed his owner’s hand.

“What’s that noise, Michigan?” said his owner, Joff. “That hoofy noise. Like the pigeons are wearing wooden shoes. Felted wooden shoes.”

Michigan wagged his tail. Michigan knew it was a goat. Michigan and the goat were friends. But Michigan had no way of telling Joff that.

“I’m not getting very far, Michigan,” said Joff.

He was working on a novel that was going to be totally different from the last book. No dragons. No samurai. The Plates of Barifna, it was called. Joff worked every night from one in the morning until seven or until he had written two thousand words, whichever came first.

Right now it was 6:55.

He had written thirty-six words.

The plates of Barifna were not dinner plates but tectonic plates. Barifna was a planet whose core was heating up and so its tectonic plates were moving at a much faster rate than they do on earth and smashing mountains into place within a month or two. Volcanoes erupted continuously along subversion zones.

Barifna had been a happy planet until exploited by human-like people, who treated it like one vast mine, extracting ore that they needed to fuel their warp-speed inter-planetary travel. Now it was taking revenge. The people did not realize that Barifna was a sentient planet in a galaxy of sentient planets, but by the end of the book they would. They would learn that they were, in fact, parasites, and that it is not in the interest of parasites to kill their host.

His main character, Martin —

What was that noise?

Joff went out to the deck, Michigan by his side. The air misted his cheeks.

Was that a snort?

“Who’s there?” he said, not really thinking anyone was. But something had made a clop noise. Something had made a snorty sound.

Was that breathing he heard beyond his own and Michigan’s? He could not say.

He heard pigeons prring, shouts from the street twelve stories below. The clanging of truck doors going up. The wheels of hand-trucks rolling.

“Spiderman in clogs? Clogman? Superman with a cold and lead feet?”

He rubbed a hand over his face, feeling the stubble on his jaw.

“Maybe I just need to sleep.”

His computer beeped at him. Seven o’clock. He groaned.

“All right,” he said. “I’m going to sleep. I’m going to sleep, and tonight, I’ll nail it. I’ll sit down, type-type-type-type-type, and two thousand words will appear just like magic. I’ll nail it.”

He brushed his teeth, washed his face, put in his earplugs, fell into bed and then fell into sleep.

Three floors down, in Apartment 908, Jonathan was waking up. He opened his left eye. His right stayed half-shut.

Another day. Grump. Doris was in the bathroom, singing. She had the coffee on. He could smell it. She’d be in in a moment.

Good morning, she’d say cheerfully, whipping off the covers like a peppy, mad nurse. Let’s get these limbs moving!

Here she was now. Her white hair was neatly brushed, her neck scarf neatly knotted. Good God, she looked like an airline stewardess!

“Good morning!” she said cheerfully. She whipped off the covers. “Let’s get these limbs moving!”

Jonathan groaned. She lifted his right leg and manipulated it so his knee bent then straightened, bent and straightened, bent and straightened.

“Now you,” she shouted.

I can hear you, he fumed in his head.

He lifted his leg about two inches off the bed, then dropped it.

“Again. Left leg. Come on, now,” shouted Doris.

Lift. Drop. Bah.

“Arm,” shouted Doris. “Come on, Jonathan.”

Leave me alone.

She wrangled his arm, not reading his telepathy at all, or ignoring it if she did.

“Now, up you get.” Doris helped Jonathan into a sitting position. She brought his walker forward, helped him stand, helped him get on his housecoat, let him fumble his way into the bathroom.

At least she let him pee alone now. Jonathan finished, washed and grumbled and shuffled to the breakfast table.

“Lift your feet, darling,” said Doris. “Do try.”

Jonathan glowered.

“I’ve got wonderful hot cereal for you.”

And so it went. Unrelenting cheerfulness. Minimal movement from maximum effort. Troops of people in and out of the house to “help him get better.” Physiotherapist, occupational therapist, massage therapist, speech therapist. All madly cheerful, all career optimists.

And he could do nothing about it, not even tell Doris to shut up.

“What flavor wheatgrass juice would you like this morning? Banana-strawberry? Kiwi-lime? Blueberry?”

Vinegar vomit, thought Jonathan.

“I know you don’t like it, dear, but it does do wonders! All that chlorophyll!”

I am not a plant. You’ve been duped by yet another fad.

After delivering his vinegar vomit, Doris brought the wheatgrass in again.

“It’s not pigeons eating it,” she said. “What else could it be? You don’t get rats up this high, do you?”

Jonathan didn’t answer.

“Jonathan, I wish you’d talk to me,” said Doris.

“I a,” he shouted.

“Don’t be silly,” she said. “Of course you can.”

Meanwhile, two floors up, in Apartment 1103, Kenneth P. Gill hummed through his morning routine. He brought in the empty hay bucket from the ledge, leaving the window open, just in case. He showered, shaved, put on his nicely ironed shirt and his pleasing suit, his spiffy shoes. He phoned his mom, sent an email to his ex-wife, arranged dinner with friends and tried not to think too much about the goat.

Goat? he said to himself. What goat?

2

Down in the lobby, a tall man with a big-headed white dog at his knee held out both hands toward Kid’s dad.

“Bobby!” he cried, putting his hands on Kid’s dad’s cheeks just as if he were ten. “Look at you, all grown up. I haven’t seen you since you were this kid’s age!”

He tossed Kid’s dad’s head back and forth between his two hands. “Hello! Welcome!”

“I’m Doug,” he said to Kid and her mom. Kid feigned extra sleepiness in order to look like she was not paralyzed by shyness. He looked down at the dog. “This is Cat.”

Cat? Kid was leaving her actual, real cat at home to look after a dog with a big nose and weeny eyes named Cat?

Cat wagged her tail.

“This is Lisa,” said Kid’s dad. “And Kid.”

Doug shook Kid’s hand. His was big and warm and like his face smiling down on her it radiated bonhomie. But she could only get her eyes as far as his ear. That was what happened when she met new people.

“Doug and Cat?” said Kid’s mom, raising her eyebrows.

“Kid?” said Doug with the same expression.

There was a pause and then both moved their shoulders in a way that meant, I like you.

“What a relief,” said Doug in the elevator. “I thought you’d be the same, Bobby, but of course you never know. I couldn’t leave Cat with just anybody.”

The elevator doors opened.

“Properly, her name is Catherine the Great, but we’ve always called her Cat, haven’t we?” Doug said, rubbing Cat’s jowls. “Yes, we have.”

Kid kept an eye out for someone else to explain the “we” business, but in the apartment there was a very small kitchen, a living room with a dining ell, one small bedroom and one tiny bedroom with a desk and a Murphy bed and no other people.

“Cat, of course, is the best dog in the world,” he went on. “But you will discover that for yourselves. I’m leaving you The Book of Cat.” He showed them a hardcover book he had put together and went on to explain its contents. What food she liked, when she liked it, where she ate it, where she liked to go in the park, and so on.

Kid collapsed onto the couch. Cat jumped up, turned around twice, curled up next to her and put her chin on Kid’s leg.

All right. Maybe she was sweet. But she was not the best dog in the world. The best dog in the world was a cat.

Wait. That was almost what Doug had said. Ha. Joke.

Kid fell asleep.

She slept until two in the afternoon and woke hungry. Someone had put a blanket over her.

Where was she?

Oh. New York. With Cat. The dog. Who was so warm. Mm. You could see her skin under her fur. On a lot of creatures this would be gross. On Cat it wasn’t. It was perfect. Her eyes also seemed to convey perfect understanding. As if they were saying, I am sorry you couldn’t bring your cat.

Kid found she had already forgiven her. Kid was simply not going to think about Fleabag. She was not.

There.

Faint noises arose from the street — car horns, engines, a bash and clang or two, the hissing of tires on wet roads. Closer, rain went plat, plat on the windows. The apartment itself was quiet.

Her parents must be sleeping, too. Yes, there was a little snort from her father, a sigh from her mother. She padded eight steps down the short hall and peered into the small bedroom. They lay in their clothes on the bed, her dad on his back, mouth open, her mother curled on her side.

Kid sighed. They were so excited about New York. They kept trying to explain what made it so much better than Toronto.

She wasn’t convinced.

Here she was, though, in this neat, crowded living room with its tall dark bookshelves, comfy chairs, end tables neatly stacked with art books, and a dog on the couch.

It was okay but it was Someone Else’s. It smelled different. Like pencils.

Two windows looked across a broad busy street to Central Park, gray and misty in the September rain, the treetops dulled to silver.

On the dining-room table was Doug’s The Book of Cat. It was a sketchbook, really, with an ink-and-watercolor drawing on the front of Cat curled up on the couch, exactly as she was curled right now.

Doug was a good artist. Kid opened it.

Underneath another sketch of Cat, this time standing bulldoggishly with head cocked, it said, My name is Catherine the Great. But you may call me Cat.

Do you know the important things in life?

Each of the important things was illustrated.

Food. Here there was a food bowl.

Sleep. Cat asleep in three different poses.

Walks. Cat and Doug from behind on a path in the woods.

Rats. An overhead view of a rat running away from Cat.

Singing. Cat and Doug singing.

Singing?

People. Three people sitting on a park bench, Cat running up to them.

Things that approximate rats. A tennis ball.

Here is how I like to spend my day: