Gator on the Loose! Read online

  Daddy always swaggered a little when he put his waders or his big gloves on.

  “Daddy,” Keisha said when he got close enough. “What does the pool water feel like?”

  Daddy removed a glove and leaned over. “Cool,” he said. “Ahhh … cool. You think the little guy is going to stay put?”

  “Who is going to stay put? Why?” Razi wanted to know. He was tugging on Keisha’s arm. “When can I see the goggles?”

  “Alligators are poikilothermic, Razi,” Daddy told him. “That means cold-blooded. You are warm-blooded and can stay warm even when it’s cold by putting on sweaters and mittens. Cold-blooded animals like alligators and snakes get as cold as it is outside their bodies, and then they just—”

  “They freeze up,” Keisha interrupted. Razi didn’t care about the science as much as she did. “Daddy, if you go slow, maybe you can put the noose around his snout. If his mouth is closed and we can catch him, then we can roll him in the tarp.”

  “That sounds like a plan. As I recall, alligators have lots of muscles for clamping down, but not opening up. Their mouths are easy to hold shut.”

  “If he’s frozen, how come he’s running away from Grandma?” Razi asked, turning everyone’s attention back to the pool.

  Later, Keisha would think that the sight of her grandma rushing toward that poor little alligator and waving her arms like she did when she was rooting for the Langston Hughes Elementary School girls’ basketball team—from an alligator’s-eye view—would have been enough to make his blood run cold even if the pool water had warmed up.

  Grandma was shouting, “Get ready, Fred. I’m sending him your way!”

  It seemed like a good idea, but it didn’t quite work the way Grandma thought it would. Instead of running away from Grandma and across the pool deck, the alligator scuttled deeper into the water. After a few kicks, he was able to dive down and swim underwater all the way to the deep end.

  Daddy looked back over at Keisha.

  “FTC,” they said at the very same time.

  “FTC” stood for “Failure to Communicate.” When you worked with scared or injured wildlife, you needed to stay calm and have a good plan. Failure to communicate was one of the Carter family’s biggest problems, especially when Grandma was in on the rescue operation.

  Mr. Ramsey had rushed out to Grandma. He helped her back to the pool office by holding on to her arm—very OL—and was looking over his shoulder as if some monster had just jumped into the pool and not a poor scared alligator that was barely the size of the rescue tube.

  “Looks like it will be Plan B,” Daddy said as he leaned back against the fence and crossed his arms, which made his waders squeak impressively. “Remind me again about Plan B?”

  “The problem with catching him is that alligators can see all the way around their head … and they can feel when anything enters or leaves the water.”

  Daddy crossed his arms the other way. “Goodness, this sounds like something the United States Army would be interested in.”

  “Hmmm.” What Keisha wanted was to jump over the fence and get into the action herself. She was small enough to lie on the diving board and not let a shadow fall onto the pool. But she took one look at Daddy all covered up and decided not to even ask.

  “They don’t have big lungs, so they can’t move fast for long. You could chase him around the pool until he gets ti—”

  Keisha stopped. “What was that?” An alligator’s eyes were peering at her from the deep end of the pool. He was swishing his tail back and forth in the water!

  She took Razi’s hand and pointed.

  “He’s trying to get warm,” Keisha told Razi. She looked at the dark tarp absorbing sun on the pool deck, where Daddy had let it fall in a pile.

  “I think he knows he has to get out of the water, Daddy. If you go throw the tarp over that play alligator, he might want to hide underneath it.”

  Grandma was back on the pool deck waving the pole with the net attached, the one they used to skim off the leaves and bugs from the surface of the water.

  That gave Keisha another idea. “Maybe we should get a bigger alligator to scare the little one!”

  Daddy looked at Keisha over his shoulder. “Say what? Don’t you think one alligator in the city pool is enough?”

  “It doesn’t have to be a real alligator. The little one just has to think so.”

  It took Daddy a minute to warm up to Keisha’s idea, but then it must have clicked because he cupped his hands around his mouth and yelled in the direction of Grandma: “Mom! CFC.”

  “CFC” stood for “Carter Family Conference.” Most times when the Carters had a Failure to Communicate, they needed to follow it up with a Carter Family Conference.

  Daddy grabbed the tarp and took it over by the fiberglass alligator. He tossed the tarp over it and tucked all the loose ends under. Keisha wondered if such a place would look warm and safe—like a hole on the riverbank—to a little alligator.

  Grandma let her net drop to her side and put her hand on her hip. Keeping close to the fence, Daddy walked around and whispered a few things into her ear. Grandma whispered back and disappeared into Mr. Ramsey’s office.

  The next thing Keisha knew, Justin was taking the spine board off the wall and he and Mr. Ramsey were carrying it through the pool office.

  Razi tugged on Keisha’s arm. In all the excitement, she’d forgotten about her little brother.

  “What are they doing now, Key?”

  “I’m not sure. Let’s watch.”

  Razi grabbed hold of the fence and started reciting one of their hand-clapping rhymes: “In came the doctor, in came the nurse, in came the lady with the alligator purse.”

  “Razi, not so loud. We want the alligator to come back by us. Shhh … look.”

  Justin and Mr. Ramsey trotted past them, just inside the fence, with the spine board. Mr. Ramsey couldn’t stop looking over his shoulder for the alligator.

  “Where are you going?” Razi asked, and took off after them. “Can I come? Can I ride on that?”

  The fence by the deep end was only about fifteen feet from the pool. Justin and Mr. Ramsey stopped there. It looked like they were waiting for Daddy’s signal. Keisha watched as Daddy walked slowly back to the fiberglass alligator in the shallow end. As soon as he took his place, he waved at Justin and Mr. Ramsey. They began heaving and ho-ing, and that’s when Keisha knew what had been decided at the CFC. On the count of three, the spine board sailed through the air. Nothing makes a small alligator get out of the water faster than what he thinks is a big one, because it is a little-known fact that alligators eat each other! If you didn’t know any better and you were a small, scared alligator, you might think the spine board was a very big alligator.

  When it landed on the pool surface, that little alligator dove down so fast it was hard to keep track of him.

  “Where is the little bugger?” Grandma had put on her sun visor and was scanning the surface of the pool.

  Keisha had better eyes. She saw him scuttle out of the water and dive under the folds of the canvas tarp. Daddy did, too. Quick as a flash, he was there, stepping on the open end with his big waders.

  Mr. Ramsey called out, “Need any help over there?”

  Grandma was power-walking over to where Daddy was busy making sure there were no avenues for escape.

  “I think we’ve got it covered,” she said.

  “There is something you can do,” Daddy called back to Mr. Ramsey. “Will you get the dog crate from the back of the truck and maybe a hamburger patty from the snack bar?”

  “Sure, but it’s frozen.”

  “Never mind, then. This little guy is cold enough as it is.”

  Grandma stood over the tarp with her hands on her hips. “I was hoping this wouldn’t take all day. I don’t know about you-all, but I’ve got work to do.”

  “On Saturday?”

  “I’m designing my own jeans. Mid-rise, boot cut … generous, kind to the silhouette. I’m think
ing YSL.”

  “Yves Saint Laurent?” Keisha had been around Grandma long enough to know some of the fashion designers she liked.

  “No, no. Mid-rise, boot cut … it all adds up to Youthful Senior Legs.”

  Chapter Three

  Mrs. Carter grew up on a ranch in Nigeria. Nigeria is on the western coast of Africa right near the equator. Half the year, it is dusty and hot. Half the year, it is rainy and hot. In Nigeria, there are tropical rain forests and deserts and almost everything in between. Mama grew up near the Jos Plateau, in a vast grassy area called a savanna.

  During the dusty times, Mama often had to sweep twice a day. She had always liked things tidy, even now in Michigan, where half the year the dust was frozen! Mama also liked to keep the animals out of the house. She knew that there were times when you had to bring the animals in, such as when they were babies or very sick. But she reminded her children many, many times that the goats and sheep they raised in Nigeria were kept in pens on the other side of the courtyard from the house.

  For all these reasons—lots of animals, enough dirt already—Mama was not interested in any CFPs. “CFP” stood for “Carter family pet.” The only person in the Carter family who used this abbreviation was Keisha. It used to be when she went to her friends’ houses and saw their puppies(!), their kittens(!), their gerbils(!) she would ask Mama if she would think about changing her no-pets rule. But Mama knew what Mama knew, and Keisha’s mama did not want one more animal in the house.

  That was why when Mama carried baby Paulo into the house, all the other Carters sat quietly in the kitchen, picking at their peanut butter and banana sandwiches. No one knew how to tell Mama about the alligator upstairs in the bathtub, with Grandma outside the bathroom door reading her Harper’s Bazaar magazine for denim inspiration.

  Grandma wasn’t guarding the door because the Carters thought the alligator would open it. She was guarding the door because, as with everything else in the very old house, it was hard to make it stay shut on its own. In all the excitement of bringing home their first alligator, no one could find the big skeleton key that locked that door.

  “One sticky baby,” Mama said, giving Daddy first a kiss and then the baby. Paulo liked to dangle. Daddy just let him hang there in the air, a smile on his adorable face. He was chewing on a Popsicle stick, and Popsicle juice was all over his hands and down the front of his jumpsuit.

  “Where’s Grandma Alice?” Mama asked, setting down a string bag full of vegetables from the farmers’ market. “Keisha, when you are finished with your sandwich, I want you to go up and run the bathwater so Daddy can give the baby a bath.”

  Keisha and Daddy and Razi looked at each other and then back down at their plates.

  “Look at these greens,” Mama said, holding up a bunch of spinach so the children could admire it. “After I rinse them, they’re going in the pepper soup.”

  Most people didn’t make soup in the summer, but Mama had a pot bubbling all year long. She especially liked to make red pepper soup out of tomatoes and peppers and chicken broth. Then she added whatever meat and vegetables she had around.

  In Nigeria, guests expect to be fed when they stop by, and it is considered rude if you don’t have enough food to offer them. Mama made food for her family as well as food for anyone who liked to drop in. The postman, Mr. Sanders, loved Mama’s pepper soup. He said it was the only thing that cleared his sinuses. Mama’s soups were spicy. That was how she’d learned to make them. A lot of Keisha’s friends said “No thank you” when Mama offered them soup.

  “Razi, what are you doing with your lips?” Mama asked in her and-don’t-pretend-you-don’t-know-what-I’m-talking-about voice. Razi was pinching his lips together. Keisha knew exactly what Razi was doing. He was trying to keep the secret in.

  “Don’t forget to breathe, son,” Daddy whispered.

  Razi took in a big, noisy breath through his nose.

  “There’s something wrong here,” Mama said, her hands on her hips. “What is caught inside your mouth, Razi? Tell me now.”

  “But, Mama, you’re the one who says the mouth should not relate everything the eye sees,” Keisha reminded her mother.

  “Yes, but that does not include keeping secrets from Mama.”

  “Well …” Keisha looked at her dad. There wasn’t much hope of keeping it hidden.

  “There’s an alligator in the bathtub,” Razi blurted out, panting hard. He had forgotten to breathe. “Want to see it?”

  “There’s an alligator in my bathtub?” Mama repeated, taking baby Paulo back and cradling him in her arms. She must have been in shock because Paulo put his sticky fingers all over her necklace and she didn’t even notice.

  “It’s Lyle, Lyle, Crocodile, only it’s an alligator and it doesn’t talk, but it has goggly eyes that can see behind its head!”

  Keisha sighed. When Razi tried to keep a secret, it was like putting a kink in the hose. Once you undid the kink, the water spurted everywhere.

  “Now we need Hector P. Valenti to come and take him back to the circus,” said Razi. “When I grow up, I want a mustache like Hector P. Valenti!”

  “Hector P. Valenti?” Mama turned to Keisha and raised one of her eyebrows, just a bit, which usually meant Child, you are getting on my last nerve!

  “We heard a story about a crocodile named Lyle at story time yesterday,” Keisha said. “In the story, he lived with a family, but his real owner worked in the circus.”

  “His mustache was this long.” Razi flung out his arms. “And stiff. Daddy said you could hang an umbrella on it.”

  Now it was Daddy’s turn to get Mama’s high-eyebrow look. Everyone knew where Razi got his talent for exaggerating. “Not a beach umbrella,” Daddy said. “More like a parasol. Anyway, Mr. Valenti’s mustache is not the point here. We’re not set up for large reptiles out back, Fay, and we had to get the chlorine off him.”

  Mama pulled out a kitchen chair and sat down. The baby was in her lap, and the greens were in his. Paulo squished the spinach with his little fingers and smiled.

  “You were going to the city pool,” Mama said, trying to piece it together.

  “That’s where we got him!” Razi told his mom. “Grandma yelled him into the deep end and then the spy board scared him into a big bag.”

  “Spine board, Razi.” Keisha turned to Mama. “It needs to get a little warmer before he can be outside. We could make a little shelter. Just until we can figure out what to do with him.”

  “I wanted to run through the sprinkler with him, but Daddy said that would make some chaos,” Razi informed his mother.

  “I said ‘cause chaos,’ buddy. Can you imagine what the neighbors would think of us if we put the alligator in a purple polka-dot bikini and let it run through the sprinkler out back?”

  Whenever Mama looked like she was going to get mad, Daddy tried to jolly her out of it by saying something funny. The fact that Mama was not smiling now was a sign that an alligator in her bathtub made her very unhappy. She stood up again, holding Paulo close on her hip. She went to the stove and turned the gas on low under her soup. Setting a bowl in the sink, Mama pulled the bunch of greens from the baby’s hands and dropped them in. She let Paulo dangle over the sink and swish his hands in the water to rinse off the sand and grit.

  “Can this really be the same bathtub, Fred, that just got the new enamel? What will alligator toenails do to my new enamel?”

  “We put a wet beach towel underneath him. I’m hoping that will protect it.”

  Mama handed the baby to Keisha and tossed the rinsed spinach into the pot. Then she picked up the bowl of rinse water, carried it to the back door and poured the water over the roses that grew by the step.

  “So tell me,” Mama said when she had dried out the bowl and put it back in the cupboard. “How big is this alligator that is not in my tub?”

  “Not too big,” Keisha told her mom. “Maybe three loaves of bread and a tail?”

  “And does that make it a baby?�
��

  “Well, not exactly. But he was crying for his mother.”

  Mama looked over her shoulder at Keisha. She never could stand to hear a baby cry. “How do you know that?”

  “I’m not positively sure,” Keisha said, unsticking a banana from some peanut butter and popping it into Paulo’s mouth. “But in my report, I learned a little something about how alligators communicate, and that’s what I think he was doing. But it’s a lot different reading about it in a book and hearing it in real—”

  “It crawled out of the bathtub!” Grandma yelled down from the top of the stairs. “Want me to get some towels?”

  Daddy tilted back in his chair and turned to face the doorway. “Just make sure to keep the door closed, Mom.”

  Keisha knew from the look on her mother’s face that Mama understood now there really, really was an alligator in the bathtub and this wasn’t just one of Razi’s make-believe stories or Daddy trying to pull her leg.

  “Sorry?” Grandma yelled back. “I’m getting some feedback in my transmitter.”

  Though she hated how OL they looked, Grandma did have to wear hearing aids. It helped some that they came in designer colors now and not just “flesh.”

  “The door, Mom. Make sure the bathroom door stays closed.”

  “Why should I answer the door when you-all are so much closer to it?”

  Everyone froze, listening to the sound of Grandma clattering back down the hall.

  “Jumpin’ Jimmy Choo,” she said. “Where’d it go now? I could swear that door was closed.”

  Chapter Four

  The entire Carter family, except baby Paulo, knew right away what had happened. They knew right away because this was not the first time that Grandma had lost an animal. In fact, over the years since Daddy had brought his mom to live with them at Carters’ Urban Rescue, she’d also lost a sugar glider, a pregnant possum and a rat snake.

  Daddy dashed upstairs. Mama took the baby out of Keisha’s lap and set him in his high chair. “Keisha, you keep the baby in here. And do not let Razi out of this room.”