The TV wasn’t working. More specifically, the internet in the house wasn’t working, which meant the TV could turn on, but there weren’t any shows to watch on it. Instead of showing the menu that let you pick your show, it just showed a message: No connection found.
Sanahin and Tvene came home from school as usual, and they asked the same things they always asked. “Can we watch TV? Can we have snacks?”
“I’ll give you a little snack,” said Baba, “but the TV isn’t working. We have a lot of other activities we can do though. Coloring? Or maybe we can have a dance party?”
Tvene did not like hearing this. She was three and a half years old. Sometimes kids that age have a hard time not getting what they want. She started to yell.
“I want TV!” she yelled. “Give me TV!” She cried about it pretty loudly for a bit, but eventually she calmed down and went to her room to play with some toys.
“And what about you, big kid?” Baba asked Sanahin. “What do you want to do? Should we read a chapter book? Or do some art?”
“Nah,” said Sanahin. “I don’t think I want to do any of that stuff.”
“Hmm…, maybe we can take Maddie for a walk?”
“Nah,” Sanahin said again. Who taught her to say “Nah”?
“Well, what do you want to do?”
“Maybe I can go play in the backyard? On the climbing dome?”
“Okay,” said Baba. “Let me get ready and we’ll go.”
“Maybe I can play by myself out there?” she asked.
“Well, ok,” said Baba, “But I want you to take Maddie with you so she can get outside a bit too.” Maddie was a seven-year-old greyhound. She had white fur with big patches of jet black. Her nose was pointy. Her tail was long. At the mention of her name, her black ears perked up, and she let out a long, deep groan.
“Ok,” said Sanahin. “I’m just going to get dressed in my room with the door closed.” And with that, she went in her room and closed the door.”
While Sanahin got dressed, her little sister Tvene played in the living room. She was building a tall building out of magnetic tiles. The sun shined through the window and the colorful tiles splashed the room with red and orange and green and blue. “I make building, Baba!”
“That’s great,” said Baba chewing on a salty licorice. He was trying to get some work done, although it wasn’t easy. He winced a little at the sound of the Magnatiles as Tvene’s building came crashing down.
“It’s okay,” said Tvene. “I fix. I make again.” Tvene was only three-and-a-half, a little more than two years younger than Sanahin…
You know, this isn’t a story about Tvene or Baba. I have stories about them to tell, but this isn’t it. This story is about Sanahin and the adventure she goes on. So let’s get back to Sanahin.
“I’m ready,” Sanahin exclaimed coming out of her room. She had dressed herself magnificently. Her shirt was black and had a picture of a unicorn made of sequins. When she ran her hand up and down the sequins, the picture would change colors. And her pants? Her pants were her favorite color, which is to say they had stripes all the colors of the rainbow. She’d put her hair in a ponytail and stuck a lot of clips in it. There were three or four clips with bows and a bunch more with shiny charms on them.
Sanahin had also packed a backpack.
“Don’t you think that’s a lot of stuff for a trip to the back yard?” asked Baba.
“Nah,” said Sanahin. “I packed a lot stuff. I packed some colored pencils and paper in case I want to color. I packed 5 hair ties and 5 hair clips. I packed some granola bars, 3 bananas, and 4 oranges so I don’t get hungry. I even packed some treats for Maddie.”
“Wow,” said Baba. “How many treats?”
“Let me count,” said Sanahin. “How much is 6 plus 4?”
Do you know?
“Ten,” said Baba.
“Then I brought ten dog treats. Six of the long ones and 4 of the ones that look like bacon.”
Down the back stairs she went. Maddie stared from the top of the stairs. “Come on, Maddie!” called Sanahin. “Good girl, come on.” Maddie stood there looking at her, her teeth chattering. Greyhounds shiver and chatter their teeth for a lot of reasons. These particular chatters were her I-am-going-to-be-weird-about-going-down-the-stairs chatters. “Come on, Maddie. Good girl. Good girl.” Click, click, click came the sound of her claws on the wooden stairs as she walked down.
The backyard was full of kid stuff: a wooden jungle gym, a plastic climbing dome, lots of wood chips… There was a tall fence to keep children and dogs inside, and it was covered with creeping ivy. A rusty trampoline. A barbecue grill. A table with chairs and a giant, orange umbrella. A tall black door to nowhere… Wait, what’s that?
Something new in the backyard, a tall, black, iron door to nowhere. Sanahin came closer to look at it. It stood freely in the middle of the yard, not attached to the house. It was closed and had a beautiful, brass handle. When Sanahin saw the handle, she knew it would fit her hand perfectly, like it had been made for her.
Maddie’s teeth chattered. These were her something-about-that-door-makes-me-nervous chatters.
Sanahin put her hand on the handle and turned it. The door opened with a long creak. Since it wasn’t attached to a house, she expected to see straight through to the rest of the yard, but instead she could see the inside of a long, dark hallway. Maddie’s teeth chattered her you-definitely-shouldn’t-go-in-that-hallway chatters.
She wasn’t sure but she could almost hear a voice calling to her from down that hallway. Maddie’s ears pricked up. Could she hear it too? It said “Sanahin… The world is waiting for you… Come on an adventure…”
Sanahin took a look up at the house where her baba and sister were playing inside. She didn’t want to scare them, but adventure was calling.
She held her breath and stepped through the door into the hallway.
Sanahin stepped in the door to nowhere and found herself in the dark hallway. The hallway had a thick carpet with a pattern made of squares and triangles. The walls were mahogany, a deep brown wood. The dim lighting came from lamps on the walls every 20 feet or so. She looked closer and realized the lamps were actually lanterns lit with real flame. The whole room seemed to dance in their light.
Sanahin turned around and saw that Maddie had followed her into the hallway. It was eerily silent except for the chatter of Maddie’s teeth. A burst of wind outside blew the door shut with a slam, causing the lanterns on the walls to flicker, and the sound made Sanahin jump.
“Oh my gosh!” said Maddie.
What???
Sanahin stared into Maddie’s brown eyes, and Maddie stared back. Had she just talked?
“Maddie,” said Sanahin. “Did you just talk?”
Maddie’s teeth stopped chattering.
“Maddie,” Sanahin said again making her voice a little deeper. When Baba talked to Maddie in a deep voice, she always listened. “Maddie, did you just talk to me? Tell me please. Good girl, tell me.” Maybe Sanahin had only thought she heard Maddie talk.
She reached out her hand and began to scratch Maddie under her chin. Maddie just stood there.
“Come on, Maddie!” shouted Sanahin. “This is not fair. I know I heard you talk. I’m not crazy and I’m not stupid. I know what I heard. Why won’t you talk again?”
“I’m not really supposed to,” said Maddie. “I don’t want to get put in the zoo.” I guess she really could talk. Have you ever heard of a dog that could talk?
“Can all dogs talk?” asked Sanahin rubbing Maddie’s chin again. She felt Maddie relax a little.
“I don’t know if they can. I can talk, and my mother could talk. She told me when I was a baby that I must never speak in front of anybody. She said that if people knew a dog could talk, they’d make her live in a zoo. I don’t think so though.” The fur around her eyes was black, and her brown eyes stood out against it, reflecting the light from the lanterns.
“Well, I won’t send you to the zoo,” said Sanahin. “You’re my best friend, and we even sleep in the same bed together.” That was true.
“Well, we better get out of here,” said Maddie. “I’m pretty scared. Can you open the door? I’d do it, but I don’t have hands.”
Sanahin walked over to the door, but there was no handle on the side of the door they were on. The door was smooth and flat. The girl and the dog looked at each other, both realizing at the same time that they were trapped and that there was only one way to go.
They would have to see where the hallway led. Sanahin gave Maddie a kiss on the snoot and said “Don’t worry, girl. We are together. If we stick together, nothing can hurt us.” They walked away from the door, into the darkness of the hallway. Sanahin could hear her heart beating hard. She didn’t know if she was nervous or excited.
On and on they walked. It was hard to tell how long it had been in the dim lantern light. The hallway had no windows or doors. Eventually they started to get tired.
“I think we should find a place to sleep,” said Maddie. “It has to be night time by now. We’ve been walking for hours. My feet hurt.”
“Mine too,” said Sanahin. She took off her jacket and put it on the floor, and then she put her backpack at one end. It did not look like a comfortable bed, but it was better than nothing. She ate two of her granola bars and a banana, and then Maddie had 3 long dog treats, one bacon-looking dog treat and a banana of her own.
Sanahin lied down on her coat and put her head on the backpack. Maddie walked around 4 times in a circle and lied down next to Sanahin, putting her head on Sanahin’s leg, groaning deeply.
“Maddie? Do you think Mama and Baba and Tvene noticed we are gone?” she asked.
“They must have,” said Maddie. “I bet they’re very worried. That’s so sad.”
“We’ll have to bring them back a special present from our adventure,” said Sanahin. “Maybe a pine cone or some paklava or a special toy or a potion that can make people who are sick better or a book to read or some spicy hot sauce or a magic flying bicycle that can take you anywhere or…” She yawned, blinked her eyes a few times and fell asleep.
They slept for a long time. They had gone through a magic door to nowhere and walked for hours down an endless, windowless hallway. With no sunlight to wake them up in the morning, Sanahin and Maddie just kept sleeping.
When they eventually woke up, Sanahin shared the last banana with Maddie. She cleaned up her stuff and put her coat back on and started to walk down the hallway.
“Where are you going?” asked Maddie.
“Going down the hallway like yesterday,” said Sanahin.
“But that’s the way we came,” said Maddie. “We should go this way.”
“No, we came from this way, and we should go that way.”
“I’m pretty sure we came from that way and we should go this way.”
They argued like this until they both realized something horrible. Maddie stopped talking and her teeth began to chatter very loudly. Greyhounds’ teeth can chatter when they are stressed out. They also fart when they are stressed. Quiet, stinky stress farts.
“We’re lost,” said Sanahin starting to cry. “We walked for hours yesterday. If we go the wrong direction, we won’t know until we get back to the door.”
Maddie farted.
The two of them stood there crying and chattering and farting until they heard the sound of footsteps coming down the hall. From the darkness, came running a strange-looking man. He had long, black hair and a beard. He wore a bright red jacket with a hood, and on his legs was a kilt. He had tall, yellow socks and shiny black boots.
When he got to where Sanahin was standing, he stopped running.
“Oh, hey,” said the man. “Are you?”
“Am I what?” asked Sanahin.
“Oh,” said the man with a confused look. “I guess you aren’t. Well, have a nice day.” He pulled up his yellow socks and began to run off again.
“Wait!” called Sanahin. She and Maddie started running too and quickly caught up to the man. He was not very fast, since he was running in boots, and Sanahin is a fast runner, and Maddie is a greyhound.
“Oh, hey,” said the man when he saw them running alongside him. “Now are you?”
“Am I what?” said Sanahin as she ran.
“Still no? Ok.”
“Can you help us? We are very lost. I heard the adventure calling and went through a door to nowhere, but then the door closed behind us.”
The man stopped running, and good thing too, because Maddie was getting tired. Greyhounds are fast runners, but they can’t run for a very long time. Her black-spotted tongue hung out of the side of her mouth.
“You came here through the door to nowhere?” he asked. Sanahin nodded. “And you heard the adventure calling?” Sanahin nodded again. “You should have said so before! Let’s stop messing around in the hallway.”
“Who are you?” asked Maddie when she could catch her breath.
“Me? I’m the Major-Domo! That means I’m in charge of running this place. I can find anything, anywhere… eventually.”
“Could you help us find our way out?” asked Sanahin.
“Of course. Which way do you want to go? Home, or towards the sound of adventure?”
Sanahin thought about her parents and sister and how worried they must be. Then she thought about the magic flying bicycle that could take you anywhere that she was going to get them. Then she thought about a funny TV show she had seen last week and it made her laugh. Then she thought about eating one of the last granola bars from her backpack.
“Adventure!” she said.
“Then let’s go!” said the Major-Domo. “On! On!” He led them a short distance to a doorway. It was the first door Sanahin and Maddie had seen since coming in the hallway yesterday. The Major-Domo knocked three times on the door and it swung open, filling the hallways with golden sunlight.
Sanahin and Maddie’s eyes had gotten used to the dark of the endless hallway, so when the door opened, they had to squint until their eyes got used to the sunlight. Beyond the door was something they never expected, a beautiful, green landscape.
On the other side of that door was a forest. There were trees and ferns and tall, scrubby grasses. The ground was covered in leaves and moss, except for a path leading from the door out into the woods. Sanahin had never seen so much green.
Did you know that dogs are colorblind? They can see some colors we see, but not really red or green. Reds look more of a dark brown to them. And for dogs, green things look yellowish. So while Sanahin had never seen so much green, Maddie had never seen so much yellowish.
The Major-Domo began to speak quietly. “If you take this path, you will find the river. Once you find the river, the path will split. If you follow the river to the left, it will take you to the Rainbow City. If you follow to the right, it will take you to Opposite Town.”
“Which way is the adventure?” asked Maddie.
“Both ways,” smiled the Major-Domo. “I’m sure there is adventure to be had in both places, and even beyond. It depends which adventure you heard calling. Which one was it?”
“I don’t know,” said Sanahin. “How do I know which one it is? You have to help me figure it out.”
“I can’t,” said the Major-Domo.
“You have to!”
“I can’t.”
“Just tell me which way.”
“Listen, it’s not my adventure. The choice will be yours. Before you go, take this.” He reached into the pocket of his read coat and pulled out a small bell on a stick. “Take this with you. I can find anything. Ring the bell when you need help and I’ll come find you.”
He handed Sanahin the bell. She rang it a couple times to test it out before putting it in the pocket of her backpack.
“Now listen,” said the Major-Domo. “Whatever you choose will be right. Don’t stress out about it.” He gently pushed Sanahin and Maddie out the door. “Remember, ring the bell if you need me. I can find anything.” He held out his hand to Maddie and she licked it. Then the Major-Domo closed the door and left them alone in the forest.
Sanahin whistled as she and Maddie walked through the woods. Maddie couldn’t whistle because she had no teeth, but she could do a sort of high-pitched whine with her voice. So the two of them walked through the woods whistling and whining and having a great time.
It was an easy walk, but their stomachs started rumbling after a little while. Sanahin had a couple of granola bars and dog treats left, but they hadn’t had any real food in hours.
The sunlight came through the leaves and danced along the grass. A cool breeze came rolling through the trees.
Dogs have better noses than people, lots better. A dog’s nose can smell food anywhere, even half a mile away. And Maddie’s nose smelled something yummy, a delicious smell that should not have been in the forest. Her ears pricked up.
“I smell bacon,” said Maddie.
Suddenly something seemed to block out the sun. A great, winged shadow darkened the land around them. The shadow blocked out, not just the light of the sun, but also its heat.
Sanahin looked up and squinted her eyes, but the shadow had moved and she could not see what was flying over their heads. Whatever it was flew across the sun again, only lower this time. Sanahin could hear the beating sound of its wings as it circled them. Each loop that it flew was a little tighter and lower until she could feel the wind coming off the wings as they pounded and pushed the air.
Maddie’s teeth began to chatter.
“What are you?” called Sanahin. The flying beast responded with a menacing roar. It flapped its wings and Sanahin had to work hard not to get knocked over.
“I am the guardian of the forest! I am a wild animal!” Its voice was deafening. “These are my woods! No trespassing!”
Sanahin was so scared, her teeth started chattering too. “We didn’t know,” she yelled back towards the sky. “If you tell us where the river is, we will leave. So sorry!”
“Too late!” the beast roared back. “All trespassers must be eaten!”
It flapped its wings even harder, knocking Sanahin off her feet.
“Please don’t eat us!” cried Sanahin. “I don’t think we’d taste very good. Maddie is pretty much all bones anyway, and me? I haven’t eaten anything all day but bars. I bet I taste like cardboard. Please don’t eat me!”
AND THEN!!!
Maddie farted.
Every living thing is born with DNA, a list of instructions for how your body will grow. Sanahin’s DNA said that she would grow to have brown hair and cute toes. Baba’s DNA said his hair would start falling out. Tvene’s DNA says that she is strong and good at climbing. Mama’s DNA says she gives the best hugs.
And what’s more than that, you get some of your DNA from your mother and some from your father. Maybe people even tell you that you LOOK like one of your parents. Or maybe you look like them both put together. Or maybe you look like the milkman. That’s because you get your DNA from them.
Dogs are very special because their DNA is extra stretchy. That’s why they can look so many different ways. Maddie, being a greyhound, is long and slender. She’s got muscular back legs and a flexible spine so she can run super fast. Her tail is long, like a cat’s. She is mostly white, but she has big black spots on her back and face, and her belly and legs are speckled. Baba thinks she looks like a cow, so he calls her Mad Cow. Nobody thinks it’s funny but him, but he keeps saying it.
Sanahin’s grandfather has dachsunds. They’ve got short, stumpy legs and a long body. They look like furry hot dogs. Maddie weighs 75 pounds and these dogs weigh, maybe 12. Maddie could put one of them in her mouth if she wanted to, but that’s digusting and she would never do that.
Maddie’s body has been bred over generations to be a fast runner, but when she gets nervous, she doesn’t usually run. She stands there and shivers, chattering her teeth. It’s the exact same thing she does when she smells bacon. And when she’s really nervous or smells a lot of bacon, she also farts. Farting is her other superpower.
Sanahin didn’t know it, but Maddie’s great-grandfather Fast Barton was the best farter of his generation. He was the slowest greyhound around, but he won races by knocking out the other racers with his powerful flatulence. Fast Barton’s daughter, Miami Marie could clear the entire race track. She gave birth to Blue Sue, who gave birth to Kiara Carter. And she was Maddie’s mother. Maddie had the DNA of a first-class farter.
Standing in the forest with a flying wild animal roaring at them and threatening to eat them, Maddie was more nervous than she’d ever been before, and don’t forget, for some reason she was smelling bacon.
One other thing about greyhound farts, and then I’ll stop, because the parent reading this is probably bored of talking about dog farts. Just one more fact and then we can get back to the story: The noisy ones are never the stinky ones, but the quiet ones are the worst.
Well, with the smell of bacon and the roar of the flying beast, Maddie let loose a real air biscuit, a real tail scutter. She cut the cheese. And when the beast smelled it, the great wings stopped flapping, and the roar gave way to coughing and choking. The monster came crashing towards the ground, landing a few feet away from Sanahin.
The beast that had been roaring and flapping and threatening to eat them had fallen from the sky and landed in some tall grass only a few feet away. Sanahin and Maddie waited to see if it would get up and start roaring, but it was quiet. The smell of Maddie’s atomic fart had completely knocked it out. It didn’t affect Sanahin the same way because she shared a bed with Maddie and was used to the smell.
They went closer and as they did, Sanahin realized that the beast was not so scary as she’d thought. First of all, it was small, just a little bigger than her hand. Its belly was covered in white and tan feathers, its wings were gray and its head was black. It had a short little beak. When it was in the sky, it had seemed like a monster, but up close it was… cute? Sanahin picked up the creature in her hands and stroked its feathers. It blinked itself awake and looked around, taking a minute to remember where it was and what it was doing.
When the creature realized who was holding it, it began to roar, only the roar wasn’t quite as scary as it had been before. “Dee-dee-dee!” it yelled. “Let me go! Dee-dee-dee!” Sanahin knew that sound. “It’s a chickadee!” she realized.
Maddie came closer and smelled the small bird. “It is a chickadee!” she agreed. “It seemed so scary when it was in the sky, but down here it’s tiny.”
“Dee-dee-dee!” yelled the chickadee. “Put me down or I will eat you! No trespassers! I’m a wild animal! Not fair! Chicka-dee-dee-dee!” Sanahin placed it gently on the ground, and it tried its best to puff up its feathers and look scary. Unfortunately, there’s nothing scary about a chickadee, so Sanahin and Maddie just gave it space and let it yell until it got tired and stopped.
Sanahin took her last granola bar out of her bag and crushed it up into crumbs, which she then spread on the grass near the chickadee. It looked at her, then at the granola crumbs, shrugged its shoulders and began to peck at the ground. “Thank you,” it said. “I’m sorry I said I would eat you.”
“That’s not a very nice way to treat visitors,” said Maddie. “We were really frightened.”
“What else can I do?” said the chickadee. “Just let people walk through my forest without threatening to eat them? Be nice to them? Be friendly? Help them get where they are going?” Sanahin and Maddie agreed that this would be a better way to live and they said so.
“I’m Sanahin,” said Sanahin. “And this is Maddie, my dog.”
“Well,” said the chickadee. “Ok.” It finished its granola crumbs and flew up to sit on Sanahin’s shoulder. “Why do you want to get to the river?”
“We are trying to get to the Rainbow City,” said Sanahin. “We were in my yard and I heard the sound of adventure calling, so I went through a magical iron door to an endless hallway, where I met a strange man who brought us to these woods. We’ve been walking forever and I’m so tired and hungry and bored of granola bars.”
“Speaking of hungry,” said Maddie. “Why does this forest smell like bacon?”
Sanahin and Maddie had just made friends with the chickadee, guardian of the forest and they had given her their last granola bar. All that was left in Sanahin’s backpack was a bunch of dog treats and an empty water bottle. They were hungry, and the smell of bacon was making their tummies growl. Maddie’s teeth were chattering as the bird lead them to the source of the delicious smell.
The chickadee sat on Sanahin’s shoulder and gave her directions. “Hey sweetie, go left here. Hey sweetie, go up that hill.” They crossed a small stream and came to a part of the forest that looked different from where they’d been before. There were these strange trees growing all around. They looked like small maple trees, but their branches hung heavy with smooth, white ovals. It was some kind of fruit. The bacon smell was stronger than ever and Maddie’s teeth chattered the baconiest chatter ever.
“Check this out,” said the chickadee as she flew over to one of the small trees and Sanahin and Maddie followed. The outside of the trees were covered in a rough bark. Some of them had fungus growing out of them, like some kind of mushroom. The chickadee beckoned them closer. “Listen,” it said.
“Listen to the tree?” asked Sanahin.
“Seet, seet!” squeaked the chickadee. “Don’t talk. Listen…” They listened closely to the tree. It made a hissing, sizzling noise, like the sound of a frying pan. “Do you get it yet?” asked the chickadee.
Sanahin didn’t get it, but Maddie had a dog’s nose and a dog’s nose never lies. “Is that… Could it be? That tree is covered in bacon!”
The chickadee showed them how to pull strips of the bark off. Maddie and Sanahin did the same, and took a bite at the same time. The bacon was hot, almost too hot but not quite. It was crispy and chewy at the same time, with just a hint of maple flavor.
“Fee bee! Don’t take too much off any one tree,” said the chickadee. “A tree’s bark is like it’s skin. Losing a little won’t hurt it, but we don’t want to go crazy. How do you like it?”
Sanahin and Maddie could only nod, their mouths were so full of hot, crispy bacon. The chickadee flew up and pulled one of the white, oval fruits off of its twig and handed it to Sanahin. The fruit was warm and heavy and its skin was hard. The chickadee landed on Sanahin’s hand and tapped the fruit with it’s beak, pulling away pieces of the broken shell. “Like this,” it said.
Sanahin peeled the rest of the shell and took a bite. Her mouth filled with the warm, gooey yolk at the center of the egg-fruit. The perfect complement to the bacon. Now if only they had something to drink.
The chickadee broke off a mushroom cap and handed it to Sanahin. Sanahin broke the mushroom in half and squeezed one of the pieces between her fingers. It was kind of like squeezing a wet sponge. Sticky, brown liquid dripped down Sanahin’s fingers. She licked one finger and smiled from ear to ear. “It’s tea! With sugar!”
The three friends ate bacon and eggs and drank sweeet mushroom tea until they were stuffed and couldn’t put one more bite inside them. Maddie wandered around in the grass, looking like a skinny cow, until she found the perfect spot. Then she walked around the spot in a circle three times and lied down with a deep, satisfied groan. Sanahin lied next to her, and the chickadee perched on Sanahin’s backpack. Full, tired and happy, they all napped together in the warm afternoon sun.
Sanahin, Maddie and the chickadee had just eaten a feast in the grove of the breakfast trees. Sweet mushroom tea, cruelty-free bacon-bark and soft-boiled egg-fruit. After their nap in the afternoon sun, Sanahin filled her backpack with egg-fruits and bacon-bark, taking care to wrap the bacon in the wrappers she’d saved from all her granola bars. Then she broke off a bunch of mushrooms and squeezed their juice into her water bottle.
When they were ready, they started walking again. Sanahin walked with the chickadee perched on her shoulder giving her directions. Maddie was a weird walker, she would run ahead a hundred feet, then stop and sniff a spot on the ground for several minutes letting Sanahin overtake her. Then when Sanahin was about a hundred feet ahead, Maddie would run full-speed until she was in front again.
“Fee bee! What is she always sniffing?” asked the chickadee.
“My dad says it’s usually peepee from other dogs,” said Sanahin.
“Gross,” said the chickadee. Sanahin agreed.
“Everybody has different tastes,” said Maddie. “You shouldn’t yuck someone else’s yum. I’ve seen you eat olives stuffed with blue cheese. I think that’s gross.”
“How can you think olives with blue cheese are gross, but smelling peepee is ok?” asked Sanahin.
“Don’t look at me,” said the bird. “I think both of you are gross… Wait!” The chickadee raised a wing. “Listen,” it said.
“What is it?” asked Sanahin.
“Seet seet! Didn’t I tell you before you listen instead of talk? Nobody can listen while their mouth is moving. Use your ears.”
Maddie heard it first because she had dog ears, which are more sensitive than a human’s. At home, Maddie will hear Mama or Baba coming home from all the way up the street, and will start crying next to the door to see them before they even park the car.
Normally her ears were tucked back against her head, but when she was listening hard, the ears spread out like bat wings from her head. They were black on the outside, pink on the inside, and when the sun shined just right, it would shine through the skin, and you could see all the veins and capillaries in her ears. Her ears were pointing straight out, and then when she realized what she was hearing, one of them went straight up.
Sanahin did her best to listen but the forest was quiet. There was a breeze rustling through the leaves, the sound of her own breathing, the sound of a lot of water moving, gurgling, bubbling…
Wait, what? A lot of water moving very fast?
“The river!” yelled Sanahin when she realized what she was hearing. “We must be close.” And indeed, just as they went over the next little hill, they could see the river before them. It was wide, and the trees on the other side looked very small because of how far away they were. In between here and the other side was about a mile of the clearest water Sanahin had ever seen. She could see fish swimming in it, some fighting the current, and others just letting it move their body wherever it wanted.
Next to the river was a hand-painted sign with arrows pointing in two opposite directions.
<-- Rainbow City 1.5 miles (this side)
<-- Flea Alley 1.5 miles (other side)
Opposite Town 1 mile (this side) -->“Nobody told me about Flea Alley,” said Maddie. “Dogs hate fleas, so lets stay on this side of the river.” Fleas are little bugs that can live in fur or hair. Their bites are itchy and uncomfortable so Maddie was nervous just hearing the name.
“I already told you,” said Sanahin. “We’re going to the Rainbow City. How many times do I have to say it to you?”
“Just 2 more times,” said Maddie with a snort.
“Will you come with us?” Sanahin asked the chickadee. “We really like you.”
“Seet seet. I can’t,” said the chickadee. “It’s my job to protect the forest. I’m the protector. If I’m gone, who will protect it?”
“Pleeeeease,” begged Sanahin. Maddie’s just chattered her teeth.
“Fee bee,” said the chickadee. “Okay, I’ll come with you.”
And Sanahin said “Yes!”
According to the sign, it was a 1.5 mile walk to the Rainbow City. This distance would take a grown-up about 25 minutes maximum. But kids have shorter legs and they get tired more quickly. And greyhounds are built for running short distances, not walking for a long time. And chickadees aren’t used to roaming far from home. And don’t forget, this kid and greyhound and chickadee had been walking for days. So when they found the boat, you couldn’t blame them for wanting to spend the rest of the trip sitting down.
They came around a corner, and there it was. A boat! It was a small, flat-bottomed rowboat with two oars in the rowlocks. It was just big enough for Sanahin and Maddie. The chickadee didn’t really take up any space.
“How much farther do you think we have?” asked Maddie.
“I don’t know,” said Sanahin. “It feels like we’ve been walking for days. I don’t think we’ll ever get to the Rainbow City.”
They both looked at the boat. It looked seaworthy (which means they thought it would float), but the river was fast and strong. Besides, what if the boat belonged to somebody? What if that person came back looking for their boat? When they looked closer they could see that the boat was really stuck in the dried mud around the river bed. It had been there a long time, which meant its owner probably wasn’t coming back.
The three friends decided that it was okay to take the boat as long as they left a note. Sanahin took some paper and colored pencils from her backpack and wrote a note for the owner of the boat:
Dear Person That Owns This Boat, We took your boat to the Rainbow City. We are very sorry. Love, Sanahin, Maddie and the chickadee
Sanahin tried to push the boat into the water, but it was really stuck in the mud. Maddie pushed against it with the flat part of her head, and the chickadee grabbed ahold of one edge and flapped its strong, little wings. They rocked and pushed and shoved and flapped and jiggled and jostled that little boat until it popped out of the dried mud. They slid it along the river bank until the water was deep enough to float. Sanahin’s socks and shoes got soaking wet as she waded in the ankle deep water.
First she helped Maddie in, then she took off her backpack and threw it in the boat. She climbed in, sat on the flat bar in between the two oars and began to row into deeper water. Soon the current started to push them on its own, so Sanahin stopped rowing. She took off her wet shoes and socks so they could dry.
Sanahin, Maddie and the chickadee watched the shore line drift by as the river carried them along. They told jokes and ate soft-boiled egg-fruits and congratulated themselves on all the walking they had successfully avoided doing.
When Sanahin, Maddie and the chickadee got in the boat, the river had been kind of slow moving, faster than 6-year-old girls and greyhounds can walk, but pretty manageable. Sanahin had a lot of fun using the oars to push them around the slowly-moving water.
But as they went further downstream, the current seemed to pick up, and soon they found themselves moving far too fast. Sanahin tried to row them closer to the shore, but it was too hard. They were at the mercy of the river. They would keep floating until it slowed down again, however far that turned out to be. The water rushed faster and faster as more and more of the scenery went flying by. It would have been fun if it wasn’t a little scary.
By the way, everybody is going to be ok. There are a lot of chapters left to this book, and they would be very boring if all the characters in the story drowned in Chapter 12. The next part is probably going to get a little scary, so I wanted to stop and make sure you knew that everybody was going to be ok.
As they drifted, Maddie’s sharp eyes spotted something on the left shoreline and she pointed at it with her nose. It was something big and reflective, the evening sun bounced off it and glared in their eyes. It looked like an entire city covered in a glass dome. It was hard to look straight at it with the light in their eyes, but underneath the dome were buildings and roads with cars and if you squinted just right you could see tiny little people in the distance walking around.
They all turned to the other side of the river and saw something amazing. There was another city. This one had much smaller buildings and there were no cars. The roads looked unpaved, like they were made of dirt. But the thing that was really amazing was the rainbow. Remember, the city on their left was covered with a glass dome, and the light hitting it split like it was going through a prism. This caused the smaller city on the right bank to be entirely bathed in a rainbow. The small, dilapidated buildings shined in bright colors as the rainbow touched each one.
“The Rainbow City,” said Sanahin to herself. Maddie’s teeth started to chatter.
“That’s not the Rainbow City,” said the chickadee. “The Rainbow City is on the left, under the dome. That’s Flea Alley!” Maddie’s teeth started to chatter louder.
“Don’t talk about fleas,” said Maddie. “I get itchy just hearing the word.”
“It doesn’t matter,” said Sanahin. “We can’t stop anyway. I’m not strong enough to get us to the shore, and the river is moving too fast!”
And so the three friends watched as the Rainbow City and Flea Alley grew smaller and smaller in the distance. Eventually, the river turned and the twin cities were completely gone from their view. The sun dipped lower and lower into the sky. The afternoon flowed into the evening, and the river flowed into the sea. And that’s how Sanahin and Maddie and the chickadee found themselves alone on a boat in the middle of the ocean.
Most of the time when you are on a boat, it’s not very dangerous or scary. Maybe you’ve taken small sailboats or canoes on a lake or river. Maybe you’ve been out on the ocean on a yacht or even a cruise ship. None of these are particularly scary or dangerous. But this was not the situation that Sanahin, Maddie and the chickadee found themselves in.
The river had carried their little rowboat out to sea. They could not see the shoreline anymore. All they could see in all directions was black water reflecting the black sky. Sanahin looked in her backpack and saw that they were almost out of food and mushroom tea. Getting in this little boat out on the river had not been a good decision.
“H-h-h-h-how are we ever g-g-g-going to get h-h-hom-m-me?” asked Maddie through chattering teeth.
“I don’t know,” said Sanahin. She started to cry a little. It was cold and dark out.
“Maybe we can spot a boat or something,” said the chickadee. They looked out into the distance hoping to see the lights of a boat, but there was nothing. Just blackness in all directions.
Suddenly Sanahin remembered something. “I know!” she shouted. “We just need to nap!”
“Nap?” asked the chickadee. “Why?”
“So the gaghaktagan tertyoon comes, of course! I don’t really nap, but my mom says that when we nap, the gaghaktagan tertyoon comes to visit. That means magical bird in Armenian. Sometimes she even brings me a present!”
“You must have a lot of presents,” said the chickadee.
“Not really,” said Sanahin. “I don’t really like taking naps. That’s for little babies and I’m almost 6 years old! But I bet I could take a nap now.”
She looked up at the sky. “Gaghaktagan tertyoon please come find us and save us.”
You wouldn’t think it would be easy to nap on a boat at night in the middle of nowhere, and at first it wasn’t. Sanahin liked to talk a lot, and nobody can fall asleep when their mouth is moving. Eventually she sat on the bottom of the boat and leaned against Maddie, feeling her warmth. She stopped talking and looked out at the horizon. There was no sound except the gentle splashing of the water against the outside of their little boat, and the gentle rocking and peaceful stillness made all three friends fall asleep in no time at all.
It was hard to know how long they slept in that little boat, but eventually morning came. Sanahin woke up from the light of the sun as it moved higher in the sky. Even before her eyes were fully open, she realized that something was different.
The boat wasn’t rocking anymore! She opened her eyes and looked around and could not believe what she saw. They were on a beach!
The beach was encircled by small, rocky hills. They were all made of different kinds of rock, with different colors. That one was copper brown, that one a darker rust brown, that one gray with a whine vein, that one so black it was almost purple, that one steel blue. Behind the rocks, the sky shined the bluest blue and there wasn’t a cloud to be seen. The rocks went all the way around, even into the water, creating a secluded lagoon.
Did you know what sand is? Tiny little pieces of rocks. Over a very long period of time, the ocean and the wind and the sun all work together to grind many of those rocks into teeny, tiny little grains. The color of the rocks determines the color of the sand, and so there are white sand beaches, and black sand beaches. But this beach was full of colorful rocks, and that meant the sand had streaks of all different colors running through it.
There were blue and red and yellow areas and in some places the primary colors mixed and made greens and purples and oranges. It was beautiful. Sanahin took a handful of the colorful sand and let it run through her fingers.
“Where are we?” asked Maddie to nobody in particular.
“It must have been the gaghaktagan tertyoon!” shouted Sanahin. She opened her backpack and looked in it. Inside, there were three small packages wrapped with brown paper and string. She took them out and placed them on the seat of the rowboat.
“It’s real!” said the chickadee in disbelief. “Those are our presents for napping!”
Sanahin opened the first package. She untied the string, peeled back the brown paper, and opened the box. Inside was a can of wet dog food: Chicken Stew In Gravy. Maddie’s teeth started to chatter her that’s-a-can-of-my-favorite-dog-food chatters. Sanahin pulled the tab to open the can and emptied the contents onto a piece of the brown paper. Maddie trotted over and started eating.
Inside the second box was a bird seed block with sunflower seeds, millet and cracked corn. She put it back on the seat of the boat, and the chickadee landed on it an started to nibble at the seeds.
When she opened the third box there were two tins of brisling sardines packed in olive oil and a small fork for eating them.
“Yum,” said Sanahin. She pulled the tab on one of the cans and ate a few sardines, taking care not to spill the oil on herself. It was the first food any of them had had in a while, and they all ate without talking. Maddie chomped at her chicken stew in gravy, the chickadee pecked at her birdseed block and Sanahin slurped her sardines.
After breakfast, Sanahin, Maddie and the chickadee decided to explore the strange place they’d landed. In order to leave the beach, they had to climb up one of the rocky boulders that surrounded it. Maddie went in front and Sanahin behind her. Maddie’s feet were not well-suited for rock climbing and sometimes she would slip a little. The chickadee did not have to climb, but flew from perch to perch so that she was close to the others. After getting to the top, they had to climb down the other side, only this time Sanahin went in front to help catch Maddie if she slipped again.
When they got to the other side of the rock, they found a dense forest of tall skinny trees with papery bark that looked like it was peeling off. The trees had long, spreading branches on top that were thick with leaves. Above the tree canopy, they could see the top of a mountain rising up, gray and ominous. The floor of the forest was teeming with plant-life, bushes and moss and these strange curly ferns. Sanahin picked one and examined it.
Each fern had a long central stem with lots of little fronds coming off. The fronds each had a similar central stem with smaller leaves growing off them. And those smaller leaves had their own center with their own smaller divided leaves. And those teeny leaflets were made up of even smaller mini-leaflets.
“I’m used to being in the forest,” said the chickadee. “Let me go first. We need to find some food and a place to sleep.”
They walked through the forest with the chickadee in the front and Sanahin and Maddie following close behind. Suddenly Maddie stopped walking. Her ears were standing straight up, her tail was pointing straight out and her teeth were chattering.
“Seet, seet! What’s going on with your dog?” asked the chickadee.
“She probably has to poop,” said Sanahin.
“No, I don’t!” said Maddie. “Well, maybe in a little while, but that’s not it. Don’t you hear it?”
“I don’t hear anything,” said Sanahin.
Maddie chattered harder. “It-t-t-t sounds lik-k-k-ke-”
Before she could finish, the chickadee flew started flying straight up towards the tree canopy. She flew around in a circle shouting at the top of her lungs “Fee bee! Fee bee! Fee bee!” Suddenly the air was filled with birds flittering from tree to tree and singing back. They all had the same black tail and round belly as the chickadee and they all sung “Fee bee!” There must have been hundreds of them, more than Sanahin even knew existed.
The chickadee, our chickadee that is, flew back and perched on Sanahin’s shoulder. “I may not know where we are,” she said. “But I know these birds. Allow me to introduce my family. Family! Allow me to introduce Sanahin and Maddie. They are my friends!”
“Fee bee!” said all the other chickadees at the same time.
Sanahin, Maddie and the chickadee found themselves on the Island of the Chickadees, a tropical paradise inhabited by little, puffy birds. The chickadee, our chickadee, introduced Sanahin and Maddie to all the other chickadees.
“Fee bee! This is my family,” the chickadee said. “This is my cousin Phoebe, and my other cousin Daphne! And this is my aunt Sophia and my uncle Philip and my other cousin Phineas! And this is my half-brother Phoebus and my second cousin-in-law Philomena. And this is my great-granduncle Hubert!” There were too many to name them all but our chickadee kept trying. “And this is my mother’s uncle’s cousin’s granddaughter Chantelle! And this is my nephew Dorcas!”
When she finally got through the list, our chickadee said, “Everybody! This is Sanahin and Maddie!” All the chickadees flew around their heads, singing and tweeting and swooping down for a closer look. Maddie’s ears were standing straight up and her teeth were chattering loudly.
When everybody had settled down, Sanahin told them the story of how they’d come to land on this island. “The TV wasn’t working,” she said. “Well, actually, the internet wasn’t working. The TV would turn on but it wouldn’t load any shows. So of course, I took Maddie out to play in the bardess which is my backyard, and that’s where we went through the magic door to nowhere. And then we had a sleepover in the hallway! And then the Major Domo took us to the forest which is where we met the chickadee! I mean, our chickadee.”
The chickadee was excited to get to her part of the story and she sang, “Fee Bee!” All the other chickadees sang back, “Fee Bee!” and then they started flying around and singing, and Sanahin had to wait for them to calm down again before she could continue.
“Anyway, we started walking towards the Rainbow City, but we got tired so, of course, we got in this old boat we found. But the river was just too fast and we missed the Rainbow City and Flea Alley.” Maddie’s ears stood up at the word “flea”. Sanahin kept talking:
“And then, after that we were stuck out on the open ocean with no way of getting home. So we decided to take a nap so that the gaghaktagan tertyoon could come, because we knew of course, that she would bring us to land and also give us presents, which she did.”
The chickadees got excited again when they heard about the gaghktagan tertyoon and the sound of Fee Bee filled the air. It was so loud that Maddie’s teeth started to chatter. One of the birds, a fat little chickadee named Xena, flew down and landed on her knee. Xena raised a wing and shouted “Seet!” All the birds got quiet and found places to land. For a moment, it was completely silent except for the sound of the island breeze passing through the leaves and the distant crash of waves.
Xena started to speak. “My dear Sanahin, I speak for all of my family when I say that we are moved by your story. You are obviously very smart and strong, but it is impossible for you to leave this island alone. We have seen your boat, and we don’t think you’ll make it past the breakers. The tide will push you back in. You aren’t big enough to row that fast.”
Sanahin realized that Xena was right. She started to think about her parents that she was missing and her little sister who only ever wanted to play with her. She began to cry a little bit.
“Don’t worry,” said Xena. “For there is hope. We, the chickadees of this island, will help you get home. You are here with our cousin, which means you are also our cousin. We love you, and we are going to help you get back to the Rainbow City.”