May Bird Among the Stars Read Online Free

him.
    â€œI’LL
say. They can make you lose your mind,” Beatrice said matter-of-factly. “Just by yelling nonsense at you. I read it in my book on Dark Spirits. You have to cover your ears to keep from going insane. And also …” She considered, biting her bottom lip as she tried to recall. “Oh, yes, they smell like rotten bananas.”
    May continued flipping through the pages of the newspaper. There was an op-ed on the pros and cons of cannibalism, though one contributor complained the topic was irrelevant for everyone except certain groups of pygmies. A local man had found a talking skull in his nightshade bushes and was trying to find the body it belonged to.
    Of their escape from Ether there was no evidence but for a small blurb on page 27 that read:
    LIVING CAT/SACRED DEITY SPOTTED IN ETHER
    Spirits in the City of Ether were shocked Tuesday when a living cat with exceptionally large ears and little to no fur was spotted near the Eternal Edifice. Local authorities attempted to capture the cat, who escaped into the desert on foot.
    An unusually large number of Egyptian witnesses on the scene claimed that the cat was sacred and asked that he please be returned to the main pyramid on Tutankhamen Drive in New Egypt if found. New Egypt officials are offering a reward of one mummy of solid gold encrusted with rubies for the safe return of Dinè Akbar, or “Big Ears.”
    â€œGood thing John the Jibber’s not with us,” Pumpkin joked, but May turned a look of such hurt upon him that his smile vanished. “Sorry.”
    Judging by the way their former traveling companion, John the Jibber, had betrayed them at the Eternal Edifice, there was no doubt that he would have traded any one of them for a mummy in a heartbeat. Still, May shuddered at the memory of watching his soul disappear into the Bogey’s horrible, sucking fingers.
    Nonplussed, she continued to flip through the pages. “Nothing about us anywhere,” she finally said. Page 6 had a box of movie listings at the Everville Spectroplex:
    Guess What’s Coming to Dinner?
    Tomb with a View
    Drifty Dancing
    â€œI suppose they won’t be showing any more movies in Everville,” Beatrice said, and everyone was silent.
    Pumpkin shivered. He took the paper from May’s hands. “Does anyone want to hear their horoscope?” he asked. Without waiting for a response, Pumpkin asked everyone their birthdays and then read Bea’s: “‘Gemini. Be on the lookout. You are destined to meet a horrible fate.’” Fabbio’s: “‘Leo. You may as well stop being so pompous. You’re headed for doom.’”
    May told him Somber Kitty was an Aquarius. He scowled and sighed and said flatly, rolling his eyes, “‘Aquarius. Trust your instincts. You are right to be sad.’“
    â€œMeay,” Somber Kitty said pensively. Somber Kitty was always sad.
    Pumpkin looked at May.
    â€œSagittarius,” she said warily.
    Pumpkin scanned the page. “Ah.” He stabbed the paper with his finger, then frowned. “‘Stay in bed today’”
    Everyone looked at the ground, utterly depressed.
    â€œWhat’s yours, Pumpkin?” May asked.
    â€œOh.” Pumpkin thrust his finger into his mouth and blushed. “I don’t have one.”
    He looked so crestfallen, even Somber Kitty looked sympathetic. Unlike Bea and Fabbio, who were specters, Pumpkin was only a ghost. And that meant he had never been born.
    â€œIs all superstition,” Fabbio said stiffly, thrusting his chin in the air. After a moment he added with a sniff, “I am no pompous. I am the picture of modesty”
    His eyes traveled to Beatrice, and then he dropped the rest of his words. She was twisting the long locks of her hair thoughtfully. “What are we going to do, May? Without a train? North Farm must be thousands of miles away.”
    â€œI don’t know.” May