Tails of Spring Break Read Online Free Page B

now.”
    “She’s probably all adjusted now,” I told him. “She still hasn’t pooped.” Cheerios blew out of his mouth as he said “pooped.”
    “How do you know that?” Claire pushed her dish to one side, out of range.
    Tyler jammed more Cheerios into his mouth and talked around them. “Her litter box doesn’t have any poop in it.”
    Claire turned pale. “You looked in her litter box?”
    Just then, a terrible noise came down the hall. A scream! High and low. And then, high again.
    “That’s the yowl,” I said, clattering my spoon into my bowl. “That’s what got her thrown out of the Motel La Paws.”
    “The cat made that racket?” Dad jumped out of his chair and ran down the hall.
    We followed him.
    China yowled again. She was a cat siren. We held our hands over our ears till it stopped. In the new silence, my ears rang with a noise of their own.
    Finally, Dad blew out a big sigh. “I hope they can’t hear that all the way to Hawaii.”
    “Sierra’s going to be so mad about this,” I said.
    “China doesn’t screech,” Tyler said, snuffling, “if I’m in here. But maybe I don’t want to be in here.” He moved closer to the door. His freckles showed up dark on his pale face.
    “You HAVE to stay with her,” I told him. “That’s the only way we’ll get through this week. We’ll bring you toys. We’ll bring everything you need.”
    He crossed his arms and snuffled again.
    “I’ll share my candy,” I said.
    “Candy?” he asked.
    “Yes,” I said.
    “And will you bring my trucks?” he asked.
    “Yes,” I said. “Everything you need.”
    “This could be good,” Dad said. “We’ll be able to walk around without stepping on a truck.”
    Just then the phone rang, and Dad went to answer it. “It’s your dad, Claire,” he called.
    She ran for the phone.
    When she finished talking to her dad, Claire helped me gather up trucks. “Grandpa’s better,” she said as she piled little pickups into the back of a big dump truck, “but he’s still in the hospital. I told my father about China. He said make sure she has water to drink.”
    China had curled into a tight ball under Tyler’s bed. She growled at us as we brought in the trucks. Her eyes flashed mean lights.
    Tyler moved closer to me. He shivered. “I don’t like her anymore,” he said.
    “Want some water, China?” I asked.
    She yowled again. Her awful song went up and up and flowed back down into a low rumble, sort of like thunder. She slunk out from under the bed and leapt onto Tyler’s dresser. Then she scrabbled up the wall to the window sill. “Huff, huff, huff,” she said. She crouched there, her ears flat to her head, her evil eyes staring. Her tail wound and unwound like a snake getting ready to strike.
    A scared feeling filled my stomach. “Get Dad,” I said.
    China dashed toward us. We ducked as she darted between us and out the door.
    We chased after her. We split up to look in every room.
    “She’s here,” Tyler hollered from the living room. “Nope, there she goes.”
    Dad joined us as we raced all over trying to find her. She knocked over bottles in the kitchen.
    She scrabbled across Dad’s newspaper on the table, sending it flying. She zipped past us one more time, headed down the hall. Then, silence.
    We looked under beds, expecting that any minute she’d explode out at us. We pulled back the shower curtain and checked the bathtub. We slid closet doors open and peeked in.
    No cat.
    “Could she get outside?” I asked Dad.
    He shook his head. “Everything’s closed tight.”
    “She’s not under my bed anymore,” Tyler said. “I’m glad.”
    “It’s worse now,” I said. “Now, she could be anywhere.”
    As Tyler’s eyes filled with tears, I realized what I’d said. “Don’t worry, Tyler,” I told him. “We’ll find her.”
    But my own heart was beating too fast. My voice came out shaky.
    We stood there a long time, listening. We heard nothing but our own breathing. China had