The Drowsy Cub Who Yearned For Slumber

The trees wept a certain dew on the mornings Huey’s mom barged into his room yelling about leaving in time so she would make it to work. “This is the last time I’m going to tell you. Get up!” Her stomps roared against the wood floors as she walked back to the kitchen repeating her words until they rippled away.

Huey, however, heard her commands as mumbles and responded with mumbles of his own. He listened to her walking back and forth, like a sentry patrolling his chambers as if he were a prisoner. It was like she knew he was struggling to stay both awake and asleep, unable to choose which was more important. Still, Huey found a way to bide more time atop his mattress.

Suddenly, as he laid in bed, his stuffed rabbit stood up from the floor and walked around his room. For a moment the toy was taken by the scenery of the room, in awe of its new found consciousness, until Huey finally glimpsed its way. The rabbit’s purpose became clear once it noticed Huey’s stare, and it proceeded to slowly climb up the bed sheets.

“It’s still nighttime, you can go back to sleep,” the rabbit spoke reaching the flat of the bed.

Huey looked down at his rabbit and smirked, “You’re right, I got five more minutes at least.” His stuffed rabbit pat him on the head, “Goodnight Huey.” Huey turned over and buried his face back into his pillows, his rabbit by his side.

As soon as Huey slipped into true sleep he heard his mom yell, “Get up now!” in a new tone, a tone reserved for real anger. Immediately popping up to the sound of her voice he sat in his bed and responded, as he fought the weight of his own skull from toppling over, “I’m up.” In that same moment a creak came from his nightstand. He looked to the side of his bed and saw nothing but an empty space. “Where’s my…?” he began to mutter when the sound of a soft piano from an old speaker started playing from above.

Huey looked up to see his nightstand floating along the ceiling. It looked as if it were dancing to the music playing, bouncing like something out of an old cartoon. He and his stuffed rabbit turned and looked at each other with smiles on their faces. They kicked off the sheet and floated into the air to meet the nightstand.

“Huey! I’m leaving! You better be at school by the time it starts,” His mother said in a furious flurry of instructions and a slam of the front door.

Huey snapped back to his bed. His arm asleep from leaning on it, his stuffed rabbit still on the floor, and nothing but dust on his nightstand. He kicked off his sheet and ran to the door. He saw his mom’s car drive down the street and was met with a swell of disappointment. He walked back to his room and snatched a towel from the rack for a shower. After, he got dressed and ate a bowl of cereal, grabbed a house key, his backpack, and left. A long walk to school was ahead of him, but the unbelievably tired feeling from before was still present.

Huey slogged his way from his house to a known shortcut discovered by the 9th graders, The Wash. A forest path splintered between houses of the neighborhood filled with sand, wild animals, and bad kids, as referred to by members of the school’s faculty. He stepped off the sidewalk and crossed through a bush with painted branches, marked to symbolize the entrance. Once inside The Wash he was instantly greeted by Lucas, one of the so-called bad kids, with the nickname “The Ditcher of Dihna Heights”, sitting on a rock.

“Hello there, Sleepwalker,” Lucas jovially remarked.

“Don’t do that,” Huey recited in an irritable tone.

Lucas threw up his hands, “Hey, don’t be mad at me cause you always get left. Not my fault your mom has a job.”

Huey continued walking past Lucas, and Lucas followed. “Can you just help me so I won’t get in more trouble later,” Huey pleaded.

“I expect this from you at least twice a week, I’ll get the stick,” Lucas said running over to a tree surrounded by runoff. He grabbed an unwieldy branch leaning against the tree sloppily labelled “Will Whacker” in bright purple paint. He slung it over his shoulder and met Huey back on the path.

“The coyote is back, so we gotta be extra careful today,” Lucas said warning of impending fangs to the face.

“Coyotes are cowards,” Huey renounced.

“Last Friday, I’m telling you, I had to smack him cause he got too bold. You weren’t here.”

Huey responded with doubtful scowl.

“I’m just saying,” Lucas shrugged, “I be smacking these coyotes.”

Huey continued ahead of Lucas into “Sandland," a section of the path lazily nicknamed that because it was only sand. As he walked, imagining the sleep that escaped him, he sunk deeper into the sand with every step. “I should just turn back,” he thought to himself with shoulders but peeking above the grain. With a deep breath he completely submerged. Underneath the sand a countless variety of bugs stared in shock as Huey sunk deeper and deeper past their homes. The bugs had created something of a village, layered like an ant farm, and Huey could only say, “I’m sorry,” as he sank through their streets and houses unable to move his body.

“I gotta get out of this town,” an ant whispered to itself rolling its eyes as his miniature television was destroyed by the giant Huey.

Lucas was highly entertained watching Huey’s ho-hum stride through the sand, someone that tired was something he rarely witnessed. He giggled, tossed the stick to the side, and proceeded to mock Huey by transforming his body into; arms of boiled pasta, a back hunch sculpted by years of life, feet dipped in concrete, and just the lamest facial expression of all time.

“Huey you look pathetic right now,” Lucas teased. A rumbling came from the brush next to them and Lucas immediately broke character. “Huey,” he eagerly whispered, “look alive.”

Ambling out from the brush came a coyote. Lucas knew it was THE coyote because its face was still swollen from their last interaction. “Huey it's time to wake up, seriously,” Lucas said maturing to a protector as the coyote circled them, clearly aiming to get its revenge.

Lucas began to understand his efforts were pointless so he shifted his focus away from waking Huey to gaining the coyote’s full attention. He squat down and smirked, “You know what’s gonna happen to you right? I’m gonna smack you again, leave you looking like a parade balloon.” The coyote snarled and followed Lucas with its eyes.

“Yeah that’s right one more hit to the face and the other coyotes are gonna shame you so hard…” Mid taunting Lucas realized he didn’t have the stick.

“Crap.”

The coyote looked down the path and saw the stick on the floor. It began growling at Lucas and lunged toward him, but, thinking on his toes, Lucas quickly scooped a hand full of sand, chucked it at the coyote’s eyes, and sprinted toward Huey. He shoved Huey out of his trance and grabbed the strap of his backpack, “RUN!” Lucas shouted.

Huey began sprinting out of pure shock, “WHAT? WHAT?”

“COYOTE! RUN TO THE DITCH!”

Huey looked over his shoulder to see the coyote hot on their heels, their fastest sprint was nothing to the hungry coyote galloping with all four legs. Just as it was about to chew on their ankles Huey slung his backpack off his shoulders and swung it into the coyote’s side. It yelped and fell to the ground. They hopped the ditch and the coyote stopped pursuing and paced on the other side.

They both celebrated and continued to taunt the coyote as it ran back into the brush. Lucas, however, cut his celebration short knowing what he had to do.

“Hey Huey, I’ll be right back,” Lucas said sternly as he hopped back to the other side.

“Woah, woah, woah… what are you doing?”

“I gotta get the stick.”

“The coyote could still be right there,” Huey said pointing and reaching to the ground, “Here, here’s a stick.”

“I should’ve never dropped the stick in the first place. Plus, it’s the rules in here, once you mark your weapon you can’t change it.”

“That’s stupid.”

“I know you are, but I love you anyway.”

Lucas turned and ran back to Sandland. Huey watched him until he lost sight and continued moving forward. As he walked he heard a scraggly howl ring from whence he came, “He’s dead,” he thought. He looked back once again but didn’t move, he just stared for a moment and then continued to press on.

Huey arrived at a broken wooden fence and peered through a splintered crack inspecting the area for looming threats. It was an empty field with browning, dead, weeds scattered about, one broken down shack made of metal off to the right side, and a self-made bike ramp at the bottom of a hill aimed directly at the shack on the left. The opposite end of this field was his goal, the end of The Wash, the soccer field of the school.

“You see anything?” Lucas asked, also peering through the fence as if he was with Huey the entire time.

Huey turned from the fence and saw claw marks across Lucas’s entire face, as well as the stick labelled “Will Whacker” in hand. He didn’t call attention to any of it, “No, you?”

“No.”

Simultaneously they yelled, “3…2…1!” lifted a picket and sprinted towards the other side. Just then they heard a repeated bang come from inside the shack, an alarm! Huey and Lucas looked to their left and saw another kid fashioned in a motorcycle helmet and football pads, that he stole from his big brother, and hightop Chucks, racing toward them on a bike at breakneck speeds holding a tennis racket labelled “Arthur Bash” in bright green paint.

“You’re dead Huey!” he screamed until no air was left in his lungs.

Lucas and Huey were stuck in-between the hill and the bike ramp with no time for both of them to get out of the way. Lucas pushed Huey toward the exit, sacrificing himself. Huey fell to the ground and watched in slow-motion as Lucas got smacked in the face by the tennis racket while jamming the stick in the bike spokes sending the bike kid hurling into the shed.

Huey sat and stared as both Lucas and the bike kid laid unmoving on the floor. A moment passed, then another, then another. Finally Lucas lifted himself up and looked at Huey. A giant red welt was added to the mess on his face but he still smiled and gave Huey a thumbs up. He then looked toward the shed, cuffed his hands around his mouth, and yelled, “You good Oliver?”

Oliver yelled back, “Yeah I’m good! That might’ve been the best yet!”

They all laughed. Huey got up and dusted himself off. He walked to the exit and waved bye to Lucas and Oliver, “Don’t get caught out here,” he said.

“We never do,” they both answered joyfully.