Menu-You Bush fruit was on the menu for breakfast the next morning. Milton decided his should taste like banana bread French toast. Banana bread French toast was his mother’s specialty. She always made it for him on particularly difficult days, like spelling-test days, running-the-mile-in-gym-class days, returning-to-school-after-being-suspended-for-breaking-his-teacher’s-nose days—that sort of thing.
Milton was pretty sure that today was going to be a difficult day. They had to finish their hike to the center of the island, find the treasure, and make it home by nightfall. Way more difficult than a spelling test.
Milton thought about his mother’s banana bread French toast and took a bite of the fruit. It tasted just like it (if banana bread French toast were squishy, mushy, and juicy), and that made him feel better about the day ahead. Even though it also made him miss his mother a little.
Okay, a lot.
“Do you think your mother will notice that you didn’t actually sleep in the tree ship?” he asked Fig as she disassembled the tent.
“I don’t know,” Fig said. She pulled the poles apart, folded the pieces together, and slid them neatly into their sack. “She trusts me, but now that it’s only the two of us, she worries. I hope she doesn’t check the tree ship, but I left a note saying we went hiking in the jungle in case she does.”
Milton thought he could probably do what Fig was doing, so he took one of the long tent poles and lo and behold—he was able to fold it up! “My mother worries too,” he said, handing Fig the pole. “She worries about a lot of things. And she works a ton too. This year especially.”
“Maybe work is her Isle of Wild,” Fig said. “I mean, the thing she does so she can be somewhere else or think about something else.”
Milton considered this as he took another tent pole to fold. “I think you’re probably right,” he said. “I wish she could come to the Lone Island, actually. I think she’d like it here.”
He had this one memory of his mother from right before the Most Totally, Terribly, Horribly, Heinously Rotten Year of All Time, when he was still in his Nature Phase. She had surprised him by coming home early and asking what he wanted to do—anything! She hadn’t complained when the answer was Backyard expedition or even when he had lain down in a slightly muddy patch to observe the grass. She had lain down next to him.
“What’s this one, Milt?” she had asked, holding up a stalk of grass.
“That,” he had told her, “is Kentucky bluegrass.”
“And this one?”
“Also, Kentucky bluegrass.”
“And this one?”
“You found ryegrass!” Milton had cried, and his mother had laughed.
All afternoon they had examined grass and ants (from a safe distance, of course) and then (gloriously!) a cardinal. She had seemed so relaxed, not one bit impatient, and she hadn’t looked at her phone or sighed even once out there under the blue sky.
“She said this summer was going to be what we all needed,” he told Fig, “and I hope she’s right.”
After the tent was put away and the compass had been consulted, everyone shouldered their backpacks.
“Onward we go to the center of the island,” Milton said as they headed out of the starry clearing.
“Keep an eye out for the Enmity-Amity Trees,” Fig added. “That’s our next stop.”
They were deep, deep, deep in the jungle now, and it was a jungle that was growing weirder and more wonderful with every step. Rafi was taking pictures of everything (including a disproportionate number of bug shots). Gabe kept dancing ahead until Rafi called him back. Fig was as enthralled as she had been yesterday, and Milton was right there with her.
He saw trees covered in fire-truck-red fur (which seemed like a poor decision for the tropical climate, but to each their own). He saw shiny golden vines looped around and around the trees like fancy jewelry (at least he thought they were vines until the end of one turned out to have lovely black eyes and some very elegant fangs). The flowers were bigger. The colors were brighter. There were hoots and hisses above them every now and then, and Milton could have sworn some of the trees were moving.
As they hiked along, Fig read aloud from the upcoming entries, beginning with the UnderCover Cat. “The UnderCover Cat is almost completely camouflaged,” she read. “The only unmirrored parts are the cat’s retractable fangs, which are a foot long and razor-sharp.”
Milton had fallen a few steps behind during this reading. He was listening, but he was also taking in the flora and fauna. Then, while he was sniffing a wispy blue-and-pink flower that smelled like cotton candy, something brushed his leg.
With a caw, Milton dropped into his self-defense pose. He was 99.99 percent sure he could maybe hear a growling sound somewhere to his left, so he reached into his backpack very slowly and found the fork he’d packed. Maybe Sea Hawk didn’t harm fauna, but Milton wasn’t going to be anything else’s lunch. He jabbed at the air with the fork once. Twice. Thrice!
Then he ran.
“What are you doing with that fork?” Fig asked when he caught up to her. “And did you scream a minute ago?”
It took Milton a few moments before he could speak. “It was a bird-of-prey call,” he gasped. “Now, don’t be alarmed, because I think I handled it pretty perfectly, but I felt something touch my leg back there.”
“Like a fern?” Fig asked.
“Like an UnderCover Cat,” Milton said.
“Did you see the floating fangs?”
“Well, no,” Milton admitted.
“Okay…,” Fig said. “Well, if it really was an UnderCover Cat, that’s actually a good sign, Sea Hawk. The guide says the cat lives near the center of the island, so we’re almost there!”
“That’s all well and good, Fig,” Milton replied, “but my concern is that a practically invisible feline might be stalking us right this very moment, ready to pounce and devour us whole. And I do not want to be devoured whole for a second time!”
“Keep your fork out, then,” Fig said. “And let’s stick together.”