“And he really thinks it’s monkey hair?” Eliza Rose says as we trudge through tall grasses and push past long pine arms.

“Half primate and half human,” I say.

“That’s crazy.” She wipes sweat off her forehead. “Oh, and what’s scat, anyway?”

“You don’t want to know,” I say, stepping over a large boulder.

“Sure I do.”

I turn back to face her. “It’s poo.”

She stops. “Okay, I didn’t want to know that.”

“I told you so,” I laugh, sitting down on top of the rock.

I sneeze and wipe my nose with my forearm.

“We should have brought a canteen of water,” Eliza Rose says, leaning up against the trunk of a tall oak. “You think Mr. Harold would let us have one of his bottles of RC Cola to share?”

“Maybe,” I say.

“How much longer are we going to do this?” She yawns. “It’s so hot, and Scooby-Doo! starts at three o’clock. It’s the one where Scooby and Shaggy get locked in the basement on an old abandoned farm. I read it in the TV Guide.”

“We’ll stay until we find some evidence. Plus, I saw that one already. It’s a rerun.”

“I know, but it’s funny,” she says, fanning herself. “And don’t you think Fred is cute?”

“He’s a cartoon.”

“Still,” she says. “When I get married, I want my husband to look just like him.”

“Let’s keep going,” I say. “We have to find something or—”

Eliza Rose gasps.

“What was that?” she whispers.

“I don’t know,” I whisper back.

I crouch low behind a thick bush and scan the forest through the Polaroid’s viewfinder, my finger on the red button, ready to click. Eliza Rose scrambles over near me, linking her arm with mine.

“Was it a branch cracking?” I ask her.

“Sounded more like someone cracking a stick against a tree,” she says.

I scan the forest again, but all I see through the lens is green.

“Oh, no!” she whispers.

“What?”

“Now I can’t remember what we decided the call is supposed to be! Was it the owl or the whistle? And what if it’s hungry?”

“It’s okay,” I say. “They eat mostly vegetation, anyway.”

That’s not really a lie.

“What does mostly mean?”

“The call is the whooop, remember?”

“Oh, yeah, that’s right, the whooop,” she says. “Should I do it now? Should I whooop now?”

“Wait,” I say, squinting through the viewfinder.

Still just green.

Green leaves.

Green moss.

Green bushes.

“Now?” she says again.

“Not yet,” I whisper.

We crouch in silence, listening to the sounds of the woods. The wind blowing through the tops of the trees makes a shhhhh sound. The birds up above us call back and forth. And far out in the pasture, we hear the low moan of steers complaining about the sun.

“I don’t hear anything now, do you?” I whisper.

“No.”

“Whooop, whooop!”

We turn to each other with our mouths open and our eyes wide.

“Was that—?”

“Yeah!” I say. “Come on!”

We jump up and dart in the direction where we last saw the boys.

After four rounds of whooops, we spot the three of them huddled under the bottom bough of a pine tree that has a trunk thicker than the three of them standing side by side.

“What are you doing under there?” I call out.

“Shhh!” Tobin hisses, motioning for us to hurry.

Eliza Rose and I scramble over rocks and old fallen needles and branches to reach them. When we do, we huddle under the pine branches too. It smells like Christmastime under there.

Pine needles and bark and sap.

Something is following us, Tobin mouths to us, peering over his wire-rims and pointing to the left.

“You’re lying,” Eliza Rose says, frantically scanning the woods.

“Something really is following us,” Joe Kelly whispers. “Something big, too.”

That’s when Eliza Rose starts bawling.

“Ohhhh,” she whines. “I don’t want to be eaten by a Bigfoot.”

“I told you they’re mostly vegetarian, didn’t I?” I say.

“Is mostly the same as all?” she asks.

“No.”

“Then I want out of here right this second,” she says.

“For criminy sake,” Tobin says. “You’re going to scare whatever it is off.”

“Good!” Eliza Rose sniffs. “Lemonade, let’s go. I don’t want to do this anymore.”

“I’ll take her back,” I tell them.

“I’ll go with her,” Beau says, stuffing his hands in his pockets and flipping his bangs.

“Yeah…me too,” Joe Kelly says. “You know, it’s so hot and everything…maybe we could do it again when it cools down a little. Like October. October sounds good. Everyone good for October?”

I look at Tobin, and he looks at me, and then he rolls his eyes so hard I think they’re going to fall right out of his head.

“Hey! You! You there! Stop!”

A loud gunshot blast fires, making my ears ring.

“Move, move, move!” Tobin yells.

He pushes everyone out of his way and darts out from under the pine tree and through the forest like a rocket. The rest of us scramble to keep up with him.

When we make it to the wooden fence, I climb on top of it and shield my eyes from the sun with my hand. Mr. Harold is on Cimarron out in the west field at the edge of the fence. He has his rifle in his hand pointed straight upward.

“Mr. Harold!” Tobin hollers, waving his arm. “What are you doing?”

Mr. Harold flips the reins and kicks the sides of Cimarron’s fat brown belly. “Yah!” he yells, and the horse begins to gallop in our direction. When they reach us, Mr. Harold jumps off.

“Was it a Bigfoot?” I ask.

“Why do you have a rifle, Mr. Harold? They won’t hurt you,” Tobin says.

“I think someone or something ran off with one of my chickens. One was missing yesterday, too, but I thought it just wandered off or a dog got to it.” Mr. Harold keeps scanning the woods. “Just now, I saw something running through the forest with another one of my chickens under its arm.”

“What do you think it was?” Joe Kelly asks.

“Was it a biped, Mr. Harold?” Tobin asks.

Mr. Harold turns his head to face Tobin and then forces a smile.

“You know what? It was probably just someone down on their luck…looking for a meal. I don’t know who it was. And he’s gone now, so…so let’s get you Bigfoot hunters an ice-cold RC Cola. You could probably use it.”