Free Beholding Bee by Kimberly Newton Fusco Page A

answer.
    “Let’s go.”
    Peabody shoots out in front, and my little pig follows. I let them take the lead. It is hard to get excited about running when you cannot see the finish line.

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    I do not have much of a plan except we need a home that will take a girl with a diamond on her face, a funny-looking dog with a stumpy tail, and a little pig.
    We run down the main road past all the big houses with the porches out front and the gingerbread trim that looks like frosting dripping down over everything. Once upon a time I told Pauline a house like that was waiting for us. We just had to find the right one.
    Now I make myself watch my feet instead of looking at dreams. A house on the main road would not offer enough protection. I keep looking over my shoulder for Ellis. I would not want to be looking for him all the time.
    It is a good thing I brought a pocketful of corn because it is the only thing that keeps Cordelia from running after butterflies. Cars and trucks hurry past, and sometimes they beep because it is not every day you see a girl, a dog with hardly any tail at all, and a baby pig all running down Main Street. They slow down and yell at me like I don’t know how to keep my dog and my pig out of the road, and I make sure my hair is tight over my face so they don’t see my diamond.
    It is very hard to hold your hair over your face when you are running. I am so out of breath I tell Peabody it is time to walk. A boy hoots out of the window of his truck. Peabody notices a squirrel running, and he leaps after him, and itturns out that where Peabody goes, Cordelia wants to go, too, and that’s how we turn onto a smaller road.
    The houses are smaller here and everyone has a victory garden with tomatoes big as melons hanging over their fences. I breathe deeply and try and get myself calmed down. There are many flower gardens along this road and that means many bees and Peabody is very interested in their buzzing. He keeps trying to stop and watch them and I pull at him and tell him to get his head out of the clouds and to stop acting just like Cordelia.
    We pass three girls playing hopscotch and I am very careful to hold my hair tight and I have to pull Cordelia when they start saying things like “Oh, what an odd-looking pig,” and she gets herself all puffed up and wants to stop and be all friendly because she doesn’t know that they are making fun of her. All she hears is the tone of their voices, sugar-sweet, thick as maple syrup.

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    Each house on the next road is all wrong. One has a yard too small for Peabody to play in, one doesn’t have a shed in the back for Cordelia, another has a lady snipping her roses who says, “Shoo, shoo,” as soon as she sees my little pig.
    Just as we turn onto another road I think maybe I see the lady in the orange flappy hat limping ahead, but as we turn a corner she vanishes and I know I am just fooling myself. We start runnning again and I follow Peabody and Cordelia down another road and I am trying to make sure we are following the general direction of the main road, which I reckon is heading south. Pauline is south.
    My chest is heavy and my blood pounds in my head and I want to stop and rest. But I hear Bobby telling me whatever you do, even if you are slow as Christmas, do not stop. Keep going. Press on. That is how you find your second wind. I don’t know why he spent so much time on me. I never got much better at running, even with all the things he taught me.
    We turn onto a smaller road, this one with a farm with a cow and a horse in the field. The sun is high in the sky and I feel my shoulders blister. I am also getting very thirsty. I run so slow I am almost walking. Peabody is all interested in the cow and he stops and so Cordelia stops and she grunts and squeals and the cow looks up wondering what all the noise is about. This house looks pretty wonderful, I think, with awide porch and roses climbing all over the sides, but then a yellow dog comes shooting out