Free Dusssie by Nancy Springer

got sick of SoHo and I took the subway to explore other places. South Street Seaport, Battery Park. Little Italy. Chinatown. Chelsea, with its wrought-iron fences and sunken gardens and all kinds of dogs walking their people. Greenwich Village. Specifically, Washington Square Park.
    I didn’t have to take the subway; I walked there. It wasn’t that far away, and it was a sunny afternoon, with just a whiff of a breeze. Aside from a few winos I had to step over, Washington Square Park was cool. The NYU students dressed to be noticed. I was wearing my pink-and-yellow madras hippie hat and I fit right in. Street musicians played all around the park—my snakes didn’t mind their music—a mime kept running into invisible obstacles, and a team of jugglers kept six wooden swords in the air at once, and there was a modern dance troupe in purple outfits and orange body paint trying to present something under the triumphal arch.
    Let usss sssee! demanded a black racer, picking up the images from my mind.
    Oh, God.
    Sure enough, just like I was running a preschool, the rest of them started in. We want to sssee, too! Sssee them dance! Dance like cobrasss! Let usss sssee, too!
    I felt little heads starting to poke out from under my hat.
    â€œStop it,” I ordered between my teeth, walking away from the dance troupe and tugging down on the brim of my hat with both hands.
    Dusssie, remove thisss absssurd headgear , ordered the scarlet king snake.
    â€œChoke and die,” I told her.
    I’ll bite your ssscalp!
    â€œI’m sure I can find a freezer around here somewhere. You promised not to bite, remember?” Like me, they seemed to know they had to keep their promises. I glanced around to see whether anybody noticed that I was talking to myself and my hat was moving. But, duh, no problem. This was New York. Just like in midtown, people hurried by, barely noticing the violinists or the mimes or the dancers or me. All kinds of people. Guys in suits, businesswomen in fur coats and cross trainers, people with dreadlocks, hospital workers in scrubs, tweedy people who might have been professors, people in military uniforms, bag ladies pushing shopping carts, street people and commuters and kids and old people—I was keeping an eye out for the old man, what was his name? Cy, because he had said he went to NYU, but I didn’t see him. Maybe it was too cold for him.
    My snakes settled down and coiled close to my head for warmth. It got even colder, and darker, almost nighttime. The square swarmed with taxicabs, their white lights blinking on like they were big glowworms. People hurried even more, wanting to get home. It was time for me to get home, too. I sighed and headed down a narrow street toward SoHo.
    Once I got away from the park, the neighborhood changed. No bistros, no shops, just apartment buildings, with almost nobody on the street. It wasn’t a bad neighborhood, but it spooked me to be all alone. I walked faster, staying alert.
    It’sss okay to be ssscared , whispered my yellow-bellied racer, his voice all green and worried. Unlike the other racers, he seemed to make being ssscared his ssspecialty. But he had picked a good time for it. On my head I heard other snakes start to hiss softly.
    â€œShush,” I told them. “There’s nobody around.” Except about a block ahead of me was one other person, his back to me, an old guy with a funny bent-over, bow-legged walk. Because I’d never seen him from the back, I didn’t recognize him till he paused under a street lamp and raised his head like a turtle to look around.
    â€œCy!” I blurted.
    Too far away to hear me, he lowered his head and limped on. I smiled and started to trot to catch up to him.
    But just as he stepped into the shadows before the next streetlight, somebody grabbed him.
    An arm darted seemingly from the wall of a building, snatched Cy by the elbow, and yanked him out of sight.
    I gasped and