The Hunt
It was an impossible task, and time was running out. I had less than 3 hours left. But where to find it?
If my sisters ever found out that their pet parakeet was missing and something happened to it, I definitely would be added to their death list.
The bird was gone when I got home; all that was in the cage was a note that said, “Find me.” I immediately recognized the handwriting. I rushed to his house only to find another note on his door. It said, “Help, I’m trapped in a box.” I uttered a few curse words as the door opened, and there stood Ronald.
“I thought playing hide and seek with an object would be fun,” he said. “I get tired of trying to find you all the time.”
“YOU COULD HAVE ASKED,” I shouted. “This is serious. I need to find that bird before my sisters get home!”
“I thought it was your bird,” was his reply. He said it would be easy to find. I had nothing to worry about. It was hidden in plain sight.
I waited for the next sentence, but it never came. So, in my head, I filled it in for him, “What could possibly go wrong?”
What could go wrong is that something could die. We played hide and seek before, but never with a live animal. And the fact that Ronald had taken it away in an enclosed box without anyone noticing wasn’t the greatest idea.
Before I could say anything else, Ronald’s mother called him. He apologized and said he had to go with her to pick up his father, and they were late.
His mother came rushing out the door, grabbed Ronald, shut and locked the door, then they were gone. I never got an answer to where the parakeet was. If it was in his house, I was doomed.
So what was I do? I needed to think like Ronald. Those of you who know Ronald realize that thinking like him is challenging. He doesn’t think.
For most people, if you get into their heads, you can follow a logical progression of their thought patterns and behaviors. It is reasonable that you would be able to deduce and infer what they were going to do and where they were going to do it.
This is not the case with Ronald. To get into Ronald’s head, you had to let your mind go blank, and you were there, meaning there was no predictability, and he could do anything. Less than 2 hours left before my sisters came home.
A bird, a box, and Ronald, what do they have in common? Well, there was that incident with the bird and the oven https://www.hdhstory.net/Storyblog/?p=2274, but Ronald wasn’t there for most of it.
Ronald always seems to disappear when the times get tough, just like now. I had to be missing something.
I tried all the usual places – the candy store on Broadway, the local butcher up the street (I knew it couldn’t be there, but I was getting desperate), the abandoned house on Dash Place, and even the Food Fair on Riverdale Avenue. None of them brought me success. I now had less than an hour left.
I chose to go back home and search the apartment again. I was in my sisters’ room when I heard the front door open, and my sisters entered the apartment. I panicked. I hid in their closet, hoping they wouldn’t find me. Luckily for me, they went directly to the kitchen for a snack.
While in the closet, I heard some frantic wings flapping and little chirps. Looking down, I found the box. I quickly exited the closet and released the parakeet into their room. I left and hid in the hall bathroom. As soon as they entered their room, I went outside. As I was leaving, I overheard them arguing about who left the cage open after cleaning it. I was in the clear.
That was until two days later when my oldest sister, Marion, confronted me with an empty shoebox found in her closet with several holes punched in the lid and what appeared to be bird droppings in the box.
I don’t remember what happened after that. I do remember that Ronald was no longer given free entry to our apartment whenever he chose and that Ronald and I were only allowed to play hide and seek outside. After all, what could possibly go wrong with that?
