To read the previous editions of this tale of a mysterious pet shop, go here.

Furrowing her forehead, Birdie scowled at the strange man in front of her.  “Listen, sir, I grew up on a hippie eco-commune,” Birdie snapped, jamming her hands on her hips.  “I know what being surrounded by animals is like.  A fish tank that takes up your back wall and one puppy are not being surrounded.”

Percy glanced at Frankie, who was pretending to examine a ferret harness.  “Do you see them?” he asked.

Frankie slid a glance toward Birdie, then looked at Percy’s shoes.  “All I see is the fish and the puppy,” she admitted.

Percy deflated with a large sigh, his large thin head drooping towards the floor as his back curved alarmingly.  His eyes misted over behind his thick glasses.  “I was sure it was you,” he muttered, his head swaying side to side.  “After all, Mr. Jingles came to see you.”

“Mr. Jingles?” Birdie inquired.

“The puppy.”  Percy jerked his thumb towards the black bundle burrowing in a green cat bed on a shelf nearby.   “I had such high trust in his judgement…”  He sighed, deeper this time.  “Well, thanks for coming in, anyway.”  He began to slink away, his head bobbing from side to side.

“Hey, wait!” Birdie cried, rushing after him.  She grabbed for his arm.  “Listen, none of this makes sense.  Are you telling me this shop is full of animals no one can see?”

Percy cocked his head, his frizzy yellow hair dancing in the breeze from the air conditioning vent.  “That’s one way to think of it.”

“But how could I see them if no one else could?” Birdie pressed on, her finger’s digging into Percy’s bony arm.  “And why are you depending on a two-month old puppy for help?”

The puppy raised his head and barked.  Percy nodded, the yellow tuft of hair bobbing.  “He’s three months, actually.”

Birdie raised an eyebrow and waited.  Biting his lip, Percy glanced side to side.  “You see,” he whispered, leaning in so close Birdie could see pale blue veins pulsing through his thin ivory skin.  “The thing about this pet shop is that…”

Suddenly, a door slammed in the back of the shop.  “Percy!” a deep voice bellowed.  “I need you!  Immediately!”

“C-c-coming!” Percy stuttered.  His hands quivering and teeth chattering, he snapped up and bolted to the back without a single word to Birdie or Frankie.  Birdie stared after him, scratching her head.

The puppy barked a second time, his black tail beating against the green cat bed.  Squatting down, Birdie rubbed his ears.  His pink tongue lapped against her hand, his dark eyes staring up at her as the rhythm of his tail quickened.

“So what’s the deal?” Birdie whispered, rubbing his soft head.  “What’s going on here?”

The puppy licked his hand, his quiet eyes holding the answers he couldn’t share.

After Percy didn’t come back for another half-hour, the girls left the shop and plodded towards their neighborhood in a glum funk.  Each was lost in their own thoughts, identical expressions stamped on their faces.

“This doesn’t make any sense,” Birdie said finally, breaking the silence.  “How do you have a pet shop where you can see fish and a puppy, but no other pets?  And that Percy guy–he’s like something out of a movie.  I don’t know, Frankie.  There’s something fishy going on there–no pun intended–and I intend to find out what it is.”  She waited a moment, then glanced at her friend.  “Frankie?” she prompted, elbowing her.  “What do you think?”

Frankie’s head snapped up, her green eyes focusing.  “I was just thinking about if our piano teacher called my mom,” she muttered.  “I can just imagine how mad she’ll be if she found out we skipped.”  She glanced at her watch and gulped.  “We’re going to be late, too.”

“I’ll come with you,” Birdie said, patting her worrisome friend on the shoulder.  “I’ll tell her it was my fault.  Besides, I want to talk to your dad about the shop.  Will he be home tonight?”

Frankie nodded.  “He doesn’t have to work tonight, so he should be home.  Unless there’s a football game on or something and he goes to a bar.”

Birdie peeked at Frankie’s watch and threaded her arm through her friend’s.  “Well, if we hurry, we’ll catch him for sure.”  Breaking out into a full run, Birdie dragged Frankie down the sidewalk as the light dappling through the trees faded from a brilliant orange to a dusky gold.  Whipping around the street corner, the two girls barreled down the sidewalk and thundered up Frankie’s driveway through the side door.

As always, chaos greeted them.  No sooner had the door slammed shut then three toddlers launched themselves at Birdie with squeals of joy.  She squeaked, falling back as several other children rushed towards her.

“Birdie!  You came for dinner!”

“Birdie, we missed you!”

“You promised me you’d teach me how to milk a cow!  You haven’t yet!”

“Look at the picture I made in school today!”

“Look at my shoes!”

There was a loud clapping over Birdie’s head.  The children scattered, fleeing to different corners of the room as a pale hand reached down to pull up Birdie.  “Sorry, love,” purred Frankie’s mother, who was originally from Ireland.  “They get excited when new blood walks in the room.  It’s lovely to see you.”  She eyed her oldest daughter.  “Your piano teacher called.  Where were you, young lady?”

Frankie froze, her green eyes wide.  “Uhhhhh…”

“That was my fault, Mrs. O’Neil,” Birdie interrupted, flashing the biggest smile she could manage.  “I wanted to go see the new pet shop in town.  Some girls at school were talking about it, and I’m afraid I stayed so long we missed our lesson.  Frankie was nice enough to go with me, see.  So please don’t blame her.”

“Oh yes, the new pet shop,” Mrs. O’ Neil murmured, nodding.  “Charles said there was something odd about that place.  He seemed quite disturbed by it.  The man has written about dead bodies and all sorts of nasty things, but he got scared over a pet shop!  Very odd, very odd.”

“What’s so odd about it?” Birdie asked, her breath caught in her throat.  Her pulse raced and her ears strained forward to record Mrs. O’Neil’s every word.

“Well, to begin, the shop has supposedly been around for 30 years but no one has paid attention to it until now,” Mrs. O’Neil replied.  “And no one has ever bought anything from there–at least that he could find.  And then there was the strangest thing….”  She shook her head as one of the toddlers bashed the other in the head with a plastic toy.   The victim began to scream, setting off a chain of wailing and shrieking children.

“You better go ask him!” she bellowed over the noise, scooping up several of the children.  “Frankie, take her to your dad’s office.  Then come help me get dinner ready. Birdie, would you like to stay?”

“If you have room, I’d love to,” Birdie replied.

Mrs. O’Neil snorted.  “Child, when you have eight children, you learn to cook for an army.  We always have room.”  With one screaming child tucked under each arm, she marched to the kitchen.

Covering her ears, Frankie gingerly stepped through the minefield of toys in the living room and hurried through the hallway.  Stopping at a thin oak door, she knocked.

“Dad?” she called.  “Can we come in?”

“That depends,” her father called, his voice holding a hint of laughter.  “What’s in it for me?”

“Birdie wants to talk about the pet store you’ve been investigating for the paper,” Frankie replied.  The door popped open.  A lithe man with flaming red hair peered out, a ridiculously wide grin on his pinched face.

“Bring me some pretzels and orange juice and I’ll tell her everything,” her father teased, his green eyes identical to Frankie’s.  She nodded and rushed to the kitchen, the screaming growing louder as she neared.

Peering down, Frankie’s father smiled at Birdie.  “You’ve seen it, haven’t you?  That’s why you’ve come.”

“The animals?  No.” Birdie admitted, swallowing some pride.  If she was so good with animals, how come Frankie’s father, who didn’t know a kitten from a lion, could see them and not her?

Fankie’s father furrowed his brow.  “There’s no animals in the pet shop,” he replied.  “Well, no pets anyway.  Didn’t you see it?”

“See what?”  Birdie stared at him.

Frankie’s father blinked, his orange lashes fluttering rapidly.  “Why, the elephant of course.  The elephant in the back room.”

Stay tuned, Invisible Friends!  Tomorrow we have a delicious new recipe for our pie celebration Saturday and Friday, a new Dallas Jean!

Remember, if you want to be part of our National Pie Day Celebration Saturday, send me your favorite pie recipe or whatever your favorite pie story is!  Maybe it’s a memory of your grandmother making the most tender crust, maybe you got engaged over a coconut cream pie….tell me by Friday at 3 p.m.!! Any stories after that won’t make it!  Stay tuned!