Heading out on the road When you hear the word vacation what do you think of Beaches and warm water nice hotels with swimming pools Giant waterslides and amusement parks and miniature golf Maybe even Disneyland Me too But not my parents They’re pretty strange that way They want to have new adventures in some out-of-the-way place So every vacation my little brother and I have to go with them to some wild faraway destination where no one else ever goes The farther it is the more remote it is the better my parents like it That’s called off the beaten track No tourist traps and no line-ups No wonder Nobody wants to go there Half the time I end up having to save them or my
brother or both from alligators high tides or sandstorms Let me tell you sometimes it’s pretty tough I don’t know why my parents are like that I guess it’s their way of feeling young again and different from other people If it were up to my little brother and me we’d be normal kids with normal parents going on a normal vacation Even getting to where we’re going can be an adventure Like the time we drove to Maine We’ll take the road through the mountains my father said showing us the map It’ll be much more interesting When he says interesting he really means we’ll be driving on bumpy back roads folding and unfolding the map and generally getting lost It’ll be much more beautiful too my mother added Which means we’ll have to stop and look at all the beautiful stuff along the way It’ll take us forever So there we were bumping along the winding mountain roads on our way to Maine Our tiny car was filled to the brim with suitcases books and fishing nets My parents bicycles were on the roof and my brother’s and mine were tied to the trunk Between us was our brand-new cat-carrying box with Miro our cat inside It was about 100 degrees in the car And 150 degrees in the box
Why is the cat’s tongue hanging out my brother asked I thought only dogs did that Maybe he thinks he’s a dog I said Actually he looked pretty sick His furry face was pale and his eyes were half-closed It’s too hot for him my father said Let him out of the box He’ll be fine But he wasn’t First he gave a pitiful howl then he threw up on the back seat Then he climbed in front and peed on my mother’s shoes The next thing we knew a wasp flew in the open window our car doesn’t have air-conditioning of course and stung my brother on the knee He howled Not a pitiful howl A loud angry howl that startled my father He
