fter the game I found a giraffe in my locker I wasn’t surprised Yesterday there was a crocodile and the day before that a monkey All three animals were made out of balloons The giraffe was the best one yet with orange spots colored onto the yellow balloons with a felt-tip pen I was a batboy for the Pine City Porcupines Balloon Day was coming up at Pine City Park so Spike the Pines junior mascot was learning how to make balloon animals Not many people knew Spike’s secret identity but I did I knew that Abby a girl from my class was inside the porcupine suit Abby told me she wanted to be able to make any balloon animal a kid asked for even if it was something crazy like a possum or an armadillo What did you get I asked Dylan He was the other batboy I don’t know He opened his locker and pulled out a tangled knot of balloons What do you think this is A spider I took it from him and made it crawl up the locker I guess Spike remembers the time you saved that spider in the visitors dugout
Spider No way said Teddy the Bear Larrabee the first baseman He took the crazy balloon thing from Dylan and said It’s a it looks like maybe a He turned it this way and that trying to think of something
