But she noticed that the canaries weren’t the only birds to stop singing. All of them had stopped making any kind of noise at all. The macaws, parrots, doves, and parakeets were silent, and stood unmoving in their cages. Never in her life had Mina walked into a pet store and heard this kind of silence.
She swallowed nervously and began to back away from the bird aisle and make her way back toward Nan. The canaries turned their heads and watched her retreat. Being under the scrutiny of so many black beady eyes was enough to make anyone jumpy. “It’s just a coincidence,” Mina chanted to herself. “It’s just a coincidence.” Mina was so nervous that she stumbled into a large fake tree stand with a gray macaw.
The bird crooked his head and snapped his beak a few times before it spoke one word. “Doom.”
Chapter 10
The hair stood up on the back of Mina’s neck. “Doom, doom, doom,” the parakeets echoed. The silence disappeared as all of the birds seemed to chirp one word over and over: “Doom. Doom. Doom.” Even the canaries seemed to take up the battle cry
Mina covered her ears and ran down the aisle, putting as much distance as she could between the bewitched birds and herself. She didn’t stop running until she was in the aquatics department.
“Finally!” Mina muttered. The sound of the birds dissipated into nothingness among the hums of the stacked fish tanks. Looking around at the fish tanks, Mina was relieved. There was nothing here that could talk and spew out frightening words. The fish, either because they had small brains or were numb to humans, ignored her presence next to their tanks.
Mina walked aimlessly, staring at the different fish and thinking back to what had just happened. Had she imagined the birds speaking to her? Or was this more of the Story’s magic trying to take control? There wasn’t any way the canaries could talk, so maybe she had imagined it.
A thumping noise drew Mina’s attention toward a shelf of tanks along a side wall. There wasn’t a tag identifying the species in the tank, but the presence of logs and moss gave her the idea it was some kind of amphibian. Thump, thump. The noise came again, and Mina leaned closer to look to see what was making the noise. Something smacked itself against the glass, causing Mina to scream and step back. She could clearly see it was a toad, who was not only croaking but throwing himself against the glass as if trying to break through.
Thump! Thump! More thumping sounds came from one tank over. Mina stared in horror as frog after frog came out of hiding and began to throw itself against the tanks. Eight tanks full of frogs in various sizes began to shake and move with the vibration of the frenzied frogs. Even the tree frogs were causing their smaller tank to shudder the slightest bit.
“Stop it!” Mina hissed out. “You’ll hurt yourself.” She reached forward apprehensively to push the tank with the large toads farther back on the shelf. The toads took this as a rally point and began to climb on each other’s backs as a way to reach the top of the cage and lift the lid off.
Mina looked around in horror and grabbed a large aquarium rock to weigh down the lid. The other amphibians must have gotten the same idea, and began to hop, climb, and otherwise maneuver to the top of the tank so they could escape through the lid.
“No, no, no, no,” Mina called out frantically, and looked for other decorations to keep the frogs from escaping. She put a pink mermaid statue on the tree frogs’ tank, and petrified wood on the poison dart frogs’, which could have been disastrous. It wasn’t until something slithered past her foot that Mina abandoned her efforts. A large striped snake was disappearing under a shelf, and, from the looks of it, more snakes were dropping from them by the second. When a boa came toward Mina’s legs, she screamed and ran toward the front door. She only hoped the frogs were smart enough to stay in their tanks once the snakes were loose, but that wasn’t her problem anymore.
Mina slowed by the puppies long enough to grab Nan’s arm by the elbow as she was handing one of the puppies back to Greg.
“Nan, we have to go. Now!” Mina whispered under her breath. A little louder, she called out toward Greg, “I think there’s a clean-up in aisle eight.”
Greg looked up in surprise and went to get a doggy bag and broom. Mina knew Greg was assuming he needed to clean up whatever present a customer’s unattended dog might have left for him. Unfortunately, it wasn’t going to be that kind of surprise. She secretly hoped Greg wasn’t afraid of snakes.
Once they were back on the sidewalk, Mina kept up a fast pace, causing Nan to nearly run behind her. “Mina? What’s the matter? What’s going on?”