Jocelyn whispered, “Hey, there, Miss Snake. Are you lost, lost, lost?”
The snake didn’t answer. Ha-ha!
Lulu glanced from Jocelyn to the other counselors. Trinity shrugged. Lulu asked, “So, you like snakes, Jocelyn?”
Jocelyn nodded. “My brother,” she said in a soft, small voice. “He has a few like this. It is a corn snake. They’re not scary, scary, scary at all.”
“Okay, Falcons,” Lulu told us, looking relieved. “Let’s look at this like real campers. We are in the woods, so basically we’re invading the snake’s house. She belongs here. It’s her habitat. We are invading her space, not the other way around. You gotta remember she did not invite us over for tea and cookies.”
Athena cracked up. Then she asked, “What’s ‘habitat’?”
“?‘Habitat’ refers to where an animal lives. This is her living room and dining room, and we have parked ourselves in the middle of it!” Lulu paused, then said, “Okay—quick science lesson. Like Jocelyn confirmed, this is definitely a corn snake.”
Athena said, “I bet it’s got fangs!”
Jocelyn shook her head. “Nope, no fangs.”
Well, that was good to know!
Lulu added, “And it’s non-venomous.”
“What does that mean?” Karyn asked.
I knew, but I wasn’t gonna be a show-off.
“It means it’s not poisonous.”
“But aren’t all snakes poisonous?” Athena wanted to know.
Lulu wrinkled her forehead. “Y’all watch way too many scary jungle movies.”
I didn’t think I’d ever seen a movie where the snake was a hero. I was feeling a little sorry for snakes in general at this point. They never get to be the good guys!
“Would the rest of you like to touch her?” Lulu put out there.
Hesitation hovered.
“How do you know it’s a girl?” Athena asked.
Lulu laughed. “I honestly don’t know for sure. I just figured she was looking for some cool girls to hang out with, and she chose us!”
Karyn raised her hand at last. “I’m not scared of it,” she admitted. “It just… surprised me, showing up like that.”
Exactly how I felt.
“I’ll tell you what we’re gonna do,” Lulu announced. “Jocelyn, if you’d like, you can bring the snake—”
“Her name is Cleopatra,” Jocelyn announced. The snake curled around her wrist like a bracelet.
Athena asked, “How do you know that’s her name?”
Jocelyn shrugged. “Uh, ’cause she told me. I promise she’s nice, nice, nice. You wanna touch her?”
“I’m no scaredy-cat!” Athena carefully adjusted her glasses, then gently touched the snake with one finger. “She’s so smooth!” she cooed. “Not snaky at all!”
Snaky—great word!
Jocelyn was rocking back and forth. “Snakes are not slimy,” she told us.
Lulu agreed. “She’s right—they’re sleek and smooth. When we go on our nature hike, we will probably see squirrels and birds, but I bet we won’t see a single snake. We’re actually lucky we got to see this one.”
“How come?” Athena asked.
“?’Cause snakes are smart and know how to hide from noisy folks like us!”
“Hide where?” I tapped.
“Under leaves. Behind bushes. In the undergrowth. That’s their home. They know all the safe places to hide from birds and squirrels and foot-stomping campers.”
“Snakes don’t have ears,” Karyn said with a thoughtful frown. “So how do they hear us, or anything that’s trying to sneak up on them to eat them?”
Athena found the idea of ears on snakes hilarious. “Ears on a snake! Ears on a snake! That’s soooo funny!”
I was trying to draw a picture in my head of a long, skinny snake with protruding ears attached to each side of its body. Maybe wearing headphones! Okay, yep, pretty funny.
“Snakes listen for vibrations through their jawbones. Odd, huh?” Lulu asked. “So when we pound through the woods this afternoon, Miss Cleo will be as far away as she can be!”
Jocelyn had come over to me with the snake. Lulu asked if I’d like to touch Cleopatra before we let her go.
I nodded and lifted my right hand. The snake was so pretty—golden brown with orange splotches on it. I couldn’t believe I was actually sitting there, thinking about touching a beautiful snake!
Everybody there knew by now that my hands sometimes had their own agenda. It’s actually one of the things that’s most frustrating about having cerebral palsy. I just want my body to be still sometimes. This was one of those times.
Slowly I reached out. I wasn’t scared. But what if I scared it? Be still, hand! I ordered my right hand. Miss Cleo had tiny black button eyes, and it stared right at me.
As I touched the snake, it still didn’t move, and neither did my hand! It felt a little like cool, smooth leather on my fingertips. Look at me! Getting all cozy with snakes and stuff—Mom and Dad would never believe this!
Once we’d learned more about snakes than we ever imagined we wanted to, Lulu announced that she was going to let this one go home. “Everybody good with that?”
She opened the cabin door. Jocelyn went outside about ten yards from the cabin, then gently placed Cleopatra on the grass. “Bye, bye, bye,” she whispered.
Trinity snapped a quick photo.
“Thanks for visiting us,” Lulu called out, “but go find a safe place to sleep, okay? These campers think you’re very pretty, but they want you to go back to the forest.”
It raised its head, seemed to look around for a second, then—spfft! It slithered off into the warming-up morning.
CHAPTER 25
So, we had a snake come to visit us. And now they wanted us to go on a trek into snake territory on purpose? Actually, that sounded like a fair trade—I was up for it, ready to go and check out Cleopatra’s neighborhood.