Coincidental Magic: A Spanky Adventure

By Papa

Longing to be free, when Spanky escapes his habitat, he runs into a world nothing like the one he's seen through the distorting lens of television. Unbeknownst to the one-and-a-half-pound platypus, Spanky has lived a sheltered life, but he soon learns there's a lot more to it than the wild exaggerations found in the movies. (And unlike himself, animals don't talk.)
A treacherous place, full of deadly beasts, time and again, Spanky battles homesickness, his own ignorance, and the overwhelming dangers he meets on the road with his usual plucky attitude.
But when Spanky finally puts aside his fears to help the girl-fish Matilda, only then does he shine. Spanky is a hero and whether it's crossing a raging river or just the highway, he will not let the world stop him. He will save the girl from her terrible witch step-sister, and get her home. Facing one danger after the next using only his wits--and the one Kung Fu move he knows--one thing is for certain, Spanky is not giving up easily.
Meanwhile, realizing that Spanky is missing, his family begins a desperate search for him. Following a cold trail, they race to save their beloved platypus before something terrible happens to the little fellow.
And unbeknownst to the Wildermusses, they may prove too late to save Spanky from the greatest danger of all--teenagers.
Of course, sometimes a platypus has to roll up his sleeves and do things himself. Now, if only Spanky knew which direction home lay?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Papa
• Release date: May 16, 2020
• ISBN: 9780463591659

Book preview

Chapter 1

Spanky Escapes

Few people knew that Spanky talked. And he was talkative, garrulous, at times.

Sometimes, in his haste to speak, Spanky's tongue vibrated out of control and banged against his duckbills as he tried to form the word he wanted to say with no rhyme or reason to it. A byproduct of the genetics of the woman that made him, Spanky often sputtered and spewed his way through a sentence, and when he had something particularly urgent to say, he stuttered. Sometimes, he just went, Spplltt. for no reason at all. It didn't, however, make him inarticulate.

Chatty and friendly was how everybody that met him described Spanky. And occasionally, smart.

And Spanky was smart. Well, everyone said for a platypus Spanky was smart, but also true, Spanky was smart for a seven-year-old child. He reasoned uncommonly well, and in his arguments with the family (Mainly, arguments about letting him out of his habitat so that Spanky could, as he put it, Spplltt, breath.) he put forth strong, valid points for gaining his freedom.

That Spanky was a duck billed platypus astounded those that learned he could talk. And that circle of those in the know about Spanky was small, since the family that cared for Spanky didn't just let anyone know he talked. There might be consequences: visits from circus people, news reporters and possibly even, government involvement.

That made them insular in this case, for otherwise, the Wildermusses--like Spanky--were also open and friendly.

Spanky's desire to leave his habitat pained the family that watched over him. They wanted to free Spanky but couldn't tell him that the outside world might not treat him as they did, with love and affection. The outside world would try to exploit Spanky's unique ability and the family knew that.

And yet, no amount of reasoning could convince Spanky he was safer in a pen, and so in a fit of desperation for just a glimpse of the bigger world beyond him, Spanky ran away from home.

His escape was simplicity itself. He merely lifted one edge of the chicken wire fence surrounding his habitat and slithered under it. Spanky had grown plump from the well-tending and generousness of his family, who inadvertently almost spoiled his attempt, but with minor scraps he managed to squirm beneath the wire and waddle his way to the side of the yard.

His escape while fortuitous was also well-planned. His nights spent in the back yard of the Wildermuss home left Spanky ample time to listen to the neighboring couple talk and Spanky often overheard the couple when they sat out on their back deck. (The solid brick of their house acted as a natural amplifier, bouncing their words off the walls and offering him a clear understanding of what they said.) Spanky had talked with the couple countless times over the last two years since he'd come to live with the Wildermusses but the couple had always thought they were talking to one of the Wildermuss children.

In fact, on the night his plan was formed, he had overheard the couple talking about their vacay as Heather Cheeks called it. The Cheeks were drinking wine at the time and grew excited--and loud--as they talked about their travel plans and what time to wake up the next morning.

And thus, Spanky's plan arose from an overhead discussion for a vacay.

On the morning of the Cheeks departure, Spanky merely waited for them to set their luggage down by the car and then he wiggled out of the habitat and--using their bags like steps--climbed up the rear of the car and slid into the Cheeks trunk. (Heather's husband, James, like everyone does when leaving for a long trip, had ran back inside to retrieve some forgotten but much needed item, and Spanky had been waiting for his chance.)

Quietly, for Spanky knew someone might still thwart his escape, he said, Sppll, I'm free! He settled as far back inside in the trunk as possible. Spanky didn't want the Cheeks seeing him there either.

Eventually, James Cheeks tossed the bags into the trunk, jumped into the car, kissed his blond wife and cranked up the jams. They took off, heading straight for Tunica, in Mississippi.

Reclining in the trunk to the soothing sounds of death metal, the little platypus had never felt so elated in his life. Spanky had carried out phase one of his plan, succeeding spectacularly. The tunes were just an added bonus.

As the car bounced on its way to Mississippi, Spanky giggled and quietly sputtered, Free spplltt. Free at last!

Chapter 2

Spanky and the Squirrel

Spanky didn't ride in the trunk all the way to Mississippi; he didn't think that necessary. And he had every intention of returning to the Wildermusses, who treated him like royalty and besides, the mother was a good cook. She always toasted the prawns she fed him. He just needed to put distance between himself and his family. That he loved them no one doubted, but sometimes, they smothered him with their constant attention, and besides, Carson, the youngest, had the ability to track him, so Spanky needed to get beyond the range of the physic boy. Especially before they realized Spanky had gone missing.

So, his plan was to find a little freedom, although Spanky suspected that he couldn't live out in the wide world all by himself. Too much danger existed out there for a six-inch-high, one-and-a-half-pound animal. Danger that made Spanky look like the perfect meal. And although he suspected this, his life had become intolerable and he refused to stay cooped up in that glorified chicken pen any longer.

After several hours of snoring in the Cheek's trunk, Spanky felt the car stop. The end of the car's rocking roused him; he immediately missed the relaxing rhythm.

The Cheek's had pulled over a hundred and fifty miles from home, at a traveler's stop that backed upon a state park whose name was gibberish to Spanky. He spoke well for a platypus, but read not a single word of English.

Wide awake now, Spanky waited for his moment, and when Heather Cheeks popped open the trunk and pulled something out, Spanky crouched deep in back and watched for her to look away. It didn't take long.

A conscientious blond where it concerned her looks, she lifted out her make-up kit, leaned against the car's side panel and began an inventory, frowning that her war chest of beauty looked lean in places. Her eyes on that, Spanky wiggled out of the trunk, slid down the bumper, and waddled straight for the tree line. He never looked back either.

(And Heather Cheeks did see Spanky. The wet trail he made in the grass caught her eye but she dismissed him as some strange bird.)

Spanky wended his way through the woods, found a shallow bowl in the landscape and veered down into that.

He followed the natural trail another hundred yards, on the lookout for other woodland creatures.

Well, look at this, Spanky said. He'd spied an animal similar to him.

Spanky waddled up on the squirrel and gave it a befuddled, sideways look. The strangeness of the creature mystified but also fascinated him. Its long, bushy tail, its small, impenetrable eyes, and those prominent teeth he'd never seen up close. (Well, the teeth once on one of Lyse's friends.) Before this moment, Spanky had only ever seen people, other platypuses and a gorilla for references to how other living things acted towards each other. He didn't think much of the squirrel now.

Hunched over a hickory nut, the squirrel gnawed away, trying to get to its juicy center.

And who might you be? Spanky asked the squirrel. The squirrel only chattered at him and turned away.

Now, hold on a spplltt minute. I was talking to you. You do know it's rude to not reply to another person. Spanky also didn't know that animals couldn't talk. (He knew some animals