The Adventures of Rank
The “Cat” Gets a Name
Carl was having a birthday party and Rank couldn’t have been more excited. He was actually invited. Now that he and Terry were good friends, other kids didn’t seem to mind Rank hanging around. There were still a few times when some tough kid had to see if Rank was tougher, but that was nothing new.
Before he could go to the party, he had to stop by at Mr. Jenkins. Mr. Jenkins was gone that weekend and it was Rank’s responsibility to take care of the cat. This was the first time Rank had been in Mr. Jenkins house alone and he wanted to do everything right.
Rank was all ready for the party. He had a present and had even showered. His foster parents were proud of how far he had come in his new life so they bought him a new outfit. Rank felt kind of silly wearing a new outfit. But, he didn’t want to disappoint his foster parents.
Rank put the key in Mr. Jenkins door. He casually opened it. The minute the door was open a few inches, out ran the cat! “No, not now,” thought Rank. He didn’t really have time to deal with it. The cat rarely ran outside but of course, today would be the day that it did.
Rank dropped his present and the keys and went in search of his cat. He wasn’t too worried though; the cat had never left the yard. He figured he would just find the cat, bring it back in, feed and water it and off he would go to the party.
Well, that just wasn’t the case. Rank looked all around the yard and there was no sign of the cat. He then started scouring the neighborhood. If Mr. Jenkins was there, he could just whistle. For some odd reason, the cat came when Mr. Jenkins whistled. Rank wasn’t all that good at whistling but he was giving it his best effort. Puckering his lips, he blew and blew. A little sound would come out occasionally but clearly the cat wasn’t fooled. He didn’t come back.
Rank headed further down the street. To his horror, he saw a group of boys that were also going to the party. He thought about hiding from them. He was a little embarrassed to admit he had lost his cat. But, he figured he might as well face it. He kept walking. He was calling the cat and trying not to pay that much attention to the group of kids. When they walked up to him, Rank was relieved to see Terry. He knew the other kids but he was better friends with Terry.
Immediately, Terry asked Rank what he was doing. Rank told him about the cat. Terry and the other boys offered to help Rank look. It wasn’t long and one of the kids asked Rank the name of the cat. Rank and Terry looked at each other. "Well, we haven’t gotten around to naming the cat, yet," explained Rank.
All throughout the neighborhood the voices of boys calling, "Come here cat" could be heard. This went on for at least 30 minutes until someone finally yelled, “Over here!” Then, all you could hear were the sounds of tennis shoes pounding on the sidewalk. All the boys came running!
Well, they found the cat alright. Stuck in a rain gutter! All you could see was its head peaking out. All you could hear were soft cries of panic. The boys gathered around the rain gutter and pondered what they could possibly do to get the cat out.
They tried to pull the cat out but quickly realized the head of the cat was not the best thing to pull on. They thought about squeezing the cat out from behind but realized it wasn’t going to just pop out like toothpaste.
One of the boys had a great idea. One time his mom had sprayed a baking pan with this liquid oil. He had walked into the kitchen and slipped on the floor where the oil had over-sprayed. They thought if they could make the cat slippery, they could pull the cat out. The boy with the idea ran to his house and got the can of spray.
Covering the cat’s eyes, they sprayed the best they could at the body of the cat. Gently they tugged on the cat’s legs and out it popped!
With the boys laughing and chasing behind, that cat ran for home with all of its might! All of the way home the boys were calling the cat “Houdini” because none of them could quite figure out how that cat got in the rain gutter.
Rank and Terry kind of liked the name. They looked at each other, smirked and said, "Houdini" it is!