Fortune's Magic Farm by Suzanne Selfors (rainbow fish read aloud .txt) 📕

Neptune picked up speed. The only home she had ever known disappeared from view, and with it the only people she had ever loved, now doomed to work longer and harder to make Mr. Supreme richer and richer.

“I’ll be back,” she whispered. “I promise that I’ll come back and find a way to help you.”

A journey usually includes sights to see along the way, like the world’s largest ball of twine, a castle made from sand, or maybe even a waxed figure museum. But just beyond Runny Cove, fog rolled in, as thick as porridge. Isabelle narrowed her eyes, straining for a glimpse of anything, but found nothing. Was she drifting across the sea or across the sky? The only way to tell that they were actually moving was from the constant swaying of Neptune’s body. But she was on her way and that was all that mattered. She was going to find out where she had come from and in that place a family waited—her family.

Isabelle bombarded Sage with questions. “Will I meet my mother and father? Are they tenders too? Do I have any brothers or sisters? Is there going to be a party when I get there? Do I look like my mother? Is she nice? Does my father work in a factory?” She didn’t get to ask the most important question of all—Why was I left on a doorstep?—because Sage cut her off.

“I can’t answer any questions about your family.”

“You mean you don’t know the answers?”

“Of course I know, but it’s really complicated. Besides, someone else wants to tell you.”

“Who?”

“You’ll find out soon enough. Now stop jabbering.”

Isabelle folded her arms and “hmphed” with frustration. She wasn’t jabbering. Asking important questions about one’s heritage is totally different from jabbering. You’ll find out soon enough, he had said. Soon enough seemed like an eternity. She leaned against the saddleback and watched the fog drift past.

With nothing to look at, some might have considered the ride boring. But not Isabelle. She knew boring and this was the furthest thing from it. Her frustration quickly turned to excitement, for never in her ten years had she gone anywhere. And the most amazing thing of all, more amazing even than riding on an elephant seal, was that it had stopped raining.

Eve poked her head out of the satchel a few times, then curled up for a nap. Rolo sat on Sage’s shoulder, his beak tucked under his black wing. Isabelle wiped sea mist from her face. Neither she nor Sage wore their hoods, since the temperature was quite comfortable.

She decided to risk a non-family question. “Are we almost there?”

He sighed. “No. We’ve got to travel west for most of the day until we reach the Tangled Islands.”

“Is that where Nowhere is? West?”

“West to the Tangled Islands, then north to the Northern Shore. But you might as well start calling Nowhere by its real name—Fortune’s Farm.”

Grandma Maxine had told Isabelle about farms. There had once been a goat farm and a parsley farm in Sunny Cove. They sounded like pretty places. And the fishermen had often visited a worm farm. “How does Neptune know how to get there? Can he see through all this fog?”

“He can smell the place.” Sage turned half around. Mist sparkled at the ends of his long black lashes. How different he looked. There didn’t appear to be a speck of mold on him and he didn’t wheeze when he breathed like most everyone in Runny Cove. “Neptune’s harem lives on the Northern Shore. Last time I counted he had twenty-three wives. You ever smelled a herd of elephant seals?”

Isabelle scratched the itchy patch above her right ear. “Neptune is the first elephant seal I’ve ever seen. I didn’t even know they existed.”

“You don’t know a lot,” Sage said, smirking condescendingly. That may have been the truth. After all, she had never been to school. But did he have to be so rude?

“I’m a fast learner,” she said. “Leonard once showed me how to skip rocks and I learned right away. And my grandma taught me how to make a quilt out of old socks.”

“You’d better be a fast learner or when you get to Fortune’s Farm your head will spin right off.” He turned back around. “I’m going to take a nap. It’s a long journey so you should take one too.” He slumped forward, resting his head on the satchel.

Isabelle couldn’t recall ever taking a nap. If she accidentally dozed while standing at the conveyor belt, one of the assistants would wallop her on the head. Besides, if she napped during the sea elephant ride she might miss something. She settled against the saddle and stared into the fog.

Like the ocean’s swells, her thoughts rolled and tumbled and her emotions peaked and crested. Going to Nowhere thrilled her. Knowing that she’d never again see her grandmother saddened her. The fact that it had stopped raining amazed her. Riding over deep water scared her. She felt goosebumpy and shivery and sweaty at the same time. So, to ease her mind, she began to compose a little song, which she sang in her head so as not to disturb Sage.

The Elephant Seal Song

Salty water swooshing past,

I might fall off ’cause he’s swimming fast.

But I don’t care ’cause this is a blast,

on the back of an elephant seal.

What a marvelous way to feel, on the back of an elephant seal.

I hope Mr. Supreme gets fleas,

and Mama Lu chokes on cheese.

Look at me, doing what I please,

on the back of an elephant seal.

What a marvelous way to feel, on the back of an elephant seal.

Suddenly she felt lightheaded and woozy. The bread churned in her stomach. She felt worse than she had ever felt, even worse than the time when she’d eaten a bowl of Mama Lu’s “What’s that growing in the back of the icebox?” soup. Come the third verse, Isabelle’s song took a different tone.

Up down up down goes the