PUBLISHER’S NOTE: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Cataloging-in-Publication Data has been applied for and may be obtained from the Library of Congress.
ISBN 978-1-4197-2859-4
eISBN 978-1-68335-243-3
Text copyright © 2018 Ellen Potter
Illustrations copyright © 2018 Felicita Sala
Book design by Siobhán Gallagher
Published in 2018 by Amulet Books, an imprint of ABRAMS. All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, mechanical, electronic, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission from the publisher.
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For Addison, Natalie, Ethan, and Violet Waterman, who are always ready for an adventure in the Big Wide World.
Deep in the cold North Woods, there lived a young Sasquatch named Hugo. He was bigger than you but smaller than me, and he was hairier than both of us. He lived in apartment 1G in the very back of Widdershins Cavern with his mother and father and his older sister, Winnie.
Even though the apartment was very small, there was a nice little stream that ran right into Hugo’s bedroom. It entered through a hole in the bottom of the stone wall, traveled across the room, and then escaped out another hole in the wall by Hugo’s toy chest.
Hugo had carved a little wooden boat that was small enough to sail in the stream. He pretended that he was the captain of the boat and he was sailing to Bora Bora or Atlantic City or some other mysterious place that his grandfather had told him about. He’d make storms by swirling his hand in the stream, and the toy boat would wobble wildly but wouldn’t topple.
Sometimes little fish swam into his bedroom. They were on their way to Ripple Worm River, which ran through the North Woods. Hugo pretended the fish were sharks and that they were attacking his boat. He made the noise of a shark splooshing out of the ocean and clacking its teeth. (Sasquatches are excellent at making pretend noises. For instance, if you are in the woods and hear a howl, you may, in fact, be hearing a Sasquatch pretending to be a coyote.)
The fish played with Hugo for a while, but in the end they always swam out through the hole in the wall and into the Big Wide World, where Hugo was never allowed to go.
Each morning, Hugo and his sister, Winnie, walked to school. Because their apartment was at the east end of the cavern, and their school was at the west end, Hugo and Winnie had to walk quite a long way. The cavern floor was icy cold against their bare feet, and their breath made cloudy puffs as they walked along.
“Do you think sharks would eat a Sasquatch?” Hugo asked Winnie.
“Don’t be a pinhead, Hugo,” said Winnie. She was always grumpy in the morning. “There aren’t any sharks in a cavern.”
“But I might become a sailor. And if I ran into a shark, I’d like to know if it would eat me.”
“Sasquatches don’t become sailors,” Winnie told him.
“Maybe sometimes they do,” Hugo said.
“No, never,” said Winnie firmly.
Winnie then stopped in front of apartment 1B. She gave a quick rap on the door. The door opened, and her friend Hazel came out.
Winnie and Hazel rubbed their elbows together and bumped their hips together and then said, “Hakkah-makka-momo.”
That’s because they were in a secret club, except it wasn’t very secret since everyone at school knew about it. Anyway, the only thing they ever did in the club was make their own lip gloss.
Right behind Hazel came Hazel’s younger sister, Gigi. She was a small Sasquatch, as Sasquatches go. She had three thin braids down the right side of her head and very good posture.
As they walked along, Hugo asked, “Gigi, do you think a Sasquatch could become a sailor?”
Gigi thought for a minute. She was a slow but excellent thinker.
“It’s possible,” she said.
Hugo’s spirits lifted.
“But,” Gigi added, “the Sasquatch would have to be VERY careful not to be seen by Humans.”
“Of course.” Hugo nodded seriously. A Sasquatch could never be seen by Humans. That was the Most Important Rule.
“He’d need a boat, too,” said Gigi.
That was no problem, thought Hugo. Sasquatches were good builders. They could build just about anything from logs.
“And he would have to bring along five barrels of blackberries and twenty jars of acorn butter for the trip,” Gigi added.
“Right!” said Hugo. He’d bring thirty jars of acorn butter, since that was his favorite thing to eat.
“And do you think a shark would eat a Sasquatch?” Hugo asked.
Gigi snorted. “Of course not! Eating a Sasquatch would give a shark hair balls.”
“Phew, that’s a relief,” said Hugo.
Gigi thought some more.
“There’s something else a Sasquatch would need,” she said. “A Navigator.”
“A Navigator.” Hugo nodded thoughtfully. After a moment he asked, “Is that anything like an alligator?”
“No, Hugo. A Navigator is someone who knows all about the Big Wide World. A Navigator tells you which way to go.”
“Oh.” That might be a problem, thought Hugo. Sasquatches don’t know about the Big Wide World. They only know about caves and trees and acorn butter and berries and the deep, cold woods.
Even though Hugo’s school was in a cave, it was a cozy, cheerful-looking place. Painted in loopy yellow letters above the door were the words THE ACADEMY FOR CURIOUS SQUIDGES. (A “squidge,” in case you don’t know, is what you call a young Sasquatch.) There were three classrooms in the Academy. Classroom One was for the youngest squidges. Classroom Two was for squidges who were old enough to know better. Classroom Three was for squidges who thought they knew better than everyone else but really didn’t.
Hugo was in Classroom One. Behind the teacher’s desk, colorful letters of the UMLECH