The Secret of Rover by Rachel Wildavsky Page A

to eat in a truck full of food?
    Katie heard a barfing noise from David. “What?” she asked.
    â€œDog biscuits.”
    â€œActually—”
    â€œI’m not that desperate!”
    Sighing, Katie turned down the next aisle, waving her flashlight listlessly at the boxes that lined it. Her heart leaped. “David!”
    He scurried to her side, and triumphantly she pointed her light squarely at the middlemost box in the wall of cartons on her left.
    THE CHEESY SNACK ! announced the only side of the box that they could see.
    â€œSweet!” said David, pouncing on the carton.
    â€œWhat are they?” whispered Katie.
    â€œI don’t care,” he answered. “Let’s get ’em open.”
    They quickly decided that it would be easier to tear a hole in the side of the box and pull out the snacks—whatever they were—than to pull the box out of its stack and open it the right way. But “easier” wasn’t the same as “easy.”
    Cardboard, it turned out, was nearly as unbreakable as wood. So instead of punching through the box, they had to tear off the tape that sealed the carton around the edges and open it at the seam. This resulted in numerous paper cuts and broken nails. And as if their bruised and bleeding fingertips were not aggravation enough, they had to wage the whole struggle in a tight, narrow space, with flashlights wedged under their arms, in a hot, unventilated, moving truck.
    Sweat rolled in rivulets down Katie’s sides, and hercuticles stung as she jammed her dirty fingers into the gap they were painfully trying to open along the side of the box.
    â€œDavid,” she gasped, “we don’t need snacks; we need drinks.”
    â€œThat’s next,” he grunted.
    With a wrench the side of the box came free, exposing a wall of blue and orange cracker boxes.
    â€œYes!”
Both children lunged. Their flashlights clattered to the floor, flinging wild beams everywhere as they pulled out armfuls of boxes and retreated with their booty to the wide center aisle of the truck.
    David dropped to the floor and ripped the top off of one of the boxes, letting the others tumble in a heap about him. He was just tearing at the foil packet inside when Katie suddenly said, “David! Don’t.”
    He stopped, staring up at her in bewilderment. “What?” he said. “I’m starving, Kat!”
    â€œWhat time is it?” she demanded.
    He looked at his watch, his irritation increasing. “It’s twelve twenty. It’s after midnight, Katie! I think we last ate at, what? Six? I’m incredibly hungry!”
    â€œI know; I am too. But listen, David. We’ve been in this truck for an hour and fifteen minutes. It took us
over an hour
—OK, some of that time was for the flashlights—it took us about an hour to get these crackers.”
    â€œSo?” Defiant, David ripped the foil, but he did not eat.
    â€œSo it could take us at least that long to find something to drink.”
    â€œGet to the point!”
    â€œI am, if you’d just listen! David, we have to find drinks! Who knows what’ll be in our next truck? The next truck could be carrying . . . lightbulbs, I don’t know; or furniture, or toilets—”
    â€œDon’t say that!”
    Katie simply stared.
    â€œDon’t say ‘toilet’! Katie, I can’t drink anything!”
    â€œOh, I forgot. Sorry . . . although in that case,” she continued, “you shouldn’t eat crackers at all. Look at the box. They’re going to make you even thirstier than you already are.”
    The box was emblazoned with a banner that screamed: THE CHEESIEST EVER ! David chucked it across the aisle, defeated and miserable. She was right, of course.
    â€œWhy’d you have to say ‘toilet’?” he repeated, disconsolate. “Now I feel even worse.”
    â€œSorry,” she said again. “But we do have