Orwell's Luck Read Online Free Page A

injured rabbit, had simply stopped moving forward.
    Each morning, before getting ready for school, I read my horoscope, and each morning it said things like
MAKE GOOD USE OF OPPORTUNITIES PRESENTED YOU
and
RESUME PROJECT YOU HAVE PUT ON HOLD .
    Hardly predictions. Not even very good advice. About what you'd expect from the fortune cookies at the Imperial Garden. It seemed that even the stars had slowed down.
    And then, quite unexpectedly, my horoscopes began to change. One Monday morning in late January, the seven deciphered numbers in Scorpio spelled out this message:
UNDER NEW MANAGEMENT
WATCH FOR SPECIAL INSTRUCTIONS .
    "What kind of horoscope is this?" I asked right out loud.
    Starting over at the beginning, I carefully checked every word again. Then I deciphered Pisces and Aries, choosing two strangers at random, to see if their messages were anything like mine. Theirs was the usual stuff:
DRESS FOR SUCCESS TODAY YOU'LL BE GLAD
and
A TELEPHONE CALL BRINGS NEWS FROM AFAR .
    This is strange,
I thought. But by the time I got to school, I had forgotten all about it.
    The next day, my horoscope was at it again, advising
STAY TUNED FOR AN IMPORTANT NEWS BULLETIN .
    This is really weird,
I thought.
    Then, in a complete departure from horoscope protocol, I got the very same message for two more days. Just when I was getting tired of staying tuned, on Friday the repetitive series was broken with these words:
KEEP ALL FURTHER COMMUNICATIONS
UNDER YOUR HAT.
    "What in the Sam Hill universe is going on?" I blurted out.
    "Watch your language!" my father admonished, barely lifting his eyes from the Help Wanted section.
    "I should say so!" my mother agreed.
    "Maybe you better go feed the dog," my father instructed.
    The dog is older than I am. My parents got him so they could practice taking care of something before they decided to have kids. My mother says it was all my father's idea. She didn't need a dog to tell her if she wanted children. The only thing getting a dog did for her, she says, was convince her that she didn't want a dog. Under the circumstances, I guess I am lucky to have been born.
    That night I hung out with Orwell until bedtime. I had come up with a special knock on the door, so he'd know it was me. Three longs, a short, and a long.
    Tap-tap-tap-ta-tap!
    This was the secret signal, and I was careful not to perform it in the presence of others.
    Unfortunately, since Orwell's thumping feet were out of commission, he could not return the signal. But he seemed to like it, because he looked happy when I let myself in.
    "Hey, Orwell, what's the good word?" I greeted him, handing him a carrot strip.
    While he ate his snack, I cleaned up his habitat and told him about my day at school, what was going on with my father and his job, what my sister was up to, and how my mother was taking everything. I even told him about stuff I'd read in the paper and seen on TV.
    Orwell continued munching on carrot strips. Every once in a while he'd rotate his ears or wiggle his nose. But when I mentioned the recent episodes with my horoscope, Orwell stopped what he was doing, sat very still, and looked me in the eyes for the longest time, so long that I was able to see my reflection in them, and not just me, but the whole room, curved and reproduced in miniature—a tiny, magical world displayed in duplicate by two of the brightest, shiniest, brownest eyes I've ever seen.

From the watchtower
    On Saturday, I picked up the paper in the rain. It was a gentle, sorrowful rain that began sometime in the middle of the night. Despite its misty quality, by the time I got outside it had created a puddle near the basketball goal. This was a sign that the creek was rising. Soon the outdoor creatures would be moving up the hill toward the safety of the higher ground on which our little house was perched.
    The dog wisely went back inside, but I stayed out to restock the Science City diet pellets and after that tossed out some cornbread left over