“I was going to suggest the same thing. Why don’t you prop open the door? I’ll carry it for you.”

For the next two weeks I was completely consumed with the growing of chicks. I labeled the eggs A, B, C, D, E, and F, but before long they had names, too: Abby, Bonnie, Clyde, Dexter, Eunice, and Florence. Every day I weighed them, candled them, and turned them. I even thought it might be good for them to hear some clucking, so for a while I did that, too, but clucking is tiring! It was much easier to hum around my quiet little flock, so I did that, instead. Soon I was humming without even thinking about it, because when I was around my eggs, I was happy.

I read The Beginner’s Guide to Raising Chickens cover to cover twice. For my project I drew diagrams of the various stages of an embryo’s development, I made a giant chicken poster, I graphed the daily fluctuations in temperature and humidity, and I made a line chart documenting the weight loss of each egg. On the outside eggs were boring, but I knew what was happening on the inside!

Then two days before the science fair I was candling Bonnie when I noticed something. I called my dad into my room and said, “Look, Dad! Look at this! Is that the heart beating?”

He studied it for a moment, then smiled and said, “Let me get your mother.”

So the three of us crowded around and watched Bonnie’s heart beat, and even my mother had to admit that it was absolutely amazing.

Clyde was the first to pip. And of course he did it right before I had to leave for school. His little beak cracked through, and while I held my breath and waited, he rested. And rested. Finally his beak poked through again, but almost right away, he rested again. How could I go to school and just leave him this way? What if he needed my help? Surely this was a valid reason to stay home, at least for a little while!

My father tried to assure me that hatching out could take all day and that there’d be plenty of action left after school, but I’d have none of that. Oh, no-no-no! I wanted to see Abby and Bonnie and Clyde and Dexter and Eunice and Florence come into the world. Every single one of them. “I can’t miss the hatch!” I told him. “Not even a second of it!”

“So take it to school with you,” my mother said. “Mrs. Brubeck shouldn’t mind. After all, this was her idea.”

Sometimes it pays to have a sensible mother. I’d just set up for the science fair early, that’s what I’d do! I packed up my entire operation, posters, charts, and all, and got a ride to school from my mom.

Mrs. Brubeck didn’t mind a bit. She was so busy helping kids with their projects that I got to spend nearly the entire day watching the hatch.

Clyde and Bonnie were the first ones out. It was disappointing at first because they just lay there all wet and matted, looking exhausted and ugly. But by the time Abby and Dexter broke out, Bonnie and Clyde were fluffing up, looking for action.

The last two took forever, but Mrs. Brubeck insisted that I leave them alone, and that worked out pretty great because they hatched out during the fair that night. My whole family came, and even though Matt and Mike only watched for about two minutes before they took off to look at some other demonstration, my mom and dad stuck around for the whole thing. Mom even picked Bonnie up and nuzzled her.

That night after it was all over and I was packing up to go home, Mom asked, “So do these go back to Mrs. Brubeck now?”

“Do what go back to Mrs. Brubeck?” I asked her.

“The chicks, Juli. You’re not planning to raise chickens, are you?”

To be honest, I hadn’t thought beyond the hatch. My focus had been strictly on bringing them into the world. But she was right—here they were. Six fluffy little adorable chicks, each of which had a name and, I could already tell, its own unique personality.

“I… I don’t know,” I stammered. “I’ll ask Mrs. Brubeck.”

I tracked down Mrs. Brubeck, but I was praying that she didn’t want me to give them back to her friend. After all, I’d hatched them. I’d named them. I’d saved them from mushy chick disease! These little peepers were mine!

To my relief and my mother’s horror, Mrs. Brubeck said they were indeed mine. All mine. “Have fun,” she said, then zipped off to help Heidi dismantle her exhibit on Bernoulli’s law.

Mom was quiet the whole way home, and I could tell—she wanted chickens like she wanted a tractor and a goat. “Please, Mom?” I whispered as we parked at the curb. “Please?”

She covered her face. “Where are we going to raise chickens, Juli? Where?”

“In the backyard?” I didn’t know what else to suggest.

“What about Champ?”

“They’ll get along, Mom. I’ll teach him. I promise.”

My dad said softly, “They’re pretty self-sufficient, Trina.”

But then the boys piped up with, “Champ’ll piss ’em to death, Mom,” and suddenly they were on a roll. “Yeah! But you won’t even notice ’cause they’re yellow already!” “Whoa! Yellow Already—cool name.” “That could work! But wait— people might think we mean our bellies!” “Oh, yeah—forget that!” “Yeah, just let him kill the chicks.”

My brothers looked at each other with enormous eyes and started up all over again. “Kill the Chicks! That’s it! Get it?” “You mean like we’re chick killers? Or like we kill the chicks?”

Dad turned around and said, “Out. Both of you, get out. Go find a name elsewhere.”

So they scrambled out, and the three of us sat in the car with only the gentle peep-peep-peep from my little flock breaking the silence. Finally my mother heaved a heavy sigh and said, “They don’t cost much to keep, do they?”

My dad shook his head. “They eat bugs, Trina. And a little feed. They’re very low-maintenance.”

“Bugs? Really? What sort of bugs?”

“Earwigs, worms, roly-polys… probably spiders, if they can catch them. I think they eat snails, too.”

“Seriously?” My mother smiled. “Well, in that case… ”

“Oh, thank you, Mom. Thank you!”

And that’s how we wound up with chickens. What none of us thought of was that six chickens scratching for bugs not only gets rid of bugs, it also tears up grass. Within six months there was nothing whatsoever left of our yard.

What we also didn’t think of was that chicken feed attracts mice, and mice attract cats. Feral cats. Champ was pretty good at keeping the cats out of the yard, but they’d hang around the front yard or the side yard, just waiting for him to snooze so they could sneak in and pounce on some tender little mousy vittles.