Rocco the Recess Raccoon

Rocco is a grey raccoon with a stripy tail, an orange backpack, and a little magnifying glass that he keeps in the front pocket. Every day at Brightfield School, when the recess bell rings, Rocco is the first one out the door.

One sunny morning, Rocco ran to the climbing frame. “Waverly!” he called. “Want to play pirates with me?”

Waverly the puppy looked up from the sandbox. “Not now, Rocco,” she said, and turned back to her digging.

Rocco stopped. Something pinched inside his chest, like a sock that was too tight. She doesn’t like me anymore, he thought. His ears went flat. His tail drooped down into the grass.

Rocco sat on the bottom step of the climbing frame. The pinch felt big. It felt like the whole playground had gone grey.

Then his paw bumped the pocket of his backpack. Clink. The magnifying glass.

Rocco took it out and held it up to one eye. “Okay,” he whispered. “Detective time. Why did Waverly say no?”

He looked at the sandbox. Waverly had a bucket, a spade, and a very deep hole.

“Clue one,” Rocco said. “She is in the middle of digging. Maybe she wants to finish first.”

He looked again. A little bunny was digging right next to her. That was Dabney.

“Clue two,” Rocco said. “She is already playing with someone. Maybe she promised Dabney.”

He looked one more time. Waverly’s tongue was poking out the side of her mouth, the way it did when she was thinking really hard.

“Clue three,” Rocco said. “Maybe she didn’t really hear me. She looks busy in her head.”

Rocco lowered the glass. He counted on his claws. One reason. Two reasons. Three reasons. And not one of them said Waverly doesn’t like Rocco.

The pinch in his chest got smaller. Not gone. Just smaller, like a sock that had been pulled a little looser.

Rocco walked over to the sandbox. “That’s a really deep hole,” he said.

Waverly grinned. “We’re digging to the middle of the earth! Want a spade? We need a third digger.”

Rocco’s tail swished up high. He took the spade.

Later, when the bell rang, Rocco tucked his magnifying glass back in his pocket and gave it a little pat.

Whenever a friend says no, Rocco does the same thing. He takes a breath. He holds up his glass. And he looks for more than one reason why. There is almost always more than one. And most of the time, it isn’t about him at all.