Pluto

Valentyna Vzdulska

The illustrator Iryna Chernyak

Valentyna Vzdulska

The illustrator Iryna Chernyak

Kharkiv

2016

1 This will be a special day in July.

Father takes me from grandparents’ earlier than usual. After dinner we go to the living-room, get seated simply on the rug and lean our backs against the sofa. Father turns on his laptop computer while I am biting my nails impatiently.

‘Mark, stop doing it!’ Father gets annoyed at this habit of mine.

6

The live broadcast will not start. I cast glances at the big clock on the wall. The second hand is almost crawling: Plu-to, Plu-to, Plu-to…

Pluto is a small planet at the very edge of the Solar system. So small indeed, that it is even called a dwarf planet. And some people do not consider it a planet at all. Even our Moon is three times larger and six times heavier.

Nobody has yet been able to take a proper look at Pluto as it is a distant place in outer space. But things will change today.

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The spacecraft equipped with cameras will reach Pluto at last. It has been dashing through the blackness of outer space for nine and a half years to get there. It is longer than IÂ have lived. And when it does get there, it will send everything its advanced instruments will take pictures of to the Earth.

Even pictures of aliens or souls of the dead.

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2 Pluto and IÂ have a story of our own. It had started even before IÂ was born.

My Mother and Father had just got married at that time. My Mother is a physicist and my Father is an astronomer. They got acquainted while studying at university. They went out to the observatory on their dates — to look at planets and comets in the telescope. And they went to the Carpathian Mountains on their wedding journey.

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Having taken tents and sleeping-bags with them, my mom and dad slept under the starry sky.

‘Golden dashes of meteors swept past,’ they say.

My parents brought a puppy as black as outer space from that journey. They called it Pluto.

Pluto had grown up and turned from a puppy into a large dog. When he barked, the walls shook and the neighbours banged on the central heating radiator.

‘Woof! Woof! Woof!’

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Pluto looked fierce. But only my parents and I knew that in fact he was kind and sweet.

Pluto really was my nanny. Mother says that I learned to walk holding on to his back. Once he even pulled me out of a large puddle into which I had fallen.

We ran grass sprints, played ball and splashed in the lake in the country. One day Pluto and I went to the wood. But there he was bitten by a forest fly and it took him long to recover. So we did not take Pluto on picnics with us anymore.

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Even now Pluto is looking at me from the photograph. He stares kindly and his tongue hangs out. He seems to be saying, ‘Why, what’s the matter, little boy? Don’t be upset!’

Still I do feel upset. I want to hug Pluto. But a year ago he was hit by a car. And now he is no more. My parents keep saying that Pluto has not gone away forever. He has just moved to the planet he shares the same name with — to Pluto.

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3 When the planet Pluto was discovered, an 11-year-old English schoolgirl came up with the name for it. The girl’s name was Venetia Burney.

Venetia was keen on mythology. She knew the names of all ancient Greek gods and heroes. Scientists thanked Venetia and even paid her a reward.

Pluto is the god of the Underworld who rules over the dead. He always welcomes guests but never lets them go back.

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And what if our dog has really moved to Pluto? Sometimes I imagine him there on his own. There are no cars on Pluto and he can scamper about wherever he may want.

I fancy Pluto jumping over small craters, carrying meteorites in his mouth and barking thunderously, ‘Woof! Woof! Woof!’

And then Plutonian mountains quake and send hundreds of small stones rolling down.

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Pluto lives well on Pluto. Sometimes he recalls our home, Father, Mother and me. How we went on a walking-tour all together. How we studied the star map stretching ourselves out on the sofa. Or how he kept getting in our way while we were assembling an amateur telescope.

He stole parts and hid them under his mat.

He may feel lonely at such moments. He raises his head to the sky and growls at all five moons of Pluto: Charon, Nix, Hydra, Kerberos and Styx.

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4 I stop biting my nails and get glued to the screen. It says that for the first time in history a planetary space probe will come close to Pluto in a few minutes’ time. The countdown has already begun.

‘Father, will the probe land on Pluto?’

‘No, it won’t,’ Father shakes his head. ‘It will only get close and take pictures.’

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I am waiting for the pictures of Pluto holding my breath. I will see our black dog with lively eyes and a big tongue in these pictures.

And what if I don’t?

Meanwhile a group of scientists are rejoicing and waving flags on the screen. Father translates what they are saying from English for me.

Although I am learning English, I cannot understand everything.

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‘This is really a breakthrough in science,’ they say.

‘We get to know a lot of new things,’ scientists go on.

‘We explore a lot of mysteries.’

‘We shall shed light on many enigmas.’

But photographs will not appear on the screen.

‘They will come later,’ Father explains. ‘When the probe sends all information.’

Pluto’s secret as well as mine remains safe so far.

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5 I do not go on watching as nothing can interest me any more.

I reach for the toy construction set. I want to add one more tower to my castle with knights. The castle has been attacked by aliens. But at this moment somebody rings the doorbell.

‘It’s not Mother. Mother’s got keys,’ I say and run to open the door.

Father goes with me.

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As we open the door — Father ahead then me looking from behind his back — we see Mother on the doorstep. She stands looking at us and smiling. She is pressing a bundle tenderly to herself.

‘Ooh-oh,’ I whisper.

‘Surprise!!!’ Mother’s smile becomes even wider.

The «surprise» has light yellow fur, floppy velvet triangles of ears and a black nose. Mother holds out the puppy to me. Being wary, it smells at my palms first, then greets me with the amiable wagging of its tail.

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‘It’s a girl puppy,’ Mother says. Parents are embracing each other while looking at me. ‘You may name it as you wish.’

‘It’s unjust,’ I think. Nobody has asked me if I want a dog. I put the puppy carefully on the floor in the corridor.

‘And what about Pluto?!’ I want to cry. ‘How could you have forgotten about Pluto?!’

But exactly at this moment the puppy is smelling at my toes and I do not dare to move.

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6 The puppy follows me about.

IÂ do not want to think of a name for it. No name comes to my mind.

To tell the truth, it makes no difference to me whether it is called Liza or Princess. The only thing that matters is that parents should take care of it themselves. They should feed it, wash it and walk it — as well as play with it, again by themselves. And they should not look at me like this as if expecting something.

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It has been a week already and the puppy still does not have a name.

In the end Mother and Father cannot bear it any longer and name it.

Vanilla. Vanillapup.

However, Vanillapup does not smell of vanilla, rather of milk, fur and of something else. I do not know of what exactly, but of something very nice. When Vanillapup makes a puddle, it smells different. The little one licks my hands time and again, though I try to take them away. It has a pink and warm tongue.

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‘Mark, if you want, Vanillapup can sleep in your room,’ my parents tell me during dinner.

‘No,’ I say sharply.

Vanillapup’s new, soft bed is set up in the corridor. But when it is left alone for the night, Vanillapup whines and it keeps everyone from falling asleep. Mother and Father give up and take it to their bedroom.

Vanillapup stops whining, and the mess in my head also subsides — till the morning.

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7 At the end of the week Father prints colourful pictures of Pluto and brings them to me. Mountains and plains can be seen on its surface.

One spot directly in the middle looks like a heart made of snow. But no dog can be seen on Pluto.

Vanillapup tugs at my tracksuit and growls — it wants to play, — but I ignore it.

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Now I want to gaze at the picture of Pluto in quiet.

‘Stop that!’ I order but it does not understand commands yet.

Pluto consists mostly of rock and ice as scientists say. It even has mountains made up of frozen water three and a half kilometers high.

It may be something similar to water though nobody can be sure yet.

Much ice and rock, a thin layer of atmosphere. Chill and silence.

The piece of paper is slightly trembling in my hands vexing Vanillapup.

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‘Stop it! Stop it!’

Jumping it snatches the picture out from my hands and starts to tear it. I want to take it back but Vanillapup rushes to another room.

‘Give it back!’ I run after it.

But Vanilla does not do as it is told. It runs away, growls, shakes its head, photo in mouth. The snapshot of Pluto turns into wet shreds of paper.

‘Do-o-o-n’t!’ I give up and sink on the floor.

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Something bubbles and grows in me. As if IÂ were the dwarf planet Pluto at the edge of the Solar system. And all ice mountains and the frozen inside of mine started melting and overflowing.

The puzzled Vanillapup lets the torn snapshot fall down and comes up to me. It licks my hands and my face wet with tears.

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At this moment IÂ still look like the planet Pluto, cold and distant. IÂ feel that somewhere a large black dog is scampering about, his tongue stuck out from his mouth and his eyes looking kindly. He carries meteorites in his teeth, jumps over craters and barks at comets. IÂ also picture a vast heart-shaped snow-clad plain not far away where Vanillapup is sitting.

And they definitely like each other.

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Valentyna Vzdulska is a children’s book writer, a journalist and an editor. She is the author of many famous children’s short stories: «Christmas for Nina», «Tailtwister», «A Letter’s Journey» etc. stiv, Kyiv region.

She was born in 1983 in Fastiv, Kyiv region. She graduated from the Kyiv-Mohyla National Academy with a degree in philology. She is a co-founder of Kazkarka, a literary blog about children’s literature.

Inna Chernyak is the internationally-appreciated Ukrainian artist. She is well-known in Brazil, England, USA, Korea and Russia. The first degree she received was in economics.

However, the great passion for art brought her to Kharkiv State Academy for Arts and Design. She graduated from the Academy with a diploma of a graphic desiger. Inna says: «It’s a privilege for me to be an illustrator, and I consider my job as the dearest and most precious of treasures».

Aquarelle Picture Books Series The little boy loved his huge black dog Pluto very much. When old Pluto passed away the boy used to watch the planet Pluto and imagine his friend living and playing there. But one day mom brings home a cute white puppy. Is it a betrayal to love a new puppy? — wonders the boy…

ISBN 978-617-690-564-6

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