Barney the Frog's Arc

Chapter 1 of 5

Rain had fallen on the swamp for nine days, and Barney the Frog counted every neighbor who had stopped smiling. Cricket wouldn't sing. The old newt kept staring at the water like it owed him an apology. Barney sat on a wet stump and made a list on a soaked leaf: everyone in the swampy end of the forest needed somewhere warm to gather before the gloom set in for good. That was the promise Barney had made to themself when the rain began. No frog, no bug, no fish was going to slip into sadness on Barney's watch. The problem was simple and awful. There was no dry spot. The lily pads sagged. The muddy leap where Barney usually held sing-alongs had become a puddle inside a puddle. Barney tried stacking reeds into a roof. The reeds fell. Barney tried a hollow log. Water poured through the knot in the top. Every attempt ended with wetter neighbors and darker faces. Barney hopped toward the tree line to think, and nearly collided with a white rabbit in a green field coat and muddy boots. Frank Rabbit. Barney had only met him once, at the edge of the marked paths, where he'd been mapping washouts with a stubby pencil. He had the same pencil now, tucked behind one long ear. "You're going to catch a cold standing there," Frank said. He didn't smile. He looked at Barney's soaked leaf list and read it upside down. "Gathering, warm, dry. That's a shed problem." "There isn't a shed," Barney said. "There is. Up the slope. Rustic. Empty since last spring." Frank tugged a strap on his satchel. "Roof holds. Door sticks. I can get it open." Barney hesitated. The shed was outside the swamp. Some of the older frogs wouldn't want to hop that far in the rain. But wet and far beat wet and hopeless. "Show me," Barney said. Frank led the way along a marked path, ears flat against the drizzle. The shed sat under two leaning pines, small and gray and blessedly dry inside. Frank shoved the door with his shoulder until it gave. The floor was dusty. The roof did not drip. Barney hopped in a slow circle, testing every board. Dry. All of it dry. "I'll bring them up before dark," Barney said. "Sing-along at sundown." Frank nodded once and started sweeping leaves out with the side of his boot. "You'll need firewood. And more room than this by week's end, if the rain keeps up. Word travels." Barney stopped at the door and looked back down the slope, where the swamp glittered gray under the rain. The shed would hold tonight. Maybe two nights. But Frank was right. If neighbors from the dry end of the forest heard there was a warm room, they'd come too. And Barney had only one small building, one stuck door, and no plan for a crowd.