Jack Wong tries to answer the question, 'Who is that monster under the bed?' in new short story
Tupelo is an original story by the 2023 Governor General's Literary Award winner
Tupelo is an original short story by Jack Wong. It is part of Identity, a special series of new, original writing featuring work by the English-language winners of the 2023 Governor General's Literary Awards, presented in partnership with the Canada Council for the Arts.
"When a girl finds a huge reptile under her bed, she tasks herself with figuring out if it's an alligator or crocodile. I wrote this story during my recent travels where, as an ecotourist of sorts, I was thinking about how the way we relate to nature is not so unlike that perennial question we ask of each other — 'Where are you really from?' Even as Tupelo's protagonist gets her share of things wrong, the story suggests that our desire to identify and differentiate comes from an elemental and not altogether unwarranted place," Wong told CBC Books.
CBC's IDEAS will host an episode featuring participants from this original series.
Wong's middle-grade book When You Can Swim won the 2023 Governor General's Literary Award for young people's literature — illustrated books.
You can read more works from the Identity series here.
Tupelo
When Reina first discovered the monster under her bed, she thought it a fearsome-looking thing. It had a long, rotund body pressed belly-to-the-ground, baring a scaly backside; lines of knobby spikes ran down its length, flaring sharp as the ridges converged at its tail. At its head, a mouthful of sharp teeth glistened under a gnarled snout.
And yet (being that it found itself so out of place in Reina's room, which was her domain), Reina also felt it a hapless creature, who with its short, stubby legs could only scramble clumsily along the laminate floor, and whose tail performed idle curlicues like a kitten. (That's how she had found it in the first place: it had accidentally knocked over the glass of milk she put by her bedside the previous evening.) Atop that impressive head, its two yellow eyes moved like periscopes, watching Reina furtively, while its wide mouth made an altogether different impression, fixed as it was in a genial grin.
Reina had seen such creatures before, though only, of course, on the internet. Tupelo (she decided to call it Tupelo) looked very much like something you'd call an alligator — or a crocodile.
There were ways to tell the difference between the two, but as Reina went down the list, evidently none of them applied to Tupelo. For one, you were to observe whether it had a broad, U-shaped nose, like the former, or a narrow V-shaped one, like the latter, whereas Tupelo's made a lean oval, like the bottom of a zero. For another, crocodiles showed both top and bottom teeth with their mouths closed, while alligators had overbites, but Tupelo's jaw always hung open (not unlike, Reina thought, a happy dog), and she was not about to go trying to shut it.
Reina had seen such creatures before, though only, of course, on the internet. Tupelo (she decided to call it Tupelo) looked very much like something you'd call an alligator — or a crocodile.
Alligators should be black, dark green or slate, while crocodiles could be brown, olive green or some (ostensibly non-slate) shade of gray. (It reminded Reina of when her parents had tireless debates over the dozen paint chips of the same colour taped to the bathroom wall.) Speaking of which, none of the relative comparisons she read were of any use. Crocodiles: larger when fully grown; more aggressive; stronger bite. Alligators: faster. But how were you supposed to tell when you had only Tupelo? (As long as her bed frame; never in a hurry to go anywhere; decidedly mercurial in temperament.)
"If you are living somewhere north of South Florida, it is probably not a crocodile," according to one web page. She just couldn't be sure if this applied when one finds one under their bed.
After that fruitless exercise, Reina grew less occupied by the question. Tupelo was, in a word, Tupelo. She got used to sharing her room with it and knowing its habits, like how it was more disposed to irritability in the mornings. Apparently, being cold-blooded was one trait that crocodiles and alligators did share. Tupelo was most amicable after having sat in the shaft of sunlight that angled favourably into Reina's room on clear afternoons. After a good sunbathing, Tupelo could be very agreeable indeed.
She got used to sharing her room with it and knowing its habits, like how it was more disposed to irritability in the mornings.
Reina also read that both alligators and crocodiles liked sweet water, so she went to the kitchen and rummaged for the stash of pop in the back of the refrigerator. (Her father thought they were well concealed behind the tubs of yogurt, but it was actually because nobody else in the house cared for Dr. Pepper.) Tupelo gulped this down happily, and when it was done (which only took a second) let out a loud, wet burp, then slapped its pudgy paws for more. (Reina buried the emptied cans under the bed so that, over time, festive rattling accompanied Tupelo whenever it shuffled to and fro.)
One day, however, Reina found Tupelo crying, its crusty snout streaked with dark lines like drips from a hose on summer pavement — a turn of countenance so alarming that, in her panic, she had no choice but to call her older sister for help.
"Maybe it misses home?" Reina's sister wondered. "Or it's sick?" (A seasonal cold had been going around the household.) Their mother had just put on a potful of chicken noodle soup, which might do for either scenario, so they fetched some for Tupelo in the largest salad bowl they could find. Tupelo slurped it up with great pleasure — if it was possible, it was grinning more widely than ever — but the more it ate, the more it cried. Maybe they were happy tears.
For the rest of the afternoon, Reina got to work, fetching Tupelo one bowl of chicken noodle soup after another (and, so that her mother wouldn't grow suspicious at the prodigious rate of its depletion, feigning a lingering cough as she went about the hallway).
One day, however, Reina found Tupelo crying, its crusty snout streaked with dark lines like drips from a hose on summer pavement — a turn of countenance so alarming that, in her panic, she had no choice but to call her older sister for help.
"Aha! I got it," Reina's sister announced triumphantly when she returned. She had gone to do a bit of searching herself, and had finally found a beast to match Tupelo's description: one that drank seawater, could swim vast distances (even across oceans), and cried from time to time. Tupelo was a saltwater crocodile. It figured that Tupelo had to have traveled very far from home to end up under Reina's bed, where it now lived its new life of impassionedly taking to savoury broths and shedding the occasional crocodile tear.
Reina fetched an umpteenth bowlful of soup, which Tupelo lapped up, less hurriedly now, with relish. She was just glad that it was okay. And she did like the sound of Tupelo's new nickname, given to its kind: Tupelo the Saltie.
"Now," her sister wondered aloud, "is it an Australian or Indian…?"
About Jack Wong
Jack Wong is a Halifax-based author and illustrator who was born in Hong Kong but grew up in Vancouver. When You Can Swim is his first book. It won the 2023 Governor General's Literary Award for young people's literature — illustrated books.
About the series Identity
The English-language books that won the 2023 Governor General's Literary Awards in many respects reflect on the idea of changing or shifting identity.
CBC Books asked the 2023 Governor General's Literary Awards winners to reflect further on the theme of identity in original works. The special series explores the complex ways we maintain, construct and subvert who we are and what we represent in the outside world. Tupelo was Jack Wong's contribution to the series.
