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He had almost caught it. But "almost" brought the same results as "not at all." Jake watched from the bushes as the creature with red fur scurried past his unnoticed trap.
"Dag nab it. Almost," the adolescent mumbled to himself as he went to go pick up the empty box. But he was forgetting all about his grandmother's teachings. If at first you don't succeed, you must try again. And if you don't succeed after that, you must try harder.
Perhaps his strategy was flawed. The young adventurer inspected the makeshift trap with a careful eye. Something had to be wrong. All it needed was a little alteration.
Jake had emptied his box of VHS movies and propped it up with a rather large stick. Underneath, he had cleverly placed some peeled bananas in hope to attract at least one of the horned animals.
"Perhaps the circle-horns don't feast on fruit," he mused out loud as he thought of another plan. Jake rested his chin up on his tiny fist.
The tanned boy had been trying to catch an animal he had seen about a week prior. It stood on four legs, had a sweeping tail, and horns that curved around in a spiral. The closest thing he had seen on television was a ram, but that title didn't seem to fit this animal. No, it was something different all together, much like the other animals in the jungle on his island.
Of course, if he really wanted to catch it, he could have always blasted it with a gun. Something about the ram-thing made Jake want to interact with it alive though. Maybe it would even make a good pet! It appeared friendly enough.
With a concentrated stare at the contraption he had crafted, he continued speculating. As much as he hated to admit, the cardboard container just wasn't cutting it. He needed a different method. The boy needed to think outside of the box! (No pun intended.)
"What would Grandma Harley do?" He spoke to himself as he drew things in the dirt with the stick. It seemed to work much better for drawing than catching fauna!
"Think, Jake," he told himself as he tried to focus. The young boy had a habit of talking to himself. When his grandmother was still around, they would chatter together throughout the day, and when she passed, the silence grew unbearable. Speaking out loud made him feel a little less lonely.
Of course, when he typed to his friends online, it also helped, but nothing had quite the same effect as a real human voice. Watching movies also helped him out in that endeavor. When he sat, enraptured by what was happening on screen, it sometimes felt like he was really with the characters. Especially in that movie with Bill Murray and the clock that…
So his mind was getting a little off track. As he stared at the twig in his hands, he suddenly remembered what he was supposed to be doing.
"Oh for frig's flippin' sake! This is much more difficult than I had anticipated," he said, voice laced with irritation. “All I wanted was to bond with it!” The little boy tossed the stick down bitterly.
He was aggravated mostly at himself. All of his friends could do amazing things. Jane could bake and solve mysteries in her detective novels. Roxy was amazing with computers and was very imaginative. Dirk could even build functioning robots!
"I can... I'm good at aiming my pistols," he said when he was urged by the memory of his grandma to be optimistic. She would have picked him up, rubbed his back, and assure him otherwise. "I'm certain I have many terrific talents that are yet to be discovered!" Yes! All he had to do was go out there and find them.
Then, his eyes drifted over to the bowl of peeled and soggy bananas, and his hopeful smile slowly melted like forgotten candy left out in the heat of the sun.
"...I'm sure I'll capture them when I get older."