Anansi Grows Too Big Jolly Phonics · Step 3, Unit 7: /oa/ mixed
Practice Words
No rain has come for two weeks. Just one thing still glows on Kofi's dry land: his prize melon, big and round and yellow-green, in the shade under a big leaf. Anansi smells it from far off. When Kofi turns his back, Anansi bites a small hole in the skin and slips inside. It is dark and sweet and cool. Anansi eats, and eats, and eats, and dozes off before he sees the problem.
Now Anansi is in a bad, bad fix. He is not small any more. He is as fat as a yam! His belly presses the melon skin on all sides, and the hole he came in by is far too small. He pushes. He twists. He tries to go out legs first. No luck. Then Kofi comes back down the path. Anansi pulls his legs in and holds very, very still.
Kofi reaches the melon and pats it, proud. Anansi is stuck, but he is safe. He can still eat sweet melon in the cool shade, so he is not upset at all. Then Elephant goes past on the road up high, and Anansi makes his best bad plan yet.
'Good day, Elephant!' Anansi calls in a deep melon voice. Elephant stops. She looks left. She looks right. No one is on the road. 'Down here,' says the melon. 'My, what a big, grand Elephant!' Elephant backs up one step, then two, then turns and runs, and the road goes thump, thump, thump.
The tale grows fast. By night, all the town has the news: Kofi's melon can speak. The next day, a big crowd stands on Kofi's land. Anansi waits, then says in his best melon voice, 'The rain comes back in seven days.' The crowd gasps. 'Who can say a melon can chat?' says one elder with a frown. But she keeps her gaze on it, just in case.
News reaches the King by day's end. The King calls for the melon to come to him. Anansi gulps. This is not the plan! But four strong helpers lift the melon onto a cloth and load it up.
The King's big room is full. The King sits on his stool in his fine gold and black cloth. His helpers, the wise men and women who help him rule, sit in rows. The crowd packs in tight at the back. The helpers set the melon on a low stand. The King leans in and says, 'We are told this melon speaks. Melon, please speak.' Inside, Anansi thinks fast. He could stay quiet. But quiet is not Anansi's way. He will put on a grand show.
Anansi gives the crowd a grand show. The melon tells the King his gran's stew needs one more thing: hot pepper seeds. And it is right! The melon tells the drummer where his lost drumstick is: by the jar. Right again! The King is wowed. At the back, Kofi frowns. Is this good news or bad? He can not tell.
Then Abena, a sharp and wise helper, steps up to the low stand. 'Melon,' she says, calm and slow, 'what am I thinking now?' All the crowd goes still. Anansi can not tell what Abena thinks! Any guess will miss. It is a trap. No one speaks. No sound comes at all. The long, bad wait grows and grows.
'The melon,' says Anansi at last, 'thinks just what Abena thinks.' It is his best guess. The big room is still. Then the King stands up slowly. 'I am a good host to this melon,' says the King, 'and it makes us all look like fools.' His voice is low now, and a king's low voice is a bad, bad thing. 'Take this melon outside,' says the King. 'Quick!' A helper lifts the melon up. But the King takes it from her hands and throws it.
The melon hits the yard with a crack! It bursts into bits and seeds and one very fat, very dizzy spider. Anansi bounces twice and rolls to hide by a bench. He lies very still. He hopes all will think he is a big seed. Kofi looks at the burst melon. Then at Anansi. 'Who can say a melon can chat?' says Kofi. Then the King grins and howls, and Kofi howls, and all the crowd howls too.
The King is stern. But he sends Anansi home with a cloth and pepper seeds for Kofi's stew. Anansi goes down the road, still stained, picking seeds off his legs. He is clever. He can fool a big crowd. He can just about fool a king. But when it counts, he is far too fat to slip out. When the next crop grows, Kofi looks after his melons well, and a crow looks on too.
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