Dedication
For Mom and Olivia,
Who beautifully bookend my life.
You are resilience and hope personified.
Chapter 1
Starting New
My insides are getting that gross sort of carsick feeling as I step onto the schoolyard. And it’s not because of the sour milk I drank by accident—thanks to Pops forgetting that I live with him and Nan now.
Yuck.
I stop walking, and Charlie Parker Drysdale strides on ahead of me. He’s still talking about how I’ll love living in Halifax and going to his school.
I’m not looking at him. I’m looking at the bodies popping in and out of that skateboard park, which is why my insides feel gross.
“Seriously,” I say in disgust. “A new park?” I mean I used to skateboard through this schoolyard whenever we visited Nan and Pops. The yard I’m standing in and the empty lot behind the school were the only places to skateboard when I actually had a board.
“Yeah,” says Charlie Parker Drysdale as he turns a little to the right to walk toward the park. “Another reason you’re going to love it here.”
Nope, I say to myself. I will NEVER love living here.
I’d like to say that out loud, but I don’t because of what Vera told me. She was my super best friend at my old school. She told me to follow exactly two rules when I got to my new school. Vera said this: “First, be chill. Being chill is how you will make new friends.” But then I said, “What new friends? Who needs new friends? And you know I don’t like rules.” And then Vera said, “See, that. That is what not being chill sounds like.”
I’m new at chill. I am not new to Charlie Parker Drysdale.
We used to spend time together whenever I visited Nan and Pops. Now he’s my next-door neighbor and my one and only school friend. Guess that makes him my new best friend. Maybe. Dunno. Feels kinda soon.
The closer we get to the park, the louder the sounds get—wheels on cement, music, and voices yelling words like sick, and whoa, and dope.
“Esther!” shouts Charlie Parker Drysdale. “Esther,” he shouts again and starts waving his hand. A girl wearing a pink helmet with big stars on it smiles and rides her scooter toward us.
“Charlie,” she yells back, which is weird to hear. I mean, I could never call Charlie Parker Drysdale just Charlie. I’ve tried, but he always wears a sweater-vest, and boys who wear sweater-vests should be called by their full name if you ask me. Today’s sweater-vest is bright green. I always wear hoodies. Today’s hoodie matches my hair, which Nan calls “sun-kissed.” I just call it “light brown.”
I hear Charlie Parker Drysdale say something about Esther’s scooter being new. But I’m not totally listening because I’m staring at the biggest most amazing skateboard park I’ve ever seen.
“So sick,” I whisper as my eyes travel from one end of it to the other. I’m not even sure how long I’ve been staring before I notice my mouth is hanging open. I’m pretty sure Vera would say it’s easier to make friends when your mouth is not hanging open, but she hasn’t seen this park. It’s super dope. It has everything any skateboarder would want—handrails, half pipe, quarter pipe, a bowl, flatbars, a pyramid, ledges, and even a five-stair hubba.
I tighten my fist. Normally, when I do that at a skateboard park, I feel the front truck of my skateboard. Now, I just feel the inside of an empty fist. And that makes the carsick feeling move up my throat to make my mouth feel all watery.
“…so I don’t know what his problem is,” Esther continues, “but stay away from him is all.”
“Huh?” I say and I turn toward Esther. She and Charlie Parker Drysdale are standing beside a bike rack. “From who?” I ask just as Esther clicks the lock on her scooter.
She doesn’t hear me.
“That’s Sibby.” Charlie Parker Drysdale points at me. “Just got here last night.”
“Hey,” I say.
“Hey,” she says and takes her helmet off. Her hair is all black, except for the bottom. The tips are blue. I open my mouth to ask who we should stay away from, but then we hear shouting coming from the park. Right away, I see a boy on a skateboard getting serious height at the top of the half pipe. Another boy is cheering him on and yelling “Duuuude” every time the boy on the skateboard rides up the ramp and into the air.
“Whoa,” I say, and, instead of noticing that my mouth is open, I’m noticing that it’s smiling. It didn’t smile much after Mom and Dad told me we were moving. And then it totally stopped smiling after I said good-bye to my skateboard.
Looking at those boys makes me feel better because I think—maybe—I could borrow a board from one of them just to take a couple of turns. Skateboarders help each other; at least they did at my old school. If they ask where mine is, I’ll say something like, “Lipslide. On a rail. Snapped the deck.” And then maybe they’ll be like, “Sick. But too bad about your board. Here. Borrow.”
And then I’ll do a 50-50 grind and they’ll be like, “Wow, new girl’s dope.”
And then Mom and Dad will be like, “Hey, Dad got his job back. We’re moving back home.” And then Vera and I will go buy me a new board.
“Sibby!” I hear Charlie Parker Drysdale calling. “Sibby. Come on.” I look away from the park and see that he’s headed toward the school’s front entrance.
“Where’s Esther?” I ask as I’m running to catch up with him.
“In the line,” he says, “with Hannah. They’re saving us spots.”
I look back at the park one last time. I don’t know where the boy who was skateboarding went, but he’s not in the air anymore. Just seeing those skateboarders makes me think maybe it won’t be so bad living here. Maybe…
Plouph!
Since I wasn’t looking in front of me, I run right into Charlie Parker Drysdale’s backpack. It falls off his shoulder and lands on my left foot.
“Ouch!” I say. And when I look down, I see something awful.
“Oh, no. No. No. No,” I say…like that’s going to erase what’s staring back at me.
I hear Charlie Parker Drysdale zip his backpack open.
“A scuff,” I mutter, rubbing my left shoe. “Go away,” I say, like I can actually make something happen just by saying so. Man, I wish I could. If I could, I’d say, “Go back…to the way it was.”
“What’s the big deal? Your shoes have lots of scuffs,” says Charlie Parker Drysdale.
“Not like this,” I snap. Seriously. This can’t be happening. No board. And now my red skateboard shoes have a regular scuff like…like they’re regular shoes. As if.
I keep trying to get the scuff out. It’s not working.
“Whew, nothing broken,” says Charlie Parker Drysdale and I hear him zip up his backpack.
“What’s not broken?” I ask and I keep rubbing.
“Sorry, Sibby. Your foot okay?” he asks, which is weird. He says it like he didn’t even hear my actual question. And that makes me stop rubbing and look up. I see him staring at the line of kids. It reminds me of Dad staring at the For Sale sign on our front yard and asking how I was feeling about moving.
“Whatever,” I had said.
“Maybe later,” Dad muttered, which didn’t make sense. But that’s what happens when you’re too weirded out to hear right. I don’t know why Charlie Parker Drysdale is weirded out.
“Foot’s fine,” I snap, but then I remind myself to chill. So, I stand back up and, in a voice that sounds as chill as I can make it, I say, “What’s in your backpack? Rocks?”
“No,” he says. “My homework. Remember?”
“Homework?” I shout.
“Already? But it’s our first day. Who has homework on the first day?”
“It’s like I told you,” he says. “Ms. Anderson sent an email.”
“Ms. who?”
“Wow, Sibby, did you listen to anything I said while we were walking to school?”
“Can you just tell me again?” I ask.
And, seriously, I say inside my head, you said a whole bunch of stuff on the way here. How am I supposed to remember it all?
“Doesn’t matter,” says Charlie Parker Drysdale when we reach the end of the line. “It’s easy homework. We’re just supposed to talk about our summer vacations.”
The sour milk feels like it’s crashing around inside my stomach like ocean waves smashing against rocks in a storm. My first day is starting to feel like the worst first day of school ever. I mean I’d rather go to the dentist than talk about my summer. No. Worse. I’d rather go clothes shopping—for a dress—than talk about my summer.
Just lie and say, “It was good,” I tell myself. And sound chill.
“So why’d you bring rocks?” I ask. I’ve never seen Charlie Parker Drysdale with rocks. He’s never even talked about rocks. We’ve talked about skateboarding. Correction. I’ve talked about skateboarding. We’ve eaten pepperoni pizza together and watched videos of Josephine Jackson skateboarding. She’s the best Under-13 skateboarder there is and even has her own video channel. She goes by Jackson Jo. So dope.
“It’s not rocks,” says Charlie Parker Drysdale as he scans the line of kids in front of us. “It’s…It’s…”
“It’s what?” I ask.
And then he says, “Uh-oh.”
“Can too!” we hear Esther shout. Her voice doesn’t sound very chill. There are lots and lots of kids in the line. Esther and another girl are halfway between its beginning and the very end where I’m standing with Charlie Parker Drysdale. They’re talking to the two boys I saw at the skateboard park.
“Hey,” I say. “Are those boys—?”
“Sibby,” Charlie Parker Drysdale turns to me really fast, “I need to tell you something—”
“Hey,” says one of the boys and then he gets out of line, drops his board, and starts riding toward us. The boy who was cheering him on comes too.
“Ineedtotellyou…aboutthoseboys,” says Charlie Parker Drysdale very fast.
And now he totally does not sound chill either.
Chapter 2
Hello Trouble
Asoccer ball flies through the air above the line of kids. It goes right past the sign on the front door of the school announcing—in big letters—Michael G. Murphy Elementary. A woman, who I think is a teacher, watches the ball go and calls to a girl in line to “collect it and bring it back.”
Everyone watches the girl run after the ball, everyone, that is, but Charlie Parker Drysdale, Esther, and me. We are watching the two boys from the skatepark skate right for me and Charlie Parker Drysdale. When they get close, they both lean back on the tail of their boards, come to a stop in front of us, and then jump off. Then they pop the noses of their boards into their hands. Weird. It’s like they’re in a synchronized skateboarding video.
“Hey,” says the boy who was getting serious air back at the park. But he’s not saying it like, “Hi, how’s it going? Welcome to our school. Wanna borrow my board?”
Nope. What I hear in his voice makes me think I’m about to break Vera’s second rule, which was “Avoid trouble.” But then he walks right by me like I’m invisible, so maybe keeping rule number two won’t be so hard after all. Now he’s nose to nose with Charlie Parker Drysdale.
Seriously? I think to myself. Why’s he getting all up in Charlie Parker Drysdale’s face like that?
I look at the other boy like I’m saying, “What the…?” He just looks back at me like he’s all confused about what’s about to happen.
“Not cool, Dude,” says the boy in Charlie Parker Drysdale’s face and he points behind him to where Esther is standing. “No line cutting.”
“He didn’t,” says Esther who is now standing beside us. “I was saving spots, Freddie.”
Right, I think to myself. Esther was saving spots. So, why bug Charlie Parker Drysdale about it?
And then the boy Esther called Freddie steps back.
Okay. Good. He’s backing off.
But instead of going back to his place in line, he looks Charlie Parker Drysdale up and down.
“And that’s not cool either,” says this Freddie kid and he’s pointing at Charlie Parker Drysdale’s sweater-vest. “You look like a Muppet.”
A Muppet? Charlie Parker Drysdale only ever looks like…well, Charlie Parker Drysdale.
The second boy is now looking the way I felt when Mom made me wear that stupid dress with the really tight band around the middle—super uncomfortable.
I fold my arms across my chest and make a you-don’t-scare-us face. I mean how crazy is this? Who does this kid think he is?
Stay chill, I tell myself. Charlie Parker Drysdale will say something to this total jerk-face Freddie kid. Just wait.
Nothing.
Say something, I yell inside my head.
Still nothing.
Come on. I’m bursting.
Waiting for Charlie Parker Drysdale to tell the total jerk-face in front of him to back off is almost as hard as waiting for Dad to admit the real reason we moved. “Just tell the truth!” I wanted to shout at Dad but couldn’t. It feels mean to shout at someone who walks around looking like he got the wind knocked out of him from the biggest slam of his life.
Charlie Parker Drysdale looks down at his bright green sweater-vest. He’s not saying anything.
It’s really hard not to talk when no one else is. I can’t stand it. I talk to myself.
Stay chill. Avoid trouble. Stay chill. Avoid trouble. Stay chill…I say it over and over until…
“Um…I like it, Freddie,” says Charlie Parker Drysdale. “And I’m pretty sure Muppets don’t even wear sweater-vests, at least not like mine anyway.”
“Pretty sure I saw a movie where there was a Muppet wearing one,” says Freddie.
Muppets? You’re talking about Muppets? Can’t you see what this jerk-face is doing?
There is only one thing that needs to be said. But Charlie Parker Drysdale just keeps looking down until Esther says, “Come on, Charlie. The line will start moving soon, and Hannah’s saving our spots. Let’s go.” Esther starts to walk back to Hannah, and Charlie Parker Drysdale tries to follow her.
GO? What? You’re just gonna let him get away with that?
“When you come to school tomorrow,” says Freddie like he’s some kind of king boss of everyone, “no Muppet clothing.”
And then he gets in Charlie Parker Drysdale’s face. Again.
My arms fall loose.
“That’s it.” I step between Freddie and Charlie Parker Drysdale.
“Charlie,” calls Esther from the middle of the line. “You coming?”
“Um, nope. I’ll catch up,” he says. “I think.”
I’m looking straight at Freddie, but I don’t see a skateboarder. I see a bully. And a bully is the reason I’m living in this stupid town, going to this stupid school, and missing my super best friend. I can’t stand bullies, and I won’t let this one win.
“Back off,” I demand.
Freddie is staring at me, and I’m staring right back. I don’t know what he’s seeing, but I’m seeing someone who isn’t so good at being chill or avoiding trouble either.
Chapter 3
In or Out?
For weeks leading up to the Charlottetown Skateboard Invitational last month, I practiced all kinds of tricks: flips, grinds, and slide tricks. I even practiced grab and air tricks.
The trick I couldn’t make was a backside bluntslide. It’s super hard. It’s also Jackson Jo’s best trick. I m
ean she can do anything, but watching her do a backside bluntslide is like watching someone fly. She says to do it on a ledge first because you don’t have to pop out. But I saw her backside bluntslide on a quarter pipe. She held the slide for four whole Mississippis.
At the Invitational, I landed a backside bluntslide on a quarter pipe, too. But I barely held the slide for half a Mississippi before I popped out and had a totally sketchy landing. It wasn’t enough to beat Ian McFarlane, but I did beat Evan Rothsay. And the look on Evan’s face when I beat him and came second to Ian is the same look Freddie has right now. Total shock.
“Who. Are. You?” he asks.
“Yeah,” says the boy who was at the park cheering on Freddie. “Who are you?” He says it like he actually wants to know.
They’re both still holding their skateboards by the noses.
“Sibby,” I answer.
“Sippy?” says Freddie. He laughs and gives the other boy a high five. The other boy doesn’t look so into the high five.
“That’s not what I said…Fartie,” I say.
Freddie stops laughing but the boy with him starts. But then Freddie gives his sidekick a you-better-quit-laughing-because-she’s-making-fun-of-me sort of stare.
“What?” says the boy to Freddie. “It was funny.”
Freddie keeps staring at him.
“Okay, okay, whatever.” And the boy stops laughing.
“Never saw you before,” says Freddie. “And the name’s Freddie, not Fartie.”
“It’s my first day,” I say. “And the name’s Sibby, not Sippy.”
“Where’d you come from?” asks the other boy.
“Charlottetown,” I say. “And who are you?” I stand up as straight as I can. I heard Mom tell Dad that’s how you deal with bullies. You stand up straight and show confidence. Too bad Dad didn’t listen. If he had, none of this would be happening.
“Jake,” says the boy. He lifts his fist into the air like he wants to connect with mine. I lift mine too.
“Dude?” says Freddie in a stop-being-so-nice sort of voice.
“What? She’s new. That’s it,” says Jake. We bump fists.
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