“Why can’t you ask them out?” Mack countered.
“We can’t ask someone out,” Struts said, confused.
Mack stood up and walked over to the girls. “You can do anything a boy can do,” she said.
“I don’t know where you’re from, but around here, you have to ask a boy out without asking him,” Lela explained. “Like, with your eyes.” She demonstrated fluttering her eyelashes.
Mack started to laugh, and Cheechee and Struts joined in. Mack fell back on Lela’s bed. This was definitely a very girly slumber party!
Meanwhile, Brady was at Big Momma’s with Tanner, Seacat, and Rascal. They were playing pool and listening to songs on the jukebox.
“So really, all you guys do around here is eat, hang, and surf?” Brady asked.
The surfer boys all nodded their heads. “Yup,” they said in unison.
Brady smiled and leaned back in his seat. “Sounds kind of perfect.”
“Is there any other way?” Tanner asked.
“There sure are some boo-ha beauties around here,” Brady said, trying to steer the conversation. “Like that girl who was singing…Lela?”
“The Rodent?” Seacat said. “We don’t date no rats.”
“You wouldn’t take out a girl just because she’s a biker?” Brady said.
“The tide wouldn’t take out a girl just because she’s a biker,” Seacat said, laughing.
Brady noticed that Tanner seemed uncomfortable. “Don’t listen to those guys,” Tanner said, leaning close to him. “It don’t matter if a girl’s a surfer, a biker, or a bookworm.”
“So, what is it you do like?” Brady asked the surfers.
“Any girl who agrees to go out with me is the perfect girl!” Rascal exclaimed.
Tanner laughed along with the others but then grew serious. “A chick’s got to have something special, you know…”
Brady knew what was most likely coming next—a song. He guessed that Mack was probably being serenaded by Lela and her friends, too.
When Brady and Mack met up the next morning they both did a double take.
“Groovy outfit,” Brady joked, pointing to Mack’s ’60s-style clothes and hairdo.
“You too, Elvis,” Mack countered. She had to giggle at Brady’s retro pompadour. “How’d it go last night?”
Brady grinned. “It was so cool being one of those guys, even for a night,” he said. “They look out for each other.”
“Well, those girls sure like to talk about boys,” Mack said. “But no matter how hard I tried to get Lela to talk about Tanner, I don’t think we’re any closer than we were before.” She took Brady’s hand. “What if we can’t get them together? We could be stuck here forever.”
“Would it be so bad?” Brady said. “For a while, anyway?”
“Yes!” Mack argued. “Every minute that I’m here is another minute I’m not doing what my mom wanted me to do.”
Brady put his hand on Mack’s shoulder. “But, every minute that we’re here, we’re still together,” he said.
“I know,” Mack said with a sigh. “But…”
“Besides, when will we ever get another chance to be in a movie?” he questioned her. “Like, actually in a movie. Really, Mack, what’s your hurry to grow up—and leave?”
Mack looked down at her toes in the sand. “Everyone’s counting on me to.”
“But is that really what you want?” he asked.
“I thought you understood,” she whispered.
“I do,” Brady said.
“Then help me get home,” Mack begged. “Please.”
Brady nodded. “Maybe we need to get Lela and Tanner to spend time together without peer pressure.”
“Right. So they get to know each other as people, not rivals,” she told him.
“How do we do that?” Brady asked.
“I don’t know, but I’m not going to stop until I figure it out,” Mack said. She spotted Tanner by the water with his surfboard. She jumped up and grabbed her board.
Brady was left in the sand, watching Mack head off to the ocean. He wondered how this was going to end.
When Tanner and Mack finished surfing, they strolled up the beach together. “No one has ever beaten me on the waves,” Tanner said to Mack. Tanner was impressed with Mack’s surfing skills. “Especially not a girl,” he noted, smiling.
“Girls can do anything boys can do,” Mack replied. She winked at him. “And we look better doing it.”
Tanner threw his head back and laughed. “If I was going to think something right now, I think I’d think that maybe people aren’t always what I think.”
“Does that go for bikers, too?” Mack asked.
Tanner shifted his surfboard in his hands. “Truth is, bikers aren’t that bad. They want the same thing we want.”
Mack stopped and looked at Tanner. “Then why the conflict between you?”
Shrugging, Tanner answered honestly. “It’s how it’s supposed to be, I guess. Like, it’s sort of what everyone expects.”
Tanner’s reply made Mack think. She looked down the long beach. “It’s like your heart tells you one thing, but you feel like you have to do something else,” she said.
“That’s why people who don’t follow their hearts, leave their hearts behind,” Tanner said.
For the first time since she had met him, Mack saw that he was deeper than just some surfer dude. “You’re a pretty smart guy,” she said.
“Yeah, but more pretty,” Tanner replied, flashing a stellar smile. Then he ran off toward Big Momma’s and left Mack standing in the sand.
Tanner’s words had made a big impression on Mack. She stood for a moment, letting his advice sink in.
That evening, Mack was back in Lela’s bedroom. She was trying to put a record on the record player. She had no idea how the machine worked!
Lela came up behind her and took the record out of her hands. She placed it on the turntable and lowered the needle. “I know,” she said, “this electronic stuff can be really complicated.”
Mack laughed to herself. If only Lela knew how she usually played music! When the record started, Mack walked over to the window and gazed at the night sky.
“Are you okay?” Lela asked her.
“Sure…just homesick,” Mack said sadly.
“Is it the decor?” Lela asked, a little horrified.
“No, I’m not sick of your home,” Mack quickly explained. “I’m…” She didn’t want to get into the whole story, so she changed the subject. “So, how are things going with Brady?”
“Good, I guess,” Lela said, slightly distracted. “How are things going with Tanner?”
“Good, I guess,” Mack replied.
Lela picked up her brush and began combing her hair. “Sometimes I think boys don’t tell us what they’re thinking, mostly because thinking would involve more thinking,” she said. “But they make up for it by being cute. And boys.”
Mack couldn’t help but smile at Lela’s simple honesty. She noticed Lela’s necklace. It had a round medallion with a rose engraved in the center. “That’s a really pretty necklace.”
“It’s Hawaiian,” Lela told her. “It means ‘friendship forever.’ Like us, now.”
“Lela…you’re not at all what I thought you’d be,” Mack told her.
“Yeah, I’m a lot less like me than people think,” she said, laughing. “It’s funny, I feel like I can tell you anything.”
Mack nodded. “I know, it does feel like that.”
Suddenly, Lela’s eyes grew wide, and she let out a yelp. She scurried over closer to Mack. “I have a secret I’ve never told anyone!”
“I’d be happy to be your ‘anyone’ if you want,” Mack offered.
“Okay. Ready?” Lela asked. She squeezed Mack’s hands and then closed her eyes tightly as if she were making a wish on a birthday cake. “I want to surf.”
“Surf? Really!” Mack exclaimed.
“I mean, like a pro!” Lela exclaimed. “It’s insane
, I know. And if my brother found out, he’d blow a gasket.” She got up and walked. “Plus, no girl ever surfed like a boy, until you!” She saw Mack staring at her. “You think I’m crazy, right?”
Mack stood up. “Not at all. Lela, never let anyone tell you that you can’t do what you want in life.”
“But, how do you do that?” Lela asked.
Mack paused for a moment. “It’s not always easy,” she said. “Believe me!”
“So you think I should surf?” Lela pressed on. “Like you do, like the surfers do?”
A fantastic idea popped into Mack’s head. “I think you should definitely surf like the surfers do! In fact, Brady could teach you. He taught me everything I know, and I’m a great surfer, right?”
Lela clapped her hands together. “You think he would?”
“I think he’ll agree. It’s a perfect plan!”
The next morning, Lela was on a surfboard, wading into the shallow water. Brady stood beside her, giving her directions.
“This is so exciting!” Lela gushed. “I’m really going to surf.”
“That’s the goal,” Brady said.
“Mack told me I should believe in myself,” she told him. “Thank you for not laughing at me for wanting to do this.”
“Hey, you haven’t tried yet,” Brady said, smiling. “We may both be laughing!”
Lela giggled and followed Brady’s lead deeper into the water.
In the abandoned lighthouse, Les and Dr. Fusion were still working on their weather machine.
“Momentarily, this machine will create enough humidity to cause excessive precipitation, inducing torrential rain, as well as lots of frizzy hair and stinky pits,” the mad scientist said. His eyes twinkled with delight. “Now, we just flip this switch…” A light flashed on. “That’s better. I could hardly see,” he said.
Les rolled his eyes. The suspense was maddening! “Now, we flip this switch ever so delicately so as to protect the intricate inner workings…” Dr. Fusion mumbled.
He flipped the other switch, but nothing happened. Tilting his head, he thought for a minute, and then he banged the machine hard with his fist. The machine whirled into action!
Mack searched the beach as she walked along the shore. Finally, she spotted Tanner and strolled over to him.
“You know what I would love?” she asked him. “A walk on the beach!” She pointed toward the water where Brady and Lela were having their surfing lesson. “In that direction,” she added.
Tanner nodded and then handed her a flower garland for her hair.
Mack was touched. “You made this? For me?” she said, blushing. “Really?”
“There are, like, over a hundred kinds of flowers indigenous to this region, which would look so rad on a foxy babe like you,” he said as he put the garland in her hair.
Mack lowered her eyes. “Thanks,” she said, gently touching the flowers in her hair. “It’s beautiful.”
“So, how about that walk?” Tanner asked.
Down at the shore, Brady and Lela ventured farther into the water for their surfing lesson.
“You really think I can do this?” Lela asked.
“Sure,” Brady said. “Remember, think of it like riding a bike.” Then he thought a moment. “Except without the handlebars. Or bike.”
Brady looked up the beach and saw Mack and Tanner coming closer. As they approached, Brady overheard their conversation.
“It’s like I say: if you want to meet new people, try taking off on the wrong wave!” Mack exclaimed.
“Exactly!” Tanner replied. “I dig the way you think. And you do it, like, all the time!”
Mack motioned to Brady and he took his cue. He turned to Lela. “Okay, here comes a nice one,” he said, pointing at the building wave. “Just visualize yourself riding it.”
Lela was nervous, but she readied herself. “Okay, whatever you say,” she said.
“Paddle!” Brady shouted to Lela.
Lela was on her stomach, paddling out to push past the breaking waves. She stood up at the right time and rode the wave in!
“I did it!” she cried as she swam up to Brady.
Mack knew she had to hurry to make her plan work. Tanner still hadn’t noticed that Lela was on a surfboard. Mack started to wave and point. “Oh, hey, there’s Brady in the water,” Mack said. She posed a question as innocently as she could. “And who is that beautiful girl surfing with him?”
Tanner squinted and tried to make out who was surfing. He brought his hand up to his eyes to block the sun’s glare. “Wow,” he said. “Check that out. She’s surfing. Amazing!”
Just as Lela stood up on the board, a beam from the lighthouse hit the ocean. Dr. Fusion’s machine began to shoot rays of light out of the lighthouse windows! The machine was beginning to have an effect on the water.
There was a low rumble and suddenly the water went completely flat and still. Lela looked around, confused. Where were the waves? What happened?
Mack and Tanner both looked out at Lela standing on the motionless surfboard.
Mack caught Brady’s eye, and they shared a worried look. They both knew that the weather machine was responsible for what had just happened. They had to destroy that machine—and fast!
“Sorry, Lela,” Brady said, apologizing. “I guess that’s all the surfing for today.”
“It’s okay. There’ll be another time,” Lela said optimistically. She looked at the shoreline and spotted Tanner. She recognized him from Big Momma’s. She held his gaze for a moment and smiled.
“Bravo!” Les shouted to Dr. Fusion as they stood before the weather machine. “So, now that we’ve temporarily caused these changes in the weather, how do we make them permanent and get rid of the bikers and surfers for good?” he asked.
“We need to magnify the power,” Dr. Fusion told him. He made his way over to a small cooler and took out a glowing green liquid.
“Plutonium?” Les guessed.
Dr. Fusion shook his head. “Lime soda,” he said, opening the top and taking a swig from the bottle. Then he reached in and took out another cylinder. This one was filled with red liquid.
“Strawberry soda?” Les asked. Suddenly, he was very thirsty. He grabbed the bottle and took a huge gulp of the drink.
“Plutonium,” Dr. Fusion said flatly as he took the bottle from Les’s hand.
Les spit out the red liquid as Dr. Fusion poured the rest of the plutonium into the machine.
“In two hours’ time, it will turn green and reach a boiling point of six hundred forty-seven degrees,” Dr. Fusion explained. “Or, as we scientists like to call it: Wow that’s hot.”
“Meanwhile, let’s go see the effect it had on the water,” Les suggested.
They both headed out of the lighthouse, anxious to see if their experiment was working.
“I thought for sure that would work,” Mack said, disappointed. She was sitting with Brady on a quiet part of the beach.
“I know,” Brady said. “And it was the final warning before the big storm.” He looked toward the lighthouse. “Les’s plan is working.”
Mack looked around, and then climbed up a rock to get a better view. “We have to get into that lighthouse again and try to stop them,” she said. She thought for a moment. “But we need the element of surprise. You think there’s a way in from the water?”
Just then, she slipped and fell off the rock, tumbling right into the ocean! The flower garland fell off her head and landed on the sand. Brady reached his hand out and pulled her up.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
When she stood up, Mack flipped her hair back to get the water out of her face, but she stopped. In a panic, she felt her head. “Hair!” she cried. She pointed to her dry hair. “Hair! Hair!”
Brady stared blankly at her as she ranted on and on about her hair.
“Hair? Hairstyle? Hair extensions?” he asked, trying to figure out what she was getting at. “Hair dryer?”
The word “dryer” seemed
to strike a chord with Mack, so Brady stopped. “Hair dryer what?”
Mack didn’t answer. Instead, she ran into the water, dunked her hair again, and came out.
“Your hair isn’t wet,” Brady said, realizing what Mack was trying to tell him. “What does it mean?”
“It means my hair isn’t wet!” Mack cried. “We’re morphing into the movie. We’re changing!”
Brady was still confused. “We’re changing?”
“We’re changing,” Mack repeated. “What are we going to do?”
All of sudden, music started playing and Mack began singing. It was as if she couldn’t control the words coming out her mouth!
Brady’s mouth hung open as he watched and listened to Mack sing about how she felt.
“Why are you singing?” he finally asked.
“I don’t know,” Mack said. “I suddenly just…”
“…broke into song,” he finished for her.
“Oh no! I’m in an involuntary musical number!” she cried.
“Stop,” Brady suggested.
“I CAN’T STOP!” Mack shouted between lyrics. Her emotions were tumbling out in song, and all her thoughts and feelings were creating a moving, heartfelt ballad.
“This isn’t good,” Brady said, shaking his head. “First the rash guard vanishes, then your hair, now this.”
When the song finally ended, Mack cautiously tried to speak.
“Did it stop?” Mack asked. She was so thankful to hear a spoken sentence come out of her mouth and not a line from a song.
“I don’t know,” Brady replied, looking around. “Give it a second.”
They both stayed quiet for a long moment, waiting for a musical cue.
“Okay, I think it’s passing.” Mack listened intently and then sighed with relief. “We’re not singing anymore.”
“Let’s go find Lela and Tanner,” Brady suggested. “We have to get them together so they can find out about Les’s weather machine and then unify everyone to destroy it before it destroys them!”
“Oh no! We’re talking in plot points,” Mack said, flinching.
They began to run but stopped short when Les and Dr. Fusion appeared in front of them, blocking their way. The doctor aimed a toylike laser gun directly at them.
Teen Beach Movie Page 4