One Kid's Trash

by Jamie Sumner

  She pulls me aside. “We get free skiing on the mountain? Opening day free skiing?”

  I nod.

  She doesn’t say anything. Good surprise or bad surprise? I want to ask, while she stares at me. I can read almost anybody’s trash, but I cannot read Em’s face.

  “All right, I’ve got skis and boots for Hugo and Vij, but Emilia and Micah, you’re going to have to tell me your sizes. We’ll see what we’ve got in the back.” He puts his hand on the counter like he’s about to take their order at Subway. Vij grabs his boots, grinning like it’s Christmas come early. I guess all is forgiven from earlier. I am beyond grateful Dad already has my boots out so Em doesn’t have to hear me say my shoe size. I’ve never liked telling people what size clothes or shoes I wear. It shouldn’t matter, but it does.

  She says, “Umm, I’m usually a five, sir, but I’m not sure I should be—”

  “Nonsense.” Dad claps his hands together. “I called your mother. Yours too, Vij, and your grandmother, Micah. We’re all on the up-and-up. Now let me see if I can find those fives.” He doesn’t mention calling Mom.

  Once we’re geared up, Dad escorts us to the chairlift and tells the operator to “take care of them,” before waving us off. No self-respecting Coloradoan would ski in jeans, but it’s all we’ve got, and once we’re on the lift, I don’t even feel the cold. I look over to Em on my right. She’s smiling. Like a real smile. So, good surprise, then. Micah, on her other side, adjusts his glasses and leans over the rail. I bet if his dad were here, he’d take him on the mountain all the time.

  Vij starts to rock our chair back and forth. It swings and creaks in the wind.

  “Cut it out.” I shove him hard enough that he almost drops his gloves.

  “You cut it out.” He pushes me back and I knock into Em who knocks into Micah.

  “Both of you cut it out,” she says, but she’s laughing. I think this might be the first time she’s looked more like an eleven-year-old than a mini-mom.

  The lift stops halfway up. Somebody probably lost a ski or is too scared to get on or too slow to get off. Vij stops rocking. My boots are a little too big with my thin socks. My heels rub up and down each time I shift my skis. Now that we’re still, I start to shiver. I hope we get moving soon.

  “It’s not just Chance, you know,” Em says into the silence.

  “What’s not Chance?” Micah asks.

  “Nobody read the newsletter.”

  Vij and I trade glances.

  “People took them,” she says mostly to herself, “but then they dropped them on the floor, or left them at their table. I saw one girl spit her gum in it.”

  “Maybe it’s because it’s Friday and everybody’s thinking about the weekend and ski season opening and—”

  “No,” Em says, cutting me off, “it’s not that. Nobody wants to read about parking spaces and drinking fountains and what Mr. Carpenter majored in in college.”

  “I do!” Micah offers up.

  “No.” She shakes her head. “Even my mom forgot it was today. I wrote it on the calendar on the fridge, and I thought maybe she’d do something special, you know? Like make breakfast or call me after school to ask about it, but…” She pauses. “It’s not her fault. She works two jobs, and my parents share a car. It doesn’t matter. Chance was right. Nobody cares.”

  “Whoa.” Vij holds up a hand. “Let’s not get crazy. Chance is never right.” Then he adds gently, “We just need to spice it up.”

  Em twists her hands around the safety bar.

  “Next time will be amazing,” he adds. “We’ll sell out! This was a warm-up. That’s it. Not everyone can get it right every time. Not even you, Em.”

  “We can do it,” Micah says, sounding even more sure than Vij.

  “They’re right,” I add. “We’ve got a month. I’ll help more this time. I’ll write whatever you want. I swear. It’ll be great.”

  Em settles back against the cold vinyl seat.

  “You really think so?” she asks finally.

  “I do.”

  The chairlift starts moving again with a jerk. Up above, we can see the top of the mountain coming into view. This is it. We’re about to ski the mountain, without responsible adults, on opening day. Vij claps his gloved hands together and howls like a wolf. After a second, I do too and so does Micah. It’s something we’d get made fun of for if Chance or anyone else heard, but out here there’s nothing but us and the open air. I howl so loud my ears pop. Em even joins in with a little “yip yip, yeooowwww!” We howl all the way to the top.

  * * *

  “Micah, I cannot believe how fast you took those moguls!” Vij yells when we slide to a stop after our first run. He’s right. Micah was like a cheetah on skis, his legs moving at warp speed over the icy mounds.

  He plants his poles in the ground to receive all our high fives. Then he shrugs.

  “We basically live on the slopes when my dad is here.”

  As we get in line for the chairlift, I ask, though I’m not sure if I should, “When—when is your dad supposed to get back?”

  “His deployment was scheduled to last six months, but it got extended to nine, so, February, but my granny says Easter if we’re lucky.” He rubs at his glasses to clear some of the fog, and whatever he sees in my face before I can cover it up makes him hurry to add, “But the zone he’s in is mostly stable! He said in his last email they’d even started a baseball league.”

  I plaster on a grin, and he smiles back. Except all I’m thinking is that I complain about Dad not making it home for dinner. I can’t imagine months without him and not knowing when he’ll get back. If he’ll get back. Micah inches forward with his poles as the line moves. He’s the toughest of all of us.

  Three runs are all we can squeeze in before it’s last call for the chairlift and time to catch the shuttle back down to town. While we wait, Em leans over and whispers, “Thank you, Hugo” and hugs me, and my brain short circuits and I forget what my arms are supposed to do. On the ride down, our noses are running and nobody has tissues and Micah’s glasses are completely fogged over again and my jeans are soaked through and my heel definitely has a blister.

  But it was totally worth it.

  At least it was until Aunt Soniah drops me off at home.

  The shuttle took longer than usual to get us down because of all the extra people and all the extra stops on opening day. It is 6:47 when I walk through the front door and dump my wet jacket on the floor.

  “So is it shrimp, tuna, or salmon?” I yell down the hall, because that’s the only way we know how to do fish Friday. But the fishy smell is mysteriously absent. The house is quiet. Creepy quiet. All the lights are off except for in the kitchen. I follow its glow down the hallway, peeling off my damp socks along the way. Mom sits at the table in her fuzzy robe with her back to me. She doesn’t turn even when I walk up right next to her. Her hands are clasped in front of her and her eyes are closed. For a second I think she’s praying, but then she huffs out a breath, opens her eyes, and points to the clock.

  “I can explain.”

  “Don’t.”

  “Em was having a bad day.”

  “So you decide to take the shuttle by yourself. And ride the chairlift by yourself. And ski down the mountain by yourself!”

  “Dad said it was okay.”

  “Dad said it was okay?!” She stands up and marches past me. I follow her down the hall at a safe distance. She picks up my wet socks and hurls them into the laundry basket and then jams my jacket onto the hook by the door. Then she turns toward me.

  “Let me ask you something, Hugo. Why didn’t you check with me?”

  “I, uh, needed Dad to get us boots and skis and stuff.”

  She crosses her arms. “Try again.”

  “I knew you were busy with clients.”

  She shakes her head.

  “Okay. I just didn’t think about it!”

  “No.” She points a finger in my face. “You knew I’d say no, so you w
ent to your father who is so distracted with his new job that he didn’t stop to think about your safety! I had to hear about it from your aunt!” She stops. Breathes in for four. Yanks her robe tighter. And breathes out.

  “Go change your clothes,” she says in a new voice. “There’s leftover lasagna in the fridge.”

  “What about fish Friday?” I ask as she turns to walk back down the hallway. Mom never leaves first. She’s always grabbing my sleeve or calling me back for one more thing. I lean against the wall in the dark and feel more alone than if the house were empty. As she disappears around the corner, I shout, “I was just trying to be nice!” But she’s already gone.

  Chapter Nine Breaking and Entering

  Mom seemed back to normal on Sunday morning. She even made pancakes with chocolate chips for the two of us. Dad, of course, was on the mountain. But then she didn’t let me go over to Vij’s after Mass, and every time I walked out of a room, she asked me where I was going. So, not totally back to normal. It was like she grounded me without ever actually saying it.

  Her fight with Dad on Friday night began with an epic round of hissing whispers after they thought I’d gone to bed, and it ended with him on the couch, where he has spent the last three nights. They’ve fought a million times since we’ve moved here, but they’ve never slept apart. I kicked his pillow off the end of the couch this morning and then carried it back into their room and put it on his side of the bed. That pillow being in the living room terrifies me more than the entire move from Denver.

  I can’t stop seeing Em’s face as she stared at the flyers in the trash can and tried not to cry. I can’t unhear Mom yelling at Dad. And my nose still hurts. It’s Monday now, and I’ve had the weekend to think about it. If you trace the line of events all the way back, there’s only one conclusion: This is completely Chance’s fault. He is ruining my life and the lives of my friends. It’s time to fight back.

  I pull Vij aside before he can walk into English.

  “I have a plan.”

  “Yeah? For the next Paw Print?” he asks.

  “What? No. I have a plan”—I lean in close to his ear—“related to garbology and revenge.”

  * * *

  Em is in better spirits this week. She greets us at lunch with a list, front and back, of new ideas for the next issue, and she wants us to put our initials by the assignments we want. She’s jotted down things like:

  New turf on soccer field

  Recent study on concussion in youth hockey

  ebook vs hard copy (English class debate????)

  Cougar mascot—too violent, vote to rename?

  Childcare for teachers

  Organic snacks in vending machine (poll??)

  We all kind of say “hmmm” and “yeah, maybe” but nobody initials anything, not even Micah. Meanwhile, Vij and I are in a text debate and hiding our phones under the table.

  Vij: today after school

  Me: cant. mom making me go straight home

  Vij: tmrw before lunch after algebra

  Me: no he’s IN that class and the crow will never let us both leave early

  Vij:

  Vij: U figure it out then

  Me: (after a few seconds where Em definitely gives me a dirty look during her cost analysis of Annie’s Organic Cheddar Squares versus regular Cheez-Its) fri right after school during bball practice

  Vij:

  * * *

  “Dude,” I say out loud, “please never use the winking face again.” Em takes our phones away for the rest of lunch.

  The week passes as slowly as humanly possible. Seriously. It’s like counting down to Christmas. There’s a bright spot on Wednesday when the girl in my Spanish class brings me homemade blueberry muffins for looking through her brother’s car trash. He’s finally driving her to school now.

  After the bell rings at the end of the day on Friday, I meet Vij at our pre-planned location behind the school. I’m late after being stopped again for more garbology-related business. I had to reject four bags for hygienic reasons, and the owners were not happy. It took a while to sort out. I was afraid Vij would have given up and left, but he’s there, kicking dirty icicles off the bottom of the dumpsters.

  “Did you make sure everyone saw you leave through the front doors?” I ask him.

  “Of course I did.”

  “Easy. I’m just checking. What time is it?”

  He checks his phone. “It’s 4:05.”

  “Okay, we’ll give it another few minutes. Make sure practice has already started and everyone’s in the gym.”

  I kick one of the icicles he’s already broken off and we kind of pass it back and forth for a while until it breaks into a thousand pieces. I’m starting to think this is a bad idea. I mean, this week’s been pretty good. Chance only rubbed my head for luck twice. Em’s happily ordering everyone around again. The Crow hasn’t singled me or Vij or Micah out once. Mom even let Dad back into their bedroom yesterday.

  I almost tell Vij we should call it off, go get fries at Five Guys instead. But then the alarm I set on my phone beeps and it’s go-time and I don’t say any of it.

  We sneak back in through the door by the dumpsters, which Vij has propped open with his algebra book—the best use we’ve gotten out of it all year. Inside, the hallways are deserted and feel over-hot after the few minutes we spent waiting around outside in the cold. The few teachers who are working late have their doors cracked, but there’s not many, because it’s Friday. We sprint past each door like burglars, which I guess, technically, we are, or we’re about to be. When we turn the corner to the sixth-grade hall, I hear a whistle and the squeak of shoes on the gym floor as the basketball team runs sprints. I check my phone. They’ll be done in forty minutes. We only need five. Five minutes to do something that could get us both suspended and would definitely get me grounded for life if Mom found out.

  We stop in front of locker number twenty-three.

  “Stop breathing like that,” Vij says at a totally normal volume, so anyone in the world could hear.

  “Like what?” I whisper.

  “You’re panting. This was your idea. Calm down.”

  Calm down, he says, like we’re just out for a stroll.

  “Do you remember the combination?” I ask, still whispering.

  He pulls out a sheet of paper and hands it to me. It’s wrinkled from being stuffed in his pocket and my hands are shaking, which doesn’t help.

  “ ‘Twenty-two, seven, five,’ ” I read extra slowly while Vij turns the lock. I glance over my shoulder. We both hold our breaths while he pulls down hard, like you have to do on every locker, because they’re old and dented and basically useless. But it clicks open, smooth as butter. Neither one of us moves. It’s been so easy so far. Too easy. Vij saw the combination by pretending to slip a note into the neighboring locker while Chance was unlocking his own.

  “Ready?” he asks. He opens the door before I answer. Everything falls out with an almighty crash and I yelp.

  “Shhh!” he says.

  “You shhhh!”

  We bend down to gather it all up. I force myself to stop panting and refold the bent pages of Chance’s history book. While it’s most definitely breaking and entering, we’re not actually stealing. We are not taking a single thing with us. Everybody knows lockers are de facto trash cans. The plan is to see what Chance’s got in here and find whatever dirt we can on him. That’s it.

  Vij restacks the books while I dig around in the bottom of the locker. A half-crushed Twix oozing caramel sticks to a protractor. A bunch of wadded-up napkins from the cafeteria hide in the back. Pretty basic so far, with the exception of a tiny magnetic mirror stuck to the door. Who knew Chance was so into his looks? A ticket stub is wedged between the mirror and the door. I wiggle it loose. It’s a ticket to a Pioneers game from last March. Well that’s disappointingly predictable. Of course he would save a ticket from the state basketball team.

  I replace the ticket in the door and return to the loc
ker itself. Piles of detention slips peek out from his English and Spanish binders. Coach hates it when his players miss practice. But still, it’s no big secret that Chance gets detention. So far this is a huge letdown.

  I pull out the binders to see if there’s anything left worth noting, and a folder falls out. I pick it up. It’s a Star Wars folder, the same pattern as my bedspread at home. Great, we have something in common. I shove it back in before I can think more about it, and his English binder gapes open. Our most recent essay from Mrs. Jacobsen is shoved into the front pocket.

  “Check this out.” I hold it up for Vij. “Chance got an F—a big, red F.”

  “Sweet!” Vij says, and stands next to me while we scan the page.

  It was supposed to be an essay on The Book Thief, analyzing the propaganda during the Holocaust. But all he did was write a summary. And he misspelled “Thief” as “Theif” every single time. He also misspelled the name of the main character and, no way, the author. He also lost five points for forgetting to give it a title. I flip through the rest of his binder. F in vocabulary. D- on The Giver test. Chance is failing English. Like failing failing. And way in the back is a thin slip of paper—a note from Chance’s parents saying he’s allowed to keep a prescription for something called “Drysol” at school.

  I hold it up for Vij, but he shakes his head. We have no idea what “Drysol” is, but I know how to Google. It better be something good, because we’re out of time. I pull out my phone and take a picture, hyperaware that Chance could walk out any second.

  I grab Vij by the arm. “Come on, man. Let’s go.”

  “What? No!” Vij protests.

  “We got what we got,” I say, jamming the lock back in place and clicking it shut. “Now we live to fight another day.”

  Chapter Ten Trick-or-Treat

  On Halloween morning, I lie in bed under my Star Wars comforter, trying to convince myself to get up already and brave the cold. It spit rain all day yesterday that froze and turned to ice before it hit the ground. Then it snowed. Ice. Snow. Ice. Snow. The air was so humid from the heaters working overtime on the bus that Ms. Sherry, our driver, had to pull over so we could wipe down the inside of the windows with towels. It’s going to be a slip and slide for all the little kids trick-or-treating tonight.