by Carl Deuker
I looked to Arnold. "You hear that one soldier was killed here, or two there," he was saying, "and it doesn't make much of an impact. But each one of those soldiers has a family, has friends, has a story, just like Brent did. Each one of them had a life they never got to lead."
When class ended, we all filed out silently. But as soon as we were in the hall, Brian Mitchell confronted Melissa. "I bet you're happy," he hissed. '"The dumb soldier got what he deserved.' That's what you're thinking. You should join al-Qaida if you hate America so much. Go bow down to Allah. You make me sick."
Melissa's face went white and she burst into tears. I stepped between Brian and her. "Shut up, Mitchell," I said.
He wheeled around. "Don't tell me to shut up. I'll say whatever I want to say. You're as bad as she is, anyway."
A crowd had formed around us. "You're being a moron, Brian," I said.
That's when he started throwing punches. I should have been expecting it, but I didn't get my hands up until he'd smacked me once right in the face. I grabbed him around the waist and wrestled him to the ground. We thrashed around trying to punch each other for a minute or so. Then somebody grabbed me from behind, and I guess somebody must have grabbed him too. A minute later I heard Arnold's voice. "What's going on here?"
"Nothing," I said, twisting free from whoever was holding me.
"What do you mean, nothing?"
"I mean nothing."
"So why's your nose bleeding?"
I put my hand to my face and felt the hot blood. "It's nothing," I repeated.
"It's not nothing," Arnold said. He looked to Brian Mitchell. "Both of you come with me."
Once we reached the main office, Arnold went to find the nurse, Ms. Tolbert. She handed me a small towel and had me lean forward and pinch my nose. "Don't lean your head back or you'll swallow your own blood."
I was still pinching my nose when Ms. Dugan appeared in the doorway. "Come with me," she said.
I followed her to her office. Brian Mitchell was slouched in a chair by the window, his arms folded across his chest. Dugan motioned for me to sit in the chair next to him.
"You fight, you get suspended. It's that simple. We have a zero-tolerance policy, and you both know it." She picked up the telephone. "I'm calling your folks, Chance. What's your phone number?"
I looked at the floor.
"Come on. What's your number? I can get it from the secretary, you know."
"I don't have a phone number," I said.
"What do you mean, you don't have a phone number?"
"Just what I said."
"How about a cell phone?"
I shook my head.
"Your mom or dad got a work number?"
Again I shook my head.
"So how does a person get in touch with them?"
"Ms. Dugan, I'm pretty much on my own. So if there's something you want to say, just say it to me."
Brian cleared his throat. "How about if Chance and me just shake hands and go home." Brian turned to look at me. "You'll shake my hand, won't you?"
"Sure," I said. "I'll shake your hand." He stuck his hand out and I shook it.
"OK?" Mitchell said, looking to Dugan.
Dugan stared at me, and then at Mitchell. "All right. I'll ignore what happened. But this ends here. You understand? You two don't even bump shoulders in the hall or I will suspend you."
I nodded. So did Brian.
Dugan motioned with her right hand. "Go on, get out of here. Brent Miller has us all frazzled."
Mitchell and I walked down the long empty hall side by side. I tried to think of something to say, but nothing came to me. When he reached the main doors, he pushed them open and took the stairs two at a time. I watched him until he had crossed the street. Then I started down the stairs myself.
Melissa was sitting on the bottom stair waiting for me. When she saw me, she stood and faced me. "Did you get suspended?" she asked.
I shook my head.
"That's good." She paused. "Thanks for coming to my defense. Again."
I shrugged. "He was out of line."
She looked down; her voice was quiet. "Do you think other kids think the way he does? That I'm glad Brent Miller died?"
"Nobody thinks that, Melissa. Mitchell doesn't even think that. He was just being an idiot."
She raised her head. "I didn't like him, but I didn't want him to die."
"Everybody knows that, Melissa." Her green eyes were all watery; looking at her made my throat tighten. "Nobody wanted anything bad to happen to him."
I looked at my watch. I needed to get back to the marina to run. "I've got to get going," I said.
She nodded. "I do too. But come to the Blue Note on Friday. OK? I have to talk to you about something."
I shook my head. "No, Melissa. There's no point."
"I told the others that there wasn't going to be a meeting. I have to talk to you, Chance. I have to."
"Whatever it is, just say it now, Melissa."
She shook her head. "There's something I have to show you." She paused. "The Blue Note, Friday. Is that so hard?"
"All right," I said. "Friday."
CHAPTER THREE
A person dies, a person you know, and you should think about them. All week I tried to think about Brent Miller. But my mind kept going back to Melissa—what did she want to say to me? What did she want to show me?
Then on Thursday afternoon, my dad called out to me from down below the moment I stepped on the boat. "That you, Chance?"
"Yeah," I said. "It's me."
He came topside. "Sit down," he said.
"I was going to go running now."
"Sit down, Chance. This won't take long."
I sat down, and he sat across from me. The boat rocked back and forth. I tried to act calm, but inside I was in knots. First Melissa, then my dad. Were things coming apart all around me, and was I the only one who didn't know it?
Finally he spoke. "This morning the port police went up and down every single pier in the marina. They had their dogs with them."
"Oh yeah," I said, trying to act unconcerned.
"Yeah," he said. "They asked me if they could board."
My heart was pounding so loudly I was afraid he'd hear it. "What did you say?"
"I told them that this was America and that they could go to hell. So did most of the owners on the pier."
"What did they do then?"
"They laughed, but they wrote down the name of our sailboat."
"Do you think they'll come back?"
"No. If they were coming back, they'd have been here hours ago." He tilted his head back and took a long drink of the beer he was holding, finishing it off. "Would it matter?" he asked.
"Would what matter?"
"If they came back."
"Not to me," I said. "I've got nothing to hide."
He stared at me, and I forced myself not to look away.
"Well, neither do I. So we've got nothing to worry about, do we?"
CHAPTER FOUR
I was ten minutes early when I stepped into the Blue Note that Friday night, but Melissa was already sitting at a table in the back corner. She was reading the newspaper, and her face looked older, more grown-up. I wondered if I looked older too.
I went to the counter and ordered a mocha and coffee cake. When my order was ready, I carried my plate and cup to her table and sat across from her. She didn't greet me with either a word or a smile. I took a sip of my drink and a bite of my cake. "OK," I said, trying to keep my voice light. "I'm here. What's this all about?"
"I figured it out, Chance."
"Figured what out?"
"Don't play dumb. You're involved in a smuggling ring, aren't you?"
I chewed the cake, swallowed, and then took a sip of the mocha.
"Well, aren't you?" she repeated.
"I don't know what you're talking about," I said.
"I'm talking about the packages you pick up on the beach. They're filled with drugs, aren't they?
"
Beads of sweat broke out on my forehead. "I told you—I don't know what you're talking about."
"Stop lying, Chance."
The net seemed to be closing around me. First the police on the pier, now Melissa. I'd thought I was being so clever, fooling everyone, and it turned out I was fooling no one. I was tired of the lying, tired of the hiding, tired of the constant fear.
"I don't really know what's in the packages, Melissa," I said quietly. "I don't know where they come from or where they end up. I just pick them up, take them to a locker, and leave them there. That's all I do."
"Don't be stupid. It's drugs. What else could it be?" Her tone was contemptuous.
"You're probably right. All I'm saying is that I've never looked inside any of them. I just pick them up, Melissa. I don't even know how they get on the beach."
"Do you want to know? Because I can tell you."
I thought for a moment. Did I want to know? The fat guy had said knowing was dangerous. But not knowing had its risk too.
"Yeah," I said. "I do."
She reached down and pulled out a stack of photographs from her backpack. Then she moved her chair so we were sitting side by side. "Do you know a boat named Bob's Toy?" she asked.
Everybody on the marina knew Bob's Toy. It was one of those million-dollar yachts wealthy people charter to go on whale-watching trips to the San Juan Islands and other places like that. "Sure, I know it," I said. "It's for rich people who want to see the sights without dealing with the crowds on the big cruise ships."
"They do more than show rich people the sights," she said. She showed me a picture of Bob's Toy sailing into Puget Sound. As she talked, she flipped from one photo to the next. "When the yacht gets to within half a mile of Shilshole marina, two kayakers drop into the water. The tourists come up on deck to watch and take photos as the kayakers race to the shore. Maybe they bet on which kayak will get there first. Or maybe they're told it's some sort of Native American tradition. It doesn't really matter. What matters is that the kayakers hit the beach right where your rat's nest with all the cute baby rats is supposed to be." She stopped and looked at me. "Were there ever any baby rats?"
"No."
"I figured as much," she said, flipping to the next photo. "The two kayakers pull the kayaks onto the shore. They wave to the tourists on the boat, have a drink of water or something, and then slip a package out of the kayak and into the rocks. It's very clever, don't you think? They do their smuggling in front of everybody. They call attention to themselves, so no one suspects they're doing anything wrong." She had one more picture, which was face-down on the table.
"What's that one?" I asked.
"This one?" she said. "This is the one that could put you in prison." She turned it over. It was a photo of me pulling a package out of the rocks.
I swallowed. "I thought we had an agreement. I told you I'd tell you everything as soon as I could, but instead of waiting, you've been spying on me."
She shook her head. "That's not fair, Chance. I promised you I wouldn't go back down to the beach. And I haven't. But that's all I promised. Do you think the newspaper stuff is a joke to me? Because it isn't. I want to be a top-notch reporter someday. Reporters investigate. You acted guilty that day on the beach. You acted guilty the last time we met here. So I decided to find out the truth, and I did."
As she spoke, she gathered up all the photos and put them back in the file folder. She shoved the folder into her backpack, zipped it shut, and then looked at me. "There's one thing I don't get."
"What?" I said, glowering at her.
"It's my guess that drugs or alcohol or both have ruined your father's life. Am I right?"
"My father has ruined his own life. Every bum on the street ruins his own life."
"But why be part of it, Chance? You see what it does to people. More than anybody, you should want to stay clear. Is the money that important to you? What do you need it for, anyway?"
There it was, right there in her question. The difference between her and me. She knew things I didn't. Lots of things. But it went both ways, because I knew all about a world she couldn't even imagine.
"What do I need it for?" I said. "I need it for the moorage fee, for food, for clothes, for heat and electricity, for sewage. I need it for my toothpaste and soap and my dad's booze and his cigarettes. I need it so that I can sit here with you and have a mocha and eat a piece of coffee cake. That's what I need it for."
She looked at me in disbelief. "You pay all the bills?"
"Yeah. I do."
She sat back in her chair and stared at me. "I didn't know."
"Now you do," I said.
Melissa didn't say anything for a long time. The door to the café opened a few times, a gust of cold wind entering as people came and went. Finally she glanced at the clock on the wall. "I can't stay. My aunt Catherine is visiting from New Jersey and I promised I'd be home by nine." She gathered her stuff together and then looked at me. "You didn't have to do it," she said, her voice low. "My father would have helped. All you had to do was ask and he would have helped. He still would."
"I'm not a beggar, Melissa, and neither is my dad."
"Sooner or later you're going to get caught. You know that, don't you?"
CHAPTER FIVE
After she left, I sat looking at my half-eaten cake. Then an idea came to me. I went to the counter and asked the waitress for paper and a pencil. She gave them to me, and I returned to the table. It didn't take long to get the answer. Three weeks. Twenty-one days. That's how long I had to keep running to make enough money to get us through May and June. As soon as I graduated, I'd go to the recruiting office by Northgate and enlist. By July 1, I'd be on my own.
As I stared at the numbers on the paper, I thought about my dad. What was going to happen to him when I was gone? Would he be able to get his act together without me around? I wanted to think he would, but I just didn't know.
I bused my dishes, and then headed down the steep stairway that led to the marina. Once I was under the tree cover, it was so dark I couldn't see my feet in front of me. Overhead the limbs in the treetops were tossing back and forth.
When I came out from under the trees at the bottom of the stairway, I turned and started toward the pier. Then I stopped. It was Friday night. I knew where the regular stuff came from; Melissa had solved that for me. But all I knew about the red packages was that they turned up on Saturday. Melissa had watched the drop spot during the day, but never at night.
I don't know why I cared where they came from. Maybe it was because I was quitting. Maybe I didn't want to quit and not know how it had all worked. Whatever the reason, instead of going to the sailboat, I walked out to the drop spot. I checked around in the rocks and found nothing, so nothing had happened yet. About fifty feet past the maple tree is a small recess in the rocks. I slipped into it. From there I could see back to the tree without being seen. I looked at my watch. One hour. That's how long I'd wait. If I was lucky, something might turn up.
The hour came and went. I was hunkered down out of the wind, but I could hear it in the trees and in the fury with which the waves were attacking the beach. If I were back on the boat, I'd be rolling this way and that, miserable. Might as well stay put, I thought.
It was almost midnight when I heard the train whistle. I looked toward the Edmonds oil refineries and saw the headlight of the train engine work its way south, down the shoreline toward me. A freight train, like any other freight train.
The train whistle blew again as it reached the bend above the maple, and as it did, it slowed and finally came to a stop. Nothing unusual about that, either. Another freight train heading north was probably crossing the bridge by the Ballard Locks. The railroad never runs two trains across that bridge at once.
But as the southbound train sat, puffing in the darkness, a man scrambled down off the caboose. I watched as he eased himself down the boulders leading to the beach. He descended slowly, and in the dim light I saw why—he
was holding something in his right hand. He wasn't on the beach long, no more than thirty seconds, before he was climbing back up the rocks and onto the train. Only now he wasn't carrying anything.
So that was it.
A few minutes later, the train lurched into motion again. I moved out from my hiding place and watched as it gathered speed. The back door to the caboose opened and the man stepped onto the platform. He had a large flashlight in his hand, really more of a spotlight than a flashlight, and it bobbed this way and that way as the train chugged forward. Then, suddenly, the light was right in my eyes. I stood blinded for a split second before I dropped down onto the sand and lay still. I stayed face-down, unmoving, as the light passed over me, until the train rumbled out of sight.
CHAPTER SIX
I walked back to the Tiny Dancer. As usual, my dad wasn't around. The wind, growing stronger by the minute, was tossing the boats in the marina around. I went below, crawled into my berth to get warm, and leaned my head against the pillow.
The stuff from Bob's Toy, the stuff Melissa knew about—it was marijuana. I could tell from the smell and feel of it. I'd known it for a long time, even though I'd pretended I didn't. But the stuff in the red packages, the stuff from the train—what was that? And why would somebody run the risk of smuggling those packages into the country and then let them all sit on the Tiny Dancer week after week. It didn't make sense.
I twisted around and slid open the panel to the storage nook. I reached inside, removed my dad's medals, and then took out the closest red package. For what had to be the fiftieth time, I put it up to my nose: no odor. I squeezed it; and once again it reminded me of Play-Doh. I turned it this way and that, held it up to the light, even thought about "accidentally" ripping a corner so I could peek inside. But what chance was there that I'd know what it was even if I could see it?
At that moment I heard a heavy clomp above me. My dad was back. It was so windy I hadn't heard him walking on the pier. My light was on; the storage nook was wide open; his medals were all out on my mattress. As fast as I could, I stuffed the package back into the storage space. He was climbing down into the cabin just as I slid the false panel shut. His medals were still out, so I shoved them under my blankets.