I clipped my cleat back into my pedal and turned toward Scout’s.
I nearly fell over.
There, sitting on the crossbar of her orange Kona mountain bike, staring at me, was a girl with more hardware on her face than I’d ever seen—an ear studded all the way around in earrings, an eyebrow ring, a nose ring, a lip ring, and shock-white hair sticking up straight around and through her silver cycling helmet. Staring, and not smiling. Her hair made an eerie halo, so I had this panicky feeling that she was a ghost from one of the dead dinosaur trailers. But she was way too tan to be a ghost.
“Oh! Hi,” I said. “You scared the crap out of me.”
She jerked her head toward the dead mobile homes. “Lovely, isn’t it?”
I nodded. “I didn’t know it was legal to dump that much junk anywhere and get away with it.”
“It’s not legal. But it’s private property.”
I stared.
“You haven’t seen nothin’ yet. Even grosser deeper in the woods. Guy who owns it is an ass, if you wondered what I thought about him.”
“Uh—I didn’t really have time to wonder.”
The hard line of the girl’s jaw loosened and amusement crept up her face. I started to smile at her, but then our eyes locked, a sort of duel to see what who would make the next move. I felt like a preppy goody-two-shoes with my clean, smooth face and brown ponytail.
Finally, her eyes twinkled and she cracked into a grin. “Ride much?”
I shrugged. “As much as I can.”
She nodded, taking in my Giant Yukon mountain bike, my legs, my arms. She herself looked rock-hard, from her eyes to her shoulders to her quads and her calves. Even when she was relaxed on her bike, her muscles seemed to bulge. She wore a neon orange tank-top jersey and you could draw a line along the separation of her shoulder, biceps, and triceps. “Race?” she said.
“Huh?” I asked. I couldn’t quite imagine where she wanted to race me in this junkyard woods.
“You race your bike?” she asked.
“Oh. No,” I said. “I want to.” That sounded lame. I shook my head, worked my front brake lever. “Not yet. Keep thinking about it.” I looked back up at her. “Guess I’m chicken.”
“Just gotta do it anyway. Wanna go for a ride? With me, I mean?”
I shrugged again. Scout and Thomas wouldn’t be back for quite a while. The aunts wouldn’t be any happier than they were when I left. A longer ride couldn’t hurt. “Sure.”
And so I followed her. Her thighs were so cut that from the back, you could see the quads bulging above her knee.
The hardware girl was strong. And fast.
Out of the woods, down the hill, past Scout’s Last Chance, across Highway 60, I tailed her. Back into the woods on the other side of the highway. “Been down here?” she asked.
“No.”
“This is the other river. Minnesota. The one back where we just were is the Blue Earth River. They merge in town. That’s why they call Mankato the ‘Bend of the River.’ Did you know that?”
I was breathing so hard from keeping up, all I could answer was, “No.”
“You’re new here.”
“Yeah.”
“Thought so. I thought I knew all the mountain bikers in town.”
She rode down a rutty, bumpy, rocky dirt road. The descent was so sharp I had to feather my back brake constantly. She looked over her shoulder to check on me from time to time. We went under a railroad trestle where the rocks were as big as bread loaves. It was like riding down a stairway. If I were alone, I’d have gotten off and walked down the bumps, but I couldn’t do that with her there. I couldn’t be chicken, but I was sweating bullets. This was scary. I tried to watch where she put her wheel and follow the same line.
It worked most of the way; then, at the bottom, there was a sharp turn into soft sandy dirt, and I oversteered and felt myself flying over the handlebars. The dirt came flying at me, and smack, I was on my back in the weeds. “Oof.” A rock dug into my back, too, but just by my shoulder blade. Nothing vital.
The hardware girl’s brakes squeaked. “You okay?” She clicked one foot out of her clip-in pedal and set it on the ground to look back at me.
“Yeah, fine.” I jumped up, brushed off my butt. “Just stupid.”
She eyed me. “Not stupid. That’s a tricky descent. You’re good.” She wheeled back to me and stuck out her hand. “I’m Allison Baker. Allie.”
“Sadie Lester.”
“Sadie.” Her handshake was so firm it was almost scary. Like a man’s. “Sadie. I never knew anybody named Sadie.” She clipped back into her pedals. “Except my cousin’s Doberman. Let’s go, Sadie Lester.”
We were off. The road disintegrated to four-wheeler tracks that followed the Minnesota River. It was less technical than the downhill we just rode, but tricky and the sand was powdery in places. The river flowed wide and calm and murky. We rode and rode until we ran out of trail.
Then we pedaled up a steep grassy hill, jounced over some railroad tracks, and hit the shoulder of a paved road. I had never ridden harder in my whole life.
When we stopped, I said, “I better get back.”
“Where do you live?” she asked.
“Behind Scout’s Last Chance.”
Her eyebrow ring went up, in a question she didn’t say out loud.
“Scout’s my uncle. I’m staying for the summer. I—just got here. Today.”
She nodded. “Let’s ride again, Sadie Lester. See ya around.”
“Okay—” I started to ask for a phone number or something, but she was gone, pedaling off in the direction away from Scout’s.
When I tooled into the driveway, the cannon was put away in its trailer. Mom and Thomas and Scout were standing in the yard, not with happy faces.
“Where have you been?” Mom’s face was pinched with anger and worry.
“Riding. Why?”
“You’ve been gone almost three hours! When Scout and Tom got back, they said they never saw you. And there are lots of freaks out on the road today. I was scared silly. Besides, I need to get going. My plane leaves at five in the morning, you know.”
“If you’re so worried about me, why are you leaving me for the summer?” That wasn’t fair, but I couldn’t resist. “I’m fine, Mom. I met a girl out riding, and she showed me a bunch of trails.”
I could tell she was torn between being glad I’d met a friend already and being mad. So she said, “Good thing for your sake we have plenty of other stuff to worry about.”
“What?”
Scout explained. The cannon ball had put a hole clear through the back wall of the Roberts’ garage. But if that wasn’t enough, the cannonball landed squarely on Norton Roberts’ four-month-old Audi; the gas tank exploded, and the thing went up like a bomb. That was the first boom we’d heard. Worse yet, parked right beside the impeccable car was Norton’s irreplaceable, restored classic 1974 Norton motorcycle. Norton’s Norton. His pride and joy. While the garage was burning down, of course the Norton’s gas tank blew up in the flames, too. Not good, any way you look at it. Everyone expects a few minor explosions on the Fourth of July. But Memorial Day? Leave it to Uncle Scout and Uncle Thomas.
There would be a hearing on Wednesday.
When we were alone, I said, “Mom, you gonna leave Timmy and me with them for the summer? Isn’t that negligence or something?”
“Hush,” she said, and I thought she might cry, so I hushed.
She walked Timmy and me to the edge of the woods, promised she’d call us at least once a week from Egypt. For our sake, she was trying not to act too excited about Egypt. Or too worried about leaving us. I couldn’t muster up any excitement for her.
“Bye, Mom. Have fun. Yeah, love you, too,” was all I could give her with my hug. Th
en her Subaru disappeared around Scout’s bar and grill and turned up Highway 60.
Three
CCC
May 28, continued
Timmy moved into Stevie’s bedroom with glee. Stevie is nine, a year older than Timmy, so they were thrilled to death about the summer arrangements.
I wasn’t.
After Thomas and Janie and kids left, Aunt Susan turned to me. “You have a couple choices. You can move in with Megan.” Megan is only seven, not even half as old as me. “Or you can move into my sewing room. It’s sort of a mess, but you’d have privacy. I never have time to sew in the summer, so I don’t use the room. It’s up to you.”
I picked privacy, and Megan started to wail.
“Look, Megan,” I said. “I’ll see you every day anyway. But I like to read and stay up late, and it would be a pain to have me banging around in your room every single day. And you wouldn’t like my music.”
“Yes I would! I want to listen to your music.”
I sighed. “You can come listen to music with me sometimes. And”—I was afraid I’d regret this part—“and we can do other stuff together, maybe even go on bike rides.”
Her waterworks turned off instantly. Little manipulator.
The sewing room was really a closet in the basement. It used to be the root cellar a hundred years ago, but Scout put cinder blocks and cedar paneling down there to make a room for Susan. Susan had crafty stuff all over the house. Timmy said the house was “crowdy” with stuff Susan had made, and he was right. All the overflow “crowdy” stuff had been crammed into my bedroom closet. Shelves and shelves of cloth and styrofoam balls and yarn and fake wheat and silk flowers and stuff. Just great. I was going to live in Hobby Lobby. At least it smelled like cedar.
“Nice,” I said.
“It’s not nice,” she said. “And it’s a disaster, but it is private.”
“Thanks,” I said.
This is your bed,” she said, pulling out the fold-out couch and handing me sheets and one blanket. I’d brought my own pillow. “You can rearrange anything you like. Just please don’t throw anything out. I might want it sometime.”
I nodded, thinking that in a million years she couldn’t use all the crap in the room. But I just nodded like I agreed.
A reading lamp was perched on a tiny table at the end of the couch-bed, and the magazines on the table were this month’s. She’d lied about not using this room. This was her only hideout, away from the rest of the household, and she was giving it to me.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“For what?”
“Taking your room. I could stay with Megan. Really. I just thought—”
“No,” she interrupted me. “A sixteen-year-old has no place sharing a room with a seven-year-old. Let me feel good about one thing, just one thing, this summer, okay?”
“Thanks.” I hugged her ’cause I thought I should, but her face sagged, and I could tell she was already sorry she had two extra bodies in her house for the summer.
I vacuumed and piled up some stuff that was on the floor. I even wiped down the walls with a rag because I discovered that they smell more like cedar if you rub them. I wondered if I could get high, smelling it. When the bed was folded open, I had two feet on each side of the room to move around. I figured I’d fold the bed up during the day. It was a closet, and there were no windows. At least I wouldn’t have to get out of bed if a tornado blasted through town. A bit of privacy was worth a ton of claustrophobia. I made a sign and put it on the door:
“Cedar Claustrophobia Central. Please knock before entering. Thanks. Signed, Sadie, Management, C.C.C.”
“Very funny,” Aunt Susan said.
Four
Jail
May 30
Wednesday, the big boys, Janie, and Susan went to court. I had to babysit everybody. It was mayhem, but we played croquet and I made frozen pizza for lunch. It wasn’t as bad as it could have been.
It got worse when the adults got home. They were stone quiet.
Janie and Thomas didn’t even say hi. They just picked up their kids, got in Thomas’s truck, and took off. Scout’s and Susan’s faces were so long I didn’t dare ask what happened. But Scout told me I could come in his study while he called Mom to give her the news.
“No jury trial,” he said. “Just a judge’s sentence. Reckless endangerment. Illegal discharge of firearms within city limits. Public drunkenness. Operating a motor vehicle under the influence … yeah … willful and careless destruction of property. Norton Roberts is one pissed-off dude. He’s ruthless, and his lawyer is a shark—the lawyer went on a rant. He said, ‘Nothing, nothing can restore Norton’s Norton.’ So guess what?”
I couldn’t hear Mom’s answer.
“Nope. Goin’ to jail.”
I sucked in my breath. I could almost hear Mom doing the same. “Tomorrow morning. Can’t believe it.”
Five
The Blue Ox
May 31
So the next morning, the big boys went to jail. Aunt Susan quit smiling entirely, and Timmy and I were stuck for the whole long summer in a house with a new total of six kids and one depressed aunt.
My first order of business was to get a job.
I asked Marley, Scout’s cook and manager, if I could work at Scout’s Last Chance, but they serve alcohol—that’s what a bar and grill is—so they couldn’t legally hire a sixteen-year-old, even to bus tables or wash dishes. Marley said, “Scout might hire you and just pay you cash, but I don’t feel okay doing that. I don’t want to get him in any more trouble than he already is.”
I wanted to work somewhere I could get tips. So I rode my bike across town to fill out an application at the Blue Ox, a greasy-spoon diner/truck stop/gas station that specialized in Paul-Bunyan-sized twenty-four-ounce steaks. A twelve-foot Babe the Blue Ox stood guard near the rustic hitching post between the parking lot and the door. I leaned my bike against Babe’s front leg and reached up and touched his nose for luck before I went in.
Barb, one of the owners, interviewed me. She could have been my grandma’s twin, but Barb was hard around the edges where Grandma was soft as cotton (except for the calluses where life had rubbed against too much hard work and too many people she loved who had died). Barb’s hard edges made me think everything that had rubbed against her life had hurt. Her voice sounded deep and thick from cigarette smoke.
I got the job. I had to wear a uniform: a bandana somewhere on my body (she gave me one red and one blue), a checkered shirt (she gave me one blue and one red), and jeans. I was supposed to start the next day for the breakfast shift. I had to be there at five o’clock a.m. for a half hour of training. Usually breakfast shift started at five thirty, but not on my first day.
Six
And a Wet Dog
June 1
It wasn’t really light enough to see, riding my bike across town, so I swiped a flashlight from the junk drawer. But there wasn’t much traffic to worry about.
I bussed tables, learned the shorthand for the kitchen, and only spilled coffee on one table.
The place sported red-checkered tablecloths. It was the first time in my life I felt like I blended in with the furniture. And it was the first time in my life I watched people eat mammoth steaks for breakfast. I couldn’t imagine. I watched fat men chew steak at six thirty a.m., and I debated becoming a vegetarian right then and there.
When I got home at eleven fifteen that morning, all the little kids were swarming around the house.
“How was it?” Susan asked without looking up.
“Okay,” I said.
Susan was wearing a faded green T-shirt that read Walk for Hope. Stooped over the sink, she reminded me of a hopeless stalk of wilted celery. She brushed hair out of her face with the back of her dishpan hand a
nd asked, “Will you take Peapod for a walk? Scout always walks him in the morning. I don’t have time.”
I changed my clothes.
When I came back upstairs, Megan was waiting to pounce on me. “Can I go? Can I go?”
“Okay,” I said. “Peapod, come on!”
“Girls,” Aunt Susan said, “don’t go anywhere near that trailer court. Hear?”
Peapod bounced around, thrilled to death. Anybody who says dogs don’t smile is insane. He bounced his sleek golden self high enough to slurp my cheek and tore circles around us, waiting to find out which direction we were going.
“Let’s go to the river,” Megan said.
So we headed into the woods, toward the trails above the river. Peapod bounced ahead, out of sight, and then came bounding back to check on us.
The woods was full of birds and squirrels. I saw lady-slippers and jack-in-the pulpits. And I love the bright green of early summer. I breathed it in, like I always do, and was glad not to smell smoke this time. I couldn’t wait to get out on my bike. We came around a bend in the trail, and once again, the litter seemed to spring from the ground thicker than the wildflowers. Everywhere. Whiskey bottles, newspapers, broken plates, a smashed TV, a water heater, beer cases, carpeting, a swivel chair, and couch cushions. I could have stepped on junk like stepping-stones, all through the woods, if I’d concentrated on it. “The junk woods,” I said out loud.
“Yup,” Megan said. “Sometimes we find treasures.”
“I bet.”
We reached the steep slope down to the river. The water sparkled in the sun.
“Want to swim?” I asked Peapod.
He looked at me, ears cocked, and wagged.
“Want to go swim?” I said again.
He jumped straight in the air and took off down the rest of the steep path so fast I think his feet touched the ground four times in fifty feet. He disappeared around a corner, and we heard him splash into the water.
Chasing AllieCat Page 3