Alex Ryan, Stop That!

by Claudia Mills

The run-through was bad enough; the actual dance, at full speed, with Mr. Dee’s comments coming in a constant, unintelligible stream, was almost impossible. But the crazy, frenzied pace of it got people laughing. The collisions, which at first had seemed embarrassing, now seemed hilarious. And at full speed the dance was over more quickly.

  They danced three more dances with the same partners, in the same squares. Then Mr. Dee sent them back to their corners again, girls on one side, boys on the other.

  “Ladies, it’s your turn now. That’s right, ladies, go get ’em!”

  No waving of Behavior Modification Slips was needed this time. The girls obediently started across the room toward the boys.

  Alex knew Marcia wouldn’t ask him, because he hadn’t asked her. Sure enough, Marcia asked Dave. He knew she had chosen Dave deliberately, because he and Dave were standing right next to each other. Marcia didn’t want Alex to miss seeing her flagrantly choosing someone else.

  He hoped Tanya wouldn’t choose him. Toward the end of the previous dance, she had been acting suspiciously friendly, laughing too hard when he swung her around, giggling for no discernable reason. He had nothing against Tanya, but he had had enough of dancing with someone twice his size. But Tanya didn’t ask him. She asked Julius, even though Julius was easily the worst dancer in the seventh grade.

  Maybe Lizzie would ask him. He knew she liked him well enough; she had forgiven him for his relentless teasing over the years. But Lizzie asked Ethan.

  The group of remaining boys was fast dwindling. Alex felt a strange surge of panic. Worse than having to square-dance with a girl would be not even being picked to square-dance with a girl. Alex wasn’t the type not to get picked for things. He was always one of the first kids called when they were choosing sides for games; at all three seventh-grade dances he had never had to worry about having a partner for every dance. But with Marcia turned against him, and turning all her friends against him, even Lizzie …

  Out on the dance floor the squares were already forming, the giggles were already being giggled. Two boys were left now—Alex and a short fat boy with funny clothes, named Henry.

  Only one girl was left, a short fat girl with funny clothes, named Randi. Alex hadn’t realized there was one boy too many. He hadn’t noticed who was left over during the last set of dances, or what had happened to him. Alex had been part of the dancing and giggling then.

  Randi hesitated, evidently going through her own version of eeny, meeny, miny, mo. Alex stared down at his worn-out tennis shoes, unwilling to beg with his eyes. When he looked up, Randi and Henry were heading for the dance floor together. Alex was all alone.

  Alone for one brief moment. His social studies teacher, Mrs. Martin, was bearing down on him. If Alex had to be the recipient of a teacher’s pity, why couldn’t it have been Ms. Singpurwalla? Mrs. Martin was probably fifty, every bit as tall as Tanya, and a good hundred and fifty pounds heavier. “May I have this dance?” she asked him kindly.

  Alex didn’t need a Behavior Modification Slip waved in his face to know that this was an offer he couldn’t refuse.

  As he trailed behind Mrs. Martin to the last incomplete square, the square of leftovers, the square of losers, he had to walk past where his father was standing with two other dads. His father, motioning in his direction, said something to the others. Apparently it was something funny, because all three fathers laughed.

  10

  ALEX WAS GRATEFUL THAT DAVE made only one crack to him about square-dancing with Mrs. Martin. As they walked back to their room that night, Dave used an Auntie Em voice from The Wizard of Oz and babbled, “Dorothy, oh, where are you, Dorothy?” Mrs. Martin’s first name was Dorothy. Alex swatted him, Dave grinned, and that was that. Alex’s new definition of a true friend was “someone who makes only one wisecrack following the most humiliating experience of your life.”

  At breakfast the next morning, as Alex had dreaded, his father was less restrained. When they met at the orange juice machine, his father said, “Square-dancing muscles sore, eh?”

  “Aw, Dad,” Alex said.

  His father chuckled. “Tall women have their appeal.” A double crack: his dad had obviously seen him dancing first with Tanya, then with Mrs. Martin.

  Two people were ahead of them in the orange juice line. Alex was sorry now that he had ever wanted orange juice, but retreat at this point was impossible. Alex would only lower himself further in his dad’s opinion if he acted as if he couldn’t take some teasing.

  “Mom’s not tall,” he said, to say something.

  “Well, I know how to pick ’em. Why you and Cara …” His father trailed off.

  Alex knew that it pained his dad to have his daughter choose someone like Dax and to have his son suddenly so unpopular as to be chosen by nobody. Marcia was the kind of square-dancing partner his father would have approved of—cute, pretty, lively personality, always surrounded by a chattering group of other popular girls.

  It was finally Alex’s turn for the juice machine. He filled his glass halfway full.

  “Drink up,” his father said, his jovial tone restored. “Gotta catch up with those dance partners of yours.”

  Ha. What would his dad do if Alex said, Stop it, it’s not funny. Do you think I liked being humiliated like that in front of everybody, in front of Dave and the other guys, in front of Marcia, in front of you?

  Instead he forced a laugh and carried his tray back to the table.

  It was the day of the big hike. They were going to hike all day, nature journals and soil-sampling kits in their day packs, to a set of cabins at the far end of the ranch. They’d spend the night there, cooking their own dinner, which Alex suspected would be a far cry from the barbecue provided by the ranch chefs last night. Then they’d hike back on a different set of trails tomorrow.

  A ranch truck was going to meet them at the cabin with their groceries, sleeping bags, and other supplies. When this had been explained the night before, Marcia had asked, “If we can drive there, why are we going to walk there?” None of the teachers had answered.

  As they stood now in front of the lodge, shouldering their heavy day packs, the first raindrops started falling.

  “Get out your rain ponchos,” Coach Krubek ordered.

  “I can’t believe this,” Dave said to Alex. He began rummaging through his backpack, getting all his other gear soaked in the process. “It never rains in the morning in Colorado.”

  “It’s raining now,” Alex said.

  In their ponchos, the students looked like a flock of wet birds. It was hard to tell one bird from another, except for the very small birds, like Lizzie, and the very large birds, like Tanya. And the very clumsy birds, like Julius, who was still struggling to find the head hole in his poncho and maneuver it into the vicinity of his head.

  Alex looked around warily to see which bird was Marcia. He strolled casually over to the other side of the group, as if he was just stretching his leg muscles while they waited. On his way, he passed Lizzie. Her small, freckled face was alive with happiness.

  “Don’t you just love the rain?” she asked.

  Alex was so relieved that one of the girls was actually speaking to him that he said, “Sure. Yeah. It’s so … wet.”

  Lizzie laughed. “Smell.”

  Alex wrinkled up his nose obligingly. He didn’t smell much of anything. “You haven’t seen Marcia, have you?” he asked.

  Lizzie’s face changed, as if she was remembering that she was mad at Alex on Marcia’s behalf. “She’s over there. In the lime green poncho.”

  Should Alex try to approach her? The lime green of Marcia’s poncho was electric in its brightness, like a neon sign flashing DANGER. Maybe he’d better not.

  “Thanks.” Alex matched the coolness of his tone to Lizzie’s.

  The hikers set off. The trails were muddy already. Some of the kids tried to scramble through the underbrush on the sides of the trail, to avoid getting their boots all covered with mud.

  “Stay on
the trail,” Coach Krubek called out. “A little mud won’t hurt you. But a hundred pairs of tramping feet walking off the trail can cause environmental damage that takes years to repair. Besides, you want to see where you’re walking. Walk in the brush, you could be walking into ticks. Or rattlesnakes.”

  The last word did the trick. Those who had tuned out to the remarks about damage to the environment now sprang back onto the trail with terrified shrieks. Alex slipped his hand into his pocket and closed his fingers around his rattlesnake rattle. Maybe he shouldn’t use it, after all. But if he didn’t have any plan, then he’d just be the guy nobody wanted to dance with, the butt of his father’s unfunny jokes.

  They walked slowly and steadily for about an hour, all uphill, a fairly gradual ascent, but steep enough that Alex was starting to feel sweaty and winded when they stopped under the shelter of some pine trees for a break.

  “Drink lots of water,” Coach Krubek said.

  “Did any of you see anything to write about in your nature journals?” Ms. S. asked. Even in a rain poncho, she looked beautiful. Raindrops glistened in the dark hair framing her dusky face.

  Alex pulled out his journal, just to impress her, and tried to think of something to write.

  Ode to Rain

  The rain

  Is a pain.

  Wet trails make me slip.

  Drip, drip, drip, drip.

  That was all he could think of. Next to him Lizzie was settled on a damp log, scribbling away.

  “What are you writing about?” he asked, taking another chance at friendliness.

  “The rain. Do you think it looks like liquid silver, spilling from the leaden goblet of the skies?”

  “Definitely,” Alex said.

  “What are you writing about?”

  “Same thing. I haven’t gotten too far.” He read to her what he had written. To his relief, she laughed. He hadn’t entirely lost his touch.

  As soon as Lizzie laughed, an electric lime green bird materialized beside her. “Lizzie,” the bird said warningly. Alex wondered if Marcia had written anything in her journal yet. He could imagine a poem or two:

  Ode to Alex Ryan

  I hate you, Alex Ryan.

  I hate you all day long.

  Everything you say is dumb.

  Everything you do is wrong.

  He turned back to his poem about the rain, but he couldn’t think of anything else to add. Maybe it was perfect just the way it was.

  By the next break, for lunch and soil sampling beside a spring-swollen creek, the rain had stopped and the sun was fighting to break through the clearing clouds. Julius lost his footing on the creek bank and soaked one leg up to the knee. Hopping about, trying to dry it, he almost took a second tumble. Ethan caught him just in time.

  The hikers had their ponchos off now and stuffed in their day packs. Without her bright green covering, Marcia looked less alarming, more like a regular girl. She had a bandanna tied around her dark hair that was even cuter than her pigtails had been yesterday. Did Alex dare say something to her about it?

  “Nice bandanna,” he said, swinging his pack on after the soil sampling.

  Marcia stared at him, once again, with unmistakable rage. What, he wondered, could have been so offensive about “nice bandanna”?

  “You know I’m only wearing this because I ran out of hot water partway through my shower this morning, so I didn’t get to wash my hair. But leave it to you, Alex Ryan. The worse someone feels, the worse you try to make them feel.”

  Alex couldn’t let the unfairness of this accusation pass by. “But it does look nice. I meant it. It’s cute.”

  “Cute like a hillbilly in a cartoon, maybe.”

  Alex gave up. Apparently Marcia really thought she looked awful in her scarf. If even sincere compliments could make a girl mad, then there was no hope for any boy, ever.

  “Forget it,” Alex said. “Forget I said anything.” Marcia gave a short, shaky laugh. “Now you want me to forget it. Let me tell you something. People don’t forget things. I don’t forget things. I never forget things.”

  Alex turned and walked away.

  Dave fell into step beside him as they continued up the trail. “Did you bring it?”

  “Bring what?” Alex asked gloomily.

  “It.”

  “Yeah, I brought it.”

  “And?”

  Alex didn’t reply. Nice bandanna. Who would have believed that those were words so terrible they could never be forgiven or forgotten? Of course, Marcia wouldn’t have reacted that way to this particular remark if it hadn’t been for earlier remarks about zits, used toilet paper, and gorillas.

  His father, side by side with Coach Krubek, passed the boys. Leave it to his dad to attach himself to the teacher whose good opinion Alex most valued.

  “Come on, Alex,” his dad said. “Pick up the pace. This is a hike, not a Sunday stroll to show off your Easter bonnet.”

  The coach chuckled. So much for his good opinion of Alex.

  “We have at least another three hours on the hike, I think,” Dave said, once the adults were out of hearing. “Three … long … dull … empty … hours.”

  “All right,” Alex said. If there was ever a day for a plan, this was it. He made his voice low and dramatic. “We need to wait for a window of opportunity.”

  “What if there isn’t any?”

  “There will be. What do they say? ‘Luck favors the prepared mind.’ Something like that. We’re prepared. We’ll be lucky. Trust me.”

  After they had trudged for another forty-five minutes in the ever-hotter sun, Alex looked around and didn’t see Marcia’s “nice bandanna” anywhere.

  “Where’s Faitak?” he asked Dave.

  “I haven’t seen her for a while. You think she’s up ahead?”

  “No.” Marcia was hardly an eager hiker. She was one of the seventh grade’s most reliable complainers when serious physical exertion was involved. “I think she’s fallen behind.”

  “Is this the window?”

  “It’s the window.”

  Alex led Dave off the trail. They crouched behind a cluster of juniper bushes. After about five minutes of waiting, while a few other groups of slower hikers passed them, Dave said, “Are you sure she’s not up ahead?”

  “Pretty sure.”

  They waited some more. Then Alex heard girls’ voices approaching. He listened more closely. It was Lizzie and Marcia. Marcia’s best friend, Sarah, who loved to hike, had long since left her behind on the trail.

  “This is ridiculous,” he heard Marcia say. “We’ve been walking for hours. This isn’t outdoor ed. It’s outdoor torture.”

  “Do you want to take another rest?” Lizzie asked patiently. “I think the others are pretty far ahead.”

  For answer, Marcia plopped down on a large rock a few feet from Alex. The window of opportunity opened wider. Alex motioned to Dave to stay quiet. He willed himself not to breathe.

  “My boots are killing me,” Marcia moaned.

  “We could write for a while in our journals,” Lizzie suggested.

  “You could write for a while in your journal. I haven’t seen any wildlife at all today. Except birds. If you count birds. And bugs. If you count bugs. Not that I want to see any. Do you think there are really snakes around here, or did they just say that to make us stay on their stupid muddy trail?”

  If Alex lived to be a hundred and six, he would never have a window of opportunity opened wider than this one. From his pocket he retrieved the rattle. He shook it. Then he paused, to let it take effect.

  Peering through the bushes, Alex could see Lizzie freeze. More alert than Marcia, she had heard the rattle first. “Wait,” Lizzie said softly.

  “What?”

  “I thought I heard something, but I don’t hear it now.”

  Alex shook the rattle again, louder this time.

  “I think it’s a rattlesnake.” Lizzie’s voice was trembling.

  “What should we do?” Marcia
’s voice rose hysterically. “Is this like the mountain lion, where you make yourself look bigger, or like the bear, where you make yourself look smaller?”

  Alex gave the rattle another good shake. He made a rustling noise with his foot in the underbrush.

  “Run!” Marcia shrieked.

  In her terror, she bolted, not up the trail toward the others, but back down the trail the way they had come. Joining her screams to Marcia’s, Lizzie pelted after her.

  Alex and Dave burst out laughing. Dave was almost laughing too hard to give Alex his high five. Never had a prank been executed more perfectly. This could go in The Guinness Book of World Records for most flawless practical joke in the history of the world.

  “We’d better go after them,” Alex said when they were temporarily laughed out. “I hope they don’t run all the way back to the ranch.”

  Smothering a new wave of laughter, the boys hurried down the trail toward the girls. Then they stopped abruptly.

  Marcia was lying sprawled in the dirt, one foot twisted grotesquely, her face contorted with pain. Lizzie had Marcia’s head cradled in her lap; Lizzie’s face was pale with fright and wet with tears.

  “I’m so glad you’re here!” Lizzie cried out when she saw Alex and Dave. “We heard a snake, and we ran. Marcia tripped on a rock, and I think she’s broken her ankle, or her foot, or her leg. Broken something.”

  Marcia’s eyes were closed. She was paler than Lizzie, which was saying a lot. Alex stared down at her. She wasn’t going to die, was she? Could you die of shock brought on by a broken ankle? Because if Marcia died there on the trail at outdoor ed, it would be his fault. He, Alex Ryan, would be a murderer.

  11

  ALEX PULLED HIMSELF TOGETHER. Marcia was not dead or anywhere close to dying. Her ankle probably wasn’t broken. People thought they had broken bones all the time, and then it turned out to be nothing but a sprain. Or not even a sprain. If he hadn’t broken his arm after his twenty-foot fall from Marcia’s tree, Marcia couldn’t have broken her ankle tripping over one little rock on a practically smooth trail.