Lions & Liars

by Kate Beasley

  “I … umm…”

  Frederick looked up. Benjamin’s cheeks were pink again. He hooked his thumbs through his belt loops and took a deep breath that swelled his stomach. “I have to tell you,” he said in a serious voice. “There’s no fighting allowed here. You’ll be sent straight home if you get in a fight.” He raised a finger. “It’s a one-strike-and-you’re-out policy.” He paused and looked at Frederick, waiting for him to say something.

  “Okay.”

  “Okay?” Benjamin said.

  Frederick shrugged and nodded.

  “Well, good then.” Benjamin rolled onto the toes of his white tennis shoes and then dropped back on his heels. “Good for you, Dash.”

  The front doors of the main building opened and boys burst out of it, running for the food tent where Benjamin and Frederick waited.

  “Oh!” Benjamin said. His face paled. “They’re coming.” The way he said it someone would’ve thought he was talking about asteroids coming to destroy all life on Earth, not some hungry campers coming to breakfast. He took a step back, putting Frederick between himself and the oncoming campers.

  “May I get some more food?” Frederick asked, ignoring Benjamin’s behavior.

  “Sure!” Benjamin said. “Of course you can. Please help yourself.”

  “I mean … I just feel kind of bad because I already had some pancakes?” Frederick said, expecting Benjamin to retract his offer. After all, they probably had a limited amount of food for all the boys.

  “Have all you want.” Benjamin spread his hands wide as he backed away, toward the woods.

  “Thanks!” Frederick said. “Thanks a lot!”

  He hurried to be the first in the food line and got the plate off the top of the stack. As he was reaching for the tongs, he half turned to the boy who had just gotten in line behind him.

  “Hi—” Frederick began, but before he could get another word out, the boy body-slammed him out of the line and sent him staggering into one of the folding chairs. Frederick clutched his plate to his chest like a shield.

  Boys shouted and shoved. Stainless-steel lids clanged and clonged as they hit the table. The closest tent pole trembled like a tree in a storm. Boys brandished tongs that they snapped and clamped down on arms and noses. Then Frederick saw one of Miss Betty’s beautiful golden pancakes fall to the ground.

  A shoe stomped the pancake, and Frederick let out a strangled, “Hey!”

  One of the boys closest to Frederick turned to look at him then. The boy was at the edge of the free-for-all, spinning a plate on one finger. When his eyes dropped to the name badge against Frederick’s chest, the plate toppled. The boy lunged and caught it before it hit the ground. Then he looked up at Frederick again.

  “You’re Dash?” the boy asked in a tone of wonder. He was holding the plate in both hands now.

  “Dash?” someone else said, turning to see who had spoken.

  A hush fell among the boys closest to Frederick. While the rest of the campers carried on shouting and fighting, Frederick found himself in a pocket of calm. The boys stared at him, waiting for him to answer.

  “Uhh,” said Frederick, touching his name badge. “Yeah … yes, I mean. I am Dashiell Blackwood.”

  Aargh. Why had he said I am Dashiell Blackwood? Nobody said I am So-and-So.

  “I mean,” Frederick said quickly, “I’m Dashiell Blackwood.”

  That sounded wrong, too.

  “I’m Dashiell Blackwood.” For some reason, Frederick said this in the deepest voice he could manage, like he was doing a Darth Vader impression.

  “My friend Simon said you’d be here. He said y’all were here together last year,” the plate spinner said. “I didn’t even know you could come to Omigoshee twice.” Then he took a step back and made a welcoming gesture. “Do you want to get in line in front of me?”

  Frederick hesitated. He wasn’t normally a line cutter. But then he remembered that he was at camp to make a fresh start and be more of a lion, and Fresh Start Frederick was exactly the kind of person who got asked to cut in line.

  “Thanks,” he said as he stepped in front of the other boy.

  The boy bobbed his head. “Sure thing, Dash!”

  The kids around them started talking again. Now that he was in line, Frederick realized that the deafening noise the boys were making was exciting, not frightening. Like a good pep rally.

  “Which group are you in?” Frederick asked loudly over the clamor.

  “Nine,” the boy answered. He kept stealing glances at Frederick.

  Frederick had been hoping they were in the same group. “I’m in Thirteen,” he said. “But I bet we’ll hang out with people from all the groups.”

  “Yeah.” The boy nodded. “Sure, Dash.”

  When he reached the serving trays, Miss Betty’s perfectly arranged pancakes were in disarray, smooshed and scattered. But Frederick picked out two that looked mostly untouched and put them on his plate. He got two more sausage links and a spoonful of breakfast potatoes. Then, before he headed off, he tried to think of something cool to say to his new friend.

  “Well…,” he said. “I’ll see you when I see you. I mean … I’ll see you. Later.”

  The plate spinner blinked uncertainly. Frederick nodded and walked away.

  He spent a long time at the condiment table, getting the exact right amount of syrup and layering butter pats onto his pancakes. He considered the strawberry jelly packets but decided the pancakes didn’t need them.

  By the time he made it to the table that had a sign with the number thirteen on it, four boys were already sitting there. Their cheeks were fat with pancakes. They clutched their forks in their fists and looked at Frederick with beady eyes. There were no empty chairs left at the table.

  Frederick hovered for a moment, trying to figure out what he should do.

  One of the campers at the table, a lean, stringy-looking boy with a buzz cut, swallowed and squinted at Frederick, his eyes darting down to the name tag and then back up to Frederick’s face. His grip on his fork loosened, and his eyebrows rose.

  “You’re in our group, Dash?” he asked excitedly. Metal braces glinted on his teeth when he spoke.

  The others’ eyes widened. The boy with the braces didn’t wait for Frederick to answer.

  “Awesome!” he said. “Make some room for my man Dash.” He waved his fork at a smaller boy who sat beside him.

  The small boy didn’t move. He tapped his plastic knife with one finger … tap, tap, tap … and glared at Frederick.

  Frederick felt his shoulders hunching under the boy’s stare. He started to say it was all right, he would find another chair and squeeze in, but then the boy with braces gave the glaring boy a shove. “Move it, Ant Bite,” he said in a less friendly tone.

  Ant Bite slapped the knife down. Then he sighed and stood, looping his arm around his plate and cup, scraping them sideways to clear a space for Frederick.

  “Umm, thank you,” Frederick said, and lowered himself into Ant Bite’s seat.

  Ant Bite stalked off to find another chair without looking back.

  The others started eating again, shooting looks at Frederick every few seconds. He studied them as well.

  The boy with the braces looked like he was Frederick’s age.

  The one sitting across from Frederick might have been their age, too, but he was huge. Everything about him was big. He was tall and wide. He had a big head and hands like shovels.

  The third boy looked older and taller. He had a big chin with one of those chin dimples right in the middle, and as he ate, he was reading a book that lay spread open in his lap. Frederick glanced down at the boy’s chest to read his name badge, but he wasn’t wearing one.

  None of them were wearing their lanyards. Frederick looked around and saw that none of the boys at the other tables were wearing lanyards either. He casually lifted his own over his head and dropped it on the ground beside his seat. Then he kicked it under the table.

  The younger b
oy, Ant Bite, came back, dragging a chair.

  “So,” said Frederick. “Do you all go to the same school?” He wondered if they knew each other already. He hoped not. He didn’t want it to be one of those situations where they had all these old stories and inside jokes and Frederick never knew what they were laughing about. He hated that.

  “Nope,” the big boy said around a mouthful of food. “I go to Pike County Middle.”

  Frederick had never heard of it. The boy with the braces shrugged at Frederick to show he’d never heard of it either, and then he shoved some potatoes in his mouth.

  “I’m Nosebleed,” the big boy who went to Pike County Middle added.

  “Your name’s Nosebleed?” Frederick said.

  Nosebleed laughed—still with his mouth full so that Frederick saw wet gray chunks of pancake bouncing on his tongue. “No!” he said. “I’m called Nosebleed. That’s my nickname.”

  Of course Frederick had known it was a nickname, because nobody’s parents would actually write Nosebleed on a birth certificate, but he decided not to get into it.

  “Why are you called Nosebleed?” he asked instead.

  Nosebleed didn’t answer. Instead, he lifted himself off his chair and leaned sideways until he was over Ant Bite’s plate. He pressed a finger against his nose, closing off one nostril.

  “Hey!” Ant Bite said, trying to block Nosebleed with his arm.

  But it was too late. Nosebleed … blew, and blood sprayed onto the potatoes and sausage.

  Ant Bite yelled and shoved his plate away so hard that it slid off the other side of the table. Boys at the neighboring tables looked over at Group Thirteen in alarm.

  “That’s nasty, Nosebleed,” said the boy with the braces, shaking his head. “What have we told you, man? Not while we’re eating.”

  The older boy with the chin dimple was leaning back and holding his book over his shoulder, protecting it from the blood spray.

  Frederick was frozen, staring.

  “Do you have the plague or something?” he asked when he had found his voice.

  Nosebleed laughed again. “No!” he said. “I have nosebleeds.” He chuckled some more and sat down. He was still shaking with laughter as he stuffed a sausage in his mouth.

  Frederick set his fork down.

  “You don’t want your pancakes?” Nosebleed asked.

  “I’m not hungry anymore,” Frederick said. “Forever,” he added.

  “I’m Specs,” the boy with the braces said.

  “Specs.” Frederick’s voice was wary.

  “Like spectacles,” Specs said in a hard voice. “Because whenever I see a pair of glasses, I get enraged and I have to snap ’em in twain.”

  “In twain,” Frederick said. He could hear himself repeating Specs’s words back to him like a parrot, but he couldn’t help it. His brain was still processing the blood shower.

  “In twain,” Specs said again, and he slammed his fist on the table. “In two?” he said, raising his eyebrows at Frederick, like Frederick was being slow on the uptake, which he guessed he was.

  “Why would anyone do that?” Frederick asked.

  Specs leaned back in his chair, rearing it up on two legs. “My mom made me wear glasses when I was a little kid. And everybody picked on me. Until one day”—Specs brought the chair legs down with a thud—“I broke ’em in twain.”

  The boy who was reading sniffed and shook his head before he turned the page.

  “Did you get in trouble?” Nosebleed asked Specs, his eyes wide, holding a pancake in either hand. “Because my cousin wears glasses, and they cost five hundred dollars.”

  Specs curled his lip, showing a glint of metal brackets. “Yeah.” He shrugged. “I got in trouble. But I didn’t care. And this guy at my school, Corbin Harris, saw me do it, and he said I was the wildest person he ever knew.” The way Specs said this, it was clear that having Corbin Harris say you were the wildest person he knew was a high honor.

  “So now,” Specs said, “whenever I see somebody with glasses, I break ’em. It’s just what I do. It’s my thing.”

  “How can you see?” Nosebleed asked, leaning over the table so that he was closer to Specs. “Can you see me right now?”

  “People who wear glasses can still see without them,” Specs said.

  “Do I look really blurry to you?” Nosebleed pressed.

  “My friend Raj wears glasses,” Frederick said. “He couldn’t play baseball without them. He plays third base. He was on the all-star team last year.”

  “And if I met your buddy Raj, I’d break his glasses, too,” Specs said, jutting out his chin.

  Frederick thought that Specs had completely missed the point about how Raj’s glasses were a good thing.

  Nosebleed’s mouth was full again as he pointed to the other two boys at the table. “We call him the Professor,” he said, indicating the older boy with the chin dimple. The Professor glanced up from his book and nodded at Frederick. “And that’s Ant Bite.” Nosebleed gestured at the smaller boy beside Frederick, who was glaring at the empty table where his breakfast had been before it was bled on and slung to the ground.

  Frederick guessed the Professor was the Professor because he liked to read, which was a lot more promising a nickname than “Specs” or “Nosebleed.” But he wasn’t sure why someone would be called Ant Bite. Did the kid bite people? Did he bite ants? Had he once had, like, a million ant bites and had to go to the hospital? Ant Bite didn’t seem eager to discuss it.

  “So what’s your nickname?” Nosebleed asked.

  “Uhh,” said Frederick, stalling for time. He’d never had a nickname. Raj and Joel didn’t have nicknames either.

  These four boys had just met at the welcome meeting this morning, and they already all had nicknames, while Frederick—in his entire life—had never done anything to earn a nickname.

  “Well,” he said, thinking fast, “some people call me…” He paused, and then said the first name he thought of. “Frederick Frederickson.”

  The Professor looked up from his book, letting the cover fold closed. Ant Bite’s permanent glare faltered and was replaced with a doubtful expression. Nosebleed and Specs blinked at each other, and then they burst into laughter.

  “That’s the dumbest nickname I ever heard of,” the Professor said, awed, over the sound of their guffaws.

  For some reason, that made the other two laugh even harder.

  “Yeah, how’d you even come up with a name that dumb?” Specs asked as he gasped for air. “Frederick Frederickson.” Specs shook his head and slapped Frederick’s back so hard that Frederick jerked forward, his face nearly hitting his breakfast.

  Frederick smiled weakly and shrugged.

  “You’re the funniest guy I ever met.” Nosebleed was wiping his eyes.

  Frederick looked around. He realized he was waiting for someone to disagree and say he wasn’t that funny, but no one did. All the others were smiling, too. Even Ant Bite smiled a little. Though he was still holding his knife in his fist.

  No one had ever told Frederick he was funny. And even though the thing they were laughing at was his own name, he found that it felt good to make people laugh. It made him feel happy … popular … powerful. He picked up his fork and started digging into his food. The breakfast potatoes were peppery and crispy on the outside.

  “I wondered where you were when I saw your name on the registration,” Specs said. “My brother’s told me all about you. He goes to the Straker Academy. You got sent there, too, right? Before you were kicked out? Anyway, you weren’t on the bus, so how’d you get here?”

  Frederick paused with his fork halfway to his mouth, brain reeling, wondering what the Straker Academy was and what Specs’s brother had said about Dashiell. If anyone at camp knew Dashiell—the real Dashiell—then they would know that Frederick wasn’t him.

  “Yeah,” said Nosebleed, “how’d you get here?”

  “Umm … I…” Frederick stammered. His mind was a blank empty hole of not
hingness and … and more nothingness. “I stole a boat and came down on the river.”

  Everyone at the table went still and looked at Frederick, and Frederick gulped down the pancake he was eating, realizing what he’d just said and how it sounded. Dangerous, illegal.

  “Did you really steal a boat?” Ant Bite was looking Frederick in the eye.

  “Uhh…,” Frederick said. Were they going to tell on him? He needed to explain that he’d been joking. Or, at least, that it wasn’t the way it sounded. “Well—”

  “That’s classic Dash,” Specs said, shaking his head in appreciation.

  Nosebleed was gazing at Frederick, a forgotten sausage in his hand.

  The Professor was smiling to himself, his eyes far away, like he was imagining what it must be like to commandeer a boat and navigate it down a dark river.

  “Huh,” Ant Bite said, tilting his head back. He set his knife down.

  Frederick shifted in his seat. He was pleased that the boys seemed to be so impressed with him, but he didn’t know if he should let them think he stole stuff all the time.

  “You can’t fight while you’re here, though,” Specs said. “They’re serious about that.”

  Frederick made an annoyed sound. “Why does everyone keep saying that? I’m not going to get in a fight.”

  “Is that what you said before your face got like that?” the Professor asked, pointing his book at Frederick.

  “Oh!” Frederick said, his hand going up to his broken nose. “This? This wasn’t a fight.”

  “That’s right,” Specs said, slapping the table and grinning. “’Twas but a light skirmish for our man Dash.”

  “You’ve got blood on your shirt,” Nosebleed said. “Cold water’ll get that out.”

  Frederick looked down at the T-shirt he’d been wearing since yesterday. It was spattered with dark specks.

  “He got you good,” the Professor observed, eyeing Frederick’s nose.

  “Hey,” Specs said. “Don’t be disrespectful. I bet Dash got the other guy good, too.”

  “What did the other guy look like when you were done with him?” Nosebleed said eagerly, leaning forward and gazing at Frederick as he took a bite of sausage.