Monkey Bars and Rubber Ducks (14 page)

‘We should stop that boy,’ said Mr Morris.

Don’t stop him,
I wanted to say.

Miss Walsh opened her mouth but . . .

‘Let’s wait,’ said Max. ‘I think he wants a second chance.’

I counted the rungs – there were ten. Fifty was on number five, but he wasn’t exactly whipping across. It’s hard to hang by your arms, fine for howler monkeys but not great for humans.
Come on, Fifty.
He made rung six, but he was too slow. Everyone knows you have to make yourself go fast or it’s too tiring. The longer you hang, the less likely you are to make it. He was stuck on six. His face was going red. And he wasn’t grinning any more. He was going to fail, for the second time. As soon as I had that thought I knew I had to do something RIGHT AWAY. I grabbed the arm next to me, which happened to belong to Jonno, and headed for Fifty. He might not be able to do it on his own, but he could it with our help.

‘Good thinking, Keener,’ said Jonno as we launched into the freezing cold river. It took a second to get over the shock. But in two seconds we were under Fifty’s dangling legs, and then they weren’t dangling, they were standing on a pair of shoulders (well one of mine and one of Jonno’s). Fifty was going to make it, just not in quite the same way as everyone else.

Bee started clapping, a few people joined in, and then more. Fifty jumped off our shoulders, with the help of our bended knees, and on to the grassy bank. There was shouting and hollering and wild clapping. Everyone was for him, even though he still hadn’t made the crossing on his own. Max came to the edge and slapped him on the back.

‘Top try, Fifty.’

Fifty shrugged. ‘Got halfway.’

‘Six-tenths actually,’ I said.

‘Nerd,’ said Copper Pie. (I do think being able to add up shouldn’t necessarily qualify you as a nerd. Most people can do it.)

Max took Fifty’s hand and held it high (well, as high as it would go) and said, ‘This member of Team Tribe has just shown us that it’s the things you find difficult that are worth the most. If you can swing over the monkey bars like a chimpanzee, like Copper Pie did, that’s great, but it’s not a challenge. You find out what a person’s really made of when they’re faced with something they’d rather
not
do.’

It was a good moment. No, not a good moment, a great moment. I glanced at Callum to check the sickly smile had been wiped off his face. Too right it had.

We walked back to the mess tent, hungry for breakfast. In the bacon queue Copper Pie turned to Fifty and said, ‘It would’ve been a whole lot easier if you’d done it the first time.’

‘No it wouldn’t,’ said Bee. ‘This way Fifty got to be a hero. If he’d done the monkey bars first time like everyone else, he’d still just be Fifty – slightly small, bit of a show off.’

Fifty gave her a you’re-not-a-nice-person look.

We were back to teasing, which meant we were back to normal, that was all that mattered. Tribe was back to normal. (And our reputation was restored.)

We had to pack up, and dismantle the tents. Max said the quicker we cleared the area, the sooner we’d get to play crab football and the longer we could play crab football for. Crab football is good. Even girls like crab football. We shoved everything in our bags, which wasn’t easy because either the bags had shrunk or our stuff had swollen.

Team Tribe reported for football at the same time as Team GB so we were put down first on the play list. It was a tournament. Ten minutes per game. Winners play winners. Losers play losers. Blah blah. Max dragged two ancient goals out of a door next to the washrooms and we helped tent peg them down.

‘OK. Your goalie can use hands, everyone else feet only.’

‘Who’s goalie?’ I said.

‘Not me,’ said Bee. ‘I’m going to be a striker.’

‘Same,’ said Fifty.

‘I’ll be goalie,’ said Jonno.

‘Sorted,’ said Copper Pie. ‘Let’s practise.’ He fetched one of the balls (lighter than a football, smaller than a beach ball), got down on all fours, tummy-side up . . . if you get what I mean, and started to dribble the ball.

I made my crab.

‘Pass it to me.’ He kicked me the ball. I missed and it went straight past. Lily picked it up.

‘No hands, Lily,’ said Bee. Lily threw the ball at Bee, who caught it.

‘No hands, Bee.’ She said back. Max blew a whistle.

‘OK. Team GB versus Team Tribe. Get into positions. I suggest two at the front, two mid, one sweeper at the back and goalie. We’ll start with a centre pass for Team GB.’

An interception by Bee gave us possession right away. We were off. She passed to Fifty, who kicked it straight ahead to no one. Copper Pie crab-sprinted after the ball, overtaking everyone else. A boy from Team GB had the ball but Copper Pie just ran into him, hooked the ball out from between his feet and shot at goal. The goalie stopped it with his knee, but the rebound landed at the feet of our redheaded football freak. Smack! Team Tribe score!

After ten minutes of utter humiliation (for them) the score was 13-0, all goals scored by you know who. That got us talking about the awards ceremony.
Maybe we’d be back in contention for the lead if we won the crab football?

‘We are so going to be top,’ said Bee.

‘We haven’t even seen the other teams play yet,’ said Jonno. I don’t think anyone heard. They were already laughing about how sick Callum would be if Tribe triumphed again.

Our next match was against Alice’s team, Flower Power, who’d beaten Hogwarts. We annihilated them, no problem, which put us in the semi-final against the Missiles. No way was Tribe going to lose to Callum and Jamie’s team.

Except our magic feet (or rather Copper Pie’s) deserted us in the third match. We were level at 3-3, sweating and desperate to score, and I for one was equally desperate to turn over into a more human position. My wrists were ‘weak as a kitten’, like Big Jim’s.

‘Sudden death from now on,’ Max said. ‘We’re into extra time so we play golden goal, the first to score goes through to the final.’

There was a big crowd watching. It was our centre pass. Bee took it, passed back to Copper Pie. I think he was going to try and take it all the way but Callum and Jamie were on him. He tried to get rid of the ball to Fifty who was crabbing alongside but it deflected off Jamie and landed at the feet of another Missile, who lobbed it high in the air. We all watched it soar up and then loop down, bouncing right in front of Jonno, who totally misjudged everything and grabbed at thin air while the ball hopped into the goal behind him. Missiles win!

We were sick. Beaten by the team we most wanted not to be beaten by. We sat in a huddle, ignoring the other semifinal, and Copper Pie did a running commentary of our match and what we did wrong. I didn’t listen. I thought about going home instead. We’d had a great time but I was looking forward to getting back to my room, particularly my hammock. There’s something about swinging while you read that’s really nice.

The camp horn sounded, announcing the final: Missiles versus Mountainboarders.

‘Up you get,’ said Bee. ‘We need to make sure Ed and Marco pulverise the Missiles.’

‘Too right,’ said Lily.

‘Same,’ said Fifty.

We lined up and from when the second play began, we yelled our heads off. It was a good game. Both sides were fixed on winning. Copper Pie coached from the sideline. Callum did his usual hogging of the ball. There were loads of goals in all the other matches but this time – zilch. It was nearly full time when Marco messed up his pass and Callum got the ball, just feet from the goal. I shut my eyes, but the sound from the crowd told me the answer. Missiles had scored.

‘COME ON, MOUNTAINBOARDERS!!!’ Copper Pie nearly lost his tonsils. ‘You’ve only got seconds to score.’

That was all they needed to hear. Marco crab-slid to steal the ball off Jamie, kicked it to Ed who did exactly what the Missiles did to us. He lobbed the ball sky-high, it landed and bounced right over the Missiles’ goalie’s head and dropped into the goal. 1-1.

‘One more of the same,’ shouted Copper Pie.

‘Shut it, Ginge,’ shouted Callum from the middle of the pitch.

‘If you were less of a hog, your team’d stand a chance.’

Callum turned and took a couple of crab-steps towards Copper Pie. His face was red and sweaty and his blond fringe was stuck to his forehead.’ Don’t call me Hog.’

Max could see there was something other than just the game going on. ‘Come on, Callum. We’re still playing here.’

Callum crabbed over to near where Jamie was waiting to do a kick from the sideline where the ball had gone out of play. The ball went straight to Callum’s foot and stuck to it like superglue as Callum made his way up field.

‘Tackle,’ shouted Copper Pie.

Ed tackled, as directed, but Callum went through him, leaving only the goalie to beat.

But Marco came from nowhere, and as Callum took back his foot to welly the ball, Marco’s whole leg sideswiped him, leaving Callum flat on his back. Marco didn’t wait to assess the damage – he kicked the ball as hard as he could the other way. Another Mountainboarder scooped it up and aimed high – the ball flew into the corner of the net.

Whistle.

Mountainboarders win 2—1.

Brilliant result. If it couldn’t be us, they were the next best. Copper Pie ran on to the pitch to slap a few backs. I stayed where I was, enjoying the sunshine and the furious look on Callum’s face. He’s not a good loser. Shame we weren’t going to win the team award – that would ruin his day big time. I wondered who was going to win . . .

Max, the nurse person, Mr Morris, Miss Walsh and two other adults that I hadn’t seen before all stood at the entrance to the mess tent with a table in front of them. On the table were goodies – chocolates and more chocolates and jellybeans and more jellybeans. There was also a pile of yellow papers, and some white rolled-up ones.

‘So, we come to the end of another successful camp at Highwoods,’ said the nurse. And we like to finish off with a review of the highlights, before we go on to present the awards.’

She handed over to Max who gave quite a funny talk about all the activities, including our awesome raft building and the Mountainboarders’ awesome crab-football playing.
Hurry up with the prizes,
I thought.

‘So, we’ve got a few awards to hand out. The team in overall third place is . . . the Spiders.’ There was clapping. ‘They performed well in the quiz, did two cracking breakfast duties and collected more fuel for the fire than any other team.’ He looked over at them. ‘Come up here, Spiders.’

We clapped more. They trooped up – Zoe looked as pink in the face as I go, strawberry-jam pink. They got a certificate each (the yellow things) and a jar of jellybeans, and then Max picked up one of the white things, unrolled it and held it up. It was a photo of the Spiders on their raft, most of them half on and half off. Everyone cheered.

‘And in second place, let’s hear it for Flower Power, who designed an excellent raft, helped Miss Walsh make the camp cake, did an astonishing display of synchronised swimming in the sea and were the best all-girl team in the crab football.’

I had no idea they were any good, but then again their group was in the other half so we didn’t see them much. Their photo was brilliant – they’d made a flower shape, using their bodyboards as petals, and they were lying on them in the sea. Cool. Alice grabbed the photo – no surprise there.

I had a rush of hope that we’d be first, I mean we won two legs of the assault course, and the quiz. Maybe the football didn’t count . . .

‘So, this year’s camp champions are . . . the Mountainboarders. Top at crab football. Top at duck racing, and in Marco’s case duck
embracing. .
He paused so everyone could laugh about the way Marco leapt in the water to congratulate his duck on winning, which they did. ‘And for doing a
mountain
of washing-up.’ Mad clapping. Marco started bowing. Ed copied. They were the centre of attention. They got jellybeans
and
chocolate, and the picture Max held up was of the six of them all holding on to their winning duck. I wished we could have had a photo.

I felt a bit disappointed. We were winning after the quiz, but didn’t even end up in the top three. I wasn’t cross with Fifty – I know he didn’t fail on purpose, but I wished he had managed the monkey bars. I wasn’t cross with Jonno either – anyone of us could have let that goal in, but if he’d judged the bounce a bit better the story might have been completely different. We might have been prize winners.

‘Now, we have three extra individual awards for noteworthy performances.’ I tried to think if I’d done anything noteworthy. Nothing came to mind. ‘A jar of jelly beans is awarded to Roddy for offering to organise the litter collection and making sure it was done every evening.’ (I didn’t know there
was
a litter collection.) Everyone clapped while Roddy got his sweets. ‘And two monster bars of chocolate for two other helpful members of camp, who showed both cooperation with other teams and a keen sense of loyalty to their own.’ I looked around to see who the loyal, cooperative, helpful kids were.
Probably girls,
I thought.
Tidying their tents and doing each other’s hair.

‘Jonno.’ Everyone turned to look at him. He stood up and shrugged as if to say,’ I don’t know what I did to deserve it.’ I didn’t know either. Max smiled at him.

‘And Keener.’ Me!!! Everyone turned to look at me. Instant raspberry face. I got up but kept my eyes on my knees.

‘Keener and Jonno helped the other teams get the hang of bodyboarding. Jonno did some useful lugging of wood with the Spiders. And this morning they both stepped in to help a member of their team make an unscheduled crossing of the river.’ Max held up a photo of Fifty standing with one foot on my shoulder and one on Jonno’s.

I waited for Jonno to go up and get the prizes together, but he said, ‘Come on, Tribers. All for one and one for all.’

So Bee, Copper Pie, Fifty, Jonno and I all went up together. (Bee tried to drag Lily too, but she didn’t want to come because she’s not a Triber.) I took the photo and carried it back to where we were sitting. Fifty grabbed the chocolate before Copper Pie had a chance – Jonno didn’t get a look in. Not that he cared.