Strikeout of the Bleacher Weenies (14 page)

“I'd be in a movie?” Ricky asked.

“For sure. And you'd get paid.”

“How much?” Ricky asked.

The man told him. Ricky whistled. He rarely whistled, but it was a lot of money. A whole lot of money. Enough for a fistful of sunglasses. “What do I have to do?”

“Run.”

“I can do that,” Ricky said.

“Do you know the river canyon, out past the old Parker ranch?” the man asked.

“Sure do,” Ricky said.

“Be there tomorrow morning at 7:15. Wear blue jeans.”

Ricky thought of last fall, when he'd gone out for football. “Do I need permission from my parents?”

“No point bothering them,” the man said. “Parents don't understand much about this sort of thing. And they tend to be overprotective.” He gave Ricky a wink and walked off.

The next morning, Ricky slipped out after breakfast and rode his bike to the river canyon.
Be careful,
he told himself.
It could be some sort of trick.
He planned to approach the area cautiously, and leave lots of room to turn around and dash off if he saw anything that made him nervous. But as he got close, his heart sped up in a good way. He saw trucks, trailers, cameras, and lots of people. There was no doubt a movie was being shot.

When Ricky reached the edge of the set, Buster Grogan waved at him and walked over. “Hey, right on time. You ready?”

“Yeah. Sure. I think so.” Ricky still had no real idea what he was supposed to do. He knew stunt people did dangerous things. That was fine. He loved danger. He figured he'd find out the details soon enough.

“Here, put this on.” The man handed him a green zip-up jacket and a red ball cap. He led Ricky to the edge of the canyon, then pointed toward a spot about a quarter of the way down the face of the cliff, where a woman was placing a small red cone on a ledge. “See that?” he asked.

“Yeah.”

“That's your starting point,” Buster Grogan said.

“So the star ran the first part for the camera?” Ricky asked. He wanted to show that he knew how this worked. The star would get filmed doing the safe stuff, before the slope got too steep. Then the stunt person—the stunt kid, in this case—would take over for the dangerous part.

“Yup. We have the first part on film,” Buster Grogan said.

Ricky was sorry he'd missed seeing that. Far off, way below them, he spotted another kid, wearing jeans, a green jacket, and a red hat, limping away from the bottom of the canyon. “Who's that?” he asked.

“That—oh, he's just a stand-in for the star. We use him to make sure everything is in focus and the lighting is right. So, are you ready to thrill the crowds?”

“Absolutely.” Ricky made his way down the slope to the cone.

The woman was standing to the side of the ledge now, out of camera range. She pointed at the cone, then held out her hand. “Toss it here.”

Ricky tossed the cone to her, then waited. He knew what was coming next.

“Action!” someone cried.

Here I go!
Ricky thought. He started to race down the cliff. His enthusiasm drowned out the small voice in his brain that yelled about the danger of sprinting along a steeply slanted surface. He only traveled several steps before he lost his balance.

He stumbled, staggered, skittered, and clambered, making a heroic effort to remain on his feet. He managed to do that until the midpoint of the drop, when he made a swipe at a small scrub tree that jutted from a crack in a boulder. He missed, totally lost his balance, and fell. He rolled, bounced, tumbled, plummeted, and slid the rest of the way down.

Numb, stunned, and slowly realizing he was covered with small and large cuts and bumps, Ricky staggered to his feet.

There was a guy waiting there. “I don't think I can do that again,” Ricky said.

“No worries,” the man said. “We figured it would take five or six kids for a complete shot. But you did so well, we might only need four.” He held out a hand to lead Ricky down the path toward a car. “Let's pick up your bike. Then, I'll get you home. What's your address?”

Still too dazed to make sense of everything, Ricky looked toward the top of the canyon, where he could vaguely hear Buster Grogan greeting a kid who had just arrived.

“Hey—7:30. Right on time. Let's get you started.” He held out a jacket and hat. “Here—put this on.”

Halfway down the cliff, a woman was setting the cone up, right at the spot by the small tree where Ricky had lost his footing and made the uncinematic transition from action hero to accident victim. He realized he was only one in a series of stunt kids that Buster Grogan had hired.

As Ricky got into the car, he winced in pain. But then he smiled. He was going to be in a movie. How awesome was that?

 

URBAN GIRL

The flowers are nice,
even if I don't get to keep them for very long. The dress is pretty, but no matter how beautiful it might be, it's always the same blue, cotton, knee-length dress, with the same two pockets, and the same frills at the cuffs. A girl likes variety in her wardrobe. I guess I'd like variety in any part of my life. And I guess “life” isn't exactly right.

There's a lot of variety in who comes by, at least. It might be a car, or a van, or even a truck. But it won't be a really big truck, since they aren't supposed to be on this road. The driver can be alone, or have a passenger. In that case, I get in the backseat. It doesn't matter to me. It's not a long ride.

Some things have changed a lot over the years. Cars have changed. So have people. Long ago, the driver would just lean over to roll down the passenger-side window, cranking it by hand, and ask, “Are you lost, little girl?”

I'd lift the bouquet and say, “I picked these for my mom. I was walking home. But I got tired.”

The driver would say, “Hop in.”

And I would.

But people are a bit more careful these days. I understand that. Sometimes, they'll have the radio on, and I'll hear news stories. So I know what's happening in the world. Or they'll give me a lecture about how dangerous it is to be walking alone along a lonely country road after dark. Especially a road that runs right along the train tracks.

If you've ever swapped scary stories at a campout or a sleepover, you probably know how the rest of it goes. They bring me home. I ask them to make sure my mom isn't angry.

So they get out of the car and walk up the porch.

They knock on the door.

When they mention me, my mom looks shocked and tells them I've been dead for years. Hit by a train while picking flowers. They run to the car. But I'm gone. There's nothing left except for the flowers. They're on the seat.

I guess I'd feel bad if my real, living mom had to go through this. But it's not my real mom answering the door. It's not even a real person. I can see that. The people who pick me up can't.

I guess I serve some kind of purpose. I have to believe that. Otherwise, it would be unbearable to go through this every night. But don't ask me what that purpose is. I don't know.

As I said, nothing much ever really changes.

Until tonight.

It was an old car, and a young driver. That's not an unusual combination. But the car was very old, and the driver was very young.

“Lost?” he asked.

I said what I always say, telling him about picking flowers and getting tired.

“Hop in,” he said.

“Are you old enough to drive?” I asked. Not that it mattered. He was the one who stopped. I'd get in the car no matter what. That's how it worked.

He laughed. “Almost. Well, sort of…”

I liked the way he laughed. That was the best part of this. I got to meet all kinds of people. “What are you doing out here?” I asked as I took a seat.

“It's my mom's birthday. I got her a present.” He pointed to the backseat, where there was a rabbit in a cage.

“Well, that's different,” I said. My head lurched as he pulled back onto the road.

“Sorry,” he said. Then he nodded. “She loves animals.”

We were halfway to where I had lived when he pointed to his left and said, “That's my house. I'll take you home, and then come back. She'll never know I borrowed her car.”

“I hope she likes the bunny,” I said.

“She will.” He glanced over his shoulder, again.

“Look out!” I screamed. He'd turned the wheel when he looked back. We were heading off the road. He swung the car hard in the other direction. He didn't seem to know how to steer very well. Tires screamed. So did I. We skidded. Then, we were rolling.

And then we weren't.

We stopped hard, with a loud crash. I wasn't hurt. I can't get hurt. He looked shaken up.

“My leg…” he gasped.

I looked down, then looked away.

“Call for help,” he said.

I didn't have a phone. I had to go to his house. That was the closest place. “I'll be right back, with help,” I said. I forced the door open. As I walked toward the road, something white caught my eye.

The rabbit cage had been flung from the car. I picked it up. The rabbit looked stunned, but otherwise okay.

I reached the house and knocked on the door. As soon as the woman opened it, I said, “There's been an accident.… Your son…”

And I stopped cold. The rest of the words froze in my throat. I didn't know the woman. I'd never seen her before. But I knew her expression. That look of fear and confusion, mixed with the slightest pinch of hope.

I saw that look every night when whoever was chosen to drive me home walked up my porch, knocked on my door, and told my mother they'd brought me home.

“Thomas died years ago,” the woman said. “He'd taken my car. He didn't know how to drive.”

I put the cage down. Then, I turned and ran, heading back to where the car had crashed.

There was no car. No sign of Thomas. One of the trees, an older one, bore scars, as if it had been badly damaged ages ago.

I headed toward the tracks. It was a long walk, but time meant little to me, and fatigue meant nothing.

“That was strange,” I whispered. And it was. But it was also good, in a way I'm not sure I can explain. I needed to think about all of this.

But I did know one thing beyond any doubt. For the first time in forever, I felt alive.

 

THE PRINCIPLE OF DISCIPLINE

My first week at
Santini Middle School, I almost got beaten up by a bully. The kid—I don't even know his name—knocked my books from under my arm when I was on my way to my third-period math class.

“Hey!” I shouted as I spun around to face him. I swallowed whatever else I was going to say, because the kid was big. The way a truck is big next to a car. Or next to a tricycle.

“Be careful.” He pushed my shoulder real hard. “Watch where you're going.”

This was totally unfair. He'd knocked down my books on purpose, and now he was trying to pick a fight. I figured there was no way I was escaping without getting hurt. I just hoped I could limit the damage to my body so I didn't have to walk around for the next week with a face that looked like uncooked steak. There's nothing better for attracting unwanted attention from bullies than a black eye or a puffed lip. When he started throwing punches, I planned to curl up and cover my head with my arms.

That turned out not to be necessary.

As the bully grabbed my shirt, the principal, Mr. Verger, walked up behind him, put a hand on his shoulder, and said, “Come with me.”

Mr. Verger was really big, even compared to the bully. The two of them walked off, like a semi and a dump truck heading down the highway.

“Man, that was close.”

I looked over at my friend, Troy, who was standing behind me, about six feet away. “Too close,” I said. “I figured I was dead meat.”

“I doubt I would have been much help once he started pounding you with his fists,” Troy said. “But at least I stuck around.”

“Yeah. Thanks.” I did appreciate that. I liked to believe I would have done the same thing for him.

“I'm getting sick of these bullies,” Troy said.

“Me, too. But I don't think anyone's ever going to do something about them, so we might as well get used to it.” I'd sat through dozens of stop-the-bullying assemblies and three or four antibullying movies. It never seemed to make a difference. The bullies just laughed at the assemblies and got new ideas from the movies.

I headed off to class and tried to forget how close I'd come to getting pummeled.

I kept an eye out for that bully the next day, figuring he might be in an even nastier mood after he was punished. He'd probably want to take his anger out on me. But I never saw him again. I didn't think much about it until a month later when I happened to see Principal Verger snag another bully in the hall.

This time, I knew the bully. I knew him way too well. It was Farley Gormwall. He was pretty mean, but also pretty sneaky. He'd never get in a fight. He'd punch you when nobody was looking, or steal stuff from your backpack when he knew he wouldn't get caught.

I watched Principal Verger lead Farley away after Farley tripped a kid in the hall. That was the last time I saw Farley.

After that, I started to pay more attention to the bully population at Santini. The next time I saw a bully snagged in the hall, it was right before lunch. I followed Principal Verger and the kid. They went into his office. I stopped outside the door. There was no way I could go inside. The secretary would see me. But Principal Verger's office was on the ground floor, and it had a couple windows.

I slipped outside and peeked through his office window. Principal Verger was at his desk, with his back to me. Farley was in a chair on the other side, looking scared and angry.

I couldn't hear what they were saying. But I guess I didn't need to hear anything, because I could see everything. Principal Verger pushed a button that was next to his leg under his desk.