I Owe You One (3 page)

Chapter 3

From behind, I'm sure we looked like two bowlegged cowboys as we walked our bikes back out of the field, trying not to let our clammy, stinky jeans touch us more than necessary. We had apologized over and over to the Delanys before we left, but they just glared at us.

“Man, I'm going to be grounded for the entire summer for this one,” I said.

“We can go to my house first and use the hose to wash the mud off,” Zach said. “Then we just have to find some place to hide out until our clothes dry.”

“That'll never work. My mom has this spidey sense when something bad happens. It's like she can smell trouble. It's spooky. And this mud's not going to come off with a hose. As soon as the Delanys call my mom, I'll be grounded for the rest of the school year. Probably the whole summer too.”

“I don't think the Delanys will call.”

“Why not?”

“'Cause they're probably leaving for that big race weekend out in Humber tonight. They'll be too busy getting ready.”

“I don't know,” I said slowly. I wanted to believe that we could be that lucky, but it seemed too good to be true.

“And it's not like they're gonna get all superior after some of the stuff their kids pulled. Wasn't your dad one of the ones who helped pull their car out when Brian Delany rolled it into Waseeka Lake?”

“Yeah, but…”

“All we gotta do is get clean, and our moms won't suspect a thing.”

“Well,” I said, hoping beyond hope that Zach was right, “there is one person who might help us.”

“Who?”

I don't know why I thought of Mrs. Minton. Maybe because she seemed so understanding the last time I was in a mess.

We took the back way to Mrs. Minton's so as not to have to go past my house.

We were just about there when we heard a loud bang. I almost lost my grip on my bike as the ground shook.

We looked at each other.

“Daryl,” we both said at the same time.

“I don't know why he didn't just join the army when he turned eighteen. Then he could have spent the last five years blowing things up as a job instead of doing it as a hobby,” I said.

“Maybe he thinks groundhogs are the enemy? You know, sneaking around in underground tunnels.”

“I think he just likes blowing things up,” I said. There was a rumor around town that Daryl was a few bricks short of a load. But Mom said every small town had its oddball, and I guessed Daryl was ours. Besides, he never hurt anyone. Even the groundhogs seemed pretty safe. They'd pop their heads up, and by the time he set the charges and hit the button, they'd be miles away watching from another hole. I swore they thought it was a sport and even enjoyed it.

We rounded the corner onto Fraserwood Street, left our bikes by the gate and walked up to Mrs. Minton's door.

I was trying to think up a good explanation for how my clothes got all muddy again when she opened the door. Her bright blue eyes looked us up and down.

“You two smell like a stagnant pond. What was it this time, Wesley? Mud boarding? Dumpster diving? Swamp surfing?”

For a second my mind wandered, thinking how cool mud boarding sounded. Then I pictured my mom finding me like this and I came back to earth.

“One of the Delanys' horses got stuck in a swamp and we helped get it out,” Zach said.

Mrs. Minton raised an eyebrow. “You want to tell me what
really
happened, Wesley?”

There was no point lying. Like I said, I'm a terrible liar. I told her about everything—the supposedly empty field, the rail fence, the motocross hill and the rescue of the stuck horse.

She didn't say anything for a moment, but the corners of her mouth were twitching as she said, “And I suppose you've come here hoping I'll have mercy on you and help clean you up to escape your parents' wrath?”

“We didn't mean to do anything wrong,” I said.

“And we were doing our best to get the horses out of there,” Zach said.

“And we offered to fix their fence,” I added.

“And if we had seen or heard any animals in the field, we never would have—”

Zach was cut off by Mrs. Minton holding up her hands in surrender. “All right, boys. You're lucky my washing machine is only half full. I was waiting until after I finished changing the oil on my Mustang to wash my dirty clothes.”

“Thanks, Mrs. Minton,” I said.

Mrs. Minton shook her head as she let us in. “You are so like you father, Wesley.”

“My father?”

“He sure was one for getting into scrapes when he was little.”

I couldn't believe it. Mr. “Highest Respect in the County” got into scrapes?

“But he was the most decorated fire chief in the region's history,” Zach said.

Mrs. Minton nodded. “He grew into a man of courage and integrity.” She smiled at me as she handed me an afghan and the moose slippers. “Which is why I still hold out hope for you, Wesley.” She laughed a little as I waddled into the bathroom to get out of my muddy clothes.

I couldn't even imagine that I'd ever be as brave, calm and strong as my dad. “I wouldn't even know where to begin,” I mumbled.

Mrs. Minton smiled a broad, warm smile. “Yes, you would.”

Chapter 4

My only consolation that day was that Zach could never again make fun of me for the afghan/mooseslipper thing. Not when he was wrapped in a quilt that had bonneted dolls in every square and his feet were covered in hand-knit lime green socks. I almost choked on my cookie when I saw him waddle out of the bathroom.

“What are these, anyway?” I asked Mrs. Minton, biting into the hard, crunchy cookie.

“Biscotti. They're Italian and very good for dunking.” She took hers and plunked it into her mug.

Zach and I dunked ours into our hot chocolate. She was right. The hot liquid made them soft and delicious.

“So,” I said, almost afraid to ask, “are you going to tell our moms?”

Mrs. Minton looked thoughtful. “Well, I can't get one of you into trouble without getting the other one in it too. And I'm not too fond of the idea of bothering your mother with this, Wesley.” She put her coffee down and looked across the room at a picture of a young man in army uniform. I was pretty sure it was Mr. Minton.

“The first couple of years after a woman loses her husband are very hard. Your mother certainly doesn't need any extra worries right now.” She looked back at me. “But honestly, Wesley, you need to tone it down a bit. My hip surgery has been moved up to the week after next, so I'll be out of commission for a while. I won't be able to rescue you for at least a couple of months.”

I nodded, but Mrs. Minton's face clouded over.

“It'll be good to have the surgery over with, won't it?” Zach asked, seeing her face.

“Oh yes, but I was planning on going to Chile to watch Rachel's race. I had my ticket and everything. The surgery was originally scheduled for after I got back.” She sighed. “I had to cancel all my plans, but the doctor said I was lucky to get in early. Still, I hate to disappoint Rachel. Now I'll have to just watch it on tv, I guess.” She looked over at the small set. “I just hope the picture will come in clearly. Maybe I need new rabbit ears?”

“Why don't you get a satellite dish, Mrs. M.? We get two hundred channels!” Zach said.

“Do you know what a fixed income is, Zachariah?” she asked.

Zach shook his head.

“It means that even if I could figure out those remote control things, I couldn't afford satellite. Besides, rabbit ears aren't so bad. I get most of the programs I like to watch on the six channels I pick up with them. I can even get channel fifty-six if the wind is blowing in the right direction.”

We left Mrs. Minton's feeling guilty but smelling mountain-fresh.

I spent the rest of the night at home jumping out of my skin every time the phone rang, sure that the Delanys would call. But my mother never came into my room with that look on her face—the look that said my summer would be better spent helping around the house than having fun. The look that said I needed to build my character and learn some responsibility.

There was one tense moment after breakfast the next morning when I saw my mom in the laundry room smelling my T-shirt from the day before. Her forehead wrinkled as she sniffed it and held it up to the light.

I froze.

After a moment, she shook her head and threw the T-shirt in the machine. I didn't know I could sweat so early in the day.

By the end of the week the Delanys hadn't called, so I figured we were home free.

“See, I told you the Delanys would forget all about it,” Zach said as we headed to Lee's Gas and Grub Saturday morning to see if the new magazines were in yet.

“I think we were just lucky the Delanys were busy with their race. And my mom was a bit suspicious, but I think I fooled her. How about you?”

“I think so. But Mom did keep running my shirt through her fingers like it felt funny. Do you think moms take espionage classes before having children?”

I shrugged, my mind already wondering if the value of the Spider-Man comic my dad had given me had gone up since the last issue of
Wizard
magazine.

“So have you thought about how are you going to do it?” he asked.

“Do what?”

“Pay your life debt to Mrs. Minton.”

“My what?”

Zach sometimes came up with the weirdest ideas. I think it was from watching too many
National Geographic
specials.

“I was watching this show about it last night. A life debt is created when someone saves your life. Mrs. Minton saved you from drowning in the creek, and now you have to pay her back,” he said.

“Where do you get these ideas? I've never heard of a life debt. Besides, it was weeks ago.”

“Life debts don't expire, you know,” Zach said.

“Well, don't you owe her, too, after the whole muddy clothes episode?”

“I only owe her a laundry debt. A few trips taking her stuff to the dry cleaners should cover it.”

“How do you pay back a life debt, anyway?” I asked.

“Well, in some cultures the ‘savee'—that's you— has to spend his life protecting and looking after the ‘saver'—that would be Mrs. Minton—even if it means your own death.” He paused for dramatic effect. I was starting to sweat again. All I could hear were my dad's words in my head.
A man always pays his debts, Wes
.

Most guys only have to hear that kind of fatherly advice once in a while. Usually when they get in trouble. When my dad knew he wasn't going to be around all that long, he started throwing around advice at every possible opportunity. It was like an avalanche of wisdom on everything from why I shouldn't throw spitballs at girls (
A man always treats a woman with respect, Wes
.
You'll understand why that's important someday
) to why I had to turn in the lottery ticket I found outside Lee's (
A man doesn't keep what doesn't belong to him, Wes
).

“In other cultures,” Zach said, “you'd be her slave, forced to do chores like cleaning her dentures and vacuuming.” He looked like he was enjoying this.

“She doesn't have false teeth,” I said. I knew he was going to ask me how I knew that, but we had arrived at Lee's, and I quickly opened the door and went inside. With any luck, Zach would forget all about my debt to Mrs. Minton.

Mrs. Lee was at her usual post behind the counter. “Hi, boys! We got new magazines in.”

Mrs. Lee ran the store like a garage sale. Everything was jumbled up and stuffed in wherever it fit. She didn't believe in throwing anything away either. The bells that rang when you ran over the cable at the gas pumps came off the old
Nice'n Icy
ice-cream truck parked out back. The rags Mr. Lee used to wipe off his squeegee looked like cut-up flannel nighties.

I passed the empty chocolate-bar boxes filled with fishing lures, and the postcard rack stuffed with packages of spices and rolled-up Chinese calendars, and went straight for the magazines, hoping the new
Wizard
was in.
Wizard
is all about comic books. At the back, it lists how much you can get for some really old ones. It was there on the rack, and I opened it to the price lists.

“Holy crow, Zach! My comic is up to eight hundred dollars already!”

“You gonna sell?”

“Nah. I want to wait till it's worth enough to buy a dirt bike.”

He looked over at me, his forehead crinkled. “But eight hundred dollars can get you a bike right now, and Frank would snap up your comic in a second. I think that's the only issue he doesn't have.”

“I know, I know. Every time I go near him, he asks me. But it's still not enough for a two-fifty-cc Hummer. Even used, they're about twice that.”

Zach just shrugged. He wouldn't know a 250cc Hummer if he tripped over one. One dirt bike was just like the next to him. But ask him about fiberglass versus wooden hockey sticks, and he would go on for about an hour. He was a hockey nut, even though he hadn't played since he was little.