Off Season (4 page)

“Sucker seared the hair right off the top of my head, shot down the left side of my body and went out through my left foot … blew the shoe clear off!”

“That must have hurt,” I said loudly, not
knowing the right thing to say to somebody who'd been a human lightning rod.

“Hurt like heck … at least what I can remember of it. Woke up face down in a ditch.”

“I've never known anybody who was hit by lightning,” Kia said.

“Happens to park rangers all the time,” Ned said. “There's a guy in the United States who's been hit seven times!”

“Once was more than enough for me, thank you.”

“So are you going to be around for a few days now?” Ned asked.

His father shook his head. “I've got to go away to check out Maple Ridge … I'll be leaving first thing tomorrow, gone for a day and back by dinner the next.”

“I was kinda hoping you'd be sticking around for a while,” Ned said.

“Sorry, no can do.” He paused. “But tell you what, how about the three of you come along with me?” He turned to Kia and me. “You two feel like a little hike in the woods?”

“Sure,” I said.

“Sounds like fun,” Kia replied.

“Good. We leave at sunrise tomorrow.”

We unpacked and settled in for supper. It was
a good meal — a big meal. I couldn't believe how both Ned and his father could put away food. Ned practically licked the serving bowls, cleaning up the last grains of rice and the last of the casserole — the vegetarian casserole. I'd forgotten that Ned and his family were vegetarians. Somehow it struck me as strange that somebody as big as his father wouldn't eat meat. I could almost picture him just picking up a cow and chewing on it. Apparently not eating meat hadn't slowed down his growth.

“So what did you think of my cooking?” Debbie asked.

“It was good … really good,” I said.

“Yeah, I liked it a lot,” Kia agreed.

“Are you two going to be able to go a whole week without meat?” she asked.

“I'm practically a vegetarian,” Kia said.

“You are?” Debbie asked.

“Yeah. I only eat animals that are vegetarians,” she joked. “Actually, I can live without meat, but I'm not so sure if I can last that long without french fries.”

“That we might be able to take care of,” she replied.

“You can?” Kia asked.

“I was thinking that we might take a little trip into town in a couple of days. I have some
shopping I need to do. Do you have any idea how many groceries I have to buy to keep up with these two?” she said, gesturing to her son and husband.

“I can only imagine.”

“Hopefully you're not going tomorrow or the next day,” Dan, Ned's dad, said. “These three are coming with me on a little hike tomorrow.”

“How far are you going?” Debbie asked.

“Maple Ridge.”

“That's a lot more than a little hike,” she said. “Do you think they'll be able to manage that?”

“Of course they can,” he said. “They're young … in good shape if they're playing sports. Shouldn't be a problem.”

I hadn't thought it would be a problem until she'd mentioned it.

“How far away is this place?” I asked. “How far are we going to walk?”

“It's about six hours … each way.”

That certainly didn't sound like any little hike to me.

“Just a little walk in the woods. We're going to leave just after sunrise.”

“In that case maybe these three should get to bed soon,” Debbie said.

“How soon?” Ned asked. “Couldn't we do something for a while first?”

“What did you have in mind?” his mother asked.

“I was thinking that maybe we could go down to the mall and do some shopping,” Kia said.

“Mall … shopping? There really isn't any mall around here for a — ”

“Ned, I'm joking. What do
you
want to do?”

“I was hoping we could play a little basketball.”

“Basketball?” I asked, my ears perking up. “Now that sounds like a plan.”

“Would that be okay?” Ned asked his parents.

“I think that would be fine. The three of you go and play some basketball, and your mom and I will clean up the kitchen.”

“That sounds like an even
better
plan,” I said.

I picked up the basketball and started spinning it on the tip of one of my fingers. It was a nice ball … leather, just worn enough to be easy to handle.

“So where's this court you've been talking about?” I asked.

“Right down the way,” Ned replied. “Are you sure you want to play?”

“Do birds fly?” I asked.

“Well … the vast
majority
of birds do fly,” Ned answered, “but there are many flightless species including ostriches, emu and penguins … although many people consider the manner in which penguins
swim
to be much like
flying
through the water and — ”

“Ned,” Kia said, cutting him off. “He does want to play basketball. Consider him like the vast
majority
of birds.”

“So you
do
want to play?” Ned asked.

I nodded my head. Apparently whatever
cool we'd given him had worn out and Ned was once again the Nerd.

“Oh … good … we should play. Follow me,” Ned said and then headed for the back door.

Kia grabbed the ball from me. “Yeah, follow him, unless you're like a penguin or an ostrich or some other big fat bird too heavy to fly … or jump and get rebounds.”

“I'll show you who can't get rebounds!” I snapped. I reached out to try to take the ball back, but Kia danced out of my reach and out the door after Ned. I ran after her. She and Ned were walking up the dirt trail away from the cabin.

“I'm afraid it isn't in the best shape right now,” Ned said. “The creek took off one of the corners.”

“The creek did what?” Kia asked.

“It washed away the back corner.”

“Washed it away? You mean it isn't paved?” she asked.

“Nothing can be paved or built here without special permission.”

“Permission from who?” I asked.

“The Parks Commission.”

“You mean like the park rangers? Like your dad?”

“Like my dad's bosses.”

“So did he ask them?” Kia questioned.

“No,” Ned said, shaking his head. “My father said he's here to protect the park, not pave it. He doesn't believe in disturbing the natural ecosystem.”

“What?” I asked.

“He doesn't think anything should be built in the park that disturbs nature. It took both me and my mom to convince him to let me even make a dirt court.”

“Just where is this court?” I asked as we continued up the dirt track.

“It's not much farther. Less than a kilometer.”

“Why didn't you just put it right by the house?” Kia asked.

“Because there wasn't a spot close to the house. I had to put it someplace that was relatively flat and didn't have any trees. It's just through here.”

Ned turned off the dirt track and onto a trail that cut through some bushes — raspberry bushes — like the ones I had in my backyard.

“Have you ever played on a dirt court before, Kia … Kia?” I turned around. She had stopped and was searching through one of the bushes.

“Kia!” I yelled.

“I was just trying to pick a few raspberries. You know how I love raspberries!” she called back.

“How about we play some ball and you eat later?” I stood on the path and waited while she caught up to me. Ned continued on along the path ahead of us.

“How were the berries?” I asked.

“I couldn't find any.”

“I'm sorry about all this,” I said.

“It's not your fault there were no berries,” she said.

“I didn't mean the berries, I meant about bringing you along and the basketball court. It'll be hard not to play ball for a week. I didn't know it was just made of dirt.”

“Who cares?” she asked. “We didn't come here to play basketball and it wouldn't hurt either of us to have a vacation from basketball for a week. Don't you ever get tired of it?”

“Me get tired of basketball?” I asked, sounding like I couldn't believe what she was saying.

“Come on, be honest,” she said. “I'm not your mother.”

I didn't answer right away. “Sometimes.”

“For me it's toward the end of the season
when we have the playoffs coming up and everybody is taking everything so seriously and I'd like to just sleep in one Saturday morning instead of going to some game or practice.”

“Sleeping in would be nice,” I admitted.

“So what if we don't even shoot a ball for a week? Who cares? Let's just enjoy the trees and the woods and all this nature stuff, okay?”

“Sounds okay to me.”

“Hey!” Ned yelled and I turned around. He was standing, waving, from a bend in the trail up ahead. “Are you two coming?”

“Let's go,” I said to Kia, “and no matter what his court looks like, let's just pretend we're impressed.”

“Goes without saying.”

We caught up to Ned. He was standing on a little rise in the trail.

“So what do you think of my court?” he asked.

I looked past him. There, through the brush and berry bushes, sat a beautiful little basketball court.

“That looks amazing!” I exclaimed.

“It has lines,” Kia said.

“All measured out and in the right places. The key, three-point line and out of bounds … everything.”

“You painted the dirt?” I asked.

“Not paint. Come on, I'll show you.”

Ned led us down the trail to the court. I stopped at the outside line … It wasn't a line but a thin strip of wood that had been set into the ground to form the line.

“The outside line is made of birch, but just branches that had fallen off or were already dead. We set them into the ground flush so they don't stick out.”

“That's amazing.”

Kia was already on the court, bent over, examining one of the lines at the key.

“And the lines on the court are made of ground-up chalk,” Ned said.

“Like on a baseball field,” I suggested.

“Not exactly. This is completely natural and biodegradable so that even when it's washed away it doesn't harm the environment.”

Kia started bouncing the ball. “And it's flat, perfectly flat.”

“Not perfect, but pretty flat. My father said it's to within three degrees of completely flat. Of course that one corner isn't so good by the creek.”

The far corner was obviously sloping down.

“And you built all of this?” I questioned.

“Me and my father. We gathered the wood
together and worked to make it flat and marked out the lines and put up the hoop.”

The hoop … I'd been so amazed by the court I hadn't even noticed the hoop. It was a clear, Plexiglas backboard attached to a tree.

“It's regulation height and we attached it to the tree with special brackets so the tree wouldn't be hurt. So what do you think of my court?”

“It's amazing,” I said.

“Really something,” Kia agreed.

“And do you want to see something even more amazing?” Ned asked.

He took the ball from Kia's hands and walked over to the three-point line. Slowly and deliberately he set himself and then put up the ball. Nothing but net!

“Way to go, Ned!” Kia yelled.

“That was a great shot!” I exclaimed. And totally unexpected. Ned had only started to play basketball last summer when he joined us for the tournament, and he wasn't exactly what you'd call a great shot. Actually, calling him a bad shot would have been a compliment.

Ned loped over and retrieved the ball. “Anybody can make one shot. Could just be luck.”

He put up a second shot and it dropped!

“Two in a row!” Kia yelled.

Ned grabbed the loose ball. “Still could be just a fluke.” He walked out to the three-point line again and put up another shot. It dropped!

“I've been practicing my shooting,” Ned said. “And reading.”

“There are a lot of really good basketball books,” I said.

“Not basketball. Math.”

“How would a math book help you shoot basketballs better?” I asked.

“I learned about angles and arcs. Shooting is all about geometry.”

“And practice,” Kia said.

“I did that too.”

I took the ball from Ned and started to dribble when I saw something and stopped. Just off to the side of the key there was a gigantic pile of poo. Oh, yuck.

“I think we're going to have to do one thing before we play,” I said, pointing out the offending pile.

Ned grabbed a stick from beside the court and began poking at the pile.

“Bear poo,” he said.

“You're kidding, right?” I asked anxiously.

“No,” Ned said as he continued poking it
with the stick. He didn't look like he was trying to move it as much as examine it.

“Judging from the size of the dropping it could be either a large black bear or a semi-mature grizzly, no more than two years of age. There are traces of berries, which either type of bear would eat, but I'm looking for fish bones or the remains of a larger animal that would indicate it was a grizzly.”

“So you're saying that a bear, a real bear, was right here on this court?” I questioned.

“How else would you think that the droppings got here?” Ned questioned.

“I just meant … oh, forget it,” I said.

“And judging from the freshness of the pile, I think it has been here no more than two hours ago.”

“Two hours?” I gasped.

“Could have been a bit longer or as little as ten minutes ago. I can't tell for certain. Of course my father could tell for sure but I — ”