Radiate
Authors: Marley Gibson
Tags: #Juvenile Fiction, #Health & Daily Living, #Diseases; Illnesses & Injuries, #Love & Romance, #Religious, #Christian, #Family, #Sports & Recreation
Copyright © 2012 by Marley Gibson All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Graphia, an imprint of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
For information about permission to reproduce selections from this book, write to Permissions, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company, 215 Park Avenue South, New York, New York 10003.
Graphia and the Graphia logo are trademarks of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
The text of this book is set in Garamond Pro.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Gibson, Marley.
Radiate / by Marley Gibson.
p. cm.
Summary: Just after making the varsity cheerleading squad the summer before her senior year of high school in Maxwell, Alabama, Hayley Matthews learns she has an aggressive form of cancer in her leg, and she turns to her family, her cheerleading, and her Christian faith to sustain her through her treatment.
ISBN: 978-0-547-61728-2
[1. Cancer—Fiction. 2. Cheerleading—Fiction. 3. Interpersonal relations— Fiction. 4. High schools—Fiction. 5. Schools—Fiction. 6. Christian life— Fiction.] I. Title.
PZ7.G345Ra 2012
[Fic]—dc23
Manufactured in the United States of America DOC 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
PrologueTo all those who have struggled and overcome.
Never say never.
Never give up.
You, too, can radiate.
If children have the ability to ignore all odds and percentages, then maybe we can all learn from them. When you think about it, what other choice is there but to hope? We have two options, medically and emotionally: give up or Fight Like Hell.
—Lance Armstrong
You know how you always think there’s something . . .
more?
Like there’s something else you can be doing? A way you can put yourself out there more. An effort that will plant you in the spotlight and make people finally recognize that, “Hey, you’re special.”
Sure, your parents tell you that all the time. They’re supposed to. It’s, like, in the parents’ handbook they get when they take you home from the hospital. Still, it’s not the same as acceptance from the general public, and more specifically, your peers. Not that I’m narcissistic and need to be told this every hour of the day like Chloe Bradenton in my class does. But right there, who or what decided that Chloe Bradenton and others like her get to
be
special while people like me... just exist?
Chloe’s a cheerleader; she dated the quarterback off and on; she’s been on the homecoming court all three years of high school and will probably be voted queen our senior year. Total cliché; then again clichés are clichés for a reason. She thinks everyone’s pea-green with envy of her and her lot in life. I’m not jealous of her—seriously, I’m not. I just want the same opportunities, you know? Is that too much to ask?
For my three years in high school, I’ve semi-anonymously played my trumpet in the Polk High School marching band. Not even my own trumpet, but one handed down from my big sister, Gretchen, who’s ten years older than me. She gave it up way back when she was in tenth grade and lost interest and started hanging with kids Mom called “the rogue element.” I wanted to play something delicate and beautiful like the flute. However, my parents said I should take a shot at the trumpet since we already owned one. I made the best of it, took lessons, and excelled with my lipping and fingering. I’m pretty damn good, if I must say so myself. Got the “Best Brass” trophy two years in a row. (Please... no comments.) And band’s been fun. What can I say? I’ve got an itch, though. I want to expand my horizons and get the full high school experience however I can. Where’s the rule that says I can’t take my own stab at something...
more?
Okay, I want to be popular. I’ll admit it. What teenager doesn’t?
I’m not a social leper at all... but again, I just feel like there’s something else I can be doing.
I want to be
seen
and not just blend into the other hundred who are dressed in red and blue polyester uniforms. I don’t want to be part of one cohesive, marching unit.
I want to march to my own drum.
So, one Saturday afternoon while watching
Bring It On
on DVD for like the kajillionth time, I thought of the craziest thing I could do, the one thing that no one in his or her right mind would expect out of me.
I tried out for varsity cheerleader.
And I made it.
Me. Hayley Matthews. A virtual no one to a well-known someone.
I got my wish.
I got popularity.
And that... desired
more.
In fact, I got a hell of a lot
more
than I ever bargained for— something that stopped me in my tracks.
A diagnosis that would change my present and bring into question my future.
A challenge of epic proportions to overcome.
The need to find hope when everything seemed hopeless.
This is a story of how cheerleading saved my life.
Everyone has inside him a piece of good news. The good news is that you don’t know how great you can be! How much you can love! What you can accomplish! And what your potential is!
—Anne Frank
I nailed it!
That was the best damn round-off back handspring I’ve ever done!
Beads of sweat roll down my back as I pump my fists in the air in time with the adrenaline coursing through my limbs. Nothing can stop me. Across the gym, at the long table ahead of me, I can see that the judges are impressed with my efforts, as well. Pencils move furiously over score sheets, and I beam from ear to ear as I quickly move into a perfectly executed herkie. It should be perfect... I’ve been practicing for weeks on end. I stretch my fingers out to meet up with my pointed right toe before landing back on the gym’s shiny parquet. My Nikes hit the floor with a firm
thwack,
and I move into my next jump.
With the agility of a jaguar leaping through the jungle, I wind up and hurtle myself into the air, elongating my legs in front of me in the pike position. My arms parallel in the air with my legs until the tips of my fingers again touch my outstretched sneakered toes.
My tryout partner, Shelly Kingsford, slips behind me and plants her Reebok in the middle of my back as she climbs up onto my shoulders. I grip her calves and adjust into a tall, straight position, balancing her hundred and eighteen pounds just so. Looking up, I watch as she pulls her left foot to her right knee to strike the star pose. I don’t swerve or teeter as all of her weight goes to my right side. I just smile that eye-squinting grin of mine and yell out along with Shelly, “Go, Polk, Go!”
She jumps forward to dismount and lands flawlessly with me catching her around the waist for stability. Again, the judges nod their approval and continue to make notes on the score sheets.
I stand at attention with my hands fisted on my hips while Shelly does her tumbling run. Cartwheel. Cartwheel. Cartwheel.
Ugh
...
what is she doing?
She was supposed to do a cartwheel into two back handsprings. We’d practiced it for weeks. What is she thinking? You totally have to show the judges more agility than just a cartwheel, which you learn, like, in kindergarten.
Poor Shelly. I hope they won’t deduct points because of her lackluster tumbling. She didn’t even do them that well, hesitating between each one. Can’t think about it, though. I have to finish our routine. I have to make sure
I
do everything right.
The music begins and blares out a Techno beat. We snap into performing the dance we’ve both spent hours rehearsing. I pop. I snap. I crunk. Moves I’ve honed in front of my bedroom mirror in the late-evening hours, much to Mom’s chagrin—especially when the chandelier in the dining room started shaking. I laugh. I smile. I wink. But most of all, I have fun. The groove of the music pumps through my veins, fueling me on.
After our dance routine, we barely have time to catch our breath before Shelly and I line up together to execute a formal school cheer. This part is about the precision of our moves, our silent clapping with cupped hands, and the ability to project our voices throughout the gym.
I have no problem with the latter. My dad has always called me “the Mouth of the South.” He took me to an Alabama vs. Auburn game once (Roll Tide!), and he said I was the loudest out of more than a hundred thousand people. Today, it’s going to play to my favor.
I clap my hands together. “Our team. Ready?”
“Okay,” Shelly says with me.
Pop. “Our team... is great”—arms tight; fingers straight —“and, we just can’t wait”—legs locked—“to show”—left hand fisted on hip; right arm forward, pointing—“you... just how”—spin; slap arms to side—“we rate.” Knee to chest; arms pumped out front. “We’re”—step forward—“Number”—index finger pointed to the sky—“One!”
Another herkie into a spread eagle. And more cheering as I advance on the judges, urging them to root, root, root for the Patriots with me, my voice carrying much farther and louder than Shelly’s meeker one. Two of the three judges clap along while the third nods his head and smiles. All three of them are from the squad across town at Maxwell State University. They totally know their stuff. They’ve finaled in the college nationals the last three years in a row.
Perspiration moistens my skin in an exhilarating sheen of accomplishment. Shelly and I embrace, stoked that we got through the tryout and relieved that it’s over. We grab hands and run back to the locker room where the other girls are waiting—those who’ve gone before us and the two teams still left to go.
Ashlee Grimes hands me an iced bottle of Aquafina from the cooler at the end of the bench. “How’d it go?” she asks.
Gulping the delicious water, I wipe my mouth and say, “That was the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life.”
Ashlee giggles. We’ve been good friends since fifth grade. And, even though she was a cheerleader last year and I was in the band, we’ve managed to stay tight. She’s been so helpful since I shocked her with my idea to quit band and do something...
more.
She’s even been mentoring me through the whole practice sessions leading up to tryouts. “If you make the squad, tryouts will look like a piece of piss compared to actually being a varsity cheerleader,” she says with a nod. “How did you like it?”
“I loved it!” I say without hesitation.
It’s no lie. It’s a high like nothing I’ve ever felt. Belting out the school fight song on my horn never gave me
this
feeling. This is so much better than cheering up in the stands in my band uniform while the short-skirted girls on the field perform gymnastic stunts, pyramids, and dances that get the whole crowd into the game.
The next team of Melanie Otto and Lora Russell gather their things and head out to face the judges. It seems like a year and a half before they return, exhausted and sweaty. When they collapse on the bench, the last pair to try out vanishes out the door.