The Secret of Ferrell Savage (10 page)

“Why is the bus so empty?” Maybe I was the last one in town to learn that getting on a bus with a driver juiced up on sports drinks was taking a bigger health risk than any I'd yet taken in my young life.

“I reckon folks aren't hard-core adventurers like you and me. They get scared when they hear any mention of a little snow coming over the mountains.”

“A little snow?”

“You know how it goes. They say the mountains are going to get dumped on, and then the snow peters out right when the clouds get to Lakeside.” He sighed and added, “We never get the good blizzards.”

Now, there're two words you don't usually hear together: “good” and “blizzard.”

I took a seat toward the back, thinking it would decrease my chances of being hurled through the windshield. I leaned the Pollypry sideways in the aisle. The bus started, the driver shut the door, and then he suddenly opened it again. Mary leaped up the steps, breathless. She handed Mr. Energy her money, then, seeing me in the back, she took a seat in the front.

“What is
she
doing here?” I mumbled out loud to myself. But I knew what she was up to. She didn't
think I could handle it. She was scared I was going to somehow blow it and her secret—and mine too, let's not forget!—was going to be spilled all over town.

The bus rolled forward. It crawled out of the parking lot and began to trudge up the hill. “Woo-hoo!” the driver shouted. “We're on our way now!”

At this pace it would be noon before we got there, but you know what? I could not have cared less.

Just looking at the back of Mary's head, I felt a surge from years' worth of aggravating situations. Like the way she never gives me the answers to our homework assignments because she tells me I need to understand it for myself. I understand everything; it just takes me too long to do it. And when we go to the SuperTarget with Mom, Mary pulls on my shirtsleeve when I start to wander down the wrong aisle. Maybe I want to look at something. Besides, isn't getting lost the whole reason for cell phones?

Oh, and here's the big one. When we're sitting on our beanbag chairs in front of the TV, she always turns to look at me during the funny parts. I used to think it was because she wanted to make sure I was having a good time. But now I get why she does it.

“Hey, Mary!” I yelled from the backseat. “I know
why you look at me during the funny scenes on TV.” She turned around. Her face was small and pinched up underneath her teal-blue hat. “It's because you want to make sure I'm not too stupid to get the jokes.”

“If you get SpongeBob's jokes, then why do I always have to explain them?” she yelled back.

Low blow.

“Boys and girls,” the driver said. He shook his head and wagged his finger over his shoulder at us. “This is a happy bus.”

“I'm not talking to you!” Mary shouted at me, and jerked herself around so fast, the bobble on her hat got twisted up.

“Me neither!” I shouted back, which didn't really make sense.

Oh, who cares? The bus chug-chugged on, and we rode in silence. I leaned my head against the window and felt the vibrations rattling my brain. And then I tried to remember why I was doing all this to begin with.

Oh yeah, because of redemption.

Redemption is for suckers.

WHEN THE BUS STOPPED AT
the top of the mountain, I heard Mary ask the driver, “Which way is Specter Slope?”

He pointed. “Just follow that ridge. But whatcha going to Specter Slope for? Nobody skis or sleds there. Even young adventurers like Survivor Boy back there know better than to go to Specter Slope.”

“Why? Avalanches?” Mary asked.

“No, man. Worse then avalanches. Trees.”

Well, then, I had all the information I needed now to go back home and enjoy a Saturday of
cartoons. But just then Mary looked at me and said, “You can cope with a few trees.”

“Arghh,” I said to myself. I grabbed my sled and dragged it up the bus's aisle, bumping it against all the seats as I passed.

When Mary and I finally reached the top of Specter Slope, Bruce was reading a book.

“Sorry we're late,” I mumbled.

“An hour and a half late,” Littledood said. He closed his book,
Much Ado About Nothing
by William Shakespeare. “I wasn't worried. I know you both have a lot riding on that sled, no pun intended.” Then he chuckled. “Okay, the pun was totally intended.”

I looked down the steep slope and heard Mary's snarly voice in my head saying,
You can cope with a few trees.
The mountain was so dense with pines that there wasn't even a trail to follow!

“How are we supposed to get around the eight hundred trees between here and the bottom?” I asked.

“Well, I don't know how
you're
going to get around them, but I'm going to steer my way. Like this.” And he showed Mary and me how the steering bar on the front of his sled moved with barely any effort from his feet.

Show-off.

“Surely you didn't forget to build a steering device into your sled,” Littledood said.

I didn't answer. I set the Pollypry next to the Titanium Blade Runner and comforted myself with the thought that this would all be over soon. I played with the duct tape repair job to show Mary I knew what I was doing this time. Strong and solid. Phew. I sat down, adjusted my legs, and prepared to push off.

“Are you ready?” Littledood asked.

“Yep,” I said.

“On your marks,” he began, “get set—”

“Hey! Ferrell, you are not ready!” Mary screamed from behind us.

“GO!” Littledood shouted. But neither of us moved. Littledood looked at me, and Mary ran to my side.

“You can't stop me now!” I protested.

“What are you thinking?” she shouted into my face. “Am I just going to walk down the slope?”

“I don't know! I guess I figured you would take the bus back. You're responsible for your own self, Miss I'm-So-Independent-I-Don't-Need-to-Go-to-Your-House-Anymore.”

“No! I'm going down the slope with you, on the Pollypry.”

Littledood stood up from his sled. Mary and I stopped fighting.

“You're quitting? We can go home now?” I asked.

“No. Carry on with your bickering. I seem to have dropped my bottle of oil for the steering bar. You go whenever you're ready.”

“You mean I can begin without you?” I asked.

“He did already say ‘go,' ” Mary pointed out. But she stood in front of me and put her foot on the Pollypry to keep me from sliding.

“Yes, that's right. I said ‘go.' Consider the head start a little gift from me to you.” Littledood smirked.

“I don't need your little gift,” I fumed. But Littledood ignored me and walked along the path back toward the road.

“Take it, Ferrell. We need all the help we can get.” She took her foot off the sled and stood to the side.

“What's this ‘we'? You're not coming,” I insisted.

“Yes, I am. I have to. Who else is going to make sure you don't kill yourself like you almost did last time?”

“But you're the one who's making me do this in
the first place,” I said. No, wait, I was doing this to redeem myself.

“I already thought you were dead once. We all did. How much can we continue to rely on miracles?” She slid onto the back of the Pollypry and continued to talk. “Thank you for doing this race in order to preserve my integrity and to maintain my reputation as an intelligent human being. It really is the least you can do, given that it was your great-great-great-uncle who ate my great-great-grandfather. Now, as my own act of goodwill in support of this situation, I will not let you die.” She looked behind us toward the path along the ridge. “Oh, and one more thing.” She pulled the real Polly Pry's quill feather out of a side pocket in her ski pants and stuck it in a grommet behind her at the back of the sled. “I stopped by your house this morning.”

“What for?” I asked.

“I guess I must have known you'd forget
something
. Now let's go before Littledood gets back.” Then she wrapped her arms around me. “This is not a hug, by the way,” she said.

Maybe not, but I still felt my insides kerplam into a gazillion shards of giggling kissy-faced yellow marble pieces.

I pushed off down the hill, and away we went, gliding across the snow, the wind in our faces, our scarves blowing behind us, and the world belonging to Mary and me. I could hear
The Ride of the Valkyries
in my head as we sailed along.

Then
slam
! We jolted to a stop.

“One tree down, seven hundred and ninety-nine to go,” I said. I didn't even try to hide the big, goofy grin on my face.

ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY TREE
slams later, Mary and I started to get the hang of turning.

She called out instructions from behind. “You lean hard to the left, and I'll go only lightly to the left. Now lean forward! Lean forward! Farther!” I felt her lean way back. C
rrunch
. Instead of hitting the tree head-on, we skimmed the side of it, hard enough to spin us around and come to a stop. Near success!

“Yahoo!” we both shouted.

“We need more weight in the back,” Mary ordered. “Let's switch places.”

As we stood up and brushed snow off ourselves,
I looked up the hill. No sign of Littledood. Without thinking, I reached into my pocket, searching for a sugar-glazed fruit pie.

“Hurry. Get back on,” Mary commanded.

“Do you think he could have passed us somehow?” I asked.

“Maybe he got lost,” Mary said. “Come on! We could have a real shot at winning this thing if you'd just hurry it up!”

“But I'm hungry and . . . Oh no . . . Aw, crud! When you stopped by my house this morning, you didn't happen to grab my bag of fruit pies and Skittles, did you? I must've left it on the kitchen counter.”

“No, I didn't. You're better off not consuming anything than putting that junk into your body. Eat some snow and let's go!” Mary said.

I grabbed a handful of smooth, stomped-on snow and bit into it. After a few mouthfuls, my tongue went numb and my teeth hurt. But at least it helped me forget the emptiness of my stomach. I sat down behind Mary and wrapped my arms around her. Something small and happy inside me said, “Woo-hoo, you're hugging Mary,” but something bigger and monstery said, “It could be hours before you get something to eat.”

After about an hour had passed, and somewhere between thirty and thirty thousand more trees had been bonked, I was done. I was sick of eating snow, sick of cold toes, and sick of sledding. Now it was beginning to snow. We had reached a level place on the hill and had to walk the Pollypry. I tied my scarf around one end and pulled the sled behind me. We were getting close to the bottom, I knew, because I could see the Specter Slope skating pond off to our right. A few summers ago I had hiked up the slope with my dad and we'd fished at the pond. We had eaten macaroni salad and corn chips with spicy bean dip. Now a strong wind was picking up, and flakes were falling, but I hardly noticed. Mary and I walked without talking, and I kept my focus on putting one foot in front of the other.

“Do I hear your cell phone ringing?” Mary asked.

“No. It's my stomach. It's growling.”

“That's crazy loud!”

“Now you see why I have to eat every two hours.” I caught a faint whiff of smoke, and through the snow, which was falling harder now, I could barely make out a small shack.

“That must be the shelter for the skating pond,” I said. I could imagine a family inside, taking a break from skating, drinking hot cider and eating toasted
marshmallows. “Maybe we could head over there and rest for just a minute?”

“No. It would take us four or five minutes just to get there. We can't spare the time,” Mary said. She trudged on. “We're close to the bottom.”