Part II: Coming Together
Chapter 7

Bree didn’t think the lunches at Spearfish Lake High School were very good, but then, as far as she knew no one else did either. Today, the Monday following her flight to Warsaw and back, it was a slice of rather sloppy pizza, thin on the topping. It had corn on the side, which didn’t make a lot of sense but that was what was served. It really didn’t sound very good, but she wasn’t very hungry, either. Since she was smaller and much less athletic than Becca, she ate only a fraction of what her sister did. Considering the pizza wasn’t very appetizing, she decided to treat herself to a box of chocolate milk; at least she liked that.

The lunchroom at the school was large, colorful, and bright from the large windows along one wall, even though Bree could see through them that the sky was still overcast. In the last year or so it had really become hard for her to look out the windows and see cumulus clouds outside, knowing she couldn’t be out there with them.

The lunchroom was crowded with kids and noisy. Students from all four high school grades sat around the tables in clumps and clusters, talking about any number of things, and often having to talk loud to make themselves heard. Carrying her tray, Bree looked around for a place where she could be by herself, as was usually the case, or failing that, find someone she could stand to sit with. Becca was beyond consideration, of course; she was seated at a table with mixed boy and girl athletes, who were yelling and teasing and joshing each other. There wasn’t any room at that table anyway; some chairs had been pulled in from another table so the kids could crowd around.

After only a few seconds she spotted Autumn Trevetheck sitting by herself at a table over in the corner. Autumn would do just fine, she thought; besides, maybe Becca had a point yesterday about trying to be a little better friend with someone. Autumn would do just fine for that, too. She walked over to where Autumn sat looking at a thick book.

“Hi, Autumn,” Bree said quietly. “Mind if I sit here?”

“No, fine,” the brunette girl about Bree’s size replied. “I’d be glad to have someone to talk to.”

“Well, me too,” Bree replied, setting her tray down. “What are you reading?”

“Vale of Kolombanara again,” Autumn sighed. “I really love the book, but it’s so complicated I’m afraid I’m just skimming it to get to my favorite parts.”

“I haven’t read it for a while, but there are a lot of good parts, aren’t there?” Bree smiled. She didn’t read fantasy much anymore, especially long epic fantasies like the book Autumn had open in front of her. Reading about flying was so much more interesting . . .

“There sure are,” Autumn smiled. “So what are you reading these days?”

Bree had been surprised this morning to not be confronted by someone over the rumors Jared and Howie had to have started after they’d seen her land Saturday. It was hard to believe it hadn’t gotten around! With that thought in mind she didn’t want to admit to Autumn that she was reading Stick and Rudder again. “I’m kind of between books right now,” she fibbed. “I finished Firestarter over the weekend. I haven’t made up my mind what to try next.”

That was a fib, too; she’d pretty well decided to read Wind, Sand and Stars by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, and not for the first time for that aviation classic, either. She’d often been amused by seeing kids wearing “Aeropostale” shirts. Saint-Exupéry had flown for Aeropostale over the Sahara, back in the days before World War II when it was a dangerous adventure. Those kids had no idea what the name on those shirts really represented. None at all. But right now, she wouldn’t be caught dead reading a book like that around school. Firestarter was the sort of thing that would be expected of her; if kids found her reading something as adult and incomprehensible to them as Wind, Sand and Stars they’d probably think she was being snooty.

“I really like Firestarter,” Autumn said. “But I think when I get done with this one I may just try something else. I don’t know what yet.”

The thought crossed Bree’s mind that she needed to find some new fantasy to read, just for the sake of having something to talk about with Autumn. It had been a while since she’d actually read any of them, and was going on memory. It was tough to have a conversation about books she hadn’t actually read in a while and didn’t have much interest in anymore. “Yeah, me too,” she agreed for the sake of saying something. “I just don’t want to get into that sappy Twilight stuff. Paranormal teen romance, eeewwww!”

“It seems pretty stupid to me, too,” Autumn agreed. “I got about halfway through the first book and I just couldn’t take it anymore.”

“Bree, Autumn,” they heard a guy’s voice say, “how are you doing today?”

“Not bad, considering,” Bree said, looking up to see Jared Wooten standing there with a lunch tray in his hand. Jared was OK, she thought. She didn’t know him well, but he didn’t seem to be like a lot of other idiots in the class. It was pretty clear he hadn’t spread around the story of her landing the 1-26 Saturday, and that seemed like a miracle.

“If you’re looking for a place to sit,” Autumn added, “you’re welcome to sit here, if you don’t mind us discussing fantasy books.”

“I don’t mind,” Jared said. “I’m sort of waiting for Wendy Carter’s new book to come out, but I guess it won’t be till next spring.”

Autumn’s interest perked up at that statement. “You read her books?” she asked. “I didn’t think that was the kind of things boys read.”

“They’re pretty good,” Jared smiled, opening his box of chocolate milk. “It takes some imagination to understand them, though.” He turned to Bree. “Hey, I’m still thinking that was pretty cool Saturday. I never even dreamed you did something like that.”

“Most people wouldn’t believe it if I told them,” Bree replied, a little disheartened. Just when it looked like the story might stay in the bottle, Jared had brought it up, right in front of Autumn at that.

“That was really awesome,” Jared continued. “Dad and Uncle Randy have let me mess around with bulldozers and backhoes a little, just for the heck of it, you know, but that doesn’t hold a candle to what you did.”

“What’s this?” Autumn asked, her interest clearly showing now.

Before Bree could say anything to possibly put a cap on it, Jared turned to Autumn and said, “Howie Erikson and I were out at Bree’s aunt’s sign shop Saturday afternoon, and guess who gave the airstrip a buzz job in a glider! She came in over the field at what must have been a hundred miles an hour, pulled up and landed. Howie and I were never so surprised in our lives when Bree got out of it!”

“Bree?” Autumn said, her voice laden with questions.

Bree sighed. She was outed now, there was no doubt of it, so she might as well make the best of it. “Actually it was a hundred and fifteen, that’s the redline speed for the Schweizer. I guess I was a little excited from making my out and return to Warsaw.”

“Hold it!” Autumn frowned. “Let me get this straight. Bree, you were flying this glider? By yourself?”

“It about had to be,” Bree replied, trying to hold back on sounding smug about it. “It’s only got one seat, so there wasn’t room for anyone else.”

“Bree, I had no idea you did anything like that!” Autumn gushed. “Where did you learn to fly?”

“Uncle Mark and Aunt Jackie mostly,” Bree replied matter-of-factly. “Some of the glider stuff came from a guy down in Mt. Vernon. That was where I soloed a glider first, a year ago last summer.”

“Bree, that is so cool!” Jared shook his head. “I had no idea you were a pilot!”

“So I had no idea you knew how to run a bulldozer,” Bree shrugged, trying to deflect the awe level a little.

“It’s not the same thing,” Jared grinned.

“How come I never heard about this?” Autumn asked.

“Mostly because no one would have believed me if I’d been the one to tell them,” Bree shrugged. “Would you have believed me if I’d been the one to tell you instead of Jared?”

“Well . . .” Autumn nodded in understanding. “It would be sort of hard for me to believe if I hadn’t seen you doing it, or at least if Jared hadn’t told me about it.”

“There you go. Who would believe a kid, especially one like me, could do it if they hadn’t seen it?”

“Yeah, I guess you’re right,” Autumn nodded. “But how do you get a glider off the ground?”

“Becca towed me behind Aunt Jackie’s pickup, on a real long rope. Two thousand feet long, in fact. That got me up to about eleven hundred feet, and I was on my own from there.”

“And you could go all the way to Warsaw and back on that?”

“Well, no,” Bree said. “In still air, I could go about five miles until I hit the ground from a launch that high. I kept having to find air going up faster than the sailplane was sinking, and circle around in it to pick up altitude. I was up about a mile high several times. It’s not always easy to find air going up. I had to mess around down low in weak stuff for almost an hour at one point before I could get back up high enough to leave.” She decided she’d better not say that it had been over the nudist place, or there were sure to be some really awkward questions she was sure she didn’t want to answer, not to mention the snickering she was sure she’d hear.

“What’s it like to fly like that?” Jared asked.

“That’s a little hard to describe,” she said, and tried to change the subject at least a little bit in order to divert some of the attention away from her. “Look, if you can tell me what it’s like to drive a bulldozer, maybe I can try to tell you what it’s like to fly.”

“I don’t . . . well, you have this machine that can do all these powerful things, to shape things, things you can do with a pull of a lever that would take you all day if you had to use a shovel. You’re controlling that power. Bree, did you ever play in a sandbox with a toy bulldozer?”

“No,” Bree sighed. “When we were real little back before Mom died, she used to take Becca and me to the beach sometimes. It was fun to play in the sand, move it around, sort of make hills and stuff out of it.”

“That’s sort of what I’m talking about,” Jared said. “A great big sandbox, and you can make great big hills out of dirt, then flatten them back out again. Not only does it give you a feeling of power, it gives you a good feeling to know that you can take the power of that machine and do something with it. You know my Uncle Randy?”

“I don’t think so.”

“There’s a couple acres of nothing much out in back of his construction company,” Jared explained. “Sometimes when he wants to think things out, he goes out there with a bulldozer or a backhoe or something and moves dirt around or digs a hole or something, just to relax and get his mind off what he’s concerned about. When he gets done, he puts everything back. The people at the company call it ‘Randy’s Sandbox.’”

Autumn laughed. “Who was it that said the only difference between the men and the boys is the size of their toys?”

“Yeah, that’s it exactly,” Jared grinned. “I could talk about all the levers and stuff you use to control a machine like that, but the feeling . . . it’s cool, I guess. Is that what you wanted to know?”

“I guess,” Bree said. “Flying a glider, well, it’s a lot like being a bird except I can’t flap my wings. In a way it’s a feeling of freedom, of controlling a machine to get it to do what I want it to do, like you said. But in a way it isn’t. You’re restricted by natural things, like weather, air going up and down, and even gravity. In a way you can use some of them to your advantage for a while if you’re smart enough and skilled enough to do it. It’s real neat to look out and see that what you’ve accomplished is a result of your having the skill and the machine to do it with. So I suppose it’s sort of like driving a bulldozer.”

Jared shook his head. “Except that it’s a whole lot cooler. Could you take me flying with you sometime?”

“Maybe someday,” Bree smiled, a little surprised that they’d found a way they could make contact out of two very different experiences. “Not soon. I can’t until I turn sixteen and get my regular license, anyway, and that’s next summer. Then we’d have to find a two-seat glider somewhere I could use to take you with me. The closest one I know of is down at Mt. Vernon.”

“I’d love to do it,” he said. “Maybe I could get Dad to take us out to Randy’s Sandbox sometime so you could get an idea of what it’s like to run a backhoe or a bulldozer or something.”

Bree smiled at him. “You know, I think I’d like that. I don’t think I’d want to do it for a living, but it would be fun to try for the experience.”

“Darn,” Autumn shook her head. “I wish I could do something like that. I mean, being able to do stuff like that is cool, and you’re lucky to do it, but all I get to do is to sit around and read fantasy books and stuff.”

“You’re a cheerleader,” Bree said. “You get to do that. It’s not something I’d want to do.”

“I sometimes wonder why I want to do it,” Autumn sighed. “I mean, this fall it’s been sort of cool the way the games have been, but I still don’t feel like I’m doing much of anything special.”

“There’s nothing wrong with it, but I wouldn’t want to draw attention to myself like that,” Bree said a little sympathetically.

“That’s not it,” Autumn said slowly, as if reaching for a concept she hadn’t previously worked out. “I mean, take Jared here. He’s out there on the field playing the game, so he’s actually doing something, while I’m just on the sidelines watching. Bree, if you were to take me out so I could watch you fly, even if you could take me flying sometime after you get your license, I’d still be watching it instead of doing it. I’d like to be able to do something instead of just watching.”

“I don’t know what to tell you,” Jared said. “Don’t you do something special, something you like to do?”

“I read fantasy books. I enjoy it, but I don’t think that’s anything special. There isn’t anyone standing on the sidelines and yelling, ‘Yaay, you finished chapter thirty-seven!’”

“If Jared and Howie hadn’t shown up Saturday with Jared’s dad, there wouldn’t have been anybody but Uncle Mark and Aunt Jackie cheering me on when I finished,” Bree said. “Nobody but the three of us would have even known about it. There was nobody cheering me on, and if there had been I wouldn’t have known about it. At least I knew I’d done it, and really, that was all I was looking for.”

“Besides,” Jared said, understanding Autumn’s point, “there has to be some kind of satisfaction in finishing chapter thirty-seven.”

“It’s not the same thing,” Autumn protested. “I don’t know how to say it, but it just doesn’t feel like the same thing.”

Bree shook her head. “I suppose if I didn’t have my flying I’d feel pretty much the same way, and when you get right down to it I don’t get to fly that much. Even over the summer I was lucky to get out once or twice a week since everything else has to be right, too. In another couple months I won’t be able to do it till spring, unless maybe we get a day in the winter when everything is just right. Believe me, all winter long I’m going to be wishing I could do something instead of reading a book with one of our cats in my lap.”

“Well, maybe we can think of something if we can work on it together,” Jared said. “There doesn’t have to be an answer found today. Maybe it’d even be something we could all do together.”

“Jared, I’d sure like it if we could,” Autumn said. “I’d be willing to do something I don’t really care about if it would mean I could hang out with someone. I don’t even get to hang out with Summer much anymore since she’s always busy working on the game with Alan or something.”

“Well, maybe we can,” Bree said, feeling some of Autumn’s loneliness a little. She hadn’t really wanted to think much about the fact that next fall Becca would be off in college somewhere, and things would be even lonelier than they were now. Maybe Becca had been right; maybe she did need a friend or two, and right at the moment it looked like she might be starting something that hadn’t been there before. “If nothing else we can sit around and talk about books, or play a board game or something.”

“I don’t mind talking about books,” Jared said. “I don’t have many people I can talk with about them. Look, let’s think about it a little and get together tomorrow. Sometimes little ideas grow into big ideas.”

Not many people took much notice of the three kids talking intently in the corner of the room. Half of the room away, Howie and Misty were among a number of kids sitting around a table intended for half as many. There was the usual amount of joshing, teasing, gossip and trash talk that could be expected around a group of kids that size, with several conversations going on at once. Maybe three or four kids were listening to Howie tell the story of Bree landing the glider on Saturday; one of them was Misty, who was acting pretty sulky. Howie was aware of it, but didn’t seem too concerned by it.

“So then the top opened and the pilot got out,” Howie said. “Jared and I just about crapped our pants when we saw it was Bree Gravengood!”

“Bree?” Matt Wadsworth snorted. “Her? Erikson, you’ve got to be kidding! You’re full of shit to the eardrums.”

“Go ask Jared, he was there,” Howie shrugged, not noticing the frown on Misty’s face deepening.

“What would a shy little shit like her be doing flying an airplane?” Wadsworth protested. “She ain’t old enough to be flying an airplane anyway, and she wouldn’t know enough about flying to fly a paper airplane.”

“Well,” Howie admitted, “I would have thought so until I saw it myself. Turns out she’s been doing it for a couple years.”

“Christ, Erikson, you’re so full of shit it’s pathetic,” Wadsworth replied, obviously unwilling to believe the truth.

Howie felt a tug at his arm; Misty obviously. “Howie,” she said petulantly, “we have to talk. I mean just you and me.”

“OK,” he said quietly to her. He was tired of Wadsworth’s bullshit anyway, not that Misty was likely to have anything better to say. He’d called her up when he’d finally got home Saturday, and she’d really given him an earful about how he had to have been hanging out with his loser friends all day instead of with her. Two or three times over the course of that conversation he’d been just about ready to tell her to go fly a kite. It was nice to have a girlfriend, after all, but this was starting to get a little beyond ridiculous. Still, there were advantages to having a girlfriend, especially one as cute as Misty, and the possibilities existed for even more advantages sometime in the future.

So with very mixed feelings he’d ridden his bike over to Misty’s after supper, and they spent most of the evening hanging around the Frostee Freeze. It had been a cool evening, and Misty had continued to be about as cool as the evening. He was in the doghouse, and he knew it. He didn’t even get a kiss until he took her home, and right on her front porch he couldn’t get as touchy-feely as they had been for a lot of the summer anyway. But the kiss had been enough to think that maybe the fire wasn’t all the way out. She’d been fairly decent today, not that there had been time to do anything about it, what with being in school and all, but now it was pretty clear she had a bug up her butt again. This was getting tiresome.

“Guess we’d better go,” he said to the crowd of his teammates and friends around the table. “Guys, see you at practice.” He got up, scooped the stuff on Misty’s tray onto his, then carried both trays over to the trash cans, with Misty following along, a scowl on her face.

It was hard to get alone, but there was a place up the hall a ways where they could get away from some of the other kids hanging around a little. He didn’t even get a chance to ask what was on her mind before she gave it to him. “Damn it, Howie,” she said. “It was bad enough you had to be out to Bree Gravengood’s house at all! Then, we have to have all your asshole buddies crowding around and you had to boast about it! How do you think that makes me feel?”

“Misty,” he sighed, “I told you before, I wasn’t out there to see her. Mr. Wooten offered to give me a ride home, so long as he could stop off out there. I was tired and I took him up on it. It was no big deal.”

“You didn’t have to do that,” she fumed. “You could have ridden your bike home and not gone out there at all. But no, you had to go out there instead, and that makes it look like you don’t care about me anymore. And what’s worse, you had to boast about it, and how cool a kid she is, and we both know she’s a stuck-up little twerp. You were defending her, Howie! That really makes me look like a piece of shit, you know?”

“Look, Misty,” he shook his head. “I didn’t go out there to see her. I just happened to be there when she landed that thing, and it really was pretty cool.”

“Howie, I’m supposed to be your girlfriend. You’re supposed to be praising me, not defending some other girl. Even if she was flying that thing, big deal! She’s still a stuck-up little brat, and if it’s true, which I don’t know whether to believe or not, you mouthing off about it is just going to make her more stuck up. Howie, I’m supposed to come first, not her, and especially not those useless asshole buddies of yours.”

“Some of them are OK,” Howie replied, realizing he had his ass well and truly in a crack now. “I’ll agree Wadsworth is an asshole, but he’s still a blocker I need in front of me when I’m trying to throw the ball. That means I have to put up with at least a little of his shit.”

“Howie, I know you want to be on the team, and it makes me feel good to know I have the quarterback for a boyfriend. But when you’re not playing football or at practice, you need to be thinking about spending time with me, not hanging out at some other girl’s house. Think about it, Howie. What do you really want?” She turned on her heel and walked away.

Howie stood there thinking about it, all right. Having a girlfriend may have been all right, but some of the time it wasn’t that all right. Every now and then Misty got into her little snits that came right out of midair with no warning, and this wasn’t the first one he’d seen out of her – not even the first time this weekend. Damn it, she may have been his girlfriend, but he had other friends, other things to do, too. Was it worth all the trouble and effort?

Oh, well, hell, maybe after practice was over with he could call her up and see if she’d gotten the wad out of her panties.

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