Shane Savage, who Sid hated based on his cool name alone, did a kick-flip, landed on his board, and then rolled to a stop. He glanced up and even from across the field he saw Shane struck dumb as he spotted Ash.
Ashley was still half-turned, watching the park behind them where a guy was getting dragged from tree to tree by his huge Siberian husky. He called out, “Heel, heel, damn you, Fluffy,” but the dog only continued dragging him forward.
Ashley laughed, and when she finally turned forward, Sid had come to a full stop, a deep groove between his eyebrows.
“Ah, shit, the Thrashers,” she groaned.
Sid didn’t know where the gang of boys had gotten their name. Probably their leader, Travis Barron, had coined it and then thumped anyone who called them anything different.
“Let’s go back,” Sid whispered.
Travis had just attempted the same ramp as Shane, but he’d landed with his board wheels up. Sid heard him cursing from across the field.
“Hey, Trav, it’s Butterball Four-Eyes,” one of the other boys called out.
Sid’s eyes, magnified by his owl-eyed spectacles, slid over to Warren Leach, who stood a foot taller than every other boy in the seventh grade. Warren’s size was a two-parter. He was supposed to be in the ninth grade, but he’d been held back twice. He also came from a family of big beefy guys with thick necks and angry red faces.
“No way,” Ashley hissed. “It will take us an extra ten minutes to go the long way. I’m not scared of those ass bags.”
Sid grabbed for Ashley’s arm, but she’d already begun to stride purposefully toward the parking lot.
“Butterball Putnam and his spic girlfriend. My, what a fine pair you make,” Travis jeered, snapping his foot down on his skateboard so the end kicked up. He caught it in his hand.
Ashley faltered at the term spic. She’d heard it before, Sid knew. He’d been standing beside her on more than one occasion and usually the mouth that uttered it belonged to Travis Barron or one of his bonehead friends.
“I’d rather be a spic than a poser,” Ash retorted. “I’ve seen dogs ride a board better than you.”
Sid had caught up to Ashley and grabbed the back of her t-shirt just as Travis threw his skateboard down.
“I’m going to rearrange your face, bitch,” Travis shouted, red climbing up his neck.
Nothing enraged Travis Barron more than being called a poser. He fancied himself a future skate-pro, but in reality, he could barely ride switch. His daddy’s money got him the clothes and the board and all the skater videos he could watch, but he still sucked.
“Get ‘em,” Travis yelled.
Warren took off first, his big body lumbering with surprising speed. Two other boys followed, but not Shane. Shane watched the scene unfold, his mouth a grim line.
Ashley turned on her heel, grabbing Sid’s hand and yanking him along.
“Go to the hole,” Ashley spat,” shoving Sid toward the pond at the edge of the park.
She could outrun the boys. Sid could not.
He took her advice and raced to the right, panting as he came upon the small patch of woods bordering the pond. He tripped over a root, managed to keep his feet beneath him, and then slid down the hill that edged the pond. The hill dipped inward, creating a little mushy cave blanketed in moss and stinking of wet. They called it the hole.
Sid crawled inside and tucked himself into an awkward little ball, wheezing as he tried to get air into his constricted diaphragm.
The wet grass beneath him soaked through his shorts, and he hoped there weren’t any leaches in the pond.
“Damn you, Ash,” he muttered, listening as one boy called out, “She went that way.”
After that, the park went silent except for the frogs and crickets chattering from the cattails and reeds edging the pond.
Sid stared at his Star Wars watch, counting the minutes. After more than an hour, he heard a rustling above him. Sid shrank further into the cave, pulling his legs tight to his belly and holding his breath.
A pair of feet hopped down to the grassy bank before him.
5
He recognized Ashley’s tattered blue sneakers with purple laces.
“Hmph.” Sid let out a little groan and a whoosh of breath.
“I thought it was Warren for a minute there,” he grumbled, crawling out on his hands and knees. His feet had fallen asleep and sharp prickles tittered in his feet. “Ouch.”
Ashley offered him a hand, and when he stood, Sid saw scrapes on her arms and leaves in her hair.
“You climbed the English Vermillion?” Sid asked.
“Yep. Warren couldn’t pull his big ass up that tree with a ladder.”
Sid snorted.
The English Vermillion was a huge oak tree on the opposite end of the park. In autumn, the tree turned a dazzling pink-red, which Ashley had commented looked the exact shade as the crayon color named English Vermillion. The name had stuck, and Sid rather liked the way they could whisper the word and know what the other referred to while the rest of the world did not. Their own secret code.
“Sorry,” Ashley told him, as they climbed back up the hill. They stuck to the wooded part of the park as they headed out. “I should have listened to you.”
Sid shrugged.
“They’d already seen us. They would have come after us anyhow. I’m sorry they called you that name.”
Ashley’s face darkened, but she waved his comment away.
“I don’t care what he calls me. Travis is a waste of space.”
Ashley had guts of steel, but Sid knew the insult upset her. Travis was a dirtbag, but he had money, and other kids listened to him. Though he was a year ahead of them, Travis had singled Sid and Ashley out in elementary school. He’d been picking on them both since the third grade. In a way, Travis’s cruelty had brought them together.
It had been Ashley who had stood up for Sid when Travis had knocked him down in the hallway four years before, sending his book bag flying and his books scattering across the slick linoleum floor.
“What d’you do that for, jerk?” Ashley had shouted, and though she’d stood six inches shorter than Travis, she’d shoved him.
Travis had cursed and pushed Ashley as hard as he could. She’d hit the racks of metal coat hooks, one of them jabbing into her armpit.
A teacher had witnessed the incident, and the principal had suspended Travis for three days.
After that, Travis made it his life’s work to torture them. Their shared enemy had bound them together, and now Sid couldn’t imagine a world without Ashley.
“Does your dad have Hell House? I heard a teacher talking about how ghastly it was. I’m dying to read it,” Ashley asked, as they turned onto Ash’s street.
Sid frowned and imagined the books lining the top shelf in his father’s bedroom. “I’m pretty sure, yeah. You already finished Interview with the Vampire?”
“Yep, last night. It was awesome,” Ash told him, leaning over to grab a penny she’d spotted on the pavement.
“Tails up, I wouldn’t-” Sid started, but she’d already grabbed it and stuffed it in her pocket.
“Heads-schmeads,” she said. “I’m saving for a new bike. I’m taking everything I can get.”
“The Huffy Pro Thunder?” Sid asked.
He didn’t have to ask. He’d visited the bike shop with Ashley half a dozen times. She’d sit on the bike, trace her finger over the silver spokes and grip the handlebars.
“I only need twenty-two dollars and it’s mine,” Ash said, a faraway gleam in her eye.
They had decided in school that morning to walk to The Crawford House to get wood for a raccoon den.