Deadwood (12 page)

“I don't have my book, either.” She slumped down a little further.

“I see. You managed to remember your uniform, but not your school work,” Mr. Michaelson said, narrowing his eyes. “Next time don't forget which word comes first in ‘student-athlete.'”

Hannah mumbled an apology.

“You can share Libby's book. I'm sure she won't mind.”

Libby smirked at Hannah, who scooched over, but somehow Libby kept blocking the text whenever she tossed her glossy curtain of hair. A week earlier, Martin would have been glad to see Hannah humiliated in social studies. But not anymore.

Mr. Michaelson asked another question, but Hannah didn't raise her hand. No one else did, either. Martin knew the answer, but he just stared stonily ahead, letting the teacher twist in the wind, waiting for a response that never came.

Later at lunch Martin should have been getting a jump on homework while he ate, but instead he mentally replayed one of his favorite confrontations—the battle between the ranger and the Arlithean hordes after they had kidnapped the Worlinzer sorceress, Lady Torthea.

Thus, he was less prepared than usual when Hannah plopped down next him. He glanced over at her usual spot, where Waverly huddled with Libby. Behind the two girls, a cafeteria table was lined shoulder to shoulder with red and black jerseys, each with a different shade and texture of ponytail flowing down the back.

“To what do I owe the pleasure, my lady?” he said in a low tone.

“What?” she said, eying the exits as if about to flee.

Martin cleared his throat, pretending to cough. Then he said in his normal voice, “What's up?”

“Nothing good. The curse is getting worse. Take a look at this.”

Hannah handed him her phone. He held it up, trying to block the glare from the fluorescent lights.

“Be careful. If Mr. Michaelson sees it, he'll confiscate it for sure. No phones during the school day.”

“Sorry.” He held it under the folding table.

H
URRY
. T
IME
IS
RUNNING
OUT
.

He lifted his eyebrows. “What? Is a shoe sale almost over at Brynwood Park Mall? This is worse luck than me getting attacked by a swarm of killer bees?”

“No!” She grabbed the phone back. “That's not the point. I got this message even though I don't have any airtime. And there's no return number.”

“Telemarketers have mysterious ways, don't they?”

“Come on, Martin. Don't you see? This message is from the tree.”

Was she making fun of him? No, she looked nearly frantic—she believed what she was saying. “The tree sent you a text?”

“Why not? It flashed us that message the other day. Things
are
getting worse—you saw what happened in social studies.”

“You forgot your homework. So does half the school on any given day.” He looked longingly at his oozing sandwich and wished his sloppy joe weren't so, well, sloppy. Made it hard to eat it around Hannah. He ate a chip instead.

“But not me! I never forget,” she said. “That's only the start of it. This is getting scary. I feel like the trees are watching me. A branch from the tree next to our house cracked my window the other night. That dead grass all around Chase on the field, the broken scoreboard, the way the bees attacked you.” The hairs rose on the back of Martin's neck—that was just how he felt. Hannah dropped her voice and said, “I had the strangest dream last night. And when I woke up, I started getting messages over a disconnected phone.”

Martin remembered what Jenna had told him in the midst of his antihistamine daze. “The other day Jenna said something about plants sending out electronic or magnetic signals.”

Hannah nodded. “And those bees. They're social animals—they communicate with chemical signals, different flying patterns. Don't tell me that attack was a coincidence.”

“I was standing on their hive. They were kind of provoked.” Martin used a chip to scoop up some sandwich filling.

“Maybe. But look at my phone. If the tree could flash a message, if it could send out electrical or radio signals, then it fits. Why
couldn't
the tree send messages over the airwaves now?”

“Now we just need Jenna to help us, after we practically broke into her house.”

“It was just her beehive, Martin,” Hannah said. “We can win her over, and she's forgotten more about trees than we will ever know. So, if she's not behind the whole curse thing, she can figure out who is.”

“A witch can be a good person to have on your side.”

Hannah wrinkled her freckled nose. “I told you I don't like that word.”

“It's not like it's a bad thing. You know, back in the old days, ignorant villagers used to be afraid of wise women—the women who understood plants and medicines. They called them witches, too. People are afraid of what they don't understand.” Martin couldn't wait anymore. He took a huge bite of sandwich, sloppy joe sauce squirting between his fingers. At least it landed on the tray.

“Well, no wonder this is creeping me out,” Hannah said, looking creeped out by Martin now, too. “Because heck if I can understand any of this. But don't worry, I will.”

19

Junior Junior Executives of Tomorrow

A
fter school Martin felt the full effects of his bad luck when he was forced to attend his first Junior JET meeting. It was even worse than he expected. First, Aunt Michelle insisted he wear a suit. A suit! As if he really were some sort of mini-executive.

“Always dress to impress, Martin,” she said, practically shooing him upstairs when she saw what he was wearing—his favorite T-shirt, some perfectly decent cargo shorts (only slightly frayed), and his second-best pair of running shoes that had been promoted to the most presentable since his new pair lost that run-in with a pile of unidentified crap.

He was still grumbling when he came downstairs in his too-small suit. For a moment he had been pleased to have grown out of it; then he saw the twitch in Aunt Michelle's temple.

“I suppose I'm not surprised your mother didn't think to buy you a new suit since Grandmother's funeral this summer,” she said with disgust. Martin would have snapped at her, but his nose began to twitch a little at the blunt mention of Abuelita, and he had to concentrate on not crying. He would not let his emotions out, not in front of Aunt Michelle. She noticed the look on his face and said, “Oh, don't worry, sweetie. We'll get you a new suit this weekend.”

As if the suit was what bothered him. As if shopping with his aunt was consolation instead of punishment. Instead he muttered, “What's wrong with what I was wearing? If it's good enough for school, shouldn't it be good enough for after-school activities?”

“Just ‘good enough' is never good enough, Martin. Junior Junior Executives of Tomorrow is not just an after-school activity. It's where today's boys and girls meet their selves of tomorrow.”

Like everything else Aunt Michelle said, it sounded like it ought to be carved on some dumb plaque and hung on the wall. And when Martin walked into the Greater Brynwood Community Center, it was the first thing he saw written on a plaque above the whiteboard.

W
HERE
T
ODAY'S
B
OYS
AND
G
IRLS
M
EET
T
HEIR
S
ELVES
OF
T
OMORROW

At least I know where she got that lame saying from
, he thought, taking a seat by the window. He left his iPod on and tried to sneak a look around before anyone noticed him. He didn't recognize anybody, but that was no surprise. Then he saw the girl who had been hanging out with Hannah's friend, Whatshername. The girl with the social studies textbook who didn't like to share. The girl who was always staring at him, laughing as if she'd just said something he wouldn't want to hear. Libby.

Oh crap. She spotted him.

And even worse, she was walking his way, flinging her shiny hair around like she was in a shampoo commercial.

She sat down next to him, toying with a lock of hair and smiling dazzlingly with her clear braces. “Aren't you Hannah's friend, Marvin?”

“Martin, actually.” He prepped himself for some juvenile mean-girl joke.

“I'm so sorry,” she said. And she actually looked disappointed. “Last week in Junior JET we practiced remembering names for our first lesson. When you know someone's name, you're halfway to knowing them. Or something. The secret is using a mnemonic device. You associate a person with an object or phrase, and that helps you remember their name.”

“What was mine?”

“Marvin Martian, of course. You know, the way your hair sort of sticks out from your head. But mostly your voice.”

He should have known better than to ask. What made it worse was that she was trying to be nice, and this was the best she could do.

“I'm Libby, in case you didn't know,” she said, as if she thought he would know. Which he did. She offered her hand, but he must have grabbed too soon because he squeezed her fingers in a weird, limp handshake. “Waverly wasn't sure about you, but if you're friends with Hannah and a Junior JET, maybe you're okay.” She paused as if she expected a response, like thanks. When Martin didn't say anything, she continued, “There aren't many Lower Brynwood kids here, actually. Just a couple of us from Brynwood Estates. The rest is an Upper Brynwood crowd, so I'll introduce you. My parents are lawyers, and they think this will give me an edge for my college interviews. What about you?”

“My Aunt Michelle made me come.”

“You mean Michelle Medina? She's scheduled to be a guest speaker soon. I didn't know you were related. She's chairman of the board for JET! Did you know she was the one who started the junior version of Junior Executives of Tomorrow?”

Martin gave her a sideways look. “She didn't mention that, exactly. I thought she was in the club back in high school.”

Libby squealed with delighted exasperation. “It's not a club. It's an honor society, and yeah, it's been around for, like, a hundred years. She just started the middle school version. That's why we have her quoted up there.” She jabbed her blue-manicured thumb towards the plaque hanging over the whiteboard.

Martin thunked his elbows on the desk and laced his fingers over the top of his head. It figured.

Libby twirled a lock of her hair. “So, do you want my notes from last week?”

“That's okay.”

She nodded. “This week is when the good stuff starts—the Seven Habits of Highly Successful Executives. One habit per week. We're starting with
Superbia.”

“Suburbia?”

“No,
Superbia
. That's Latin for pride. If you're proud of yourself, you attract the respect you deserve. That sort of thing.”

“Sounds awesome. Good thing I've got all my pencils sharpened,” Martin said, opening his bag. He contemplated the perfect point of one yellow pencil and remembered how, as a ranger, he'd once used a stiletto to stab his own eardrums, avoiding the trap of an Arlithean mountain siren's deadly song. Not a bad backup plan, except that he didn't have a trove of hit points and Marlician heal-all herb to reverse deafness once class was over. Then again, if he had Marlician heal-all herb, this whole Spirit Tree problem would solve itself. Or not.

A fortyish woman with heavy makeup and long, perfect soap-opera hair stepped in front of the class and cleared her throat so that Martin could hear the phlegm rattling around in the back. She may have only been trying to get the group's attention, but she managed to gross Martin out at the same time.

“Ms. Stemmler,” Libby said, leaning in closer. Her hair smelled like tropical fruit. “She's a corporate trainer during the day. I think she's a secret smoker.”

Martin wouldn't have been surprised if a loogie came shooting out when Ms. Stemmler opened her mouth to speak. He got the impression that middle-school students—even neatly dressed, well-behaved ones—made her gag, and the feeling, for him, was mutual.

Martin's mind wandered to how Hannah had done in her soccer game. He hoped she'd won. Crap, at this rate, he hoped her leg didn't fall off or an asteroid didn't crash in midfield.

Then Martin started to draw, and before long he didn't notice the droning in his ears. He forgot about Hannah, too. It was only later that he noticed the Wise Woman he drew on his notepad had a freckled nose, a heart-shaped face, and a long ponytail down her back.

Martin ran through a field beneath an open sky.

At least, he thought it was a field. He saw that this had been a forest, but now the trees lay around him, tossed like pick-up sticks. As he climbed along the trail, he dodged massive spokes of twisted roots, upended and ripped from the ground as if the trees had swung on hinges, opening muddy pits where they had stood.