Spoiled Rotten (3 page)

“Don't waste your phoney tears on me, Amy, you're just a spoiled little brat!” I tossed her book onto the beach. It bounced against a rock and splashed into the water.

“I hate you, Jessica!” she screamed, and ran to save her book.

I took off. I ran as fast as I could over loose rocks. When I was even with the dinghy, I plunged into the water. It was surprisingly warm.

I swam with strong strokes and gained quickly on the dinghy. But suddenly the water turned icy around me. I had reached the river mouth where glacial waters spilled into the sea. In front of me the dinghy made a slow half-turn and headed straight out from shore.

The cold water took my breath away. But the dinghy was so close! I put my head down and swam as fast as I could. When I looked again the side of the dinghy was just above my head. I reached for it.

A wave splashed against the dinghy and back into my face. I choked on a mouthful of salt water. Another wave splashed over me. I couldn't breathe, and now the boat was out of reach.

If I could get into the dinghy I would be all right. But it was drifting faster now, caught in the river current. Then I noticed its long yellow rope trailing in the water.

Coughing and sputtering, I fought my way to the rope. My fingers touched it, but it slipped away. I tried again and caught the loop at the very end. I pulled myself along the rope, grabbed the dinghy and climbed over the stern.

I reached for the oars and headed for
Fanta-sea.
But the current and wind pushed against me. I started to shiver in my wet clothes. The cool wind didn't help. Even the hard work of rowing didn't warm me.

I wasn't thinking about Amy when I reached
Fanta-sea
and tied up the dinghy
.
I was so cold all I could think of was getting inside and into some dry clothes.

Water poured down my legs as I squished across the back deck and looked into the cabin. Dad and Patti were eating sandwiches, drinking iced tea and talking. I could have drowned and they wouldn't have noticed.

“Dad,” I said crossly. “Can you pass me a towel?”

His head jerked around. He saw me standing in the doorway, dripping wet. His face went hard. “What the…?”

Patti jumped up and grabbed a beach towel to wrap around my shoulders.

“Did you fall in?” she asked.

“No.” I told them what had happened. Everything.

My father took an angry breath. “And here we thought you two would learn to be friends if you spent some time together. But you didn't even try, did you?”

I couldn't believe this! After all the trouble Amy caused, he wanted to blame me?

“It wasn't my fault!”

“You're more than two years older. You should be watching out for her.”

“Amy isn't a baby, she just acts like one. She can take care of herself.”

We all turned toward the loud voice wailing on shore. “Mom!” Amy called. “Jessica left me here!” She paused. “And I'm hungry!”

Patti looked at me, then at her own daughter.

“So swim out,” she called. “I didn't pay for all those swimming lessons for nothing.”

Amy was too stubborn to swim. She stood on the beach trying to turn the pages of her soggy book. Then she waved it in the air and shouted, “You ruined my book, Jessica!”

I shook my head. This kid was unbelievable. She acted more like a five-year-old than someone who would turn twelve in a week. But I was glad I had told Dad and Patti about the book.

“I'll go get her,” Dad offered. “

No.” Patti put a hand on his arm. “Her father always gave into her tantrums. It's time she started to grow up.”

Patti went back into the cabin where she could keep an eye on Amy without being seen. “Let her sulk for a while. She'll swim out when she thinks we've forgotten about her.”

I wrapped the beach towel more tightly around myself, but I couldn't stop my teeth from chattering. So I grabbed some dry clothes and squeezed into the tiny bathroom to get changed. It was the only place on the whole boat where I could get any privacy.

As I dressed I thought about Patti. I knew she was trying to be fair, but that only made it harder to hate her. I didn't need her in my life, and I sure didn't need her spoiled rotten daughter.

I dressed in shorts and a T-shirt. Then I pulled a pair of sweat pants and a sweatshirt over top. I sat at the table and ate a sandwich, but I couldn't face the thought of iced tea. It was too cold.

“Why don't you get into your sleeping bag?” Patti suggested. “I'll bring you some hot chocolate.”

I wanted to say no. I wanted to tell her to leave me alone. But the thought of hot chocolate was hard to resist. “Okay,” I said through chattering teeth.

Dad glared at me. “Is that any way to answer your mother?”

“She's not …” I stopped. What was the use? We all knew she wasn't my mother but they wanted to pretend she was. By then I was too cold to care. “Thank you, Patti,” I said and crawled into my sleeping bag.

Dad brought the hot chocolate to me. I sat up and reached for it. He touched my hand. “You're freezing!” he said.

I wrapped both hands around the hot mug and Dad tucked the sleeping bag up around my ears.

“I'll be back in a minute,” he said.

When he returned he gave me a hot-water bottle. “Tuck this against your stomach,” he said. “I'm heating up some water for the other bottle.”

I hugged the hot-water bottle like a little kid with a teddy bear. I must have had hypothermia. In ice-cold water it only takes a few minutes to lower the body's temperature. When that happens your body can't warm itself up again without help.

Dad brought the second hot-water bottle and slid it against my back. By the time I finished my drink I was beginning to warm up. But I felt really sleepy. I closed my eyes.

I woke up later, so hot I felt sick. The air was stifling and I was stuffed in a sleeping bag with two hot-water bottles. My T-shirt stuck to my back. I moaned and struggled to get out of the sleeping bag.

“Shut up!” Amy said from the bunk above mine. “I'm trying to read.”

I opened my eyes and reached for my watch hanging on a hook above my bunk. I looked at it, sat up quickly, and looked again. I couldn't believe it was almost five o'clock. I wriggled out of my sleeping bag.

At eye level, Amy glared at me. “Why aren't you outside?” I asked.

“Because I got a sunburn when you made me stay on the beach.”

I talked down to her as if she were three years old. “Amy, I didn't make you stay there. You're the one who forgot how to swim.”

“Don't act like you're my mother,” she growled.

That night I went to bed when everyone else did. But I couldn't sleep. So I got up in the middle of the night and tiptoed out of the cabin. I crossed the back deck and sat on the stern. The sharp outline of the mountain stood tall and dark above me. Moonlight lit up a patch of snow on the very top.

Gentle waves lapped against the boat and river sounds echoed from rocky crags. Somewhere up on the mountain an owl hooted. It reminded me of other years.

Before Mom got sick all three of us used to go hiking into the mountains together. For the past two summers it had been just the two of us. The summer before, Dad and I paddled up the coast and hiked into the hills. We always liked exploring streams and
rivers to find little mountain lakes where no one else went.

This river was a perfect one to follow. With so much water there had to be a lake up there somewhere. If not, it wouldn't really matter. Exploring was the part I liked best.

Dad and I had our backpacks and tents on the boat. Tomorrow I would ask him if we could take off to go hiking together. He owed me that much. I mean, didn't I peacefully accept this trip? Hadn't I been helpful and uncomplaining? I'd used
the look
only when absolutely necessary and had not yet tossed Amy overboard.

The next morning I found Dad sitting on a folding chair on the back deck. I watched his eyes follow the winding path of the river and saw the old glimmer of excitement on his face.

“I bet you're right,” he said, sipping his coffee. “I bet there's a lake up there.”

Patti came out then, carrying a coffee mug. Amy trailed behind her.

“Did I hear something about a lake?” Patti asked.

Oh-oh
.

Dad nodded. “Jessica and I might go exploring.”

“What about me?” Amy whined.

“This is just between me and my father,” I told her. I looked to Dad to confirm it. What I saw did not make me feel good. He looked from Amy to me to Patti with a lost expression on his face. Finally Patti spoke.

“Amy,” she said, “Jessica and her father are used to going on overnight hikes together. I think they'd like to get away alone.”

“That's not fair!” Her whining got louder; she was working on a tear.

“Look, Amy!” Patti said crossly. “You don't think anything is fair unless it is your idea. Besides, you could never keep up with the two of them on a hike.”

“I want to go,” Amy said stubbornly.

Dad put his hand over Patti's. “Maybe we shouldn't go just now.”

No!
I cried inside.
Don't take this away from me!

“Anyway,” my father continued, “I hate to leave you two alone on the boat.”

“We'll be fine,” Patti told him. “What could happen?”

“Well …” Dad looked back up the mountain. “I don't know.”

Please Dad!
I kept saying in my head.
Please!
Maybe I should have said it out loud. Instead, I gave him
the look
.

Amy whimpered. Her lower lip trembled. “I'd be so-oo scared,” she said. And there it was, one big sloppy tear. This kid should be in movies.

“I tell you what.” Dad turned to me. “Why don't you and I just take a day hike? You know, get up early tomorrow morning, pack a lunch and see how far we can get?”

I shrugged. “Sure Dad, whatever.”

Amy smiled.

Tears, two.
The look
, no score.

I carried my sketchbook around the deck and sat on the bow with my legs dangling over the water. I opened the sketchbook to my letter to Sara. On it I drew a picture of
Amy being strangled by two huge hands. Her tongue hung out to one side, her eyes were crossed. Underneath I printed, The Brat
.

I'm telling you Sara, it's either Amy or me. One of us has got to go!

You think you've got it bad with two little brothers and a sister? What do you say to a trade?

Dad and I almost got to go on an overnight hike, but Amy ruined it. Dad suggested a day hike, but I'm not sure if I want to go at all now.

And here I am behaving myself, trying my best not to be rude or obnoxious. What a drag!

Hot sun beat down on the boat. There wasn't a breath of wind. I went inside, hid the sketchbook under my bunk and changed into my swimsuit. I dove off the stern into clear warm water. As I swam I thought about the hiking trip.

Later, when I climbed out onto the swim grid, I had made up my mind. One day was better than nothing.

That afternoon we all piled into the dinghy for a tour of the inlet. By the time we got back a wind had come up. It turned the water choppy and grew stronger by the hour. In the late afternoon Dad and Patti listened to the marine broadcast on the VHF radio. It predicted gale force winds on the water overnight and all the next day.

Already the boat was rocking back and forth. Dad and Patti rechecked the ropes to be sure they would hold. Then Dad sat down beside me. “Jess,” he began. “I don't think tomorrow would be a good day to go hiking.”

“Why not?”

He scratched his head and looked across the water where the waves were building. “I don't like to leave the boat in this wind. I'm not sure the anchor will hold.”

“You mean you don't like to leave Patti and Amy,” I snapped.

He put his hand on my shoulder. He wasn't angry; he simply looked sad. “I wouldn't feel right about it,” he said. “Sorry, Jess, but we'll go another time. I promise.”

I pulled away from him. I needed to be alone, but that was impossible on this stupid boat. So I got my sketchbook and rowed the dinghy to shore. I walked across the beach to the river. Using small rocks as stepping-stones, I made my way to a big, smooth boulder in the middle of the river. I sat there with water rushing all around me and roaring in my ears.

Alone at last.

I stayed on that rock for hours, sketching and thinking. I tried to draw Sara's face but couldn't get it right, so I added to my letter instead. Not that Sara will ever get to read it because where could I mail it? There was no way to reach Sara. The cell phone didn't work with all those mountains around and there was no way to send an e-mail.

So anyway, Amy wins again. No hike. Big surprise.

If only you were here, we could go hiking together and forget about our problems for a while. It's so beautiful up here, I could almost be happy. If only we had two less people along.

By the time I rowed back to the boat I had made a decision.

At dinner I told them about it.

“You're not going!” Dad said, shovelling in a mouthful of stew.

“Why not?” I pushed my plate away and glared at him. “I can take care of myself.”

“Oh yeah?” Amy piped up.

“Amy,” Patti told her. “You stay out of this.”

“It's too dangerous to go hiking alone,” Dad said. “And overnight is out of the question. You don't have enough experience. You might fall and get hurt. How would anyone find you?”

Wow! He had a ready-made list. What could I say? Nothing, so I gave him
the look
. It wasn't a huge success since he was staring out the window.

“This isn't an island, you know,” he went on. “It's the mainland. Grizzly country. I saw signs of bear near the river today.”