The Secret of Ferrell Savage (11 page)

“If we're so close, then why should we hurry? Don't you think the little dude's just tapping his fingers waiting for us?”

“Look, if we have to be losers, let's at least make it as close as we can,” Mary said.

I stopped walking, and the scarf slipped from my hand and fell to the ground. My body didn't care about making Mary mad.

“Oh, for Pete's sake. Rest. Just for a minute, though, and right here,” Mary said. “We're not hiking all the way to the shelter.” I sat down on the Pollypry. Was Mary glaring at me or squinting into the falling snow? I was too tired to guess. “You know, people can go days without eating,” she said.

And with that, she pulled out a chunk of beef jerky and chomped down on it. My mouth watered, and I felt slightly dizzy. I wanted to push her face-first into the snow. Hunger will do that to a guy. I lay down on the sled, closing my eyes and trying to find a picture in my head that didn't have food in it.

That's when the flakes really started to fall. Hard. I sat up, but I couldn't even see the skating shelter anymore.

“Hey, the Weather Channel said it was going to be clear all day,” Mary said.

“They were wrong,” I grumbled into the wind. I wasn't sure if Mary could even hear me, so I said more loudly, almost yelling at her, “Since when does anyone put that much faith in the Colorado weather report?” The wind whipped around us, and snow was coming down harder with each word I spoke. I stood up, and Mary moved closer to me, as if there were something I could do to stop the snow.

“Ferrell! I can't see in front of us . . . or behind us!”

It was as if someone had dropped white buckets over our heads. I grabbed the Pollypry off the ground and shouted to Mary, “Hold on to my jacket! We can't just stand here. We've got to keep heading toward the bottom of the slope.”

“But how do you know we're going the right way?” Mary asked.

“I don't!”

She hung on to the back of my jacket, and I took a few steps forward and hit a tree. We could get really lost if we kept walking, so I came up with an idea that could at least help Mary.

“Face the tree and crouch down,” I told her. I felt her let go of my jacket. “Are you as close to the tree as you can get?”

“Yes!”

I turned the Pollypry lengthwise. The black of Mary's jacket and her teal-blue hat were just visible, and I could tell she was pressed up tight against the tree. I shoved one end of the lounge securely into the snow and pushed the other end against the tree and over her head. I took off my coat to fill in the gaps in the webbing. It wouldn't keep her snow free, but it would help.

I curled up low, facing the tree, and pressed as close to it as I could get. As long as I kept contact with Mary, I knew I wouldn't lose her. One step away, and I might never see her again.

“Ferrell! Where are you?” Mary's voice was frantic.

“I'm right here!” I shouted. I tried to reach for her, so she could feel how close I was, but I decided to keep my face covered with my arms instead.

“We're going to die, Ferrell!”

“No, we're not. We're just going to be scared for a while, but we won't die.”

“How can you know that?” she screamed at me.

“Because I'm the Survivor Boy, remember? And you're with me,” I said.

THE NEXT THING I KNEW
Mary was hitting me. Smacking me all over.

My head was tucked tightly under my arms, so at least she wouldn't be able to give me a concussion. I tried to uncurl my body from under the tree, but I couldn't move. I was barely able to lift my head to see that the snow and wind had died down. I could see a little farther ahead of us than before. Mary hadn't been hitting me. She was knocking the snowballs off my hat, my shoulders, and my arms.

“You look like the Abominable Snowman. And your lips are purple.” Mary wasn't making fun; she
sounded scared. “Where's your jacket?”

I looked up and pointed with my ice-coated eyeballs to the top of the Pollypry. Mary turned and grabbed my jacket from its makeshift roof position and shook off the snow with all her might. The feather, still stuck in the grommet, was bent in half and frayed, like it belonged to a swan that had been half eaten by an alligator.

“Look what you've done to yourself! Are you crazy? I would have been fine.” She continued brushing the snow off me, brushing and smacking a little harder than she needed to.

She pulled me slowly to my feet and forced my stiff arms into my jacket sleeves. “Are you all right?” she asked.

I wanted to say,
I'm fine, so fine that I can't even feel anything at all
,
which is kind of cool
,
but it makes it hard to move
, but I didn't quite have the lip action to get out those words. Then when I tried to nod, I realized my neck and shoulders were shaking too hard. So from the only warm and properly functioning spot in my whole body, probably near that spot where the marble was lodged, I managed to muster up enough strength to say, “Uh-huh.” I hoped it was loud enough to be heard.

“You've got to move around, Ferrell. It's the best thing for you. Get your blood going. Come on, let's start walking.”

My arms had now wrapped themselves tightly around me, and all I wanted to do was curl up into a ball.

“Come on! Pump those arms.” She grabbed my left arm and lifted it up and down, up and down. She was going to break me!

“Now walk. Let's go.” She pulled the Pollypry a few steps ahead of me, but I couldn't get my legs to work.

As soon as she noticed I wasn't following, she stumbled back to me. She slid the sled up behind me. “Lie down,” she ordered. “I'll pull you to the shelter. We'll get there faster.”

My brain argued and said I didn't need to lie down, but the rest of me didn't agree. Mary put her arms around me and sort of tipped me over onto the sled. I closed my eyes and lay there, feeling myself being pulled.

I heard a door unlatch and felt the skis scrape across something rough and hard: the concrete floor. The shelter. We had made it. The air was warm, and as soon as the door clanked shut, all I could hear was
Mary's breathing. I opened my eyes, and her worried face hovered over mine. I tried to smile to show I was okay.

“I'll help you up,” she said. “The hearth is still warm from a fire here earlier.”

She put her arms around me, pulled me to my feet, and half carried me to the fireplace. I wanted to make a joke and say,
Is this a hug or are we dancing?
But I still couldn't get the words out. Before she lay me down on the hearth, she took my jacket off me, then put it over me as a blanket. She rolled up her own jacket for me to use as a pillow. The coals, which were barely smoldering, had a sleepy campfire smell, and the warm bricks heated my back the way a hot concrete pool deck bakes you after you've jumped out of a freezing swimming pool. I finally stopped shaking so hard, and my world felt a little less like an earthquake.

The shelter was made of logs and was about the size of a one-car garage. Some light came in through two windows. Mary pulled a wooden bench up next to me and sat down.

“I almost killed you. You almost died—again!—because of me,” she whispered.

But after my first so-called near-death accident,
a lot of people told me about what happens when you come to the edge of death. And, once again, none of those things had happened. I hadn't seen a white light, my dead relatives hadn't called out to me, the hands of Elvis hadn't reached for me. I didn't have the energy to say all that, though, so I went with “Nuh-uh.”

“Are you comfortable?” she asked, tucking my jacket underneath me, like a blanket around a mattress. “There must be more I can do for you. Oh! I know! Water! You must need water. I saw a bucket outside. I'll fill it with snow, and you'll have water to drink in no time.” She bolted out the door, leaving a cold flurry of air behind her, and quickly returned with what looked like an oversized white snow cone.

“Do you want me to feed you some now?” she asked.

“I'm good,” I said.

“Oh, Ferrell, I'm so sorry. I shouldn't have put you in this position. Everything I do turns into a failure!”

“Science fair,” I argued.

“Ughh, don't remind me. Second place! How shameful!”

“Council vice president,” I whispered. Why couldn't Mary see how amazing she was?

“Exactly!” She stood up and stomped around the room. “When I didn't win the presidency, that's when I suspected I was on the same losing streak as my relatives. The plug popping out of my sink made it official. I should have known coming with you today would only lead to a catastrophe. You must hate me for being so awful!”

“I don't,” I said.

“Well, thanks a lot! That just makes me feel worse!” she yelled, and plopped herself back down on the bench next to me and stared at the floor. “I do these awful things to you, and you just go on liking me! At some point, it just feels rude.”

I was flabbergasted. I wanted to say that out loud, so Mary could hear me use the word, but my poor brain was so twisted up that I started to laugh instead. It came out as a long wheeze, which startled Mary at first, but when she realized I was in hysterics, she folded her arms and scowled at me. Then, finally, she laughed too. Soon she was laughing so hard that her nose squeaked, and tears streamed down her face.

At last we caught our breath. She said, “You always have fun, don't you? I mean, here you are, half dead, frostbitten, and starving, and you're laughing your head off. You didn't even want to be here,
or do the race at all, but you did it for me, to protect my secret, and you show no resentment toward me.”

She stopped talking and waited for me to respond, but I didn't know what to say. My brain was thawed now, thanks to the hearty laugh, but I was at a loss for words.

She leaned over me and spoke softly. “Are you tired? Do you wish I'd shut up? I promise I won't be mad if you say yes.”

“Keep talking,” I answered.

“I know this is going to sound dumb, but you know what I was thinking about when we were huddled around the tree during that whiteout? I was remembering how in first grade, Miss Cowl would pass out juice boxes at snacktime. She always had orange or grape or lemonade, and when kids fussed about the flavor, she'd say, ‘You get what you get and don't throw a fit.' Man, that lady got on my nerves! But the thing is, no matter what flavor you got, you'd pick it up, slurp it down, and say, ‘This one is my favorite.' I had thought it was just a food thing for you, but you're like that about everything. You just roll along, not worrying about winning or making good grades or being the best.”

She paused, and I wondered if she was going to start yelling at me for being lazy again. But she didn't. Instead she said, “I wish I could be more like that.”

My face burned, but I managed to say, “Thanks.”

“You know,” she went on, “maybe if I could be more like you, I wouldn't be such a loser. Maybe I don't have to hate my dad for being stupid and leaving us. I mean, Mom and I are doing okay, right? Maybe the way things turned out is my favorite way, because, well, any other way and I might not have gotten to spend so much time with . . . I don't know . . . you.”

I was tingling from head to toe, and I wasn't sure if it was because of her words or because my blood was coming unfrozen. I blinked and kept listening.

“There's something I've been wanting to tell you. I think you're—”

Brr zzz brr zzz . . .

Mary jumped. “Is that your stomach again?”

“My cell phone,” I said.

“You've had a cell phone all this time? Are you kidding me? I could've called for a helicopter and had you flown out. Where is it?”

I'd hoped she'd ignore it. Whoever it was, they'd call back. Besides, I'd only brought the phone in case of an emergency, and, in my opinion, being half dead, frostbitten, and starved in a shelter with Mary, who was about to confess some kind of feeling for me, which I think was probably going to be pretty
awesome, was no cell phone–worthy emergency.

She reached into my coat pocket and pulled out the phone.

Throw it out the door, Mary. Just throw it!

“Hello?” she asked. She listened for a few seconds, then looked at me and said, “It's Littledood!”

“How did he get my number?” I asked.

Mary shrugged. “What?” she yelled into the phone. “You're talking too fast, slow down!” Then to me she said, “He says he's had an accident.”