My Top Secret Dares & Don'ts Page 5

  “Do not.”

  “Do so. Grandma said.”

  Glass floors? My heart starts to pound.

  “Sorry, Wyatt,” I say. “I can’t take you. Not now. Not ever.” I twirl and zoom across the square as fast as two trembling legs can carry me.

  Wyatt catches up. “Why not?”

  “You know why.”

  He sighs. “Aren’t you over that yet?”

  I don’t answer.

  “It’s no big deal. Mom’s scared of bees,” he says. “Dad hates driving next to big trucks. I flip out if I have to get a shot at the doctor’s—”

  “I get it, Wyatt. Everybody has fears. Thanks,” I clip.

  “So you’d be afraid to be that high off the ground. Then what?”

  I glare at him. “Isn’t that enough?”

  He lowers his head and starts kicking a pebble over the red brick walkway. Thank goodness that conversation is over. We head back across the wooden bridge above Fitzsimmons Creek. This time, I move a little closer to the railing—not much, but a little.

  My brother is tugging on my shirt. “Hey, Kes, remember last year, at Elvin’s birthday party, when we went to Northwest Trek and everybody was going on the zip line? I was super scared, and I didn’t want to go.”

  “I remember.”

  “I got all dizzy—”

  “And you got a bellyache,” I recall.

  “And my knees got all noodly.”

  “You were sure you were gonna die.” I think I am proving my point here.

  “But I didn’t.” Wyatt stops on the trail. “I felt horrible, like I was gonna die, but nothing bad happened. In fact, I ended up going on the zip line three times that day. Don’t you get it, Kes?”

  I do. Sort of. “So you’re saying fear can’t kill you, it just makes you think it can?”

  “Bingo.”

  I never thought about it like that before. When you hate all the things being afraid makes you feel—the pounding heart, the shortness of breath, the spinning head—it’s only natural to do whatever you can to escape it. But what if you didn’t try to outrun it? What if you stood fast, faced your fear, and said, “Okay, bring it on”? What then? I don’t know, but it might be worth a try. I look at my little brother, with his messy hair, scraped elbows, and streak of birthday cake ice cream on his chin. “You know something, Wyatt Keith Adams? You’re a pretty smart kid.”

  He folds his arms in front of him and, for the first time in his eight and one-quarter years, does not grunt.

  6

  Don’t Go on a Bear Tour with Evil Twins (but If You Must, Do Not Sit between Them)

  I’d like a hot dog and fries, please,” Wyatt says to Madeline. “No ketchup. Extra mustard.”

  “I’ll have a B.L.T.A.,” I say. That’s a bacon, lettuce, tomato, and avocado croissant sandwich. We each order an orange soda.

  There is only one person in the dining room with us: a man—in his forties, I’d guess. He’s eating a heaping salad covered in so much ranch dressing it looks like a mountain in winter. He’s spilled some dressing on the front of his olive safari shirt. The shirt has pockets everywhere, even on the shoulders. His shorts match his shirt: olive, with zillions of pockets. We finish lunch, and I pay the bill with money Mom gave me. Wyatt and I go to the lobby to wait for the bear tour people to pick us up. We’re a few minutes early. I am so nervous I have to go to the restroom to pee four times.

  “Is this bear tour thing okay for Wyatt?” I ask Dinah on my last trip back from the restroom. “He’s just a kid.”

  “Oh, yes,” she says. “He’ll love it. You get to go off-road and everything.”

  “Off-road? How far off-road?”

  She tips her head toward the door. “You’ll see.”

  A gigantic, lime-green Land Rover with a photo of a black bear running across one side of the vehicle is pulling up. KODIAK CLEM’S BEAR TOURS is plastered over the doors in bright yellow letters.

  “I get the front!” cries Wyatt, tearing for the car.

  “If we don’t make it back, tell my mom and grandma I love them,” I say to Dinah.

  The corners of her cherry-red lips turn up. “You’ll be fine.”

  I get in the car behind the driver so I can keep an eye on my brother. There are already three other people in the vehicle: a married couple in the very back and a man in his late twenties behind me. He’s got a camera and a lens so large it needs its own seat!

  “Hey there, missy.” The muscular driver is glancing at me in the rearview mirror. Sunglasses shaped like alien eyes and a straggly beard cover most of his face. He’s wearing a dark brown leather cowboy hat with red braid around the trim and a khaki shirt with the sleeves pushed up to his bulging biceps. The driver looks at a sheet of paper taped to the dash. “You must be Lark’s grandkids.”

  My brother thumps his chest. “I’m Wyatt. She’s Kestrel. Are you Clem?”

  “Nope. I’m Mutt. Clem’s driving our other vehicle. We’ll meet up at Widowmaker Ridge. It’s a rule that we always travel together in case something happens.”

  Widowmaker Ridge? In case something happens? I have to pee again.

  Wyatt is firing questions at Mutt. “Have you ever been chased by a bear? How far up the mountain do we go? How many bears do you think we’ll see?”

  Mutt keeps up. “Chased? Nah. I have enough sense to keep my distance, unlike some of the tourists, who treat bears like puppies. Big mistake. Always respect wildlife, son. We’re going up about six hundred meters or so. No telling how many bears we’ll come across, but this morning we saw a big fella catching fish at Slippery Creek.”

  “Wicked!” Wyatt does a rooster neck bob. “I hope we see lots of bears.”

  I hope we don’t. I so hope we don’t.

  My window is down. Closing my eyes, I take a big gulp of crisp mountain air. I hear the lodge door creak open.

  “Hold my lip gloss? I don’t have pockets.”

  “Neither do I.”

  “Then what is that thing sewn on the side of your sweater?”

  “A decorative accent.”

  “Come on—”

  “No! I don’t want your makeup stretching out my clothes.”

  I’d recognize that bickering anywhere. I open my eyes. Rose and Veranda are marching toward us. Veranda is wearing a pink cardigan with the sleeves pushed up, a pink lace tee, jeans, and a ball cap covered in pink rhinestones. Her pink beaded sandals go spick-spack against the flagstone. Rose has on a white boatneck top with thin, navy horizontal stripes, white shorts, and white tennis shoes without socks. Please let them be going shopping or out to lunch or anywhere that isn’t—

  My car door opens.

  With us. They are coming with us. I knew this was a bad idea.

  “Hi.” Rose smacks her gum. “Could you scoot over?”

  I start to slide across the seat. Before I can make it to the other side, Veranda flings open that door and hops in. I am trapped between the Tolliver twins.

  “Oh goody, it’s Happiness Girl,” Veranda murmurs. “Here to spread more joy?”

  I pretend not to hear that.

  “Guess not,” she spits, fixing her hair. A wide gold bracelet with three rows of diamonds slides down her arm. “Oops. I shouldn’t guess. I should know.”

  I have a feeling this is going to be the longest ride of my life.

  “Hello, ladies,” says Mutt. “Either you’re the Tollivers or I’m seeing double.”

  Everyone laughs. I try to laugh too, but can’t. I know too much.

  “Fasten your seat belts, folks.” Mutt’s voice booms through the SUV.

  I click in my seat belt, and we are off. We turn left out of the driveway and head up Painted Cliff Road. This is it. We are going up the mountain to search for bears. I’d give anything to be at Lake Wilderness with Langley and Annabeth right now. Veranda and Rose are taking out their phones. Their red cases glimmer with what I can only assume are genuine rubies. I slip out my own phone. It’s in a yellow plastic case with
an owl on the back. Veranda sneaks a look at my phone. She squishes in her lips as if I’m holding a tarantula.

  I text Langley: I am on a bear tour with Wyatt. That’s right, we are going LOOKING for bears! Can you believe that?

  I stare at my phone for several minutes, but she doesn’t text back.

  Rose tips her head to look at me. “You’re American, aren’t you?” When I nod, she says, “I could tell by your accent.”

  I have an accent? I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. I’ve noticed slight differences in the way Canadians speak too. My grandmother and Dinah pinch off their words, like they are forming them at the back of the throat instead of on the tongue. It gives them kind of a nasal sound. They pronounce words differently too. When I say the word “been,” it sounds like “ben.” When they say it, it’s “bean.” “Out” is “owt” for me and “oot” for them.

  We are winding our way up the mountain. After about a kilometer or so, the smooth pavement abruptly ends. The Land Rover bounces onto a dirt road, although I’m not sure the word “road” is even remotely accurate. It’s more like an overgrown dirt path with the biggest bumps and deepest ruts known to humanity. Now I know what Dinah meant when she said “off-road.” One second we are being thrown from side to side, and the next we are thumping our heads on the ceiling. If there are any bears out here, we’re all bucking around too much to spot them. My stomach is tumbling like a clothes dryer, and I keep banging my right knee on my brother’s seat. Wyatt, however, is having the time of his life. He’s got his hands spread out on the dashboard for stability, his head tracking right and left as he scopes the forest for bears.

  “Bear Two calling Bear One,” Mutt says into his radio. “Do you read? Over.”

  The radio crackles. “Bear Two, this is Bear One. We’re on the north side of Widowmaker Ridge at the hairpin turn above Vista Lake. We’ve got a mama bear and two cubs within sight. Over.”

  “We’re on our way,” says Mutt. “Over and out.”

  “Wahoo!” Wyatt throws up his hands.

  Mutt takes a sharp right, and I slam into Veranda’s shoulder. She shrieks.

  “Sorry,” I say.

  She glares at me.

  “Hey, Mutt,” says Wyatt. “What do you do if you come face-to-face with a bear in the woods?”

  “You don’t run, that’s for sure,” he answers. “That’s an invitation for him to chase ya. Instead, back away slowly. Wave your arms and try to make yourself look big and scary. Make some noise, too—yell or bang a pot. You want him to think you’re a threat, but you don’t want to block him in. Be sure and give the fella an escape route. The trick is not to get too close in the first place, if you can help it. Tourists see a bear and they want to get closer to take a photo. Bad idea.”

  His eyes huge, Wyatt takes in every word. The kid is mesmerized. Dinah was right. He IS loving it. I’m glad someone is. We hit our biggest pothole yet, and for a second I think the car is going to flip. It doesn’t. My right kneecap hurts from smacking Wyatt’s seat, and my stomach isn’t too happy either. It’s churning like one of those volcanoes you make in science with vinegar and baking soda. I’m probably the only one who hears it, though.

  Veranda is staring at me. “Is that noise coming from you?”

  “No,” I say.

  Rose tilts her blond head. “You sure you’re okay, Kestrel?”

  She knows my name. Breck must have told her.

  “Yes,” I say, even as I swallow the acid bubbling in the back of my throat.

  “You don’t look fine. You look positively . . .”

  “. . . green,” says Veranda, looming in for a closer look.

  Slurp. Gurgle.

  “That is you,” says Veranda. “Cut it out.”

  A cramp slices through my stomach. I groan. “I would if I could, believe me.”

  “Mutt!” cries Rose. “Carsick passenger back here. You’d better pull over.”

  “Hurry! She’s going to hurl!” yells Veranda.

  The second the Land Rover stops, Rose throws open her door. She scrambles out and turns to help me. I barely make it to the bushes before a bacon, lettuce, tomato, and avocado croissant sandwich, two scoops of Gooey Mooey, a waffle cone, and an orange soda burst from the depths of me. It is not a pretty combination.

  “Ewwwww,” wails Veranda from inside the car.

  Once I am done throwing up, Mutt is beside me. His hand is on my shoulder. “You all right, Kestrel?”

  “I think so.” I lift my head. “Sorry.”

  “No worries. Puking’s nature’s way of setting things right.”

  I look at the ground. “Then I must be one perfect girl.”

  He chuckles. “It can get bumpy, especially in that middle seat.” He hands me a bottle of water. “I can take you back to the lodge, if you want.”

  “No.” I stand fully upright. I do feel better. There’s nothing left to throw up now, even if I wanted to. “I’ll be okay.”

  “That’s the spirit.”

  As I get back in the Land Rover, I feel a light pat on my back from Rose. By the time we get to the north side of the ridge, the mama bear and her cubs are gone. No one in the SUV says anything, but the air hangs heavy with disappointment. Wyatt crumples into his seat. The photographer starts cleaning his lens. Veranda and Rose stare out their windows. They are all thinking the same thing: We missed the bears and it is all Kestrel’s fault.

  “The afternoon is young, eh? Plenty of other sites to check,” says Mutt, winking at me in the rearview mirror. “No worries.”

  I try to grin.

  For the next hour and a half, Mutt drives us up and down and around the mountain over every teeth-chattering, bone-jarring, stomach-sloshing road he knows. We spot a couple of hawks circling overhead, one marmot lounging on a rock (think groundhog), and the tail of a garter snake before it wriggles out of sight.

  We do not, however, see a single bear.

  7

  Dare to Be a Little Braver Today Than Yesterday

  Wyatt waves the television remote. “Kestrel, pleeeease, can I—?”

  “Yeah.” I don’t have the energy or the stomach for one more activity today. “But turn it off when you hear Mom coming, or we’ll both be in trouble.”

  The TV clicks on. I shuffle past the sofa toward my room.

  “Kes?”

  “Uh-huh?”

  “Don’t feel bad,” says my brother. “It could have happened to anybody.”

  “Thanks.” It could have happened to anybody, but it didn’t. I am a walking natural disaster. I should change my name to Hurricane Kestrel. Oh yeah, I know her, people at school will say. She’s a Category Five. Whatever you do, stay out of  her way.”

  “Mutt says he’ll take me up with him again when he’s got a spare seat,” says Wyatt. “For free! You don’t have to come.”

  “Good to know.”

  My phone is ringing. I fall on my back onto the bed and hold the phone above me. Before I answer the video call, I paste on a grin. “Hi, Langley.”

  “Hi!” Two faces hover in front of the screen. It’s Langley and Annabeth.

  “How was the lake?” I ask.

  “Can’t you tell?” asks Langley. “Look closer.”

  “Is that . . . Is your hair wet?”

  “Yes, it is. And why is our hair wet, Annabeth?”

  Annabeth twirls the damp end of hair around her finger. “Because the first rule of canoeing is never—”

  “—stand up in the boat,” Langley and I say at the same time, and we all burst out laughing.

  “I didn’t mean to knock us over,” wails Annabeth. “There was this big wasp, and I was trying to swat it away. Before I knew it, we were in the water.”

  “It’s okay.” Langley puts an arm around her. “I still love ya.”

  Annabeth rests her head on Langley’s shoulder. I sure do miss them.

  “Did you see Aaron?” I ask.

  “No, thank goodness,” says Langley. “The last thing I nee
d is for him to catch sight of me soaking wet. Can you imagine anything worse than your crush seeing you looking like a complete mess?”

  Breck’s face flashes in my mind. I have no idea why. Or maybe I do. Breck did see me when Mutt dropped us off this afternoon. After being tossed around like a stuffed animal for a couple of hours, not to mention tossing my own stuffing, I must have looked awful. If Breck thought so, he was kind enough not to say it.

  “Hi, Breck,” cooed Rose when he’d opened her car door.

  “Miss Tolliver.” He helped her out of the car. “Enjoy your afternoon.”

  Veranda squealed her irritation quite loudly in my left ear. “What about me?”

  Breck rushed around to her side of the car to help her out, as well.

  I slid out Rose’s door, only to find Breck’s outstretched hand waiting. “Miss Adams?”

  “You’re quick,” I said, taking his hand.

  “And you’re brave,” he whispered in my ear as I stepped past him. “Two hours stuck between the Squabble Sisters is medal-worthy.”

  Unable to wipe the grin off my face, I followed Veranda and Rose toward the lodge entrance. Rose opened the door for her sister. As Veranda waltzed in ahead of her, Rose glanced back and lifted a hand. I figured she was waving at Breck, but when I checked behind me there was nobody there. By the time I’d turned around, the door was swinging shut. She couldn’t have been waving at me, could she?

  “How is everything in Whistler?” Annabeth is asking.

  “Wyatt and I went on a bear tour.”

  “Fan-tabulous!” cries Langley.

  “We didn’t see any bears.”

  Her face falls. “You’ll see ’em next time. We’d better go,” says Langley. “I promised Dad we’d dry our hair before we go to Dabney’s.”

  They’re going to our favorite burger place. Without me.

  “Miss you,” I say.

  “Same here times a million,” says Langley.

  “Eat some curly cheese fries for me.”

  “We will,” they say. “Bye, Kestrel!”

  I hang up. Slipping off the bed, I grab the chair from the little desk, and slide it up to the window. I sit, lean my forearms on the sill, right over left, rest my chin on my arms, and simply look. I scan the trees—hundreds of hunter-green pyramids packed tightly together on the hillside like fans jammed into a rock concert. My eyes travel up to the rugged gray-and-white pinto summit peeking out over the top of the slope, then on to the smattering of popcorn clouds scooting across an azure sky. I could sit here forever.