Mom, There's a Dinosaur in Beeson's Lake Read online

  Automatic sliding doors

  Squish-o-matic your kid at the Food Mart! Have a nice day.

  The letter G

  I can’t write it in cursive. My teacher, Miss Sweetandsour, says my G’s are saggy. So are her ears.

  Ferns

  Freaky branches? Curly tendrils? Spores?? Hello, alien species!

  Getting lost

  I’d miss my dog, Joe; my friends; and my family (even Tattletale Isabelle).

  “Woof!” Joe thinks we are playing. He is chasing my foot.

  “O-kay.” She is watching me. “You’re acting like it’s the first time you’ve ever . . .”

  “Another miracle,” I shout when she doesn’t finish. “Isabelle McNally shuts up.” I collapse into a pile of clean clothes that I am supposed to fold but never do. I think this is the clean pile. Joe starts tugging on the end of my sock. I pull. He pulls. I pull.

  “Owwww!” I cry out, half-laughing when I feel a tooth sink into my toe.

  My sister gasps. “That’s it!”

  I fling a pair of my underwear at her. “What’s it?”

  Isabelle ducks and my underwear lands on my model B-52. “I get it now.”

  “What are you blabbering about now?”

  “That’s why you made the trick toe. And why you didn’t want to do a kneeling dive last week. You were scared to dive.”

  I give her a ripper snort and get my foot back from Joe.

  She comes closer. “And you’re scared of the deep end, too, aren’t you?”

  “No,” I say, but start folding my clothes, which is a dead giveaway.

  “It’s all right if you are—were—whatever.”

  “I’m not—wasn’t.” I roll a pair of socks up in a ball and throw it at her. She ducks. It hits my mom’s cookbook, which falls over onto Abalard’s paw.

  The cat coughs up a furball. “Eeeee-yaaaaaak.”

  “You could have told me,” Isabelle says. “I would have understood.”

  “You would have tattled.”

  She doesn’t say anything. Isabelle knows I am right. She picks up Joe’s squeaky hot dog and tosses it into the hall for him. “At least you’ll have a good story to tell Ashlynn and the class. I promise I’ll let you tell it—”

  “It’s all yours. I’m not going back to class.”

  “You’re quitting?”

  “Yep.”

  “But why? If you’re not scared anymore—”

  “No reason to go now,” I say, and break the news to her that our parents have canceled my fishing trip with Uncle Ant.

  “But you can’t quit now. What will I . . . ?”

  “What?”

  She shakes her head. “Never mind. Sorry about the trip. It’s still two months away. Maybe they will change their minds.”

  “Maybe,” I say, but we both know they won’t. Once you get a punishment in our house, it’s stuck to you like duct tape.

  Joe brings his toy to me and drops it. I fling the hot dog into the closet. He races after it, his paws going every which way on the hardwood floor as he scrambles around the corner of the bed. I smile. I am feeling better. I heard my dad say something about getting Mexican takeout for dinner. I usually get spicy rice and beans, but tonight I might try something different. Maybe a taco. Or even an enchilada. After all, if I can swim the Deep End, maybe I can do one or two other things on my list too. We’ll see.

  My stomach gurgles. I slide across the floor to my desk. I do a spin. “Hey, Isabelle, do you want a peanut butter celery—?”

  But she is gone.

  CHAPTER

  13

  Bravest Kid in the Universe

  I am chugging pineapple-orange juice straight from the carton when, out of the corner of my eye, I spot a group of well-dressed rodents on a yellow background. My squirrel swim trunks are swinging in the air.

  “Forget it, Isabelle,” I say. “I’m not going.”

  My mom’s head pops around the corner. She is smiling. Her smile disappears. “What is the rule, Scab?”

  “Use a glass,” I mutter. It’s so much faster this way. Besides, it’s not like I have fleas or the chicken pox or anything. Still, I get the glass.

  “I’m driving Isabelle and Doyle to swimming today,” says my mother. “Why don’t you come too? It might be fun.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “I’d love to see you swim across the deep end.”

  I slam my palm into my forehead. Isabelle cannot keep her whale mouth shut for three seconds!

  WEIRD STUFF YOUR PARENTS SAY

  WHAT MY MOM SAYS

  WHAT I SAY

  What’s the rule?

  Don’t you know?

  Don’t make me come up there.

  Who’s making you?

  Is that the best excuse you’ve got?

  Give me a minute and I’ll come up with something better.

  If all your friends jumped off a cliff, would you jump too?

  Uh, no. That would hurt.

  I hope one day you have a kid just like you.

  Thanks!

  “No, thanks.” I start gulping juice and don’t stop until it’s all gone.

  “If you won’t do it for you and you won’t do it for me, how about for your sister?”

  “Isabelle?” Her name echoes off the bottom of my empty glass. “What’s she got to do with it?”

  “I’m not supposed to tell you this, but—”

  “What?”

  My mother leans in. “Isabelle would only take the Salmon class if you took it too.”

  This doesn’t sound like my I-am-better-than-you-at-everything sister. “Why?” I ask.

  “Maybe she was a little scared about what to expect. Maybe it made her feel better to have her brother there too.”

  Isabelle scared? Hardly. Wanted me there? Never.

  I think about it. Well. Maybe.

  The front doorbell rings.

  “That’s probably Doyle,” says my mom.

  I follow her into the hall. When she opens the door, my best friend is leaning against the door frame, gulping air. His cheeks are red. “You’re not gonna believe . . . your pictures, Scab . . . it was something there . . . and they think . . . a diver . . . and they’re bringing it up.”

  “Doyle, relax,” says my mother. “Scab, what’s he talking about it?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I do,” says a voice behind us. Isabelle is standing on the stairs. “He’s talking about the digital photos that Scab’s submersible took at Beeson’s Lake.”

  I shake my head. “No, he’s not. Mom and Dad took my computer away. I never got to see—”

  “You didn’t,” she says, wincing. “But I did. Sorry, Mom. I was just so curious. Besides, I never expected to see anything. I mean, a dinosaur in Beeson’s Lake? Come on. But then, when I was looking through the pictures, I saw—”

  “Zenobia!” I cry. “You saw the dinosaur!”

  “No-ooo. But I did see something, some kind of object. I made a CD and gave it—”

  “She gave it to me.” Doyle jumps in, his voice at full strength again. “I showed it to my dad, who showed it to Mrs. Scudder at the public library, who showed it to Miss Waddington at the historical society.” He pulls out a piece of paper from his back pocket, unfolds it, and hands it to my mom. “Here’s a copy of the newspaper article Miss Waddington found. See, back in the 1940s, a couple of guys robbed the Granite First National Bank. They got away with a bunch of cash and gold bars.”

  “Are you saying—?”

  “We didn’t find a dinosaur in Beeson’s Lake, Scab. We found a 1940 Buick.” My best friend’s eyes are huge. “And it’s probably full of gold! That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you. They’re bringing the car up out of the water right now!”

  “Let’s go,” says my mother.

  “What about swimming lessons?”

  “You’ll be a little late, Isabelle.”

  I snatch the squirrel trunks off my mom’s arm and rac
e up the stairs. “Wait for me. I have to get a towel.” And Joe. “Joe!” I shout.

  “You’re coming?” asks Isabelle.

  “I’m coming.” I punch her in the shoulder. But not that hard.

  She smiles and punches me back. But not that hard.

  In the car, Doyle and I are bouncing all over the place. “Mom, go faster.”

  “I’m not running a red light, Scab.”

  “They’ll probably give us some gold as a reward,” I say.

  “We’ll be rich,” says Doyle, who is between Isabelle and me.

  “I doubt it,” says Isabelle.

  “They’ll probably put our picture in the newspaper,” I say. Sitting behind us, Joe licks the back of my neck. “Yours too.” I laugh.

  “We’ll be famous,” says Doyle.

  “I doubt it,” says Isabelle.

  “Be sure to tell the reporter everything, Scab,” says Doyle. “You know, about how you first wrestled with Zenobia and broke your fishing pole, how you invented the Surveillance Submersible, and how you went in the water to rescue Joe. Maybe I should tell it. You might leave something out. I’ll give ’em the headline, too—‘Bravest Kid in the Universe.’”

  Sweet!

  We knock knuckles.

  I look past him at Isabelle. She looks at me. And for once, my sister doesn’t say a thing.

  I don’t even have to fart.

  We both know I’m not that brave. Maybe someday I might be. When there are no more automatic doors or alien ferns or cursive G’s in the world. When I know I will never lose my family. Maybe then I’ll be the bravest kid alive.

  Then again, I have a feeling there will always be something on my top secret list of fears.

  But you dive in anyway, right?

  SEE WHAT HAPPENS

  WHEN SCAB RUNS FOR CLASSS PRESIDENT

  IN THE NEXT

  SecRets

  of a Lab Rat

  COMING SPRING 2011