“He’s probably not used to people saying no to him,” I reason. “This must be a huge shock to his system. He’s rebelling. What would you do in his place?”
“I would be the exact opposite of him,” she says with absolute certainty. “In other words, I wouldn’t be a jerk.”
Janelle, the water sports pathfinder, announces that we’re going to be taking out the pedal boats today. The Oasis is located on the Saline River, right at the inlet lake that we use for boating and kayaking. As we all start pairing up for the two-person pedal boats, Jett reaches into his pocket as if searching for his phone, which obviously isn’t there. It’s a common rookie mistake at the center—we’re so used to having our devices right at hand.
Am I crazy to think that Jett and I could be friends? We’re both kind of misfits here. Neither of us loves the Oasis. Okay, him more than me, but that might be just because I’m way better at letting myself be pushed around. Whatever the reason, Jett has a zero percent chance of ever getting picked to be somebody’s partner for pedal boats. And that’s going to make him hate it here even more than he does now.
So I step forward. “I’ll go with Jett.”
This is news to Grace, who is always my pedal-boating partner. Her eyes shoot sparks at me.
“All right.” Janelle beams. “Jett, you’re with Tyrell.”
Jett’s half-closed eyes open maybe an extra millimeter, but that’s his only reaction.
Janelle rattles off the rules, which the rest of us have heard before: bathing suits only; baling buckets handy in the back; keep hands and feet inside the boat; pedal in unison; and most important, don’t get too close to the river, where the current can catch you. “Not unless you speak Creole,” the pathfinder concludes. “The Saline will take you all the way down to Louisiana. Any questions?”
Jett raises his hand. “Do we have to do it?”
“Can it, smart guy,” Matt puts in wearily. “Yes, you have to do it.”
And the next thing I know, I’m climbing into the boat next to Vladimir Baranov’s son.
“My family are big Fuego fans,” I tell him as we pedal out onto the lake. “We use ByteBolt on our computers and do most of our shopping through Fuego Prime.”
“Yeah?” he replies in a bored tone. “I’ll be sure to tell Vlad. Oh, wait. No phone. Sorry.”
“I mean, he obviously doesn’t have to know about every customer,” I say hastily. “Fuego has, what, two billion users?”
“Two-point-five,” Jett corrects me. “And my dad cares about every single one of them—more than he cares about his own son.”
“Uh, I’m sure that’s not true—”
He shoots me a sideways glance. “Did he send any of them to this hippy-dippy wellness Podunk?”
“Well, I’m sure he has his reasons—” I risk a glance at his bland features. “Come to think of it, why did your father send you here?”
“Because Pluto was already booked.”
I’m about to ask what he could possibly have done to tick his father off so badly, but I catch a glimpse of Grace. She’s in the blue boat with Stuart, one of the high school guys. She’s making an O motion with her finger, and I realize what she’s trying to tell me. We’re going around in circles. A quick check reveals that this is because I’m pedaling and Jett isn’t.
“Hey, you have to pedal too,” I urge.
“Why? I don’t want to go anywhere.”
“Because if you don’t, we’ll—”
There’s a scraping sound as our boat runs aground in the reeds.
Jett sits up and looks around. When he sees Matt scowling at us, he breaks into a happy smile.
“Back up, Einstein!” Matt hollers from the opposite shore.
Violating the rules, I reach my foot out of the boat and jam it into the silty bottom in an attempt to pry us loose. The mud is really soft, so I can’t get any leverage.
Jett isn’t helping. For the first time since I laid eyes on him, he actually seems to be enjoying himself.
Lazily, he plucks a bulrush out of the water and examines it with interest. “I wonder how these things would fly.” He scrambles up, and with the boat rocking beneath him, he rears back and launches the rush like a spear. It soars high in the air and lands with a small splash near the cluster of boats pedaling around.
“Wow,” I can’t help commenting. “I didn’t think it would go so far.”
“I know, right?” He’s impressed. “The fat part gives it weight and the stalk adds stability.” He pulls out another rush and cocks back his arm like a pitcher. “Watch this one.”
“Careful you don’t hit anybody,” I put in.
Jett’s second throw is much harder, the action of his body jarring our boat free of the mud and sending us back into open water. The projectile sails halfway across the lake and, as if aimed by an evil spirit, comes down into the lead boat.
“Yeow!” comes a deep-throated cry of outrage.
Jett is still on his feet, arms spread wide in triumph when Brandon peers over to investigate the source of the missile that clobbered him.
“What’d you do that for?”
I grab Jett’s arm and pull him back down to the seat. “Aw, jeez! You just nailed the biggest, meanest kid in the whole center!”
Jett is serene. “Be whole, man.”
He’s not nearly so calm a few seconds later when Brandon and his partner, Armando, pedal out of the group, kicking up a pretty good spray. There’s no question that they’re coming straight for us. Jett finds his pedals at last and we’re headed at them on a collision course.
“You don’t want to mess with Brandon,” I plead. “His dad used to play for the 49ers!”
“My dad used to own the 49ers,” he shoots back.
The transformation in Jett when he isn’t half asleep is amazing. His eyes are wide and bright blue. His cheeks flame. The grin is practically ear to ear, revealing a mouth full of gleaming white teeth. Compare that to Brandon, whose expression is like a line of thunderheads as he closes in on us. Maybe Mr. Bucholz came here to get less aggressive, but it’s not affecting Junior very much.
I catch a fleeting glimpse of Grace in the blue boat. She was annoyed at me a few minutes ago, but now she’s all sympathy. Or maybe she’s distracted because she’s wondering what to wear to my funeral.
“I want to talk to you, rich boy!” Brandon roars.
We’re seconds away from a painful head-on collision when Jett reaches over and heaves the tiller as far as it will go in the opposite direction. Our boat pivots suddenly and swerves out of the path of the oncoming Brandon and Armando. They miss us completely. Brandon lunges for Jett and belly flops into the water.
“We’re dead,” I predict mournfully as we pedal away. “We’re so dead.”
“Try a little meditation,” Jett advises.
By the time the dripping Brandon climbs back into his boat, we’ve got a solid head start and we’re moving even faster than before. The other kids and the people onshore are all yelling at us. What are they saying?
“Turn back!” Janelle’s frantic voice rises above the others.