Nessie Quest

by Melissa Savage

And then the worst thing happens.

  Dax gives her his smile.

  The one-lipped one.

  The one he smiles at me.

  “Well, we better get going, then,” I say, curling my arm around Briony’s and trying to pull her up off the step.

  Briony slips her arm away from mine like a ninja and keeps on smiling her crazy smile. “I see ye play the guitar?”

  “Yep,” he says.

  “Yeah, yeah…he plays, he sings…da, da, da, let’s get going or dinner is going to get cold.”

  “I play the piano,” she gushes. “And I sing too. I’m in choir in school. D’ye wan’ to hear me sing? I mean, mebbe I could sing for ye sometime—”

  That’s when I give her a mighty yank by the back of her sweater to really get her attention.

  Which it does, because she gives me a very dirty look.

  “We really have to go, Dax,” I say, stumbling up the steps as I pull on her arm. “Have fun with Mr. Dunbar the Third. We’ll see you later.”

  “Right,” Dax says, bounding down the steps.

  “Hey,” Briony complains. “What’s wrong wi’ ye?”

  “I was doing that for you,” I tell her. “I hate to be the one to tell you this, but you totally embarrassed yourself back there.”

  She puts two hands on her hips and gives me an angry stare.

  “Emmmmmbarrassing,” I say.

  “That lad is pure tidy,” she tells me. “I mean seriously barry.”

  I know I’m going to be sorry for asking her, but I do it anyway. “What is that supposed to mean?”

  She puts her hands on the banister and stretches her neck to sneak another peek at Dax through the spiral of the staircase.

  “He’s utterly wonderful is what he is,” she gushes. “And ye see him every day, ye jammy lass?”

  “Mmm,” I say, shaking my head. “Wonderful? Not sure I’d use that particular word. I mean, you know…he’s okay.”

  “Are ye well radge?”

  “I don’t think so,” I say.

  But I don’t tell her what word I wrote in my feelings journal that first day I met Dax or what I think about him when I see him in that jean jacket with the peace sign on the back. Those words are for no one’s eyes but mine. That’s why my feelings journal has found its new home under the mattress.

  But it doesn’t mean I like the kid or anything.

  I mean, do I think he’s cute? Sure, he’s cute in an obvious sort of way with the seaweed eyes and the one-lip smile, but that doesn’t mean I like him. Do I think he’s cool and smart and really good at playing the guitar and funny and a little bit weird…oh, and do I like the way he uses people’s initials instead of their full names or what it sounds like when he says my handle on the radio or how he shakes his hair out of his eyes when he’s playing the guitar? I mean, yeah, I suppose I do…but it doesn’t mean I like him, like him.

  “You know,” I say, “he’s…well, I would say he is a little…it’s like this, he’s…he’s like a…this is what it is, okay? He’s like a, um…a—”

  “I think someone would like to winch with our lad Dax.”

  “I would not,” I snap. “Wait. What is that?”

  She smiles real wide this time and puckers her lips up into the air and makes kissing noises.

  “First of all”—I point a sharp finger in her direction—“that’s just plain gross, and secondly, you couldn’t be more wrong.”

  She’s still smiling.

  I point to myself. “You think I have a crush on that kid?”

  “Quite right, and I think he fancies ye too,” she says. “I saw the way he looked at ye when he said goodbye. I think he might want to nip on ye too.”

  “Okay, there will be no winching or nipping of any kind,” I tell her. “Plus, he doesn’t like me, he makes fun of me all the time.”

  “That’s exactly what lads do when they like ye.” She starts up the steps.

  I think about that and follow her.

  “I don’t think so, because when Tad Garrett liked me in fourth grade, he gave a note to Britney B to give to me and it said Do you like me?, with a no box and a yes box. I checked the yes box and we were officially boyfriend and girlfriend for three weeks. But we ignored each other the entire time. And then I heard three weeks later he asked Emmanuelle Penney the same question and she had checked yes. So then he ignored her.”

  “What’s your point?”

  “The point is he never made fun of me once. He just never talked to me.”

  “Aye, lads can be well radge. But I still think there’s somethin’ happenin’ between you and Dax.”

  “Well, there isn’t,” I tell her. “I have no feelings about that kid whatsoever.”

  “So ye keep prattlin’ on aboot.”

  “Listen,” I say. “I would know if I liked that kid, which I don’t. And I know for a fact that he’s not pure barry or toody.”

  “Tidy,” she corrects me. “He’s pure tidy. And, I might add, downright scrummy.”

  After Uncle Clive, Aunt Isla and Briony have gone home, I lie in my bed staring at the ceiling. That’s when it comes to me. Exactly what might raise Hammy Bean’s spirits.

  A killer article.

  One that is so stellar, he’s going to want to read it word for word on the very first podcast and maybe even interview me.

  The one and only Tobin Sky will have to settle for second place.

  I would bet any money on it.

  It’ll be the breakthrough Hammy Bean’s been looking for.

  I spend the entire week working on it and finally email it to him on Friday, letting him know I’m on my way to the Juggernaut office. But I stop at Ness for Less for a Coke and a Kit Kat bar first.

  “Hello, Mr. Dunbar the Third,” I call when the bell on the door dings.

  Dax is on the counter again playing his guitar and I know I hear my name in the words he’s singing right before he stops.

  My Nikes halt dead in their tracks and I point a finger at Dax.

  “Were you just singing about me?”

  “No,” he insists.

  But I can’t help but notice his cheeks getting a shade pinker.

  I don’t know what Briony is even talking about. Maybe I think he’s cute and maybe I like the way he looks in his jean jacket and maybe the tips of my ears feel hot sometimes when his seaweeds meet mine, but that doesn’t mean I like him, like him.

  “Good mornin’, Ms. Ada Ru,” Quigley Dunbar III calls back to me. “Here for yer regular Coke an’ a Kit Kat bar?”

  “That’s right,” I tell him, heading to the refrigerator and grabbing a can of soda. “I’m on my way to see Hammy Bean today. I wrote a killer article that I hope he’s going to want to read on the very first podcast.

  I slide the can of Coke and the Kit Kat bar onto the counter.

  “That will be one pound an’ thirty-one pence, please,” Mr. Dunbar III says.

  I take the coins from my pocket and pick the ones I need and put the others back.

  “Dear girl, ye should have a jacket on today, yer arms are filled wi’ goose bumps, lass.”

  “Yeah,” I say, rubbing them down. “It was warm and sunny yesterday.”

  “The weather changes quickly here because of the mountains,” Dax says.

  “I’ll be okay,” I say.

  “Here,” Dax says, setting Ole Roy to the side and shrugging his jean jacket off his shoulders. “You can wear mine if you want.”

  “Ah…you mean…that? I mean, y-your…your jean jacket?” I point to it hanging in his hand.

  He shrugs. “Yeah, why not?”

  “Oh…well, I wouldn’t want you to get cold.”

  “I’ll be okay,” he says. “Here, take it.”

  I slip one arm in and then the ot
her. It’s still warm and smells like him. Like soap and whatever he shampoos his hair with, which is sweet and spicy and a little bit tropical. The shoulders are too big and the arms reach well below my fingers.

  It’s perfect.

  “Thanks,” I say.

  “Yer change, lass,” Mr. Dunbar III says, handing me a few coins.

  “Oh…thank you,” I say, dropping them into the pocket of my jeans.

  “So…did you want to come with me to see Hammy Bean?” I ask Dax.

  “Yeah, sure,” he says, jumping down from the counter and swinging Ole Roy around to his back. “Later, QDT. Thanks for the tips. You said key of G instead of E, right?”

  “Aye, I think G would be best,” Mr. Dunbar III says, and then waves a hand to us as we’re on our way out the door. “Tatty bye, kids.”

  “Hey,” I say. “How far have you gotten on the Harry Potter series?”

  “I’m on book seven, but don’t say anything. I just started it.”

  “Oooh, that’s a good one,” I tell him. “Don’t worry, though. I won’t give any spoilers.”

  Once the door of Ness for Less closes behind us, Dax grabs the sleeve of the jacket and drags me over to the side of the walkway.

  “I have to tell you something,” he whispers.

  “Hey,” I say. “What are you doing?”

  “You will never in a million years guess what I found out,” Dax tells me.

  I open my eyes wide at him.

  “What?”

  “Guess.”

  “I’m not going to guess,” I tell him.

  “Come on, just one guess,” he says.

  “You said I won’t guess it anyway, so just tell me.”

  “One guess,” he says again. “What will it hurt? Come on, I gave you my jacket.”

  “Fine,” I say. “Ummmmm…you’re done with Hammy Bean’s intro.”

  He makes an annoying buzzer noise. “Wrong,” he says. “Not even close. Try again.”

  “Oooh!” I clasp my hands together. “My intro? Did you finish mine?”

  “Almost, but no, that’s not it either.”

  “Really? You’re almost done? Is that what you were singing to Quigley Dunbar the Third? In the key of G?”

  “You’re changing the subject,” he informs me.

  “What’s the subject?”

  “What you’ll never guess in a million.”

  “Just tell me already,” I say.

  He looks to the right and then the left and places two palms on my shoulders, just like Dad does when he’s setting me up for one of his jokes.

  “I found out why Mamo Honey quit the Nessie Race.”

  I suck air. “Get out!” I whisper with wide eyes. “You know the top-secret bobble that is so Nessie-sensitive, Hammy Bean can’t even let the Jug crew know about it?”

  “Yep,” he says.

  “Tell me,” I say. “Wait…I bet you anything it has something to do with what’s padlocked up in that old garage in the back of their house, doesn’t it? Doesn’t it?” I stand on my tiptoes and bounce up and down. “I know it does! Does it?”

  He looks to the right and then the left again and then leans even closer to me, which causes me considerable knee weakness.

  “QDT told me the whole deal,” he says. “But he swore me to secrecy, so you have to swear too.”

  “I swear.” I make a crossing motion over my heart. “Hope to die,” I tell him.

  “It has to do with a yellow submarine and a near-death experience.”

  “Wait a second,” I say then, putting my hands on my hips. “Is this a joke? Like the whole pooping goose thing? A yellow submarine flies in the wind while the goose poops on a Subaru?”

  His laugh comes up in a burst. “No, but that’s good.”

  “So you’re being totally serious?”

  “Totally serious.”

  “Swear?”

  “Swear.”

  My eyes open wider and I suck air.

  “So that’s what she’s got locked in the shed?” I ask. “An actual submarine?”

  “It’s got to be what’s in there,” he says.

  “Wait, aren’t submarines supposed to be super huge, though?”

  “I guess this is a smaller version or something.”

  “That’s crazy,” I say. “So…what was the accident?”

  “I don’t know all the details, but I found out there was an accident with the yellow submarine and she almost died from it. Which is why she doesn’t like to talk about it. After it all happened she decided Hammy Bean was more important than anything else. And if something happened to her, who would take care of him? You know, because of his parents and everything. So she quit the Loch Ness Project and that’s when she started the Nessie Quest business. Even though she was considered the top investigator by scientists all around the world. She had even suspected that a portion of the loch was a hundred feet deeper than the rest. But because of the accident, she was never able to prove it.”

  “Whoa,” I say. “Did someone actually save her?”

  “Yeah, she almost drowned,” he tells me. “The submarine started to take on water, like six hundred feet below the surface. And you’ll never guess who saved her.”

  “Who?”

  “Corny. She radioed for help and he was there. I guess he ended up having to give her serious CPR and everything.”

  “Cornelius. Blaise. Barrington.” I say each word slow and careful.

  “Yep,” says Dax, nodding.

  “No wonder they call him extraordinaire,” I say. “This story is getting good.”

  “Epic,” he says. “But you still have to give me a part cooler than Hermione.”

  “Fine,” I say.

  “Right on,” he calls out. “Are you thinking Wolfgang or Guitarman?”

  I start walking and he scrambles to follow me. “I mean, I’m fine with either one, really.”

  I roll my eyes even though I can’t help but grin way wider than I want to.

  And when he’s not looking, I slip my Kit Kat bar deep inside the pocket of his jean jacket just like Mom did with Jeff What’s-His-Name.

  I ring the old-fashioned doorbell and then crack open the red door of Tibby Manor and poke my head inside. “Hammy Bean!” I call.

  “He’s upstairs, love,” Mamo Honey hollers back to me from the kitchen.

  Me and Dax stop in the doorway of the kitchen and find her. Mamo Honey is at the table writing numbers in a leather-bound notebook.

  “Cheers, Mamo Honey,” I tell her.

  “Hello, kids,” she says.

  “What are you doing?” I ask her.

  “Oh, just the books for the business,” she says.

  “I just wanted to say sorry again for the other night. We really didn’t mean to make you worry.”

  She smiles and scribbles more numbers. “I appreciate that, lass, but I have a feelin’ ye may not have been the instigator o’ that wee excursion.”

  I smile too. “I suppose he’s just like you in a way, huh?”

  “Aye, I’m afraid our love for cryptozoological mysteries is in the blood,” she says.

  I look at Dax and he looks at me.

  “So I—I heard that, um, you…you, well, were a great explorer in your time.”

  Dax smacks my arm.

  “Is that right, lass?” she says, writing down another number.

  “A famous one,” I go on.

  “Well, I dinna ken aboot that.”

  “You were probably the only female explorer, though, huh?” I say. “I mean, of that time.”

  She stops writing and looks at me. “Aye, an’ it was a challenge,” she says. “A wonderful one. But that was in the past.”

  “Yeah…I heard that you…ah, that
you…ah…”

  Dax smacks me again and shakes his head.

  “…you didn’t want to do it anymore,” I say.

  “Aye, it was time,” is all she says.

  “Have you ever thought about starting up again?”

  “Oh, no, dear, my time is past. There are plenty o’ new explorers oot there to find new answers. It’s their time now.”

  Hammy Bean’s feet stomp in the hall above us.

  “Are ye comin’ up here or aren’t ye?” he calls down at us from the top of the stairs.

  Mamo Honey gives us a big grin then. “He’s been anxiously awaitin’ yer visit this mornin’,” she tells me.

  I wrap my arms around the back of her shoulders and she turns to look at me.

  “What was that for, lass?”

  “For all the orange possibilities you discovered in your time,” I tell her. “And all the ones you help Hammy Bean explore. I’m just happy I get to be a part of it.”

  She holds her arms out to me, enveloping me in a warm hug.

  “Thank ye,” she tells me, and reaches for Dax’s hand. “Hammy Bean hasna ever had a friend like you and Dax. Ye have made a big difference in his life. An’ not because ye treat him like he’s special or different in any way—it’s because ye don’t. He’s just one o’ ye, and that has changed things for him in a way that has made him smile down to his toes—and I havena seen that in…well, I guess I’ve never seen it.”

  “Hello?” Hammy hollers from the top of the steps. “Are ye comin’?”

  “He doesn’t sound very happy right now,” I say to Mamo Honey.

  “I’m sure you kids can cheer him up.”

  * * *

  Hammy Bean is behind the desk, his fingers racing on the keyboard. His computer voice names each letter he types.

  Dax finds his leather chair in the corner and starts his strumming.

  “Did you get it?” I ask him.

  Hammy Bean stops typing and leans back in his too-large leather office chair. “Aye,” he says. “I got it this mornin’.”

  “And you read it?”

  “Aye, I listened to it twice.”

  I wait for it.

  But he just sits there, his fingers intertwined on the back of his head, not saying a single word.