The Infinity Year of Avalon James

by Dana Middleton

  I looked around. There were some really big seventh- and eighth-grade girls and boys we would be competing against. They looked at me and Isabel like we were little kids who were crashing their big-kid party. We sat down together on the stairs that led up to the stage.

  That’s when Mrs. Jackson showed up. She walked into the backstage area like she was the queen bee herself. Get it? The Queen … Bee …

  She started lining us up to go onstage. The fourth graders were up front, followed by the older grades. I saw Hari Singh run in. Mrs. Jackson saw him, too, and tapped her watch.

  “You’re late, Mr. Singh,” she said, and everyone turned and looked at him. “I was starting to get worried.”

  Hari smiled and brushed his hair out of his eyes. “No need to worry, Mrs. J,” he said. “I wouldn’t miss this for the world. W-O-R-L-D.”

  All the kids laughed. To the spellers of our school, Hari Singh was like a rock star.

  As Hari got in line, we heard Mr. Peterson at the microphone on the stage. “Parents, students, guests, can I have your attention, please?”

  Everybody in the lunchroom and auditorium got quiet. Mr. Peterson continued. “Welcome to the Sixty-Eighth Annual Grover Cleveland School-Wide Spelling Bee.”

  We heard clapping and some of the big students behind us in line started stomping their feet.

  “As you know, great spelling is a tradition here at Grover Cleveland. Over the years, we have had four spellers from our very own school make it to the National Spelling Bee in Washington, DC. Last spring, our own Hari Singh placed twenty-seventh in the national bee.”

  There was more clapping and foot stomping. From my spot on the stairs, I could see some of the audience. I saw Hari’s parents, Mr. and Mrs. Singh, in the front row. The Singhs are from India. Hari’s mom wears colorful dresses called saris that wrap around her all the way down to her feet. She has long black hair and a red dot on her forehead. His dad wears regular clothes and thick black glasses. They both speak with accents because they both grew up in India. Hari grew up here.

  I heard Mr. Peterson introduce Mrs. Jackson, the spelling bee faculty sponsor. Then he invited the fourth-grade spellers to the stage.

  There were rows of chairs on risers on the stage, each row for a different grade. The fourth graders sat down in chairs on the front row as the audience clapped for them.

  Then Mr. Peterson called us, the fifth graders. As I walked onto the stage, I felt for the lucky acorn Atticus had given me that was buried in my pocket. I looked out and was surprised how full the auditorium was. All those applauding people made it suddenly more real.

  Then came the older grades. When Hari appeared, there was the biggest roar from the crowd yet. I watched him leap up the risers to the seventh-grade row and sit down. I saw him look at his parents, for just a second, and smile. Then he went back to being cool again.

  I looked out at the audience for my mom. I couldn’t see her. I saw Atticus, though. He was sitting with Caroline and Will in the second row. He smiled and nodded at me, which should have calmed me down but it didn’t. I forced a half smile back at him.

  Farther back in the audience, I saw Elena sitting with her family. Her older brother, Mark, was in the bee, too. Mark was in eighth grade. I’d never really met him but he seemed nicer than his sister.

  I saw an empty seat at the end of one row in the audience and imagined it was reserved for my dad. What if he was somehow magically invisible and sitting there right now? If I needed help, he could secretly mind-talk to me how to spell any word. It felt like an Infinity Year wish that was too good to be true.

  The spelling bee was soon underway. It was a lot like our classroom bee—only bigger. When it was your turn to spell, you had to walk up to a microphone at the front of the stage and spell your word to the audience. There were two microphones at the front of the stage. One was higher for the bigger kids and the other was lower for the littler kids.

  Mrs. Jackson sat in front of another microphone at a table to the side of the stage and moderated. That means she really ran the whole show. She was there to give us our words, answer our questions, and smile at us encouragingly. She was also the one who would be ringing the bell.

  Mrs. Jackson had explained that in this bee, when you got a word wrong, the bell would ring and you would have to leave the stage. In the end, there would only be two spellers left on the whole stage together.

  The eighth graders were each called up first. Mrs. Jackson planned it this way so that the younger kids wouldn’t be so nervous. Then there were the seventh graders and Hari Singh, who, of course, spelled his word right. By the time the sixth graders were spelling, my palms were sweaty. When the first fifth grader, Aubrey Izurieta, walked to the microphone, my mouth was so dry I could hardly swallow.

  Aubrey spelled her word correctly and sat back down again. Then it was Isabel’s turn. She walked to the microphone and was asked to spell the word conundrum. Isabel asked all the questions we were supposed to ask and then spelled conundrum right. Suddenly, her ponytail swung around and she was bouncing back to her seat.

  I wasn’t ready.

  “Avalon James,” Mrs. Jackson said over the microphone.

  I didn’t move. I sat there staring out at the audience.

  “Go, Avalon,” I heard Isabel whisper in my ear.

  “Avalon,” Mrs. Jackson said again. She said it nice, though. I looked at her and she smiled at me—like it was all going to be okay.

  I took a breath and got out of my seat. And walked to the littler kid microphone.

  “Scrupulous,” Mrs. Jackson said.

  I cleared my throat. “Scrupulous,” I said quietly into the microphone. I looked out at all the faces in the audience that were looking back at me. I couldn’t remember the questions to ask. I couldn’t remember anything. I couldn’t even see the word in my head.

  I looked at Atticus in the second row. He looked really concerned—like he was afraid I was going to throw up or something. Maybe I was going to throw up. Then I couldn’t help but look at Elena. Her eyes were all squinty and happy. If I threw up in front of everyone right now, it would make her year.

  Finally, my eyes settled on Hari’s mom. I wondered why she had a red dot on her forehead. I wondered why she dressed different from the other moms. And I wondered why she was looking at me that way.

  It wasn’t a mean look or a nice look. It was a firm look. It said, “Get yourself together, kid. You can do this.”

  It reminded me of Hari.

  That’s when something wonderful happened. I remembered what Hari told me after the classroom bee in October. “It’s all about you and the words,” he had said. “Don’t let anybody else get in your head.”

  I felt myself starting to smile inside. Because I realized I had let the whole audience inside my head. With all of them in there, my word was impossible to see.

  Hari was right. It has always been about the words and me. Other than M and Atticus, the words were my best friends. They were always with me.

  And just like that, the audience got out of my head. It was like I was standing alone on that stage.

  Just me and the word.

  “Scrupulous,” I said. “S-C-R-U-P-U-L-O-U-S,” I spelled. “Scrupulous.”

  “Correct,” Mrs. Jackson said. I had forgotten to ask any of the questions, but I spelled the word right anyway.

  The audience clapped. There was a loud roar from the second row. Atticus let out a whoop and Will whistled through his fingers. Relieved, I walked back to my chair.

  By the fourth round, Isabel was out. She misspelled the word insouciant. Her shoulders jerked up when she heard the bell ring. Sadly, I watched as Isabel walked away from the microphone. She exited the stage where her mother suddenly appeared and gave her a hug.

  Hari was good at all the questions. He asked about word origins and definitions and parts of speech. Somehow he always made the audience laugh. I looked at his mother every time he spelled. She seemed to hold her breath until he
finished every word. I could tell she would never miss one of his spelling bees.

  By the tenth round, the stage was getting empty. There were only three of us left. Hari Singh, a sixth-grade girl named Sierra Ghassemian, and me. We all sat in the front row now. There were no fourth graders left in those chairs. There was only us.

  By the time the eleventh round started, it was just Hari and me. He was spelling at the microphone for the bigger kids and I was spelling at the microphone for the littler kids. After he spelled his eleventh-round word, we passed each other on my way to the microphone. He grinned at me and stuck out his hand. I slapped his palm and everyone in the audience laughed.

  It went on like that, slapping each other’s hands in between words, until we got to round eighteen.

  It was a silent-letter word that did me in. The first h in diphthong is silent. Who knew? What’s crazy is that diphthong is a word about words. It’s a word that I had seen before. It’s a word from the Greek to the Latin to the French to the English. It’s a word I should have known how to spell.

  But I didn’t.

  The bell rang and I took my seat. The only way I could win now was for Hari to spell his word incorrectly. There was very little chance of that.

  I looked at the empty chair in the audience—the one my invisible father was sitting in. I was feeling so happy, even though I knew I was about to lose to Hari, and I realized two things. First, that my dad would be happy for me, too, if he were here. And second, that he wasn’t here and it was no use pretending that he was. So I had a little mind-talk with him. I told him I hoped he was proud of me. I told him I was sorry I didn’t win. And I told him I wasn’t going to write him any letters anymore. I knew he probably liked getting my letters, but it hurt too much that he stopped answering. It made me feel bad and I didn’t want to feel bad anymore. I wanted to feel like I was feeling on that stage all the time.

  I watched my invisible dad disappear as Hari walked to the microphone. His word was doppelgänger. He spelled it correctly.

  Hari Singh won the bee.

  Everyone started clapping. Hari was once again our spelling champ. As the whole audience yelled for Hari, I walked off the stage. I missed my word. It was time for me to go.

  From the side of the stage, I watched Mr. Peterson give Hari the winning spelling trophy. Hari held it over his head and smiled like he had just won the homecoming football game.

  Mr. Peterson finally put up his hands to quiet down the audience. He leaned into the microphone and said, “And now I’d like to congratulate our runner-up, fifth grader Avalon James.”

  He turned around and saw I was no longer on the stage.

  “Avalon?” he said. Everyone began murmuring. I saw Mr. Peterson look at Mrs. Jackson and then I saw Mrs. Jackson point toward me.

  “There you are,” Mr. Peterson said with a big smile. “Come back up here, Avalon.”

  As I walked back onto the stage, the audience started clapping. I looked out at all the people and couldn’t help but smile. Suddenly, everyone in the auditorium (except probably Elena) was standing up and cheering for me.

  It was so weird. I didn’t understand at first. I had been so busy spelling, I had forgotten what coming in second place meant.

  “Avalon,” Mr. Peterson said. “There’s only one person I know who did as well as you did in their first spelling bee, and that was Mr. Hari Singh. You should be very proud of your achievement today.” There was more clapping.

  “Go, Avie,” I heard Will yell. Then I looked at Atticus. He was on top of his chair cheering for me. Then I saw my mom. She was standing next to them. She had made it. She was there.

  “Avalon James,” Mr. Peterson continued, “I present you with our second-place plaque and am proud to announce that you and Harinder Singh will be representing Grover Cleveland K–8 School at the Regional Spelling Bee in April. Congratulations!”

  It was really happening. Hari and I were going to the regional bee.

  TWELVE

  The next week there was a picture of me and Hari on the front page of the Arcadia Weekly Herald.

  Mrs. Jackson was so proud of us. I could tell she was really proud of me. After the bee, she called me over to her moderator chair. “See, I wasn’t wrong about you,” she said so nobody else could hear. “I can always pick ’em.” She winked at me. “You’ve got great potential, Avalon James.”

  Great potential. That’s what they used to say about my dad.

  Now, I knew the regional bee would be the end for me. At least for this year. Hari would win and Hari would go to the nationals. But I didn’t care. I was so excited about going to the regionals that I could hardly stand it. I would get to watch everything Hari did. I would get to learn from the best. I would get the chance of a lifetime.

  That night, after the bee, M and I sat on our bed and looked at the plaque I won. I read the words that were etched into the gold metal out loud to her. “Runner-up. Grover Cleveland School-Wide Spelling Bee.” Then I pointed to the blank space under the words. “That’s where they’re going to put my name, M,” I told her. I was supposed to bring my plaque back to school on Monday so it could be engraved, but Hari and I were allowed to take our trophies home until then.

  M purred extra loud so I could tell she was extra happy for me.

  Next to my plaque sat an unfinished letter to my dad. I’d started it before the bee. It had a blank space near the bottom just like my plaque did. I’d been saving that space to tell him how I did.

  There was a knock on my door and my mom walked in before I could hide the letter. I didn’t look at her as she sat down on the side of my bed.

  “You going to tell him how great you did?” she asked.

  I looked up at her. After the bee, my mom had run to the side of the stage and given me a big hug. She’d been late, but she’d been there. Now, as I saw her looking at the letter on my bedspread, I didn’t know what to say.

  “It’s okay,” my mom said. “Spelling was you and your dad’s thing. I know.” As I watched her hand touch my letter, she said, “He really missed something tonight. Dad missed something big.”

  It was the first time she had called him “Dad” since he went away.

  In that moment, I realized she wasn’t really mad at Dad. She was hurt. Deep-down-in-the-center-of-her-heart hurt. Just like I was.

  “You okay?” she asked.

  I nodded, still looking at the letter.

  “Did you tell M how great you did?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “I told her everything.”

  Mom reached out and shook M’s little paw. “You would have been very proud of our Avalon tonight, M. She was amazing.”

  I felt a little smile creep across my face.

  “This is the kind of day you will remember your entire life,” she said. “Don’t let anything or anyone take that away from you.”

  I nodded again.

  “Okay then,” she said. “Get some rest.” Mom kissed me on the cheek. “Good night, sweetheart.”

  “’Night, Mom.”

  As she left my room, I looked at the letter again. I was tired of being so sad. Before I could change my mind, I crumpled up the letter and threw it in the trash.

  * * *

  The next day Atticus met me as usual at recess, but he had a funny look on his face.

  “Come with me,” he said, all secret-agent-like, and I followed him to the far edge of the basketball court where nobody was playing.

  “Avie,” he said very seriously.

  “What?” I asked.

  “I had another dream.”

  “You did?”

  “Yes, the night before the spelling bee,” he said. “I didn’t want to say anything because I didn’t want to jinx you. And I couldn’t say anything about it last night because of all the people around.”

  “Well, what was it?” I asked, very intrigued.

  “I dreamed you were going to the regional bee.”

  “You did not!”

  “I did to
o.”

  “That’s impossible,” I said. I really did think it was impossible. I believed his dream saved M and that was great but could he really dream other things? Actual other things that could come true, too? This was getting spooky.

  My puzzled look made Atticus grin. “Avie,” he said. “When are you going to finally get it? This really is our Infinity Year. Pop-pop said it. Remember? Infinite possibilities? Maybe nothing’s impossible.”

  Nothing’s impossible. I walked around for days with that in my head. Maybe Atticus was right. After all, in less than three months, I was actually going to the Regional Spelling Bee.

  The spelling drills with Mrs. Jackson started up again on Monday and Wednesday afternoons but now without Isabel. Isabel was nice about it, though. She gave me a book about Spanish words and said she would help me with them whenever I wanted.

  Hari sometimes showed up at our practices. But usually he practiced with his father. They studied together every single night.

  As Mrs. Jackson and I worked together, I started to feel different inside. Sure, I wanted to go to the regional bee. I even secretly pictured myself at the national bee in Washington, DC, one day. But those kinds of dreams had always felt far-off to me. Dreams like that came true for people like Hari. Not me.

  But why not me? I was a really good speller. Mrs. Jackson believed in me. Atticus believed in me, too. I started to wonder—What would be possible if I believed in myself?

  Everything I did in those weeks after the school bee was about spelling. Even at recess, I studied. Sometimes Atticus would help but most of the time, I studied on my own.

  On one strangely warm day in the middle of February, I sat under the tree behind Mr. Peterson’s office with my sleeves rolled up reading through my flashcards. Nearby, Atticus was kicking a soccer ball with Kevin and Adam.

  I looked up and saw some girls jumping rope together. Elena was one of them. She looked at me at the very exact time I looked at her. I knew it must have been driving her crazy that I did so great at the spelling bee.

  “Avalon.”

  I turned and saw Mae walking toward me. She was carrying a plastic cup and a paper towel in one hand, and something that looked like stickers in the other.