Snowboard Maverick

by Matt Christopher

  Suddenly a snowboarder raced gracefully down the hill toward him, calling his name. As the boarder approached, Dennis recognized him. It was Dale Morgan, the best athlete in Moorsville. Dale was fifteen, and he could snowboard like a pro. He got to the bottom of the hill and did a tight circle around Dennis before coming to a halt.

  “Hi, Dale!” Dennis said, smiling. As good an athlete as he was, Dale Morgan never got a swelled head about it. He never made fun of anybody else, no matter how bad an athlete they were. He was a truly nice kid.

  “Hi, Dennis. This your first time out?”

  “You figured that out, huh? I must have looked pretty bad.”

  “Not at all,” Dale assured him, sounding sincere. “The couple times I saw you, you were doing okay. I heard Hogan and Kunkel making fun of you, though.”

  “You heard that, huh?” Dennis asked miserably.

  “Yeah. Don’t worry — they’re just being jerks, as usual. You were doing great on that run until they distracted you. Then they go and make fun of you, on top of it.” He shook his head disapprovingly.

  “Don’t get discouraged, Dennis,” he said, before taking off for another run. “You’re going to be fine. Better than Rick and Pat, for sure!”

  “Thanks, Dale!” Dennis shouted after him. Wow. If Dale Morgan thought he was okay, then it really must be true! Dennis decided he was going to keep at this sport until he got really good at it. No way was he going to give up now.

  I just need more time to practice, he told himself. After all, I didn’t learn to skateboard in a day, either.

  The car horn brought him back to reality, and he trudged over to the van, smiling all the way.

  9

  The next day, Saturday, Dennis, Tasha, and Robbie were back out at the Breakers again — except that this time, Dennis’s parents did the chauffeuring. After that, the three sets of parents agreed to share the driving over the holiday week. It was clear to all of them that their children would be out snowboarding every single day.

  By the end of the second day, Dennis had gotten to the point where he could do more than just keep his balance. He could actually control the board a little, to make himself go faster or slower. His turns became more graceful, and he fell only occasionally.

  By the middle of Christmas week, it was hard for Dennis to remember that he’d once felt afraid to go down these slopes. He was having so much fun and getting better so quickly that it didn’t even matter when Rick and Pat would speed by him, uttering some stupid comment or other.

  At the end of Thursday’s session, Dennis turned to Tasha and said, “Let’s go to Schoolhouse Hill tomorrow.”

  “Okay, but why, Dennis?” she wanted to know. “There are fewer people here, and the hills are higher, too. I like it better here.”

  “Yeah,” Dennis agreed, “but our parents have been driving us out here every day, and I think we ought to give them a break. Besides,” he added, grinning, “I want the other kids to see me on Gizmo. I’m ready for them now.”

  “So that’s it!” Tasha said, returning his smile. “Well, okay. Let’s do it.”

  “And there are picnic tables and rails there!” Robbie chimed in. “We can teach Dennis to do some jibbing!”

  “Jibbing?” Dennis repeated, confused.

  “You know, doing stunts on stuff besides snow.”

  “Way cool!” Dennis said excitedly. “All right!”

  It would have been Dennis’s parents turn to drive the following day — New Year’s Day — and they were kind of surprised when Dennis told them the night before that they wouldn’t have to bother, since he and Tasha and Robbie were going over to Schoolhouse Hill.

  “Oh. Okay. You’re sure, Dennis?” his mom asked. She and his dad were staying home on New Year’s Eve because of baby Elizabeth. They didn’t think Dennis was old enough to be left alone with so young a baby. “I mean, it’s fine with me,” his mother went on. “I’d rather have you kids nearby where we can keep an eye on you.”

  “Mom!” Dennis moaned. She always treated him like such a baby!

  All week, he’d insisted that his parents not stay at the Breakers and watch him. He knew they’d just get upset every time he fell and probably make him come home if he went too fast. He didn’t want them watching him until he was really good at snow-boarding. There’d be plenty of time to show off then.

  “Sorry, sorry,” she said, and went over to goo-goo baby Elizabeth, who was sitting up in her playpen. “I trust your judgment, Dennis — you know I do.”

  “Me, too,” his dad said. “Hey, it’s okay with me not to have to drive him back and forth. The Bowl games are on TV tomorrow!”

  “When is football season over?” his mom asked with a sigh.

  “Just in time for hockey and basketball,” his dad answered with a good-natured laugh.

  Dennis sympathized with his mom. He wished his dad would take up skiing again, instead of just watching sports on TV. Before Dennis’s skiing accident, his dad had gone just about every weekend. After that, though, the joy of it seemed to go out of it for Mr. O’Malley.

  Maybe he wanted to go skiing with me, Dennis realized. Now he felt guilty for letting his dad down. Oh, well, soon he’d be able to teach his dad to snowboard! And his mom, too — why not?

  Schoolhouse Hill was pretty empty when they got there on New Year’s morning. Dennis figured a lot of kids had stayed up late to watch the ball drop in Times Square on TV.

  “They’ll probably start showing up soon,” Robbie said with a shrug. And sure enough, they did. By two o’clock, the hill was full of snowboarders.

  Dennis fit right in among them. No one made fun of him — why would they? In fact, one or two kids, realizing they hadn’t seen him boarding before, asked him if he’d been doing it for long. When he told them he’d only done it a couple of times before, they seemed impressed.

  Dennis knew he’d actually been boarding more than a couple of times — this was his eighth time, if you wanted to get technical — but “a couple” sounded good, and it wasn’t exactly lying.

  By three o’clock, Dennis and his two pals were a little bored with Schoolhouse Hill. Having been out on the Breakers, it seemed too tame and crowded for them.

  Then Robbie perked up. “Hey, Tasha — how ‘bout we teach Dennis how to do jibbing stunts? Remember we talked about it?”

  “Yeah!” she said, clapping her gloves together. “C’mon, Dennis — let’s go over to the picnic area!”

  Overlooking the school yard on the side farthest from the street was a wooded area with picnic tables. You had to climb up a set of concrete steps with handrails to get there.

  “You can teach him to go off tables,” Robbie told Tasha. “I get to show him how to do rails!”

  “I already know how to do rails,” Dennis said. “On a skateboard, remember?”

  “Oh, yeah,” Robbie said. “I forgot. But this is different. You’ll see. Here, I’ll show you how.” He ran over to the set of steps that led down from the picnic area, then strapped on his board as he stood at the top of the handrail.

  “Watch this, you guys!” he called.

  Before either of them could stop him, Robbie vaulted himself up and slid on his board fearlessly down the rail, landing in the snow and riding down the slope to the bottom — where he fell into the snow headfirst. Tasha and Dennis held their breath, then cracked up when Robbie came up for air, yelling with triumph.

  Then it was Dennis’s turn. His stomach was in knots, and he almost changed his mind. Then he tried to hypnotize himself into believing he was skateboarding. He approached the rail, sliding down it just the way he slid down the banister at home. Then, imagining it was his trusty skateboard below him, he leapt off at the last minute, staying on his board for a long, slow gliding stop.

  “Yahoo!” he shouted. He couldn’t remember ever having a better time in his entire life!

  “You did great!” Tasha said admiringly when she got down the rail herself and caught up to him. “I thought
you’d get spooked.”

  “I almost did,” Dennis admitted. “You know, snowboarding can be kind of scary — sliding down hills and all. It’s not like with a skateboard, where you can just jump off.”

  “I know what you mean,” Tasha said, nodding. Then she grinned. “So, you want to see something really scary?”

  Tasha went to the highest spot in the picnic area and shoved off, pushing against a tree. Heading right for a table, she grabbed her snowboard and sprung into an aerial. She slid smoothly along one of the benches and then sprang off it, executing a clean landing and coming to a stop at the bottom edge of the clearing.

  “Wow!” Dennis gasped. “That was awesome!”

  “Try it,” Tasha told him. “But be careful.”

  “Dale can do it on top of the table!” Robbie said, trying to show how easy it ought to be to do it on the bench.

  But it hadn’t looked easy. A miss could send you sprawling, hitting the table hard.

  Dennis suddenly remembered his mother’s warning against trying anything risky. He’d promised his mom not to attempt anything dangerous. And Tasha had been boarding a lot longer than he had. But Dennis was the best skateboarder in Moorsville. That ought to count for something, he thought. “Okay, I’ll try it,” he said.

  Robbie smiled, showing off his braces.

  He tried to do what Tasha had done, but twice, he broke off at the last minute, coming to a quick stop or veering off to the side. “I’m just getting the feel for it,” he explained to his friends, hoping he didn’t sound too lame.

  On his third try, he went for it — even though he had to steady himself by putting a hand on the tabletop as he went. But as he landed, his board went out from under him. He slid, spinning around and around, and nearly hit a big tree before he finally stopped.

  “I’m okay!” he insisted as Tasha and Robbie ran to his aid. “I don’t know what happened — I’ve done things like this on a skateboard… .”

  “It’s really different on a snowboard, I guess,” Tasha said. “Don’t worry, Dennis, you’ll get the hang of it.”

  “It’s going to take a lot more practice than I thought to get good at this,” Dennis said. “I think I’m going to have to work up to it before I try the tables again.”

  He had been terrified trying the table stunt. And yet minutes before, he had felt on top of the world after riding the rail. Snowboarding is a lot like riding a roller coaster, Dennis said to himself. One minute you’re up; the next minute you’re down.

  He wondered what would be around the next bend.

  10

  He found out the next moment.

  “Hey, Dennis, how about a race?” Tasha suddenly challenged him.

  “Huh? I can’t race you — you’re the fastest kid around!” he replied.

  “Not really. Rick and Pat and a whole lot of other kids are much faster than me.”

  “Well, you’re sure faster than I am!” Dennis said.

  “So far,” she agreed. “But you’re getting better really quickly. I’ll bet you could give me a good race. Wanna find out?”

  “Sure, I guess so,” Dennis said.

  “What’s going on?” Robbie asked, sliding up to them and skidding to a halt.

  “Dennis is going to race me down the hill!” Tasha told him.

  “All right!” Robbie shouted. “Let’s go!” They all trudged over to the top of Schoolhouse Hill, which by now was crowded with kids, dodging each other as they made their way down.

  “Hey, everybody, it’s a race — make way!” Robbie shouted. Kids at the bottom scrambled out of their path as Dennis and Tasha took positions side by side. “Ready,” Robbie called out, “set — go!”

  Dennis shoved off with all his might and went into a glide, not turning at all until he absolutely had to. He didn’t see Tasha shove off, nor did he see her challenging him, but he could tell from the yelling all the kids were doing that she must be right behind him. She must have gotten off to a slow start, he realized.

  Just before he got to the bottom, he saw her shoot past him to win the race. He couldn’t dwell on it, though. He was going too fast. He had to make sure he stopped without doing a face plant.

  “Great race, Dennis!” Tasha said, unstrapping her board and coming over to him. “You almost beat me!”

  “What happened up there?” he asked. “You didn’t start on time.”

  “Yes, I did,” she insisted, but something about her eyes and her tone of voice made him not believe her. “You just gave me a great race — that’s all.”

  “Well, thanks,” he said. “But you still beat me, remember. I’ve got a ways to go to be as good as you.”

  “Not that far,” she assured him.

  But Dennis knew she hadn’t raced her fastest. She’d done it to build up his confidence so he’d keep boarding. What a great friend Tasha was, he thought. But she didn’t need to do anything to make him love snowboarding — he loved it already, even more than skateboarding!

  “Dennis!” Dennis looked up and toward the street, where his mother’s voice was coming from. There she was, with his dad, next to their van. They were both waving to him and smiling. Dennis ran over there through the deep snow.

  “My, my,” his mom said. “You sure were going fast! Was it a race?”

  “Yeah,” he said. “And Tasha won.”

  “Doesn’t matter who won,” his dad said. “You sure looked good going down that hill, son.”

  “Thanks,” Dennis said, feeling himself blushing. “I’m starting to get used to it.”

  “Now, don’t go getting overconfident, Dennis,” his mother said. “I don’t want you doing anything foolish, like jumping off tables or stuff like that.”

  Dennis’s breath caught in his throat. Had she seen him? No, she couldn’t have — they’d just driven up … hadn’t they?

  “When did you guys get here?” he asked nervously.

  “Just this minute,” his dad answered. “We came to pick you up for New Year’s Day dinner.”

  So they hadn’t seen him jibbing. Dennis sighed with relief, then perked up. “Dinner? What time is it?” Dennis asked.

  “Four o’clock,” his dad said. “Aren’t you hungry? You didn’t have lunch.”

  “I guess I am, now that you mention it. Okay, let me just go say good-bye.”

  He went over to say good-bye to Tasha and Robbie and to make plans to meet them tomorrow. He wanted to hit the Breakers again — so he wouldn’t be tempted to do any more jibbing. Not until he could get his mom’s permission. Today had been a close call, and he didn’t want to risk her catching him at it. He was feeling guilty enough about it already.

  But it sure had been fun. He would have to start working on his mom right away. He knew she’d give in. It was just going to take a little convincing. After all, she’d seen him nearly win a snowboarding race. That had to give her some confidence in him… .

  “Hey, O’Malley!”

  Dennis’s heart banged in his chest as he wheeled around to face Rick Hogan.

  “Hi, Rick. What’s up?”

  “I see you have to have your mommy and daddy watch you while you go boarding,” Rick said, smirking.

  “I notice you didn’t bring your baby-sitter with you today,” Dennis shot back. “Where’s Pat? Did he break his leg or something?”

  “Don’t change the subject, newbie,” Rick insisted.

  “Newbie? What’s that?”

  “An amateur. A beginner. You, O’Malley.”

  “Leave me alone, Hogan, okay?” Dennis said, trying not to sound wimpy.

  “Yeah, right. I notice your friend Tasha almost let you beat her,” Rick laughed. “Gotta baby the newbie.”

  “Shut up, Rick,” Dennis said. “She did not.”

  “Oh, yeah? I’d like to see you race somebody for real. Like me, for instance.”

  “I’m not afraid to race you, or anybody,” Dennis shot back. “I’ll beat you, too.”

  “Uh-oh,” Rick said, a wicked gleam
in his eyes. “Now you’ve gone and done it, O’Malley. You challenged me. Well, you’ve got yourself a race, big shot.”

  “Fine with me,” Dennis said, fighting the urge to panic. Why, why hadn’t he just walked away and kept his mouth shut?

  “Tomorrow?” Rick was grinning now, from ear to ear.

  “Uh, can’t,” Dennis said lamely. “I’m busy. How about next weekend?”

  “Need some time to practice, huh? Okay, fine. Next Saturday.”

  “Eleven o’clock?”

  “You got it.”

  “Here?”

  “Oh, no,” Rick said, rubbing his gloves together hungrily. “Too easy.”

  “The Breakers, then?” Dennis gulped hard. He sensed what was coming.

  “Uh-uh. Ford’s Mountain.”

  “What?!” Dennis exclaimed before he had a chance to bite his tongue. Ford’s Mountain was way too hard for a “newbie.” There were trees if you missed a turn, and boulders, and moguls, and overhangs …

  “Scared, O’Malley?”

  “No. It’s just… it’s expensive.”

  “My treat,” Rick said, jingling the change in his jacket pocket.

  There was no way out, Dennis knew. Not without looking like a total chicken. “Okay,” he said. They shook on it.

  “See you there, newbie. Ha! This is going to be fun!” Dennis stood there as Rick walked away, laughing as loudly as he could.

  Dennis knew he was in for it now. He had just done possibly the stupidest thing he’d ever done in his entire life.

  What were his parents going to say when they found out? What if he fell and made a total fool of himself? Even worse — what if he got badly hurt?

  What a jerk he was! What a total jerk!

  11

  Dennis felt his legs go rubbery. What had he done? In an instant, all his old fears of the mountain returned, closing in on him. Watching the kids on Schoolhouse Hill made him suddenly sick to his stomach. Incredible that he’d been racing down that hill himself only five minutes ago! He couldn’t have done it now if his life depended on it.

  Robbie ran up to him, falling once or twice in the deep snow on his way. “Hey, Dennis, what’s wrong? You look like you swallowed a frog or something.”