Sam, page 5
“I know,” Sam says.
“You like climbing,” Courtney reminds her.
Sam says, “Not really.”
Courtney searches every box until she finds the climbing shoes Mitchell gave Sam a year ago. “I knew I packed these!”
“Mom, stop!” Sam says. “They don’t even fit.”
“They’ve got to fit by now.”
“No, they’re too small.”
“They can’t be,” Courtney says, but Sam is right. The shoes that used to be too big now pinch Sam’s toes. Sam throws them in the trash.
“Sam! Those are brand-new shoes! Maybe some other kid can use them.”
“They’re junk,” Sam says.
“Hey.” Her mom is about to scream I’ve had enough of you. But she does not. She just leans against the wall.
* * *
—
Sam doesn’t tell anybody she’s going to the Y. The first day of Afterschool, Sam picks up Noah from pre-K and rushes him outside so nobody her age will see them.
Noah says, “Ow! Sam!”
She slows down a tiny bit. It’s not his fault for being born. His hair is black, but his eyes are green. When Sam tells him something, he believes her. Right now, she tells him to pretend he is a spy escaping from prison, and he has to walk as softly as possible, or gorillas will catch him. “Hurry,” she whispers. “Don’t let the gorillas see you. Here, I’ll carry that.” She grabs his little backpack and together they rush down the hall and out the door. “Okay, we’re safe.”
Noah asks, “What if they’re hiding in the trees?”
He is a good brother, for his age.
At the Y, Sam takes Noah downstairs for lessons in the green chlorine pool where all the little kids are screaming. She hands him his bathing suit and towel, and she meets his teacher, and then she almost hides on the white bleachers, but everybody there is moms.
Slowly she walks up to the gym where more little kids are jumping, tumbling, and wrestling on gymnastics mats. There are only three big kids in climbing—a girl, a boy, and Sam.
The girl is tall with freckles and long, frizzy blond hair. Her jeans have a purple ink stain on the back pocket, and her name is Halle. The boy is her brother, Eric. He has red hair, and he wears glasses. Halle and Eric don’t go to Sam’s school. She has never seen them before, even though they also live in Beverly.
Eric looks around at the little kids. Then he asks Sam and Halle, “Are we the only people here?”
“I guess so.” It seems like Halle really doesn’t mind how babyish Afterschool is, even though she is nine and her brother is ten.
“Okay, everybody,” announces a YMCA teacher. “Little Tumblers, follow me. Climbers, follow Kevin.”
Halle, Sam, and Eric shuffle to the climbing wall. It’s a relief that Halle and Eric wear sneakers. Nobody has climbing shoes.
As soon as Kevin takes attendance, he makes a big deal out of Sam. “Hey, kiddo. You got so big I didn’t even recognize you. How’s your dad?”
“Good.”
“Say hi for me, okay? Who else we got here? Hailey?”
“Halle.”
“Gotcha. And Eric. Apart from Sam, has anybody climbed before?”
They stretch their arms and roll their shoulders and lunge and practice jumping jacks and talk about how safety is their number one priority. Kevin shows them the ropes and clips that he will use and explains how he will belay them. Climbing, they take turns, and Eric goes up first.
He is so awkward! Kevin is holding the rope below, so nothing bad will happen, but Eric is afraid. On the first footholds, he just stands there with his legs splayed out and looks over his shoulder.
“Okay, reach,” says Kevin. “Just reach over your head.”
Eric’s arms are long, but they won’t stretch.
“One step at a time, buddy. Try moving your left foot closer.”
“I can’t.”
“You won’t fall,” says Kevin. “I got you.”
“He’s afraid of heights,” Halle tells Sam as they watch from the mats. Eric could step down, but he acts like he’s hanging from a mountain by a thread.
“That’s better,” Kevin tells Eric. “A little more.”
Eric inches his left foot over. He’s getting ready to move that foot onto a new hold.
Halle rests her head on her knees and closes her eyes, but Sam keeps watching. He’s like a bug caught in a spiderweb.
When Eric makes it up partway, Kevin allows him to come down. Instantly, Eric opens his book and starts to read.
“There’s always a first time,” Kevin says.
Halle is next, and it’s her first time too, but she’s way better.
“Steady as she goes,” calls Kevin.
Halle is unafraid. She reaches with her long arms, and when she gets stuck, she listens to directions. Watching from below, Sam thinks, You’re pretty good—but why did you take the long way? You can swing across!
By the time it’s Sam’s turn, she is stiff and grumpy. Then Kevin says, “Let’s see if you remember what Dad taught you.”
Sam’s whole body tightens. She stares at Kevin’s tattooed fingers—L.O.V.E.—but doesn’t feel any.
“All set?”
She attacks the wall, jumping the first holds, climbing without stopping. She’s been watching long enough to memorize the route, so she swings across and pulls up in two seconds. When she makes it to the top, she doesn’t stop to enjoy it. She pushes off with both feet so she is dangling in midair.
“Whoa, whoa!” Kevin calls out, as Sam glides down.
Wide-eyed, Halle stares at her. Even Eric looks up from his book.
“You’re on fire!” Kevin says. “Where have you been practicing?”
Sam tells the truth. “No place.”
10
Every day, Sam and Noah walk to the Y. Sam takes Noah to the pool and then she goes to the gym where Kevin sets up new routes. Eric never climbs very high. He’ll try just once to get it over with, and then he opens up his book. Halle is different. She tries hard and learns fast. Kevin says Halle is an athlete. Sam is quick, but Halle has longer arms. She is strong, and she doesn’t worry about anything.
“Have you ever been to Boulders?” Sam asks Halle, after class.
“No, what is it?”
“A real gym.” They are standing in front of the Y and Noah is pulling on Sam’s arm to leave.
“Can kids go there?” Halle asks.
“Yeah, but it’s too far.”
“Where is it?”
“Newburyport.”
Halle’s dad pulls up in a huge black station wagon. Sam has never seen a car so big and black. “Dad,” says Halle. “This is Sam.”
“Hi, Sam. I’m Jim.”
“I like your car,” says Sam.
He smiles. “It’s a hearse.” He says he is a sculptor, and he bought the hearse to transport his work.
Halle and Eric squeeze into the front seat with Jim, and Halle asks, “Dad, can you take us to Boulders on Saturday?”
“Probably,” says Jim. “Or Mom can.” With Sam’s dad, probably means no, but Jim makes it sound like yes.
* * *
—
“They can take me home on Friday and I can sleep over so we can go to Boulders,” Sam tells her mom that night.
“What about Noah?” Courtney says.
“He can come with me to their house, and you can pick him up from there.”
“Okay,” says Courtney.
“I can go?”
“Sure,” Courtney says. “Yes.” She is lying on the couch with her feet up, and she is wearing her red shirt from Staples.
“Can I have two quarters?” Noah asks. He is on the floor with his homework, drawing things that start with G.
“For what?”
“Gum.”
“You don’t need gum.”
Sam explains, “At the Y they have a gumball machine.” She kind of wishes she could get some.
“Please?” Noah says.
“No way,” says Courtney. “It’s a good word, though. Gumball starts with G.”
* * *
—
Halle lives in Beverly Farms and her house is old and full of books. There are even bookshelves in the bathroom. You can see where Eric gets it from. He has a giant bookcase in his room. Halle has a bookcase too. Her dad built it like a castle. She has her own room at the top of the house, and a secret staircase that leads up to it. The stairs are painted blue. All the rooms are different colors. The kitchen is bright yellow. The family room is green. Halle’s room is white with a blue sky and clouds up on the ceiling.
At dinnertime, Jim cooks dinner while Halle’s mom works late at the hospital. Jim’s food is weird and spicy, cauliflower curry, but Sam tries to get used to it.
“I hear you’re an amazing climber,” Jim says.
“I’m okay.”
“When did you start?” Jim looks old for a dad. He is bald and he wears squinty glasses like Noah’s grandpa.
Sam says, “When I was seven, I was going to join a team.”
“Why didn’t you?” Eric asks.
Sam thinks for a second, and then she says, “Transportation.”
* * *
—
On Saturday morning, Halle’s mom, Lucy, drives the girls to Boulders. Lucy pays and signs a waiver for Halle. Then Sam hands over a waiver that Courtney got Boulders to fax to Staples so she could sign it in advance.
“Okay!” Lucy says. “Go for it!” And she heads off to find some coffee. She looks like Halle, except her eyes are tired and her hair is gray.
The girls borrow climbing shoes and take a lesson with a climbing teacher. It’s the STAFF Sam saw that time with her dad, the one who said, My name is Toby. Now Sam is sure Toby is a girl, even though her hair is super short.
“Let’s get started!” Toby says. Luckily, she doesn’t remember Sam and ask about her father.
Sam and Halle take turns climbing with ropes while Toby belays them. Toby likes the way Halle does not give up. “Good effort!” she keeps telling her.
Halle picks her holds and tests them out. She is straightforward on the wall.
Sam can’t be straightforward because she’s not tall enough. Also, she can’t climb so slowly! She finds weird angles and cuts corners. She squinches her feet and crimps her fingers onto tiny handholds. When she sees a hold too high to reach, she lunges for it. More than once, she ends up dangling from the rope. She’s frustrated, but Toby thinks she has potential. Both girls should come on Saturdays for 12 and Unders, Bigger Boulders. Halle’s mom and dad can drive, if it’s okay with Courtney.
“What comes after Bigger Boulders?” Sam asks Halle when they get back to Halle’s house.
“Youth Competitions,” Halle says.
Whenever you win a competition you get points. The top points go to regionals and then nationals and worlds and then you’re famous. You’re a prodigy! You wear patches on your sleeves and companies will send you shoes and water bottles.
11
When they start training to be famous, Kevin changes up the walls, switching handholds with his power screwdriver. The wall is like a giant pegboard and you can move the holds into a million different combinations. He is trying to challenge Sam and Halle now that it’s just the two of them at Afterschool. Eric has decided he would rather walk over to the library.
On Saturdays, they practice with five other girls at Boulders. Usually, Sam sleeps over and Halle’s mom or dad will do the driving.
They are pretty much the best in Bigger Boulders, except for one girl named Emily. Her legs are really long. She can do the splits, so she can stretch out and reach any hold—but she cries all the time. Her fingers hurt, or she stubs her toe, or she twists her ankle, or she doesn’t fall right. She makes a big deal about everything.
She’s always complaining, and she isn’t that good. Halle is stronger than Emily. Sam is faster. Also, they’re working on their splits at home. Halle can’t get all the way down to the floor, but Sam can. Toby says she’s bendy.
Toby is their teacher now. She has no fat on her entire body. She’s streamlined, and she likes to treat the whole team equally. She doesn’t give out many compliments, and when she does, they’re small.
The lowest is okay.
Then after that, good effort.
Then nice.
Nice is as high as Toby goes, but once she says, What?
They are on the bouldering walls and everybody else goes vertical, then side to side. Sam goes vertical, but then she takes a chance and jumps, springing off black footholds to grab the purple ledge above.
“WHAT?” Toby exclaims, like Where did that come from?
Sam is climbing like a squirrel, stretching and leaping in a tree, and everyone below is quiet.
Halle looks a little glad, but a little jealous too. Then when it’s her turn, she tries Sam’s move and builds on it to climb even higher.
“Nice, Halle!” Toby calls out, and Sam wants to say I invented that.
Toby says, “We share beta.” That means everybody should share information, like This is where to put your feet, or Don’t do what I did.
Beta is annoying. It’s like permission to steal your ideas. On the wall, Sam is like the scout. She will try stuff no one else will do. But Halle is always learning. She is always right behind.
At least Halle admits Sam is better than she is.
“You’re smarter at climbing,” Halle says after practice one day.
Sam nods. It’s true—but Halle is smarter at other things. She has a hundred books, and she has read them all. She is always telling Sam, You should read this, and you should read that. She tries to get Sam to read Black Beauty, which is about an old horse explaining how he pulls wagons and coaches all his life—and that’s all he ever does. Nothing happens to him, even though he knows how to write.
Halle gives Sam Harry Potter and a mini reading light for her tenth birthday, but Sam likes the light better than the book, which is so long.
She likes everything quick. If she is climbing, she will scramble up as fast as possible. If she’s got homework, she waits until the last second and scribbles down the answer. Her mom says, Slow down, but Sam likes being done. Her mom says, It’s not a race. She also says, I was just like you.
Halle takes her time. On the wall she’ll hang there, thinking about her next move. Sam just goes for it. For this reason, she falls a lot—but then sometimes she nails it.
* * *
—
Their first competition will be at their own gym. Everybody is going to wear Bigger Boulders T-shirts, which are blue with a drawing of a boulder and a kid standing on top. And you’re supposed to wear your own climbing shoes. Sam wants blue shoes because those are team colors—and Courtney buys them.
They are the best things Sam has ever had. They are bright electric blue, extra narrow, and they smell so good. She loves the smell of new shoes.
“Okay, work hard,” says Courtney, “and please don’t grow.”
But you can’t help it. At the doctor’s office, Pat, the nurse, says, Oh wow look at you, getting so tall.
“What grade are you in, Sam?”
“Fourth.”
“How can that be?” Pat asks Courtney.
Courtney shakes her head. Nobody knows how it happens, but your feet keep growing, and your legs, and all the rest of you.
Sam’s mom calls her skinny Minnie, and string bean. Sam’s dad doesn’t call at all, because he is having a rough time. Sam doesn’t ask what that means. Her mom always says, You can talk to me about anything, but Sam doesn’t want to talk about him.
Usually she only thinks of Mitchell when she is falling asleep. She dreams of him on the bus home from field trips. After the aquarium, her dad is swimming with sea turtles. After the zoo, he is in the woods with arctic foxes.
12
The day her dad does call, Sam almost drops the phone.
“Hey, monkey. How are you? Hey, Sam? Are you there?”
Her mom says, “Who is that? Dad?” She takes the phone. “Mitchell?” She is talking just like she always does to Sam’s dad. What the hell? And where are you? Uh-huh. Oh my God. Courtney is scolding and arguing and finding out everything, but Sam can’t talk, because she’s crying. As soon as she hears his voice, all the tears start pouring out.
Her mom is trying to hug her. “Say something.”
“Hi,” Sam says finally. She is glad her dad can’t see her crying face.
“Hi!” her dad says. “What’s going on?”
Sam just says, “When are you coming back?”
“That’s what I called to tell you! I’m coming in a few weeks.”
“December ninth?” Sam wipes her face with her hand.
“What’s December ninth?”
“My competition. Nine A.M. at Boulders.”
“Oh wow.”
“Write that down, Dad.”
“Will do!”
She strains her ears, but she can’t hear him writing. “Do you have a pen?”
“What do you mean, do I have a pen?”
“What color is it?”
“Green.”
“Really?” She is afraid to trust him, and a little bit afraid to see him. How will he look next to all the other moms and dads? She is afraid for him to show up now, and, at the same time, she is afraid that he won’t come.
She tells herself, Don’t worry, he won’t. Or if he does, he will not come in time. But then she has a feeling he will show up while she’s climbing. Just as she reaches the top, she’ll turn around and see him watching.
