Bridge to Terabithia - Katherine Paterson [9]
“But I won the heat,” she said.
Gary lowered his head like a bull. “Girls aren’t supposed to play on the lower field. Better get up there before one of the teachers sees you.”
“I want to run,” she said quietly.
“You already did.”
“Whatsa matter, Fulcher?” All Jess’s anger was bubbling out. He couldn’t seem to stop the flow. “Whatsa matter? Scared to race her?”
Fulcher’s fist went up. But Jess walked away from it. Fulcher would have to let her run now, he knew. And Fulcher did, angrily and grudgingly.
She beat him. She came in first and turned her large shining eyes on a bunch of dumb sweating-mad faces. The bell rang. Jess started across the lower field, his hands still deep in his pockets. She caught up with him. He took his hands out and began to trot toward the hill. She’d got him into enough trouble. She speeded up and refused to be shaken off.
“Thanks,” she said.
“Yeah?” For what? he was thinking.
“You’re the only kid in this whole durned school who’s worth shooting.” He wasn’t sure, he thought her voice was quivering, but he wasn’t going to start feeling sorry for her again.
“So shoot me,” he said.
On the bus that afternoon he did something he had never thought he would do. He sat down beside May Belle. It was the only way he could make sure that he wouldn’t have Leslie plunking herself down beside him. Lord, the girl had no notion of what you did and didn’t do. He stared out the window, but he knew she had come and was sitting across the aisle from them.
He heard her say “Jess” once, but the bus was noisy enough that he could pretend he hadn’t heard. When they came to the stop, he grabbed May Belle’s hand and dragged her off, conscious that Leslie was right behind them. But she didn’t try to speak to him again, nor did she follow them. She just took off running to the old Perkins place. He couldn’t help turning to watch. She ran as though it was her nature. It reminded him of the flight of wild ducks in the autumn. So smooth. The word “beautiful” came to his mind, but he shook it away and hurried up toward the house.
FOUR
Rulers of Terabithia
Because school had started on the first Tuesday after Labor Day, it was a short week. It was a good thing because each day was worse than the day before. Leslie continued to join the boys at recess, and every day she won. By Friday a number of the fourth- and fifth-grade boys had already drifted away to play King of the Mountain on the slope between the two fields. Since there were only a handful left, they didn’t even have to have heats, which took away a lot of the suspense. Running wasn’t fun anymore. And it was all Leslie’s fault.
Jess knew now that he would never be the best runner of the fourth and fifth grades, and his only consolation was that neither would Gary Fulcher. They went through the motions of the contest on Friday, but when it was over and Leslie had won again, everyone sort of knew without saying so that it was the end of the races.
At least it was Friday, and Miss Edmunds was back. The fifth grade had music right after recess. Jess had passed Miss Edmunds in the hall earlier in the day, and she had stopped him and made a fuss over him. “Did you keep drawing this summer?”
“Yes’m.”
“May I see your pictures or are they private?”
Jess shoved his hair off his red forehead. “I’ll show you ’um.”
She smiled her beautiful even-toothed smile and shook her shining black hair back off her shoulders. “Great!” she said. “See you.”
He nodded and smiled back. Even his toes had felt warm and tingly.
Now as he sat on the rug in the teachers’ room the same warm feeling swept through him at the sound of her voice. Even her ordinary speaking voice bubbled up from inside her, rich and melodic.
Miss Edmunds fiddled a minute with her guitar, talking as she tightened the strings to the jingling of her bracelets and the thrumming of chords. She was in her jeans as usual and sat there cross-legged in front