Bridge to Terabithia

“Boys!” Mrs. Myers’ face had lost its lemon-pie smile.

“He stomped my toe.”

“Take your seat, Gary.”

“But he—”

“Sit down!”

“Jesse Aarons. One more peep from your direction and you can spend recess in here. Copying the dictionary.”

Jess’s face was burning hot. He slid the notebook paper back under his desktop and put his head down. A whole year of this. Eight more years of this. He wasn’t sure he could stand it.

The children ate lunch at their desks. The county had been promising Lark Creek a lunchroom for twenty years, but there never seemed to be enough money. Jess had been so careful not to lose his recess time that even now he chewed his bologna sandwich with his lips tight shut and his eyes on the initialed heart. Around him conversations buzzed. They were not supposed to talk during lunch, but it was the first day and even Monster-Mouth Myers shot fewer flames on the first day.

“She’s eating clabber.” Two seats up from where he sat, Mary Lou Peoples was at work being the second snottiest girl in the fifth grade.

“Yogurt, stupid. Don’t you watch TV?” This from Wanda Kay Moore, the snottiest, who sat immediately in front of Jess.

“Yuk.”

Lord, why couldn’t they leave people in peace? Why shouldn’t Leslie Burke eat anything she durn pleased?

He forgot that he was trying to eat carefully and took a loud slurp of his milk.

Wanda Moore turned around, all priss-face. “Jesse Aarons. That noise is pure repulsive.”

He glared at her hard and gave another slurp.

“You are disgusting.”

Brrrrring. The recess bell. With a yelp, the boys were pushing for first place at the door.

“The boys will all sit down.” Oh, Lord. “While the girls line up to go out to the playground. Ladies first.”

The boys quivered on the edges of their seats like moths fighting to be freed of cocoons. Would she never let them go?

“All right, now if you boys…” They didn’t give her a chance to change her mind. They were halfway to the end of the field before she could finish her sentence.

The first two out began dragging their toes to make the finish line. The ground was rutted from past rains, but had hardened in the late summer drought, so they had to give up on sneaker toes and draw the line with a stick. The fifth-grade boys, bursting with new importance, ordered the fourth graders this way and that, while the smaller boys tried to include themselves without being conspicuous.

“How many you guys gonna run?” Gary Fulcher demanded.

“Me—me—me.” Everyone yelled.

“That’s too many. No first, second, or third graders—except maybe the Butcher cousins and Timmy Vaughn. The rest of you will just be in the way.”

Shoulders sagged, but the little boys backed away obediently.

“OK. That leaves twenty-six, twenty-seven—stand still—twenty-eight. You get twenty-eight, Greg?” Fulcher asked Greg Williams, his shadow.

“Right. Twenty-eight.”

“OK. Now. We’ll have eliminations like always. Count off by fours. Then we’ll run all the ones together, then the twos—”

“We know. We know.” Everyone was impatient with Gary, who was trying for all the world to sound like this year’s Wayne Pettis.

Jess was a four, which suited him well enough. He was impatient to run, but he really didn’t mind having a chance to see how the others were doing since spring. Fulcher was a one, of course, having started everything with himself. Jess grinned at Fulcher’s back and stuck his hands into the pockets of his corduroys, wriggling his right forefinger through the hole.

Gary won the first heat easily and had plenty of breath left to boss the organizing of the second. A few of the younger boys drifted off to play King of the Mountain on the slope between the upper and lower fields. Out of the corner of his eye, Jess saw someone coming down from the upper field. He turned his back and pretended to concentrate on Fulcher’s high-pitched commands.

“Hi.” Leslie Burke had come up beside him.

He shifted slightly away. “Umph.”

“Aren’t you running?”

“Later.” Maybe if he didn’t look at her, she would go back to the upper field where she belonged.

Gary told Earle Watson to bang the start. Jess watched. Nobody with much speed in that crowd. He kept his eyes on the shirttails and bent backs.

A fight broke out at the finish line between Jimmy Mitchell and Clyde Deal. Everyone rushed to see. Jess was aware that Leslie Burke stayed at his elbow, but he was careful not to look her way.

“Clyde.” Gary Fulcher made his declaration. “It was Clyde.”

“It was a tie, Fulcher,” a fourth grader protested. “I was standing right here.”

“Clyde Deal.”

Jimmy Mitchell’s jaw was set. “I won, Fulcher. You couldn’t even see from way back there.”

“It was Deal.” Gary ignored the protests. “We’re wasting time. All threes line up. Right now.”

Jimmy’s fists went up. “Ain’t fair, Fulcher.”

Gary turned his back and headed for the starting line.

“Oh, let ’em both run in the finals. What’s it gonna hurt?” Jess said loudly.