CHAPTER TEN

BAILEY

 

 

 

 

 

 

I slipped out of the bathroom and ran back up the main deck.

“There she is!” yelled Noah, a boy in my grade with blond hair and a smile that was way too confident and friendly for my comfort level. This was his first time trying out, too. “Bai-ley! Bai-ley!” He chanted and clapped his hands. The other kids joined in.

Oh, God, I was gonna die. I ducked my head and hurried past them, but couldn’t take my eyes off Baron. He was still sideways in his chair, for all the world as if nothing earth-shattering had just happened. Nothing that would maybe alter the course of his life forever. He just gave me a grin and a nod, as if saying You got this.

My face felt numb and cold. I had to focus. I never called the police station, I told myself, as if it were true. This is the day you’ve been waiting for—mail jumping. This is a really, really good day. I tore my eyes from Baron and scuttled to the front of the boat. Tommy stood at the helm, guiding us in a lazy circle so I could run at the same pier everyone else had.

He cocked half a grin. “You ready?”

I bobbed my head—again, as if it were true. But I couldn’t feel my extremities. Probably a bad thing for mail jumping.

Melissa held up my mock delivery, a bunch of envelopes rolled up inside a newspaper. A rubber band held the entire bundle together. She placed it firmly in my upturned hand. Thus bestowed with the scepter of the office I hoped to occupy, I scooted to the large square window at Tommy’s right. As high as my hip, it sat wide open, the glass insert stowed against the wall on the opposite side of the boat.

I threw one leg over the sill. My outside foot found the rub board. My inside foot found the bracket bolted to the floor, like an upside-down stirrup. It had been specially mounted to help the mail jumpers keep steady. The wind whipped my hair and spit a fine mist into my face, some from the sky, some from the waves breaking under the bow. Under the rub board, the water rolled dark blue and foamy white. The shoreline and the piers whipped by.

Oh my God, I was sitting in the mail jumper’s window. I hadn’t expected it to feel so… exhilarating. Like a mermaid riding a charging seahorse. The Mailboat’s engines rumbled through my bones. A grin spread across my lips as my whole body unexpectedly relaxed. This felt sooo good. So right. Like I’d been born for this. Like the Mailboat was part of me. Like the spirit of its wooden body ran through my veins.

Tommy pushed the two levers beside his helm. If he was slowing the boat down, I couldn’t tell. The pier felt like it was speeding toward us. “Use as much runway as you need,” Tommy said.

Instead of sticking straight out into the lake, this pier ran parallel to the shore, creating a slip for the owner’s boat. In the middle of this runway was the mailbox. Fixed to the top of a pier post, it stared me down. I mean, literally. The box was shaped like a badger, a wooden craft-fair find painted black, white, and gray. Its little black feet hugged the mailbox and a dark shiny eye locked gazes with me.

Gripping the handrail above my head, I pulled my other leg through the window. I was standing on the rub board now, the lake flying beneath my feet. I held the mail in an iron grasp so there was no chance of it getting away.

Back in the boat, the kids clapped and cheered. “Go, Bailey! You can do it!”

“Just keep your eye on the pier,” Tommy coached as it charged closer, a javelin waiting to unseat me.

“And don’t forget to kiss the badger!” Melissa called.

Kiss the badger? Oh, yeah. It was a tradition. All the mail jumpers kissed the badger…

The first pier post swung by.

“There you go, right there.” Was it just me, or was Tommy’s voice tense? Why would he be nervous?

There was no time to think about it. I launched myself off the side of the boat. My feet hit the pier, but my body kept running as if the Mailboat had flung me away, a dog shaking water out of its fur. Momentum. Account for momentum! Isn’t that what Baron had told me?

I’d run clear past the badger before I knew it, but it was okay. It was a long pier. I’d just reel myself in before I sailed clean off the end.

That’s when my shoe slipped out from under me, the rainwater offering zero traction. My right hip crashed to the deck. Then just like a Slip n’ Slide, I careened across the pier… over the white-painted boards… off the edge.

My yelp was choked off by lake water and cascades of bubbles.