Chrissa Stands Strong Page 4

“A four point seven,” I said, just to outscore his scoring.

  We dove and swam all afternoon. With a little prodding from Tyler and Tara, I worked up enough courage to try a forward one-and-a-half, with less-than-perfect results.

  When I climbed up onto the raft, my belly was red from smacking.

  “Way to go,” Tyler said. “But at least you tried.”

  I could feel my irritation with him growing.

  “Now, I’ll show you how it’s really done,” Tyler said, perching at the edge, shoulders back and head high. He jumped, and I couldn’t help myself. Just as he started, I called out, “Big Head!”

  Tara laughed.

  I could tell he was attempting a pike, but he didn’t have enough air to open up fully, so instead he came down in the water in a royal belly flop.

  “Ouch!” Tara giggled. “That one hurt.”

  When Tyler broke through the surface, he splashed at us. “I would have aced that one if it hadn’t been for you, Chrissa.”

  “At least you’re trying,” I said, mimicking his words to me.

  He rolled his eyes at me. “Guess I have better things to do.” He swam toward shore.

  I watched him leave with satisfaction. Then I caught myself. Why was I forcing him away when we really had been having fun? Was Sonali right? Was I becoming poisoned by Tara?

  I stretched belly-down on the raft and pretended to rest. Head tucked in my arms, I didn’t want to meet Tara’s eyes.

  That evening, after Tara had gone home, Nana called to me upstairs. “Phone’s for you, Chrissa!”

  I zipped down the stairs, expecting Tara to be on the other end to tell me what a great day she’d had. Instead, it was Sonali.

  “Oh, hi!” I said, glad that she’d let only a few days—not years—go by before getting back in touch. And then I burst out with news I knew she’d like to hear. “Guess what? Cosmos had a baby girl! And we named her Starburst!” I didn’t know how to tell her about Tara, so it all came out in a rush. “And…Tara came over today, too, and that went really well.”

  There was a long pause. Then Sonali said quietly, “You mean Tara was the first one to see the baby?”

  “I’m sorry. I know you wanted to be here—I really wanted you to be here, too, but…well, it all happened so fast.”

  “You could have called.”

  “I figured you wouldn’t want to be here if Tara was here.”

  “Well, that’s true.”

  “But, Sonali, you can come over tomorrow to see the baby. Honestly, she’s the cutest thing you’ve ever seen.”

  Again, there was silence—chilly as a block of ice.

  “We’ll see,” she said. And then she hung up.

  A dreary, dismal rain started before I went to bed, and it fell all Sunday morning. After church and lunch, while the rest of my family ran errands, I stepped into what used to be Grandpa’s library. It has wall-to-wall bookshelves filled with everything from medical books to Greek mythology to tattered picture books from Mom’s childhood. The library still smells of Grandpa’s pipe tobacco, and I could almost feel his presence. The computer screen saver glowed, casting an eerie light into the darkened room. I plopped in the padded leather swivel chair, touched the keyboard, and checked to see if I had any new e-mail messages.

  “Good!” I said aloud. To my relief, there were e-mails from both Sonali and Gwen. “I bet they want to come over to see Starburst!”

  But when I opened their messages, my heart sank. There wasn’t a word about meeting our new cria. Instead, they were both mad as yellow jackets about Tara. They also mentioned some mean e-mails that seemed to have been sent to everyone on the swim team and were even posted on the swim-team message board.

  I looked at the spam e-mails and then at the swim-team message board. One nameless sender had written, “Gwen should get her head examined. What’s she doing being the coach’s assistant? She can’t even add 2 + 2!”

  And another said, “Somebody should tell Sonali to cut off her ugly long hair. Doesn’t she know that it could get caught in a pool drain?”

  I toggled back to the flurry of e-mails between and from Gwen and Sonali.

  The most recent e-mail from Sonali concluded, “Chrissa, it has to be Tara! Or if it’s not, then maybe she got you to do it—because I notice there’s nothing about you. I tried to warn you, but you wouldn’t listen. You should NOT trust her!”

  I bit hard on my lip and held back tears. This was such a mess! How could they think that I would post anything like that online? Giving Tara a chance didn’t mean that I would do something like this to them—or to anyone. They were my friends.

  But now they didn’t trust me.

  Everything about this was so awful—and so unfair! Sweat beaded on my hairline and I thought I was going to throw up.

  I replied to both of them at the same time with an IM—an Instant Message—my fingers pounding on the keyboard. “I don’t know who did this, but I’ve never said anything bad about you two. I never would! I never will. You just have to believe me.” I pressed SEND.

  An IM shot back immediately from Sonali. “It’s hard to know what to believe anymore.”

  And then a message came through from Gwen, too. “I agree. I don’t think you would do this, Chrissa, but I don’t trust Tara.”

  I paused, wondering what to write next. But really, what could I say to change their minds? Nothing. Then I started to wonder: How could you find out who was sending the mean e-mails? And the message-board postings—didn’t the coach see them? If I told Mom and Dad about this, would they even know what to do? And what if it was Tara sending these messages? How did she do it? For what felt like hours, I sat there staring at the screen until the screen-saver images made me dizzy and my stomach started to ache. Finally, I turned off the computer and pushed the chair back.

  I yanked on my raincoat and rain boots and dashed past puddles in the grassy lawn. Earthworms slithered, forced aboveground by the rain. Two fat robins hopped along. One paused beside the base of the birdbath, plucked a worm, and flew off with its catch. “Huh,” I muttered. I felt like that earthworm.

  In the barn, I hung up my dripping raincoat on a wooden peg and walked past Checkers, who was chewing her cud. “You look happy to be inside,” I said. Nana had asked Tyler and me to bring in the llamas last night when the first raindrops began to fall. Nana generally likes them to be outside in the paddock during the day and inside at night so that she can sleep without worrying about them, especially now that Starburst has arrived.

  Cosmos, the proud mother, was kushing—resting with her legs tucked beneath her. I stepped carefully into Cosmos and Starburst’s stall and handed Cosmos some hay. Starburst danced away from me but then stopped, gazing at me curiously, her ears perked upright. Her black eyes sparkled with mischief. “Will you let me pick you up?” I asked softly. Though I’d held her a couple of times already, I hadn’t picked her up on my own.

  Carefully, I moved closer and then I sank down into the straw. Starburst jumped to the left and then stood still. “I won’t hurt you,” I cooed. She came back and let me gather her onto my lap. I held her close to my chest and pressed my nose into her coat. “Starburst, you’re so lucky,” I whispered. “You don’t have to deal with girlfriend problems. Llamas might spit at each other when they’re angry, but at least you know where it’s coming from.”

  Tears finally came, and I cried into Starburst’s soft coat.

  In my whole life, I’d never felt so terribly alone.

  That night at dinner, I was too upset to eat—even Dad’s special spaghetti and meatballs.

  “Sweetie, what’s wrong?” Dad asked. “You’ve hardly touched your dinner.”

  I wanted to tell him what had been going on—after all, when things went wrong last spring at school, telling Mom had been helpful. It led to a change in seating arrangements, and things were better after that. But this time was different. Last spring, I knew who was causing problems. This time, if I spoke up, I might get the w
rong person in trouble. I didn’t have an ounce of proof yet. And until I did, I was going to have to go it alone.

  “Sorry, Dad, but I don’t feel so hot. I’m trying to work something out, but I’m not ready to talk about it.”

  Dad looked at me closely. “Well, I’m here when you are ready to talk about it.”

  I excused myself and climbed into bed early. I shifted this way and that, hoping to fall asleep so that I could quit playing the mean messages and botched conversations over and over. My head hurt, my stomach churned, and sometime in the middle of the night, when everyone was sleeping, I threw up in the bathroom. I tried to be as silent as I could, hoping no one would wake up and check on me. I didn’t want to have to talk.

  When morning came, the sun was way too bright and cheery. I rolled over in bed and hid my head under my pillow, dreading practice. How was I going to deal with seeing Gwen, Sonali, and Tara at the same time? How was I going to manage being around all of them in the locker room and the pool? If only I could swim and dive with my eyes closed.

  But then Tyler was at my door. “C’mon, Chrissa! Joel can’t make it to practice today. Want to bike over together?” He obviously hadn’t seen the message board.

  Somehow, having one person on my side—even Tyler—helped me to climb out from under my covers.

  The whole way over, I really wanted to talk about what had been going on, but I didn’t want to start crying again. We locked our bikes in the bike stand, and walked toward the center’s doors. “Chrissa,” he said, “I think I should aim for being an Olympic diver first, and then, after that, go to work for the space program.”

  I snapped at him. “Olympics? Wow, Tyler, with all your bragging lately, maybe I should call you ‘Big Head’ all the time.”

  He strode ahead and said over his shoulder, “Boy, are you ever crabby this morning!”

  Before I could apologize, he disappeared into the boys’ locker room.

  I really hadn’t meant to be so snotty to him. I didn’t even know why I did it. True, he’d been bugging me, but it wasn’t fair to take out my other frustrations on him. I couldn’t seem to say or do anything right lately.

  In the locker room, with my head down, I passed Tara and Jadyn.

  “Morning, Chrissa!” Tara called.

  “Hi,” I said softly, not stopping.

  “How’s Starburst doing?”

  “Fine,” I said without enthusiasm, turning to the emptiest corner of the locker room. I opened the locker door and swung my backpack in, but it crashed against the metal door, sounding as if I’d slammed it.

  In the background, Jadyn asked, “What’s with her today? And who’s Starburst?”

  “Their new baby llama.”

  I thought of the mean e-mails. Was it Tara who had sent those? Why should I trust her? And now Sonali and Gwen believed the worst—that I might have sent them.

  All I wanted to do was to protect myself, to close up as tight as a clam so that no one could get to me. No wonder people use the expression “clamming up.” That’s exactly what I wanted to do—close up my hard shell around my feelings and sink down through the water, deep into the mud where no one could ever find me. Or ever hurt me again.

  That morning, when Coach gave us his regular pep talk, I sat on the first row of bleachers—alone. Tara and Jadyn were behind me to my left. Sonali and Gwen were off to my right. I pretended not to know anyone. It seemed to be the only thing I could do. But acting like a clam hurt. The more I tried to bury my feelings, the more my chest ached. And the more my chest ached, the more my throat dried up. I could barely swallow.

  “Before we get started,” Coach said, “let me remind you that the swim-team message board will not be used to send mean messages or bad jokes like those I saw this weekend. There’s a word for using technology this way. Anyone know what it is?” While waiting for an answer, he clasped his hands behind his back and walked back and forth past the front row. “It’s called cyber-bullying. And I’m not going to tolerate it. If I catch wind of whoever is behind the messages that showed up on the swim club’s board, they will face a penalty.” He stopped and looked across the stands at us. “Is that clear?”

  Everyone nodded.

  “From now on, I will review all messages before they’re posted. If anything else like this happens, the site comes down. You’re teammates, and this is totally unacceptable in every way.” He let his words soak in. “Am I clear?”

  Heads nodded again, and a murmur of “Yes, Coach” went up.

  “Okay, then. This morning, I’ve compiled a list of relay teams,” Coach announced. He read them off, and to my dread, he’d put Sonali, Tara, and me on the same four-person relay team, along with the red-headed sixth-grader named Rachel. “And the key word is ‘team.’ If you think only of your own time and your own fame, you’ll bring your team down. You must learn to work together and cheer one another on.”

  Right, I thought. This is going to be interesting.

  We clustered by lane three, ready to practice. But how were we going to be a team if Sonali wouldn’t talk to either Tara or me? She avoided eye contact and so did I.

  Sonali was first. Relays usually start with the backstroke in the pool, not off the starting block. Sonali jumped in and held on to the edge with her fingertips. When the whistle blew, she pushed off hard and swam the backstroke to the opposite end of the pool, did a kick turn, and then came back.

  I waited on the starting block, knees bent and arms back. Forget everything, I told myself, and when you hit the water, just swim.

  The moment Sonali touched the end of the lane, I pushed off hard and dove shallow. The moment I surfaced, I swam the breaststroke as fast and as strong as I could. I reached the wall and tucked into my turn, pushed off hard, and then propelled my body down my lane toward my relay team.

  “Chrissa! Go!” The cheering urged me on, though my lungs burned.

  When I touched the pool’s edge, Rachel dove off the block. I climbed out of the pool and cheered for her as she did the butterfly to the end and back again.

  “Rachel, go!” we shouted. Finally, when Rachel touched back, Tara hit the water and swam the freestyle, meaning she could pick any stroke she wanted—and like the other relay teams’ anchors, she swam the crawl.

  “Good times,” Coach announced, “but you all can do better. In three weeks we’ll have our first meet. And between now and then, the only way to improve is to practice, practice, practice.”

  Our team practiced until my arms and legs felt as heavy as barbells. But it gave me little time to think, and that was good. Still, I was relieved when Coach announced, “Divers, line up!”

  During dives, Coach demanded absolute silence, but the moment a dive was completed, we could cheer like crazy. I quietly waited my turn in line, watching the other divers. I’d memorized the five groups of dives for springboards: forward, backward, reverse, inward, and twist. And each group had various positions: straight, pike, tuck, and freestyle. There was a whole lot more to diving than I’d imagined.

  When it was Tyler’s turn, he walked to the edge of the board. He circled his arms down as he pushed off the board with bent knees. Reaching for the ceiling, he soared into the air and tucked his knees to his chest; then, looking back toward the board, he found his target—the water—and dropped in headfirst.

  Cheering erupted.

  “What was that?” I said to no one in particular.

  From behind me, Joel said, “His secret weapon! It’s a reverse tuck. He’s been practicing at the pool during open swim times. He wanted to surprise the team.”

  I couldn’t believe it. If he was that determined, maybe he really could go to the Olympics someday!

  The coach was clapping, too. “Good effort, Tyler! Nicely executed.”

  “Awesome!” Tara called out to Tyler as she turned to scale the ladder next.

  “That was amazing, Tyler!” Jadyn joined in, next in line.

  Someone tapped my shoulder. I turned. Joel pointed two d
ivers back. Sonali leaned closer and whispered, “Chrissa, looks like Tara and Jadyn are up to their old tricks. Acting like fans of Tyler’s, just to get to you. Remember?”

  I didn’t reply.

  “Well,” she continued, “do you really think anything has changed?”

  I replied, a little too loudly, “I don’t know what to think anymore!”

  “People!” Coach ordered. “Quiet!”

  At the end of practice, I was determined to risk talking with Tara in the locker room. Nana’s words kept going through my mind: If you’re nice to people, then they’ll be nice to you. I needed to know if that really was true.

  I changed quickly, and then walked over to where Jadyn and Tara were drying their hair by the blowers. “I need to talk,” I said to Tara.

  Tara flipped her hair back. “Okay. I’m done anyway.” She walked away from the blower. Jadyn stepped toward us, tilting her head curiously.

  “Alone, please?”

  “Oh,” Jadyn said, wrinkling her brow as she moved off toward her locker.

  Tara followed me to my empty corner.

  “Tara,” I whispered, “I need to find out who sent those awful e-mails and posted those mean messages.”

  “Yeah, I saw those,” she said innocently. “So did Jadyn. Wow, Coach was steaming mad, too. Think it’s someone older on the team?”

  “I don’t know. I wondered if you knew who—”

  “Why would you ask me?” She gathered her hair into a ponytail.

  I didn’t want to say—because everyone knows you’ve been a bully—so instead I just didn’t say anything for a few seconds.

  Then she met my gaze. “Chrissa, I promise—it’s not me. I’ll admit that I’m a little sore about your stealing Sonali—”

  “I never stole Sonali.” Unflinching, I looked her directly in the eyes. “She makes her own decisions about friends. I don’t make her do anything.”

  Tara glanced over her shoulder, but when she saw that no one was eavesdropping, she continued in a whisper. “Hey, here’s the thing. Sonali and I used to go shopping every year for school clothes with our moms. Forever, we were best friends. Now she won’t have anything to do with me.”