Fire Season Read online

  But today, Stephanie thought, aware the image was just a bit melodramatic, I feel as if I’m walking off a cliff just the same.

  “Bleek!” Lionheart commented, a note of reproof in his voice. At least, Stephanie thought she heard reproof. Lionheart might not be able to “talk,” but he had a wide variety of verbalizations. These might not be “words” as such, but she’d learned to hear the differences between a “bleek” of excitement, of alarm, and, as this time, of disapproval.

  She knew Lionheart knew she was nervous. All the way into town, the treecat had sat so he could wrap his tail around her neck—a gesture she knew was one of comfort. However, she’d felt no hint of him attempting to intrude into her emotions, to provide soothing and calming as he had from time to time.

  I wonder if that means he thinks I’m up to dealing with this? The thought made her surprisingly cheerful.

  They were close enough now for Stephanie to see that most of the club members had already arrived. When her dad and Mayor Sapristos had started the club, there had only been a few people interested, but it had grown quite a bit and even spawned an adult chapter. Initially, Stephanie had been one of the younger flyers, but now there were a fair number younger even than she’d been when she started. She liked that. She’d found that kids even a little younger than her didn’t seem, well, as resentful of her as did kids her own age.

  Topping the list of those kids Stephanie didn’t get along with was Trudy Franchitti. Stephanie had already promised herself that she was going to avoid Trudy today. They hadn’t met up since what the SFS informally called “the Franchitti fire” and Stephanie didn’t trust herself to keep her temper if the subject came up.

  Now that the club was larger, avoiding Trudy wouldn’t be as tough. Moreover, after a few attempts to put them on the same team—in addition to solo flying practice, club meetings also featured team events like relay races—Mayor Sapristos had resigned himself to separating them.

  Stephanie hadn’t precisely been eavesdropping—was she to blame that so many grown-ups forgot that a kid apparently engrossed in reading might be listening as well?—when Mayor Sapristos had spoken with her dad.

  “I know I agreed with you that even if Trudy and Stephanie were among our strongest flyers they might benefit from being on the same team. Problem is, what we’ve ended up with are four teams: the Red Team, the Blue Team, Team Stephanie, and Team Trudy. They won’t pass to each other if they can help it. Trudy fouls Stephanie if she thinks she can get away with it. Stephanie doesn’t quite go as far as fouling Trudy, but I’ve caught her stealing wind in a way that’s more appropriate when done against a rival team.”

  Dad had sighed. “Better to put them on opposite teams then, where they won’t ruin the fun for the rest of the kids. Pity, though. I’d hoped Stephanie was above that sort of thing.”

  Hearing that, Stephanie had flushed. She hoped no one had realized she heard. She hated disappointing her folks, but some of the other kids—especially Trudy and her gang—were such blackholes. Did Mayor Sapristos know that Stan Chang, Trudy’s boyfriend, often came to practice high? Did he know that the reason Toby Mednick had screwed up so bad that time was because Stan and his good buddy Frank “Outta Focus” Camâra had pressured him into trying a hit of something?

  She’d considered telling the mayor, so Stan could be kept away from Toby, but because she liked Toby, she hadn’t done so. There would have been a blood test and Toby would have gotten seriously in trouble. His parents were super strict. The whole thing had been confusing, because Stephanie knew her parents would have said she should have told, that Toby could have been hurt.

  She’d settled for keeping an eye on Toby. So far, his near accident seemed to have scared him from trying anything else dumb. As for Stan and Focus…Well, Stephanie just couldn’t make herself care. They were belly lice and bullies. If they wanted to take theselves out of the gene pool by flying stoned, let them.

  Toby was on Stephanie’s guest list for the birthday party. He was only a few months younger than her, so she figured he fit that mysterious “peer” qualification. It seemed weird to Stephanie that age should matter so much. Trudy was almost a year older than her, but several sections behind in all their classes.

  Don’t be dense, Steph, she said to herself as she assembled her glider. You know the reason Mom and Dad want you to invite kids your own age is precisely because you find that hardest. Think of this as a test, just like in math or literature.

  That thought buoyed her up. All she had to do was think about social skills as if they were another subject—like social studies. Hadn’t people once studied such things very seriously? Things like etiquette or the complex hierarchical systems of the ancient Japanese—traces of which still existed in their forms of personal address.

  Stephanie grinned, wishing Karl was around so she could share her insight. He’d laugh, patting her on the head like he did his little sisters, Nadia and Anastasia. She wondered what Anders would think of her insight. As the son of an anthropologist, he probably had already thought of such things. Still, maybe she could ask him sometime.

  The thought of Anders was the final thing Stephanie needed to give her spirit wings. She strapped herself and Lionheart (who had his own harness) into the hang glider and made her way over to where the rest of the club was assembling. She even managed to make “small talk” with a couple of the other kids.

  Solo practice, especially acrobatics and targeting, went really well. A new girl in the club, Jessica Pheriss, was really good at some of the more complicated moves. Stephanie might have considered asking Jessica for some tips, but Jessica had firmly attached herself to the Trudy Franchitti faction and that made her off-limits.

  Anyhow, anyone too dumb to see through Trudy was probably too dumb to teach anything. Jessica probably performed her maneuvers by instinct, like a Meyerdahl tree-bat flying in fog.

  After solo acrobatics, Mayor Sapristos had arranged for a relay race. Stephanie set Lionheart down for this. It was one thing to have her solo performance affected by the treecat’s extra bulk, but she didn’t think it was fair to the rest of the team. Lionheart didn’t mind, especially when she gave him a stalk of celery. He scampered up a nearby spike thorn, deftly avoiding the ten-centimeter-long thorns in his quest for a perch from which he could both enjoy his snack and watch the race.

  There was a close moment when Focus Camâra closed in on Christine Schroeder, nearly snagging his wing with hers as he tried to intercept the flag Chet Pontier had tossed to Christine. Christine went into a sharp dive, saving her wing and grabbing the flag in a move that set the audience (hang-gliding club practice often drew onlookers, especially on days with warm, pleasant weather like this one) into loud cheers. After much maneuvering and a near drop of the flag they handed off, Stephanie’s Blue Team won the race.

  After the race, Focus hardly stopped long enough to listen to Mayor Sapristos’ post-game analysis, probably figuring—rightly—that he wasn’t going to come in for much praise. He stayed long enough for manners, but instead of joining the usual chatter that followed a club meeting, he motioned toward town with a toss of his head.

  “Hey, Stan, Becky, Trudy, c’mon. Let’s go grab something to eat. Somebody else can teach the bitty kiddies how to fold their wings.”

  Since Stephanie was busy helping one of the littler club members do just that, she knew the taunt was intended at least partially for her. She knew she was supposed to feel bad that she hadn’t been asked along, but she didn’t care. The only thing that stung was knowing he’d wanted to hurt her.

  Finishing with her “bitty,” Stephanie looked around. There was Toby, talking with Chet and Christine. She hurried over, knowing that her folks would take no excuses if she didn’t make at least a few invitations in person rather than over the net.

  Etiquette, Stephanie reminded herself. Just another class.

  “Hi,” she said, feeling suddenly shy. “Uh. Great move, Christine. I wish I’d been close enough to h
elp.”

  Christine, a tall, willowy girl almost a year older than Stephanie, whose fair hair was cut short in a crest that reminded Stephanie of some sort of exotic bird, grinned.

  “I wasn’t sure I could do it,” she said, “but Focus makes me so mad. Ever since I turned him down, he’s been out to get even. As if I didn’t know he only asked me out because Becky was sick with some flu. Jerk!”

  Stephanie, who had never been asked out by anyone, felt a momentary flicker of envy. She’d thought that maybe her figure—or lack of one—was the problem, but Christine was no more curvaceous. Of course, Christine was taller…

  Stephanie spoke quickly, before she could lose her nerve. “Listen, my fifteenth birthday is coming up. My folks are… I mean, they insist… Anyhow, they’re having a party. Fifteenth birthdays are really big on Meyerdahl. Something to do with the mixed German and Spanish heritage.”

  She realized she was babbling. Christine was smiling. Chet looked as if he was trying to swallow a laugh. Only Toby looked as serious as she felt. She realized that was because he probably was wondering if he was going to be included.

  “Anyhow, I was wondering if you guys would come. If my dad doesn’t have any emergency calls, we’re going to have hang gliding first. Later, there’s going to be a formal dinner, with some other people.”

  She waited to be turned down, but Christine nodded. “That sounds like fun. I’ve never been to a Meyerdahl party, but I’ve heard they’re great. Give me the date and time, and I’ll check with my mom.”

  “Me, too,” Chet said. “I don’t have a tuxedo, though. My folks say I’m growing too fast for the investment. Would just nice clothes do? I mean, you did say ‘formal.’”

  Stephanie nodded. “Not that formal. Just dress up, sit down, like that. Not a picnic or buffet.”

  She was turning to make sure Toby knew he was included in the invitation when she realized that what she’d taken for a group of three—Toby, Christine, and Chet—had actually been four. Jessica Pherris had been standing where the height of the others, combined with the partially folded hang gliders, had hidden her from Stephanie.

  Stephanie wrestled for a moment with her worse self, but, remembering how Frank’s deliberate “not-inviting” had stung, she knew she didn’t want to act the same.

  “Toby, Jessica,” she said, “you’ll come, too, won’t you? I mean, if you’re free.”

  Toby glowed. Jessica, perhaps having noticed Stephanie’s hesitation, paused.

  “I’ll check with my folks,” she said. “We’re new to Sphinx, new to the whole Star Kingdom, actually. What’s formal wear here?”

  Christine laughed. “On Manticore proper it would be a tuxedo, but this is a colony planet. Stephanie’s folks will probably be fine with anything other than your kick-arounds.”

  Stephanie hurried to second this. “My folks just wanted to make clear this wasn’t just a hang-gliding outing. They love to cook. I think they’re planning a whole banquet built around symbolic foods.”

  Jessica looked relieved. “Okay. Hey, thanks. That’s nice of you. Listen, I’ve got to run. I promised my mom I’d help her with her garden.”

  That sounded interesting, but before Stephanie could ask more, Jessica had dashed off. Only after she was gone and Stephanie was collecting Lionheart from the spike-thorn tree did she remember something.

  Frank hadn’t invited Jessica to go with him and the others, either. She’d thought Jessica and Trudy were tight, but neither Trudy nor Becky had asked her to come along.

  Of course, Stephanie thought as she walked over to where she’d promised to meet her dad, they were two guys, two girls. Maybe Becky and Trudy didn’t want the competition. Jessica’s almost as well-developed as Trudy, though she doesn’t show it off the same way. Maybe Becky doesn’t want her around Frank. Christine implied…

  Her brain spun as she tried to work out all these permutations. Calculus, she decided, was easier than human relations, a whole, lot easier.

  From where he scampered along beside her, Lionheart responded with a heartfelt, “Bleek!”

  * * *

  The days leading up to Stephanie’s birthday went very well. Even with her doubts, Stephanie couldn’t help but be excited. Back on Meyerdahl, especially when Stephanie had been really small, birthdays had always been a big deal. She’d been ten, almost eleven when they’d moved to Sphinx, and that greater age, combined with separation from their usual circle of friends and family, and the fact that both her parents had been really, really busy had led to birthdays becoming family celebrations.

  She’d been on Sphinx for almost a third of her life now, and had almost forgotten the big fuss Meyerdahl made at fifteen. The celebration was heavily influenced by the ancient Spanish quinceañera, with the emphasis being on reaching adulthood, rather than marriageability. However, a good many of Meyerdahl’s original colonists had been of German extraction. Like many of those who left their homeland, they kept to old traditions more faithfully than did those they had left behind. Germans, as Stephanie confirmed when she double-checked one of her mother’s passing comments on the net, had actually invented the individual birthday celebration, complete with cake and candles.

  Over the last few days, several of her parents’ conversations had broken off when Stephanie had come into the room. Having no desire to ruin any planned surprise, she’d even taken to making sure she whistled or talked to Lionheart so they’d have warning.

  Then, on very day of the party, the whole thing was nearly ruined. Over a mid-morning snack, meant to hold them all until lunch, Marjorie Harrington turned to Stephanie.

  “I hope you don’t mind, dear, but I invited another couple of people to your party.”

  “Oh?” Stephanie managed around a full mouth.

  “First, I was delivering some autumn squash plants to one of the holdings and I saw a girl I recognized from your hang-gliding club. She looked so lonely, sitting there by herself, that I asked if she would like to come to your birthday party.”

  Richard Harrington asked, “Which holding was this?”

  “The Franchitti holding. The girl’s name is Trudy.” Marjorie saw the twin looks of surprise on her husband and daughter’s face and misunderstood. “I’m not crazy about that family in general and I know a Franchitti was responsible for the recent fire, but I didn’t think this girl could be blamed.”

  Stephanie’s appetite vanished and she put her sandwich down.

  “Trudy Franchitti is coming here. Oh, happy, happy birthday to me…”

  “Stephanie!” Marjorie Harrington was shocked.

  Richard Harrington cut in. “Stephanie and Trudy don’t get along. Never have.”

  Marjorie Harrington blinked. “I had no idea.”

  “You wouldn’t,” Stephanie said. “You never pay attention to what I say. I told you that the kids here were utter and complete nulls. You just decide I’m poorly socialized. Now I’m going to have to put up with Trudy and her constantly reminding everyone that her father was among the first native born children on Sphinx. Happy, happy…”

  “Stephanie!” The snap in Richard Harrington’s voice made it clear he thought his daughter had overstepped. “Don’t speak to your mother that way. Maybe if you talked to her more often she’d have a better understanding. Instead, you universally condemn everyone as zorks and nulls. I only know how you feel about Trudy because I coach the hang-gliding club when I can—and because Mayor Sapristos told me that he ended up putting the two of you on separate teams because you wouldn’t play nice together.”

  Stephanie ground her teeth at the phrase, “play nice,” but she could see her dad was really peeved. She knew he loved her, but he loved her mom, too, and hated when they butted heads. Besides, technically, the description was accurate—at least on Trudy’s side.

  Richard Harrington continued. “Stephanie, one of the reasons fifteenth birthdays are a big deal—not just on Meyerdahl, but in a lot of cultures—is that especially in pre-tech civilizations, t
hey marked the beginning of adulthood. I suppose your challenge on this birthday will be to act like an adult…even if Trudy, who is older than you, does not.”

  He quirked the corner of his mouth in a little smile. “She certainly does act adult in some ways, but I must agree, in others, she is a zip in the brains department.”

  Marjorie Harrington took a deep breath. “And I apologize, Stephanie. I should have asked first. I suppose my ‘warm fuzzies’ over this whole birthday celebration got ahead of me.”

  Stephanie knew what was expected. Even though butterflies were churning around the bits of sandwich she’d eaten, she managed.

  “Thanks, Mom. That’s nice of you to say. I’ll do my best. Honest.” She couldn’t resist adding, “But really, Trudy is a perfect example of evolution in reverse.”

  “I’ll take your word for it,” Marjorie Harrington hesitated. “I hope I haven’t screwed up again, but remember I said I’d invited some ‘people.’”

  Stephanie nodded, thinking, Please, please, please not Stan or Frank…I could handle Becky, but not Stan or Frank…

  “It’s not another girl,” Marjorie Harrington went on and Stephanie’s heart sank further. “It’s Anders Whittaker. His dad will be dropping him off sometime between hang gliding and dinner.”

  Stephanie wouldn’t have believed the butterflies in her gut could get any worse, but now they were dancing and interweaving, this time in a happy bouncing dance.

  “Anders?”

  “I thought you and Karl got along with him,” Mom said, looking really anxious now. “I mean, you seemed to that day he came by to see the treecats.”

  “Oh, Mom!” Stephanie wanted to hug her, but restrained herself. After all, she wasn’t quite sure why the idea of Anders coming was so great, but it absolutely was. She settled for bouncing in her chair and reaching for her neglected sandwich. “He’s razor sharp. Definitely not a null wit.”

  “Or a zork?” Mom said, the teasing note in her voice not quite hiding her tension.