Cobra Strike (3 page)

The first sample, then, was normal.

In the sample from Gram's pond, though, I saw hardly anything through the microscope. It looked like tap water: Nothing wriggled in it.

“Chemicals,” Gram grimly announced when I told her what I'd seen. “It's chemicals what's killed the tiny wrigglers. And chemicals what's killed the birds. How did chemicals get in my crick?”

I shook my head. “Th-that's what I've been trying to figure out, Gram. All I can th-think of is the Johns Corporation and the c-coal
mining. B-but I've looked at the county m-m-maps. Th-he closest m-mine shaft is a few miles south of here, clear over Lookout H-h-hill.”

“Chemicals,” she repeated with conviction. “Mark my words. Something unnatural. Can you do some sort of special test on the water to find out what's in it?”

“I can give a s-sample to the c-county health dep-dep-dep-dep...”—I gave up on the word department and found another word— “officials.”

Gram nodded briskly. “Do that then.”

I'd been worried about something ever since I'd looked at the pond water sample. “Wh-what about y-your w-w-well?” I asked. Being nervous about her drinking water affected my speech. “Wh-what if the w-water is...”

“It's not,” she said firmly. “That well draws from a hundred feet down. Purest water a body can drink. Besides, it'll take more than bad water to put me in a cold grave.”

I didn't disagree. Still, when Gram went inside to fix breakfast, I walked down to
my truck. I had brought the empty jars for a reason. After breakfast, I would fill them with water samples from different places along the creek, upstream and downstream, to see where the bad water began and how far it went.

I took one of the empty jars and wrote on the label in red ink: WATER SAMPLE FROM CLAIRE LINDEN'S WELL. COLLECTED ON SEPTEMBER 10.

I went to her well, pumped until cold water flowed and filled the jar. I tightened the lid and stashed the jar in my truck.

It would go with all the other samples to the county health department.

Tough as Gram was, I couldn't help but think of those little birds—so stiff and silent and much too dead. And I couldn't help but think how horrible it would be for the same thing to happen to Gram.

In the locker room the following Friday night, the entire team gathered to listen as Coach Pitt gave us a pep talk on winning the game. Coach Donaldson had gone outside to talk to the referees.

Coach Pitt repeated the same old rah-rah speech we'd heard dozens of times before, and I began to think about the water in Gram's creek. I wasn't smart enough to keep my eyes on Coach Pitt, though, and without warning, he began to yell at me.

“Linden! Pay attention! Don't you care about this game?”

I nodded.

“Speak to me, Linden. Be a man!”

“I c-c-c-c...” I felt my face turning red.

“C-c-come on, L-l-linden,” Coach Pitt began with a sneer. “T-t-talk.”

Flustered, I couldn't get a word out. I felt tears of frustration threaten to start.

Then a clear voice came from somewhere in the middle of the team. “T-t-t-tobacco j-j-j-juice!”

Everyone busted up.

“Who said that?” Coach Pitt yelled. He hated being laughed at. Maybe that's why he picked on others. When no one answered, he repeated, “Who said that?!”

Again no answer. But a lot of snorting laughter.

“All right,” Coach Pitt said. The anger in his voice caused us to quiet down. “Linden, give me one hundred push-ups. Now.”

I took a deep breath, remembering what Gram had told me. Weak people picked on others, just to make themselves feel better.

This was Coach Pitt's problem. Not mine. But as I dropped to the ground, to my surprise, so did a bunch of my teammates. They began to do push-ups with me. In a few seconds, everyone had joined us.

Coach Pitt was speechless.

But Coach Donaldson wasn't. He walked in and found his whole team doing push-ups.

“Pitt,” he said, “it's tough enough for these kids to win games. Do you have to tire them out before the game even begins?”

Coach Donaldson told us to get up, and then he sent us out to the field.

I guessed Pitt wouldn't bother me again soon.

I stood in the backfield, waiting. The night was warm, and big moths darted around the lights above the field. A huge crowd had gathered for our first home game of the season.

In seconds, we would start the first play. With me as part of the suicide squad.

That's what they called those of us who played on the kick return team. Even though
I'm a receiver, our high school is so small that a lot of us have to play more than one position.

But why call us the suicide squad?

Think of it this way. The kickoff is one of the few times when the opposing team has a chance to gain sixty yards' worth of steam before trying to mow down the player with the ball.

And, against tonight's team, the Penhold Panthers, that sixty yards' worth of full speed could be painful. Because, of all the teams in the league, these guys were among the biggest.

Add up all the weight of the football equipment—helmet, shoulder pads, hip pads, thigh pads, knee pads, elbow pads, rib pads— and it's about fifty or sixty pounds, more on a rainy day when the padding soaks up water.

Now put that sixty pounds on guys who already weigh close to two hundred pounds— like most of the defensive players on the Panthers. It turns them into tanks.

The ref dropped his arm to start the game. Their kicker ran forward and leaned into the
ball. It sailed so high, I lost it briefly against the glare of the setting sun.

Then, there it was. Tumbling from the sky like a shot goose on my side of the field.

I looked ahead briefly and saw that our guards were forming a wedge to protect me.

I backed up several steps, and timed it so that as I ran forward again, I caught the ball in the center of my stomach. I wanted my feet to be moving when I got the ball.

As I connected with the ball, the Panthers began hitting our line. Above the screaming of the crowd, I heard the popping sounds of helmets and shoulder pads meeting at full speed and the grunts of bodies colliding.

Within seconds the Panthers had destroyed the wedge and were swarming toward me.

It's a lot easier to turn at full speed than at a standstill. The key to outmaneuvering an opponent is to keep moving, which I did.

The first Panther dived toward me, but I was able to cut left and jump over two fallen players. His hands plucked at my jersey as I slipped loose.

I took another quick look up the field. I could see a gap to my right. I blasted toward it, hearing more grunts as tacklers missed me and hit the ground.

A shoulder fake to the left and a duck to the right put me past another two players.

And just like that, there were only three players between me and the end zone.

I kicked into full speed, with two players angling toward me. I outran one of them. The other one got a hand on my shoulder, but I shook him off and he lost his balance. As he fell, he grabbed at my leg. I stumbled, nearly fell, but recovered.

Only one player was ahead of me and the others were chasing me from behind.

I headed back to my left, the most open part of the field.

Maybe I couldn't talk well, but I knew how to run. Getting to a place where I could use full speed would be an advantage.

It was.

The last player made a dive at me and fell short.

I heard two players chasing me hard from behind. But with no one left between me and the end zone, it became a foot race. I wasn't going to lose.

I put my head down and stretched hard, gaining five yards, then seven yards, then ten yards on my pursuers. By the time I crossed the goal line, I had a fifteen-yard lead.

I lifted my arms high as the crowd roared its delight.

First game. First play. First touchdown.

It felt great.

I dropped the ball and stood with my hands on my knees, gasping for breath as the rest of my team caught up to me.

The extra point was good, and we were up 7–0.

Our joy lasted for about five minutes.

That's how long it took for the Panthers to work the ball back to our end and score an answering touchdown. And the point after.

Seven to seven.

On the next kickoff, the Panthers kept the ball away from me and forced us to begin a drive on our own ten-yard line.

On our first play, Schenley, our quarterback, threw up a marshmallow that their safety picked out of the air.

I tackled him as he tried to run the ball in for a touchdown. But we'd lost the possession.

Two plays later, the Panther quarterback ran the ball in himself. Just like that, we were down 13–7. With the point after, it was 14–7.

It only got worse from there. Schenley was intercepted another dozen times—probably some sort of pitiful record. We lost 49–7.

First game. First loss. And with Schenley as our only quarterback, it looked like it wouldn't be our last.

Monday afternoon, I stood waiting all alone at the front desk of the county offices, a low, square, brick building on Main Street. As I looked around, I realized the inside was as boring to look at as the outside.

Beyond the front desk was a hallway lined with tiny windowless offices. I could see into the nearest offices; each held a small desk and lots of paper clutter. The walls all around me were dull white with no pictures.

The air was stale and smelled a little like old sweat.

I waited a while longer. I finally cleared my throat, hoping someone would come out of one of the offices down the hallway.

A few minutes later, I heard rustling, the sound of nylon against nylon. A skinny woman in a bright red dress came out of a carpeted office and clicked down the hallway toward me in high heels.

“Yes?” she asked. She stopped behind the front desk, looking not at me but at her nails, shiny and as red as her dress. Her huge fake eyelashes fluttered every time she blinked.

“I w-w-was here l-l-last M-monday,” I said, “w-w-w-with w-water s-samples.”

I could tell she was getting impatient with my slow words, which made speaking more difficult.

“I l-l-left th-th-them w-w-w—”

“Yeah,” she said, cutting me off, “with Fred, our health inspector.”

That was one advantage, I guess, about stuttering. People remembered you.

She half turned and bellowed back down the hallway. “Fred! Drag those lazy bones of yours out of the coffee room. You've got a visitor!”

She went back to studying her fingernails. She saw a bit of lint and blew it off. Then she buffed her nails against the shoulder of her dress.

Fred finally appeared. I knew what he looked like, of course, from the week before. He was older, about my height, with thinning brown hair, tired eyes and a sagging face. He wore the same brown suit and same stained tie he'd had on the last time I'd seen him.

“Oh,” he said when he saw me, as if I was a tax collector.

Oh? No big grin and handshake? Last Monday he had greeted me like a long-lost buddy. As a Cobra fan, he'd recognized me and told me how much he was looking forward to this season. In a small town like ours, high school football was a big deal. Almost everybody followed the team's performance closely. Had I played so badly
against the Panthers that he didn't even want to talk football?

“Hmmmm, hello,” I said. “I'm here about the w-w-water samples.”

Sometimes, when I know what I want to say ahead of time, I can practice the words in my mind. By humming a bit, I can loosen up my throat. That makes it easier to get the words started.

“Yeah,” he said, “the water samples.”

I waited. I do that as often as I can instead of asking obvious questions. Like, in this case, were the tests done like he had promised?

“I got good news,” he said. “There's not a thing wrong with the water you brought me.”

That surprised me so much I blurted out, “Th-that can't b-b-be.”

“Are you calling me a liar?” he asked, getting defensive. “I'm telling you, everything tested so pure that I'd drink it myself.”

“B-b-but under th-the m-m-m-m...” I had said the wrong thing and made him mad, which made me so nervous I was forgetting
to concentrate on how to shape the words with my mouth.

“Under th-th-the m-m-m-m...” I stopped again. I couldn't think of another word for microscope.

I pulled a small notepad and pen from the back pocket of my jeans. As quickly as I could, I wrote:

Under the microscope, it looked different from other pond-water samples.

While the skinny woman in the red dress snickered at me, I handed the note to Fred. I hated having to use the notebook, but I always keep it handy for times like this. Unfortunately, it doesn't help me when I have to use the telephone.

“So now you're telling me that you tested it yourself?”

I shook my head. “N-n-not exactly. B-b-but—”

“Maybe you think you can do my job better than me?”

Again I shook my head. I wanted to explain that things that should be simple for
me to say sometimes weren't. This was why most people thought of me as a loner. It was too hard to try to talk to others. I found it easier to stay within my own thoughts than to make friends.

“N-n-no,” I said, “I d-d-don't. B-b-b-but—”

“Look,” he said, “wait here.”

He walked heavily down the hallway. I heard a door open. Seconds later he came back carrying a small box with the jars of water samples I had brought him. He plunked the box on the desk in front of me, scattering a small pile of paper.

“Hey!” the skinny woman in the red dress said. “Watch it. What if I had important letters and stuff in that pile that I needed to keep straight?”

“Fat chance, Doreen,” he told her. “You type so slow you don't do more than a letter a day. Tough to get anything mixed up at that pace.”