The Only Exception (5 page)

Eight

The first thing that hits my ears the next morning is the opening notes of “Madhouse” by Little Mix. As I’m about to hit snooze, a thought pops into my head:
Today is Junior Champs.
Suddenly, my feet hit the floor and I’m blasting my “Pre-Competition” playlist, beginning with same song I chose for my alarm. The beat floods in through my ears and seeps into my veins, pumping my heart with excitement. I jump around a bit to loosen up, then change out of my pajamas and into my black bikini. Instead of a rash guard, I throw on a t-shirt and a pair of comfy cotton shorts. I’ll get a competition rash guard at the beach today that’s a certain color and has my number on it, so the judges can identify me out in the lineup.

The way the competition works is extremely similar to a swim meet, if you know what that is. Each surfer is put in one or two categories, called divisions, usually by age and gender. Each event has several rounds. The Junior Champs events have four rounds: Qualifying, Quarter Finals, Semi Finals and Finals. Each round is a series of heats, where a certain amount of competitors make it through to the next round. During qualifiers, the top thirty surfers make it through. In quarter finals, the top fifteen make it, and five of those fifteen make it through the semi finals to the finals. Those five battle it out for the top three spots to place.

Typically, there’s about four or five surfers per heat, so naturally, elimination is the longest round due to how many heats are scheduled and competitors signed up.

Bigger competitions take place over five or six days, because each heat takes about twenty to thirty minutes. Junior Champs is today and tomorrow, with qualifiers this morning and the rest of the rounds tomorrow most likely. I’m in the girls 15-18 event and the girls 17-18 event. They only do the large-spectrum event for the 15-18 girls and 15-18 boys, because most of us are on the same skill level thanks to the fact that we’ve all been surfing since we could stand up. Some work at it more than others. To some, it’s a recreational sport and a chance to hang out with friends. For others, it’s a career path. Me? I take it pretty darn seriously. Anyway, each surfer is allowed ten waves per heat and only the top three waves count towards that surfer’s final score for the heat. Each wave is scored from 0.5 to 10, 0.5 being you managed to get your feet on the board and straighten up, 10 being a perfectly executed ride.

Like how some mainland cities revolve around baseball or basketball, Oahu revolves around surfing. It’s the most common sport kids participate in, but unlike most kids’ sports, all the local new channels around here cover the bigger events. The last time I competed, I was fifteen and on a two-week winter break from school in New York and won both big competitions I was in. I compete a bunch in the winter in New York with snowboarding, too, but this is different. A few local news stations already caught wind of me being back and have been guessing about what competitions I’ll be in, if any. This is in front of basically the whole island I grew up on.

With my fluorescent green surfboard and canvas hobo bag in tow, I slide on my rubber slippers and head out to the kitchen. I grab a dragon fruit-flavored Vitamin Water and a few protein bars for my bag to bring along, then sit down to drink the smoothie Grammy has ready for me. “Ready?” Papaw asks. I run through a quick checklist in my head before I respond: We looked at the forecast last night and the conditions look prime; My bag is packed up with my phone, headphones, surf wax and anything else I could possibly need; Grammy’s well-trained fingers start in on french braiding my hair, so all I’ve got to do is check in when I get there.

“Stoked,” I reply.

“Good,” he says, nodding. After both my hair and breakfast are finished, Papaw takes my board out and straps it to the roof of the beater. Papaw, Grammy and I load up and move out, reaching the beach ten minutes later. We pile out of the car, unhook the board and follow the other teens carrying their boards onto the sand. At the sign in table, I sign in, get my shirt (pink, number 15), quickly find McKayla and pull her towards a spot on the shore.

Her parents and my grandparents follow us and set down their chairs and bags and other random stuff. We throw down our boards and before I can even get my surf wax out, I hear shouting and five local reporters and their camera men or photographers rush over to us. I stand and smile at them.

“Andrea! Welcome back to Oahu,” one woman greets. I’d hate to have to wear what these people have to wear to cover a surf competition. Heels and a women’s dress suit? Heck no.

“Thank you,” I reply. “I’m excited to be home!”

“What happened to your eye?” someone else inquires.

“During my first day of training, another surfer dropped in on my wave and when he cut in front of me, he kicked me in the face,” I explain.

“What surfer?”

“Sawyer Hensley,” I answer nonchalantly.

“How have you kept up your surfing while away?” another reporter interrogates.

“I’ve been competing at snowboarding in the winter in New York and I skateboard wherever I am,” I answer. “I take tricks from all three sport and adapt them for each terrain. I guess that’s why everyone says I have such an individualized style.”

“How you do hope to place today?”

“Honestly, I just came to do my best and evaluate where I stand. I know I’ve got some stiff competition and I’m excited to see how I size up,” I respond.

“Is it true that since your last competition, you took on world-famous big wave spot, Mavericks?” a man inquires.

“It is true,” I reply. “I’ve now actually surfed it twice, since typically I stay near the spot with my dad in the summer.”

“What made you come back here?” Channel 3’s correspondent asks.

“I missed my true home,” I reply honestly. “Oahu is my favorite place in the world and nothing can ever change that.” With that, I wave them away and kneel down to start waxing my board.

“Look at you miss Celebrity,” Mac laughs.

“It’s nice to know everybody missed me!” I reply. I pause and peel my shirt off to let the sun shine on my skin.

“Mind if we camp here?” an Aussie accent asks behind me.

“Not at all,” I say, rolling my eyes and turning to Sawyer. He’s already got his rash guard on. The royal blue compliments his skin tone and eyes nicely. A girl about thirteen stands behind him with her white number twenty-seven rash guard on and pink board under her arm. “Who’s this?”

“My sister, Julia,” he introduces. “Julia, this is Andrea and McKayla.”

“Hi Julia,” I greet, smiling. She smiles shyly and says a soft “hi” in return, before turning to her mother, asking her something and running off towards a group of other young girls. “So you’re all surfers are you?” I say quizzically.

“Better believe it,” Sawyer replies. “Actually, we’re real surfers. We make our own boards instead of surfing with those pop-outs you junkyard dogs use.” A junkyard dog is a surfer that has bad technique and goes for bad waves. Instead of going off at the jerkface and saying the choice words I’d like to, I smirk and raise my eyebrows.

“Real surfers, huh? Must be pretty nice boards,” I reply cooly. “I suppose you have to be snake too to be ‘real surfer’?”

“I stand by my earlier statements,” he defends. “I miscalculated and got too close to stop.”

“Well, I suppose we’ll see who the junkyard dog is by tomorrow, won’t we?” I say, finishing off the waxing and grabbing the heat sheet from Grammy. “Do you have my rash guard?” I inquire sharply, still ruffled by his insult. She hands it to me and I stretch it over my head and take my shorts off.

“Who stuck a bee in your bonnet?” Grammy asks.

“Sawyer,” I inform her.

“What’d he do?”

“Said I wasn’t a real surfer and called me a junkyard dog,” I reply, oddly hurt. I suppose an insult hurts, no matter who it’s from. “He also said my board was a pop-out.”

“Well then,” she says. “Prove him wrong.” I smile.

“Oh, don’t worry. He’s got one heck of a shock coming,” I reply with a smirk.

I’m heat two out of eleven for the 15-18 girls division, which goes at the same time as the boys, then I have to wait for the 17-18 boys to go. The 15-16 boys and girls will go at the same time as the 17-18 surfers because of the way the beach is sectioned off for the competition. The under 15 divisions are on another area of the beach. Since it’s almost two miles long, the surf can be totally different at one end then it is at the other, and most often, it is. With the 15-18 event starting now at eight AM, we’ll be done with that by about 12:30 PM. The 17-18 boys will go after that until about 5, then the girls will go until about ten o’clock tonight. Suffice it to say, competitions are exhausting.

Heat one of the girls aren’t bad. One takes a nasty spill a few waves in and can’t shake it, though. I just watch, as that’s all I can do. I won’t know where I stand until much later in the heats. This heat’s on the short end, at just twenty minutes. Over the loudspeaker, I hear them announce my heat and I go line up next to the four other girls I’m surfing with. The alarm sounds and we dive in, paddling out to the lineup.

Once out, I sit up and wait for a wave. I let three of the other girls battle it out over the first wave and take a slightly bigger one that rolls around a minute later. I remember my strategy: assure a decent spot, but don’t show off or make myself a target.

I start the ride with a nice bottom turn, a move to get me into position, a solid 360° carve, then a 180° carve landing backwards and snapping the lip off the top to face forward again. With another 360° carve, I finish out the wave and paddle back into the lineup. Honestly, this is just warm up. No big deal. Unless I get disqualified or don’t do anything but stand up on my other waves, I’m fine.

I get two more clean waves, which score decently, then a third when I show a bit of what’s to come. Papaw and I agreed, no slob air reverse or layback until tomorrow, so today’s pretty easy. 360° carves, a few 180° airs, clidro, vertical backhand snaps and a lot of slashing.

The next nine heats make my serious competition today pretty clear: Sally Emerson, McKayla, an eighteen-year-old named Kara Vanderbilt, and an eighteen-year-old named Paige LeGroe. I end the morning in spot number fifteen. Dead last of the qualifiers. Sawyer ended up in spot number one. I shoot him a glance and a smile upon hearing the results. “I guess junkyard dogs just don’t score well, huh?” he says with a satisfied smirk.

“We’ll see,” I retort, wondering what his face will look like tomorrow. With that I turn away and debate with Grammy, Papaw and the Atwoods what to get for lunch.

Eventually, we settled on sending Papaw, Mr. Hensley and Mr. Atwood to Tara’s, a beachside shack run by Tara Adams and her family. Four words: Best. Tuna. Salad. Ever. I kid you not, I didn’t even like fish before I went to Tara’s. Goldfish crackers were as close as I was going to get to liking the actual things that swim in the water until I had her stuff.

Anyway, they bring us back lunch and we all sit and talk strategy. “That was smart, not making yourself a target,” Mac says. “Sitting in third, I’m not fooling anyone what my skill level is, especially the judges.”

“This next one, do the same thing. There’s less girls, so put a little more out there, but again, not enough to make yourself a threat,” Papaw instructs. “That was good, sticking to 180 airs. Don’t go for 360 or big airs until tomorrow.” I nod and glance at Sally, who’s laughing with a group of other surfers and shoots me a look that, to anyone else would appear a sweet look, but there’s an underlying hate to the sweetness that makes me roll my eyes and turn back to everyone else.

A bit later, I see Sawyer heading down to the edge of the waves, getting ready for his heat. As I watch him surf, McKayla comes up behind me and comments “Told you he was good.” I don’t reply. I hate to admit it, but he’s more than good. He’s amazing.

Papaw and Grammy take me home for a few hours to relax and rest up for the next event, then I’m back on the beach and in the water in heat five of the girls 17-18 division. I’m in the water with that Kara Vanderbilt, so obviously I have to kick it up a notch. Just as I’m about to step up my game, she loses her footing and takes some serious dirty lickings. Well, that stinks. Better today than tomorrow.

She recovers well, though. I have to watch out. She’s in it to win it. With this in mind, I pull a clean ride that should score pretty well. The two of us battle for waves, but when I’ve got five good ones under my belt, I let her go for them. Play down my skill. Show off tomorrow. This is gonna be fun.

I come out of the water satisfied. The scores come and I’m twelfth. Mac is fourth. Sally’s third, Kara’s second and Paige LeGroe is first. “Aw, too bad,” Sawyer remarks, coming up behind me as I pack up to leave. “Poor little gremmie. Good luck tomorrow.”

“You too, kook,” I return, not looking back. The sweet boy that cried during
Three Hours Too Soon
last night is gone and apparently has been replaced by a smack-talking jerk. Joke’s on him when he sees my style tomorrow.

“Oh, my gosh,” Mac says suddenly, covering her mouth after she’s said it.

“What?” I inquire, puzzled.

“No. Just no,” she laughs. “You’d kill me.”

“Mac…” I say warily.

“Never mind,” she giggles. “Just, don’t worry about it.”

“Has the saltwater gone to your brain, Mac?” I ask jokingly.

“I’m good,” she says, still smiling uncontrollably. “See you tomorrow!”

“Yeah, see you tomorrow,” I reply, raising an eyebrow at her. I laugh and shake my head, following Grammy to the car to head home and get some sleep. After all, I have to be well-rested to prove Jerkface wrong.

Nine

The next morning, I stand at the sign-in table picking up my day two heat sheet with Mac at my side. “Okay, you’re heat one of six for quarters for 15-18,” I tell her, flipping through the heat sheet. “And heat one of six for 17-18 quarters. I’m heat four for 15-18s and heat three for 17-18s.” She marks hers down on her arm, then passes me the Sharpie. I do the same and stuff it in my bag, along with the papers. Once again, the Hensleys have camped out next to my grandparents and the Atwoods.

I sit down and take out my water bottle and
Mansfield Park
by Jane Austen, setting up for a good long wait before my heat. Like yesterday, the 15-18s will go before the 17-18s even start. Before I can start reading, though, they call Mac’s heat and Sawyer’s heat. I head down to a prime view spot to watch Mac.

As the horn sounds, Mac and her four competitors, including Sally Emerson, Paige LeGroe and Kara Vanderbilt, run into the water. The first one up for a wave is McKayla. She pulls off a good ride. Not stellar, but solid. When she’s going for her third wave a few minutes later, Paige LeGroe drops in in front of her and snakes the wave out from right underneath her feet. Half the crowd and I groan simultaneously, while the other half cheer Paige on. It was a dirty trick, but not enough to get her disqualified.

I glance over to see Sawyer up on a wave, in the middle of a jump. He lands smoothly and finishes the wave with style. I’m going to have to pull out all the stops to impress this kid. I have an idea how, though.

There’s a jump I’ve practiced a bit this week on the water called the Stalefish air reverse, in which I jump, then, as a regular footer (meaning I surf with my left foot forward), grab my heel-side rail (the edge to my back) with my right hand and spin either 180° or 360° in the air. It’s a pro surf trick that I do all the time in the half pipe. It’s how I’ve won several snowboarding competitions. I’ve been debating whether or not to pull it in finals. To give you an idea of the difficulty, pro surfers have won competitions with this move in certain combos.

Because the grab is so awkward, you have to be really coordinated to spin and hold the board at the same time. If I do it, it will be either as a hail-Mary play or just to show off if I’ve already cemented a win.

After Mac has finished, she’s scored in third place again. Sawyer has kept his position in first. I wait for my heat to come along and when they call the heat before me, I wax my board. Guess I haven’t explained that one yet, have I? Basically, you take a chunk of surf wax that looks a lot like a bar of soap and rub it all over the top of your board, coating it in wax. The wax gives you enough traction on the board to do things like shove-its, when you spin the board around under your feet, and snaps and keeps it from getting slick with water.

Next thing I know, I’m up. Papaw lays a hand on my shoulder just before the alarm sounds. “Remember not to just take any old wave. Wait for the good ones. It’ll be worth it, trust me.” I nod and the loud beep sounds over the speaker. I paddle out and kneel up on my board in the lineup, board pointed towards shore. The first wave that comes is almost always a paddle battle, which means multiple people battling for one wave. I decide to let them battle it out and play it down. A few more roll by and then comes my wave. As it slowly builds, I paddle into it at just the right time and pop up easily.

Once I’m up, I clear my head and just go for it. I kick it off with a vertical backhand snap, following with a bit of clidro and a slob air reverse, showing off by pulling the board in close to me and kick the tail down a bit, like I would on my snowboard. I hit the water smoothly and with Sawyer’s “junkyard dog” comments in mind, show off just a bit more by performing a perfect 360° shove-it, turning the board all the way around beneath my feet. I finish with a kickout, which is when a surfer ends a ride by riding over the top of the wave. I bail and start paddling out to the lineup again.

Remembering what Papaw said, I wait patiently for another wave. Then I see it. Being just slightly ahead of the other girl trying to ride it, I paddle in and pop first and from then on, it’s my wave. I even hit it so well timed and placed that I drop back into a perfect curl for a nice tube ride, which should earn me extra points. This time, I piece together a 360° carve, a big slob air reverse, and a layback, adding a slash at the end and shooting up loads of spray. At this point, I’ve probably secured my spot. Deliver a third wave like that and I’m sitting pretty for semi finals.

And deliver, I do. The next two waves are of equal or maybe even better than the first two. After that, I sit back and let the other girls go for their waves, but if a good one comes, I go for it just for fun (and to rub it in Sawyer’s face). We all head in at the horn and I’m now sitting in first place going into semi finals. “I told you, that slob air reverse is your best play, with the layback close second,” Papaw says. “Use them when you can, because they can turn an average wave into a winning score.”

“Got it,” I assure him. Grammy gets the semi-final heat sheet. This time, the first heat is Kara, Paige, McKayla, Sally and I. After the long beep of the horn, I pull ten fantastic waves, including the slob air reverse in half of them and laybacks in almost all of them. Mac catches one particularly sick air and few other stellar waves, but the other girls have also upped their game. When we get out of the water, though, it appears they haven’t stepped it up enough. I’m still in the top spot. McKayla’s amazing air showed in her score, pushing her up to second, above Sally. She shoots me that competitively devilish smile and I smirk at her. Sorry, Mac. Love ya, but if this goes as planned, I’ll be the winner, bar none.

The next two heats are basically useless and tell us what we already know, which is Mac, Kara, Paige, Sally & I are the top surfers. Minutes later, we’re back in the water. Within my first two waves, Sally has cut me off, and Paige should’ve been disqualified for trying to knock me off my board. This just confirms my suspicion: they don’t think they can beat me without sabotaging me. Believe it or not, this is good. You know, as long as I don’t get sabotaged on more than seven waves.

Sally gets pummeled by the next wave after losing her footing and eventually, Kara goes down too. They both recover quickly, though. I squeeze in two good waves, but the score I need relies on my last scoring ride. Alright, that’s it. I don’t know how to actually say a hail-Mary, but if I did, I’d be saying one right now. I’m going for the Stalefish air reverse. Am I crazy? Undoubtedly. Is it risky? Yeah, you might say that. Will it win me first place and bragging rights to Sawyer if I do it right? Absolutely.

Let’s do this.

I wait for the right wave and a minute later, it comes. I ride in with perfect timing and pop as quick as I can. My bottom turn is flawless and sets me in good positioning. I start off with a 360° carve and a big slash off the top. I swerve down, get a little clidro going, then go for the jump. The second my board leaves the wave, I grab the back side with my left hand and spin as fast as I can. I’m too high off the wave to land at 180°, so I go for the full 360° rotation and land smoothly. With a layback to cap it off, I kick out and jump off the board. As I paddle back out to the lineup, Mac stares at me, open-mouthed.

“Tell me that was not a Stalefish air reverse,” she says. “You’ve only been practicing it for a week! How is it possible that you just perfectly executed a Stalefish air with 360° rotation?”

“I’ve been practicing that a lot longer than a week,” I reply. “That move won me at least two snowboard competitions.”

“Unbelievable. I’m best friends with the girl equivalent of Kelly Slater!” she exclaims. Kelly Slater is an eleven-time ASP (Association of Surfing Professionals) World Tour champion.

“I’m not the girl equivalent of Kelly Slater,” I laugh. “Just a snowboarder in a different kind of snow.”

“Okay, fine. The female version of Shawn White. Happy?” she corrects. I laugh and roll my eyes, paddling into the next wave.

Just because I’m excited that I can, I pull two more waves with Stalefish airs. From there, I kick back and let the others duke it out, which they do until time is up. I’m receiving dirty looks from everyone but McKayla in the water, but on the shore, everyone’s rushing for me. Thankfully, Papaw gets to me first.

“That was fantastic. I’m so proud of you,” he says, putting an arm around my wet shoulders. I grin, ecstatic. The only thing that could make me more excited is what comes next.

“The 15-18 girls division winners are: In third place, McKayla Atwood,” a woman’s voice announces over the loud speaker. “In second place, Paige LeGroe; and in first place, Andrea Maverick.” Papaw squeezes my shoulders as I laugh with glee and turn towards Grammy, who envelopes me in a hug immediately.

“The 15-18 boys division winners are:” the loud speaker woman begins again. “In third place, Jonathan Stacey; in second place, David Bowen; and in first place, Sawyer Hensley.” I glimpse Sawyer slapping high fives with his friends and he shoots me a warm smile and a shaka. I grin and shoot one back, feeling either gracious or delirious after my win.

“Andrea! How did you pull off that Stalefish air?” a reporter shouts a few feet away in the crowd.

“Lots of practice on different terrain,” I reply. He writes something down on his notepad, then heads over to Sawyer.

The girls 17-18s go about the same way. I’m on fire today! I pull slob airs and Stalefish airs left and right, dominating the division. A few hours later, I’m announced as first place of the 17-18s as well.

Since we have to stick around for the awards, Mac and I pull off our rash guards and throw on our shorts. Instead of a t-shirt, today I brought my favorite multicolor woven pullover. I roll up the sleeves and pick a spot in the front of the crowd to watch Sawyer, because when I can’t hear him annoying me, I can kind of enjoy watching him surf. He’s an exceptional surfer, but I would never tell him that. Sitting in the sand with my knees pulled into my chest, I feel relaxed and happy. And tired. Scratch that, exhausted. Just give me my trophies and let me go home to bed.

A few hours later, they do. A crowd gathers around the podium and they present the 15-18 girls awards first, then the boys. The six champions stand side by side as they hand out the trophies. I shake hands with each of the girls and Sawyer does the same with the boys, then extends his hand to me as well. I smile and shake his hand. “So, junkyard dog may have been a little off,” he admits.

“You’re not such a shubie yourself,” I reply. He grins. I like the way his smile lights up his eyes.

After that, they go through the 15-16s and then the 17-18s. Now that I have two gold and blue Junior Championships trophies in hands, my job here is done.

At home, I snap a photo of the trophies and post it on Twitter, captioned “Two new additions to the collection :) #JuniorChamp #2in1day” Immediately, Amy replies, even though it’s almost two in the morning in New York and her camping trip is over.

“Congrats girl! Miss you!” she says with a little emoji face blowing me a kiss. I smile and switch to the phone app, tapping in my mother’s phone number.

“You’ve reached Charlotte Maverick. Please leave me a message with your name and phone number and I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.”

“Hi mom, it’s me. Just wanted to tell you I won both of my divisions today at junior champs,” I inform the recorder. “Call me when you get the chance.”

I hang up and call my dad. “This is Sean Maverick. Leave me a message and I’ll get back to you soon.” The beep sounds .

“Hi Dad. I just called to tell you I won my divisions at junior championships today and I love you. Talk to you later.” I sigh, turn off my phone and set the trophies on the shelf, then crawl into bed and drift off.