Explore Read online

  Explore

  Christy Goerzen

  orca currents

  Copyright © 2009 Christy Goerzen

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system now known or to be invented, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

  Goerzen, Christy, 1975-

  Explore / written by Christy Goerzen.

  (Orca currents)

  ISBN 978-1-55469-120-3 (bound).--ISBN 978-1-55469-119-7 (pbk.)

  I. Title. II. Series.

  PS8613.O38E96 2009 jC813’.6 C2008-907415-7

  Summary: Mike explores the world of outdoor recreation and discovers

  a new side of himself.

  First published in the United States, 2009

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2008941142

  Orca Book Publishers gratefully acknowledges the support for its publishing programs provided by the following agencies: the Government of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry Development Program and the Canada Council for the Arts, and the Province of British Columbia through the BC Arts Council and the Book Publishing Tax Credit.

  Cover design by Teresa Bubela

  Cover photography by Dreamstime

  Author photo by Kimberly Malysheff

  Orca Book Publishers Orca Book Publishers

  PO Box 5626, Station B PO Box 468

  Victoria, BC Canada Custer, WA USA

  V8R 6S4 98240-0468

  www.orcabook.com

  Printed and bound in Canada.

  Printed on 100% PCW recycled paper.

  12 11 10 09 • 4 3 2 1

  For Joshua, with truckloads of love

  chapter one

  I was surrounded by a sea of Gore-Tex, wooly toques and rosy cheeks. Granolas. That’s what my buddy Cam calls them. A girl near me with red hair in long braids was eating something out of a pottery bowl. It looked like orange sections with yogurt and oat flakes. Holy crap, I thought, Granolas even eat granola.

  I sat at the back of the room in my old hoodie and jeans I hadn’t washed in months, my face still creased from the bedsheets. I felt out of place. There were about twenty kids in the room, all looking pretty bright-eyed for seven thirty in the morning. There was no way I’d be here if Officer Lardface hadn’t parked outside my bedroom window and honked the horn, over and over again, until I stumbled outside.

  When I first arrived, a guy and a woman in matching fleece jackets were stacking papers and talking quietly. I stood in the doorway, not sure what to do. The guy snapped his head up immediately, a massive grin on his leathery face. Between the two of them, they’d probably had more years in the sun than most California surfers.

  “Heyyyyyy,” he said. “You must be Mike Longridge.”

  He stuck out his hand. “I’m Rick, and this is my wife Maggie. We run this program. Welcome to Explore Orientation Day.”

  Maggie shook my hand too. She had a strong grip. “Here are a few things to get you started.” She plopped a stack of handouts and a fruit bar in my hands. “Just make yourself comfortable. We’re so glad you’re here.” Maybe they were glad I was here, but I wasn’t. I looked up from below my pulled-up hood. At the front of the room, a big whiteboard said, Welcome to Explore. Below that, in even bigger writing: DISCOVER YOUR POTENTIAL.

  A girl next to me nudged me in the ribs with a bony elbow. Hard. “Would you like crackers with that cheese?” she said, pointing at the whiteboard and rolling her eyes.

  She was cute, with long black hair and perfect skin. She was the kind of girl who would never give me the time of day. Was she really talking to me? I glanced around the room to see if anyone else noticed. I could feel my cheeks burning.

  “Whatever,” I grunted, then slumped in my seat.

  “Whatever you, Hooded Fang,” she said, smiling. “Just trying to make conversation.” She shrugged and turned back to her friends.

  I flipped through my handouts. Groups of happy-looking students kayaked, rock climbed and skied across the cover of the pamphlet. Explore changed my life, it said underneath a photo of three wholesome groupies. I met lots of new friends and had so many unbelievable experiences.

  Everyone else in the room was chatting in little groups. They all came from different high schools in the Okanagan because they’re outdoorsy keeners. They were here because they love hiking and classifying plant species and whatever else Granolas like to do.

  But why was I here? Because Lardface and her cronies didn’t know what else to do with me.

  I had my first meeting with Officer “Lardface” Lando within days of moving to the new town. Officer Lando, it said on her office door, High School Community Liaison. That’s when she told me about the “amazing” Explore program. She gave me a whole spiel about perfect attendance, participation in all group activities and a good attitude.

  “Three strikes and you’re out though, buddy,” she had said through a mouthful of expensive dental work. “Otherwise it’s off to the Derbin day program with you.”

  The Explore program was five months of outdoor activity followed by five months of regular school classes. I knew about Derbin already, ‘cause Cam went there a couple of years ago. They have to pick up garbage at playgrounds and stuff like that. It sounded horrible. But being forced to climb mountains with a bunch of hippies didn’t sound so great either. Officer Lardface got me set up with English and math tutors, reminding me all the while that I was a good kid who falls in with the wrong peer groups.

  I’d heard that one before. It was easy to find guys to hang out with. Whenever Dad and I moved to a new town, I just rode my BMX to the corner store and saw who was there. Before this summer I never did anything super bad, just keyed some cars and tagged some buildings downtown. We got caught sometimes, but the cops usually thought I was following along, and nothing happened to me. You have an innocent face, someone told me once. That didn’t work last time though.

  So I had no choice. I was stuck with this Explore program whether I liked it or not. Okay, so five months of not having to sit in math class sounded pretty sweet. But once again, my fate was decided by a clueless grown-up with a coffee mug on her desk that said Fill your day with sunshine.

  My dad didn’t care either way. “Just don’t come running to me every time you need money to fix your canoe paddle,” he’d said, cracking open a beer and turning back to his hockey game.

  “Okay, folks, let’s get started.” Rick and Maggie bounded up to the whiteboard. “Let’s go around the room and introduce ourselves. Tell everyone what school you’re from and what brings you to Explore. Lisa, why don’t you start?”

  “I’m Lisa Park,” the cute girl beside me said. “I’m from Westview Secondary. I love skiing and I can’t wait to go up to the Blanket Glacier. Woohoo!”

  Was she ever perky. A ripple of excitement and some other “woohoos” went through the room.

  I was next. My heart started beating like crazy. I hate talking in class. I always say something dumb. Maybe if I looked down they’d just skip over me.

  “Mike?” Maggie said. They weren’t going to let me get away with it.

  “Uh, I’m Mike Longridge. I’m not from any school. I just moved here in the summer. I’m not sure why I’m here, I guess.” The Granolas looked at me and half smiled. Tough crowd. I looked down and started to doodle on my jeans with my pen.

  I tuned out the rest of the introductions. After that, Rick and Maggie talked about the program and the plan for the rest of the week. When I could, I glanced over at Lisa.

  “Okay, gang,” Maggie said after a while. “It’s snack time. Let
’s take fifteen minutes.”

  Snack time? Seriously? What was this—kindergarten? I glanced around. Everyone was digging into their Mountain Equipment Co-op backpacks. Bananas, homemade sandwiches and salads were pulled out. All I had was a half-empty bottle of flat Coke from the back of the fridge and a bag of chips. Oh yeah, and the fruit bar. I ripped open the bag of chips.

  “Wow,” a familiar voice beside me said, “you have the longest eyelashes I’ve ever seen.” Out of the corner of my eye, I could see that Lisa’s face was about two inches from mine.

  “Whoa!” I jumped and leaned back in my chair. Those Granolas had no boundaries. But then again, I’d never had a girl as gorgeous as her that close to me before. Let alone complimenting me on my freakin’ eyelashes.

  “Want some of my sandwich, Longridge? I see you don’t have much going on in the food department.”

  “Uh, no thanks.”

  “You don’t talk much, do ya? That’s cool. You’re the strong silent type. Want to sit with us?”

  She and her friends shuffled their chairs to make room for me. I had no idea why this Granola girl was trying to be friends with me. Watch out for those hippie types, Dad had said last night. All that “love and rainbows” crap. Your little outdoor program will be crawling with ’em.

  “No, I’m okay.” I pulled my hood up again.

  Just as Maggie and Rick stood up to do some more talking, a guy wearing an Adidas jacket and jeans shuffled in.

  “Ah, you must be Chris,” Rick said, ignoring the new kid’s lateness. “Great to have you here. Make yourself comfortable.” He plopped the requisite stack of handouts and fruit bar into Chris’s hands.

  Chris grunted something and dropped the fruit bar back on Rick’s desk. He slumped down a couple of desks away from me.

  I smiled inside my hoodie. Maybe Chris and I had a few things in common.

  chapter two

  It’s been the same my whole life, seems like. Whenever I see the stacks of unpaid bills start to pile up, I know that pretty soon Dad’s going to say it’s time to pack up and leave. He always calls it a “fresh start.”

  “Time to try our old tricks on some new dogs, Mikey.”

  I’ve heard it all a million times.

  Then we run to the next place, and somehow Dad opens up another one of his pubs. It’s always the same: waitresses with cut-off jean shorts who call me “honey” and Dad joking with all the drunks at the bar. Me and Dad living in some dump of a motel nearby.

  Pub life was fun when I was a kid. I ate deep-fried everything and ice cream whenever I wanted. I beat guys four times my age at pool. Dad and I had a whole system worked out in case the cops showed up. A twelve-year-old kid wiping tables and selling smokes in a pub isn’t cool with everyone, especially law-enforcement types. Anytime someone suspicious came in, one of Dad’s regulars would make a hand signal. Then I’d hide in the closet or run out the back door. I used to find those moments pretty exciting. But they aren’t so fun anymore.

  Sometimes Dad has one of his waitresses over for a “visit.” When he does, it’s pretty obvious that I’m not welcome.

  “Hey, Mikey, Katie and I need some alone time.”

  “Hey, Mikey, Roxy and I are having a special visit. Just the two of us.”

  This is usually followed by Katie or Roxy giggling like crazy. During those times, I usually go running. I just run, run, run until I can’t run anymore. I don’t have special running shoes or clothes or anything. I just head out the door in whatever I’m wearing, even if it’s pajama pants and bare feet. I don’t feel anything while I’m running. My legs just take over, and I can sail. Once, when we lived in Maple Ridge, I ran all the way from our motel to the town dump. The next week when my dad and I drove there to try and scrounge up some furniture, I realized that I’d run fifteen miles there and back.

  Our last big move had been really bad. Dad got beat up, and we left that night with just a few things we could load into his truck. Dad didn’t even have time for the “fresh start” speech, just a gruff “We’re going. Now.”

  And here we are in Oliver. Dad works at a pub. He doesn’t own it. A good idea. I don’t have to wash dishes and bus tables anymore. The whole thing is okay with me, considering that I messed up pretty bad in the last town.

  I don’t really remember when I started “participating in illegal activities,” as Lardface would say. It seems like one day I was playing with my toy trucks, and then the next thing I knew, I was in Stan’s Market, stuffing comic books and dirty magazines under my shirt. The older kids at Jackson Park paid big cash for those. That was my big break into the world of thievery. But it’s not like I got a rush out of doing it, like some of the other guys did. I just didn’t have anything else to do.

  The whole thing had been Cam’s idea. He said he needed money. We were sitting on the curb outside the 7-Eleven with Ty and Derek, drinking Slurpees.

  Before I knew it, we were standing at the back of a house around the corner.

  “Mike, you’re good at climbing stuff,” said Cam. “You go first. Jam the window open.”

  Everyone always did whatever Cam said. I looked up. The window wasn’t that far. Using the drainpipe and the wood siding for grips, I scaled the side of the house and jammed the window open with my pocket knife. I can’t say my dad never gave me anything useful.

  As soon as I let the other guys in, everyone scattered to different rooms. Derek shouted when he found a box of jewelry. Probably rhinestones, I thought. Ty and Cam unplugged the TV and the stereo. Derek loaded up with CDs and more jewelry.

  I just stood there in the kitchen. School photos of little kids framed the kitchen sink. A sign that said Fran’s Kitchen hung above the stove. I figured we were in someone’s grandma’s house.

  I’ve never seen four guys move faster than when we heard the car in the driveway. Ty threw open the kitchen window, taking the stereo with him. As I jumped out I accidentally knocked over a pot of yellow flowers. It smashed onto the clean white floor. I’m still not sure why I did it, but I climbed back inside to clean up the mess.

  I heard “What is he doing?” coming from outside as I frantically wiped up the dirt. My buddies took off. I got caught, dishcloth in hand. I never ratted the other guys out. It’s just not an honorable thing to do.

  The authorities—aka Officer Lardface— found me almost as soon as Dad and I moved to Oliver. She got my file from my old liaison officer when Dad registered me for school. That was how I started having the weekly meetings with Officer Lardface, and that was how I ended up at Explore.

  chapter three

  “Okay, folks, we’re going to jump right in with a game of Predator and Prey,” Maggie said. She was standing on some tree roots so that she could see everyone. For such a tiny lady, she sure looked tough.

  It was our first day at the wilderness site, our home base for the next five months. Other than a phone call at the crack of dawn, Lardface didn’t have to come to my house that day. I even brushed my teeth before I ran the five miles to the site. But not because I was excited to start identifying bear crap or anything. It was because of Lisa.

  I scanned the crowd, looking for her. She and another girl were sharing a juice box near the front of the group.

  “This team-building exercise will warm you up and help you get to know each other better,” Rick said.

  I groaned. Team building? These teacher types were always into everyone getting to know each other. The Granolas were gazing up at Rick and Maggie, their faces shining. Except Chris, who looked like he’d had a rough night. I jogged over to stand near him at the back of the group.

  “Why’re you here?” I whispered.

  “This or Derbin,” he grunted, not looking at me.

  “Same here,” I said. “Wonder if anyone else here has that problem.”

  Chris surveyed the group. “Doubtful.”

  The corners of our mouths went up. Chris started to laugh, but ended up having a coughing fit instead.

  �
�Here’s how it works,” Maggie was saying from her perch. “Some of you are predator animals, like eagles, wolves and bears. Some of you are prey animals, like chipmunks and deer.”

  Chris snickered. “Chipmunks.”

  Rick held up a green armband with a drawing of a rabbit on it. “You’ll get these armbands. Not all of you are predator or prey animals. Two of you will be diseases, which can harm anyone. When you see a disease, run like heck.”

  Maggie walked around, handing out maps and armbands. “The object of the game for the prey is to visit all ten feeding stations and collect food tickets from each one. Prey, you are holding maps of the entire site. These show elevations and landmarks so that you can find the feeding stations.”

  I glanced down at my map in panic. All those lines and circles—I had no clue how to read the thing. The Granolas were all looking at their maps and pointing around the site as if they knew exactly what was going on. Some of them even pulled out compasses. They were all experts already.

  “And predators and diseases,” Rick said, “your goal is to tag your prey and collect their life tickets. Each prey animal gets life tickets that clip on your belt. You can’t tag the same prey twice.”

  I hated games. They made me nervous. I always worried I’d get the rules wrong and then get laughed at.

  I glanced over to see what armband Lisa got.

  A deer. Same as me.

  Chris got a chipmunk.

  “Remember, it’s a good idea to team up with other predators or other prey,” Rick said. “There’s strength in numbers. Except if you’re a chipmunk. Teaming up with another chipmunk won’t do a dang bit of good.”

  Maggie held up an air horn. “When I sound the horn, the prey get a running start. When I sound the horn again, it’s the predators’ turn. The third time, the diseases are on the loose.”

  A girl with blond dreadlocks giggled with her friend. They both had disease armbands on.

  “I can run away from you any day, gangrene!” It was Lisa. Beautiful and funny.