Grind (6 page)

“But it
isn't
the middle of the night—it
wasn't
the middle of the night in Japan and China and Australia.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Go to the guest book. We've had visitors from lots of different countries. They don't call it the World Wide Web for nothing.”

I didn't know what to say. I was speechless.

“Phil, are you still there?” Wally asked.

“I'm here. Does Lisa know?”

“Not yet. I wanted to call you and then I figured you'd probably be the one who wanted to call her. Good luck.”

“Thanks,” I said.

“That's okay. That's what friends are for. And Phil, if you do eventually convince her to get back together with you, treat her good this time.”

“I'll try,” I said.

“You better do more than just try, because, I'm warning you, the next time you two break up, I don't care if you are my best friend, I'm giving it a shot myself.”

“You're going to ask Lisa out?”

“Don't sound so shocked. She might go out with me you know.”

“I wasn't shocked. I was just thinking.”

“About?”

“That she probably deserves some-body better…I mean better than me,” I explained.

“She probably does, but that doesn't mean you should give up yet.”

“I'm not giving up. Giving up isn't something I'm good at.”

“That I know,” Wally said. “Nevin wants us to meet before class,” he added. “Can you be there at eight?”

“Considering I'm up an hour earlier than usual already, I think I can manage. I'll let Lisa know.”

We stood around the computer, staring at the screen. As we watched, the number of hits on the site kept growing. It was unbelievable.

“This goes way beyond anything I had ever imagined,” I said.

“Didn't you imagine sponsors and making money?” Nevin asked.

“Yeah, I thought that could happen."

“This is the Internet. Anything that's going to happen will happen fast,” Nevin said.
“We've already been approached by e-mail by a skateboard company.”

“What company?” Wally asked.

“They're new. It's called Street Illegal Boards. They're sending us their product, new boards for everybody.”

“The new boards…how much do we have to pay?” Wally asked.

“You don't pay anything. They give you the boards so that people can see you skating on their product.”

“But I like my old board,” Wally said.

“You can like it all you want, but if we want them to sponsor the web site we have to have shots of you three skating on their board.”

“They want to sponsor our page?” I asked, not believing my ears.

“Just a small ad to start, and a link to their home page where people can order from them.”

“And they'll pay us for this ad, right?” I asked.

“The standard fee. A penny a hit.”

“A penny? That's nothing!” I scoffed.

Nevin looked confused. “Over ten thousand people visited the site last night. That works out to over one hundred and twenty five dollars.”

“That can't be right,” I said.

“Believe me, I'm hardly ever wrong when it comes to math,” Nevin said. “We all made over thirty dollars while we slept. By the end of today that amount will double or triple.”

“You mean I could make a hundred bucks today?” Wally asked.

“That's right. And make it while you were sleeping and sitting in class and eating lunch.”

“Amazing,” Lisa said.

“And if we could have that many hits every day in a year, we'd all earn close to four thousand dollars each,” Nevin said.

“That's even more amazing,” Lisa said, as we all started counting and spending the money in our heads. Making money would make my father happy and let him know that skating could be serious.

“But the hard part isn't getting them to look for a day but to keep them looking, day after day after day,” Nevin said.

He was right. I felt deflated, and then I remembered what Bam Bam had said. The secret was to keep putting on new stuff.

“If we update regularly, people will come back to check on it regularly,” I said.

“Exactly,” Nevin agreed. “And our sponsor — and they are our sponsor if you all agree — they said they had some ideas on how we could do that.”

“What sort of ideas?” Wally asked.

“They didn't say, but I'm sure they'll be good. First things first, though,” Nevin said. “If we agree to their sponsorship, I'll put the ad up and make the link right away so we don't lose any more money. Each of those hits you see is free right now.”

The hit wheel continued to click up.

“Do it,” I said, “and do it now.”

“Yeah, hurry,” Wally agreed.

“Me too,” Lisa echoed. “The sooner the better.”

“I hoped you'd all agree. You head off for class and I'll take care of everything. And remember, as you're sitting there you'll actually be earning money at the same time.”

“It's definitely started to go down,” Nevin said.

“How many hits have we had altogether?” Wally asked.

“In the past week we've had over ninety thousand hits.”

“And since we've been getting paid for the last eighty thousand at a cent a hit, that means that we've made over eight hundred dollars, or two hundred bucks each,” I said.

“But the rate of hits has been declining. We only had four thousand visits today. Our peak was four days ago, and it's been going down each and every day,” Nevin said.

“But we've been adding new material,” Wally said.

“Obviously not good new material,” Nevin said. “We have to upload something that people will want to see.”

“I've been thinking about some tricks,” I said.

“Tricks are good, but I've been looking at the comments in our guest book and talking to our sponsor and it seems pretty clear what the webcrawlers want,” Nevin said.

“What?” I asked.

“For starters, the most popular video clip we have is the one where you're running up and over the security car,” he answered.

“So you want me run up another security car?”

“No, of course not. You've already done that. I was thinking more of a police car.”

“You're joking, right?”

He shook his head. “I'm serious.”

“You're seriously
crazy
if you think I'm going to run over a police car and be chased by some cops. Real cops are different than rent-a-cops.”

“I didn't say anything about being chased by anybody,” Nevin said. “We'll find an empty police car and you can skate up to it and then run over top.”

“And just where do you think we're going to find an empty police car?” I asked.

Nevin shrugged. “I thought we'd hang around a donut shop and wait for them to go inside. The whole thing shouldn't take more than a few seconds if you think about it.”

Part of me thought he was crazy. The other part knew that I was crazy enough to be excited about giving it a shot.

“What about us?” Wally asked.

“It looks like the people visiting the page want to see more of Lisa,” Nevin said.

“I can do some more tricks,” she said.

“That isn't necessarily what they mean. They want to see more of you. More close-up pictures, maybe less clothing, no helmet.”

“Hold on,” I said, “we're not putting Lisa in a bikini to satisfy some perverts.”

“Nobody's talking about a bikini — although that would attract more hits. We could use your school pictures, or just some shots of you sitting around or talking or standing on your board.”

“I guess that would be okay,” Lisa said.

She wasn't arguing the way I thought she would. Maybe she liked the idea. I knew I certainly didn't like some of the comments people had been posting in our guest book. Lisa was really good-looking, but it wasn't helping me any for kids around the world to be telling her that.

“And me?” Wally asked.

“More tricks,” Nevin said. “If you're Wally the Wall, they want you to do some more aerial stunts, climbing the wall, riding the rail.”

“The sort of trick you've almost been hitting for the past four months,” I said. “You can do it.”

“And you should all be riding the new boards.”

We'd gotten the new boards from Street Illegal. They were nice boards, flashy, good graphics, nice handling.

“So when do we go out and tape?” Wally asked.

“Sooner is better. How about right after school?” I asked.

All three nodded. “Good. See you all at the Super Save at around four thirty.”

“How about if we go to a donut shop first?” Wally suggested.

“We can get food after,” I said.

“I wasn't talking about food. I thought we'd go looking for a police car.”

“Tell you what. You land that jump of yours and then we'll find a police car and I'll give it a shot,” I said. “Deal?”

“Deal,” Wally agreed.

We stood, boards in hand — new Street Illegal boards—waiting for Nevin to set up. There was no point in hitting a trick unless it was being taped. Nevin gave us the thumbs-up.

“Okay, Wally, go for it.”
He didn't move. It was like he hadn't heard me.

“Come on, we don't have much time. I really don't want to be here if security arrives.”

“Could make for some interesting shots if they do,” Lisa said.

“That's what I'm afraid of. Shots to the side of my head as they break my new board over my old skull.”

Lisa laughed. She'd been easing up on me over the past week…maybe this was going to work out okay.

Wally hadn't laughed—or blinked. He looked frozen.

“You can do it, Wally,” I said. “All you need is a little more speed. Go higher up the bank, okay?”

Wally nodded.

“Remember, no guts, no glory. No pain, no gain. Go big or go home.”

“And going home is okay,” Lisa said. “You don't have to do this if you don't want to.”

“It's okay,” Wally said. “I'll do it. I
want
to do it.”

“That's the way,” I said, although, looking at him, it was obvious he wasn't feeling good about it.

“I can make the trick,” Wally said.

“I know you can do it,” I said, offering encouragement.

Wally gave a timid little smile, nodded and started away for the bank.

“Do you really think he can do it?” Lisa asked quietly.

“He's a good skater. Besides, sometimes you have to just go for it regardless of what happens.”

“And sometimes you don't,” Lisa said. I knew she wasn't just talking about Wally and the jump.

I turned away from her. Wally was by the bank. He skated up high—higher than I'd ever seen him before. He did a kick flip and started back down, picking up more and more speed—he was flying! He kicked hard and the board jumped up onto the rail. He went grinding along the top … suddenly the board got caught and Wally went flying through the air, crashing into the pavement!
He landed and his head bounced against the asphalt with a sickening thud. Then the only sound was the wheels of his board as it went skittering away.

“Wally!” Lisa screamed.

Her cry unfroze me. I raced to Wally's side. There was a gash on the side of his head and blood was forming a puddle beneath him. His right leg was sticking out at a strange angle. His eyes were closed—he was knocked out! His chest heaved and I heard him inhale. He was breathing!

“Call an ambulance!” I gasped. “Some-body call an ambulance!”

“Phillip?”

I was almost asleep. The voice made me jump. Wally's mother stood in front of me.

“You've been here all night?” she asked in her heavy Polish accent.

I nodded. I'd spent the night in the little waiting area down the hall from Wally's hospital room. My parents had tried to convince me to go home, but when I refused to leave they reluctantly let me stay.

“You
good
friend to Wally,” she said. “
First
friend in new country still
best
friend.”

Another wave of guilt hit me. A good friend would have stopped him instead of pushing him.

“How is he doing?”

“Sleeping. Groggy because of all the drugs given for his pain in leg.”

I knew Wally was hurting. Just before the ambulance had arrived he'd regained consciousness and begun howling in pain. Wally was one of the toughest people I'd ever known, so I could only imagine how bad the pain must have been. Actually, I didn't want to imagine.

“I know his leg is broken. How bad is it?”

“Need operation to put in pin, but first swelling must go down. Probably tomorrow will do surgery.”

“Wally is tough. He'll get better fast.”

Mrs. Waltniski bent down and kissed me on the forehead. “Good boy, good kind boy.”

I felt like arguing. I wasn't that good or kind. I liked things to go my way. Now Wally, he
was
good and kind.

“I go home,” she said. “Wally asleep and have to get other kids ready for school. Do you want ride?”

I shook my head. “I'd like to stay here. Do you think I could sit in Wally's room? I'd be quiet. I wouldn't wake him.”

“Go, keep him company. Good that some-body will be with him. If he wakes, tell him that his daddy will be coming soon.”

“I'll tell him.” I stood up and Mrs. Walt-niski threw her arms around me and gave me a hug. I felt my rib cage compress as she squeezed. Everybody in the family was strong. She released her grip and walked away, leaving me in the waiting area.

Now that I could go and see Wally, I didn't know if I wanted to. It would be easier to sit here and read fifteen-year-old copies of
National Geographic
. But I couldn't do that.