SYLO (THE SYLO CHRONICLES) (5 page)

“I can’t believe you haven’t asked me yet,” Quinn said as he dumped a tarp full of grass clippings into a wheelbarrow.

“Asked you what?”

“About Marty. Don’t you want to know why he died? The autopsy, remember?”

“I was trying to forget. What happened?”

“I can’t tell you.”

I whacked him on the back of the head with the handle of my rake.

“You’re such an a-hole,” I said.

“I’m not! It’s unethical to discuss medical cases.”

“Then why did you bring it up?”

“Because I can’t tell you what happened.” He lowered his voice and added conspiratorially, “But it isn’t unethical to tell you what
didn’t
happen.”

I stared at him for a long moment, then whacked him on the back of the head again. “Cut the riddles,” I commanded.

Quinn looked around to see if anybody was listening, then continued softly. “The autopsy turned up zip.”

“Define
zip
,” I demanded. “There had to be something. I mean, the guy died.”

“There wasn’t. He didn’t have any heart problems; there was nothing wrong with his brain; there weren’t any drugs in his system or disease or abnormality of any kind. The guy just stopped living.”

That was disturbing news. I had hoped to hear that Marty had a previously undetected heart condition or rare genetic defect or anything else that would explain why the most athletic guy in school had suddenly become the most dead guy in school. A rare medical condition would have meant his problem was a tragic but understandable fluke. Having no explanation meant the same thing could happen to anybody.

“Tucker!” called a sweet voice.

Olivia Kinsey was waving to us from the porch of the hotel. On a table next to her was a pitcher of lemonade and some glasses. On her body was a tiny red bikini.

“That looks great,” Quinn said longingly. “The lemonade looks pretty good too.”

We dragged our sorry selves over as she poured some icy-cold drinks.

“You guys look like you could use a break,” she said sweetly. “It is so hot.”

“Really,” Quinn agreed while giving me a sideways look. “Really,
really
hot.” He wasn’t talking about the weather.

Olivia was from New York City and had been spending the summer on Pemberwick with her mother. It was her first time on the island. All season I volunteered to work at the Blackbird because, well, Olivia was there. That’s how we met. I was weeding the garden one day and—bang. She appeared like somebody out of a magazine ad for ridiculous hotness. Dad figured out my motives pretty quick and warned me about getting involved with an off-islander who I might never see again. We were actually having that conversation one day when Olivia returned from the beach in the aforementioned bikini. Dad took one look at her and said, “Uh…never mind.”

Dad was cool.

Olivia was really out of her big-city element on Pemberwick, so I volunteered to show her around the island. Come to think of it, she came right out and asked me. I wasn’t about to refuse. We went to a lot of movies. She loved movies. Didn’t matter what it was. I also introduced her to most of the people who ran the shops in Arbortown. For somebody who came from the city, she seemed overly interested in how our simple island worked, which was cool, I guess. She had blonde hair that was cut short like a guy’s, but there was nothing else remotely guy-like about her. I never put a move on her, either. Not that I didn’t think about it, but she was way out of my league. She
was older than me by a couple of years and went to some uppity prep school in New York and hung out with future captains of industry. I went to a public school on a remote island and hung out with future captains of lobster boats. There wasn’t a whole lot of future for that kind of relationship but it was fun to dream.

Quinn liked to dream too. His mouth hung open as he stared at her unashamedly. I gave him a small shove to bring him back to reality before the line of drool hit his shoes.

“Thanks, Olivia, this is great,” I said as I took the cold glass that was already wet with condensation.

“I’m sorry to hear about the guy from your team,” she said. “What happened?”

“Funny you should ask,” Quinn said as he stepped forward to begin a lecture on the subject.

“Nobody knows yet,” I said quickly, cutting him off. “It’s not good to start rumors.”

Quinn backed off.

Olivia frowned. “So sad. He was having such an amazing game.”

“You were there?” I asked with surprise.

Olivia gave me a coy smile. “I wanted to see you play.”

I wasn’t sure if I should be flattered or embarrassed.

“Oops,” Quinn said and pretended to be focused on his lemonade.

“Oh. Well, sorry,” I said. “I didn’t play much.”

“I didn’t see you play at all,” she said bluntly.

There was no pretense with Olivia—and no filter. She wasn’t malicious; she just said what was on her mind.

“Tucker’s on the kickoff team,” Quinn said, jumping in to save
my dignity. “The most dangerous part of the game because they give up their bodies with no concern for their own well-being. They call them Kamikazes.”

“No, they don’t,” I said, scoffing. Then quickly added for Olivia’s benefit, “But it is pretty dangerous.”

Olivia gave a pouty frown. “I don’t know much about football. I just wanted to see you play.”

“I’m afraid you’ll get that chance,” came a voice from inside.

The screen door opened and Kent Berringer stepped out. Kent was the starting middle linebacker on our team. A junior. He was a tall guy with blond hair that was always perfectly messed up and a tan that lasted through the winter. His family was old-school Pemberwick. They’d lived there for centuries and acted as though they owned the place…because in some ways they actually did. His family owned the Blackbird Inn, meaning Quinn and I had been mowing the grass for Kent. Indirectly.

He stood next to Olivia, looking down on Quinn and me from the porch like he was the lord of the mansion…which I guess he was.

“How do you figure that?” I asked. “Freshmen don’t play much.”

“Unless a starting senior drops dead,” Kent said with an incredible lack of tact.

It hadn’t hit me until that moment. I was Marty’s backup.

“That’s right!” Quinn exclaimed. “That makes you the starting tailback.”

“You up for that, Rook?” Kent asked, as if he didn’t think I was even close to being up for it.

My head was spinning. “I…I guess.”

“You better be,” he added.

It came across like a threat. There’s a fine line between arrogance and confidence, and Kent came down firmly on the arrogant side. The Blackbird was the nicest hotel on Pemberwick Island, which meant that Kent’s family was rich and Kent was set for life. He knew it, too. He treated most everyone like he was their boss. Of course, in my case he actually
was
my boss.

“I saw you play, Kent,” Olivia said, suddenly all coy and flirty. “You were so…violent.”

She emphasized the word “violent” as if it made her all tingly just to think about it.

Kent shrugged with fake modesty.

Quinn rolled his eyes.

I had no right to be jealous, but I was.

“So does this mean you’ll come watch me play again next week?” I asked, trying to reclaim the conversation.

Olivia frowned. “I’m not sure. School starts soon, so I don’t know how much longer we’ll be staying.”

“Your school starts late,” Quinn pointed out.

Olivia shrugged. “What can I say? Private school. They make up their own rules.”

“But you’re not leaving today,” Kent said. “Let’s catch a movie.”

Jealousy growing.

Olivia brightened. “Kent Berringer! Why did you wait until the end of the summer to ask me out?”

I knew why. She’d been hanging out with me. But now that I had been revealed to be the bench-jockey scrub and Kent the violent star, the dynamic had changed.

“I wanted to,” Kent explained with a shrug. “From the minute I met you, but hotel policy says we can’t socialize with guests.”

“Too bad,” I said, not meaning it.

Kent added, “But seeing as you won’t be a guest much longer, I think it’ll be okay.”

Quinn kept looking back and forth between me and them, hoping I would say something to stop the Kent-train from gathering speed.

“Why don’t we all go!” he declared with a touch of desperation. “You know, a group thing like you see on TV.”

“That sounds like fun,” Olivia said with genuine enthusiasm.

Quinn beamed. He had successfully derailed the express.

“Sorry, Rook,” Kent said. “Your father agreed to finish the lawn today and you’re not even halfway done.” He lifted up the lemonade pitcher and added, “Too many breaks, I guess.”

And the train was back on the tracks.

“Rook?” Quinn asked with mock confusion. “What’s with the chess reference, Kent? You strike me as more of a checkers guy.”

Kent glared at him. Quinn knew full well that “Rook” was short for “rookie” and that Kent didn’t know a pawn from a bishop, but as I said, Quinn liked to push buttons.

Kent ignored him and faced Olivia. “You should get dressed. As much as I’d like to hang out with you like that, you might get cold in the movie theater.”

Olivia giggled and backed toward the front door. “You are so bad! Back in a jiff!”

She spun away and skipped inside.

“Jiff?” Quinn repeated with confusion.

Kent gave me a triumphant smile and said, “Finish the job, go home, and rest up for Monday.”

He left us standing there holding our lemonade glasses.

“What’s Monday?” Quinn asked.

“Practice. I’m the starting tailback now, remember?”

“And you just lost the hottest girl on the island,” Quinn added. “You’re oh-for-two today, my friend. Let’s hope you do better on Monday.”

As it turned out I didn’t have to worry about practice the following Monday. It was canceled out of respect for Marty. There was no practice for the rest of the week and Friday’s game was postponed. I’d never had to deal with the finality of death. All four of my grandparents had died before I was old enough to understand how it all worked. It was a strange feeling to know that I was the last person Marty had ever spoken to. The memory of his final few moments haunted me. What had been wrong with him? Did he know he was about to die or was it just the excitement of the game talking? I wondered if I should tell somebody about it, like his parents, but decided it would only make them feel worse if they knew Marty’s state of mind at the end had been so—so what? Troubled? Confused? Frightened?

The funeral was held on Tuesday afternoon at the big white Congregational church near the town square. The whole football team was there. Coach asked us to wear our game jerseys, which I thought was a bad idea. Marty had died during the game. His parents didn’t need to be reminded. But I was part of the team so I went along.

The church was packed. Looking around I saw many of the same faces I had seen watching with worry from the bleachers as Marty lay still in the end zone. I had never been to a funeral before so I didn’t know what to expect. I imagined everyone would be all weepy but it wasn’t like that at all. I think everyone was in shock. Especially Marty’s family. He had two younger sisters who sat with their parents, stone-faced, in the front row next to the coffin. I couldn’t imagine a sight more tragic than that.

The service lasted a long time, with many people getting up to talk about what a great guy Marty was. I hadn’t known him that well because I was three years younger, but hearing the speeches made me truly sad that such a good guy had died…and that his last few moments had been so troubled.

Looking around, I scanned the faces of the people who had come to say goodbye. It was a gut-wrenching scene. Quinn sat next to me and his parents next to him. He hadn’t known Marty very well either, but in a small town, you showed up. My eyes wandered over the crowd to see the gaunt looks on so many familiar faces—

And one unfamiliar face. It was the surfer dude from the game. He stood in the back of the church, still wearing his hoodie and sunglasses.

I turned to Quinn and whispered, “Who is that guy standing in the back?”

Quinn twisted around to look and said, “What guy?”

“The guy with the—”

I turned to point him out, but the man was already gone.

“W
hat more proof do you need that football is too dangerous?” Mom asked as we walked along Main Street toward home after the funeral service. “Young boys aren’t built to take that kind of punishment.”

Mom didn’t want me on the football team in the first place but had been outvoted two to one at the beginning of training camp. I had to hope that the situation hadn’t changed enough for her to convince Dad to rethink his vote…especially not since I had become the starting tailback with the chance to impress a girl in a tiny red bikini.

Dad said, “You’re overreacting, Stacy. I played organized ball for six years and lived to tell the tale.”

“And you’ve got an arthritic knee to show for it.”

“That’s not from football,” Dad countered.

“No? It sure didn’t come from jazz band.”

That was a good one but I didn’t laugh. I was on Dad’s side.