Catching Spring by Sylvia Olsen

Author:Sylvia Olsen
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: JUV000000
Publisher: Orca Book Publishers
Published: 2004-03-31T16:00:00+00:00

10

On the morning of the derby, Bobby got up extra early. In fact, he barely slept all night. It was pitch-black outside when he first heard Dan’s feet clunk, clunk, clunk down the dock. Bobby ate the other half of his peanut butter-and-jam sandwich and gulped down his milk.

The summer was almost over. The morning was chilly and he could smell autumn in the air—blackberries ripening on the vines and oak leaves turning brown. Bobby’s feet were cold even though he had worn two pairs of socks to bed and covered his legs with his jacket. He rubbed his feet together and took off his extra pair of socks before he slipped his feet into his shoes. Then he zipped his jacket up to his chin and climbed out of the cabin and down the ladder to the dock.

His eyes took a few minutes to get used to the dark as he stumbled around the side of the boat toward the tackle shop. The light was on and Dan was standing behind the counter.

“Good morning,” Bobby called.

“Morning, Bobby,” Dan replied. “You’re early this morning.” Dan was putting tackle from the cardboard boxes into the display case under the counter. “We’d better be ready. Lots of people will need tackle. And they’ll need to be taken to their boats.”

Dan was excited. Bobby could tell from the sound of his voice and from the planning he was doing and the getting ready, the making sure everything was just right.

“I won a derby when I was a kid,” Dan said. He got an extra big smile on his face and he laughed louder than usual. “And you know what I won?”

“No,” Bobby answered. “What did you win?”

“You just guess.” Dan laughed again.

Bobby couldn’t guess. He couldn’t think of Dan being a little boy or what he would have won all the way back then.

“Can’t guess?” Dan said.

“No.”

“I won a blue bike.” Dan threw his head back and roared a belly roar. His eyes filled with tears from laughing so much. He stopped laughing and got an excited and serious look on his face as if he were remembering just how he felt. “A braaaandy new blue bike.”

That’s when Bobby knew why Dan was really excited about the derby.

“And now some other kid is going to win a brand-new blue bike.” Dan finished setting the tackle on the shelf. “I can’t wait to see the kid’s face. It’s the most exciting thing in the world. Winning a new bike.”

Bobby thought for a moment about just how exciting it would be. And then he closed off that part of his mind. He was one kid who wasn’t going to win that blue bike and that was for sure. He didn’t even have a chance at it.

“Let’s take the bike down from the ceiling and set it up so the kids can see it when they arrive this morning,” Dan said.

He reached up and lifted the bike off the hooks.

“Here,” he said to Bobby once he got it down.

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