The Adventure Is Now by Jess Redman

Author:Jess Redman
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR)

CHAPTER 38

Real-Life Adventure

“So there you have it,” Milton finished. “That’s why my vine truth was what it was—that you, Fig Morris, are my only friend in the whole entire world.”

He had faced forward for his storytelling time (during which he had carefully avoided any mention of the name Sea Hawk) because he didn’t want to see Fig’s reactions. Now he could hear that her paddling had slowed again, but she remained silent. He sat quietly and watched the river flowing past and the clouds floating by. He sat and wondered if Fig was ever going to say anything or if perhaps he should dive into the river and let it carry him back to the beach.

“See, this is what I’m talking about,” Fig finally said, breaking the stillness. “Something bad happens or you make one little mistake and you’re done!” Milton peeked over his shoulder. Fig’s eyebrows were down, and she was gripping the paddle tightly. “Dev sounds like some of my old friends.”

“I behaved quite foolishly though,” Milton said.

Fig shrugged. “So what? Everyone makes mistakes, don’t they? Everyone gets nervous or sad or angry sometimes. Isn’t that when you need friends the most? What’s the point of friends who only stick with you when you’re happy and doing everything right?”

“I suppose,” Milton said. The sun felt warm on his face, and the breeze was gentle. “Although I think maybe—well, it’s possible that I was a bit too distracted.”

The canoe had started actually drifting backward, so Fig began her paddling again. “By the video game, you mean?”

“The very same,” Milton agreed. “And by other things. Rotten things.”

“Why do you think you played it so much?” Fig asked.

For Milton, the answer was obvious: Isle of Wild was awesome. There were dozens of new parts of the island to unlock, creatures to discover, missions to complete. And Sea Hawk was the coolest person in the virtual world. He was brave, handsome, and brilliant. He loved flora and fauna, knowledge and adventure, the jungle and his feline companion. What more could you want?

But hidden just behind all of that, there was more, like the jungle behind the vines. There was this: Milton’s one-and-only friendship had started to crumble. He had been involved in a karate-chopping incident that had brought him school-wide notoriety. And for months, maybe for years, his family had been like a battered ship in a storm, a ship no one had been able to bail out or sail to safety until finally it had broken into pieces and sunk to the bottom of the sea.

That year, it had become very hard to be Milton P. Greene.

“Sometimes I want to be somewhere else, somewhere better,” Milton told Fig, swiveling to see her. “And sometimes I want to be someone else too. Someone better.”

Fig tipped her head to one side. “I like to be somewhere else and someone else too—that’s part of why I like reading. But it can’t be better if it’s not real, can it?”

“It’s real as long as I’m playing,” Milton replied.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.