Stevie (27 page)

The hounds led us across the field, into the woods, and through a glen. We had to leap over fallen trees, dodge around rocks, splash across creeks, and duck under branches. With every step, the hounds howled loudly, each pushing to get to the front of the pack and be the first to catch the wily fox.

And then it stopped as suddenly as it had started. The hounds fell silent. They still sniffed eagerly, but now they were just circling around in this grassy, open area surrounded by thick underbrush.

“He’s gone to ground,” Lisa commented, sounding a little breathless from our wild ride across the countryside.

I nodded. What Lisa meant was that the fox had found a burrow or hole to hide in underground. That meant the fox was probably safe and the hunt was probably over.

“Well wait a little while,” Chester said. “Sometimes foxes make mistakes.”

So we waited. But after twenty minutes, it was clear that the fox had outfoxed us.

“Maybe the fox went back to Cross County for the hunt breakfast,” Lisa suggested. “Certain other foxes have been known to do that.”

Chester looked confused. Everybody else laughed, including me. Then we headed back to the stable for a well-earned meal.

But even though the hunt was over, the memory of it has stayed with me ever since. In fact, I found the whole thing so inspiring that, once again, I am forced to express my feelings in verse.

That just about sums up how I felt after the hunt was over. (And how I feel about the wonderful art of poetry, thanks to my many fine English teachers over the years.) Of course, I still had a little business to take care of afterward. Now that the thrilling chase was over, I remembered what my brothers and Veronica had done.

Still, I had learned a little something from this whole experience. I had learned that sometimes silence can be the strongest weapon of all. Phil and I discussed it on our way back to Willow Creek. He was coming to dinner at my house again, and neither of us wanted anything like a repeat of his last dinner there. So by the time we arrived at the table, we had agreed upon a plan.

Chad was the first to bring up the hunt. “So, Stevie and Phil, tell me,” he said in his most fake-casual voice. “How was the fox hunt today? Anything interesting happen?”

As if he doesn’t know!
I thought. But I kept the thought to myself.

“Oh, it was great,” Phil said. “We went all over the woods by Cross County. Stevie even spotted the fox once.”

“A real fox?” Alex asked, looking surprised. “Are you sure?”

“I definitely saw its tail,” I said. “And the hounds followed it all over the place. It was something.”

“It was great,” Phil added. “You can’t imagine the adventure foxhunting is.”

“Hmmm,” Alex said.

“I don’t get it,” Michael added.

I smiled at them innocently. “I’ve never had a ride like that,” I said.

Chad glanced at the other two with an odd look on his face. I almost couldn’t stop myself from smirking. It was great! We were driving my brothers crazy.

“Well, did you catch the fox?” Chad asked after a moment.

“Of course not,” I replied. “We never wanted to do that. I told you that. It’s not about catching foxes. It’s really just a fun kind of riding.”

“The
most
fun,” Phil put in.

“But didn’t anything unusual happen?” Alex asked, sounding a little desperate.

“Ahem,” my mother said. I was pretty sure she had no idea what was going on. But I was even more certain that she could tell that
something
was going on.

Michael didn’t notice her stern look. “So, like, didn’t you spend a lot of time on the road?” he asked.

I pasted my most innocent expression on my face. “Road? What road?”

By now my father had smelled a rat, too. “Boys, what’s going on here?” he demanded.

“Nothing,” all three of them answered at once.

I smiled at them sweetly. They stared back in total confusion. It was wonderful. I knew they would find out the truth eventually, but for now the joke was on them. And that was all I really wanted.

Phil and I discussed it after dinner when we had a few minutes alone.

“Your parents are going to find out about this,” Phil predicted.

I nodded. “They’re going to be pretty angry about it, I’m sure. We’ll probably all get grounded, and if I know Dad he’ll make good on his threat not to take us to the circus this year.” As a responsible person, I knew it was only what my brothers and I deserved for all the trouble we’d caused. “I’ll be sorry about that,” I went on, “but otherwise, the whole thing has turned out wonderfully. And the circus will be back next year. I can wait until then.”

When I looked at Phil, I noticed that he had a mischievous sparkle in his green eyes.

“What is it?” I asked. “Why are you smiling like that?”

“Like what?” he replied innocently.

“Like the cat that swallowed the canary.”

“Not a canary, exactly.” He reached into his pocket. “More like an elephant.”

I still didn’t get it. “What are you doing?” I demanded.

“I just wanted to see if I had anything interesting in my
pocket here.” He pulled something out. “Oh, what’s this?” he asked, obviously trying to sound surprised. “Oh, my, my.”

I recognized what he was holding immediately. “Tickets?” My mind raced. It could mean only one thing. “To the circus?”

Phil nodded. “Jumbo’s trainer seemed to think that being on a fox hunt was the most fun he’d had all day. He was looking for a way to thank you for letting him join in. I just made a suggestion, that’s all. Are you free next Friday night?”

I grinned at him, hardly believing my good fortune. “You bet I am!”

Welcome to My Life: Conclusion

So you see, Miss Fenton, my life has been pretty busy for the past couple of months. I was forced to make some choices: To learn all about making maple syrup and help my friend Dinah instead of reading
To Kill a Mockingbird
and studying fractions. To pay tribute to a wonderful old Pine Hollow friend at his retirement and support Carole at the racetrack instead of reading my history assignment and finishing my science project. To throw myself into the excitement of the fox hunt instead of completing my word problems and writing my English essay.

I wish I could say that I wanted to go back and do it all again—that I would be willing to change my actions and choose homework over life. But I promised to be honest in
this assignment, and I’m not going to stop now. So I must admit that I wouldn’t change a thing.

However, I can promise you this: I’ve learned a lot from my experiences. And one of the things I learned is that I can sometimes get a little bit carried away. That is a valuable lesson, and one I’ll always remember.

I can also promise you that I’ll do my very best not to let myself get so far behind on my schoolwork in the future. I know learning is important.

And I ask you, Miss Fenton, what better lesson could I have learned from my recent studies in the School of Life?

Well, I did it! It’s Tuesday evening as I write this. I just finished dinner, and it’s my brothers’ turn to wash up. So this is the first time I’ve been able to use the computer since I finished my report—the three of them have been Jawboning it up nonstop.

Anyway, you’ll never believe how everything turned out. First of all, I left my report on Miss Fenton’s desk the second I got to school on Monday. She wasn’t in her office at the time, and I was just as glad about that. (Although her secretary looked kind of shocked when she saw how long the report was—it filled up an entire three-ring binder.)

I wasn’t really looking forward to hearing Miss Fenton’s comments on my report. I mean, I’d worked my brains out for two weeks straight, but that didn’t mean she was guaranteed to like it. So I was pretty nervous all through homeroom, and I hardly heard a word my teachers said in my morning classes.

Then, just before the lunch bell rang, Miss Fenton called me to her office. I walked as slowly as I could on my way there, since I was certain I was walking to my doom. If she had something to say to me this soon, it could only be bad news.

But I was wrong! Miss Fenton was all smiles when I entered.

“Congratulations, Stephanie,” she said, putting me out of my suspense right away. “I’ve spent all morning reading your report. It’s wonderful!”

I was so relieved that my knees actually went weak. I plopped down in the chair across from her and just stared. I guess I didn’t quite believe my ears.

I think she sort of understood that. She went on. “Your report was one of the most creative and interesting I have ever had the pleasure to read. And your teachers tell me you’ve done satisfactory makeup work for them as well. So let me be the first to assure you that your average is now up to a solid B.”

“Thanks, Miss Fenton,” I said, finding my voice at last. “Thanks a million!” Visions of myself riding through the woods behind Pine Hollow flashed through my mind. My summer was safe!

“But that’s not all, Stephanie,” Miss Fenton went on. “As you know, I’ve been busy myself this week. I’m supposed to announce the winner of the school essay contest tomorrow morning.”

Essay contest? For a second, I had no idea what she was talking about. Then, vaguely, it started to come back. I remembered hearing something on the morning announcements last week about how each teacher was allowed to submit their favorite student essay or writing assignment of the year. Miss Fenton was supposed to read them all and pick a winner—the best of the best, I think she’d called it.

Anyway, even after I remembered all that, I still had no idea why she was telling me about it.

Luckily, she explained. “I know I’m not technically a teacher, but it
is
my contest. So I figured if I wanted to submit a favorite student writing assignment of my own, well, who was going to stop me? I’m the headmistress, after all.”

By now I was starting to get an inkling of what she was getting at. “Do you mean— Did you—”

She smiled. “Yes, Stephanie. I chose to submit your ‘Welcome to My Life’ paper in the writing contest.” She paused and winked conspiratorially at me. “And I probably shouldn’t be telling you this, but I suspect you ought to spend a little time working on another writing assignment this evening.”

“Huh?” I said, lost once again.

This time her smile was more like a grin. “That’s right. You’re going to want to have a victory speech ready when I announce the winner tomorrow.”

I grinned back at her, a little amazed at how well this had
all turned out. Just think—I hadn’t even been sure she would appreciate or understand or like my report at all. And now here she was telling me she was actually giving me an
award
for it! Just wait until my brothers hear about that. Not to mention Veronica …

Who knew Miss Fenton was so cool?

So by the time I met Carole and Lisa at Pine Hollow after school, I was really in a celebrating mood. I was glad they’d suggested our special trail ride. Naturally, I told them my good news right away, hardly making them squirm at all first. Then we tacked up our horses and headed off toward our favorite wooded trail. The weather was perfect, my mood was perfect, and of course my friends were perfect as always. It was so great to just relax and hang out with them again. After two weeks of hardly seeing them, I had almost forgotten what they’re like!

But that’s not all I have to tell you. I’d better write fast, because my brothers could burst in any minute. The main reason I’m writing is to tell you what I finally found out about Veronica. Prepare yourself—it’s pretty shocking. In fact, it’s so shocking that I could never, ever, in a million years, tell anybody in Willow Creek about it, not even Carole and Lisa.

You see, while I was in Miss Fenton’s office hearing about my prize-winning report, I happened to notice another report lying on the end of her desk. You’ll be glad to know that all those afternoons you and I spent teaching ourselves to read upside down came in handy. I was able to scan the entire first page of the report.

It was Veronica’s extra-credit assignment, of course. The title was
Why the Homework It Is Necessary
, and the first few lines went something like this:

I don’t remember the rest of it, but you get the picture. As difficult as it was to believe, I was positive that she’d gotten her maid, Luisa, to write it for her. The poor woman hardly speaks English, but since when has Veronica ever taken no for an answer? (Even though you say no the same way in English
and
Spanish, ha ha!) Besides, she probably offered Luisa some huge bonus to knock off five pages of excuses.