Sarah Branson

Chapter 1: Mac–On the Roof

Macrae Shima hung by his fingertips from the roof of the three-story brick school building, his legs dangling and kicking as they searched for a foothold. The late September sun was hot on his head and back, the breeze ruffling his light-brown wavy hair, but he didn’t notice. He was focused and thought, I just have to boost myself up to the edge.

As soon as school was out, he made his way up to the third floor, quietly peering in the small windows of each door. Some rooms still had teachers in them; in one, he saw a parent and teacher speaking earnestly while some big kid sat looking out the window, her legs stretched out in front of her. He was annoyed that the unoccupied rooms had their doors locked, and although his mama had taught him a little about picking locks, he knew he had neither the skill nor time for that. The large room on the corner had its door open and at first glance seemed empty. He was making a beeline for the window when he heard, “Can I help you, Mac?”

Mac had turned to see not only his music teacher, Ms. Denali, but also his homeroom teacher, Mr. Castillo, and most of the other teachers all sitting around a large table with the principal and vice principal. His eyes went wide briefly, but he recovered and flashed a friendly grin. “Hi, Ms. Denali. Umm, I, ah, came to find you to ask if I could practice in your room?” He pointed down, indicating the music room that sat a floor below.

Ms. Denali glanced over to the table of teachers and then back to Mac. “I don’t see why not. But just for a little while. It’s Friday and I’m heading home after this meeting. Go ahead. It’s open.”

Mac had nodded and murmured, “Thanks!” as he scooted out of the room and headed for the stairs, taking them down two at a time and swinging on the railing at the landing. He pushed open the music room door and dragged a piano bench over to the window. Peering out, he saw the big oak tree, its green leaves starting their shift to orange and red. A branch extended out that seemed like a perfect landing spot, though he’d have to shuffle a ways along the side of the building a bit to reach it. He had opened the window and, satisfied the ledge was wide enough, inched toward his goal, his back to the bricks, careful not to look the seven meters down to the ground below.

He had jumped from the ledge to the oak tree easily since the branch was sturdy, and as he stood up, he saw his friends Andre and Tomas a distance away to his right, giving him the thumbs-up sign and looking impressed. They oughta be, he thought as he gauged the space he’d have to clear.

After the wild throw that had sent the ball curving up and landing with a crash on the roof, Andre had said in his usual know-it-all way, “There’s no way you can get up there, Mac. It’s way too high. Sorry, Tomas, that ball is gone for good.” Mac had seen how dejected Tomas looked at the thought of losing the ball he had just gotten for his birthday. So, he was determined to get it back, because he hated seeing Tomas upset and so he could say I told you I could to Andre.

He had made the leap to the roof after climbing up a couple more branches on the oak. But he hadn’t expected the red clay tiles to be so slippery and had slid down them with a clatter, just catching himself by his fingers to keep from falling the ten-plus meters. Sure, there was a low hedge, but Mac didn’t think that would make a difference if he tumbled down onto it.

So, there he hung. His hands were getting sweaty, and he could tell his grip was going to give out soon. He swung his legs out and then kicked them up hard. His right heel caught the cornice that ran along the edge of the roof, though he felt a piece of it break away and fall into the hedge with a crunch and a rustle. He was sweating as he half-lugged, half-rolled onto the roof. He paused for a moment to catch his breath. Then he pushed up on his elbows and saw his brother, Kik, alone, off to his left. Mac rolled his eyes. Now Kik would probably run home and tell their mama what Mac was up too. Andre was right: Kik had become a real rule-follower. He just wasn’t much fun these days. He never got into any trouble. Looking down from his perch, he saw Kik grasping the top of his shoulder-length black hair tight in one hand, his dark, Edoan eyes wide and his mouth open. Mac grinned and made a rude hand gesture, then chuckled a little to himself as he saw Kik sigh and put a hand over his face in the exact way their papa did.

Mac turned and lizard-crawled up the steeper part of the roof to the flat area near the old chimneys. He peered between the second and third ones and reached over to grasp his prize. He then stood and held it aloft for Tomas and Andre to see. Andre gave a thumbs-up and was laughing, but Tomas was frantically pointing toward the building. Mac looked down. Mr. Castillo stood not too far from the building, looking up at Mac with a stern expression. He pointed to the ground next to him.

“Crap,” Mac murmured. “Not again.” He stuffed the ball into the pocket of his jacket and moved until he was right above the oak branch that he had used to boost himself up. Looking around, he shrugged and sat down on the edge of the pitched portion of the roof. He pushed off, sliding down the tiles and shooting off the edge of the building. For a brief millisecond, he was airborne and free-falling until whump, he hit the branch and clambered down the tree before approaching Mr. Castillo.

Mr. C. didn’t yell. That was not his style. Instead, he took two deep breaths, handed Mac a sealed note, and then said with a sigh, “Honestly, Mac, you could have broken your neck…. Tell your mother to sign this, bring it back on Monday, and have her make an appointment to talk with me next week. This is your third warning since the school year began, and that was just three weeks ago. Not an auspicious start.”

Mac wasn’t positive what auspicious meant, but Mr. C. liked using big words and then telling his students to “look it up” when they asked what they meant. Mac didn’t have time for that; instead, he flashed his sideways grin and kicked at the ground. “Yeah, I know, Mr. C. But I had to get the ball back for Tomas. I promised, and you don’t want me to break a promise, right?”

His teacher gave him a dubious look. “Bring the note back on Monday, Mac, and try to avoid trouble through the weekend.”

“Yes, sir,” Mac said, glancing down to the ground in an attempt to look contrite, though he could still feel the adrenaline pumping through him from the excitement and danger. That was fun! He waited until Mr. C. was inside the school, then he hustled to catch up with his friends. He tossed the ball into the air and caught it as it curved back down. “Told you I could get it.” Mac’s smile covered his face.

Tomas and Andre both clapped him on the back. “That was so cool when you jumped from the tree to the roof,” Tomas said.

“I was sure you were going to fall when you were hanging!” Andre laughed. “But you didn’t!”

The three boys shoved at each other, laughing and talking until they reached Mac’s street. Tomas announced, “You can hang onto the ball and bring it tonight for the sleepover!”

“Great!” Mac exclaimed. But as he pushed the ball back into his pocket, he heard the crunch of the note from Mr. C. and frowned. Once his mama read it, there might not be a sleepover.

Chapter 2: Mac–In Trouble

“A third note from school, Mac? Seriously? What is going on this year?” Mac’s mama ran a pale hand through her short, messy curls which looked light brown today though in deep summer turned a definite blonde shade. She sat in one of the comfy, gray living room chairs, her body relaxed, her voice even, looking at him. Mama wasn’t big and she wasn’t small. When she stood next to Mac she was a good head and a half taller than him, and even a a bit more than that next to Kik, but when she stood next to Matt, his bonus dad, or his uncles, she looked small.

Mac knew she wasn’t happy, no matter how calm she seemed. So, he tried to look as apologetic as possible. He knew she wasn’t going to let this slide like the two times before. Matt sat in the other chair. His brown eyes held a twinkle, and he was clearly suppressing a smile. Mac didn’t dare look at him too long, or he’d start grinning, and then his mama would probably lose it. He could almost hear her saying, “Mac, you aren’t taking this seriously enough.”

His older sister, fourteen-year-old Grey, was sitting on the floor playing building blocks with their baby sister, Rini. Grey was stacking them up, and two-year-old Rini was knocking them down and chortling. Their littlest sister was sweet, adorable, and a whirlwind. She got into everything. Just this week, she had taken three crayons—blue, red, and green—to the bedroom room walls of the room Mac shared with Kik and scribbled in red on several of his brother’s journals. They couldn’t be mad at her—she was still a baby, after all—but that didn’t mean they weren’t plenty upset and had unsuccessfully campaigned for a door lock.

Grey set a blue block on top of a purple one and said in that cool tone she had developed since her boat accident this past summer, “It’s likely because of me.” Mac saw his mama turn her head to rest her eyes on her oldest child.

Mac wanted to immediately jump in and protest that it had nothing to do with her, but he stayed quiet as she continued, “He’s probably acting out because he wants to have some adventure. He just doesn’t realize how dangerous real adventures are. After all, he and Kik are just little boys.”

Mac narrowed his eyes and glared at Grey. She had been acting so weird since Mama and Matt had brought her home from the Great Sea Race. Sometimes she was her regular self, pretty nice and wanting to play with her brothers, but lately, she often was more aloof with an air of superiority to her. Mama said that was what happened when you started growing up and to be patient with her. But it was hard. Practically every day, she would casually mention how she had faced danger: “Something my brothers know nothing about.” Which, of course, was not true. All three of them had adventures in the woods when they were littler, and while those hadn’t really been dangerous, they were sometimes scary. And three years before, when Grey was their age, they all had that summer adventure. It was kinda dangerous and nobody called them all little kids then.

Now he glanced over at his twin brother. Kik was not looking at him, but Mac could tell by the twitch in Kik’s jaw that he wasn’t actually writing in his journal. He was listening to the exchange between Mac and their mama. Mac was pleased and more than a little surprised that Kik hadn’t said anything about the roof episode to Mama. There had been a time when Kik would have been on the roof right alongside Mac and would have known exactly what to say to Mama to smooth things over. For as much as Mac was super annoyed by his brother lately, Kik did know how to talk to adults and convince them there was nothing to be upset about. But since school ended the previous spring, he and Kik were arguing almost daily and were doing different things, Kik usually alone and Mac with his friends. In fact, Mac spent most of his days through the summer with Andre and Tomas, on the sports pitch or playing board games. Kik, though, didn’t want to do any of that. He seemed to prefer to stay inside and write his stories in his journals. But then Kik never actually got into trouble. Ever. Maybe that was why he could convince adults everything was fine. Because for his brother, it was. Mac thought that was boring.

They were twins but, really, looked almost nothing alike. Kik was a carbon copy of their papa, who lived far away in Edo. Mac looked more like his mom. He had sandy-brown, wavy hair that could have been curly if it wasn’t so short. Though his eyes had the same Edoan shape as his papa’s and Kik’s, they weren’t the deep, dark shade both his papa and brother had, but they also weren’t the light blue-green of his mama’s, falling instead somewhere in between, like the green-gray of a storm cloud, sometimes darker and sometimes brighter. Lately, when he looked in a mirror, he would peer at his nose and his chin and cheekbones, and wonder if somewhere there was a big family who actually looked like him. Mac considered that his and Kik’s different looks never really mattered before because they were like two sides of the same coin for so long. But now, it seemed like just one more way that they were diverging.

Mac refocused on the issue at hand and figured the truth was best. He faced Mama. “Tomas, the guys, and I had been throwing a ball around at lunchtime and it went on the roof. So, after school, I climbed out onto the window ledge and then jumped onto the roof and got it back. That’s all.”

Bonus-Dad Matt suddenly began coughing, slapping a copper-colored hand to his mouth and jumping to his feet. He said in a strangled tone, “’Scuse me. I… I need a drink of water.” Mac was pretty sure he could see a grin that was becoming a laugh on the big man’s scarred face. Mac really liked Matt. However, Mama was neither laughing nor coughing.

“That’s all?” Mac could hear the edge in his mama’s voice. “Just climbed onto the school roof?” Mama was the master commander of Bosch, in charge of the whole Bosch Pirate Force. She was used to people doing what she said and telling her what she wanted to know. But she had been Mama long before that, so Mac figured he could handle it.

“Uh-huh.”

Grey cut in, “See? I told you.”

Mama didn’t take her eyes off Mac as she said, “Grey, could you take Rini upstairs and get her bath started? I’ll be up to relieve you in a bit.”

Grey shook her dark-brown wavy hair and looked a bit offended at being interrupted but scooped up the little girl with the deep-brown skin and tightly curled hair and tickled her. “Let’s go get a bath, okay?”

“Bat-dime!!” Rini laughed in her sister’s arms.

Mama received a wet kiss from her little daughter and then waited until the sisters had started up the stairs.

“Kik, where were you during this escapade?” Mama asked. This question irritated Mac. What did it matter where Kik was? They weren’t joined at the hip. This was something he had done, not his brother. Mac could feel the scowl form on his face.

Kik looked up from his writing and glanced at Mac and then back at their mama, “Not on the roof, that’s for sure.”

Mama sighed and without another word, unsealed the note and read it. It seemed to take a long time. She blew a breath out and refocused on Mac. “Mac, among other things, that was dangerous and foolhardy. You could have been hurt badly. And that’s the third time since school started that you have done something that you know breaks the rules.” She released another deep breath, puffing her cheeks out a bit as she did. “I’m going to have to think about this. For now, no friends over and no going to play with friends until I meet with your teacher on Monday.”

“But Mama…” Mac was outraged but tried to keep his voice from showing his anger. “…I’m supposed to go to Tomas’s house tonight and sleep over.”

“I guess you’ll have to cancel. There are certainly enough people in this house to keep you entertained.”

“But…”

“No buts. Family only this weekend. And if you plan to leave the house, you must first get permission from either Matty or me. Are we clear?” Mac was a little in awe of how his mama could keep her voice low and her face calm but still say things in such a way that no one would consider doing something different.

“Yes, ma’am.” He clicked his heels together and said this briskly as if he were a trooper in the Force.

His mama regarded him. “Ma’am? Have you enlisted?”

“Um, no. I mean, Mama.” Mac softened his voice and stared at the wooden floor and the green-gray patterned rug on it.