G’ evening folks!! Hope all’s tremendous!!
For June 30th’s blog post, we’d revisited ‘The Patrol Car’, prolouge of my novel ‘Sons of Beasts: Legend of Steeple Creek’. For July 31st’s however, we’ll have peek at ‘Schoolhouse Rock’, one of my favorite Sons of Beast chapters! The chapter opens with Nathan (21) who wakes his brothers Aden (11) and Ethan (16) and struggles with them to spend their summer productively – while he himself attends university – before he reveals they’ll spend the day whitewater rafting, and Aden faces Schoolhouse Rock, river obsticle that takes him on a ride he’ll never forget.
Enjoy!! & Many thanks!!
The next morning:
“Aden, get out of the bed and get dressed!” Nathan said bursting through the bedroom
door, tightening his necktie. “You’ve got a big day ahead of you…”
Sitting atop the bed sheets, Aden shoved the old leather book beneath his pillow.
Nathan buttoned a cufflink and looked up. “Why are you on the bed in those dusty shoes?
Are you wearing the same clothes you had on from yesterday? What have you been doing all night??”
Aden shrugged.
Ethan staggered into the room rubbing his eyes. “Can we bring the noise level down a
notch?”
Nathan pointed upturned palms at Aden as if he was presenting him. “Ethan, look at your
brother…”
Eyes heavy with bags, Ethan glanced. “Well, his head is definitely bigger.”
“Shut up, moose-breath…” Aden said. “Fart licker!”
“Panty-sniffer”
“Butt kisser”
“Booger flicker”
Nathan swiped his arm down between them. “Enough, both of you…”
“Yeah, Ethan… why don’t you go out back and yap on the phone.”
Ethan’s pajama pants began to ring. “Don’t mind if I do…” He dug the cell out of his pocket, read the screen and smiled. “Sarah…”
He started to flip open the phone but Nathan snatched it away.
“Sarah, can wait… sit down…”
Ethan sat. “If she calls back, I’m answering it.”
Nathan powered off the phone. “Ethan, is this what you call tucking your brother in?”
“Yeah!” Aden said.
“And Aden,” Nathan said. “…making a mess of the cellar Ethan and I had to clean? Foul
words in the morning? Where’s your focus?”
Aden shrugged.
“I think I know where it is.” Nathan reached behind Aden and snatched the old book from
under the pillow.
“Hey, that’s mine. I found that!”
“You, no telephone and you, no…” he rotated the book, curling his lip as if it smelled bad.
“And you, no horror stories until you show me I can trust you.” He placed the book on the
dresser and sat between them on the bed. “Do you wanna know the real reason I work down in those law achieves two and three days straight and take so many classes? Not only so I can
build a future for us, but so I can show both of you responsibility. Mom and dad are gone, so
each of us has got to step up and help out around here.” He rubbed their backs. “I love you
both… all I’m asking you for is a year, maybe two, and we’re out of here.”
“I’ll be gone before then.” Ethan murmured.
“The point is: Can I rely on you two to behave and take care of each other when I’m at school
or work?”
Aden eyed the book on top of the dresser. “You can rely on us, no problem…”
“Ethan?”
“Huh… oh, sure, yep, count on us…”
“Good.” Nathan said. “Then get dressed for whitewater rafting, you’ve got ten minutes!”
“What!” Ethan said. “Absolutely not, Nathan!!”
“Whitewater rafting? Can I sit here and read instead?”
Nathan sprung from the bed, placed the book under his arm and walked out of the room
buttoning his blazer. He then descended the stairs with both brothers on his heels. Once he
reached the living room, he moved a box off the sofa and sat tying his shoes while the others
crowded around.
“This is in no way fair, Nathan.” Ethan said.
Nathan reached over and shook the box. “No, this isn’t fair.”
“But I’m nobody’s babysitter.”
Aden folded his arms. “And I’m nobody’s baby…”
“Shut up, Aden. Nathan, this is not the way I’m spending my summer.”
A knock rapped on the front door.
Nathan stood. “It’s how you’re spending today, Ethan… now get dressed, the both of you!”
Ethan stumped up the stairs, Aden close behind. Nathan went into the foyer, peeked through
the front door curtain. A woman—late fifties, early sixties—smiled at him. She was wearing a
shawl with white gloves and was holding a plate of muffins. He opened the door.
Her eyes widened. “Oh, my Lord..?” she said. “Which one are you? Ethan?”
“I’m… Nathan, Miss..?”
“Mrs. Carlson… from down the lane..? I was good friends with your great-uncle Artemis and
great-aunt Eleanor…”
“Oh yes, I remember you.” Nathan said. “You used to stop by when we were only kids here
for the summer.”
“Yes sir, back then you all was only this high. Your Aunt Eleanor was like a sister to me, so you
all are great-nephews of mine, too.”
“Would you like to come in?”
“Oh no, Mr. Carlson and I just got back in town last night, and when we saw your moving
van, aside from the fact I knew Artemis had left this house in the family, I just had a hunch that
it was Artemis and Eleanor’s kin who’d moved here. So I baked these muffins and hoped you’d
join Mr. Carlson and me for dinner this weekend.”
“This weekend??” Nathan said. “Well, you see, I met a young…” He heard Ethan and Aden
arguing upstairs, thought for a moment and then smiled. “This weekend you say? No problem,
your nephews will be there!”
“Wonderful, now Mr. Carlson can share all his hunting rifles and war stories with you young men instead of talking my head off.” She handed Nathan the plate. “You can just bring it with
you when you come… have a great day.” She turned and walked down the porch stairs.
Nathan shut the door, smelled the plate… the buttery scent of blueberry filled his nostrils.
Ethan and Nathan raced down the stairs.
“I’m dressed and so is the brat… now can I have my phone?”
“Nope.”
“We’re going rafting, what if there’s an emergency?”
Nathan eyed him, slapped the phone in his palm and then carried the old book with his free
hand toward the kitchen.
“Wait.” Aden said. “What about my book? Where are you taking it?”
“Back where you got it from.” Nathan said. “Now come grab a muffin.”
***
Aden sat on a log behind a row of a dozen yellow inflated rafts, and up the river, he could
see the tall smokestacks of the bulky mill. Ethan stepped over the log flipping his phone closed
and began tightening the chin strap of Aden’s bright yellow helmet and the buckles of his
orange life vest. “I’m going to make sure you’re all squared away, little brother.”
“Wait, where’s your helmet and your life vest?” Aden said.
“Uh, they ran out.”
“But who am I going to raft with?”
Ethan pointed at several other families near the rafts who were buckling each other’s
helmets and vests. “I don’t know, take your pick.”
Behind them, a school bus pulled over onto the side of the road. The door opened and a tall slender man with wild hair falling out from under his helmet and holding a clipboard stepped
off first. He pointed at the rafts. “Everybody pick a raft and stand beside it, please… the tutorial
will start in four minutes… thank you…”
Ethan hopped up from the log and jogged over to him. “Excuse me. How long is the trip?”
“The entire excursion is about four hours: seven miles of river and rapids then a twenty
minute bus ride back here.”
Ethan came back to the log. “Meet me right here when the excursion or whatever is over…
got that?”
“But I’ll be lonely.”
“Hi, Aden.” a voice said.
Aden and Ethan turned and saw a girl with red curls waving as she and her friends wandered
pass the rafts. Arlisa was her name.
Ethan patted Aden on the back. “See there,” he said. “You’re a lady’s man. Now meet me
right beside this log when you get back.” He then dug out his phone and began walking down
the edge of the road.
“Hey, Aden.” a voice said behind him. “Where’s your sister going?”
Aden wheeled and saw RK pouncing off the bus with his two goons close behind. They were
wearing helmets and vests like he was.
“What do you want?”
RK held his palms up. “Nothing, nothing… It’s just cool to see a shrimp like you stepping up and riding some waves.” He pointed over Aden’s shoulder. “There’s Arlisa… maybe if you ride
well you just might impress her…”
Aden hesitated. “You really think so?”
“Without a doubt…”
The man with the clipboard walked over and stood in front of the group. “Has everyone
selected a raft?”
RK stepped over the log and selected the nearest raft. “As a matter of fact,” he said. “Why
don’t you ride with us?”
Aden glanced at the raft and suddenly envisioned himself falling out of the boat somehow
and toppling down the rapids. “Nah, but thanks, RK… I’ve got a raft already.”
He turned and walked three rafts down where four heavy-set women were standing next to
a raft, tightening each other vests. Aden walked up to the nearest one. “Hi, my name is Aden.
Can I raft with you all?”
The woman gleamed. “Of course you can.”
Aden walked to the rear of the raft and stood.
The man with the clipboard laid a kayak in front of everyone and began a silent headcount,
pointing at each person standing beside a raft. Arlisa’s group was two rafts over. Aden glanced
over at her but looked too long as she caught him looking and smiled.
“Can everybody hear me??” the man with the clipboard said.
Everyone—young adults, adults, a senior townsman or two, but mostly children—howled in
excitement.
“What about over on that side??”
An earsplitting roar…
“Good! My name is Rob. I’m the head rafting instructor.” A heavy man wearing glasses and a tight life vest strolled over and stood beside Rob. “This is my assistant Kevin, and we are going
to go over some fundamental rules and commands…”
The two covered the basics: reasons you shouldn’t stand up in the raft, what to do if you’re
caught on a rock, why you continue to paddle even through whitewater. Aden glanced at Arlisa
and his palms began to sweat.
If I can show her how great a rafter I am then she’d really like me… I cannot mess this up!
“…and lastly,” Rob said. “Around the fourth mile which as about halfway through the course,
we’ll pull over to shore and have lunch… and you’re going to need your strength to get around
Schoolhouse Rock.” he said, grinning. “I’ll be leading you in this kayak and Kevin will trail us in a
raft carrying our sandwiches and first aid… any questions?” He paused, panned the crowd.
“Okay. Elect a captain to sit in the rear and control the steering then carry your rafts down to
the pond and meet me in the middle.”
The ladies pointed among themselves. “Georgette, you brought us here to Steeple Creek.
You be the captain!”
Georgette laughed. “But that was only to watch your faces once you got a glimpse them
rapids. Why don’t one of you all steer??”
“Oh no,” another said. “I won’t have enough energy to do it.” She stared at her finger nails.
“Plus, I just got these done!”
The four of them went back and forth till Georgette noticed Aden witnessing their squabble. “Just a minute, ladies.” she said. “You all forget we’ve got the young adventurer here. Why don’t you be captain, young man?”
Aden nodded.
“Well, then it’s settled.”
Down on the pond, after ten minutes of struggling to step into the raft, Kevin got out of the
lunch raft and helped the ladies inside and then trailed them to the center of the lake where
the rest of the rafts were huddled.
“Are we all here?” Rob said and glanced at Aden who nodded and smiled squint-eyed. And
after a final set of guidelines, the group set out down the river. After two full hours of
hearing hard breaths, countless complaints and the sound of only his paddle rowing, Aden was
relieved when he saw Rob turn his kayak around and point toward the shore where a small
clearing in the trees lay.
“Alright, everybody row to the shore there and we’ll rest and eat lunch.”
Georgette looked over her shoulder at Aden. “Sounds good to me.” she said, dipped her sun
dried ore over the side and helped propel the raft to shore.
After the rafts were secure, everyone formed a line and out of a cooler, Kevin took several
different types of sandwiches and laid them buffet-style across a few small boulders along with
canisters of water and iced tea. He pointed at the sandwiches.
“These are peanut butter and no jelly, these have jelly, these are ham and these are
turkey…”
Aden grabbed a ham sandwich and carried it to a nearby pine tree and slumped against it in the shade. He snatched the plastic off his sandwich, took a bite. And then another. Suddenly, he
felt something crawling into his left ear.
“Ahh!” He threw the sandwich and swiped his ear.
RK stepped from behind the tree, chuckling as he held up a single blade of grass. “New boy,
you’re too easy!”
Aden picked up the dirt-coated sandwich, shoved it back in the plastic. “It’s not funny RK,
look what you made me do!”
“I know, I know.” he said, smiling. “Sorry about that, man.”
“It was ham. Go grab me another!”
“Okay, I will. But first, how are things going with Arlisa? It’s okay if you like her, I won’t do
nothing…”
Aden stared at him a second. “I said, ‘hi’…that’s it.”
“That’s all??” RK shook his head. “Listen, you got to get her to notice you or pretty soon
she’ll be smiling at some other kid and won’t even notice you anymore.”
Aden’s eyes went wide. “Okay, what should I do then?”
“You’re the man around here, you figure it out.” RK said, and began to walk away.
Aden stood up and grabbed his shoulder. “Wait a second… tell me what to do… please?”
RK smirked. “Well, you’re the captain of your raft, right??”
“Yeah… so..?”
“Well, there is a gigantic rock at the bottom of the next series of rapids called Schoolhouse. Now I’ve rafted on this river every year of my life since I was five and I’ve never rowed on the
left side of the rock and neither have any of my boys.”
“Why?”
“Because, everyone is chicken.” he said. “I want to see what rapids are over there but no one
wants to row it with me and no one ever has. Turn your raft to the left side of the rock and I bet
Arlisa will see how much courage you have and like you even more!”
Aden rubbed his chin.
“Think about it, and I’ll go get you that sandwich.”
He watched RK walk over and stand in the circle of his boys. They looked at Aden and then
RK went and grabbed him a new sandwich.
Maybe things were changing, but there’d be only one way to find out!
Minutes later, everyone returned to their raft and trailed Rob down a lazy portion of river
until it thinned and then curved around several bushes protruding out over the water. On the
other side, just around the bend, they could hear the river grumbling and see the water
bubbling and speeding up as if there was a waterfall there. Rob turned his kayak toward the
group and held up a hand. All of the rafts stopped rowing. No one spoke. Everyone sat in their
rafts listening to the river bellow and roar just behind the bend.
“Everyone hear that?” Rob said, trying to make eye contact with as many people as possible.
“That sound… is Schoolhouse Rock.”
Aden’s grip tightened around the ore.
Rob pointed over his shoulder. “Schoolhouse Rock is a large bolder shaped like and schoolhouse at the bottom of the next set of rapids that literally divides the river in two. This
boulder is extremely dangerous as it is the only concave boulder on the entire route… and by
the way, concave means the whitewater runs beneath and around it so if you screw around and
fall out of your raft you will not be swept around the rock, you will be pinned beneath by the
rushing water… the end… any questions?”
Everyone sat there, mouth open.
Rob pointed to a yellow sign on the shore. “You see that sign, it says, Danger: Risk of fatality!
Listen to instructors! Captains, you are in charge of the steering for your vessel so listen
carefully. I am rowing over to shore so I can hike down to Schoolhouse and climb on top so I can
guide you through. When you see me at the bottom, follow my commands for steer left, steer
right, and take cover! When you get to Schoolhouse, do not pass on the left side of the rock!”
Rob’s words echoed in Aden’s ears as he watched him row to shore and dart through the
woods with his kayak. A few minutes later, Kevin’s walky-talky popped. “Okay, Kevin…” Rob’s
voice said. “Start directing them down.”
Kevin rowed to the front of the group and signaled for the first raft to paddle around the
bend. He sent the rafts in five minute intervals. Arlisa’s was next. They waited for the ‘okay’
then began paddling. After them, RK’s raft rowed into position. RK looked back and gave Aden a
thumbs-up which his friends seemed to find funny. Kevin gave the signal and the boys paddled
around the bend. Aden’s group was last. Kevin signaled them to paddle forward into position.
“Okay, captain.” Georgette said, looking back at Aden. “It’s up to you to get us through safe.
Do you remember Rob’s hand signals?”
Aden nodded.
“Good, because we’re counting on you…”
Aden smiled. He listened to the roar of the river and could see it foaming up ahead. He wondered if RK and the boys had tried to row down the left side of Schoolhouse. RK spoke as if
Arlisa would be waiting at the next pond looking back at how Aden had done. If so, this would
be his chance to show her that he was more than someone she should just wave hi or bye to,
but someone who was courageous. Aden gripped his ore and when Kevin waved his hand, he
stabbed it into the water and paddled for the bend.
“Stay to the right.” Kevin said as they passed by.
Aden paddled as hard as he could.
“Careful, Aden…” Georgette said over the raging water. “We don’t want to go too fast!”
Aden steered around the bend and the raft plunged into a rocky gauntlet of white rushing
water. The women stopped paddling and bounced up and down as white waves crashed into
the boat. “Ahhh!” But Aden stayed sharp. He dragged his ore in the water behind them just as
Rob had instructed, steering the raft down the center of the rapids. Ahead, a series of four-foot
drops…whoosh… whoosh… whoosh!! The river was a virtual staircase and the raft was picking
up speed and fast! Aden wiped the spray out his eyes. He felt the ore clacking against the
smooth rocks beneath the raft and just then, another stair-like series of drops ensued.
Whoosh!! Water and mist flew over the raft. Aden saw the women in front of him clinging to
the vessel; their screams faint over the roar of the river. And then, at the bottom of a long
slanted hill of water emerged the biggest boulder Aden had ever seen. He swiped the water out
his eye and could see Rob jumping up and down, giving the signal for steer right. Georgette turned herself halfway around as she held on to her seat. “Steer us right, steer us right!!”
The raft was barreling straight for the rock and picking up speed. Aden pulled his ore out the
water, unsure of what he should do. Rob was jumping up and down on the rock like an ape
pointing right.
“Steer us right!!”
What should I do??
Aden saw how the river crashed into the rock then crested like a waterfall on both sides.
Left or right, they both seem the same. But if I go left, I’d be the first to do it!
Aden dragged his ore behind the boat and turned the raft left.
“No!!! Right!!!” Georgette said.
The raft was only yards from the rock when he got a good look at the left route and how it
led to a barrier of broken logs and jagged rock and how the river flowed somewhere beneath it.
What have I done??
Aden stabbed the ore into the water and tried to force the raft right.
Come on, come on..!!!
The raft was heading straight for Schoolhouse. Rob was standing on top of it giving the take
cover! sign. The ladies leaned into the center of the raft and covered their heads, but Aden
stayed upright, his oar dragging against the current.
Come on… turn…turn!!
The front of the raft had turned but the rear headed straight for Schoolhouse.
Aden glanced up at Rob way up on the bolder. He was flailing his arms. “Get down! Down!!”
Aden ripped his ore out of the water and closed his eyes.
Foooomp!!
Eyes closed, Aden’s head jerked as the rear of the raft crashed into the rock followed by a brief moment of weightlessness, crash… and then another moment of weightlessness… boom.
Aden bounced onto the floor of the raft. He lifted his helmet off his eyes. They were floating
through a pond where the rest of the group was gathered and watching. Half of the group
began to applaud.
Georgette turned around, wringing out her shirt. “Close call up there, ay?”
“I can’t believe we made it out of there alive.” another woman said.
Aden panned the group and found RK peering at him, shaking his head as though disgusted.
Aden gleamed until he heard a splashing behind him—Rob and Kevin whooshing down the
final rapids. Rob hit the pond in his kayak and paddled toward Aden.
“What happened up there?” Rob said. “You didn’t obey any of my commands. I told you to
steer right.”
“I was steering right!” Aden said.
“Kevin was behind you. He said you were steering right only after you were intentionally
steering left.”
“Give the kid a break,” Georgette said. “This is supposed to be fun. Besides, you can’t expect
a kid to steer a raft perfectly.”
“Lady, I don’t expect him to do anything further.” He turned to Aden. “You’ll ride with Kevin the rest of the excursion. I am in no way confident you can be trusted!”