The Fingertips of Duncan Dorfman (16 page)

“Pleased to meetcha!” said one of the alligators.

“Be sure to keep your hands out of the water!” said the other. “Our son Junior can get pretty frisky!”

All of a sudden, from within the oily dark water around the boats, another animatronic alligator’s head popped up. Duncan Dorfman peered calmly down at it. Its jaws opened so wide he could see the gears inside. He could even make out a Phillips-head screw that had been screwed into a rod that held the teeth in place.

“This is the lamest ride in the world,” Carl muttered beside Duncan.

“Yeah, it really is,” Duncan agreed.

From a couple of cars behind them, one of the Surfer Dudes said in his recognizable voice, “Actually, it’s totally rad.
Not.
” His partner snickered.

“I’ve had enough already. We should be in the hotel, resting our brains,” said Carl. He turned to Duncan. “You’re definitely going to come through tomorrow, right, Duncan?”

But Duncan said nothing.

“
Right
, Duncan? No more
guilty conscience
. It’s getting old.
”

Duncan didn’t have time to reply, for they had lurched forward, moving through the dark water toward the next lit-up display. This one was made to look like a scene from Little Red Riding Hood, with an animatronic alligator dressed as a grandmother lying in a bed. A mannequin dressed as Little Red Riding Hood stood beside her.

“Come a little closer, why don’tcha!” said the grandmother.

So Little Red Riding Hood did, and the alligator reached out with its snapping jaws and grabbed Little Red Riding Hood’s head, which neatly popped off. A few kids in the boats appreciatively cried out
“Whoa!”
and
“Nice!”

“I have to urinate!” cried someone else. Duncan realized it was Tim, from the Wranglers.

“The alligator theme doesn’t even make sense,” Maxie said to Nate as they sat in their boat. “I mean, what’s the point of doing Little Red Riding Hood with
alligators
? What’s the point of this whole creepy place?”

“Don’t ask me,” said Nate.

Without warning, the light in the display—and all the other lights in the tunnel—snapped off, leaving the ride in darkness.

Someone gasped; another kid screamed. Nate and Maxie’s boat pushed through the water with a grinding noise. An ominous
KRRRRR
sound came from beneath the surface, and Nate felt himself thrust through some damp rubber flaps, and then he and Maxie Roth were out of the dark tunnel and back in the amusement park, where all the lights were blazing, and the music was playing, and everything was normal.

“That was so odd,” Maxie said. “Technical difficulties, I guess.”

“I guess,” said Nate, a little shaken up. They stood up in their boat and disembarked at the same place where they had gotten on. But when Nate turned around, he saw that none of the other boats had come out of the ride. “Where is everyone?” he asked.

They were the only ones to have made it out of the Lazy Swamp Ride. All the others were still stuck inside.

TRAPPED

W
hat’s going on?” Duncan whispered. It was so dark in the tunnel that he couldn’t even see Carl, who, in the hurry to get on the ride, had ended up beside him.

“No idea,” said Carl Slater, and for once he actually sounded unsure of himself.

“I’ve been in blackouts before,” said a voice with a Southern accent from a few boats back. Duncan recognized it as belonging to Kaylie, one of the Evangelical Scrabblers. “These things happen,” Kaylie said.

“Maybe to
you
,” said one of the Surfer Dudes. “But not to us. We haven’t been in blackouts. We’ve been in
wipeouts.
”

Their voices all sounded loud and clear, and they could hear one another perfectly.

“I’m sure it will be fixed ASAP,” said Lucy Woolery.

“Is ASAP any good in Scrabble?” asked Tim from the Wranglers.

“Of course not,” said Carl, snorting.

“Hey, be nice to him, Carl,” said April. “He’s younger than you.”

It was funny, Duncan thought, the way everybody seemed to know exactly who was speaking, even though they were all stuck in a completely dark tunnel. It wasn’t the worst place to be trapped. But just as he thought this, he became aware of a
swishing
sound in the water.

“What’s
that
?” asked Josh, the other Evangelical Scrabbler.

“Oh, it’s probably just the mechanical gears down there,” said Lucy. “Nothing to get freaked about.”

“Anyway, the live alligators in the park are in enclosed swamp areas,” April said. “Lucy and I bought little meat snacks for them from a vending machine. A dollar fifty for a piece of gross, fatty meat. I feel sorry for the alligators here.”

“Could be a shark,” said one of the Surfer Dudes.

“Cut it out,” Duncan said. “You’re scaring people.”

“By which you mean,” said the other Surfer Dude, “we’re scaring
you
.”

“Yeah, right,” said Duncan, but in a way he was a little nervous, and he knew that the Surfer Dudes knew it. Probably everyone did.

They were all silent. Finally Kaylie said, “Maybe this isn’t a regular blackout. Nobody’s made an announcement to tell us what’s happening.”

“Do you think someone’s going to rescue us?” asked Tim, his voice starting to shake.

“Oh, I’m sure they will,” said Lucy. “One of these days.”

Time passed, and the little boats rocked slightly in the water, and still no one came to get them out.

“Hello,” said Kaylie quietly.

“Hello,” said Duncan.

“I wasn’t talking to you, Duncan, sorry.”

“Oh. Who were you talking to?”

“God.”

“Really? Wow,” said Lucy Woolery.

“I like to do that when I’m in a stressful situation,” Kaylie said.

“And does it help?” Lucy asked.

“Definitely,” said Kaylie. “It makes me feel better. You guys can make fun of me if you like. Other kids do.”

“People make fun of me, too,” said Tim. “Because I look like I’m eight. My dad says I’ll probably need human growth hormone injections. You get them every day in your arm or your leg.”

“I know a kid who had those,” said April. “He said they weren’t bad. But anyway, we’re not making fun of any of you.” She paused. “I get made fun of by my sisters and my brother for liking words so much. They’re really annoying about it.”

“I get made fun of,” said one of the Surfer Dudes, whose name was Jonno, “by my partner, Bradley, when we’re surfing and I can’t handle a wave.”

“That’s a total lie,” said Bradley.

“No, it’s not. You’re like, ‘What a baby; that wave was like two inches high.’”

“If someone makes fun of us this weekend when Kaylie and I are praying before a game,” Josh said, “we’re just going to ignore them. We decided this in advance.”

“Do you guys think God’s here right this minute?” Tim asked. “At Funswamp?”

“Oh, sure,” said Kaylie. “Funswamp
needs
God.”

“And do you think God is here with us on this ride?” asked Tim.

“I personally happen to think so,” Josh said.

There was silence again. No one had any idea how long it would be before they got out of here. They all sat in their boats in the darkness and waited.

 

 

Outside, Nate was anxiously trying to get the attention of the guy dressed as Scaly the Gator, who sat on a stool by the lever of the ride. The alligator seemed distracted. “Excuse me, sir,” Nate said. “I was on the ride in there, and it got stuck, and then there was a loud grinding sound, and my friend and I got out, but no one else did.”

The alligator looked at him. “Is that right?” he said.

“Yes! There are several boats of kids still inside the ride now. They’re
trapped
in there,” said Nate. “You’ve got to do something!”

“Well, the park is pretty busy right now,” said the alligator. “I can call the manager, but I think he’s handling a fried dough emergency.”

“A fried dough emergency?”
said Nate, and he began to shout. “A FRIED DOUGH EMERGENCY? Are you serious? My friends are stuck inside a pitch-black tunnel filled with water, and it’s nighttime, and the park is going to close soon, and we’re all playing in a big tournament tomorrow. Everyone needs a good night’s sleep! They can’t spend the night on the Lazy Swamp Ride!”

“Okay, okay,” said the alligator. “I’ll see what I can do.”

He lumbered off, dragging the heavy load of his tail.

Nate had had enough. “Come on,” he said to Maxie. “We can’t wait for this guy to get his act together. We have to go back in there and help everyone.”

“Nate, we can’t do that,” said Maxie.

“All right, you stay here and I’ll do it.”

“I mean, like, we
literally
can’t do it,” said Maxie. “All the boats are inside. How are we supposed to get back in? Use our skateboards?”

“No,” said Nate.

“Go in the water?” said Maxie.

No one else was standing on the platform beside the channel of water. Nate rolled up his pant leg and stuck in a foot. The water felt cool, but not cold.

Nate Saviano was a city kid who had skateboarded through the streets and skate parks of New York, the wind in his face. One afternoon, earlier that year, he had been mugged on the street walking home from the grocery store. Two kids who looked about sixteen had come up to him, and one of them said, “Give us your iPod and all your money.” So he’d quickly handed over his new iPod and his wallet, which had exactly three dollars in it, and they had run off laughing while Nate, his heart pounding but somehow his mind staying calm, went up to a newsstand and asked the man inside to call the police.

But he had never waded through a “swamp” in his life. “I’ve got to do this, Maxie,” he said.

“Exactly what are you going to do?”

In answer, Nate lowered himself into the water.

“Whoa,” said Maxie Roth. “Be careful, man.”

Nate had no idea how deep it would be, and he was relieved when the water level stopped at his thighs. Even with his shoes on, he could feel the slippery bottom. With a shiver, he made his way through the water toward the opening of the tunnel. He pushed through the rubber flaps and found himself back inside the darkness.

 

 

When Wendell Bruno, who was still dressed as Scaly the Gator, calmly told Larry Saviano that he had trapped a bunch of kids from the tournament inside the Lazy Swamp Ride, Larry couldn’t believe it. “What do you mean, you trapped them inside? Why would you
do
that?”

“I just wanted to tire out the best teams a little,” said Wendell. “To keep them at the park longer, and make them a little bit exhausted, so that they wouldn’t concentrate as well in the morning. Nate wasn’t supposed to be among them, but he got on the ride before I noticed. Luckily he was in the first car, so I managed to get him out.”

The two men stood by the caramel corn booth, the smell overpowering them. A little while earlier, Larry had realized that he couldn’t find his son; in fact, he couldn’t find any of the kids Nate had been hanging around with at the tournament. They all seemed to have disappeared in one clump, like the astronauts who had been whisked back in time in Larry’s
Zax
novels.

“Have you become a
maniac
over the past twenty-six years?” asked Larry.

“I told you that I had a plan,” said Wendell Bruno. “You said you were glad.”

“A plan to trap a group of kids inside a ride in order to tire them out for the games tomorrow?”

“It wasn’t meant to be
all
of them, Larry. What am I, stupid? The whole point was that Nate and Maxie would be the ones to have a relaxed evening tonight, while all the other strong players would be a little . . . tuckered out. It was a totally harmless prank. Lighten up.”

“I cannot believe you would do this,” said Larry. “To minors!”

“Oh, that’s a good one,” said Wendell, shaking his large alligator head. “I believe
you’re
the one who makes your boy study Scrabble words day and night, am I right?”

“That’s an exaggeration.”

“Look,” said Wendell, “we both know that losing the tournament made us each a little crazy. As I was about to tell you, my plan to jam the ride and tucker out the kids didn’t work out exactly the way it was supposed to. Who knew you would have such a goody-goody son? The long hair and the skateboard and the hipster, ultra-pierced skater-girl partner sure fooled me.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Nate went back inside to get his friends out,” said Wendell. “The woman who’s dressed as Cuddly the Iguana told me she saw a long-haired kid slip inside. Cuddly knows everything that goes on at Funswamp.”

“What? Nate’s inside?”

“Yes. He waded into the water.”

“Isn’t that dangerous?” said Larry.

“Nah. The only thing that could go wrong is there could be a sudden electrical current in the water. But the chances of that happening are as low as . . . the chances of getting a bingo-bango-bongo.”

“An
electrical current
?” Larry was terrified and angry, but he had to take action. “Go get a flashlight from a security guard, Wendell. We’re going in.”

Wendell found a flashlight, and he and Larry jogged through the crowd toward the Lazy Swamp Ride. Together, the man and the alligator stepped into the water.

 

 

But inside the ride, Duncan was wondering something. This fingertip ability of his, this “power”—was it good for anything real?

Was it actually
useful
, or was it just some kind of cheater’s trick?

Quietly, without calling attention to himself, Duncan reached his left hand out and ran it along the slimy wall in the darkness.

Carl sensed movement and understood what Duncan was doing. “Getting anything?” Carl whispered. “Picking up any information?”