The Sledding Hill by Chris Crutcher Page A

the last pages of Warren Peece to the “dregs” of Bear Creek High School. Ms. Lloyd stands in the back of the room, following along in her copy. It has to be ninety-five degrees in here, and not one kid is asleep. Good book.
    â€œThe end,” Dad says, and slams the book shut. “We did it. We’re gonna get in big trouble, but we did it.” The room is filled over capacity. Wordspread that the book no one was supposed to read was being read in the catacombs after school, and more kids showed every day.
    There is a round of applause. Half the kids in this room have never finished a book.
    â€œTell you guys what. When the school board hearing comes around, it’s not going to matter what the adults have to say. Most of our minds are made up, and all you have to do is walk into the supermarket to get our opinions. What will matter is what you say. Most of you know YFC is going to come out strong against the book. That group is made up of some of the best students and a few of the better athletes. I don’t see that kind of star power in this room, no offense. If you guys are going to win this one, you’re gonna have to do it with smarts.”
    I can feel the incredulity index increase tenfold. We’re going to take on Dan Moeltke with brainpower??? bounces around the room like a Ping-Pongball. That’s like taking on Stephen Hawkings in Jeopardy , where all the categories are astrophysics. Actually I’m the only one who thinks that, but if I’m actually going to get this story published, I have to take some creative license.
    â€œI can hear what you’re thinking,” Dad says, “but you’re wrong. There’s as much brainpower in this room as anywhere in the school. You guys have been listening too much to your own press.”
    â€œSo how do we go about this?” Debbie Simmons asks. Debbie is a mousy girl who has probably read as many books as the rest of the kids in the room combined. Reading is about all Debbie does.
    â€œYou get organized,” Dad says. “You get a statement drawn up, and you choose someone to deliver it. Someone with flair. Someone who isn’t afraid to stand up to Dan Moeltke in a debate.”
    Montana West’s eyes light up. “I’ll read it,” she says. “Oh, jeez, Mr. Bartholomew, let me read it. Wouldn’t that be so cool? Have my dad get up thereand say all the crap he’s going to say, then I’ll come right behind him telling the whole school board how he’s so full of—”
    â€œLet us use our imaginations on how that sentence ends,” Dad says. “Anyone have a problem with Montana reading your statement?”
    Montana West is unanimously elected reader of the nonreaders’ statement.
    â€œAnd Montana,” Dad says as the group is breaking up, “might I suggest that no matter what you think your father is full of, if it’s in any way scatological, delete it. Remember, people, they’ll be looking for reasons to discount what you have to say. Three of the board members are also members of the Red Brick Church board. That puts you at a decided disadvantage.”
    Like I said before, if you were going to call up the perfect prototype for the daughter Maxwell West did not order, Montana is the one you’d come up with. Goth kids call her Goth. Black clothes,enough chains to start a towing company. One of many tattoos she got with her fake ID is a bird pulling a worm out of her belly button. Her preferred reading list is made up entirely of graphic novels, her idea of the perfect dreamboat is Donnie Darko, and though she played connect-the-dots all over her last IQ test with black crayon, she’s smarter than they get. She knows KO?N so well she can sing all their songs backward. She is also way decent when it comes to people who are like I used to be. She’ll see somebody sitting alone in the lunchroom and just go over and sit down and start a