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Ghost of Spirit Bear
Chapter One
(Two weeks later)
Minneapolis, Minnesota
Walking to school the first morning was strange and different. On the island, Cole had hiked the rocky path to the pond each morning at daybreak. Around him had been the sounds of seagulls calling, the screech of owls, and twigs snapping in the underbrush. The pungent smell of pine trees, salt water, and rotting seaweed had filled the air. Sometimes the chuffing sound of killer whales broke the stillness as they breached. And always Cole had felt the hidden eyes of the Spirit Bear calmly watching him from deep in the trees.
Here, walking on a smooth sidewalk in the city, Cole smelled car exhaust. He heard dogs barking, a garbage truck loading trash, and the traffic going by. A siren screamed in the distance. He missed the Spirit Bear. The city felt like some foreign planet. Cole wanted to cover his ears and close his eyes to it all. He didn't fit into this world.
Cole noticed his reflection in the window of a parked car as he walked. He had grown taller and thinner on the island. His skin was weathered and rough, and his muscles had become strong and lean. His old clothes no longer fit him, but he felt uncomfortable in his new ones.
As he neared the school, Cole hugged his injured right arm against his waist and tried not to limp. If he let the arm hang, it swung awkwardly because of the bone and muscle damage. He dared not let his injuries show. Around the bullies, he'd be like a wounded rabbit with wolves.
Cole blinked back his feelings of fear and frustration. On the island he had learned to control his emotions. He had learnedfrom Garvey and another Tlingit elder, Edwin, that he could never fully get rid of anger because it was a memory. But he had also learned to focus on the good. A good day wasn't a day without clouds but rather a day when one focused on finding the sunlight behind the clouds.
Cole wondered if he could keep that same focus back here in the city. The very moment he stepped onto the plane heading for Minneapolis that concern had begun eating at his gut. What would happen when the island was simply a memory and the Spirit Bear was only a ghost from his past? What would happen when he returned to the bullies and gangs? The students would remember only the old angry Cole who once prowled the hallways looking for fights. And maybe that old angry Cole still existed, a monster who would one day return without warning.
As he approached the school, the knot tightened in Cole's throat and kept him from swallowing. A statue of the Minneapolis Central bulldog mascot seemed to snarl at him from its familiar pedestal on the front lawn. The dog had one leg broken off and one ear missing. Cole remembered spraying graffiti on the marble pedestal himself. Now it was tagged with gang symbols, some that Cole no longer recognized. Looking at the ratty bulldog made his memory of the proud and magical white Spirit Bear seem like a distant dream.
Groups of kids hung around outside the school, shoving and slapping at one another and shouting names. Most wore baggy pants and T-shirts. Some wore bandannas or jackets with gang colors. Already candy wrappers and soda cans littered the lawn.
Cole recognized some of the kids, but they seemed like strangers. The cliques and gangs had already begun gathering: the preppies, the jocks, the Goths, the red groups and blue groups, blacks, Asians, Hispanics, and a dozen more. Each group eyed the others with disdain and distrust.
Cole felt like he was outside a fishbowl looking in. None of it made sense anymore. He had been fifteen and in tenth grade when he had beaten up Peter. Now he was coming back at seventeen but only starting eleventh grade because of the classes he'd missed. He felt a lifetime older.
Cole noticed one plain-looking white girl with long straight brown hair approaching the school.
"Hey, slut!" shouted a girl sitting on the steps near the door.
The girl kept walking, looking down at the sidewalk.
"Look who's calling who a slut!" shouted one of the jocks.
"Shut up, jack—!" the girl yelled back.
"Shut up yourself, b—!" the boy answered.
Suddenly Cole wanted to scream, Stop it! Everybody just shut up! Garvey's words came back to him: "Diminish anything around you and you diminish yourself." Did these kids know they were destroying themselves with every word?
Students who recognized Cole turned and stared openly. His pulse quickened and his face warmed when he heard their whispers. In the past, he would have challenged any kid who dared to stare. Now he drew in a deep breath and lowered his eyes, afraid of what he might do if confronted.
A familiar voice interrupted Cole's thoughts. "Hey, you," Peter called, hurrying over in his stumbling gait. "H-h-how are ya?"
"Good. How are you doing?"
The smile left Peter's face. "Two kids have called me a retard already. I wish we were still on the island. I want to go back and soak in the pond."
Cole studied his friend's troubled face. The beating and the brain injury had left Peter superemotional. Sometimes he laughed and cried at the same time. Cole remembered Peter's first nights on the island, waking up screaming as if he were still being attacked. With time, his fears had calmed, but Cole worried that those haunted thoughts would return here in the city.
Cole knew he was responsible for Peter's injuries, but he also knew he had helped him. After Peter attempted suicide the second time, Cole had suggested that the fearful boy visit the island. He wanted to show Peter that the monster he feared no longer existed.
At first, Peter's parents had refused, but in desperation they finally agreed under the condition that Garvey accompany the two boys to help protect their son.
Ghost of Spirit Bear. Copyright © by Ben Mikaelsen. Reprinted by permission of HarperCollins Publishers, Inc. All rights reserved. Available now wherever books are sold.
