Page 67 of The Lookback

Principal Lyons has a real flair for the dramatic I didn’t notice until recently. He’s smiling broadly at first, and then his face becomes serious as he slowly whips the blue tarp away to reveal. . .

A pile of logs.

Or to be more precise, it’s a large tree that someone has split into seven round sections.

“What are we supposed to with that?” Tommy asks. “And how in the world is it going to show that we have dexterous fingers?” His eyes are wide and this time, because he’s louder, the entire audience laughs.

Principal Lyons is frowning, which is bad for Tommy, since he’s one of the main judges. “Over on the other side you’ll find axes. Each of you has ten minutes to chop these hunks of tree into blocks of firewood, and the person who has the most usable pieces at the endwins.” He glances at his watch. “Now,go.”

We’re splitting wood?

It must be from the story—they had to split wood at the beginning, right? But this is really stupid. It takes me a minute just to get an axe, with everyone rushing over and snatching one like the Big Bad Wolf is coming. In my entire life, I have never once split firewood. I suppose that means I’m spoiled, but this isn’t my task at home.

Plus, we have a furnace that my dad sprang for three years ago, so even he hasn’t had to cut much wood since then.

When I finally do manage to drag a large, round block of wood away from the others and heft my axe, then bring it down, the end of it sticks in the surface and it takes me a good minute and a half to free it again.

Meanwhile, Jed and Tommy have both split their rounds and then split them again into nice fat quarters. They’re well on their way to having eight or ten pieces of wood each. It’s a little reassuring to notice that Denise is just as bad as me. She’s staring at her wood, and eyeing it strangely, as if she might cow it with a good, strong glare.

But then she walks back to the woodpile and grabs a smallish piece. It doesn’t look like it’ll make much for her. Until she stacks it on top of her big round chunk and splits it in half.

I’m swearing under my breath as I bring my axe around again.

But I either have a faulty axe, or I’m just really, really bad at this, because when the ten minutes is up, I’ve managed to chunk off a few strange pieces of bark, but my main hunk of wood is mostly intact, whereas everyone else has managed to split at least one big round hunk into smaller pieces.

“Well, it was neck and neck, but it appears that our winner is Jedediah Brooks.” When I glance over, they’re actuallyweighingthe wood that was split.

What a stupid game.

“And the clear loser for this game today is Amanda Saddler.” That’s not fun to hear, and neither are all the giggles and chuckles and jokes coming from both the audience and my co-competitors. “But let’s talk about why this task matters.” Principal Lyons points at his wife, which is really strange.

She starts talking right after, so I’m thinking they’ve been watching too many television programs. “What a great idea,” she says with a smile. “The next portion of our competition is about to begin, so the placing you held in this first portion will determine the position into which you enter the second part of our contest.”

Great.

Mrs. Lyons pulls a bowl out from behind the cage where Clyde’s still smiling, and holds it up. “This bowl holds the assignment for the next portion of our game. In the story, there was Hansel, Gretel, the bird who ate the bread crumbs, the witch, the stepmother, the father, and a bystander with a horse who saved the children at the end. As you all remember, we already have our Hansel.” She points at Clyde who waves and takes a bow. “But this bowl contains papers that will give each competitor information about their role in the story. You come and draw your papers one at a time in the proper order.” She holds out the bowl. “You can draw in the order you earned with the last game.”

“But how do we know what to draw?” Denise asks. “Even if I was first place, my draw would still just be luck, right?”

“You weren’t first, though.” Janet’s smiling.

“I haven’t even told you what the goal is,” Mrs. Lyons says. “So let me explain that now, before you all draw.” She smiles. “If you’re the witch or the stepmother, your goal is to kill all the other competitors.”

The crowd murmurs, and a few of them boo.

“If you’re Gretel, your goal is to save Hansel before he can be eaten.”

Clyde flexes and half bows over in his poorly made cage.

“If you’re the father, the horse, the bystander, or the bird, your goal is to survive by helping identify and eliminate the witch and stepmother. The witch will eventually have to kill everyone other than the stepmother to win.”

“How would we kill someone?” Jed asks.

The audience laughs.

“Just because you’re a loser doesn’t mean you’ll be the witch,” Clyde says. “Have a little more faith in yourself.”

Jed scowls.

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