Go Big or Go Home by Will Hobbs

behind me. We scorched the next few miles. “Stop, you lunatic!” he yelled finally, and I did.
    In the shade of a big cottonwood, we sat and dranksome water. I felt myself calming down at last. “Vaulting over a buffalo,” Quinn started in, “where’d you come up with that, Brady? You did a three-sixty, at least. You even stuck the landing!”
    â€œI can almost remember…Oh yeah, it was from a library book.”
    â€œA library book, eh?”
    â€œYeah, I was doing a report on ancient Crete.”
    â€œCrete?”
    â€œYou know, the island in the Mediterranean. They had this sport that was like bullfighting, only different. It was more of an athletic contest. Instead of killing the bull, the idea was to grab it by the horns and vault over it.”
    â€œYou read that, and you remembered it?”
    â€œI was really into the illustrations.”
    â€œSo that’s supposed to explain everything?”
    â€œI guess.”
    â€œNo way! What were you thinking, trying to save that kid?”
    â€œI wasn’t thinking, I just reacted.”
    â€œYou ran so fast you were a total blur. What’s going on, Brady?”
    â€œWhat are you talking about?”
    â€œI’m talking about the way you ran circles around me with the basketball this morning, the way you attacked Iron Mountain like a Tour de France rider. Both of those were amazing enough. Okay, you saw the buffalo-vault deal in a book, but that doesn’t explain howyou were able to pull it off. What’s going on, you goofball?”
    â€œI wish I knew.”
    â€œHow long has it been going on?”
    â€œJust since this morning.”
    â€œSomething’s happened to you, Brady. This isn’t normal.”
    â€œI know.”
    â€œWell, do you feel any different?”
    â€œI’m getting a sort of tingling all over, kind of like I stuck my finger in an electrical outlet.”
    â€œAll the time, or does it come and go?”
    â€œIt comes and goes.”
    â€œDoes it hurt?”
    â€œNot really. I’m kind of getting used to it. You think I should go to the doctor or something? I hate going to the doctor.”
    â€œI wouldn’t, as long as it doesn’t hurt. Maybe you’re a genetic mutant, something like that. You get to be fourteen and a half, and this gene nobody else has suddenly kicks in…”
    â€œJust what I want to be, a mutant.”
    â€œI wish I had it, whatever ‘it’ is.”
    With that we got back on our bikes. The easy route home would have been to go through the town of Custer. We stuck to the original plan, hung a hard right, and started the climb up the Needles Highway, another narrow and twisty mountain road. Quinn led the way up, and we didn’t do any racing. We stopped at the topwhere the road threads its way through thirty- and forty-foot granite needles, then we burned down the other side of the mountain through the tunnels and alongside Sylvan Lake, the crown jewel of the Black Hills.
    It was late in the afternoon when we rode into Hill City. Both of us found our eyes drawn to Grabba Java. The drive-through was closed, but Maggie was still inside, cleaning up. Crystal was outside at one of the picnic tables, drinking a smoothie.
    Naturally we had to stop and check in with her. As we slid in on the other side of the table, Crystal asked about our ride. We said it was great, and then she kind of bit her lip and said, “I hate to tell you this, Brady, but Buzz and Max are really fried at you.”
    I gulped, and the blood at my temples began to pound. “What about?”
    â€œAbout that meteorite in your backpack. I made the mistake, I guess, of telling them about it. They told me this long, confusing story about you coming onto their place, them saving you from Attila, you claiming you’d come over to get back a rock that Attila had taken from your mother’s flower bed.”
    â€œThat’s all