Johnny Hangtime by Dan Gutman Page B

over the script and saw that Augusta only had a few lines to say in the whole movie. Roland promised to give her more, and that seemed to satisfy Augusta’s mother.
    Roland led Augusta to a coaster car that had been taken off the tracks and put on blocks. She stepped into it, followed by an actor holding a knife in his hand. A big fan was turned on to blow Augusta’s hair around.
    For the next half hour, Roland filmed Augusta screaming her head off while the guy held the knife to her throat. For somebody who hardly ever spoke, she sure could scream.
    Finally, Roland yelled “Cut!” He would shoot the background scenes separately and put them together to make it look as though Augusta was on the coaster with the rest of us.
    Her work done for the day, Augusta stepped out of the coaster and followed her mother into the waiting limousine. As usual, she didn’t say a word to anybody.
    My ankle was throbbing, and I should have left the set to care for it, but I couldn’t stop staring at Augusta. What does a girl that beautiful think about, I wondered? Does she think at all ? Can anyone that beautiful have any problems in her life?
    I couldn’t be sure, and maybe it was just wishful thinking, but as Augusta rolled up the window in her limousine, I thought for a moment that she might have smiled at me.

10
MIXED UP
    M om put ice on my ankle when we got home. That made the swelling go down, but she insisted on taking me to the doctor. He didn’t put me in a cast or anything, but he had me fitted with a plastic brace to keep my ankle from moving. He gave me a pair of crutches and instructed me to use them for a week, even if the ankle felt fine.
    When I got to school on Monday morning, Boris Bonner was waiting on the front steps. In all the excitement over the roller coaster stunt, I had forgotten that Bonner told me to bring in a dollar to school or he was going to beat me up.
    Bonner took one look at me hobbling up the steps on crutches and broke into hysterical laughter. Some of the other kids turned to see what was so funny.
    â€œWimp!” he screamed gleefully. “Loser! Thyme, I can’t believe you would lower yourself to faking an injury so I wouldn’t beat you up!”
    â€œI’m not faking an injury,” I said, struggling up the steps. “I sprained my ankle.”
    â€œHow?” Bonner asked gleefully. “You don’t take gym. You don’t play sports. You don’t do anything !”
    â€œI…tripped on my steps,” I said.
    â€œYou are so pathetic, Thyme!” Bonner chortled. “You’re not a man, you’re a wimp.”
    As I hobbled past the line of laughing kids, for the first time in three years, I thought about giving up stunting. If I quit doing stunts, I would be like any other kid. I could take gym. I could go to dances. I could ride escalators. I could do anything I wanted. That included hauling off and socking a jerk like Boris Bonner if he gave me any trouble. And Mom would be thrilled if I quit.
    For the time being, though, doing stunts was the one thing that allowed me to get away from my problems. The only time I could ever forget about people like Boris Bonner was when I was on a movie set, jumping off a building or doing some other crazy stunt.
    I was all mixed up.

11
BLOWING STUFF UP
    â€œL et’s blow something up today!” Roland exclaimed as he walked around the set, rubbing his hands together excitedly. “Anybody else in the mood to blow something up?”
    Everybody agreed that blowing something up would be a terrific idea. The guys on movie crews always love blowing stuff up. This business must attract pyromaniacs. Personally, I think explosions are pretty cool, but I’d rather see them in the movies than in person.
    My ankle had healed quickly. We were gathered at Buckeye Municipal Airport near Phoenix, Arizona. They had closed down part of the airport for the day so we could shoot this scene