Lurlene McDaniel - Too Young to Die

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the authors imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Text copyright 1989 by Lurlene McDaniel
Cover photograph Eternity in an Instant/Getty Images
Cover design by Amanda Kain

All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Random House Childrens Books, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York.

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eBook ISBN 9780399551888

Print ISBN 9780553280081

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For my sons, Sean and Erik

Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us

R OMANS 5:35a (NIV)

Melissa. Melissa Austin, are you awake?

Melissa groaned at the sound of her name being whispered with repeated pokes in her side. She opened her eyes wide enough to see that her bedroom was still shrouded in darknesspitch black darkness. What could Jory possibly want at this hour of the morning?

Go away she muttered. Her arms and legs felt like lead weights, her brain foggy and disoriented. Every joint in her body ached.

Jory persevered. But its four A . M . Arent we going with Michael as his spotters?

It came back to Melissa in tiny spurts. Michael, her brother. Hot-air ballooning, his favorite sport. Jory Delaney, spending the night in order to drive Michaels pickup truck as his chase vehicle while he maneuvered his balloon into the Florida sunrise above. It cant be four oclock already. We only just went to sleep!

Correction, Jory said. You fell asleep the minute you hit the bed. Ive been up all night waiting for this.

Naturally Jory would be anxious, Melissa thought as she struggled again to clear her head from the cobwebs of sleep. She wished she felt better. Youve got to get over this fixation on my brother, she grumbled, more annoyed at having to get up so early than with Jory. Hes twenty and youre sixteenjust like me. Hes a sophomore at the junior college. Youre a junior in high schooljust like me. Hes

waiting for us in the kitchen. So get a move on, Jory directed, ignoring the facts that Melissa pointed out. If Michael asked me to push peanuts with my nose on the streets of downtown Tampa, Id do it. Remember Romeo and Juliet. Princess Di and Prince Charles. Were only talking four years here.

Jory flipped on the overhead light, and Melissa felt as if her eyeballs had been pricked with pins. She swung her legs over the side of her bed, stood, and almost fell over.

Whoa. You okay? Jory asked, already tugging on her jeans.

Of course Im okay, Melissa lied, feeling lightheaded. Just a little wobbly from lack of sleep. She ambled to her dresser and rummaged for jeans and a T-shirt, dragging her thick, straight, black hair out of her eyes. She had one leg in her jeans when Jory said, Melissa, youre bleeding.

Sure enough, blood trickled down her tanned leg from below the knee. Oh, I mustve cut it when I shaved my legs last night.

And its still bleeding? Youd have thought it would have clotted by now.

Could you hand me a tissue and that roll of tape? I dont think there are any more gauze bandages left.

Melissa wiped off the trail of blood and secured the tissue over the cut. It did seem odd that it was still bleeding hours later. She forgot the cut as she dabbed on blusher and lipstick and decided she should buy a concealer stick for the dark circles under her eyes.

Are you coming? Jory asked impatiently from the doorway. In lieu of a toothbrush, how about a mint? Weve got to go!

Melissa clasped her waist-length hair back and followed Jory into the kitchen where Michael was already waiting. I thought I was going to have to wake you two myself, he muttered. Ive made coffee for the thermos and theres granola bars in the cupboard. Lets get going. He was dressed in well-worn jeans, and his black hair was still damp from a shower, all five foot ten of him smelling of clean, fresh soap.

Sorry, Melissa said, catching the keys that he tossed for his pickup truck.

Ill ride in the back with the balloon. Weve got twenty minutes to get to the field and meet the others.

Melissa sensed Jorys disappointment. Why dont you drive? she suggested to Michael. We can all crowd into the cab.

Michael turned his sapphire-blue eyes toward her. Sometimes looking at him was like looking into a mirror. He had the same square face, high, angular cheekbones, and dark eyebrows as she. All right, he said. At least I drive faster than you. Jory flashed Melissa a glance that screamed thank you!

Outside the dark morning was humid and heavy. Melissa walked around Jorys new white convertible, running her hands along the gleaming paint covetously. The three of them squeezed into the cab of Michaels beat-up truck, and Melissa waved Jory in first, making certain she was wedged in the middle.

Michael sipped coffee from a Styrofoam cup, driving with one wrist draped over the steering wheel. Are you meeting in the usual place? Melissa asked.

The usual. It was a cow pasture in the northwest corner of the county.

Is ballooning fun? Jory asked.

Theres absolutely nothing like it, Michael told her. Its hard to describe. Theres nothing but sky and wind and the whoosh of the gas jets. I suppose its as close to heaven as some of us will ever get.

Maybe you could take Jory up sometime, Melissa ventured.

Michael laughed. I took you up, and how did you repay my gesture?

So Im afraid of heights and got sick to my stomach. Melissa defended herself indignantly. It could have happened to anyone.

Ive been skiing in Aspen and water-jetting in the Bahamas, but Ive, never been ballooning, Jory offered. Ive got a stomach like a rock, and heights dont bother me.

Melissa smiled at Jorys hints, but she wished Jory hadnt mentioned her many adventures. Rich girls put Michael off, and he probably thought she was boasting. Not that Jory was snobby. It wasnt her fault shed been blessed with a wealthy family.

I think youre better off staying on the ground, Michael said evasively.

He turned the truck off the road and it bounced through pasture land. Suddenly the headlights glared on a group of people clustered in the field. Several wore shirts stamped Blue Sky Balloon Club. Michael halted, pulled on the hand brake, and stepped out onto the spongy sod while Melissa and Jory tagged behind. Someone said, We almost started without you, Austin. Suns due to rise in half an hour.

My spotters overslept, he said, dragging his balloon off the truckbed. The lightweight nylon fluttered while Melissa helped him spread it out on the ground apart from the other balloons. Propane tanks hissed hot air into the necks of the dormant balloons, and they rose slowly like giant mushrooms. As each one filled, a person climbed into the dangling basket while others released ropes and the balloons drifted upward, like colorful bubbles in the sky. Michael leaped into his basket, and Melissa watched as the ropes were loosened and the mammoth balloon floated up through the gray morning mist.