✅ My Sister's Problem

115. My Sister's Scheme

"Still think you won?" Lindy taunted me as we climbed into the back of the car.

"No," I said with a shrug. "I saw what you–"

"Come on, girls," Mum cut me off. "Compare how you did when we get home. Okay? For now, you should just be proud of yourselves. You both did great."

"Yeah," I said, and I could be happy with that. "That was the most fun I've had in a long time. It's more exciting when there's something on the line. Thanks, Mum. And thanks Lindy."

"For kicking your ass?"

"For making it fun. For making me push myself harder. Like, the whole day I was thinking about what you would do, and trying to work out if I could beat you. I didn't figure it out until right at the end."

Mum didn't say anything this time. And for a little while it was just like our summers used to be, when there was a rivalry between us, and always the possibility of some kind of trickery, but we were both enjoying ourselves too much to really quarrel. It wasn't far back to the beach house; if the cliffs didn't come right up to the sea in between, it would probably have only taken fifteen minutes to get there by jogging up the beach. But it was a little farther by road, because the track down to the beach was at the far end of the cove, and that gave us plenty of time to talk on the way.

"You know I'll have to get you back for this," I said. "I'm already thinking of my next move."

"You'd have to get up pretty early to get one over on me," Lindy answered. I hesitated for a moment, thinking that might have been a movie quote, but I couldn't quite place it.

"Okay, what did she do?" Mum asked. "The suspense is killing me. I can tell from the way you're talking that Lindy cheated somehow, but I totally can't see it. Did she do something to embarrass you, or–"

"Don't worry," I answered. "And I wouldn't call it cheating. More like lateral thinking. You gave us some rules, but it's hard to win a sports day without any athletic ability. So Lindy went for a medal in lateral thinking instead. I can't believe I didn't think of it."

"So what...?"

"I didn't break the rules!" Lindy insisted. "I did everything like you said. You said it's like a score per medal, right? Half an hour for participation, up to two hours for gold. So four participation medals are as good as one gold."

"Yeah. But the girl who gets gold has three other events to try."

"That's not what you said!" Lindy protested.

"She's right," I backed her up. "I thought back, and I don't remember you telling us how many events we're allowed to enter. You bought us a prepay band with four stamps on it. I assumed that meant we're only allowed to do four, but you never said that."

We drove on in silence as the car reached the sand, and then Mum laughed a little.

"You're okay with that, Sally?" she asked when the giggles had subsided. "I don't want to let her cheat her way out of a punishment when you've been facing yours for so long."

I thought about it a little, but I'd made my mind up as soon as I saw her chalk picture, and realised just how many different kinds of arrows were depicted on it. In detail, too, meaning that she must have spent a little time looking at them before she drew it.

"Well, you know... It wouldn't be fair on Lindy if you needed to be good at sports to win."

"Hey!" Lindy yelled, and punched me in the arm. "I'm not that bad. I'll swear I'm better than you at lawn darts, if nothing else."

"Oh? And how many did you manage to hit the target with? In total?"

"None," she said, still grinning. "That's the whole point."