Stealing the Game Read online

  A collective groan rose from the students, myself included.

  “Here we go: A gravedigger digs a hole in the ground that’s two feet by six feet by six feet. How much dirt is in the hole?”

  I jotted down the numbers.

  Without having written anything at all, Theo and Brooke shouted out in unison, “Seventy-two square feet.”

  Everyone put their pencils down in defeat.

  “That was fast,” Mr. Laubaugh said.

  “I believe I was slightly faster,” Brooke said.

  A few students protested that Theo was faster or at least just as fast. Brooke ignored them and stared at Mr. Laubaugh for a ruling. He fanned himself with the DVD as if trying to decide.

  “Break it in half,” Clancy quipped. “Like King Solomon did with the baby.”

  “He didn’t cut the baby in half, genius,” Brooke said to Clancy. “He only threatened to.”

  I laughed. I didn’t mean to. It just came out. But I couldn’t take it back.

  It was so unusual that everyone turned to look at me.

  Brooke’s eyes flared, widening as if to allow more of her death ray to fire across the room at me.

  “Chris?” Mr. Laubaugh said. “Do you want to comment?”

  Not really, I thought. I want to run to the gym and shoot free throws until this knot in my gut goes away.

  I shook my head. “Nope.”

  But Mr. Laubaugh didn’t look away from me. He waited. Everyone waited.

  “Well,” I said, “I think the answer is that there’s no dirt, because it’s a hole.”

  The class looked at Mr. Laubaugh. He walked over to my desk, stared at me a long (reallllly long) moment, then smiled and handed me the DVD. “Nicely done, Chris.”

  The class erupted in chatter. I heard a “Way to go, Chris” and “Yay, Chris.” Someone called me “the Nerd-Slayer,” referring to Theo and Brooke. Theo grinned and gave me a thumbs-up.

  Brooke raised her hand and waved it. “That’s not fair, Mr. Laubaugh. You told us there would be math. That answer didn’t require any math.”

  “Yes, it did,” he replied. “It required that you ignore math and think outside the parallelogram. Right, Chris?”

  I didn’t know what to say. So I said nothing.

  “Let’s take out our copies of The Catcher in the Rye and see what our old pal Holden’s been up to,” Mr. Laubaugh said.

  “Now, there’s a basket case,” Clancy said.

  I was relieved to start discussing Holden’s problems so I could forget about my own.

  SOME SERIOUS BALL

  “YOU ready to play some serious ball?” Jax asked. He was smiling but seemed jittery, which was not like him.

  “I don’t know how serious it will be,” I said, “but we’ll give them a good game.”

  “Yeah, that’s fine. But can you beat them?” He gripped my arm a little too hard.

  I yanked my arm away. “What’s wrong with you, dude?”

  He took a step back, as if he’d just realized what he’d done. “Nothing. Sorry, Chris. I just hate owing this guy.” He leaned closer to me and lowered his voice, even though we were the only two people on the court. “I’d really, really like you to beat this guy. You know, just to make a point.”

  “What point?”

  “You know, that he’s not all that. Not as cool as he thinks.” He shrugged. “It would mean a lot to me.”

  I didn’t know what to say to that. It wasn’t like Jax to get all worked up about a bunch of middle school kids playing basketball in the park. But then almost nothing Jax was doing lately seemed like his old self. I hoped Theo was having luck with his phone calls to Stanford.

  “Dudenheimer,” Roger said, pulling up on his bike. “Where are the unfortunate victims of our superior basketball skills?”

  “Coming,” Jax said, nervously checking his phone. “Be here any minute.”

  The rest of my team arrived during the next ten minutes: Rain, Tom, and Gee Hernandez. Gee’s real name was Jesus (pronounced Hay-zeus), but people teased him by using the Christian pronunciation, so he shortened “Jesus” to “Gee.” He wasn’t on the school team, but I’d played with him before at the park and he was scrappy and fearless. I’d seen him dive on the pavement for a loose ball and come up with the ball, bloody elbows, and a big grin.

  “Gee!” Rain said with a smile. “I didn’t know you were playing.”

  “Chris said your team needed a little salsa flavoring,” Gee said, exaggerating a Mexican accent he normally didn’t have.

  Rain laughed. “I’m the hummus, you’re the salsa, what’s Roger?”

  “Good ol’ all-American burger,” he said. “With fries.”

  Gee nodded at Roger’s big belly. “And a milk shake.”

  Roger laughed and patted his stomach. “You know it, bro.”

  Tom pointed at Rain’s T-shirt. It was white with the word FOREIGN in small black letters. The word was so small you could barely read it. “What’s that supposed to mean?” he asked.

  Rain made her own T-shirts with what she called “one-word poems” on them. I never really got them, but I thought it was cool that she did it.

  “Why’s the lettering so small?” Roger said. “At first I thought it said ‘forgotten.’”

  Rain said, “That’s a good one. I’ll do that next.”

  “But what’s it mean?” Tom asked again.

  “An artist doesn’t explain her art. That would defeat its purpose, which is to make you think about what it means.”

  “Man, I hate that explanation,” Tom said. “Same crap we get in class. Just tell us, okay?”

  I could see Tom was getting a little agitated. He was a math whiz with straight A’s, but in English he struggled to maintain a C. He was the polar opposite of me.

  “Is this about immigration?” Gee asked.

  Rain shrugged, holding her ground in refusing to explain. Unfortunately, this wasn’t good for team morale, so I decided to say something.

  “Maybe she’s asking us to think about all the meanings of ‘foreign,’” I said. “Like, at first, you think she means a foreigner, someone born in another country. But then you think, maybe she means everything that’s foreign to us, like how Wall Street works, or most of the stuff on the news.”

  “I know how Wall Street works,” Tom said proudly.

  I ignored that. “And we’re all afraid of what’s foreign to us, what we don’t understand, so maybe the word is small to show that what’s foreign can be afraid of us, how we react to what we don’t understand. Sometimes cruelly or violently.”

  They all stared at me as if I’d just popped out a few extra arms, like Armed & Dangerous.

  “That’s pretty good,” Rain said. She smiled like someone relieved to be understood. “Pretty darn good.”

  Not really. I knew that Rain had been hassled by some kids because her parents were Muslim and also by her family because she didn’t really practice Islam. So she was foreign to everyone.

  “I still don’t get it,” Tom said.

  “Me neither, dude,” Roger agreed. “Sounds like something you’d say to impress a teacher.”

  I shrugged. I’d pretty much talked myself out. Like my mom always said, I used words like each one costs me ten dollars.

  “Psst! Chris!” Jax stage-whispered.

  “Where’s your bike?” I asked Gee. I’d noticed him walking past the tennis courts instead of pedaling the black mountain bike he’d gotten for Christmas.

  Gee scowled. “Stolen. Someone got into our garage, took all the bikes.”

  “Holy crap,” Roger said.

  “Chris!” Jax said more loudly.

  I ignored him. “Theo’s dad came by our house the other night to warn us about that. It’s been happening all over the place.”

  Rain nodded. “Our neighbors down the street got robbed, too. Thousands of dollars’ worth of tools. They also took every computer in the house and some jewelry from the bedroom.”

  “Ch
ris!” Jax hollered angrily. “If you don’t get over here, I swear I’ll…”

  I turned. Jax was standing about twenty yards away, waving for me to join him.

  “What?”

  “Come here!” he barked, waving even harder.

  I went over to him while my team started shooting. “What’s the big 911?” I asked.

  “What’s she doing here?” he asked, glaring at Rain.

  “Playing basketball. Why?”

  “Why? Because she’s tiny. These guys won’t care that she’s a girl, Chris. They will run right over her until she’s nothing more than a greasy stain on the court.”

  I was so mad and afraid of what I would say that I turned and walked away.

  “Is that them?” Tom said. He pointed with the hand that only had four fingers. Well, four and a half. He’d lost half of his middle finger when he was three and reached into a blender. (Did your stomach just kinda tighten into a fist? Mine did when he first told me.) Sometimes, for a joke, he’ll give someone the finger. But no one ever gets mad; they just stare at his stump and look confused. That cracks us up. Anyway, he’s still a great ball handler and a dead shot from the free throw line.

  Roger, Rain, Jesus, and I all turned to look where Tom was pointing. Five guys wearing gold basketball uniforms poured out of a white van, followed by the driver, Fauxhawk. On the side of the van was a cartoon frog wearing a knight’s helmet and holding a pool skimmer like a lance. Under the frog, in big blue letters, it said: SIR CLEANS-A-LOT POOL SERVICING. I guess Fauxhawk had a side job.

  “Holy crap,” Roger said with a snicker. “Gold uniforms. You ever seen that before?”

  “I haven’t,” Rain said.

  “Hustle, hustle, hustle!” Fauxhawk shouted, clapping his hands repeatedly. The team burst into a quick run.

  As they got closer, our expressions changed from smirks at their gold uniforms to stunned awe. For one thing, they ran in unison, their left legs hitting the ground at the same time, then their right legs. It was like some kind of synchronized swimming routine, but on land.

  Fauxhawk jogged leisurely behind them, but with a big grin on his face, like someone who’s won the lottery and just showed up to collect his winnings. He wore skinny black jeans, a vintage KISS T-shirt, and a brown leather bomber jacket with so many zippers that it looked like it had been in a knife fight and the zippers were scars. His blond fauxhawk looked a little taller today, like a tidal wave frozen at its highest point. In New York City, he would have looked like a gang member. In Southern California, he looked like a wannabe hipster movie star. I’d seen some of those clothes in the fancy stores at South Coast Plaza. They were worth more than the van.

  “They’re huuuge,” Rain whispered to me, some fear in her voice.

  “Yeah,” I said. She was right. They towered over us, each near six feet tall, if not over.

  “Maybe the gold uniforms make them look taller,” Gee said. He looked at Roger. “Right?”

  “No, man, those dudes are monsters,” Roger said. “And coming from me, that means something.”

  “No way they’re our age,” Gee said. “They’ve got to be fifteen and sixteen.”

  “At least,” Rain said.

  Fauxhawk scowled at his team. “What’re you waiting for? Go warm up!” He threw a basketball hard to one of the players.

  The five guys immediately darted for the court and started running drills. They didn’t talk or joke or scratch their butts. They ran layup drills, passing drills, and shooting drills.

  “So that’s what a club team looks like,” Tom said.

  So that’s what doom and humiliation looks like, I thought.

  MEET YOUR UNDERTAKERS

  “CHRIS, this is Rand Winthrope,” Jax said. “Rand, my brother, Chris.”

  I stuck out my hand. Rand Winthrope looked at it funny, like I’d just offered him a three-day-old fish I’d pulled from the trash. He grabbed my hand, gave it one weak pump, and let go. First Place Prize for Creepiest Handshake Ever.

  “Is this it, dude?” Rand said to Jax, turning his back to me as if I no longer existed. “This is your best team?”

  “They’re all good players, Rand,” Jax said, but without any conviction.

  Rand laughed. “No offense, man, but my guys are gonna hunt them, skin them, and mount their heads on my van roof. It’s not even a challenge.”

  My team was on the court shooting, so they didn’t hear what Rand said. But I was angry enough for all of us. My stomach twisted and churned like I’d swallowed a snake that was desperately trying to find a way out through my belly button. I waited for Jax to defend us, but he just looked away, avoiding my gaze.

  “We’ll give them a game,” I said. My voice sounded normal, despite my twisting gut. But I was good at hiding how I felt.

  Rand turned and snorted at me. “Kid, they’re not called the Undertakers for nothing.”

  “Their jerseys say the Gold Coasters,” I said.

  “Yeah, that’s their official name. But everyone knows them as the Undertakers, because they bury every team they play. What are you guys called, the Short Bus Boys?” He burst into a harsh laugh that sounded like coins being shaken in a tin can. “Oh, sorry, the Short Bus Boys—and Girl.”

  “Come on, man,” Jax finally said halfheartedly.

  “Sorry, dude, sorry.” Rand shrugged. “It’s your money, bro. But when I played with the Wildcats, we’d call this bunch a light snack.”

  “We may surprise you,” I said coldly.

  I led my team over to the Gold Coasters (no way was I calling them the Undertakers) so we could introduce ourselves. Hopefully, they weren’t as obnoxious as their coach.

  “Hey,” I said to the first Gold Coaster we came across. Like the rest of his team, he was tall and tan. They all had longish hair that was some shade of blond, as if they’d all just come here from an afternoon of surfing and modeling for Abercrombie catalogs.

  He turned around and looked us over as if this was the first time he was seeing us. He didn’t seem impressed.

  I introduced everyone on my team, and he did the same with his team. He pronounced each name as if it were a precious metal too rare and valuable even to be listed on the periodic table: Danforth, Clement, Lambert, Bendleton, Masterson.

  “Masterson?” Gee said. “Like Bat Masterson, the gunfighter?”

  “Not so much a gunfighter as a sheriff of Dodge City,” Rain said. “His first gunfight with a soldier was over a girl named Molly. It ended up with the soldier and Molly both killed and Masterson badly wounded.”

  “I didn’t know that,” Gee said.

  Masterson stared at Gee and Rain like they’d just farted in a crowded elevator.

  Suddenly, as if they’d heard a silent dog whistle, Masterson and the rest of his team ran over to Rand for some last-minute coaching.

  Jax waved us in, too. We gathered around him. “You’ve got this, gang,” he said enthusiastically.

  “Those guys are older, Jax,” I said. “You didn’t tell me that before.”

  He shrugged like it didn’t matter. “Listen up, playas,” he said. “These guys are a little older and bigger, and they are from those cliff homes in Newport Beach. They’re all richer than Donald Trump. They vacation in Spain and Tahiti and are going to get Mercedes or BMWs when they turn sixteen. While you guys are scrounging for summer jobs at Burger King or McDonald’s, they’ll be cruising the Caribbean on their yachts. You’ll smell of french fry grease and they’ll smell of suntan lotion. So how about, just this one time, giving them the taste of losing?”

  I don’t know if Jax expected that speech to amp us up into some sort of Terminator-like killing frenzy, but mostly we just mumbled some assurances to him and walked onto the court.

  “What’s with your brother, Chris?” Rain asked.

  I shrugged. “He’s going through some stuff.”

  “Who ain’t?” she said.

  If Jax thought he was going to spark some sort of class warfare, he’d pic
ked the wrong group of kids. We were used to all the über-rich kids from Newport Beach and Laguna Beach and Turtle Rock. Heck, Kobe Bryant lived down there. We didn’t have anything against them just because they were rich. This wasn’t The Outsiders, with them being the Socs and us being the Greasers. Orange County had just about every nationality and racial group you could think of, as well as every level of income. Most of us at Orangetree Middle School were upper middle class, but only because most families had both parents working full-time.

  Having said that, we still wanted to beat them. Not because they were bigger, richer, or better dressed, but because when it was game time we always played to win. If they had been smaller, uglier, poorer, and called the Lawn Gnomes, we would’ve still wanted to crush them. That’s how the game is played, with everybody trying their hardest to win. That’s when basketball is the most fun.

  My team gathered under the basket while we waited for the Gold Coasters. Their uniforms were gold on the front and back, with white piping on the sides of the jersey and shorts. They all wore LeBron XI PS Elite iD shoes, which cost $310 a pair. I’d only seen them in magazines before today.

  “Don’t look so worried,” Rain said to us as we stared at their flashy shoes. “We’ve got this.” Apparently she had overcome her earlier fear. Either that or she was a good faker.

  “I’m not worried,” Roger said with bluster.

  “I am,” Tom said.

  “I’m a little worried,” Gee said.

  Rain said, “Dr. J once said, ‘Being a professional is doing the things you love to do, on the days you don’t feel like doing them.’”

  “We’re not professionals,” Gee said. “We’re eighth graders.”

  Rain scoffed. “That doesn’t mean we can’t act like professionals.”

  The Gold Coasters ran onto the court. Was it just me or were they all synchronized running again?

  “Let’s do this,” Masterson said. He sounded like he was in a hurry to swat us like annoying bugs and get on with the fun part of his day.

  “What’re we playing to?” I asked.

  Masterson looked over at Rand/Fauxhawk. “What’re we playing to, Coach?”