Stealing the Game Page 9

  I knew that was true, but I hoped this time would be an exception.

  PRESENT…

  THANKS FOR BEING A CRIMINAL

  DEAD silence.

  Except for the tapping.

  Principal McDonald sat behind his desk tapping a pencil eraser shaped like a chess knight on his desktop.

  Tap…tap…tap…

  I sat in the chair across from Principal McDonald nervously tapping my foot to the beat of the Beatles’ “Here Comes the Sun.” It was the only song I could remember at the moment, and it helped distract me from the fear eating through my stomach.

  Tap…tap…tap…

  Officer Crane stood next to me tapping his handcuff case hopefully, as if praying for me to make a run for the door so he could show off his cop skills by tackling and restraining me like a calf in a rodeo.

  Tap…tap…tap…

  Each tap of the pencil, foot, and handcuff case sounded like an accusation: Chris…Chris…Chris…

  “Let me start, Chris,” Principal McDonald said softly, “by thanking you.”

  Thanking me?! Did my eyes bulge out of my head eight inches like in cartoons?

  Even Officer Crane made a surprised sound, as if someone had just flicked his ear.

  “Thanking me?” I think I said it aloud this time. The pounding of blood in my ears made it hard to hear.

  Principal McDonald smiled. He had long, scraggly gray hair and a black-and-gray beard that made him look like an Irish poet. You half expected to see him with a constant wind in his hair, a wool scarf, and a gray sports jacket with suede patches on the elbows. Instead, he wore black jeans and white T-shirts with “inspirational quotes” on them. Today, his T-shirt said:

  “THE ONLY THING NECESSARY FOR THE TRIUMPH OF EVIL IS FOR GOOD MEN TO DO NOTHING.”

  EDMUND BURKE

  All his shirts said stuff like that, lots of them by people I’d never heard of. (Rain gave him one of her one-word poem shirts with the word future on it. Did she mean he was our future, in that we’d all look like him someday? Or did she mean that because he was older he could see our future better? Or that he was trying to make a better future for all of us through education? See how complicated her shirts could be? Anyway, he wore it every Friday.) He told us at our welcoming assembly that his shirts were billboards for the mind. “Why should Nike and Pepsi and Pizza Hut get all your attention?” he’d said. “A lot of people think middle school is just preparation for high school. But I think of it as its own world. Middle school is like Middle-earth.”

  That got a big round of applause and laughter from the nerd herd.

  “For those of you who haven’t read Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings or The Hobbit, or at least seen the movies, Middle-earth is a fictional continent in an imaginary time in Earth’s past where magical things take place. I can see some of you making faces when I mention magic. ‘What’s the old dude yammering about?’ you’re whispering to your equally skeptical neighbor. Well, what is magic really but that sensation you feel in your scalp when you see something amazing that you can’t explain? That’s what we’re going to do here. We’re going to show you amazing things, then we’re going to teach you why they’re amazing. And the explanation will be even more amazing. Middle school will be a time of magic and wonderment.”

  I think he oversold it. I hadn’t found the magic yet.

  Principal McDonald was a chess champion of some kind, with an international ranking. Theo and Rain know more about that stuff than I do. But his office was packed with all kinds of chess stuff that he received as gifts from grateful students. And the students weren’t just kissing up. Kids and parents alike genuinely liked him. Even though I was sitting in his hot seat, I had to admit he was a pretty good guy.

  “Yes, thank you, Chris,” he said. “Because I’ve been in school my whole life. First, as a student, all the way until I got my master’s degree. Then as a teacher, and now as an administrator. I’m how old now?” He seemed to do some math in his head. “Sixty-one or sixty-two? Whatever. Thing is, I’ve been in school for over fifty years, and I thought I’d seen everything. Every day is predictable and has been for decades. For example, when Officer Crane here attended this school about twenty years ago and I was his English teacher, I could tell he would end up either in the police force or in the military.”

  “You could?” Officer Crane said, surprised.

  “Please, Daniel,” Principal McDonald scoffed. “That wasn’t even a hard call.”

  Officer Crane shrugged, looking oddly satisfied with that explanation.

  Principal McDonald focused his high-beam attention on me.

  His intense gaze was drying out my eyes and it was getting hard to blink.

  “I thought I’d have no more surprises as an educator. But here you are today. In my office. With a police officer. And for the first time in, oh, fifteen years, I’m surprised.”

  I said nothing.

  Principal McDonald stuck a pencil into his sharpener, which was shaped like a chess rook. It whirred for a few seconds, and he pulled out a dart-sharp pencil. “Shall we get started?”

  ONE DAY EARLIER…

  SOMETHING I’D NEVER SEEN BEFORE

  AFTER learning about Jax’s big lie, I couldn’t face going home yet, so I walked out of Palisades Park and just kept going west until I hit Newport Avenue, a busy street crowded on both sides with strip malls and fast-food restaurants. My smashed nose was pulsating like one of those beating hearts that are always getting ripped out of chests in horror films. My Tell-Tale Nose.

  My cheeks had puffed up toward my watery eyes, shoving them into a squint. When I came to a Jack-in-the-Box, I went in and bought a Coke. Without saying anything, the redheaded girl behind the counter also gave me a small plastic bag, which I filled with ice from the softdrink machine and pressed against my nose.

  Sweeeeet. The pulsing stopped. Cool relief spread through my nose and cheeks.

  I kept walking, the Coke in one hand and the other hand holding the ice to my face. I got a few strange looks; some people even walked far around me, as if worried I might attack them. But others noticed my basketball clothes and seemed to guess what happened. A couple guys even gave me sympathetic nods, as if to say, Been there, dude.

  Been there. But no one had been here. Here was some mystical Middle-earth place I had been teleported to, where nothing made sense:

  A QUICK MAP OF HERE

  A place where my brother might never have attended Stanford Law School. But then what had he been doing all these months?

  A place where my brother owed money to a total tool like Rand/Fauxhawk. The old Jax would have never even known a creep like that.

  A place where Jax acted scared all the time. I’d never seen him afraid of anything before.

  Here was a place with lots of questions.

  And zero answers.

  I hated Here.

  When I passed Chipotle, I realized how close I was to my favorite comic book store, Comics, Toons, & Toys. I usually went on Sundays and browsed for over an hour, not just picking up my usual favorites (Wolverine, Daredevil, Batman, Deadpool, Hulk, Fantastic Four, Spider-Man, Walking Dead, Punisher, etc.), but always searching for some new series or an old gem that would inspire me to work on my own comic more. Anything by Alan Moore, Frank Miller, Ed Brubaker, Garth Ennis, and a bunch of other geniuses.

  As I got closer to the store, I started to feel better. I didn’t have enough money to buy anything, but I knew that just looking at the colorful costumes on the glossy covers would distract me from the pain in my face from Masterson and the pain in my brain from Jax. Undoubtedly, after being pulverized by some supervillain, Batman would have to pull his broken parts together and come up with a clever way to defeat his foe with the superior powers. Maybe I’d get some good ideas for my comics—or my life.

  Then I saw something I’d never seen before.

  Something that made the pain in my face evaporate.

  Something that made me stop dead i
n the middle of the sidewalk, unable to take another step.

  Something that made my mouth drop open as if I’d seen a three-headed mermaid riding a two-tailed unicorn.

  Brooke Hill coming out of the comic book store. Carrying a bag filled with comics.

  BROOKE HILL!!!!!!!

  IN MY COMIC BOOK STORE!!!!!!

  I almost didn’t recognize her, because she usually wore expensive clothes that sparkled and glittered. She was the richest girl at school and she dressed the part, complete with fancy shoes and sweaters so soft they must’ve just come right off a lamb. No nylon backpack for Brooke; she carried a black leather briefcase with brass buckles, which looked like it should contain secret plans to take over China.

  But today she wore jeans, a maroon hoodie, and a purple Lakers cap pulled down low so you couldn’t see the face. No fancy clothes, no jewelry, no black leather briefcase.

  She walked quickly away from the comic book store as if afraid she was being followed.

  She was.

  By me.

  WHEN ARCHIE MET SHE-HULK

  LOOK, I’m not going to make lame excuses here. It’s probably pretty evident that, for some reason I didn’t know, I liked Brooke. Everyone agreed that she was one of the prettiest and smartest girls in the school. Sure, that was part of the reason. But there was something else about her. Like, even though she was rich and pretty and smart, she didn’t have any friends at school. Not for lack of other kids trying. They were always inviting her to do stuff, join clubs, or just hang out. But she must have figured they just wanted to be friends because she was super rich. She supposedly lived in this amazing mansion that everyone was dying to see. But no one had ever been invited. No play-dates, sleepovers, birthday parties. Nothing.

  Like me, she seemed to have a secret life.

  I didn’t want to visit her mansion. I just liked the way her mind worked. The way she knew most of the answers in English class. The way she was so confident when she spoke. How she didn’t care what anyone else thought of her, not even the teachers or principal.

  Once Principal McDonald popped into English class to talk about this Welsh poet Dylan Thomas. Apparently, he was some sort of expert on the guy. He kept going on about this poem, “Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night,” about how you shouldn’t just give in to death, but “rage against the dying of the light.” Which means fight against dying. Principal McDonald was being all passionate and poetic and stuff when suddenly Brooke says, “Thomas was only thirty-seven when he wrote that. What did he know about death?”

  Even Principal McDonald was stunned, mostly because, as middle school kids, we never, ever talk about death or dying—unless it’s someone in the news, like a celebrity, and then only with the word tragic stuck on somewhere. Or in a Hallmark card kind of way, like when someone’s grandparent dies and everyone asks how old he or she was, because if they were old, then it’s supposed to be okay.

  Principal McDonald stuttered at first, then said, “Well, he was writing about his father dying. He wanted him to fight against it. To live.”

  “Why?” Brooke said. “Maybe that should be his father’s decision?”

  I don’t remember what Principal McDonald said after that, but it was something to quickly change the subject. I don’t think he wanted a bunch of angry parents calling him later, asking why he was being so morbid in English class with a bunch of thirteen-year-olds. See, we’re not supposed to know about anything sad until it sneaks right up on us, leaving us completely unprepared. I mean, we read all these things in school about racism and bullying, but nothing about the other stuff we’re going through. When Peter Parker isn’t swinging around as Spider-Man, he’s dealing with more crap at home than we read in Romeo and Juliet or To Kill a Mockingbird. Sometimes I think we’d be better off if English teachers just passed out comic books and showed us John Hughes films every day.

  Maybe that’s why I liked Brooke. Because of that day in English class.

  (And, did I mention how pretty she was?)

  “What’d you get?” I said as I walked up beside her.

  She swung her head around, glared at me, and said, “What’d you get? A broken nose?”

  Crap! Even though I was still holding the ice bag against it, I’d forgotten about my swollen nose. This is not how I wanted to look the first time I spoke to her alone. Too late.

  “I don’t think it’s broken,” I said casually.

  She nudged the bag away so she could see it better. Her glare softened as she examined my damaged face. “Nah. Nose is still straight, so it’ll probably be fine once the swelling comes down and you look less like a pumpkin.”

  I laughed.

  She looked surprised at my laughter, like she’d expected me to get all mad and start yelling at her. Almost like she would have preferred that. Now she just looked uncomfortable.

  “So, what’d you buy?” I said, nodding at her bag, hoping to relax her.

  “Nothing,” she said. She started walking away.

  I followed.

  “Bet you I can guess,” I said.

  She slowed down. “Go ahead,” she said. I knew she’d like a challenge.

  “Uh…” I had no idea. Guessing which comics someone reads is trickier than you think. Guess wrong and they could be seriously insulted. You think I’d read that immature crap?! But I was stuck now. I tried to back out gracefully. “Actually, I haven’t a clue what you’d read. I’m surprised you read comics at all.”

  “Why?”

  Oh, man, another trap. There was no winning with this girl.

  I shrugged and went to my default setting: silence.

  “Do you think I’m too intellectual, too snooty, only read Shakespeare?”

  I repeated my silence, only with more emphasis.

  “Or you think only cool kids read comics. And therefore I’m not cool enough.”

  I sighed. “Can’t you just tell me and save all this talk for later?”

  She almost smiled. She pointed to a nearby Burger King and I followed her to a table outside.

  “Want a Coke or something?” I offered. I had just enough money for one drink, as long as she wanted nothing bigger than a medium.

  “No thanks.” She plopped her bag of comics on the table. It was pretty thick. “Okay, guess. What did I buy?”

  “I thought we were past this.”

  “You thought wrong. Guess.”

  I tried to see through the bag, but the white plastic was too thick. What the heck, I finally decided. I had nothing to lose. If I made her mad and she stalked off, I was no worse off than before.

  “Archie,” I said. “Or Veronica and Betty. Something in the Archie universe.”

  She showed no expression. “Go on.”

  I concentrated. What would I read if I was a girl? Wonder Woman? She-Hulk? Spider-Girl? Bomb Queen? Batwoman? Catwoman? Jennifer Blood? Scarlet? I tried to think of other girl characters.

  But then I looked at Brooke’s face. A slight smug smile had crept onto it, like she knew what I was thinking and couldn’t wait for me to be wrong. Just like in the classroom.

  I didn’t want to hear her laughing at my mistake, so I thought harder. Forget she’s a girl. Think about who she is besides that. She’s smart, funny, tough. Sarcastic.

  “Deadpool,” I said.

  Her smirk twitched. “Why Deadpool?”

  “He’s funny, crazy, talks to the reader. Lots of pop culture references, which you would get.”

  No expression now. Like looking at a backboard. “Go on.”

  “Maybe Sherlock Holmes, because you’d like the challenge of solving a mystery.” I shrugged. “That’s all I’ve got.”

  She opened the plastic bag and slid out her comics, except for one, which she left in the bag. She fanned the comics on the table. Deadpool was on top.

  “Score one for you,” she said. She pulled out a Batwoman, whose long red hair seemed to dominate the cover. “You look surprised,” she said, not hiding her glee.

  “
I didn’t think you’d be into superhero types. Seemed more like something you would mock.”

  “Technically, she’s not a superhero, because she doesn’t have superpowers.”

  “Yeah, but she does stuff beyond what a normal person could do. And without all of Batman’s gadgets, because she doesn’t have Bruce Wayne’s family money.”

  She looked surprised. “So, you read Batwoman?”

  Was this a trap? Was she trying to discover whether I had a sensitive side? “When I was younger. Not since she got red hair.”

  “She’s gay now. Batwoman has a girlfriend.”

  I didn’t know what to say to that. Was she telling me this because she was gay and wanted to see how I would react? I tried to think of what to say to show her I was cool with it without also showing I would be disappointed if she didn’t like guys.

  “I’m not gay,” she said.

  “I didn’t say anything. It’s cool either way.”

  She laughed. One of the other comics was a Sherlock Holmes. One was the Walking Dead. She shrugged. “What can I say? I’m just a girl who likes zombies.”

  “But not the fast ones like in World War Z or Dawn of the Dead, right?”

  “Absolutely not! Fast ones are shocking, but slow ones are scary, because you know that someone’s going to get overconfident around them and then…” She made a zombie face and bared her teeth as if she was going to bite me.

  I laughed. So did she.

  “Wow,” I said, “we’re having a Breakfast Club moment.”

  Oh, crap! I had just reminded her that I solved the riddle and won Mr. Laubaugh’s DVD.

  See, that’s why I usually don’t say anything. Safer that way.

  But Brooke just shrugged. “Don’t get carried away, Richards. We’re not bonding. I just like watching you hold ice to your face so I can see you suffer.”

  I lifted the opening of her shopping bag to see the final comic. She slapped her hand down on it. “If I’d wanted you to see it, I would have pulled it out with the others.”