Airball (11 page)

“That's all,” said Russell.

“Yeah,” said Manning.

Eddie slurped up another mouthful of noodles. “'Cause here's the thing.” He chewed while he thought about it. “If Coach really believes these stupid uniforms exist, then he really believes they'll make us play better. So if we don't play better, he's going to get suspicious. He's going to think we don't have what it takes.”

“To wear the uniforms,” said Russell.

“Yeah,” said Manning.

Bragger nodded. “You've got a point.”

“So all I'm saying is, I'm going to keep playing hard. In my underwear. But that doesn't mean I like it.” Eddie sucked up the last of his milk, then crushed the carton. “That's all I'm saying.” He scooted his chair back and stood up. Glanced around the table. “So we're cool, right?”

“Yeah,” I said. “We're cool. I mean, who likes playing in their underwear?”

Eddie nodded, then carried his tray over to the dump bin. The ducklings waddled along in his wake. Bragger rolled his eyes, picked up his tray, and followed them.

“I do.”

Duncan's voice was soft.

I looked at him. “You do what?”

He swallowed. “Like playing in my underwear. You asked who liked it, and, well, I do.” He twirled his fork in his noodles. “At first it was weird, but once we got going, I—I didn't mind. I mean, you know, not in a twisted way.” He sneaked a glance at me. “But the way it made us all kind of the same? That's what I liked.” His already slumpy shoulders slumped even lower. “I guess I just get tired of being the dorkiest kid in the gym.”

I looked at him. Sure, he leaned toward the dork side. But I always thought
I
was the dorkiest.

Duncan stabbed his noodles. “No matter where I go or what I do, you can count on me to look stupider than anyone else. But yesterday, when we were all in our underwear,
everybody
looked stupid. Just as stupid as me. It's almost like I fit in.” He shrugged. “As well as I'm ever going to, anyway.” He glanced up. Frowned. “You won't tell anybody, will you? I mean, it's not like a team captain duty or something, is it? To tell about stuff like this?”

I shook my head. “Don't worry, Duncan. Your secret's safe.”

Duncan nodded. “Okay. Good.” He mustered a weak smile. “Thanks, Kirby.”

He picked up his tray and scuffled off to the dump bin.

I watched him. And thought, well
yeah,
his secret's safe. I couldn't possibly tell anybody. Because then I'd have to tell them Duncan was right. That I totally understood how he felt.

Twenty-one

Eddie wasn't kidding. He said he was going to play hard, no matter what he had to wear or not wear, and he meant it. He was a maniac at practice. Dribbling. Shooting. Rebounding. Not passing, of course. He was a ball hog to begin with, plus how could he show Coach what Stealth technology was doing for him if he didn't have the ball? But stealing? Oh, yeah. He was a klepto in gym shoes.

The whole team acted like they'd overdosed on sports drinks. They didn't show any improvement in skill. Or teamwork. But they really latched onto that running-faster, jumping-higher business. I'd never seen so many guys running in so many directions before. Into the bleachers. Into the wrestling mats. Into each other. It was a miracle, really, that nobody got hurt.

But nobody did. Not even the one guy who was trying to. My ankles came through, strong as ever. Maybe even stronger. All that jumping around seemed to build up my ankle muscles.

Coach watched with a stunned look on his face. Rubbed a hand over his eyes. “I've created a monster,” he mumbled. “Twelve of them.”

I thought about that. About what it could mean. Seemed to me like something a guy would say about a science project that had gone horribly wrong. So that's where I put it, in the science experiment column. After practice, while the other guys showered and changed, I scuffed across the damp concrete to the bench in the corner and pulled out my notebook. Under column two,
Coach Is Psyching Us Out,
I wrote:

3. Coach says he's created a monster. Like Dr. Frankenstein.

I studied the two columns. Tied at three apiece. I thumped my pencil against the page. There had to be something more. Something I'd overlooked. I thought back to everything that had happened since Coach passed out those empty boxes. And remembered what Duncan said in the locker room.

In Column #2 I scribbled:

4. Coach might be mean, but he isn't stupid.

That made it four to three. I shut my notebook. And decided it was time to implement Step Six of The Plan. Or was it Step Seven? I'd lost count.

I waited till most of the guys had changed and gone home, then knocked on Coach's door. I heard a grunt, which could've been either “Come in” or “Get lost.” With Coach, it was hard to tell. I glanced back at Bragger, the only guy left in the locker room. He nodded and gave me a thumbs-up.

I took a deep breath, turned the knob, and poked my head inside. My spiral notebook rattled in my hand.

“Uh, Coach?”

He'd already showered and changed. Attempting to give the guy coaching tips was scary enough. I sure didn't need to stare at his hairy chest muscles while I did it. But Coach was back in his regular clothes, hunched over his desk, studying a newspaper. A newspaper that looked oddly familiar.

He ran a hand over his chin. “You know who this player is, Nickel?” he said without looking up.

I squinted at the paper upside down. It was the Kansas City
Star.
The sports page. The one with the Armpit column.

I frowned. “You mean Brett McGrew?”

Coach snorted. “Good guess. Usually somebody says ‘player,' you can pretty much bet they mean Brett McGrew. But I'm talking about this other guy.” He thumped his finger on the paper. “This guy with all the steals. You know his name?”

I shook my head. “No, sir.”

“Didn't think so. Can't find anybody who does.” He leaned forward, fists folded together, elbows on the paper. “So. What can I do for you, Nickel?”

I was still standing in the doorway, one shoulder in his office, the other still in the locker room, in case I found it necessary to back out in a hurry.

“Well.” I pulled my notebook around to the office side of the doorway. “I know I'm not the coach. I'm just a player. But I'm the team captain, and as such, I feel it's, well, my duty to be on the lookout for ways to improve our play, to help us, you know, win. So I've written down a few things, a few plays that might work—or maybe they won't, maybe you won't like them, maybe they're really bad ideas, and that's okay because we don't have to use them—but I just thought I should at least write these down, you know, in case—”

“Just show me what you got, Nickel.”

“Yes, sir.”

With shaky hands, I tore the play pages loose, scuttled into the office, and set them on the desk in front of Coach.

And waited for him to wad them into a ball. And then wad me up, too. And stuff us both into his trash can.

He picked up the first page, scanned it, scanned the second page, then went back to the first page and read more carefully.

“Not bad, Nickel. Pull the defenders off Reece, try to keep Poggemeyer out of foul trouble, get Webber to the line.” He squinted at the sheet for a long moment. Then he looked up. “Mind if I keep this?”

I shook my head.

“Good. I'll study it.” He glanced back at the first page. “This Reece play. You know, this might work. We ran a play something like this one time. The other team was so worried about stopping McGrew that they pretty much forgot about—”

“McGrew?” I stared at Coach. “
Brett
McGrew?”

“You know another McGrew?”

“You played with him? You played a basketball game with Brett McGrew?”

Coach narrowed his eyes. Studied me while he ran his tongue over his teeth. “Yeah. I played a basketball game with Brett McGrew.”

“Wow.” I shook my head in wonder. “So you knew him. You actually met him.” I looked up. “What was he like?”

“What was he like?” Coach snorted. “Tall guy with a wicked slash to the basket. What'd you think he was like?”

“What I meant was—” I stopped. I couldn't tell Coach what I meant. “I mean, not
me
exactly. I don't personally want to know. But the other guys, what they've been, you know, talking about in the locker room, is what he's like as a person. You know, is he friendly? To, say, strangers? Does he have any—”

Any what? Kids? Sons? Offspring he may or may not know about?

“—pets?”

“Pets?” Coach leaned back in his chair. “I got a basketball team going to Lawrence to meet a major NBA star, to scrimmage with him, maybe pick up a pointer or two, and what they're wondering is, does he have
pets?
”

“Well, maybe not pets. That wasn't a good example. I just want—I mean, the
team
just wants to know what to expect. If he'll be nice to them. And as team captain, I feel it's my duty to help out. In this area. Of, you know, whether he's nice. Or not.”

“Uh-huh.” Coach studied me. He shook his head, then folded up the newspaper in front of him. “Tell your teammates to relax. Brett McGrew's a good guy. Fearless. Relentless. Got ice water running through his veins during a game. But he's a decent person.” He dropped the paper into the wastebasket by his desk. “Hard guy to hate.”

Twenty-two

Okay. Brett McGrew was a hard guy to hate. I wrote that down in my notebook, right under
Likes biscuits and gravy.

Step Six had gone pretty smoothly. A lot better than I'd expected, especially since I'd managed to sneak a Surprise Bonus Step Six-and-a-Half into the action: Ask Coach about Brett McGrew. I closed my notebook and got ready for Step Seven.

Bragger and I had dropped off our film to get developed after the Halloween dance, and now the pictures were ready. So after practice, we pulled the hoods of our coats snug around our ears to ward off the biting November wind and trekked down to the drugstore to pick them up. I'd stowed the necessary equipment in my backpack: a magnifying glass, one of Grandma's photo albums that held recent pictures of me in various poses, and a pocket full of quarters in case we needed to blow up any of the Brett McGrew photos on the drugstore copier.

I paid for the pictures, and we settled down on the wide ledge inside the front windows. I opened Grandma's photo album and set it on the matted brown carpeting between us. The wind whistled against the fogged-up windows at our backs while heat ducts blasted hot air at our feet.

I peeled off my coat and bunched it up behind me to fend off the cold, then pulled the stack of shiny new photos from the packet. The first one was the accidental picture of Coach's back as he gazed into the trophy case, the one I'd snapped when I almost dropped the camera. It was all big and sharp and in focus, thanks to Bragger's dad's super-deluxe auto-crisp zoom lens.

Waste of film. I handed it off to Bragger.

Next photo: a row of gleaming trophies with a picture of Brett McGrew nestled in the middle. Then another photo of another row of gleaming trophies with another picture of Brett McGrew in the middle. Then gleaming medals and another picture of Brett McGrew. Newspaper clippings about Brett McGrew, featuring pictures of Brett McGrew, all in gleaming frames. Team pictures with Brett McGrew featured prominently in the center. And, of course, three photos of the big cutout poster of Brett McGrew.

Nothing I hadn't expected to see.

And nothing that looked like me no matter which angle I tipped the magnifying glass or how much I squinted. I simply could not find any part of my own unimpressive seventh-grade self in all those pictures of Brett McGrew, Future NBA Superstar. I handed the magnifying glass to Bragger, who went over the pictures, too. And came up with nothing.

The front door whooshed open, and the wind scattered the pictures. Bragger and I scrambled to gather them up.

“Hey, look!” Bragger plucked a photo from the floor. “We almost missed it.”

“We did?” I ripped the picture from his hands. Stared at it. At the accidental picture I'd taken of Coach. “What are you talking about? This isn't even a picture we tried to take.”

“I know. But look. Coach's face is reflected off the glass.”

“So?”

“So.” Bragger trained the magnifying glass over the photo. “His face is reflected right beside that picture he was staring at. The team picture. See?”

I saw. Varsity team. Brett McGrew's freshman year. Brett McGrew in his number 5 jersey sitting in the middle of the front row. Most freshmen didn't play varsity. But most freshmen weren't Brett McGrew.

And this Brett McGrew didn't look any more like me than the other ones did. “What am I supposed to be looking at?” I said.

“Here at the end. Number twenty-three.” Bragger held the magnifying glass over the picture.

I looked. At player number twenty-three. Then, as Bragger moved the magnifying glass, at the reflection on the trophy case.

“It's Coach.” I blinked. “Number twenty-three is Coach.”

“Sure looks like it.”

“Coach played basketball with Brett McGrew.”

“Sure looks like it.”

“No. He did. He told me. Just a little bit ago. Coach said he played basketball with Brett McGrew. I thought he meant maybe they played once in some kind of coaches' clinic or something, and Brett McGrew showed up as a visiting guest of honor or something. I didn't know he meant a real game.” I stared at the picture. “A bunch of real games.”

Bragger moved the magnifying glass from the team photo to Coach's reflection, then back again. “It sure does explain a lot.”

I looked at him. “This is why Coach wants to go to Lawrence. Why he's so desperate to get there.”