Captain Nobody (4 page)

I was getting all excited about this idea until I scrolled down to a picture of the shark-puncher. He turned out to be a skinny guy in blue jeans. His wet hair was plastered to his forehead and his dripping T-shirt read, I ♥ KETCHUP.

Uh
-
oh,
I thought.
If I wear that, how will people know I'm a hero?

With a groan, I laid my head down on my arms. I must have fallen asleep for a moment, because the next thing I knew, I was having a terrible dream in which I was trick-or-treating on my block. When a neighbor answered her door and asked, “Who are you supposed to be, little boy?” I looked down to see my costume only to find that . . .
I was totally naked!

I woke up panting like a racehorse.

Downstairs I heard Mom and Dad loading up their SUVs with supplies for the pregame cookout.

“Newt!” Mom yelled up. “Where did I put the plastic forks?”

“You left them in the guest bathroom,” I called down. “I'll get them.”

With a heavy heart, I turned off my computer and put my Secret Superhero Sketchbooks back in the closet. My search for my inner other was going to have to wait.

It was time for the Big Game.

That night, so many people showed up for my parents' tailgate barbecue in the stadium parking lot that in just a half hour we ran out of hot dog buns. And coleslaw. And napkins.

“It's Chris Newman's last football game!” shouted our neighbor Mr. Hennessey between bites of his cheeseburger. “We wouldn't have missed it for the world!”

As Dad worked the grill, he kept checking his pager and answering his ever-ringing cell phone. “Come on down!” he told everyone who called. “The more the merrier.”

While arranging trays of chips and dips, my mother muttered, “I wish I could remember where I put the egg rolls.”

“Mom,” I said, “they already ate the egg rolls.”

“Well, no wonder I can't find them!” She sighed. “I was afraid I was losing my mind.”

I carried the chip trays through the growing crowd. Most folks helped themselves without interrupting their conversations. Once in a while, though, someone would look down and notice me. Then they'd all ask the same question.

“Hey, Newt! You must be so excited for your brother, huh?”

“Yeah. Real excited. You want a chip?”

And I
was
excited. I swear. But I couldn't shake the feeling that I should be home, making a costume for Sunday night.

At seven o'clock, the Fillmore High School marching band paraded through the parking lot and into the jam-packed stadium. We shut down the barbecue, loaded all the picnic stuff into my parents' SUVs and took our seats.

As usual, my mom and dad had reserved a section halfway up the bleachers on the fifty-yard line where they could be surrounded by tons of neighbors and friends. I had a ticket for a seat somewhere in the middle of that mob, but as more and more people crammed in around Mom and Dad—hugging and chatting and eating and drinking—I found myself being squeezed out of my place, squished down the row, and squashed onto an end seat next to a very large lady, who jumped to her feet and shrieked like a fire engine during the opening kickoff. When she sat back down without looking where she was going, she just about flattened me. I scooted sideways in the nick of time . . .

. . . and landed—
splat!
—in the aisle.

I didn't really feel like fighting my way back to my seat. Halloween was still on my mind, so I wandered down the aisle and leaned against a railing. I watched the game with glazed eyes, worried that I was totally going to disappoint my only two friends in the world.

But then things began to happen on the field that made me forget my Halloween blues.

For three years in a row, the #1 defensive end in the county has been this guy from Merrimac High named Reggie Ratner. Reggie weighs about two hundred and eighty pounds and has a neck as thick as a telephone pole. My brother used to joke, “Reggie Ratner looks like a concrete truck with hair.” In the two previous years' games, Reggie had chased my brother all over the field, but he'd never been able to bring Chris down,
not once!
So the day before this year's Big Game, the headline in the
Appleton Sentinel
asked, “Will Ratner Finally Get Revenge?” In the article, Reggie was quoted as saying, “You watch. I'm gonna snap Chris Newman like a day-old breadstick.”

From the opening drive, it looked like Reggie was determined to keep his promise. The Fillmore Ferrets tried their best to control him, but time after time Reggie broke through two, three, even four Ferrets and charged after my brother. In every case, though, Chris was able to hand off the ball or pass it at the last possible second. Reggie actually got so frustrated at one point that he yanked off his helmet and smashed it to the ground.

“Crybaby! Crybaby!” yelled the Fillmore fans.

“Crush him, Reggie!” shrieked the Merrimac fans.

It went on like that, with both teams bashing each other senseless for the first two quarters. Fortunately, as the halftime horn sounded, the Fillmore Ferrets were leading, 21-14.

When the crowds stood up to stretch their legs, I blinked and looked around, confused. Without realizing it, I had gotten so caught up in the action that I had followed the game up and down the field, pacing in the aisles. Now I found myself standing at the far end of the bleachers. I sat down on a step and tried to use halftime to focus on my Halloween costume problem.

Suddenly from behind me a voice boomed, “Can I see your ticket?”

I turned to find a tubby, red-faced teenager wearing a Fillmore Ferrets button pinned on his Fillmore HS Usher jacket.

“Excuse me?” I said.

“You can't sit here,” the teen barked. “There's rules.”

I scrambled to my feet. “Oh. See, you're gonna laugh. . . . I'm actually supposed to be over there”—I pointed to the midfield seats—“but I kinda got squeezed out . . .”

“Ticket!” The usher snapped his fingers in my face.

“It's here somewhere,” I promised, digging deeper and deeper into my empty pockets.

And that's how I wound up standing out in the parking lot at the far end of the stadium, watching the second half through the wire fence surrounding Fillmore Field.

When the Ferrets stormed back from their locker room, I positioned myself so I could look between the uprights of the goalpost, right down the middle of the field. It was weird seeing the game from that angle because, depending on the play, the teams were either running away from me . . . or directly at me. For the first time ever, I truly understood the scary stampede my brother was always facing.

As I stood on the cold, wet grass in the dark, the Ferrets and the Chargers battled through the third quarter and into the fourth. My brother was doing a fantastic job of keeping Fillmore out in front until—with only
forty-five seconds left to play in the game—
Merrimac kicked a field goal and pulled ahead by two points. The enemy was winning!

I paced nervously as Merrimac kicked off to Fillmore for the last time. A few more plays brought the Ferrets far enough downfield toward me that I could now see Chris huddling with his team through the backs of the Charger defense. But I could also see the clock.

It said :07.

“No way!” I gasped. Chris only had enough time for one more play! It was his
last
chance to save his
final
game.

The Ferrets lined up opposite the Merrimac defense. Time slowed to a painful crawl, and it seemed like it took forever for my brother to bark his signals and take the snap.

Then everything exploded into fast motion.

As Reggie Ratner bulldozed through the line, Chris staggered backward, looking for a receiver. Reggie lunged for my brother, but Chris faked to one side and left him grabbing at empty air. Chris spun around and handed the ball off to Darryl Peeps, his running back, who found a hole and started tearing down the field. The screaming in the bleachers sounded like ten jet engines at full throttle, and I swear I was screaming louder than all of them
.

The Merrimac players looked like an orange-and-green avalanche roaring toward me, while on all sides, red-and-white Ferrets chased anybody who got close to Darryl. At the fifteen-yard line, a Merrimac tackle lunged for Darryl and caught one ankle.

“No!” I shrieked. “Stay up! Stay up!”

Just as Darryl tumbled to the turf, he tossed the ball sideways—
right into the hands of my big brother,
who, as usual, was in just the right place at the right time.

The stadium went
wild!

Please don't think I'm a wuss when I tell you that tears welled up in my eyes as my brother zigged and zagged, dodging tackle after tackle in the last ten!, nine!, eight! yards. Everyone was closing in, surrounding Chris in a tidal wave of green-and-orange-and-red-and-white. And leading the pack, breathing down my brother's neck, was Reggie Ratner.

Finally, at the two-yard line, a desperate Merrimac player dove right across my brother's path. I shrieked, “Chris, watch out!” But he didn't need my advice. In the next split second, my brother extended the ball in his outstretched hands and, with a flying leap, sailed over that Charger and crossed the goal line.

TOUCHDOWN!

Immediately both teams buried my brother in a thunderous
crash!
of shoulder pads and
crack!
of helmets that was louder than anything I had ever heard from up in the bleachers. But it didn't matter.

The Fillmore stands erupted with confetti and streamers, and the Ferrets' marching band tore into the school fight song. Cheerleaders waving victory banners ran up and down the field as miniature cannons boomed.

In the Merrimac bleachers, people covered their faces and sobbed. Along the sidelines, the rest of the Chargers' football team bowed their heads in disappointment.

The crying and cheering continued until the players had all untangled and peeled themselves off the pile.

All but one.

And in the time it takes a heart to beat, every sound stopped.

From my place behind the fence, I saw everything that happened next. Coach Gavin and the Fillmore assistant coaches rushed into the end zone, pushing through the players to huddle over my brother. They kept repeating, “Chris! Hey, buddy! Can you hear me?” until four or five adults from the bleachers joined them. Each one announced, “I'm a doctor!” as they ran up, and then
they
took turns kneeling over Chris and calling his name.

An ambulance rolled onto the field just as Mom and Dad arrived. The doctors and the coaches shook their heads with concern and said some stuff that I couldn't hear. Mom covered her mouth with one hand, and Dad put his arm around her shoulder.