Travel Team (9 page)

R
ICHIE CAME BACK FROM THE KITCHEN WITH A BRAND
-
NEW BEER
,
DRINKING IT
out of the bottle this time. When he sat back down, Danny started asking questions immediately.

Like: “How are we going to get games?”

His dad said, “I'll call the Tri-Valley League and see if they've got room for one more team. If not, I'll get phone numbers for coaches and call them on my own. It's seventh-grade ball, after all. We're not trying to join the Big East.”

They were all sitting around the coffee table, Danny and his dad on the floor, his mom on the couch, his dad showing them the to-do list he'd been scribbling on Runyon's napkins.

Ali said, “But won't they have their schedules set?”

“There's still a month to go before the season starts. I'm hoping they'll try to work something out, on account of…”

“On account of,” she said, “you're Richie Walker.”

“Yeah,” he said. “What's left of him, anyway.”

Danny said, “Even if we come up with enough players, where are we going to practice? Everybody was saying at the fair that because of what happened to the Springs gym, there's not enough practice time for anybody.”

His mom said, “I can help at St. Pat's. But you may have to practice at some weird hours. Maybe after homework instead of before, as long as all the parents are willing.”

Richie said, “What do they charge?”

“I don't honestly know. But I'll ask.”

Danny said, “You think we can really get into the league?”

Richie said, “If we don't, we'll be one of those independent teams, like they have in minor-league baseball. You know, where all the bad boys go when they come out of drug rehab and nobody will give them a job.”

His dad held up a couple of his napkins and said, “Hey, I don't have all the answers here, least not yet.”

Danny said, “But if we don't get into the league, how do we get into the tournament?”

Richie said he might have one more beer. Ali said, “Why don't I go make up a quick pot of coffee instead,” not even asking if he wanted coffee.

She came back five minutes later with two mugs, handing Richie one, saying, “Milk, two sugars,” as she did. They all sat down on the living-room floor, like they were unwrapping some kind of Christmas present.

On the kind of Christmas morning, Danny thought, they'd never had.

“Listen,” his dad said, “all we are right now is the Middletown Cocktail Napkins and you're already worried about making the tournament?” Giving Danny a shove to let him know he was playing. “If we pull this thing off,” Richie said, “maybe it'll be enough for us to win the championship of all the kids who got told they weren't good enough.”

Danny said, “But all the good players are taken.”

“No,” Richie Walker said, “they're not.”

Danny looked up at the standing grandfather clock that belonged to some grandparent and saw that it was past ten o'clock now. Past bedtime. His mom hadn't said anything about that, at least not yet.

Maybe because she was getting into it about the Middletown Cocktail Napkins the way the boys were.

It had turned into another night Danny didn't want to end.

Now she was the one who said, “I know there are still good players out there, present company certainly included. But Danny's right: Are there enough so it doesn't turn out to be Danny and the Bad News Bears?”

Danny started ticking off names on his fingers: “There's me. Bren. Will.”

Richie: “Can Will play?”

Danny: “He can make an open shot. And he can defend almost as well as he can talk.”

Richie: “Could he start with you in the backcourt?”

Danny: “Bren's better.”

He saw his mother's head going back and forth like she was watching a tennis match. A grin on her face, even though it was basketball talk, which she said usually was about as riveting for her as interest rates at the bank.

Just not tonight.

Danny said, “The only really big guy left is Matt Fitzgerald. He's already wearing size thirteen kicks. But he needs to be coached.”

His dad said, “You know what I say.”

The three of them at once, as if they'd rehearsed it, said, “You can't teach tall.”

When they stopped laughing, Danny said, “That's only four guys.”

“We don't need to come up with a whole list of possibles tonight,” his dad said. “Over the next day or so, try to think of all those fabulous bubble guys Jeff Ross talked about. Or maybe some kids who didn't try out. All we need is ten, tops. And we could play with eight.”

“I'll ask around,” Danny said.

Ali said, “I don't want to throw cold water on this. But leagues cost money, Rich. Teams like this cost money, and not just for the gym.”

He shrugged, held up a napkin. “I've got some thoughts on that. Hell, everybody's got a salary cap these days. Ours might just have to be a little lower than everybody else's.”

He started to get up. And for a moment, it was as if he had forgotten how many busted parts he still had. He got halfway up before making a face, then started the whole process again, this time putting a hand on the coffee table to steady himself, then taking it much more slowly from there.

Danny wanted to help him, just wasn't sure how.

“Sweet dreams, kiddo,” he said to Danny.

Danny thinking: You can say that again.

The two of them were still outside, standing next to his car.

Danny had snuck down the stairs once they were outside, gone out the back door, got behind where the garbage cans were, and eavesdropped on his parents like he was on a stakeout.

His mom was saying, “You can't start this and not follow through.”

“You mean like my jobs.”

“I mean with everything.”

“I can do this.”

“No,” she said. “Now you
have
to do this.”

“Okay,” he said. “I can do this, I have to do this. I
will
do this.”

“Because if you don't, you really will break this boy's heart this time.”

Small silence.

“Hell, Ali, this is
about
his heart.”

“You know you're not going to get any help from the Association. Thinking outside the box in this town can get you arrested.”

“Screw 'em if they can't take a good joke.”

“There's the old Rich.”

“Listen,” he said. “I know I'm not much of a parent. Not a parent at all, most times. But the more I listened to Jeff Ross, the more it occurred to me that my ass is just worn out having guys who can't find their own jockstraps running sports. At any freaking level.”

“I'll help any way I can.”

“Figured.”

“You can pull this off?” she said.

It came out a question.

“We're sure as hell gonna find out,” his dad said.

“W
ELL
,
OKAY
,” W
ILL
S
TODDARD SAID
,
LOOKING AROUND THE BASKETBALL
court at St. Pat's, eight o'clock the next Saturday morning. “We're looking to assemble the first all-guard basketball team in history.”

“Plus Matt,” Bren Darcy said, correcting him.

“Plus Matt,” Danny said. “Just so's people won't get the idea we're a sixth-grade team.”

“I've seen sixth-grade teams bigger than us,” Will said.

Danny and Will had written up fliers and left them around both Springs and St. Pat's, announcing tryouts for a new seventh-grade travel team this Saturday. Will, who said he knew more about computers than Bill Gates, had even figured out a way to set up a temporary Web site, though the Web site basically had the same information as the fliers.

The largest type on the page announced that this was all at the invitation of Coach Richie Walker, Middletown's most illustrious basketball alumnus.

Will had thrown in the last part.

They had left fliers at the Candy Kitchen and Jackson's stationery store and Fierro's and on the bulletin board they still kept in the lobby of the Middletown movie theater.

After all that, eight kids showed up.

Danny. Bren. Will. Matt Fitzgerald, who didn't just look tall, he was also as wide as one of those double-wide trailers at the trailer park outside of town when he stood next to the rest of them. Michael Harden, another decent St. Pat's kid. He was another fifty-five incher who'd given up on trying out for the real travel team the year before.

There was one Springs kid, Oliver Towne, a round black kid known to his classmates as the Round Mound of Towne, a play on words that came from Charles Barkley's old college nickname, the Round Mound of Rebound. Oliver was a little taller than Danny, but not by much.

Danny actually thought Oliver took up about the same space horizontally as he did vertically, as if every inch taller he got also became an inch wider.

Will used to call him Roker, because he was as fat as the weatherman on
The Today Show
used to be, but that was before the
Today
guy did that deal where he had his stomach stapled shut.

Will always seemed to know stuff like that, believing that most useful information in his life came from
People
magazine.

Whatever Oliver Towne weighed, he was the closest thing to an actual forward in the gym.

Finally, there were the only twins at St. Patrick's School, Robert and Steven O'Brien, who announced to the other kids they were only there because their mom had made them.

“She told us that if we weren't going to play hockey this year because we were tired of getting up at five in the stupid morning, we were going to do
something
,” Robert said.

Or it could have been Steven. Danny was never completely sure which was which. The only ones who seemed to be able to tell the O'Brien kids apart
were
the O'Brien twins.

The other twin said, “She said our winter sports schedule wasn't going to consist of us sitting on our skinny butts and playing video games.”

Danny took a quick survey of his teammates and in his head heard one of those NBA-arena announcers shouting, “Give a big Middletown welcome to
your…Middletown…Cocktail Napkins
!”

Now, if they could scare up a couple of more players, maybe they could even scrimmage.

Danny's dad hadn't made much of a speech when he realized the eight players in the gym were the only ones coming. He addressed the kids, and a few of the parents who'd hung around to listen. Michael Harden's dad, Jerry, had played with Richie Walker on the championship seventh-grade team, even if he looked a lot older now, having gone bald and put on a few since his playing days. He was a lawyer in Middletown, and after he gave Richie a hug, he asked if he needed any help.

“All I can get,” Richie said.

“I can help coach, I can make calls, I can organize a phone list, you name it,” he said.

“All of the above,” Richie said.

Then he told the kids that if they were here today, it meant they had a passion for playing ball, and he'd always had a soft spot for guys like that.

And told them that maybe, if he managed not to screw them up, they could all have a basketball season that was a lot more than a consolation prize.

His dad said, “Danny knows I'm the last guy who ever wants to give a speech. But bottom line here? Maybe, just maybe, we can turn out to be the kind of team nobody wants to play.”

One of the O'Briens raised a hand.

“Mr. Walker? How do we do that if we don't even have enough players to play each other?”

“What's your name, son?”

“Steven O'Brien.”

He was in the red T-shirt. It meant Robert was in black.

He motioned the other twin over. “And your name, son?”

“Robert.”

Richie looked hard at one face, then the other, stood back. To the red-shirted Steven he said, “I think you've got a few more freckles than your twin brother there, Steven, though that's not going to help me a whole lot when you're out on the court, so we're going to have to ask you to color code each other at every practice.”

They both nodded. “We switch T-shirts sometimes when our mother leaves the room.”

“Zany,” Will said.

“Anyway,” Richie said, “I'll tell Robert and Steven and the rest of you that by the time we're ready to get serious here, hopefully we'll have found a couple of more players. If not, Mr. Harden and I will play when we want to go five-on-five.”

Danny stared at his dad.

Because as far as he knew, the last time Richie Walker had played in any kind of basketball game was with the Golden State Warriors.

“One last thing before we start,” his dad said. “There's only going to be three basic rules on this team, and I'm going to expect you all to follow them. One, if you're open, shoot. Two, if somebody has a better shot than you, pass the ball, let him shoot. Three? Have fun.” He looked from face to face. “Did I go too fast for anybody?”

Will had to get the last word, of course.

“What if we're missing our shots?”

Richie said, “Keep shooting. That will be rule number four. Now get in two lines and let's see what we got here.”

Nothing, Danny decided after the first hour.

They had nothing.

They were either hopeless or helpless, he could go either way.

He kept thinking that if the Vikings could see them, they'd think they were trying to get on one of those
Funniest Home Video
television shows.

Even the guys who could play couldn't play dead today.

Danny knew that Will and Bren—Bren especially—knew how to run a three-man weave fast break drill the way they knew their own screen names; they'd all had to run the weave for any team they'd ever played for in their lives.

Just not today.

Not to save their lives.

And when they'd mess it up again, his dad would just look at them calmly, no problem, and say, “Same group, let's try it again.”

One time Matt was the last guy to get the ball, which meant he was supposed to shoot the layup. Only the pass from Michael Harden was too low and Matt had about as much chance of reaching down and catching it, and then shooting it, as he did of getting a good grade in Spanish.

But he did manage to drop-kick the ball off the court and up onto the stage.

Will immediately imitated one of those Spanish soccer announcers you heard during the World Cup.

“Goooooooooaaaaaalllllllll!”

Even Richie Walker, whom Danny knew wasn't exactly the life of the party in the best of times, laughed at that one.

To keep from crying, most likely.

When Richie said they were going to try four-on-four, full-court, push the ball every chance you got, Danny thought things might get better, even though nobody had the height to guard Matt.

Instead, they got worse.

Even I stink today, Danny thought.

He kept checking out the old clock above the stage, knowing his dad had said they would only go to ten o'clock today.

Danny praying that none of the play-practice kids would come early and see a team that he was now thinking of more as the Middletown Rugrats. One that had scrimmaged for more than half an hour and managed to produce exactly five baskets, three for his team, two for Bren's.

Danny had all the baskets for his team, Bren had the two for his. He might have been slightly off with his math, but there had also been about six thousand turnovers.

Richie Walker finally put two fingers to his mouth and gave a sharp whistle, told them all they were done for the day and to come to the middle of the court.

“We suck,” Danny said under his breath to Will.

Will said, “You're being much too easy on us.”

Danny told Will his Rugrats line and Will said, “If you remember the show, I'm pretty sure Phil and Lil are bigger.”

Richie Walker knelt down in the middle of them. When he did, he had to put his right hand out to keep himself steady, or from falling over on his side.

Maybe those weren't sad eyes on his dad as much as they were hurt eyes.

Richie said, “Before anybody starts to get down on himself, remember: This was our first practice. Wasn't even a practice, really, as much as it was, like, orientation. So hang in there, okay?”

Then he said, “Hey, the team I played on? The one that won? Our coach threw us out of the gym three times the first month we were together.”

Jerry Harden nodded. “Think it was four, actually.”

One of the O'Brien twins raised a hand. “Are we going to practice this week? We need to know because we've got piano.”

Will, whispering into Danny's ear, said, “Maybe they can
play
piano.”

Richie Walker's response was a sigh.

Then he turned and looked at the clock.

They sat in front of 422 Earl for a few minutes after his dad drove him home from practice.

“You could come in,” Danny said, “if you want.”

“I've got some calls to make when I get back to the Inn. It's a big job—two jobs, actually—being both general manager
and
coach in travel basketball.”

Danny could see his mom's blue Taurus in the driveway. Somehow he could feel her watching them from somewhere inside the house. Maybe even hearing what they were saying. He liked to tell her that she had the kind of mutant hearing that could have landed her a spot fighting crime with the X-Men.

There was just nothing much to hear right now in the front seat of the rental car.

Until: “Dad, why are you doing this?”

Richie turned in the front seat so he could face him, forgetting that the shoulder harness from his seat belt was still attached. He caught himself when he felt the pull of it, but even a sudden stop like that made him wince in pain.

“Why're you asking, bud?”

“Because you don't even
like
basketball anymore. And you
didn't
like coaching, even though you're trying to make this sound like something you couldn't live with yourself if you passed up. That's why.”

Deep breath.

Keep going.

Danny said, “The only reason you play with me in the driveway when you show up is because it's a way for us to have some kind of common language that doesn't involve us talking.”

He shot him a look to see how that one went over. His dad was actually smiling, like Danny had gotten off a good shot. Swish.

“You're pretty smart for twelve,” his dad said. “Smarter than I was, that's for sure.”

“Whatever.”

Richie said, “Can I talk
now
?”

“'Course you can.”

“I don't hate basketball,” Richie said. “Do I hate what happened to me? Yeah. Do I spend most of my life feeling sorry for myself? Yeah, I do, though I'm trying to cut down. I really hate what happened to me, that I never got the chance to find out how I stacked up against the big boys. And I did hate coaching the first time around. College boys with their attitudes who I could have run circles around when I was their age.” His dad was the one who took a deep breath now, letting it go.

“Dad, I didn't mean…”

Richie carefully turned himself back around, so he was facing forward, those big hands on the steering wheel. “I hate that I don't have the game in my hands anymore. Or ever again. But I don't hate the game, bud, and I never will.”