by Lindsay Eyre
“It was me,” I said in a voice as wobbly as a grandma’s.
When no one said anything, I said it again louder. “IT WAS ME.”
Jamie screamed. The munion screamed. They jumped off the bench.
Georgie groaned.
Jamie’s face appeared upside down. “Sophie?” she said.
Coach Diaz’s head appeared too, also upside down. “Sylvie!” he said. “What are you doing under there?”
“It was me,” I said to his beard. “I put the slugs in Jamie’s bag.”
“Dad,” Georgie said. “It wasn’t Sylvie’s fault.”
“Someone pranked her lots of times,” Miranda said. “They unscrewed the lid to her water bottle, they put mayonnaise in her lotion, and they blew baby powder on her while she was in the bathroom.”
“Baby powder?” Josh said. “Is that what it was?”
“Thank you,” Coach said quietly. “But this is serious, and I need to talk to Sylvie. I believe she’s trapped under there. Help me lift up this bench, Georgie.”
Jamie’s been pranking me, I thought, as Georgie and Coach Diaz raised the bench so I was free. She didn’t want me to score because she wanted to be team captain. It’s not fair. But I couldn’t say that out loud. It didn’t sound good enough.
“I saw baby powder in your bag,” I heard Josh say as Coach helped me to my feet. He was standing behind me, so I couldn’t see him.
“You did?” Aristotle said.
“What do you know about this?” Coach said to Georgie.
Georgie shrugged. “I saw Jamie zipping up Sylvie’s bag that day someone put mayonnaise in her water bottle.”
“Lotion bottle,” Miranda corrected.
“I did not!” Jamie said. “I’ve never even touched her bag.”
Georgie shrugged again. “I thought I saw her.”
“Was it you?” Josh said, but not to Jamie.
Jamie poked me in the shoulder. “Did you think I pulled those pranks on you?”
“Sylvie?” Coach Diaz said. “Is that why you did this?”
I couldn’t answer. I couldn’t look anyone in the face.
“Did you do the water bottle and the mayonnaise too?” Josh said.
“Alistair?” Coach Diaz said, turning in Josh’s direction.
“Why would I prank you?” Jamie Redmond said to me, as if I were a slug.
I looked up at her, my face hot and sweaty. “Because you hate me,” I said.
“What?”
“Because you hate me,” I said again.
Jamie looked astonished. “I don’t hate you.”
“Sylvie,” Josh said. “It wasn’t Jamie.”
“You do too,” I said to Jamie. “You hate me because you thought I might be team captain, and because I’m in fourth grade and you hate fourth graders. And because I’m a better pitcher than you.”
“Pitcher?” Jamie said, looking as if she’d never heard of pitchers. “You pitch?”
I couldn’t believe it. Was she joking? “I’m in your league!” I said. “We played each other in the championship game. You tricked me, remember?”
“Really?” Jamie had to think about this for a minute. “Oh yeah — I think I remember you now. You were that runner on second.”
“Alistair,” Coach Diaz said. “Is Josh right? Did you do those things to Sylvie?”
I turned around and saw the tiny boy. His arms were crossed. His mouth was shut tight. He shook off Coach’s hand and ran off toward the bathrooms, fast as a cheetah.
Everyone started talking again, but I didn’t listen. I was so stupid. It had been him, Alistair, the whole time. He’d shown me to the bathroom. He’d given me the red juice. I’d thought it was Jamie, and I’d ruined everything. Jamie’s bag. This practice. The whole season.
I picked up my stuff and pushed past Josh, who was saying that it was just a big mix-up, and Miranda, who was pretending not to be disappointed in me, and Georgie, who was telling his dad that the slugs might have been his idea.
“Sylvie!” Miranda called. “Come back! It’s okay!”
“No, it’s not!” one munion said.
“It’s totally not,” the other said.
I hurried to the front doors and pushed my way through. I would walk all the way home. I’d throw my hockey stuff in the Dumpster by the park. I’d tell my parents I didn’t like hockey anymore and I wanted to quit. I’d take my life savings and buy Jamie a new bag. The end. My dad would never have to know the truth.
“Sylvie!” my dad called.
I looked out into the parking lot and there was my dad, shutting his car door.
He was here. My bag fell from my shoulder. My legs crumpled beneath me. I sat on the ground, put my arms around my legs, and began to cry. Now he would know.
My dad lifted me up somehow and put me in the car. He asked me to explain why I was sad, but only sniffles and sobs and sadness would come. Then Coach Diaz came out of the rink to check on me, and my dad left me alone in the car so they could talk.
They spoke in whispers I couldn’t hear. Not that I wanted to hear. I didn’t want to hear anything ever again.
Then the car door opened. I was too tired to cry anymore, but I squeezed my eyes tight.
“Sylvie,” my dad said, and he didn’t sound mad.
I opened my eyes and looked up into his face. His eyes were crinkled and his mouth hung down. He didn’t look mad, but he didn’t look happy. He pushed himself halfway into the car and wrapped his arms around me. My nose smashed into his chest as he hugged me tight and rocked me back and forth. I could hardly breathe, but I didn’t stop him.
When he let go, I waited for a lecture, because hugs were almost always followed by lectures.
“I had a talk with your coach,” he said. “And I think I understand what’s been going on. I think — I think maybe it’s time for me to give you some special help. How would you like that?”
“I didn’t make team captain,” I said, looking at my dad’s shiny shoes, the new ones he’d bought when he got his promotion.
“I do not care if you are team captain,” my dad said. “Not one bit.” He stood up then and pulled me out of the car, wrapping one arm around me so I stayed upright. He locked and shut the door. “Why don’t we just walk home?” he said. “I feel like a good walk.”
I turned to look at the car. I thought of the long time it would take to walk home. “Why were you here?” I said. Had Coach Diaz called him to come get me?
“I came to catch the last half of your practice,” he said. He squeezed my hand. “I knew they were picking team captain today, and I wanted to be here.”
“So you could see me win,” I said.
“So I could be with you either way,” he said.
I told my dad the whole story while we walked home. When I was through, he said he didn’t know if I would be able to play hockey this season, but he promised everything would work out in the end. I didn’t know what he meant by that, but it sounded nice.
I was in my room that night when the doorbell rang. I was supposed to be making a plan for apologizing to Jamie since I’d ruined her bag, but instead I was sitting at my window, staring across the street at Miranda’s house. I could see her inside, talking to her mom. She looked happy and normal, like a person who could still play hockey.
“Sylvie,” my dad said a few moments later. He had opened the door without knocking. One small head appeared beneath his. Another small head appeared next to the other. The twins. Another small head appeared next to my dad’s. Ginny. He was holding her up in the air, probably to make me smile.
“Mad Max is downstairs!” Cale hissed in a loud whisper Max could probably hear.
“And he’s got a dwarf with him!” Tate added.
My dad cleared his throat at the twins. “This small boy, who I believe is Max’s brother, looks pretty miserable, Sylvie. I think he’d like to apologize. And I think you ought to let him.”
It must be Alistair. Was he Max’s brother? He’d said
he had a brother who played hockey. How had I missed that? I looked down at my quilt and the stray orange thread that was still out of place. “Okay,” I said.
My dad smiled. He rocked Ginny back and forth so that she smiled too, and I couldn’t help myself. I had to smile as well. My dad plopped Ginny’s head next to mine as I walked by, so she could slobber on my cheek. “Dad!” I said.
His smile got bigger. “That’s my terrific big sister.”
I couldn’t help but smile a little more.
“Hi,” I said to the floor when I got to the front entryway. I didn’t want to look at Max. I’d drunk his juice when he’d told me not to. I was a failure at torpedoing. I didn’t want to look at Alistair either. I wasn’t mad — I just didn’t want to see him.
Max cleared his large, high-school throat. “Alistair has something to say.”
“I’m sorry,” Alistair said. “I just — I just, I don’t know — I just —”
“Wanted your attention,” Max said.
I looked up then. Alistair scowled at Max, and Max scowled back.
“It’s okay, Aristotle,” I said.
He turned his scowl on me. “See!” he said. “You don’t even know my name!”
“Alistair!” I said. “That’s what I meant. Alistair. I’m sorry — it’s a confusing name.”
Max nodded. “People are always getting it wrong.”
“People who don’t like me,” Alistair said to his feet.
I looked at Alistair’s feet. He had on two different sneakers. One of them didn’t have shoelaces. He was a strange kid, but that was okay. “I like you,” I said. “I mean, I don’t like-like you. But I regular-like you.”
“You don’t,” Alistair said. “You think I’m too small. You think I’m dumb because I’m in third grade.”
Well, that really chapped my hive. “That’s not true! I don’t care what grade you’re in!”
“You do,” Alistair said. “You bring it up all the time.”
“I never —” I stopped speaking before I could finish. I could hear my voice saying it: “You’re a third grader.” “You’re in third grade.” “Fourth graders do it all the time.” I’d even told him at our first practice that third graders couldn’t play hockey. Actually, I’d called him a second grader.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I didn’t mean it. Not that way.”
But the minute I said this, I knew it wasn’t true. I had meant it. I hadn’t wanted to hang out with him because he was younger than me. I was just like Jamie Redmond.
I, Sylvie Scruggs, was a third-grade-ist.
Alistair looked like he felt invisible. He looked like the way I felt around Jamie.
“It’s okay that you’re in third grade,” I said with firmness. “There’s nothing wrong with third graders. All grades are good. All grades are important. I was in third grade just last year.”
Alistair stared at me, like he couldn’t believe I was talking.
“You can hang out with us whenever you want,” I said.
His face lit up like an electrified lion. “Really?”
“Sure,” I said, and if Georgie gave me any grief about it, I’d remind him that we were not snooty fourth graders. We were no-graders — people who didn’t care what grade you were in.
I stayed in the front entryway after Max and Alistair left. I knew what I had to do now. I needed be brave like Alistair. I needed to go to Jamie’s house and apologize.
But I couldn’t. I had been mean to Alistair. Really mean. I deserved what I got for ignoring him. But Jamie hadn’t done a thing to me. She’d barely even known I existed.
I would write Jamie a note and include the money for a new bag. I would give the money and the note to Miranda to give to Jamie. Then Jamie could forget about me again.
In my room, I got out a piece of paper and a pencil and tried to think of something to say. I wanted to sound mature and grown-up. I wanted to make Jamie not hate me so much.
But all I could think of to write was, “I’m sorry.”
I had to go to school the next day. School was not optional, my mom said. “Even when your life has been ruined and you think everyone is talking about you. It won’t be as bad as you think, Sylvie.”
“It won’t,” my dad said, giving me another hug. He’d given me a thousand since he walked me home. “No one cares about dumb stuff like that.”
I sighed. Elementary school was different when my parents were little. I’ve read all the Patty on the Plains books. Kids were nice back in the olden days. They played stickball in the front yard, made friends with grumpy neighbors who were really just lonely, and ate homemade cinnamon rolls every day. But times had changed. People didn’t forget stupid mistakes anymore. They talked about them on the news and on their cell phones and on the computer. They talked about them all the time.
I walked the halls with my head down, staring at my shoelaces. I sat with my friends at lunch, where we talked about molting cockroaches and not much else. None of the fifth graders spoke to me, especially not Jamie Redmond. That’s good, I thought. But it didn’t feel good.
When I saw Alistair in the hall in the afternoon, I waved at him, said his name briskly, and invited him to play baseball with us after school. Alistair was so stunned, he couldn’t speak, but he came over to my house after school and we played.
Wednesday and Thursday were mostly the same. Things were sort of normal with a bit of uckiness hanging over everything.
Coach Diaz called my house on Thursday night. “Have you apologized to Jamie yet?” he asked.
“Kind of,” I said. Miranda had given Jamie my note and most of my life savings — thirty-five dollars.
“Well, Josh and I have talked,” Coach Diaz said. “And we decided you ought to still be allowed to play. We’re also going to let Alistair continue playing. Would you like to remain on the team?”
I closed my eyes. I imagined myself at the rink, gliding around the ice, going faster and faster, the puck inside my stick. I was coming up on the net. Now was my time to score. But before the Sylvie in my mind could shoot, my vision faded, and I realized something.
I loved to play hockey, even though I was terrible with the puck. It didn’t matter that I wasn’t team captain. I would miss it.
“Sylvie?” Coach Diaz said. “What do you think?”
“No,” I said. If Jamie didn’t hate me before, she must hate me now. “I shouldn’t play.”
“Are you sure?” Coach said.
No, I thought. “Yes,” I said.
* * *
By the end of lunch on Friday, I was ready to go home. I was tired of remembering that my friends had hockey practice after school. Even Georgie looked sorry for me. I stood up from the table to throw my Nacholicious hot lunch away.
“I heard you’re quitting the team,” Jamie Redmond said.
I jumped in surprise. Then I took a deep breath and looked right at her. “I’m sorry I ruined your bag.”
“You already told me that,” Jamie said. “Besides, I went shopping yesterday and bought a new bag with your money. I like it even better than my old one.” She waved her perfectly nail-polished hand in my face. “You can’t quit the team.”
“What?” I said, because I had to be hallucifying again.
“You are not quitting the team,” she said again.
“I have to,” I said. “I’ve already told Coach.”
Jamie crossed her bossy arms. “Well, I say you can’t. We need you, and if you’d keep your eyes open when you shoot, you’d start scoring. We’re playing the best team in the league next week. Come to practice today.”
I looked down at my lunch and tried to think. Did I close my eyes when I tried to hit the puck? I didn’t know. But Jamie wanted me on the team. “I don’t think —” I began.
“You have to be there,” she said. Her eyeballs overpowered mine. “You will be there.”
“Okay,” I squeaked.
With a sharp nod, she walked away.
Kids sw
irled around me with their own Nacholicious lunches. Globs of yellow cheese dripped onto the floor. Jamie wasn’t mad. She thought I was good at hockey, even though I was in fourth grade. She wanted me to play.
It was the first game of the season. Our team was down 2–1, and we only had five minutes left to play. Coach called a time out. “Get the puck to Jamie or Josh,” he said to us.
“We can’t,” Georgie said. “They’re guarding them all the time. They’ll only steal it and score.”
Coach scowled. He looked at our team. His eyes landed on me. “Get the puck to Sylvie.”
“Me?” I said. “Coach — I can’t do it. I’ve never made it into the net.”
“You can do it,” Josh said.
“Just keep your eyes open,” Jamie said.
Coach nodded. “Now go out there and finish this game by giving it your best effort!”
We stuck our sticks in the middle of our huddle. “Go!” we shouted. Then we tried to break away, but it didn’t work, because our sticks were tangled together.
“Sylvie!” someone called.
I looked up into the stands, and there was Max. “You need to watch the puck!” he said. “You close your eyes whenever you shoot.”
“But I can’t!” I cried. “I’ve been trying to think like a torpedo like you said!”
“A torpedo?” Max said, blinking. “Did I tell you that?”
“Yes!” I said. “It’s your big secret!”
Coach pointed at the center of the rink. “They’re about to start the clock, Sylvie.”
“That was just a theory,” Max shouted. “Keep your eyes open, and you’ll be great.”
The whistle blew. I skated out on the ice, more confused than ever. A theory? What did he mean by that?
The puck went back and forth down the ice. I did a good job skating fast and keeping up on defense, but every time the puck came close, I stayed away. I was too afraid to try.
After a minute, there was a penalty and the other team missed a free shot. We lined up in position with two minutes left to play. I looked up at my family, watching me with big, excited eyes. The twins held a poster meant to encourage and inspire me.
