It’s over, I think.
The Golden era is over.
Benched with Slick
Step over the white line. You’re on the field now. Leave everything else behind. BE HERE.
—COACH KARL
Early-morning light wakes me the next day. I open my eyes, feel the sun on my face. My fingers touch my bicep, just in case the captain’s band really isn’t off my arm.
It’s gone. It wasn’t a nightmare.
I’m no longer captain of the Mudbury Magpies.
I may have taken it off myself, but I heard my team loud and clear.
Lucy’s roller skates move up and down the driveway just outside my window.
Instead of trying to go back to sleep, I tuck Sugar Ray under the covers and go outside. Lucy smiles and waves as she holds Estelle. Lucy’s hair is loose and she’s still wearing her long white nightgown, with a sweatshirt thrown over it. My heart grows two sizes. At least Lucy still likes me.
“Good morrrning!” I turn around and see Dad. He’s standing in the grass with a soccer ball at his feet. His hair stands straight up because no one has combed it yet. He wears a jacket, but it’s pulled at weird angles like he couldn’t quite get it over his shoulders. I’m surprised to find he’s not sitting in the wheelchair.
He’s practicing: tapping his foot on top of the ball.
I take a soccer ball and begin to juggle. He pushes the ball back and forth between his feet.
When I dribble, he moves the ball an inch or two, forward and back.
I do push-ups and he attempts squats, making it down only a few inches.
When I see that Dad has hit his limit, I wipe his face, arms, and legs with my shirt. Lucy continues to skate up and down the driveway, even though I know she’s watching everything.
“Thanks,” he says. “Want to talk… about yesterday?” He swallows hard.
“I don’t feel good,” I say. “Can I stay home from school with you?”
His eyes crinkle into a smile. “I’d like that.”
When Mom takes everyone to school (Faker, Jaimes says to me), Dad sits down in his wheelchair.
“Can you help… arm up?”
I put his left arm on the armrest but leave his right arm in his lap.
“Head… rest?”
I lower the headrest slightly, putting Roma’s super-soft bunny blanket behind his head. He closes his eyes and smiles.
I pick up his heavy feet and place them on the footrests. “Anything else, Dad?”
“Fingers?”
I carefully unclaw his left hand and place his fingers around the joystick.
“Go for a walk?” he asks. “Blanket?”
I nod, tucking a fleece blanket around him, and put a hat on his head.
With his pointer finger, he pushes forward and speeds toward the front door. I grab Sugar Ray.
As much as I don’t want to admit it, going for a walk with Dad in the wheelchair is actually fun. I can walk normally instead of crawling at a snail’s pace. Dad doesn’t get so worn out. He cruises down the driveway and takes a left down the road. I pause when we see the FOR SALE sign back in the Littlehouse yard, and briefly think about kicking it over until Dad says, “Come on.”
“Are you sure you want to go down the hill?”
He pauses.
“Buckle me?”
I buckle him in and he’s off! I run beside the wheelchair as Dad motors down the hill, the wind blowing his hair back, making us both smile. I remember him saying I’m flying! on the back of my bike. That’s the look he has on his face. Maybe this wheelchair thing is okay.
We sail past the trees that line the road, past the small cemetery where Lucy’s favorite dead person, Raymond Von Mousetrap, is buried. I hold my breath for good luck. Dad pauses at Benny’s house.
“Good friends,” he says.
Grandma Ho is at the window.
I wave and wave until she finally raises her hand.
I follow Dad as he motors all the way to the lake and parks in the sand.
“You swim. I’ll watch.”
“Dad, it’s October! It’s cold!”
“You’re not scared of a lit… tle cold, are you?”
I place Sugar Ray in his lap. Kick off my shoes, peel off my socks, shorts, and shirt, and dive in. It’s freezing, but I glide under the cold peaceful stillness until I’m out of breath. It’s different without Benny and Lucy, but I can’t wait to tell them. They’ll be so jealous, me swimming while they’re in math class.
But… will this be how it ends up? Me swimming alone forever? When I come up for air, I turn back to Dad. I know he can’t, but I ask anyway. “Swim?”
“No. Happy watching… you.”
“You’re not afraid of a little cold, are you?”
He laughs, but I see him shudder a little, so I go to shore and shiver awkwardly into my clothes.
The walk home is harder. Dad’s fingers tire more quickly.
I can see the effort it takes for him to make his pointer finger and thumb work together as he wills them to move.
“I can push when you get tired, Dad.”
He blinks. Was that for yes? I don’t know and he doesn’t stop pressing. We slowly climb up the hill together.
“So. A fight yesterday,” he says.
“Yeah.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know.”
“I think… you do.”
“Slick stole my mouth guard and then put it in his mouth and threw it at me and spit on my cleats so I couldn’t play!”
“And?”
“That’s what happened.”
“And because… I showed up… in wheel… chair?”
I see the moment in my mind, how time seemed to slow, my ears ringing, vision clouding. Slick’s drool coming out of his mouth with my blue mouth guard. His stupid questions. How my dad, who could walk, who was going to get better—was in a wheelchair.
“Dad… we’re trying so hard. Why isn’t it working yet?”
He pauses at the top of the hill, breathing as if he’s sprinted a mile instead of his fingers having only pressed a small joystick for too long. I pluck an apple from Lucy’s apple tree and take a bite.
We look out over our house, the way it sits beneath the mighty Mount Kearsarge. I chew and swallow. So very easily.
“That’s the hardest part about life,” Dad says. “When you try your very hardest, when you give everything… and can’t give any more… and it still doesn’t go the way you want it to… go.”
We head up the driveway.
“But we get… skip school… together.”
That’s true.
“One more… day (swallow) with you.”
I hold Dad’s hand. This time we push the joystick together.
* * *
The next day Slick and I sit on the bench watching practice.
We’ve been benched by Coach.
Mom and I really aren’t talking at all, which makes me feel sick to my stomach. I wish I could take it all back. The fight. My mean words. I wish we could rewind to when life was perfect and I didn’t even know it.
Lucy is captain by herself, wearing yellow-and-pink-striped socks and her red cleats. It’s not going so well.
“I’m playing offense today,” Mario says during the scrimmage. “And I’m not wearing a pinny. They smell.” He wads up the yellow jersey and throws it on the ground.
Slick doesn’t laugh like I’m expecting him to.
He clears his throat and doesn’t look at me. “Hey, uh. I’m sorry about yesterday. About Dragon-Ball P.”
I’m so surprised I almost fall off the bench.
“I hate sitting,” Slick says.
I nod. I hate sitting too. I hate that my dad is sitting.
“Sucks, man” is what I muster.
“You’ll be back on the field soon,” Slick says. “You’re the captain.”
“Not anymore,” I say. “I heard the team talking yesterday. I was only voted captain because�
�� you felt sorry for me.”
Slick shrugs an acknowledgment.
“And because Benny told you to.”
“Actually, I didn’t vote for you,” Slick says.
“Gee, thanks.”
I look up to see Benny walking over.
“Hey.”
“Hey.”
“Golden’s mad now because you told everyone to vote for him,” Slick says.
“Did you?” I ask.
“Yeah,” Benny says.
“Because you felt sorry for me?” I wish I could sink into this bench.
“Dude,” Benny says. “Why would I feel sorry for you?”
I stare at him.
“Oh, you mean because of your dad? No. That sucks, but he’s still the most awesome dad on the planet, so no, I don’t feel sorry for you. I voted for you because I knew how much you wanted it and because you’re a really good friend and because I thought you’d be a good captain. How’s that for a reason? Now, why don’t you step up and start acting like one instead of making both of us look like idiots?”
“Geez, Benny.”
“Geez, nothin’.”
“Easy for you to say.”
“Why’s that?”
“Why? You’re just better at everything. Everyone has always liked you more. Everyone does whatever you want—even voting for me because you said so. You score anytime the heck you want and—”
“Not true.”
“True!”
“You know what, Golden? You think everything is so easy for me? I have everything to prove. See anyone else getting called Chopsticks on the field?”
“Nope!” Slick says. We both give him a look.
“Yeah, well, I’m Goldie-Locks, Goldfish, Golden Macaroni!”
“It’s not the same and you know it. I’m Chinaman, Konichiwa, Rice Paddy. Want me to go on? I’ve heard them all and so have you. And you never let people get away with it because you’re my best friend. But do you know what everyone has always liked about you?”
“What?”
“You try so hard, no matter what.”
“Tryhard,” Slick says, but this time it actually sounds like a compliment.
“You make people love soccer,” Benny says. “You make us think everything is possible—like winning the championship—when it’s such a long shot!”
“No it’s not.”
“Yes it is! Mudbury in the championship game? That’s never happened before. We have to win the rest of our games or score enough points to be at least number two in the league. But there’s Shaker and Merrimack and they’re pretty much impossible to beat.”
“No they’re not!”
“This is exactly what I’m talking about. You believe more than anyone—and it’s hard to beat someone who never quits. Remember preseason? How in it you were? How you clapped for people, how you came off the line and got Archie through the sprints? That’s why we voted for you.”
“Oh… Thanks, Benny.”
“Well, boys, it was nice knowing you,” Slick says.
“What do you mean?”
“Here comes Mr. T.”
We freeze.
“Getting along again?” Mr. T asks.
Slick and I eye each other.
“Good. Because if you ever pull a stunt like you did the other day, both of you are off the team for the whole season, not just sitting out for one game, got it?”
We nod again.
“It’s Golden Goal time!” Coach yells.
“See ya,” Benny says. “Hope you can get it together soon, because I miss being on the field with my best friend. No offense, Slick.”
I watch Benny run off to join my team.
“Benny,” I call after him.
Benny nods, and I know we’re okay again.
It’s the hallowed Golden Goal time. Our favorite part of practice, when everything is on the line. When there are mere minutes to make the final, winning shot.
The team battles each other for a full five minutes until Sunny gets a pass from Brady and comes in with a sniper-like play to score on C.J. I look longingly after Benny and Sunny as they high-five. This is what happens inside the white lines: nothing else matters, not who’s cool or uncool, just the team.
I decide then and there: I will do everything possible to earn a place on the field again. I’m going to believe in us. If that’s my superpower like Benny says, then here we go.
“I hate not playing too.”
“Then you better stop punching me,” Slick says.
“Stop eating my mouth guard.”
“Deal.”
“Bring it in!” Coach yells.
“Come on,” I tell Slick. We rise from the bench, walk to the circle, stand on the outside.
“MVP Gum of the Day goes to Brady!” Coach yells. “For the assist that made the Golden Goal possible!”
The team claps, pounds his back.
Coach pauses to look at me and Slick.
I clear my throat. The team turns. “I just want to say… I’m really sorry.”
“What he said,” Slick says. “I’m sorry too.”
“And, uh, I hope I can gain your trust back,” I say. “I haven’t been the captain you deserve. I’m going to work harder and do better.” No one says anything about being captain again, but in my heart, I hope that someday I’ll be sliding the armband back on.
“Mudbury on three!” Lucy yells.
“One-two-three Mudbury!”
I pull Lucy aside afterward. “I’ve got the best idea you’ve ever heard!”
“Oh no,” she says.
“No, really. It’s the best!”
* * *
When we pull into the driveway, we see that all of the Maroni and Littlehouse trash cans have tipped over. Trash is strewn all over our yard and the Littlehouses’. Lucy’s mom and George are scrambling to pick it up as a family stands looking at the house.
“Oh dear,” Mom says. “Myra is showing the house. Bad timing.”
“Or good timing?” I suggest as we pile out. This isn’t my great idea, but it’s almost as good.
Curtis Meowfield is in heaven, licking a tuna fish can.
I suppose I deserve it: all adult eyes, plus Lucy’s, turn to eye me suspiciously.
“I was at practice!” I proclaim, hands in the air.
The Dark Lord has been giving me the benefit of the doubt—until now. His smoldering glare laser-beams right at me.
Mom looks flustered, Myra’s face frowns, and the visiting couple sniffs, making a face.
“It’s usually not like this,” Mom says. “The Littlehouse family is very clean.”
“Actually…,” I say.
“Golden!” Mom barks.
“Is this your house?” the couple asks.
Mom laughs uneasily and looks around like she’s not really sure. “Uh, yes. We’re kind of dealing with a lot right now. My husband is sick and… we’ve got four kids… all great and really active.…” Eyes sweep across our property, at the bikes on the lawn, the goalie nets, the soccer balls, the two-day-old laundry hanging on the line. A pair of underwear swims through the air and lands on a hosta plant. Mom’s face turns pink as she grabs it and stuffs it into her pocket.
I can’t help myself. I fall on the ground, hysterical.
Lucy looks around, her eyes wide with wonder. “Do you think the ghost of Raymond Von Mousetrap sent a tornado through here?”
“Maybe,” I whisper. “Destiny is finally starting to make its move.”
Sugar Ray and Estelle high-five.
Psyched
We go back for those left behind, don’t we, Golden?
—LUCY LITTLEHOUSE
My great idea? Secret Psychs. I don’t tell Jaimes, but I totally got the idea from when she did this with her team a week earlier.
After the trash is picked up, Lucy and I spend the rest of the evening writing a secret note to every single person on the team. Jaimes, Whitney, and Roma help too, drawing hearts and soccer balls in every i
maginable color.
“We’ll secretly put them in lockers, before we play Sunapee,” Lucy explains to them excitedly.
“It will psych us up to win, and really get ready for our next game, against Winnisquam,” I say.
When we’re done and Lucy’s leaving, Nurse Verity comes in holding a black zippered bag.
“What’s that?” Roma asks.
Verity sits down and shows us an oxygen machine. “This will help your dad get a little more air while he sleeps.”
“Like, for later?” Whitney asks.
“Maybe it will help him now. Let’s go see.”
I’m skeptical, since Dad has no trouble breathing from what I can see, and follow her upstairs, where Mom and Dad are.
Dad is lying on top of his covers and smiles when we enter. Verity sits on a chair next to him.
“Hi, Patrick.”
“Hi. New machine?”
She nods and turns to us. “Your dad can’t turn over anymore, so we need to be careful to not pull the covers up too high, in case they cover his face.”
I realize that if Dad can’t move his arms much, he can’t get the covers off his face. The thought makes me squirm.
“What if you have to turn over or get cold or too hot?” Jaimes asks.
“Your mom,” Dad says.
“So Mom probably isn’t getting a ton of sleep,” Verity says.
“Oh, I’m fine,” Mom says. I look at her, but she does look tired. And not like normal I’m-not-a-morning-person tired. I think of all the other things she says are fine. Like Jaimes needing new cleats and Dad’s expensive equipment. Like me breaking the door molding even though Dad can’t fix it anymore. Mom says it’s fine but it’s not.
Maybe I should get a job.
Do the grocery shopping.
Jaimes could drive.
Terrifying thought.
Verity puts the oxygen mask on Dad’s mouth and nose. He closes his eyes.
“Better?” she asks.
“Yes,” he says, his breath fogging up the mask.
Huh. I’m glad he can breathe better—but how did I not know he couldn’t? What else have I not been seeing?
Ten Thousand Tries Page 16
