The Perfect Secret

by Rob Buyea

  The guys started hooting and cheering. Playing under the lights was going to be awesome.

  “That’s right,” Coach Holmes barked. “Get excited. Playing under the lights is special. And if you want the stands to be packed, then you’ve got to get serious about Spirit Week and get everyone else psyched.”

  More hooting and cheering.

  “After a big victory on Friday, we’ve got the annual Halloween dance on Saturday night. A great Spirit Week and a great victory mean a great turnout for our dance, and that’s got to happen, because the Halloween dance is the number one fund-raiser for our athletics booster club. I’m the president of the booster club, so I expect you boys to get the job done!”

  “Yeah!” we yelled. “Woot! Woot!”

  I cheered because I’d just figured out what I was going to write for my article. I was going to give the best report ever on the Halloween dance to show what great work the booster club did for all our sports programs.

  “Woohoo!” The guys kept it going.

  We were psyched just like Coach Holmes wanted. It was the best speech he’d given all year, and that was because it was finally about something other than Nicky. Too bad he didn’t see that, because by the next day it was back to Nicky this and Nicky that.

  At practice on Wednesday—team jersey day—Spirit Week turned ugly. I wished I had a jersey, but Coach Holmes had forgotten to order me one. I was bummed, but at least I found an old Warriors jersey in the equipment shed. The thing was ancient, but I wore it with pride.

  “Hey, dork,” Nicky said, smacking me on the back. “Nice jersey. We need to put your name on it.” He laughed and jogged off. Once again he was the last one out to the field, and that was starting to rub guys the wrong way—Gavin especially.

  I could tell that Gavin was mad from the way he was running drills. He always ran hard, but he was catching the ball hard, slapping the leather in his hands after pulling in each pass, slamming the football on the ground when he brought it back to the starting point. When it was time for the team’s first water break, he came over and didn’t even bother getting a drink.

  “Turn around,” he told me.

  I felt him rip the tape off my shoulders. I looked at the strip he held. LOSER. “We need to put your name on it,” Nicky had said. I tried, but I didn’t like that kid, and I don’t say that about people. Gavin wadded the tape and threw it on the ground. Then he jogged back onto the field.

  I should’ve seen trouble coming when Nicky and Adam decided to hang around after the rest of the guys had gone back to practice. Adam threw his water bottle at me, knocking my clipboard to the ground. “Nice catch, loser,” he sneered.

  I bent down to pick it up, and Nicky stomped on my hand.

  “Ow!” I yelled.

  “What’s wrong?” he said, playing dumb.

  “My hand!”

  “Oh, jeez. Sorry. I didn’t realize,” he said, twisting and grinding his cleat into my knuckles and fingers.

  That hurt really bad. I couldn’t stop my eyes from getting wet. I cradled my hand while they laughed and high-fived. I watched them put their helmets on and start toward the field. The first football drilled Adam in the face mask, and the second walloped Nicky in the ear hole.

  “Ah!” they both cried.

  “Nice throws!” I blurted, real loud. I couldn’t stop myself.

  “You better say that was an accident!” Nicky yelled, holding the side of his head.

  “It was no accident,” Gavin answered. “I hit my targets, unlike some of us.”

  “You don’t belong here,” Nicky spat. “You…”

  I’m not even going to tell you what he called Gavin, because it was horrible, and I don’t say or repeat those things.

  “Hit the track, Pablo!” Coach Holmes bellowed. “You’re not a team player.”

  Not a word to his son about what he’d just said. Nicky should’ve had his mouth washed out with soap—two bars!

  I saw the team quietly congratulating Gavin on his double pass. He’d won the guys, but I knew he’d never win Coach Holmes. I wished there was something I could do with my article to help him.

  It was another pretend-family dinner. I’ve got to give her credit, Mom stuck to her guns. She kept making the three of us sit down at the table together, but it was a lost cause. In the beginning Mom was serving up fancy meals, some of my favorite things, and Dad’s, too, but lately we’d been having the stuff that came in boxes. Trying less was a step closer to throwing in the towel. Did Dad even notice—or care?

  You didn’t need to be a rocket scientist to see that Mom was exhausted, and not from work but from worry. The more she and Dad fought, the more concerned she became about me. Instead of checking on me once a day to ask if everything was okay, she was doing it two and three times now—not including all the texts she was sending me. And though she never mentioned Brian, I knew my brother was constantly on her mind. She wore his name in the bags under her eyes.

  If we’d picked through our food in silence that night, ignoring the obvious like we always did, then I imagine nothing would’ve happened. But my father asked for it when he said, “What’s wrong, hon? You seem upset tonight.”

  “Nothing,” she answered. “Just tired, I guess.”

  “You look lost in thought,” Dad pressed. “What’re you thinking about?”

  Like I said, he asked for it.

  “Brian!” my mother snapped. “Brian’s on my mind. He’s on my mind every day. I worry about him working the night shift at that crummy gas station. I worry about him in that apartment all by himself, trying to make ends meet. And with the holidays coming up, I’m worrying more, and I can’t help it. Thanksgiving will be here before we know it. How am I supposed to just sit here and pretend all is well?”

  “We’ve been over this, Dorothy. I know that this time of year is going to be difficult, but if we can stay strong, then he’ll see that we aren’t going to bail him out again.”

  “I didn’t realize staying strong meant staying away.”

  Dad fell silent. I glanced at Mom and then across the table at him. That was when I first saw he was struggling with this as much as my mother. My father talked tough, but he had more gray hair than I ever remembered seeing. And he had the same bags under his eyes.

  “You know what?” I said. “You guys should go out on a date tomorrow night.”

  Their heads snapped. They looked at me with surprised faces.

  “On a Thursday?” Mom said.

  “Sure,” I said, trying to play it cool. “We’re gonna have a short practice because our big game is Friday, and teachers aren’t giving homework since it’s Spirit Week, so I’ll have Mark come over, and he and I can hang out and have pizza.”

  This idea came out of nowhere, but I suddenly saw how perfect it was. If my parents went out, then Mark and I could get the video surveillance camera that I’d bought at Best Buy installed without them knowing. C’mon, Mom, I prayed.

  “Where would we go?” she asked.

  “I’ll figure that out,” Dad said. “It’ll be date night, just like old times. I’ll make the reservations.”

  Mom peeked at him. When I saw her slight smile, I breathed a sigh of relief. Maybe they weren’t ready to give up.

  So far seventh grade had been nowhere near as good as sixth grade had been, but it wasn’t all bad. There was something I’d started looking forward to—study hall with Magenta. She got it worked out so that I was able to hang with her and do art three times a week. When we got together, all the bad stuff with football and Randi left my mind.

  “Mrs. Magenta, whatever happened with the painting you entered in that contest over the summer, the one with the little girl picking black-eyed Susans?” I asked her.

  She stopped, with her brush midair, and looked at me. “You remembered. How sweet of you.” />
  “Well, I kinda forgot for a while, but I remember now. I loved that painting.”

  She smiled. “My piece finished as runner-up.”

  “Wow!” I exclaimed. “That’s awesome.”

  “The better news is that I had a gallery pick up my name after seeing my work, and now they’re selling my stuff.”

  “Whoa! I’m so happy for you, Mrs. Magenta! You’re living the dream.”

  She chuckled. “Thanks, Gavin—for saying that and for encouraging me. Now it’s my chance to return the favor.”

  “Huh? What do you mean?”

  “You’ve got real talent. Your sketches and cartoons are unique…but they’d be better if they came from your heart. Stop worrying about people not liking your stuff. If you put your heart into your work, people will connect with it. It took me a long time to understand that, but it’s the truth. Trust me.”

  To explain, Magenta showed me her newest creation, a set of four paintings that told a story when put together. The first in the sequence showed a little girl holding hands with her dad as they walk on a spring day. The next showed the same pair, looking older, walking through a summer field of wildflowers. Following summer, we see them in the fall, looking older still. And last, the set finishes with the pair in the winter. The dad is an old man and the girl a grown woman.

  There was no mistaking that this was Magenta and Coach. There was no mistaking that this came from her heart. “It’s beautiful,” I said. It was sad, too. But I never let on about knowing. “What’re you working on now?” I asked.

  “A different set. Same concept.” She showed me the first. It was a little girl with her mom. “Not sure how this one will end yet,” she said.

  It was Magenta and Woods in that painting. I never thought I’d be the one to spill our secret plan, but I couldn’t take it. Her paintings connected and pulled at my heart strings. I sighed and opened my mouth, but before any words came out, Magenta stopped me.

  “We’re about out of time,” she said. “You’d better pack up your things and get going so that you’re not late for your next class.”

  Saved. I gathered my stuff and got ready to leave. I still hadn’t asked her about my special quarterback towel, either. Next time, I kept telling myself.

  “Good luck in your game tonight,” Magenta said. “I’ll be there cheering you on. And have fun at the dance tomorrow.”

  “Thanks,” I said. “See you later.”

  She gave me a small wave, and I walked out the door.

  * * *

  —

  We won our big game under the lights. I didn’t get to play quarterback, but Holmes did put me in with about four minutes to go, after we had things wrapped up. Us winning had put him in a generous mood. I got to play tight end. That wasn’t a position that I’d ever practiced, but I didn’t care. By then Adam was in at quarterback, and I did my best to block for him. Better him than Nicky. Not much better, but better.

  I got to go out for a pass on one play. Maybe Adam forgot it was me, or maybe he didn’t have time to think about it, but either way, he threw it in my direction. It wasn’t a perfect pass, but I jumped and made an acrobatic one-handed grab, and then I rambled for twenty more yards before getting knocked out of bounds. The team went nuts. Holmes didn’t like that, so he took me out, but I was smiling.

  After the game Coach Holmes rounded us up in the locker room and told us how proud he was. Then he presented the game ball to Nicky, which was a joke. Mark had rushed for more than one hundred yards and scored two touchdowns. He deserved the recognition.

  “Last thing. We have a bye on the schedule next week,” Holmes said, “so you boys have Monday and Tuesday off. No practice.”

  The team erupted in cheers.

  “When we come back on Wednesday, we start preparing for our Thanksgiving showdown against the Titans. We’ll have two weeks to get ready for our biggest game of the year. They’re our rivals and they think they’re better than us, so we want to kill ’em!” Holmes hollered.

  The guys hooted and cheered again, more about not having practice than about the Titans, but we let Holmes live in his world.

  * * *

  —

  I knew Holmes had only stuck me in ’cause it was a home contest and he didn’t want anyone from school asking him why I wasn’t getting to play. But it wasn’t him they asked. It was me.

  “Niño, did something happen with Coach Holmes that you’re not telling us about?” Mom asked later that night, after we were home and I’d showered.

  “No,” I sorta lied. Nothing had happened. He just hated me.

  “You’re sure?” Mom pressed.

  “Yes.” I’d made it this far. I could make it one more game.

  Dad’s eyes narrowed. He wasn’t buying it, but he sighed and said, “Okay. But if you change your mind, you can come and talk to us.”

  I laughed, acting like that was funny, but who was I fooling? I mighta cracked, but Meggie saved me—again.

  “Gavvy, will you read to me before I go to bed?” she asked.

  “Okay,” I said, happy to escape the football questions.

  I followed my sister. “Mommy and I got new books,” Megs said, showing me her stack.

  “You went to the library again?”

  “Yup. I like it there. I like all the books. I sit under your hungry caterpillar in the reading nook and look at them.”

  That made me smile.

  “The librarian gave me something for you, too.”

  “She did?”

  “Yup. Here it is.”

  Megs handed me an audiobook and its matching hardcover. I traced the letters in the title with my finger. ECHO by Pam Muñoz Ryan. “You said the librarian gave this to you?”

  “Yup.”

  “What’s her name?”

  “I don’t remember. She’s not always there, but she’s very nice. She loves books. She even smells them.”

  It had to be Woods. Why this book? I wondered.

  “Let’s read this one,” Megs said, handing me one of her picture books called The Other Side. “I got it for us because the girl on the cover has a tire for swinging and not for football.”

  I chuckled. Then I sat back and cuddled next to my sister. I read her the story about the two girls, Clover and Annie, and the fence standing between their houses, separating black and white, and then I tucked her in.

  “Gavvy, I know the fence is still there at the end of the story, but I think Clover and Annie already knocked it down by being nice to each other and becoming friends.”

  I smiled ’cause my little sister was one smart cookie—and ’cause she was like me. She didn’t just listen to the stories, but she was a thinker about them, too. “You’ve got a smart brain in that head of yours, Megs,” I said, borrowing the words Woods had told me last year.

  “Gavvy, are there still fences like that?”

  I took a deep breath and thought about the one Holmes had put between us. It wasn’t coming down anytime soon. “Yes,” I said. “There sure are.”

  “I’m going to knock them down by being nice to people,” Megs said.

  I smiled again. “You’re going to make the world a better place,” I told her. I rubbed her head and said good night, and then I went to my room.

  I put the ECHO audiobook on and sat down with my pencils. As I listened, I drew from the heart. I sketched me standing outside a fence. Could things with football get any worse? Maybe not, but it wouldn’t be long before I learned that football wasn’t everything.

  I scoured the house, searching high and low whenever Mom wasn’t around, but I couldn’t find a single picture of my father. She must’ve thrown all of them out. I had to write to Kyle, explaining the situation. Maybe my possible dad had a picture of me there? I pulled a random cookbook off Mom’s rack so that I’d have somet
hing hard to write on. I was hurrying because I wanted to get this done before Mom got home, but people make mistakes when rushing. I dropped the book, and as it crashed to the ground its pages flopped open—and a single picture fell out. This was destiny at work.

  It was a photo of my father and baby me making cookies. I studied it. Was this the same man that was in Kyle’s picture? They were years apart, but I thought so. My heartbeat quickened. I grabbed the cookbook and raced to find pen and paper, an envelope, and a stamp. Once I had everything, I sat down and scribbled my note to Kyle. I told him the news and urged him to find a younger picture of his dad so that I could know for sure. I sealed the envelope, ran and stuck it into the mailbox, and was back inside just before Mom pulled into the driveway. Everything was still secret—from Gav, too.

  I’d thought I was going to talk to Gav weeks before, but that never happened. Something else did—and I still didn’t know what. He’d stormed out of the cafeteria, and things had been even worse ever since. He was avoiding me, sitting as far away from me at our lunch table as he could, never making eye contact. Natalie asked me about it, but I told her not to get involved. Thankfully, destiny took over and had us run into each other at the Halloween dance—literally run smack into each other.

  I was hurrying out of the gym to go to the bathroom, when Gav came rushing around the corner, headed in my direction. Our bodies slammed. The collision knocked Gav sideways and sent me to the ground.

  “Sorry,” we said at the same time. Even though ramming into him hurt, I smiled.

  He gave me his hand. “Are you okay?” he asked, helping me to my feet.

  Everything I wanted to say to him came spilling out then. “Gav, I’m so sorry. I missed your first game because I was away at the Elite Stars Camp. I got a special invite because of my performance at Regionals. I didn’t know how to tell you because I knew football wasn’t going well….I’m sorry.”

  “That’s why you didn’t tell me?”