Miracle on 49th Street

by Mike Lupica

  The Celtics finally ended up with the ball with twenty seconds left, and the game tied. Their coach called what Sam said was their last timeout, even if it seemed both teams had been calling one timeout after another for the last hour or so. Molly checked out the players huddling around the coach, but could see that he wasn’t the one doing the talking.

  Josh Cameron was.

  Molly tried to compare this Josh to the one who seemed so scared of her when he got into his car and drove off, but couldn’t do it.

  Over all the noise of the crowd, Sam shouted, “He likes to dribble out most of the clock and then do something amazing to win the game.”

  They were standing on their chairs because everybody else at the TD Banknorth Garden was standing, getting ready for the last play.

  “Just watch,” Sam said.

  But she had been watching every move Josh Cameron made all night long.

  They passed the ball in to him at half-court. At first, he didn’t even dribble. Just stood there in this cool way, like he knew something that no one else in this loud, crazy place knew, looking up at the clock over the Celtics basket.

  Twelve seconds.

  Ten.

  Now six.

  He made his move then, beating the man guarding him with his very first dribble, flying past him, looking as if he were on his way to the basket, ready to go up against the 76ers’ biggest guys once more, ready to beat them and the clock at the same time.

  Only he didn’t drive, seeing that the 76ers had cut him off. Instead he stopped about ten feet from the basket, doing that even though he’d been going at full speed. Put the brakes on so hard, Molly half-expected to hear the screech of car tires.

  She was sure he was going to make the kind of jump shot he’d been making the whole game every time he pulled up like this.

  Three seconds left.

  He went up into the air.

  He was going to do it!

  Somehow Molly had forgotten how mad she was at him. She was as excited as everyone else now.

  Josh released the ball then, and Molly’s heart sank, because she had a perfect angle to see that his shot wasn’t going to be anywhere near the basket. It was off. Off to the left.

  Which is where L. J. Brown, one of the Celtics’ biggest guys, was already in midair, in perfect position to catch what wasn’t a shot at all from Josh Cameron because it was a pass, a perfect pass.

  L. J. Brown caught it and dunked it in the same motion as the horn sounded.

  The Celtics, even the ones on the bench, came rushing out to mob Brown. Molly kept watching Josh, who was smiling at the scene from where he’d thrown Brown the ball, smiling and nodding his head. Then he turned away from the celebration under the basket and walked past the Celtics bench, right past where Molly and Sam were sitting, and disappeared down the runway that led to the locker room.

  Even now, nobody could touch him.

  Molly grabbed Sam by the arm and said, “Come on, we’ve got to go.”

  “The game just ended,” Sam said. “You can tell. See all the happy people around us?”

  “Come on,” Molly said. “Time for Plan C.”

  “This is a really bad idea,” Sam said.

  “It’s a great idea, and you know it. You just don’t like it because you didn’t come up with it.”

  “We’re supposed to wait in the press lounge.”

  “You’ll be back there before you know it.”

  “Plan C,” Sam said, shaking his head sadly, even as Molly kept pulling him through the crowd and telling him not to worry. “If I were grading it honestly, I’d actually give it a D or an F.”

  Molly knew that where the Celtics players parked their cars for games at the TD Banknorth Garden was next door, where the old Garden had been until they tore it down. Sam said that was the kind of thing he was supposed to know and not her. Molly said she’d read it in one of Uncle Adam’s columns, even before she’d met Sam. It was when she had first started to read up on Josh Cameron, after her mom had finally told her the truth. Adam Burke had written about standing over there with Josh Cameron—would she ever be able to start thinking of him as her dad?—right before the playoffs the year before, asking him if he ever ran into any Celtics ghosts in the area.

  “Only if they’re driving Hummers,” Josh Cameron had joked.

  Then Adam Burke had written that the new Celtics had Josh Cameron, so they didn’t need any ghosts, even if trying to guard him was like trying to catch one.

  Molly was the one who really remembered everything, not Sam. She was the one who remembered the womb.

  “We’re never going to find this place in the dark,” Sam said.

  “Oh, I bet they have lights for the players and everything,” Molly said.

  “One of these days I’m going to have to learn how to say no to you.”

  Molly said, “Just follow me and start thinking of what you’re going to say to him.”

  “I’m getting hungry,” Sam said.

  It made her giggle. Even in the middle of an adventure, Sam thought a quick snack could fix everything.

  And this was an adventure, even more than yesterday’s was. But it just had to work. Had to. It wasn’t as if she could keep coming up with new and different ways to run into just about the most famous athlete in America every single day.

  “You’re absolutely sure you know where we’re going?” Sam said.

  Molly had let go of him by now and was walking about twenty feet ahead. Without looking back, she windmilled her arm at him. “Just pick up the pace.”

  “Do you know where you’re going?”

  “Sort of.”

  She was guessing what exit to use, but by now she had no bearings. So when they went out what she was hoping would be a back door, they found themselves in the middle of all the people and all the postgame excitement of Causeway Street.

  Molly told herself not to panic, they still had plenty of time. That’s why she’d rushed Sam out of the arena as soon as Josh Cameron had made his pass.

  “The old Garden had to be this way, right?” she said.

  “Left, actually,” Sam said.

  “You know what I meant.”

  “Right.”

  They both laughed, being silly for a moment. It seemed to make Sam less scared. He preferred to have his adventures inside his head. It was different with Molly. Maybe because the worst thing that could happen to her had already happened….

  She wasn’t scared now, just determined to make this work.

  They made their way up the sidewalk, picked an alley, found out it was a dead end. Sam said, “I’m trying to picture the way it used to be here,” and then told her they should keep going. They finally came to a small street that took them back behind Causeway Street and to the protected lot that Sam said was exactly where the old Gah-den had been.

  “Has to be it,” Molly said. “Those are the same cars I saw yesterday.”

  There was a security guard where the players would probably walk through a small entrance into the fenced-off area, and another guard at a bigger entrance where it looked like they would drive out. Molly also noticed that it was the brightest area back here, as bright as day.

  Not good.

  “We are never going to get in there,” Sam said.

  “Think positively,” she said. “Isn’t that what you’re always telling me?”

  “Yeah,” he said. “In social studies.”

  “Are you ready?” Molly said.

  “Not really.”

  “Start sniffling,” Molly said.

  Molly couldn’t hear everything he was saying to the guard, but knew basically what he was supposed to say as she was sneaking along the outside of the fence, over by where she assumed the cars would drive out of the lot.

  Only when Sam raised his voice did she hear him saying, “I’ll never find my sister, never, never, never!”

  She couldn’t hear what the guard said, then she heard Sam say, “This has to be parking lot B.
That’s where we said we’d meet if we got separated.”

  Then he ran—or what passed for running for him—away from the first guard and around the chain-link fence to where the second guard was. The one who was closest to Molly. The first guard chased him, and the second guard came out to stop him, and when he did, Molly, staying low, got through the entrance and behind the first car she came to, which was a Mercedes.

  The first guard went back to his post, telling the second guard the “fast showerers” would be showing up any second. Molly could hear the second guard say for Sam to stay right where he was, he’d left his cell phone inside his booth.

  Huge break.

  As soon as the guard turned around, Sam Bloom made what Molly was sure was the quickest move of his whole life, maybe because he didn’t have to go far, and joined Molly behind the Mercedes.

  The next thing they heard was the guard saying, “Crazy kids.”

  He had that right, she had to admit.

  According to Sam’s watch, they waited for an hour.

  A lot of Celtics players had arrived in the lot by then and driven off. Molly and Sam had slowly moved behind the cars, toward where they could see Josh Cameron’s Navigator. It also gave them a better look at the arriving players, Sam announcing their names to Molly in a whisper, as if he were a PA announcer introducing them before the game.

  “Terry Thompson.”

  “Teddy.”

  “Nick.”

  “Antonio.”

  “L.J.”

  Molly said, “I know that’s L.J. He just won the game.”

  “No need to snap at me,” Sam said.

  It was past eleven o’clock now.

  Sam said, “Uncle Adam’s going to be finishing his column soon, and then he’s going to come get us in the lounge, only we’re not going to be there.”

  “Will he call your cell?”

  “Probably,” Sam said. “I’ll just explain that we’re in the players’ lot hiding out by Cameron’s car.”

  “Hey,” Molly said, “why do you think I called it Plan C? Cameron’s car. All Cs.”

  “That’s great, Mols. No kidding. I can’t tell you how impressed I am.”

  Then Molly told him to hush, here came Josh Cameron now.

  He was carrying the same bag he’d had with him the day before. Wearing the same leather jacket and a yellow baseball cap.

  “Way to go, J.C.,” the first guard said.

  “It’s all good,” Josh Cameron said.

  Molly and Sam both jumped when he did the remote thing and they heard the doors unlock and the car engine start.

  “Well, that scared the—” Sam said.

  Molly whispered, “You don’t have time to be scared. You’re on.”

  “You didn’t tell me acting would be this much work.”

  He didn’t move, though. Just stayed where he was, crouched down. Molly had to admit he did look a little like a frog in that pose.

  “Go,” Molly said. “Before he drives off on me again.”

  And just like that, like the car alarm that had gone off a few minutes before when Terry Thompson, the backup point guard, had hit the wrong button on his own remote, Sam Bloom said, “Oh my God…Josh CAMERON!” Walking around from the back of the Navigator to the driver’s side.

  “Good grief, kid, you nearly scared the—” Josh Cameron stopped himself right there. “What do you think you’re doing out here at this time of night?”

  In the distance, Molly could hear the guard say, “Aw, man, I’m sorry, J.C. That kid gave me some story about his sister a while ago and musta snuck by me.”

  “I got it, Bob,” Josh said. “No worries.”

  “Don’t make me go yet,” Sam said. “I have been waiting sooooo long for you.”

  He sounded like Kimmy, Molly thought.

  “It’s official,” Josh said. “I am now going for the record of kids sneaking up on me in parking lots this week.”

  Like he was talking to himself.

  “I didn’t mean to sneak up on you like this,” Sam said. “But I’m your biggest fan, and you’ve got to sign something for me. Please!”

  That was Molly’s cue.

  “Please please please!” Sam said.

  She opened the door and climbed into the backseat and, as quietly as she could, as quietly as anybody ever could, shut the door behind her.

  She got her eyes just above the window, saw that Josh’s back was to her, and then dove into the way-back of his Navigator.

  Her ride home.

  CHAPTER 8

  The papers always just said that Josh Cameron lived somewhere in the Back Bay section of Boston, which Molly knew covered a lot of territory. Nobody ever mentioned the street he lived on, not even on any of the Web sites devoted exclusively to him.

  The best one, the one where Molly got a lot of her information and found out what his biggest fans were saying about him, was called SonsofCameron.com. It was modeled after a cool Red Sox site that Sam had shown her called SonsofSamHorn.com, which was named after a former Red Sox first baseman who now did some television for them and had fan postings so funny, they would make Molly and Sam laugh out loud.

  SonsofCameron.com wasn’t as funny, but every time Molly went to it, she thought the same thing: Daughter of Cameron, checking in.

  But even they wouldn’t talk about his exact address, treating it like some kind of state secret. Out of respect for the Man, the people running the site would write from time to time when somebody asked where Josh lived. For all Molly knew, Josh Cameron could have been living around the corner from the Evanses.

  So she didn’t know where they were going. She just stayed low, bumping along, hoping he was going straight home, wherever home was, and not out on a date for the rest of the night.

  Sam was the one who had brought up the date angle.

  “What happens,” he’d said during the game, “if he’s meeting one of his girlfriends somewhere? Or picking her up?”

  “Girlfriend,” Molly had said, correcting him. “He’s dating the girl from Worth Avenue.” It was a new TV show on FOX. “The icky Amanda Ross. And they’re shooting right now in Hollywood, I read it on SonsofCameron.”

  “Mols,” Sam had said, “I know I have to watch what I say about Mr. Wonderful, but I have a feeling she’s not the only one he’s dating. So, what if he goes out on a date tonight?”

  Molly’d said, “Nobody ever said it was a perfect plan, Sam.”

  Please be going straight home, she kept thinking now, even though it was hard to hear herself think the way he had U2 blaring on what she had to admit was a pretty amazing sound system. So amazing that Molly couldn’t tell sometimes whether it was the thump of the bass she was hearing, or herself banging against the backseat.

  Somehow over the music, she heard his cell phone go off.

  He turned down the music.

  “Hey,” he said.

  Then, “Yeah, I guess it was a pretty cool way to start the season.”

  Then, “Another day at the office.”

  Another day at the office?

  “I miss you, too, baby.”

  Had to be the icky Amanda.

  Then he talked to her about her show for a few minutes, though he didn’t sound all that interested to Molly. Said he’d see her in a couple of weeks. Said he missed her.

  Finally, “I love you, too, baby.”

  He loved her?

  Not possible, according to Molly’s mom, who said he’d never really loved anybody.

  They were going faster now, Molly getting thrown around even more on the curves, wondering if maybe there was one speed limit for Josh Cameron and another for everybody else. When he really gunned the Navigator into one turn—what was this, the Boston version of the Grand Prix?—Molly went hard into the side of the car, bumping her head.

  Hard.

  She couldn’t help herself. It made her yell out, “Ow!”

  With the music still down, it was Molly who must have sounded like a car
alarm now.

  The car swerved, throwing Molly into the opposite inside wall of the car.

  “What the—” Josh Cameron yelled. “Who’s back there?”

  Somehow he got the car under control, slowing it down.

  “Who’s back there?” he repeated.

  No reason to hide anymore. Molly poked her head above the seat in front of her and could see him trying to drive the car and look in his rearview mirror at the same time.

  Molly stared at the eyes looking at her from the mirror now.

  He didn’t look happy.

  She smiled anyway.

  “Me again,” she said.

  “Stowaway brat causes Cameron to lose control of car on Storrow Drive,” he said to himself. He was angry this time. “The media would have had a field day with that one.”

  Molly stayed where she was in the way-back, afraid to get any closer to him.

  He was still talking to himself, looking at the road in front of him mostly, but occasionally using the mirror to look right at Molly with a mean face.

  “Twelve years in the league,” he said. “I go up against Shaq. Don’t get hurt. Ewing. Hakeem. Don’t get hurt. Now I almost get taken out by a pushy twelve-year-old girl.”

  “Sorry,” Molly said, her voice sounding squeaky, the way it did when she got nervous, not knowing what else to say at the moment.

  “I don’t even want to know what you think you’re doing, kid,” he said. “I thought we said all we had to say yesterday. I ought to call the police and let them handle this, but I’m not going to. Just tell me where Barbara lives, and I’ll take you home.”

  Molly didn’t say anything.

  “Hey,” he said. “I asked you a question.”

  It made Molly think of a question of her own.

  This jerk is my father?

  But she had come this far. She was going to say what she needed to say to him.

  “We didn’t finish our conversation yesterday,” she said.

  He pulled the car over. Molly could see they were on Commonwealth Ave. now, the part between Kenmore Square and the Public Garden, a little park and biking path separating the eastbound and westbound traffic. Josh Cameron turned around and looked at her. For some reason she noticed his cap, which read “Dan Bailey, Livingston, Montana.”