I didn’t.
I flipped the ball past the red forward and caught up with it two steps later. Now, briefly, there were ten of us against nine of them.
I kept dribbling ahead. Two reds peeled off to intercept me.
That was all I needed.
Two of my teammates were streaking for open positions upfield.
Time for a killer pass.
I knew I could catch the other team by surprise. All game I had been hitting first-touch push passes—dumping the ball off immediately with short safe passes. Not once had I shown the ability to bomb the ball.
I kept my head down, trying to fool them into believing I hadn’t seen those two blue jerseys cut past their midfielders.
With a quick flick of my right foot, I served up a forty-yard cross-field pass with some left-to-right spin.
Part of making a pass like this work is knowing your teammates. A lightning-fast player will want the ball to land beyond the defenders, so he can zip past them, reach the ball first and move in to score. A big strong player might want the ball right at his feet. A tall player might want it in the air, so he can knock it down with his chest or head.
As the ball made a banana curve through the air, high above the defenders, I knew I had laid it in perfectly.
Johnnie Rivers, coming in from the right, was a small player, tremendously quick, and he liked getting his passes ahead of him. At this moment, he had the advantage of a full sprint. The ball bounced into an open area just over their sweeper’s shoulder. He tried to turn and stay with Johnnie but didn’t have a chance.
Because the red defender had been between Johnnie and the goalie as I passed, Johnnie was onside when he reached the ball.
And there were only twenty steps between him and the goalie and the net.
Johnnie, still in full sprint, pushed the ball ahead slightly. He leaned into his kick and beat the goalie clean. And...hit the goalpost on the left side. The ball bounced harmlessly out of play.
Our hometown crowd groaned.
A clear breakaway. Goalie out of position. And no goal. Caleb Riggins would never have missed a chance like that.
It turned out to be the best shot we had at tying the game.
After that, nothing even came close.
We played out the final minutes, pressing hard. And they still beat us, 3–2.
We badly needed Caleb Riggins’s genius scoring touch. But where was he? Why had he missed two games? Why wasn’t anyone answering the phone at his house?
Coach had tried calling before and after the game. With no luck. So, with a four-hour break before our next game, I decided to go to Caleb’s house myself. That would have been okay...except for the dogs.
chapter four
Steve agreed to go with me. He borrowed his mom’s minivan (it’s better than walking), and we took off right after the game.
He drove us up McCulloch Boulevard, which winds up through the city, across and back down again. The street was named for McCulloch—as in chain saws—an industrialist who once flew over the lake and thought it might be a good place to test outboard motors. He set up a mobile home park for the workers and later decided that it was a good place to live. He bought sixteen thousand acres of desert land on the slopes of the Mojave Mountains overlooking the lake and built a city in the desert. Lake Havasu City grew from zero people to thirty thousand in hardly any time.
What most people might know about Lake Havasu City is that the London Bridge was moved here from England. The London Bridge was taken apart brick by brick on one side of the ocean and put back together here in Lake Havasu City, where it spans a river channel.
“I can’t believe Caleb missed two games,” Steve said as he concentrated on the road.
“Without even telling anyone,” I added. “Soccer is his whole life. And he knows how much we need him.”
“No kidding,” Steve said. “The Riverside Mudcats were useless this morning. We should have kicked them so bad...”
“Tournament’s not over yet,” I said.
“Maybe not,” Steve answered. “But it will be soon if we don’t get Caleb back.”
We stopped in front of the house. Number fifty-five on Desert Quail Drive sat at the end of the road. Like most of the houses around, it was built in a southwest adobe style and painted white to reflect the heat. And like most of the surrounding houses, the front yard wasn’t grass, but gravel, dotted with desert bushes and a tall cactus. In the summer, Lake Havasu City bakes at more than one hundred degrees. Grass takes too much water.
It was a big house. A pontoon boat on a trailer filled one side of the driveway. The boat was big—a flat deck on two cigar-shaped pontoons, with a little cabin on the front to provide shade and a large outboard at the back. It even had a rubber dinghy on the back part of the deck.
Caleb’s mom’s car, a black Volvo, was parked beside the pontoon boat. His dad’s truck, a black Blazer, was behind the Volvo.
This was a family with money. Caleb’s dad ran a couple of businesses. He did not shave his head and wear Scottish kilts.
“Check the mailbox,” I told Steve as we got out of the minivan. At eleven o’clock, the morning was already getting hot, and because I was still in my soccer uniform, the sun felt good on my bare legs.
“Mailbox?” Steve asked.
“If they’ve been away for a couple of days, there should be plenty of mail in it.”
“None,” he said a second later.
“Strange,” I said. “And both the cars are here. I wonder why no one’s answered the phone.”
We walked up the driveway.
No one answered the front door, either.
“They’ve got to be here,” I said. “Unless someone picked them up.”
“What if they’re outside around back?” Steve asked, pushing his long hair from his eyes.
“Worth a try,” I said.
We walked around the house. And stopped in our tracks when two large German shepherds began to bark at us from a kennel. It took us a second to realize they were locked behind the wire fence.
Steve dramatically placed his hand over his heart. “Thought I was dead.”
“Me too,” I answered. The lawn chairs were empty. The swimming pool was covered. “Safe to say there’s no one back here. Unless of course, they’re hiding inside and don’t want to answer.”
The dogs kept barking.
“All right, all right,” I told them. “We’re going.”
We started back toward the front of the house.
“Guys!”
Startled by the voice, we turned back.
“Caleb?” I answered, looking around.
“Right above you.”
We looked up and saw Caleb at his bedroom window.
“What’s the matter?” I asked. “Coach has been trying like crazy to get you on the phone. We need you big time.”
“Yeah,” Steve said. “It’s a different game without you on the field.”
“Win last night?” Caleb asked. He had opened his window and was leaning out, wearing our team tracksuit. Caleb was medium height with blond hair. There was a gap between his front teeth, and his eyebrows always seemed arched, like he was asking a question.
“No,” Steve said. “Tied. And we lost this morning. The only good thing about the games was when a snake attacked this woman and she ran onto the field.”
“What!”
“Long story, Caleb,” I said. “Not worth listening to.” I gave him a puzzled frown. “What’s up? Why’d you miss the games? Are you going to be there this afternoon?”
Caleb’s face twisted with anger and grief. “I’m grounded.”
“Get real,” Steve said. “You? Goody two-shoes? Grounded?”
I elbowed Steve. On the way back, he and I would have to have a talk about this thing called tact.
“I was supposed to get all As,” Caleb said. “But I got a B-plus in science and that was it. They told me no more soccer.”
“But Caleb,” I said
. “Don’t your parents know how important this tournament is?”
He shrugged. Looking closer, I wondered if he had been crying. “They won’t let me out of the house.”
“Like, as if you’re in prison,” Steve said. “That’s not right.”
A slight click reached our ears.
Caleb’s jaw dropped. He pointed at the kennels.
The latch of the kennel door had somehow opened.
“Guys!” Caleb shouted. “The dogs!”
But Steve and I were already running. The dogs had pushed the gate open.
To them, we were as tempting as fresh hamburger. They didn’t even bother to bark as they bolted straight toward us.
Steve and I scrambled around the corner of the house and ran for the end of the driveway, arms pumping, legs churning.
“The top of the van!” I shouted. “It’s our only hope. Climb the van!”
Steve didn’t say anything. He was too busy pushing off me to get ahead.
Behind us came the scratch-scratch of dogs’ nails scrambling on concrete. Not a nice sound, especially when you’re in front of it.
I had almost reached the end of the driveway when I heard a dog’s jaw snap closed. At the same time, I felt a hard tug at my shorts. I kept running.
We hit the street and beelined toward the minivan.
Bang! We both slammed into the side of the van to stop our momentum. It was quicker than trying to slow down. Steve nearly pushed my head off as he scrambled up.
I reached the roof of the minivan a few seconds later.
We looked down, expecting to see two vicious German shepherds leaping up at us.
But they weren’t even close. They had stopped just at the edge of the yard. They sat there, whining in disappointment at our escape and gazing at us with longing eyes.
I hit Steve in the shoulder.
“Hey,” he said. “What was that for?”
“Pushing me back toward the dogs as we ran,” I said. “If you were that desperate, why didn’t you just flat-out trip me?”
“I thought of it,” he said. He was panting for breath, just like me. “But I figured it would be worth it only if both dogs stopped to get you.”
“Jerk,” I said.
“That’s me.” He grinned. “Just remember I’ve got the keys. And it’s a long walk back.”
I shook my head. But my mind was already on other thoughts: like, why Caleb’s parents were so strict. And how to get Caleb to the next game.
chapter five
It turned out I didn’t have to worry. Five minutes before the afternoon game started, Caleb rode up to the field on his mountain bike. He wore an old pair of sweats. After he set the bike down, he jogged toward us.
Because the rest of us had on our team sweats, Caleb stood out from the crowd of players. The guys on our team mobbed him and fired questions and comments as he walked over to meet with Coach Poulsen.
“Where you been, man?”
“Good to see ya.”
“We were worried, man!”
“We missed ya, bud.”
Only the coach stayed silent. Mr. Poulsen was extremely tall and extremely thin. He kept his hair bristly short, and it matched his dark brown mustache. Mr. Poulsen wore dark sunglasses, and I couldn’t tell if he was angry at Caleb for missing two games.
“Riggins?” was all Coach Poulsen said.
“I need to talk to you, Coach,” Caleb said. He looked around at us. “Not a big deal, guys. I just want to explain to the coach.”
Earlier, Steve and I had agreed to keep quiet about our morning visit. Caleb sometimes got teased because his parents were so protective. We didn’t want to make it worse for him by telling everyone that at sixteen he had been grounded for getting a mark as bad as a B-plus.
Coach Poulsen and Caleb stepped away from the rest of the team.
I stretched as I looked around. The players on the Phoenix Memorial High Pirates, in green uniforms, were just coming onto the field. Fans filled the stands on both sides of the field. And in the distance, the mountains cut a jagged line against the blue sky of another perfect desert day.
I liked the way I felt. Nervous, but not scared. Inside, butterflies were dancing little circles of excitement, like offstage ballerinas who could barely wait for the music to begin.
My legs felt good too. Two games in one day was pushing it, but with all the games it took for eight teams to play each other, it couldn’t be helped. We’d been practicing and competing all year for this. We still had five games left to make the finals of the tournament, and we had Caleb Riggins back. I was pumped and ready to go.
As we stepped out of our sweats, Caleb and Coach Poulsen rejoined us. Coach nodded at Caleb, and Caleb peeled off his old sweats to show that he, too, wore our blue uniform.
I didn’t think it was strange at the time, but I should have. I just wanted to get a chance to talk to Caleb before the game started.
“Just want you to know,” I said, “Steve and I kept it quiet about visiting you this morning. Whatever you tell the team is fine with us.”
“Thanks,” Caleb said. “About the dogs—”
Coach Poulsen called for a team huddle.
“Later,” I told Caleb. “We’ve got a game to win.”
He grinned.
It was good to have him back.
Twenty minutes into the second half, we faced our biggest challenge. We were up 1–0, thanks to an early goal by Caleb. He had taken a pass from a corner kick by Steve and bounced it just under the crossbar of the net with his head.
Nobody could head the ball better than Caleb. When I asked him about it once, he told me it was simple: He pretended he was throwing his eyes at the ball as he jumped at it.
As the game wore on, that one goal began to look bigger and bigger. If our defense held, we would win the game. And, so far, our midfielders had done such a great job of clogging the center line that we had not been pressed once.
Now, though, as two of the green played a tricky give-and-go, Johnnie ran into Steve and both of them fell. The greens took the opportunity to swarm into an open gap in our territory.
I watched carefully.
We played a man-to-man defense; Coach Poulsen had told us early in the season he would give us that freedom as long as we could prove it worked better than a zone defense. So far, it had. But now Steve and Johnnie lay in a tangle, way behind the play.
As sweeper, I didn’t have anyone specific to guard. Last man back, I could see most of the field. My job was to anticipate dangerous plays and stop them.
Their striker—one of the forward attackers—was a tiny redhead, quick as a hummingbird. I figured they would try to get the ball to him.
He began to edge toward the sideline, staying just ahead of me to remain onside.
I watched their midfielders pass the ball back and forth, advancing it so quickly that Steve and Johnnie couldn’t catch up to them.
Then it came!
The same bomb play that I had tried the day before.
Their redheaded striker was bursting toward the center. One of the midfielders booted a high, hard pass.
I didn’t make the mistake of going for the ball. It was too big a risk. By chasing it, I would have taken myself on a diagonal line away from the center of our net. If I missed it, their striker would have a short clear shot.
Instead, I turned my back on the ball and focused on the tiny redhead. The ball was just behind him, and he had to take a half-step hop to slow himself down. I slid and hooked my foot, stopping the ball as he overran it. I hopped up, spun around and looked upfield.
Riggins!
He was a blue blur, already near their sweeper, who had been just a little too confident about their forward press.
Without even thinking, I snapped a hard kick, putting my whole body into it. When the ball landed, it was ahead of Caleb by about ten steps, but he was in full sprint and reached it with a three-step lead over the nearest green player.
The rest of t
he play seemed to run in wonderful slow motion.
Caleb dribbled the ball without losing speed, held it long enough to force the goalie deep into the net and picked an easy wide-open corner.
The net bulged. The hometown crowd went wild. And we were up 2–0.
I’d held my breath while watching; I finally sucked in some air.
The redheaded striker on the other team stood beside me.
“Nice block,” he said. “And nice pass. You guys deserved that goal.”
“Thanks,” I answered. With so little time left, the game was almost ours.
“Too bad about your shorts, though,” he said as he trotted away. “Aren’t you afraid of a sunburn?”
I stared after him, puzzled. Then I reached around behind me. And discovered a not-so-good thing.
It had probably started when the dog had nipped my shorts in Caleb’s driveway. And my slide apparently hadn’t helped. When I reached behind me, I discovered a very big hole in the back of my shorts.
I stood there, worrying about how to get off the field without showing the entire world a part of my body that my mother had powdered when I was a baby. Before I could move, Caleb’s father walked up to the field from the parking lot.
He was a big man with a dark beard, dressed in a dark blue three-piece suit. He put two fingers in his mouth and whistled.
Caleb looked over, dropped his head and slowly trotted to the sidelines.
Although there were still five minutes left in the game, Mr. Riggins grabbed Caleb by the elbow and took him away.
While everyone was watching them, I was able to get to the bench and put on my sweats unnoticed. But it suddenly seemed that ripped shorts were a pretty minor problem.
chapter six
“Can a parent do that?” I asked at the table during our evening meal. I had just explained to Mom what had happened to Caleb. “I mean, it was like Mr. Riggins thought he owned Caleb. If anyone else had dragged Caleb away like that, it would have looked like kidnapping.”
Dad pushed his food—some kind of casserole—around on his plate. Because my parents both work, Mom insists that Leontine and I each make dinner once a week. It was Leontine’s turn to torture us, and everyone, including Mom, was too afraid to ask about what we were eating.
Maverick Mania Page 2
