Mind If I Read Your Mind?

by Henry Winkler

  “I can’t wow anyone. We haven’t rehearsed. We don’t even know if the mind-reading thing is going to work again.”

  “Get serious, Billy Boy. Do I look like an entity that ever rehearsed in his life? I’m a natural at the supernatural.”

  There was a knock on the bathroom door, and Ricardo stuck his head in.

  “Hey, dude, you all right in here?” he asked. “I thought I heard conversation.”

  “Um … I was just rehearsing,” Billy said. “I’m fine, Ricardo. I just need another few minutes to go over my stuff.”

  “I can’t give ’em to you,” Ricardo said. “Wallwetter told me to come get you right away. Let’s go.”

  “As in now?”

  “Why, you got other plans?”

  “Tell him we’re ready,” the Hoove told Billy. “Go ahead. Look confident.”

  “I’m … I’m … I’m ready,” Billy stammered.

  “Excuse me,” the Hoove interrupted. “I believe I said we’re ready!”

  Ricardo was already out the door. Checking himself in the mirror one last time, Billy smoothed his lumpy hair as best he could and followed Ricardo out into the hall. The Hoove was right behind him.

  As they approached the auditorium, Billy thought he heard a hive of buzzing bees inside. The entire sixth, seventh, and eighth grades were talking and laughing and waiting restlessly for the competition to start. Billy walked down the aisle and up the wooden stairs onto the stage. Ruby was already seated, her name tag hanging around her neck. Ricardo sat down next to her, and Billy took the remaining seat. Ms. Winter’s team was busily going over their notes on the other side of the stage. The Hoove floated to the center and took a deep bow.

  “Too bad you guys can’t see me,” he called out to the audience, “because I’m about to perform the perfect moonwalk.”

  In his day, the Hoove had been a terrific dancer, and during his time as a ghost, he had learned all the popular dances of the last hundred years. He could do the Charleston, the jitterbug, the tango, the twist, the mashed potato, and even the funky chicken. What he loved best was the moonwalk. When he did it, it seemed like he was floating on air (which technically he was). As he began his perfect moonwalk across the stage, the Hoove shot a glance over at Billy.

  “I know what you’re thinking,” he said. “That old Hoover Porterhouse can bust a move.”

  And with that, he moonwalked down the stairs and up the aisle, coming to a stop next to the seat occupied by Rod Brownstone. Just for fun, he blew in Brownstone’s right ear. Rod promptly turned to Spencer Robinson, a muscular eighth grader who was sitting to the right of him, and slugged him in the arm.

  “What’d you do that for?” Spencer snapped, pulling himself up to his full height. “Actually, Brownstone, I don’t care what you did it for. If you do it again, I’m going to paper clip your lips together.”

  Rod backed off right away, flashing Spencer a timid grin and dropping the subject immediately. Like all bullies, Brownstone was a coward at heart and as soon as he was challenged, he sunk down into the cushion of his auditorium seat.

  Mr. Wallwetter tapped on the microphone to get the assembly’s attention and began the introduction of his team. As he spoke, the Hoove floated around the auditorium looking for the person whose mind he was going to read. After much consideration, he settled on Tess Wu, who was texting from a phone hidden in the folds of her purse so that the teachers couldn’t see it. The Hoove looked over her shoulder and saw that she was telling Ava Daley about a new pair of purple and silver running shoes she was going to buy that day.

  “This will work nicely,” he shouted out to Billy. “When I give you the signal, you tell them she’s thinking about buying purple and silver running shoes. I’ll give you more details as I get them.”

  By that time, Mr. Wallwetter had finished his introductions. Ms. Winter took the microphone to introduce her team, which consisted of Emily Yamaguchi, Samir Shah, and Paul Costello. Ms. Winter announced that Emily would demonstrate how to make an origami bird out of a dollar bill. Samir would demonstrate how to bend a stream of water using static electricity. And the final presentation would be Paul Costello demonstrating his wheelchair basketball skills.

  “We’ve got some stiff competition,” Ruby whispered.

  “No worries,” Ricardo said, throwing an arm around Billy. “We got the B Bomb here. No one’s going to beat him.”

  Billy silently thanked his lucky stars that the Hoove had shown up in time. Without him, the B Bomb would have fizzled out like a two-weekold can of soda. Billy looked nervously into the audience and was relieved to see the Hoove busily checking out Tess’s phone messages. She was watching the stage and didn’t notice her phone drifting slightly above her purse.

  “Getting all the goods on her,” the Hoover called out. “Trust me, we are going to amaze and delight. This trophy is in the bag … of that you can be sure.”

  The teachers flipped a coin to determine which team would go first, and Ms. Winter’s team won. Emily Yamaguchi and her origami dollar bill bird were up first. She did a good demonstration of something that was obviously hard to do. After she finished, the three judges each held up a paddle with a number from one to ten. Emily got all sevens. The judges said that they had to take points off because she said um and like too much.

  Ruby went next, and although she was extremely flexible while demonstrating her warm-up exercises, she completely toppled over during one of her lunges. She wasn’t hurt, and after taking a few seconds to collect herself, she stood back up and finished her routine. The judges gave her two eights and a nine. The eights were because she had fallen and the nine was for having the poise to get back up and finish her routine.

  When Ruby took her seat, Billy and Ricardo gave her high fives.

  “At least I got us in the lead.” She shrugged.

  “Even if I did lunge sideways.” Then, in typical Ruby fashion, she laughed. Billy was in awe of her self-confidence, that she could fall over in front of everyone and not be even the slightest bit embarrassed. He wondered if he would ever believe in himself that much.

  Next, Samir and Ricardo went head-to-head. Samir spoke first and demonstrated how the static electricity from a balloon that had been rubbed on a sweater could bend a stream of water. But his experiment didn’t work because he rubbed the balloon too hard and it popped before he could hold it up to the water. Luckily, he had a plastic comb in his pocket, and when he rubbed that on his sweater, it did the trick. The trickle of water bent toward the comb. Unluckily, Samir had forgotten to clean the hair out of his plastic comb, and when he was finished with the experiment, his white sweater had some serious strands of black hair traveling down the front. He got two eights and one seven from the judges. Two of the judges felt that he knew his science, but he didn’t project his voice to the back of the room. The third judge didn’t explain her score of seven, but chances were she objected to the hair party on his sweater.

  Ricardo had a strong start to his carrot and raisin salad demonstration. Unfortunately, he got some points taken off for dropping a clump of mayonnaise on the floor and then cracking up about it. When Ricardo started to laugh onstage, Billy glanced over at Mr. Wallwetter in the wings and could practically see smoke coming out of his ears. He was fuming.

  “Maintain your composure,” he hissed at Ricardo. “There is nothing funny about spilled mayonnaise.”

  Ricardo managed to finish his speech without cracking up again, but his eyes kept watering the way they do when you’re trying to stifle a laugh. He scored two sevens and a nine. To no one’s surprise, the nine was from Coach Johnston of the baseball team, who may have been a little biased in favor of his best home-run hitter. That made Ricardo’s score twenty-three, the same as Samir’s. Mr. Wallwetter’s team was four points in the lead.

  Ms. Winter announced that since the score was close, the winner of the competition was probably going to be determined by the last two contestants — Paul Costello and Billy Broccoli. She w
as looking forward to seeing how these two contestants would perform under such pressure.

  Paul Costello went first. Billy hadn’t met him yet, because they didn’t have any classes together, but he knew that Paul was a friend of Breeze’s. All Breeze had told him was that Paul was a really nice guy and that he had been in a wheelchair most of his life because of a lower spinal cord injury.

  Paul rolled his chair up to the microphone and asked Ms. Winter to take it away. Then he took a headset from his lap and slid it around his head. It had a thin wire microphone that led to his mouth, allowing him to speak and be heard without using his hands.

  “A lot of you might think that people in wheelchairs are limited,” he said to the kids in the auditorium. “I’m here to demonstrate that our limits are only in our mind. I’ve always wanted to play basketball, and I wasn’t going to let this chair stop me. So please watch and enjoy as I demonstrate wheelchair basketball skills.”

  Billy could feel the crowd moving to the edge of their seats. Even Ricardo leaned forward, eager to see what Paul could do.

  “I’ll start off with basic wheelchair movements such as the forward and backward push, the turn, the pivot, and the tilt,” Paul began. “Then I’ll show you a bounce pass and a chest pass. And I’ll end with a few different dribbles I’ve perfected over the years.”

  What followed was a dazzling display of athletic prowess. Paul moved his wheelchair up and down the stage with lightning speed. It was like it had a motor, only the motor was his two hands on the wheels. He moved with such grace and hustle that the audience almost forgot he was confined to a chair. As he pivoted and tilted, he explained how he used his hands and his torso to propel himself and maintain his balance.

  The passing demonstration was equally impressive. Billy watched in amazement as Paul shot chest passes and bounce passes across the stage to Samir and Emily. All Billy could think was that Paul was a better athlete with half his body than Billy was with his whole one. Ricardo leaned over and whispered in his ear.

  “You better do a humongous job, dude, because this guy rocks.”

  What Ricardo didn’t know was that Paul hadn’t even gotten to the good part yet. His dribbling demonstration was so dramatic that you could actually hear people in the audience gasping in amazement. Before he started, Samir and Emily set up orange cones in a straight line along the stage. Then Paul set off in his wheelchair, dribbling the ball and weaving between the cones until he reached the other side. On the way back, he did the same thing … dribbling two balls!

  The audience burst into applause. They gave Paul a standing ovation that went on for a full minute. The judges each held up their paddles — ten, ten, ten. A perfect score! From the audience, the Hoove saw that Billy was looking panic-stricken, so he flipped into hyperglide and zoomed up to the stage.

  “Don’t look so nervous,” he said as he hovered over Billy. “That guy was good, I’ll give you that. But never forget the Hoove’s Rule Number Two Hundred and Eight. When the going gets tough, the tough get going. We can take this.”

  “I’m not so sure,” Billy whispered.

  “I didn’t hear that,” the Hoove said. “What I heard is YES WE CAN. Now, are you ready to win this thing?”

  “I have to get at least all nines,” Billy said. “That’s hard to do.”

  “Not for us it isn’t,” the Hoove said, looking him square in the eye and putting both his pale hands on Billy’s shoulders. “Remember, YES WE CAN. Now, let’s do it.”

  As he flew into the audience to take his position next to Tess Wu, his voice echoed around the room with a ghostly howl. “Yyyyesssssss wwweeeeeeeeee caaaaaaaaaaaaaan!”

  It took Mr. Wallwetter quite a few minutes of tapping on the microphone to get the kids to settle down.

  “I need your attention, people,” he repeated over and over. “Our final contestant is waiting. Attention, people. Attention, please!”

  No matter what he said, the kids kept applauding and shouting for Paul. Poor Mr. Wallwetter got so frustrated that his mustache actually twitched, which made it look like a very skinny caterpillar was hiccuping on his upper lip. When Paul saw that there was no way Mr. Wallwetter was going to get control of the cheering kids, he spoke into his headset microphone.

  “Listen up, you guys,” he said. “The other team still has a chance to pull this out. I know I’m a hard act to follow, but show some respect to my man Billy over there.”

  That made the kids quiet down. Billy barely noticed the noise level dipping and the kids taking their seats. He was deep in thought.

  “Our next contestant is Billy Broccoli, who stunned my first-period English class with his amazing feat of mind reading,” Mr. Wallwetter said. “Billy, come forward.”

  Billy walked to the center of the stage staring at his feet the whole time.

  “Look up,” the Hoove shouted as he hovered in the audience above an unsuspecting Tess Wu. “There’s nothing on that floor but wood and scuff marks. Show them your eyes, Billy Boy. Command the room.”

  Billy didn’t even look at Hoover. He couldn’t. A feeling was rising up inside his chest … a feeling he knew the Hoove wouldn’t like one bit.

  Mr. Wallwetter spent more time than he needed adjusting the microphone to Billy’s height. It was just an excuse to whisper his final instructions in Billy’s ear.

  “You have to get twenty-seven points for the win,” he muttered. “Go for three nines. That’s what I’m expecting from you. Nothing less. Hopefully more.”

  Billy noticed that Mr. Wallwetter’s breath smelled like egg salad. He had never been a fan of egg salad.

  Mr. Wallwetter took his place in the wings, while Billy stood alone in front of the microphone. He looked out at the sea of expectant faces in the audience. He knew that he and the Hoove could amaze them with their mind-reading trick. But after watching Paul, he realized that their demonstration was exactly that — a trick. What Paul did was real, the result of a lifetime of effort and work and courage. And what was he going to demonstrate?

  A trick. A fake. A lie.

  “Let’s get this show on the road,” the Hoove shouted at him. “Open that mouth of yours and commence. You’re looking a little pitiful up there.”

  Billy did open his mouth and commence.

  “Does anyone here have a watch with a second hand?” he said.

  Samir raised his hand.

  “You don’t need a watch!” the Hoove shouted. “That’s not in the plan. Have Tess stand up. Tell her you’re going to read her mind. Get to it, Billy Boy.”

  “I’ve changed my topic at the last minute,” Billy said. “I have decided to demonstrate my amazing ability to recite the alphabet backward in under fifteen seconds. Samir, I’d like you to time me.”

  “Noooooooooo!” the Hoove hollered. “Don’t do it, Billy. It’s dull. It’s boring. Trust me, it is dangerously uncool. You’ll ruin your social life forever. There’s still time to change your mind.”

  Billy paused on the stage, thinking carefully about the Hoove’s words. He was right. The mind-reading trick was exciting. It was mysterious. It would probably win his team the SOC contest. And it would make him the center of attention at school for a long time to come.

  Billy looked at Paul Costello, who gave him a thumbs-up. He was a cool guy. Genuinely cool. There was nothing fake about him.

  “I’m ready when you are, Samir,” Billy said.

  Samir looked at his watch, then pointed a finger at Billy.

  “Go,” he said.

  “Don’t go!” the Hoove shouted. “I’m begging you.”

  Billy took a deep breath.

  “Z … Y … X … W …”

  “You’re killing me,” cried the Hoove. “I was sent here to help you. I’m getting graded on this!”

  “N … M … L … K … J …”

  “Now I’m going to be stuck here for all eternity,” the Hoove cried. “Thanks a lot, Billy Broccoli.”

  Billy continued with the alphabet. The Hoove was
so furious that he spun around, flipped into hyperglide, and zoomed out of the auditorium.

  Billy didn’t care. He finished anyway.

  “E … D … C … B … A!”

  A few kids in the audience applauded. Billy saw that most of the applause was coming from Breeze and her friends. He appreciated the support.

  “How’d I do?” Billy asked Samir, who was still staring at his watch.

  “Nineteen seconds,” he answered.

  “Ha ha ha! You stink, Broccoli,” Rod Brownstone called out from the audience. Some kids around him laughed as well, and Ms. Winter had to go to the microphone and tell them their behavior was inappropriate.

  Billy looked over at Mr. Wallwetter as he waited for the judge’s scores. The poor man had flopped down into a folding chair in the wings and was nervously tugging at his stringy little mustache. Billy felt bad about letting him down, but he knew he had done the right thing. He walked back to his chair and sat down.

  “What happened, dude?” Ricardo whispered.

  Before Billy could answer, the judges held up their paddles. Eight. Seven. Eight.

  Mr. Wallwetter’s head fell into his hands. He was taking it hard. Then he composed himself and walked to the stage, where Ms. Winter was waiting for him at the microphone.

  “The final score is Team Wallwetter seventy-one points, Team Winter seventy-four points,” he announced. “On behalf of my team, I congratulate the winners — Emily Yamaguchi, Samir Shah, and Paul Costello.”

  Paul accepted the trophy on behalf of their team, and once again, he got a standing ovation.

  “The Wallwetters were great competitors,” he told the audience. “Ruby, nice recovery on stage. Billy, impressive try. You’ll get it next time. And Ricardo … what can I say?”

  He rolled over to Ricardo and held up his hand for a high five, one athlete to another.

  “Maybe you should stick to baseball, man. That mayonnaise thing was ugly.”

  Everyone laughed, especially Ricardo.

  It was a tradition that the losing team had to stay behind and take the chairs down from the stage. Mr. Wallwetter claimed he had a headache and went back to his room, leaving the kids under the supervision of Mr. Labelle, the school custodian. As they folded up the chairs and carried them to the storage closet, Billy knew he had to explain himself to Ricardo and Ruby.