Grape! Read online

  I was born to dodge!

  Mrs. C, no one ever catches Bully Jim’s throws because the ball shoots out of his hand like a cannonball, and the kids who try, like Lou, get bloody noses or roll on the ground moaning and holding their stomachs.

  The thing is, even though he throws a cannonball, he always throws sidearm, so his windup is super slow.

  He never hits me. Not ever.

  And it drives Bully Jim crazy!

  This one day it was just me and him left on the court. I stood in the faraway corner and he sidearm-cannoned and I just stepped to the side, and I was calm like I had all day to decide what dodge to use, and it was kind of fun because I saw his face getting super red and heard him calling me Grapeface Fagpants, and the Twins from the sidelines calling me Grapeface Fagpants, and when it was my turn to throw, I would just roll the ball back to him because I had no chance of knocking him out.

  So my plan was to dodge until the bell rang and watch Bully Jim’s face get redder and redder.

  And it worked.

  The bell rang, and I walked off the court and got in line at the drinking fountain.

  That’s when I heard his voice.

  “Hey, Grapeface Loser Fagpants.”

  “Yeah?”

  His arm was already cocked.

  “Dodge this.”

  The school nurse gave me an ice pack to put on my nose. She said it probably wasn’t broken, but I should go to the hospital.

  “And keep the ice pack on,” she said.

  My mom drove me to the hospital.

  “¡Dios mío!” she said. “Grape, what is this game?”

  “It’s dodgeball, mom. And it’s not a game, it’s a sport.”

  “Is dangerous.”

  “Mom, I’ve been playing it every day for a hundred years!”

  “¡No hables! Keep the ice pack on, Grape!”

  The emergency room took forever, but the doctor agreed with the school nurse.

  “No broken nose,” he said, “but I think it’s best you keep him home from school the rest of the week. If he vomits or stops eating, anything else out of the ordinary, get him back to a doctor.”

  By the time I got to Lou’s, I had two black eyes.

  “But my nose isn’t broken,” I said.

  “Jeez, man,” Lou said, “just jeez. You look like a raccoon.”

  “Thanks.”

  “No, I mean, really, like a raccoon. Or Zorro!”

  “Thanks.”

  “Bully Jim throws hard.”

  “I know.”

  “But he still never got you out.”

  “I know.”

  “Hey, you wanna go swimming?”

  “I can’t. I can’t do any sports stuff, and I’m not allowed to go to school until Monday.”

  “Lucky.”

  “I know.”

  “At least you don’t have to wear a helmet.”

  “Very funny.”

  “You wanna watch TV?”

  “Okay.”

  “And then Monopoly?”

  “Okay.”

  So that’s what we did. We watched TV and played Monopoly and when Lou got home from school the next day we watched more TV and played more Monopoly, and then on Sunday we watched Movie of the Week with our moms about the lion and the villagers, and Lou came to my room and we wrote out a plan.

  We called it Operation Bully Bully Jim.

  First, I steal a bed sheet from home, then during lunch, we sneak off in different directions to avoid suspicion and then we meet at the steel grate behind the bushes where the buses pick us up. Mrs. C, do you know that grate? Sometimes Lou and I drop pennies between the bars, and a second later there’s a clink in the darkness.

  So we meet there during lunch and lift the steel grate and hide it in the hedges, then put the bed sheet over the hole and weigh down the corners with rocks and then cover it with leaves and grass.

  During the day we get Bully Jim mad at us, then at bus pick-up time we get him super mad at us, and then Bully Jim chases us behind the hedges, and we leap over the sheet and Bully Jim falls into the pit just like the lion in the movie!

  And there would be all this noise from the buses and all the kids getting on and heading home, and no one would know he was there!

  At recess on Monday, Lou and I sat at our table drinking our juice boxes when Bully Jim walked over.

  “What happened to you, Grapeface? You look like a raccoon.”

  “Oh, I don’t know,” I said. “I think this dumb guy did an illegal throw. In dodgeball, I mean.”

  Mrs. C, I’m bad at insults.

  But it didn’t take much to get Bully Jim mad.

  “Is that right, Fagpants? Well, you must have deserved it.”

  “No, he didn’t,” Lou said. “You’re just…you’re just mad because you can’t get him out on a legal throw because he always dodges you, and your throws are fast but they’re easy to dodge, and the only reason you ever get me out is because I try to catch them!”

  Lou is even worse at insults than me.

  Bully Jim turned to the Twins. “How about that, Lou-Lou wants to protect his boyfriend!”

  The Twins laughed.

  “Like I said, Lou-Lou, he deserved it.”

  He dropped a slow loogie on the cement, then he snatched the juice boxes out of our hands and squeezed what was left on top of our heads.

  We were sticky, but our plan was working!

  During Mr. Schneider’s class I couldn’t sit still.

  He talked more than usual about his sailboat and how lucky he was not to be a land lover like the rest of us, and then he said we would have extra homework because we ran out of time.

  But I didn’t care because all I could think about was our plan.

  Finally, the lunch bell rang.

  When I got to the grate, Lou was already there.

  “Did you bring the sheet?” he said.

  I told him I did.

  We got on opposite sides and then crouched down and slipped our fingers between the iron bars.

  “Okay,” Lou said, “do you have a good grip?”

  “Yes.”

  “Okay, on the count of three. ONE…TWO…THREE!”

  The thing is, in all my life I had never tried to lift an iron grate. And like I said, I don’t have many muscles, and iron grates are super heavy.

  We lifted it a tiny bit.

  Then my arms jerked down and my elbows locked.

  “Now shuffle!” Lou said, “SHUFFLE!”

  Mrs. C, we didn’t really plan this part out.

  I guess we thought we would just lift the grate and kind of toss it in the bushes, so when Lou said “SHUFFLE!” I shuffled to the right, but Lou also shuffled to the right, so the grate turned like the hands of a clock.

  “Grrraaayyype…” Lou said. “This wayyy….” He kind of jerked his head.

  I tried to follow him, but my fingers were white and my arms burned and my elbows felt like they were about to break, and my raccoon eyes were bulging, and no matter how hard I tried, no matter how much I wanted revenge on Bully Jim, my fingers started to straighten.

  And then I dropped the grate.

  Mrs. C, you know the way time can slow down? Like something happens super fast but you remember every second?

  Well, that’s what happened.

  The iron bars slipped through my fingers and my end of the grate dented the grass.

  Oh, that’s interesting, I thought. That grate sure weighs a lot.

  Then I heard the grass screaming.

  Then I thought, But that’s impossible! Grass doesn’t scream!

  Then I realized it was Lou’s scream.

  Mrs. C, it was the loudest and longest scream I ever heard. It must have carried into the hallw
ays and classrooms and offices of the school, and scared the turkey vultures higher into the sky, and crossed into the rolling hills and through the neighbors’ windows and even into outer space.

  And then the scream made two words.

  “MYYYYY FIIIIIIINNNNNNNGERRRRRRR!!!!”

  Lou’s finger was trapped under the edge of the iron grate.

  Actually, the middle finger on Lou’s left hand was trapped under the edge of the grate, and he was on his knees, looking up at the sky, like he was praying.

  “FIIIIIIINNNNNNNGERRRRRRR!!!!”

  Mrs. C, I could have tried to lift the grate. I also could have screamed for help, but Lou had that covered.

  So I ran back to the playground and onto the dodgeball court.

  “About time, Grapeface Fagpants,” Bully Jim said.

  That night I knocked on Lou’s door.

  Betsy answered and said Lou would be in bed for a few days.

  A few days passed and I knocked again.

  This time Lou answered. His arm was in a sling and a metal splint covered his smashed finger.

  “I had surgery. The doctor said it was like putting a jigsaw puzzle back together. I have pins in there now for the rest of my life.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s all right. Roman got there really fast.”

  “Roman’s cool,” I said.

  “Yeah, he is.”

  “Could you hear his keychain?”

  “No. I was screaming.”

  “Oh yeah.”

  “And I’m suspended.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes, and my dad is really mad.”

  “Thanks for not telling on me.”

  “It’s okay.”

  “You wanna watch TV or something?” I said.

  “I can’t. I’m grounded.”

  When Lou’s splint came off, he showed me his finger.

  It was kind of crooked.

  THE TROUBLE WITH DONNY RANDALL

  June 7, 1976

  Mrs. C, the trouble started with the new kid at school, Donny Randall.

  The thing is, he was fancy. He wore bell-bottoms and button-up shirts even if it was hot, and fancy high tops, and he combed his hair back super straight and he had this fancy handshake.

  But he was super fancy at basketball.

  He even played on the Hawks!

  During recess, he dribbled between his legs and spun the ball on his finger and made granny free throws, and passed behind his back, and he had this super fancy cherry pick layup.

  Mrs. C, you’re probably wondering what a cherry pick is.

  Let’s say I’m on defense. When the guy I’m covering shoots the ball, I sprint towards my basket. The guy who rebounds it passes it to me because I’m all by myself, and since I’m all by myself, I get to shoot a layup, and the thing is, a normal layup is easy. You just dribble to the hoop and bank it in.

  But not the Donny Randall layup!

  Donny Randall dribbles straight under the hoop and spins the ball around the rim and it goes in every time!

  It’s so fancy!

  And the spiders love fancy things.

  During recess Donny Randall was doing the Donny Randall layup and the spiders went crazy.

  Hey, Grape, they said.

  “Yeah?”

  Do you see how fancy that kid is?

  “You mean Donny Randall?”

  Yeah, him.

  “Yeah, he’s super fancy. He plays on the Hawks.”

  What are the Hawks?

  “They’re a team in Tryout League.”

  Grape, you need to be on the Hawks, too.

  “Why?”

  So you can do that fancy layup.

  Mrs. C, the thing is, I already played in Park League, and in Park League nobody gets cut.

  I tried to tell the spiders I could do the Donny Randall layup in Park League.

  But the spiders didn’t care.

  So after school one day, I walked up to Donny Randall and asked him about tryouts.

  “Cool, man,” he said.

  He opened his backpack and handed me a flyer.

  I put my hand out for a fancy handshake, but he was gone.

  My mom thought it was a bad idea.

  “All your friends are in Park League,” she said. “Even Lou is in Park League.”

  She was right, and Lou was better than me.

  And the thing is, in Park League everyone makes the team and everyone has to play at least one quarter, but in Tryout League lots of kids get cut.

  “It’s okay if I don’t make it, Mom. I just want to try.”

  My mom looked at my dad.

  “And, look,” I said, “I get three days to try out. It’s official.”

  I took the flyer from my pocket and uncrumpled it.

  My dad looked at the paper. “Well, is in writing. And you always need to get in writing.” He ruffled my hair. “Okay, sometimes is good to try something new. Sometimes you step up to the plate and no one else can do it for you. Let me put it this way….”

  A few days later I walked into the gym with my Dr. J. basketball. A coach with a North Valley Hawks T-shirt and a mustache sat behind a table.

  My mom signed me up.

  Then another coach with the same kind of mustache and T-shirt shouted, “Bleacher-up!”

  It was kind of weird how both coaches had mustaches, but then it was even weirder that when I bleachered-up I saw Sherman sitting there.

  Mrs. C, Sherman is even shorter than me and he has curly black hair and freckles and glasses, and the thing is, he’s older than us but he’s also super smart, so no one knows why he’s in our grade, and he never plays dodgeball or tetherball during recess or lunch. He mostly sits with his lunch pail and he hardly ever talks to anyone, so it was weird to see him wearing gym shorts and a headband.

  He held onto a brand-new basketball.

  “Hey, Sherman,” I said, “um…what are you doing here?”

  “My father’s making me.” His voice kind of trembled. “He says it’s part of my bar mitzvah training.”

  “Oh.”

  “And my Torah portion has nothing to do with basketball!”

  “Oh.”

  “I have no chance of making this team,” he said.

  “Yes, you do,” I said.

  “No, I don’t. I have about as much a chance of making this team as becoming president. Actually, I have a better chance of becoming president.”

  “I guess you’re right.”

  “What about you?” Sherman said. “You’re not exactly Jerry West.”

  “Yeah, well, Park League is kind of lame.”

  “Sports are lame.”

  “Where did you get that basketball?”

  “I don’t know. My father bought it last night.”

  “Cool. You might want to take the price sticker off.”

  Sherman just sat there.

  “Hey, but at least we get three days,” I said. “That’s the rule. They have to let us try out three days, then they can cut us. It’s official.”

  “Great,” Sherman said, “three days. This is not normal for me!”

  Mrs. C, the thing is, it wasn’t normal for me, either.

  On the first day of Park League, kids shoot baskets and fool around before the coach gathers them, and the coach wears a T-shirt and shorts, but sometimes he comes straight from his job and so he has a tie or a fancy shirt, and the assistant coach is usually one of the dads or even a high school kid, and the first day we get in a circle and introduce ourselves, and then we write our name on an index card and our favorite after-practice snack, and then we do a lot of shootaround and a scrimmage.

  But on the first day of Tryout League we just sat on the bleachers and waite
d. I mean, there was this super nice gym and a bunch of kids with basketballs and no one on the court, and when sign-ins were done, the mustache coaches left through a door and came out with another coach, and they walked behind the new coach.

  It was super dramatic!

  The new coach was tall, and his head was bald and shiny in the gym lights, so it made him look even taller, and he had a blue windbreaker with a hawk on it, and all three of the coaches had whistles dangling from their necks, and they all wore blue sweatpants and white sneakers.

  The new coach spoke.

  “I’m Coach Sperling. This is First Assistant McNamera and Second Assistant Carter. I’m going to call out names. When you hear your name, say, ‘Here, Coach!’”

  “Abrams, Mike.”

  “Here, Coach!”

  “Banini, Sam.”

  “Here, Coach!”

  “Borokovich, Grayy…pe?”

  I stood up.

  “Here, sir!”

  “What the—what kind of name is that?”

  “It’s my adopted name, sir!”

  “Ah, okay. Well, that’s fine. But don’t call me sir. It’s Coach.”

  “Yes, Coach!”

  “And you don’t need to stand.”

  After roll call, we did shootaround.

  Sherman was out by the top of the key, just standing there. When a ball bounced to him, he handed it to another kid or kind of punched it away. I was worried about him, but then I realized something.

  It was the perfect time to practice the Donny Randall!

  I took a few dribbles at the top of the key and headed straight to the front of the rim, but when I crossed the free throw line, a whistle blew, and it kind of scared me, and the ball hit my foot and rolled across the floor and banked off a wall and under the bleachers.

  “Let’s go!” Coach Sperling said. “Circle up. Everyone. Midcourt. Now!”

  On the ride home, I could tell my mom was worried.

  “¿Cómo te fue? How was it playing those other kids—”

  “It was good,” I said.

  The thing is, Mrs. C, I was telling the truth. I liked it. I mean, it was super official! All we did the first day was drills. We did give-and-goes and layup drills and rebounding drills and free-throw drills. We even practiced something called a “back screen.”