Full Court Press (7 page)

Mr. Roberts changed gears again and the car jolted forward, bouncing me against the seat as it rocked and bumped. Every time he changed gears it registered deep down in the pit of my stomach, which wasn't feeling that great even before we started this trip.

My worst fear was that I'd get sick. Mr. Roberts wasn't the best driver in the world, but his driving couldn't explain my stomach. I was nervous… no, I was more than nervous… I was scared. And there was neither the time nor the place to get sick. I was wedged into the back, my body pressed against one of the other two people who shared the back seat. One of
those was Roy. At least I was separated from him by another kid and I didn't have to have to be squished against him.

As we'd gotten into the car he'd made a joke about me. He said how ‘lucky' they all were to have me in the car with them because ‘a real-sized kid' wouldn't have fit. He certainly did know how to make somebody feel special.

Up ahead through the front windshield I could see Mr. White's car. He and a parent who had volunteered to drive were bringing the rest of the team. I wondered if either of them drove any better than Mr. Roberts and if I could drive back with one of them after the game. Then again, after the game I was sure my stomach was going to be better no matter who was driving.

“So how are people feeling?” Mr. Roberts asked.

“Fine — cool — excited” were the words that bounced back at him. I thought that ‘about to bring up' didn't quite fit in.

“The team we're playing today is Vista Heights Public School,” Mr. Roberts said.

“Vista Heights!” I exclaimed. “Didn't they win the league championship last year?”

“Yes, they did,” Mr. Roberts confirmed. “But all those kids from last year's championship team have graduated and moved on.”

That was good to hear. Maybe this year's players wouldn't be as good as last —

“Of course, they've won the league championship four of the last five years,” Mr. Roberts added. “They seem to be able to put together great teams year after year.”

Everybody in the whole car fell silent. I had a thought that maybe I wasn't the only one who suddenly didn't feel so good.

“I know their coach,” Mr. Roberts said. “That's how I was able to arrange this game before the season officially started. You know, have a little friendly game. He said his team wasn't quite up to the standards he expected.”

So maybe this wouldn't be so bad after all.

“But I'm sure their coach was just saying that about his team to get me all psyched out. You know, claiming they weren't so good to get us overconfident.”

I almost laughed out loud. Being over-confident was just about the last thing I was worried about. The car lurched again and I remembered what I
was
most worried about — barfing in the back seat.

* * *

I tried to stay close to Mr. Roberts as we walked in. Nobody was saying anything. Maybe I wasn't the only one who was feeling nervous. The only sound was the noise of our feet shuffling up the hall.

Then, faintly at first, I could hear the unmistakable sound of basketballs bouncing. We followed the sounds, getting louder and louder. Then I picked up that other basketball sound — the squeaks of sneakers against floor. I loved that sound.

Mr. Roberts pulled open one of a pair of double doors. “Here we are,” he said as he ushered us in.

“Wow,” somebody mumbled.

Stretched out before us was a gigantic, gleaming gymnasium. It had to be three times as big as our little gym. There were nets — I counted them — eight nets, and bleachers — real live bleachers. I'd played in gyms like this before, when our rep team was in tournaments, but those were always in high schools or colleges or fancy recreation centers. Not ever in elementary schools.

At the far end of the gym, warming up, was
our opposition. They were doing a simple layup drill. Simple, but they were doing it well. Very well.

“Okay, everybody, go and get changed,” Mr. Roberts said.

Mr. White led us to a bench off to the side, while Mr. Roberts went down to see the teacher leading the drills at the other end. I watched as I walked. The two of them met, shook hands and began joking around, laughing. I turned my attention to the kids doing the drill. Their coach wasn't watching and they still executed the drill perfectly. That wasn't good.

“Here you go,” Mr. White said.

“Thanks,” I said as I took the sweater he offered me from the bag he was carrying.

I held it up. It was Clark colors — yellow and blue. Number eleven was on the back. These were our school's basketball sweaters. And soccer sweaters, and volleyball sweaters and baseball sweaters. I figured if we had a swim team they would have put these on before they jumped into the pool.

As I slipped it on over top of my T-shirt I caught a deep whiff of the sweater. I didn't think it had been washed for a long time, if ever.

Next I pulled off my tear-aways and sat down to change shoes. Mr. Roberts came back to join us.

“We're going to be starting in a couple of minutes. I want everybody to go out and warm up. Come on, Nick, get those shoes on!”

I did up the laces as quickly as I could, but was still the last on the floor. Kids took shots and fooled around on their own until Mr. Roberts joined us on the floor and set us up to do a lay-up drill. Thank goodness he hadn't asked us to do a weave. That would have been embarrassing.

Between my turns I looked down at the other team. They didn't look much bigger than us. Actually, except for me and Kia, I thought we were probably a little bit bigger.

They'd switched to another drill. They were coming toward the hoop, stopping, and putting up a jumper. They were making some and missing some. Nothing too special.

What was special though was the way they were dressed. They were all wearing basketball sweaters — real basketball sweaters. Gold and black with a gigantic eagle emblem on the front. And they were wearing matching shorts and socks. The only difference between players was
their shoes. With us, the only thing the same was our smelly sweaters.

“Come on, Nick, it's your turn,” Dean said, handing me a ball.

I dribbled, put a pass over to the other lane, ran to the net to receive the return pass, grabbed the ball and laid it up on the boards for a basket. At least that still worked. Maybe we'd do okay.

* * *

“Nice game,” he said as he slapped my hand on the way by.

“Nice game,” said the second player and then the third and fourth as we walked through the line.

It didn't matter what words came out of their mouths, I could tell by the smirks on their face, and the numbers on the scoreboard, what they really were thinking: you guys stink, you guys suck, you don't belong in the same gym with us. And the worst part was they were right.

The scorekeeper flipped the board back to zero. Thank goodness I didn't have to look at the score any longer. Not that I'd ever forget
it. Seventy-six to twenty-nine.

“I want everybody to sit down and we'll talk for a little while before we drive home,” Mr. Roberts said.

He was trying to sound cheerful, but I could tell by the catch in his voice that he was as bothered by the score as the rest of us. He was trying his best to hide his feelings.

“Obviously we didn't win today, but we did learn some important things.”

I had to agree. We'd learned lots of things — none of which I wanted to know.

“Our challenge is to look at our game, as a team and individually, and decide what we did right and what we need to improve on.”

It wouldn't take long to think about what we'd done right. We hadn't scored on our own net, nobody had died, and we'd found the school. That was about it.

There wasn't much for me to do about the way I'd played either. I'd been out for about thirty seconds in the first half and no more than two minutes in the second. I'd taken no shots, made no points, had no fouls, no assists, no rebounds, and had made one steal. That one steal was the only thing separating me from a perfect ‘O-fer' game.

“You have to realized that this team we were playing has been together for a long time. They were playing as a group last year,” Mr. Roberts said. “Vista always has a ‘B' team of grade fours. They practiced with the grade five championship team from last year. So keep in mind that we lost to a very good team.”

“Why did we have to play against them for our first game?” Dean questioned, asking the question that I think was on everybody's mind.

“To see what we could do well, and to figure out what we needed to work on. This was a good loss,” Mr. Roberts said.

If this was a good loss, I would have hated to see what a bad loss looked like.

“We now have a week to work and improve before we play our first official game of the season. I know where we stand. We'll be working hard to improve certain areas of the game. Any questions?”

Everybody just sat there silently, although I was sure there were things people wanted to ask or say.

“Everybody take off your sweaters,” Mr. Roberts said.

I took a deep breath and pulled mine over
my head. At least I didn't have to worry about it being wet from my sweat.

“Do we have a volunteer to take the sweaters home and put them through a wash?” Mr. Roberts asked.

Nobody put up their hand.

“Come on, they really stink,” he said.

“Maybe Kia should take them,” Roy said.

“I guess I could —,” she started to say.

“Because washing is woman's work,” he said, cutting her off.

Mr. Roberts shot Roy a nasty look. Saying something like that when a teacher was already angry was not the smartest thing in the world. But then again, look who said it.

“Kia's not going to wash them,” Marcus said, jumping in. “And neither is anybody else on this team.”

What did he mean… was he wanting one of the coaches to wash them?

“These sweaters stink,” he said. “And so do we.”

“Marcus we weren't that —”

“Yes, we were!” he exclaimed, cutting Mr. Roberts off. “Look at the score. We stunk today.”

Nobody offered an argument.

“We stunk as bad as these sweaters, and I don't think we should wash the sweaters until we stop stinking,” Marcus continued.

“You mean, like a protest,” Kia said.

Marcus nodded his head. “When we stop stinking, then the sweaters can stop stinking.”

A couple of kids nodded their head in agreement.

“Is that what people want?” Mr. Roberts asked.

A few more mumbled or nodded agreement. What he was saying made sense to me — strange, smelly sense, but sense.

“Then that's it,” Mr. Roberts said. “The sweaters don't get washed until we show we can play better. Stuff ‘em in my bag and I'll hang onto them for the next game.”