Off the Crossbar (8 page)

It was the day after the vote, and Charlie still couldn’t get it out of his mind. He put his book down and looked out the window for what felt like the hundredth time since he sat down to do his book report. To his surprise he saw a kid on a bike wearing a dark blue sweatshirt turn sharply into his driveway. That was a Terrence Falls sweatshirt, he noticed.

The doorbell rang.

“Someone is here to see you,” Danielle yelled.

“Okay. I’ll be right there.”

Charlie ran downstairs and opened the door. Pudge waved a Frisbee.

“Wondered if you wanted to toss the bean around at school before dinner?” He paused. “Are you doin’ anything now?”

“I’m workin’ on my book report.”

“Cool. I just finished mine.”

“I’m jealous. I just started. It took me an hour to come up with a title. I can’t seem to get started. Not sure
if Hilton’s gonna be impressed with five blank pages.”

“What are you doing it on?”

“I chose
Animal Farm
.”

“Any good?”

“Actually, it is. I was surprised. I was up half the night finishing. It got pretty exciting at the end.”

“What’s it about?

“Animals take over a farm.”

“How do they do that?”

“The animals can talk to each other. The farmer is this cruel nutbar — and they chase him off. Then the animals start turning on each other. It’s kinda complicated — very intense stuff.”

“When you’re done with it maybe I’ll read it. Sounds kinda interesting.”

Charlie leaned against the door. “Yeah, okay. No problem. I’ll bring it to school tomorrow.”

“So do you need a break from all that heavy thinking?”

“I don’t think so. I’ve barely done any thinking at all.”

Pudge’s face fell. “That’s cool. I understand you wanna get it done.”

Charlie knew he should keep working. It was due first thing Monday morning. Frisbee was tempting, though. And it would be rude to say no. Maybe a game of Frisbee was what he needed to get the creative juices flowing.

“Let’s do it. No point staring at the wall any longer. I’ll finish it after supper. Hold on while I get my shoes.”

Pudge grinned. “Awesome. I’ll wait for you on the road.” He hopped on his bike and rolled down the driveway.

Charlie went into the living room. His grandmother and sister were reading together on the sofa.

“Grandma, I’m just going out with a friend for a bit.”

“Who’s the friend?”

“A guy from school.”

“Okay, dear. Your mother will be back from work soon. She said we’re eating at six-thirty, so don’t be too long.”

“I won’t.”

“Have fun,” she said, resuming her reading.

Charlie put on his running shoes, grabbed his bike from the garage, and joined Pudge.

“I hope I didn’t surprise you too much yesterday … after practice, with the nomination,” Pudge said as they pushed off. “You got dressed pretty fast. I got the feeling that maybe you weren’t too happy about it.”

Charlie shrugged. “I admit I was surprised. You didn’t have to do that, though. I don’t know many guys on the team, so …” His voice trailed off.

“I wasn’t doing it as a favour. I really think you’d make the best captain — and I think you have a good chance of winning.”

“Ethan will be captain, or maybe Jake,” Charlie replied.

“Maybe. I’m not sure about Jake. He’s been a real jerk lately, even by his standards, and I don’t believe he has as many friends as he thinks.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Charlie replied uneasily. He’d never considered the possibility that a grade ten or Jake wouldn’t win.

In a couple of minutes they were there. Charlie put his bike down and took off down the field.

“I’m open — hit me, dude,” he called out.

Pudge got off his bike and flung the Frisbee — a perfect strike. Charlie barely had to break stride. He whirled and fired it back. Pudge bounced the hovering Frisbee off his fingertips a few times before hauling it in. The guy could obviously play. Charlie was impressed. They settled down into an easy rhythm, challenging each other with longer and longer throws. It was still warm, and it didn’t take too long to work up a sweat, as they ran all over the field. After ten minutes or so, Charlie let loose a wild toss, which curved sharply towards the school and crashed into some concrete steps.

Pudge pretended not to see the Frisbee. He held his hand over his eyes, peering all around him. Charlie laughed and jogged over. It was resting against the bottom of the railing. As he leaned down to get it, he heard the familiar sound of a skateboard rolling along the pavement. He looked up in time to see a guy doing a railslide, heading straight for his head. He dropped to the pavement as the boarder flew over him.

The boarder landed easily, threw in an ollie, and then added a 5-0 grind, bringing himself to a full stop.

Incensed at the rider’s recklessness, Charlie leapt to his feet, ready to confront him. He took two steps towards him and then stopped short — it was Zachary.

“Hey, dude, how many times do I have to tell you to keep your head up?” he said.

Charlie had to laugh. “A half-second warning is all I’m
asking, then you can try to kill yourself on your board.”

“Sometimes you just need to let it fly.”

They came together and punched fists.

“Nice board,” Charlie said.

“Relatively new purchase — a combination Christmas present and forced savings. I just got it before school. Check it out.”

Charlie took the board from him. “Do you like the small wheels?”

“I think they’re 42 or 43 — and hard as granite. The rating is something like 98.”

Charlie was impressed. “I’ve never been on a board like this.”

“I really shouldn’t use it on the street. I felt like a quick ride before dinner, and lent my other board to a buddy. I figured, what’s the worst that could happen?”

“You could put the nose through Charlie’s head!” Pudge said.

He had come over to join them.

“How’s it going, Pudge?” Zachary said.

“Good. Tossing the bean around with Charlie.” He noticed the new skateboard. “Cool machine,” he said. “Check out that deck.”

The deck had a bright orange and red sun, with fluorescent flames radiating in all directions.

“Custom job, dudes. A buddy of mine does them.”

“Who’s that?” Pudge asked.

“You know Griffin Page?”

“I think so. He hangs out at the skate park, right?”

“Hangs out? The guy lives there. You should see him
ride. The other day he came flying down a ramp, at maximum velocity, doing a tail powerslide, then after landing he right away cracks off a 360 kickflip, followed by a cab jump, and shuts it down with a nose stall — and I’m talking about within five feet of each other. The guy is a wizard. His vert ramp is totally insane. Gravity has no impact on that dude.”

Charlie was about to ask for a translation, but held off. He didn’t want to sound like a novice. He’d always considered himself a fairly decent rider — he and his friends used to fool around with their boards at recess. He obviously didn’t compare to Zachary, or his friend.

Pudge didn’t hesitate to ask, however. “How come you stop speaking English whenever the subject of skateboarding comes up? What’s a 360 kickflip? And how do you jump over a cab?”

Zachary gave Pudge a good-natured shove. “Sorry, I forgot I was hanging out with a hockey crowd. The 360 is a combination shuvit and kickflip, so you jump up and spin the board around completely. Cab jump is doing a rotation, fakie, and landing forwards. Named after Steve Caballero. Nose stall is popping up on the nose and grinding it along the ground.”

“So what’s fakie?” Pudge asked.

“When you do a trick with your weaker foot forward. It’s just harder, that’s all. Hey, you guys need to come with me to the park and learn some tricks. I can’t play with guys with pathetic ollies.”

Pudge started waving his hand towards the school. “Hey guys. Where you off to?” he shouted.

Charlie looked up and saw Scott and Nick riding their bikes towards them.

“You guys must love school,” Scott said. “Did you ever leave, or are ya waiting to get into the library early?”

“We were going over some math formulas, and reviewing our book reports,” Charlie said.

“You need to calm down, Joyce. I don’t know what you did in your old hometown, but that’s a little too wild for these parts,” Scott said.

“So where are you guys off to?” Pudge asked.

“We’re going home,” Nick said. “We just went to check out the new hockey equipment at Dunn’s.”

“What’s Dunn’s?” Charlie said.

“Sporting goods store,” Nick said. “They’ve got all the hockey stuff you need. I had my hands on this Easton — sells for $425, and you can pick it up with your baby finger, it’s so light.”

“Better yet,” Scott said, “I tried on a pair of Mission skates — I think they go for over $700. The sales guy was telling me all about them. Said they have so much support you can carve on a dime. And there’s a flex system that adds power to your stride. Apparently, my entire game would change with those things on my feet.”

“So Scott offers the guy fifty bucks for them,” Nick broke in.

Scott laughed. “You should have been there. He thought I was serious. I kept saying, ‘Look, take the fifty, and we’ll call it even.’ And he kept saying, ‘That wouldn’t even pay for the laces.’ Finally, he figured we weren’t going to buy anything, and he told us to leave. I should have
bought the laces — those were nice laces.”

“Maybe you should have bought one, and then saved up for the other,” Charlie said.

“I couldn’t afford the box. Forget about one lace,” he said.

“Hey, listen to this,” Pudge said. “I was working at my Dad’s restaurant last night, when a big group of people came in. I recognized a few kids from Chelsea. They were all talking about their big school rally — I guess they do the same thing as us, announce the teams in front of all the students and hand out sweaters. Anyway, according to them, the coaches and players were just trashing Terrence Falls. They even dressed up a dummy with our sweater. It held a sign that read:
Terrence Falls Down
.”

“Real funny crew they got there,” Scott muttered.

“It would be amazing to beat those guys,” Pudge said. “They’re so full of themselves.”

“Chelsea’s gonna be really tough to beat,” Zachary said, rolling his board back and forth with his foot. “Their team is stacked. We’ve got some talent, but we won’t beat them with skill. It’ll have to be a total team effort.”

“We’ll just have to get ourselves a total team,” Scott said.

“If you just get those skates,” Zachary said, “it’ll be a done deal. You can carve circles around everyone.”

“I’ll have you know that I once actually scored a goal.”

“You scored a goal in a game?” Nick exclaimed in mock amazement.

“Okay, it was air hockey, but it still counts.”

Charlie laughed along with the others at Scott’s joke, but he was nervous about the conversation turning to hockey. He didn’t want them talking about the vote.

As if on cue, however, that’s exactly what happened.

“What do you think your chances are, Charlie?” Zachary asked.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, being captain!”

Charlie tried to downplay the entire thing. With a shrug, he said, “I honestly haven’t thought about it. Been too busy. I’ve got this book report for Hilton I’ve got to do tonight — and last night I had to read the book. Jake might be it.”

“I hope not,” Nick said. “I don’t want to play on a team with him as captain. It’s bad enough to be on a team with him at all.”

“He already thinks he’s captain,” Scott said. “I bet he went out and bought himself a shiny red C for his sweater.”

“Where do you buy a C?” Nick asked.

“At the C store,” Scott wisecracked.

“I think Charlie’s got a real shot at winning,” Pudge said, seriously. “A lot of guys feel the same way. Ethan and Craig are good guys, but maybe not skilled enough to be captain. I bet Matt, Liam and Thomas voted for Jake, and that’s it.”

“Charlie’s got five votes right here,” Scott said.

“That’s not necessarily true,” Charlie said.

“Actually, it is,” Zachary said. “We all voted for you.”

Charlie felt embarrassed. At a loss for words, he finally
managed, “I didn’t vote for me, so that’s four at the most.”

They stared at him in disbelief.

“Who’d you vote for?” Scott demanded.

“I believe it was a secret ballot,” Charlie said weakly.

“Cough it up,” Scott said.

“I voted for Ethan.”

They all groaned.

“We’ll find out tomorrow, so there’s no point worrying about it now,” Charlie said, trying to put an end to the discussion.

“I should get going,” Pudge said. “Good luck with the report tonight, Charlie, and thanks for the game. I’ll see you all tomorrow.” He waved to the guys and headed up the stairs.

“I gotta fly also,” Zachary said. “I’m getting hungry, anyway. I’ll catch up with you dudes later.”

Scott and Nick picked their bikes up.

“I hope you realize,” Scott said, “that we’re racing back to my place, and the loser, who will be you, must say to the victor, who will be me, ‘You are the greatest bike racer I’ve ever seen.’”

“I noticed you’ve taken the training wheels off your bike,” Nick replied.

“I haven’t needed them for two weeks now,” he said proudly.

“Start us off, Charlie,” Nick said.

Charlie nodded and held up his arm. “Gentlemen, start your engines.”

Scott made the sound of a revving motor.

“On your marks, get set, go!”

Charlie watched them tear off down the path and over to the road. He followed slowly, as he went to get his bike, thinking about what had been said. He’d been captain of almost every team he’d played on. He’d become used to wearing the C, so it wasn’t the responsibility he was afraid of. He had always tried to use his position to make the team better. He remembered his father telling him that the captain’s job was to give everyone else the credit when the team won. That advice had always worked, and being captain had been fun. He didn’t see much chance for fun if he was named captain of the Terrence Falls team, though. All he saw was a massive headache with Jake, and grade tens wondering why a younger kid was captain.