Revenge of the Bully (3 page)

I should have fallen right to sleep that night but something a lot heavier than the chocolate cake weighed on my mind. Tomorrow would bring football practice, and along with it my new enemy, Trevor. Plus Toby was itching for a fight, Rishi was trying to make me famous, and the girl I liked wasn't talking to me. Some first day of school. As I drifted off to sleep I thought about the one important lesson I had learned. Escargot is French for gross and never, ever order sweetbreads!

Chapter 3

TWIN PROBLEMS

“You there. You paying attention?”

It was Mr. Scab, my wood shop teacher. I had been staring at the clock on the wall for half the class, hoping against hope I could slow down time. It was the last period. Football practice was just minutes away.

Mr. Scab banged on my desk. “What's your name?”

“Um, Rodney.”

“Well, Um-Rodney, I once chose not to pay attention during wood shop. Do you know what happened?”

“No,” I squeaked.

“This!” He held up his hand. I swallowed as I looked at his missing pinky. “Think that's bad?” he continued. “Want me to remove my glass eye?”

I was trying to decide if he was serious when the bell rang. I headed down the hall, relieved that Mr. Scab hadn't lost any body parts while talking to me. Unfortunately, my relief was short-lived. I was heading to football practice. My stomach gurgled louder and louder with each step. It was the second day of school and I would soon be helmet-to-helmet with Trevor and his buddies. I rounded the corner. Coach Laimbardi was standing in the crowded hallway outside the gym arguing with a woman. He motioned for me to come over.

“Rodney, I got some bad news. The nurse says you need to have your parents fill out a permission slip and bring in a record of your physical. Sorry, but it looks like you won't be able to make practice.”

No practice?
I almost jumped up and down. Finally, some good luck. I let out a deep breath.

“Rodney!” a man's voice shouted from down the hallway. “
There
you are!”

I turned around—along with every other student—to see my dad waving his arms and heading my way. I sort of waved back thinking,
Please go away
.

“Young man, do you know that person?” the nurse asked.

A crowd of kids began to gather. Great, they would all know I was the one with the weirdo dad. “He's my father,” I eventually admitted.

“Excellent!” Coach Laimbardi hollered.

“Rodney,” my dad called out as he approached us, “I thought I'd come down and watch your first practice.”

“So you're my new star's dad? I'm Head Coach Laimbardi.” I watched the two shake hands. “You know, now that you're here, you could sign Rodney's release and he'll be able to prac—”

“He will still need a copy of his physical,” the nurse interrupted. I was beginning to like this nurse.

“Don't worry,” my dad offered, “now that I have a little more time on my hands I was able to go on the district website and read all the requirements to play interscholastic sports. I got the physical right here! I got his mouthpiece and jock strap, too. You know where this goes, son?” He held up the jock strap.

“Dad, I know where it
goes
,” I whispered. By now all I heard was the sound of kids laughing. I couldn't bear to look up.

“Well done, Mr. Rathbone!” yelled Laimbardi. “Active parents make all the difference. Now Rodney, go see Assistant Coach Manuel and get fitted for your pads. I'll see you out on the field. Mr. Rathbone, it was a pleasure meeting you.”

“Thank you, coach. And Rodney, I'll pick you up after practice.”

“Whatever,” I muttered as I walked off to get fitted.

“Wait,” my dad suddenly shouted from down the hall. “You forgot something.”
Please no
, I thought, but sure enough I turned around to see my father waving the jock strap high above his head. Luckily, only about two hundred other kids seemed to notice.

Twenty minutes later I found myself walking out of the tunnel under the gym toward the football practice field. It was my first time wearing football pads. Besides what my dad had brought me, I had on a helmet, shoulder pads, rib protectors, hip pads, a tailbone pad in the back of my pants, thigh pads, kneepads, and a mouth guard. “That's all you got?” I had asked Coach Manuel. I liked the idea of being covered in a modern-day suit of armor—especially when I got to the field and saw I was the smallest kid on it.

“Rodney, this is awesome!” Josh barked at me. “I can't wait!” His eyes sparkled from inside his helmet. Now
there
was a football player. While he might have been younger than some of the other guys, he was one of the biggest.

“All right, take a knee over here!” Coach Laimbardi called out. We all huddled around. I could feel sets of eyes staring at me through face masks. Some were friendly. Many were not. Coach Laimbardi cleared his throat. “As most of you know, we've been having a tough time the past few years. We haven't had a winning season in over twelve years. Even worse, we haven't beaten . . .” He paused and his face scrunched up into a wretched expression. “We haven't beaten Windham in seventeen years.”

“Eighteen,” Coach Manuel corrected him.

Laimbardi scowled at us for a minute. “You hear that? Eighteen years of misery! Whoever said winning isn't everything never played football. That numbskull certainly didn't have to endure the jokes and ridicule of Coach Bill Belicheat. He's always . . . picking on me.” He shook his head and looked at his feet. I thought I saw his lip quiver. His eyes looked damp. “I just want to beat Belicheat and Windham once before I retire.” After a moment his voice sounded strong again. “I was beginning to believe I never would beat them, but yesterday I saw something wondrous. Something that told me the black cloud that's been hanging over Garrettsville might finally be lifting.”

I noticed Josh glance up at the sky with a confused look on his face.

Coach Laimbardi, who had stopped in back of where we were kneeling, placed his hands on Josh's and my shoulder pads. He turned to the rest of the team and announced, “Let me introduce you to our new starting backfield—Rathbone and Dumbrowski. They have just the kind of toughness we've been lacking around here!” Thank God he didn't notice my knees beginning to shake under all that padding. “I can't wait to see them in action,” he continued. “In fact, let's not wait any longer. Now, I know we don't scrimmage the first week . . .”

That's good
, I thought to myself.

“. . . but I'm willing to make an exception. We have enough guys here today from last year to run some plays. Let's see what the new guys Rathbone and Dumbrowski can do. Trevor, take the defense out to the twenty-yard line and let's get started.”

I watched Trevor's helmet nod. Then, with a wicked look, he pointed at me and mouthed the words, “You're mine.”

I had an urge to puke but pictured bits of last night's fancy French dinner getting caught in my face mask and managed to keep it down. In a fog, I followed the other offensive players as we made our way onto the striped field. I was about to get crushed and torn apart. Noticing several small groups of students filing into the stands did little to make me feel better. A familiar voice rang out from one of the spectators. “Go get 'em, Rodney!” It was Rishi, sitting with my dad. He waved and held up his phone. “Don't worry, this takes great video!”

I walked into the offensive huddle. Apart from Josh, the other faces were unfamiliar. I was relieved to see they weren't menacing. In fact, many of the guys smiled down at me through their face masks. A bunch of them were as big as Josh and I assumed they were the offensive line. One of the biggest, a tall black kid with a friendly smile, stuck out his hand. “Welcome to the football team.”

I shook his big hand and breathed easier. “Thanks.”

“No, let us thank
you
. We're sure glad you're joining the offense, Rodney. My name is Joe. I'm the center. JJ and AJ are your tackles, and Philip and Frank are the guards. We're the offensive line.”

I couldn't believe it. These guys were nice and seemed genuinely happy to have me with them. Not only that, each player was bigger than the next. As I had learned with Josh, it's good to have big friends.

Frank said, “We heard all about you last year, of course.”

“Yeah,” AJ added. “I still can't believe someone attacked the McThugg Brothers and lived to talk about it.”

JJ blurted, “I still watch your flight off the Ravine of Doom on YouTube!”

Joe smiled. “Like I said, we were all real happy when we heard you were joining us. You see, we were kind of hoping you'd be able to help us with some of our problems.”

The good feeling in my chest was replaced by a tight, uncomfortable feeling. Their faces had lost the smiles of a moment ago and now they looked frightened. “You see, Rodney,” Joe explained, “we've been getting bullied quite a bit by a real mean group.”

The tight, uncomfortable feeling in my chest was quickly replaced by difficulty breathing and a racing heart. This was getting worse by the second. These guys were a head taller than me and a hundred pounds heavier. What group could possibly be nasty enough to bully
them
? And what could I possibly do about it?

Over the pounding of my heart I heard myself ask, “It's Trevor and his gang, right? Are they the cause of your problems?”

Joe looked surprised and almost laughed. “If it was Trevor, I could handle it. These guys are much worse. I'm talking about—” He stopped short and looked from side to side before making sure it was safe to continue. Finally he whispered, “I'm talking about the Windham team.”

“Two in particular,” JJ added. “Twin brothers.”

“Exactly,” Joe said. “They come over here after school—”

“Oh, no!” JJ gasped, staring at the sideline. “They're here.” The huddle collectively shuddered. I snuck a peak. You couldn't miss the twin giants!

“So can you help us?” Joe asked.

Trevor had wandered by and was waiting to hear my reply. Suddenly I was living out my worst nightmare. At Baber Intermediate, I had built a reputation as a kid who feared no one—despite the fact that I'm pure coward through and through. It was all by accident, of course, but now I realized that none of my past victories meant much in this new, larger world. If I acted afraid, my whole “Rodney reputation” would vanish. Once it was gone I'd be the number one bully target in Garrettsville. Heck, maybe all of Ohio. I had to pretend to be tough, but how?

Before I had a chance to answer, Coach Laimbardi shouted, “All right! Let's run a play!”

“We'll talk about Windham later,” Joe said.

For the time being I was safe—but for how long? Another kid, in a number sixteen jersey, cleared his throat. He'd been quiet up until now. “We'll run a basic sweep. Sound good to you, Rodney?”

“Huh?” I was so busy worrying about my reputation that I had forgotten about football.

“Oh, hey, my name's Hector. I'm the quarterback. I broke a state record last year.”

With a star quarterback, maybe we wouldn't have to run the ball that much. “A state record. That's great,” I said.

“Yeah, I broke the record for getting sacked the most times in one season. Seventy-nine—thanks to this great offensive line. That's twenty-two more times than Johnny ‘Pancake' Stevenson. I just regained feeling in my feet last week.”

I glanced over at the offensive line. Joe and the rest of the guys looked sheepish. No one was arguing.

“I'm not planning to throw the ball this year,” Hector continued. “Not once. Good luck running it. But with these wimps blocking for you, well I just hope you get the bed with the window.”

“What window?” I asked. “What bed?”

“At the hospital, man. So you ready?”

“You sure know how to motivate a guy,” I grumbled.

He ignored that. “I'll flip you the ball. You run around the right side. Let's go. The snap is on two.”

I grabbed Josh. “You stay in front of me, and if anyone comes near me, you hit him, okay?”

“Yeah!”

Josh was my only hope for survival. I was already wondering which state record I'd be going for—most broken bones or wettest pants. I shook off further thoughts.

Hector stopped walking to his spot behind the center and headed back toward Josh and me. He seemed to want to remind of us something. When he got within a couple of feet, Josh took two steps, lowered his shoulder, and flattened him to the ground. “I done what you said, Rodney!”

Hector lay gasping on the field. “So much for the feeling in my feet returning . . .”

I knelt down. “Sorry about that. Josh is kind of new to the sport.”

“It's okay,” Hector wheezed, “I'm used to it. I was going to remind you to try to run out of bounds. Trevor and the defense love to pile on top of the runner.”

I looked in Trevor's direction and shuddered. He and the rest of the defense were staring hungrily at me. To help set the mood, some band kids in the stands struck up a tune that sounded a lot like the theme from the movie
Jaws
.

I had just made up my mind to bolt home when Hector yelled, “Hut! Hut!” The gold-and-black bodies in front of me collided with a crunch. I watched in horror as my golden offensive line fell to the ground, offering minimal resistance to the black shirts that swarmed in my direction. Hector just managed to get the ball away before being swallowed up. The ball flipped through the air several times in my direction and I grabbed it without thinking. The black shirts growled and swarmed onward.