Love Puppies and Corner Kicks Read online

  Today is very regular. Nothing new. Then, right after lunch, as we are heading out to the playground, Mrs. Watkinson says, “Andrea, did you bring along your boots?”

  “Yes.”

  “Would you be kind enough to go put them on? I’ll wait here.”

  “Okay.” I run off to the coat closet. My heart is pounding. What is she thinking? I grab my Sambas, quickly tie them on, and am back in thirty seconds.

  Mrs. Watkinson says, “Follow me, then.”

  We walk out directly toward where Lynne and Becky are playing. Oh no! She is going to force me into their game! Doesn’t she know you can’t do things like this?!

  “Girls!” Mrs. Watkinson calls and play stops. “Girls. Andrea is here to play as well.”

  Oh my God! The kids are all staring at me. It’s like they think I went to the teacher and said they wouldn’t let me play or something. I am going to be a leper. I am done for.

  Lynne runs over. She gives me a quick look but smiles at Mrs. Watkinson. “Yes, miss. We’ll work her in. No problem.”

  “Ta, Lynne.” She turns to me. “Good luck, my dear.” Then she walks back toward the school.

  The girls are all standing around. Lynne doesn’t even look at me. She points back by the goal. “Play fullback then.”

  I’ve never played defense in my life, but I nod and jog back there. I am physically shaking. I grab the sides of my skirt and pinch to keep my hands still.

  Becky is in goal. She puts her goalie gloves on and then points over at me. “Better not screw up, Balboa,” she calls.

  12

  RISIBLE

  Causing or capable of causing laughter.

  LYNNE centers the ball. After just a few minutes I can see that she is really the best player on the field. She scores the first time she takes a shot. Becky runs up and high-fives her. I just stay in my place.

  On the next possession, the other team comes charging down the left side. I shift over and run that way. It is very weird to run in a skirt. I see where this girl on the wing is going to pass. I see the girl down the center coming and looking for it. I wait a beat. Two beats. Now she releases. I charge forward and intercept. I carry it ten yards, then pass it forward to Lynne. That felt good! Oh man, does it feel great to move a ball on a field again.

  I push up to the half, which is far in normal soccer, but this is a small field. The ball comes back toward me and I trap it. As soon as it touches my foot here at center, my mind clicks to offense. I begin to dance around the ball. I know that sounds silly, but that’s exactly what it is. The ball almost doesn’t move, but you do two or three quick fakes around it and then make your real move.

  I go right past the girl marking me and get it in a foot race with their sweeper. As I get near the goal, I fake a shot right at her; she turns her back on me to protect herself. I move around her and rocket a shot. The goalie stands there, flat-footed, and it blows right past her.

  I jog back and Becky yells at me, “Ye shouldn’a left me undefended back here like that!”

  Lynne yells back, “Shet up, you. It was brilliant.” She high-fives me. “Nice moves.”

  I can’t help smiling. That’s what I love about soccer: I don’t have to think. I don’t have to talk. I just do. I know no one is going to laugh at me or ignore me on the field. Lynne scores again and we win 3-0. If recess was longer, it could have been five or six to nothing.

  When the bell rings to go in, Lynne walks right up next to me. “Ah’m Lynne.” She puts out her hand to shake. “What position do ye usually play?”

  It’s like she doesn’t care that Mrs. Watkinson forced me into the game now that she knows I can play. I shake her hand. Must speak. Deep breath. Let the words flow out with the breath. “C-c-center forward.”

  Lynne nods. “I normally play defense, but I play forward here because the rest o’ these twits don’t have a clue.”

  Becky appears next to Lynne. She rolls her neck like she’s loosening up. “I didn’t think ’mericans played football.”

  “ ’ Course they do,” Lynne says.

  I’m pumped from my goal. I try to think of a funny story. Use my wit. My extensive vocabulary. All my soccer games and tournaments I could tell them about. Nothing comes.

  When I come in the door this morning, Mrs. Watkinson is there. “Did that work out okay yesterday with the football?” she asks right away.

  I nod. “Yes.”

  She smiles and winks. “Good. Sorry to be interfering.”

  I smile back. “No. Thank you.”

  “Nay problem, dear,” she says and pats me on the shoulder. “You’re a good sort.”

  She is so sweet, and even though it went well, I am embarrassed that she had to get me in the game in the first place, like I’m some helpless little baby. I’m not proud of it, but at least I’m playing. At least, I hope I am. We’ll see at recess.

  At lunch I watch Becky and Lynne eat at Becky’s desk. I don’t want to follow them all over like a puppy, so I stay in my seat and listen to Christian talk to himself about the kind of cheese he’s eating. When I’m done eating, I go into the coat closet and put my Sambas on. I walk out to the field as casually as I can. I stand there on the half line, pinching the sides of my skirt, waiting for someone to say, “What’s she doing here again?” But no one does.

  Lynne comes over. She nods at me, so I nod back. “Go to left wing today, ay?”

  I nod again. Lynne calls over to a younger girl with a long ponytail on the left wing. “Melinda! Do fullback.”

  The girl drops back without a word.

  The game is, as they would say here, brilliant. I score twice. Except for Lynne and Becky, these girls are not really soccer players. On the way back to class, Lynne gives me a thumbs-up. “Good game,” she says. I smile and shrug like it was nothing. I feel good. They are going to be my friends. Soccer solves everything!

  After we put our recess stuff away, Mrs. Watkinson says, “We’re going to have a spelling pre-assessment. Please take out a piece of notebook paper and a pencil.”

  I love spelling. After reading Word Power every day for the last two years, it’s easy. When my mother gave me Word Power, at first I thought it was another stupid thing a teacher or parent would give a kid, but then I started getting into it. I like the fact that I know more and better words than most everyone else, and that gave me some kind of, I don’t know, control or power or something. Like I was better with words than they were, even if I couldn’t say them out loud. It’s kind of warped, but that’s me.

  At the end of the day, Mr. Watkinson comes in. He actually looks a lot like Mrs. Watkinson—young and short with dark hair. He’s wearing black plastic-frame glasses like the joke-shop glasses you get except without the big nose.

  Mrs. Watkinson says, “Paul, this is Andrea. She’s our exchange student from America. Today she scored one hundred percent on our spelling inventory. The only one in the class. She’s an excellent writer and a first-class footballer as well.”

  “Pleased to meet ye, Andrea. I’m impressed. I often can’t spell me own name correctly.”

  I say, “Thanks,” and walk back to my desk.

  Becky passes me on her way to the pencil sharpener. “Guess yer a regular genius, ay?” she says.

  I stop. She stops. What do you say to that? No? Yes? Then I hear kids behind me laughing. I turn around.

  Stewart is coming up the aisle. He has his thumbs planted on top of his head with his fingers splayed out like antlers. He is walking all clunky toward me. “Excuse me,” he says. “I was lookin’ fer me fellow mooses hereabouts.” He is always goofy, it seems. Then he looks at Becky and says, all surprised, “Ah, there ye are, me cousin.”

  I bust out laughing. It was actually risible. Becky gives us both a glare. “Screw you, ye eejits.”

  Stewart turns to me and winks as he clunks back to his seat. I can’t help it. I smile at him.

  13

  FECAL MATTER

  Relating to or constituting feces, excr
ement.

  RECESS soccer is now the focus of my universe. I intensify my practice every day at home so I’ll be sharp for school. Faith plays defense, as well as a five-year-old can, and I shoot on Mrs. Eversole’s stone garage wall. After that, I set up an obstacle course of lawn chairs and we take turns dribbling through.

  I am playing every day at recess with Becky and Lynne, but they still don’t say much to me other than on the field, and that’s usually “Pass!” Maybe they’re just taciturn, which means “not inclined by nature to talk.” Even though I don’t talk a lot, I’m not actually taciturn. I think by nature I might be inclined to talk a lot. It’s just kind of risky to say too much with my little problem. So them not talking a lot is pretty perfect, actually.

  When I come in this morning, I’m in the coat closet hanging my stuff up. I turn to go into the classroom when I hear—“Hi.”

  I turn around and stare straight into the smiling face of Stewart McCombie! We are two feet from each other. His eyes are a sparkly kind of blue and he has freckles. “Hwr’ye?” he says.

  I open my mouth, but nothing comes out.

  He puts the antlers back on his head. “Well, don’t let me cousin git ye down.”

  I laugh and nervously look around at all of the interesting coats and backpacks. I glance back and he is doing the same thing.

  Then he looks up again quickly. “Right then. See ye.” He smiles, nods, and walks out, tripping over a little trash can on the way to his desk.

  I manage to move my legs and stumble to my own desk. Then I realize that the whole time, I never said anything to him. I just laughed. Mrs. Watkinson is writing the names of the continents and oceans on the board. I can’t even read them. I can see, but I can’t read. It’s some kind of mind blindness. Stewart said hi to me! Why did he say hi to me?

  I look over to see what he’s doing—not like a maniac staring or anything, but I figure if he can look at me, I can look at him. He has that short brown hair and smooth skin, very white except for a bunch of freckles across his nose. All of a sudden, he turns around and looks right back at me! My stomach flips!

  Yikes! I bury my head in my history book quick and feel all hot. His eyes are so blue. They, like, lasered right through me.

  We are all working on a class mural today. It’s for a Halloween carnival the school is going to have. Mrs. Watkinson assigned us to work in groups of three and take turns, and she put me in with Becky and Lynne! I’m doing the letters in red, and Lynne and Becky are making the rest of it black with spooky pictures of bats and stuff in fluorescent blue and green. I try to focus, but I keep thinking about Stewart.

  Then Jasmine wanders over. She bends down like she’s inspecting it. She announces, “Yer part looks like fecal matter.”

  At least she learned one of our science terms. Lynne says, “No. You look like fecal matter.”

  Becky is crouched down, painting. “Don’t dare touch it,” she warns.

  Jasmine raises her eyebrows, then very deliberately and slowly places both hands on the mural. She lifts them and there’s two big hand prints in the black paint. “Oops,” she says, grinning. She is crazy!

  Becky hops up, checks to see that Mrs. Watkinson isn’t looking, then punches Jasmine hard in the arm. Becky says, “Oops.”

  Jasmine yells, “Owww! Mrs. Watkinson!” and dashes across the room to her.

  “What is it, Jasmine?” Mrs. Watkinson says, all concerned.

  “Becky—”

  Becky calls over, “Mrs. Watkinson, she just stuck her filthy hands all over our painting.”

  Jasmine says, “I did not!” and jams her hands behind her back.

  Becky turns to me. “Wha’s yer name—Andrea. Didn’t Jasmine just touch our paintin’?”

  Becky and Lynne are staring at me. Mrs. Watkinson is, too. I mean, she did touch it, but I don’t really want to squeal on her, but Becky asked me. And it did happen. And—“Well, yeah,” I finally mumble.

  Becky smirks. Jasmine points a blackened finger at me. “You dare, you dare—”

  Mrs. Watkinson says, “Come with me, Jasmine.”

  Becky puts her hand over her mouth. Lynne has her head down, looking at the ground, her shoulders shaking as she stops herself from laughing out loud.

  Jasmine bugs her eyes as she continues to point. “For this I must take my revenge. I will wait. I will be patient. But I will have my revenge.” That’s how she talks. She never talks normally even when she’s answering a math problem. By this time, Mrs. Watkinson has a hand on Jasmine’s back and guides her to the sink.

  The rest of the day whenever I look in Jasmine’s direction, she mouths the word revenge. At least, I think it’s revenge. It could be cabbage but that wouldn’t make much sense. Then again, it’s Jasmine talking.

  Later, when we’re getting ready to go home, Lynne comes over to my desk. And talks again! “What was tha’ flake, Jasmine, whisperin’ at ye all day?”

  I answer nice and slow. “I think—it was—‘revenge.’ ”

  Lynne snorts. She’s wearing a cool necklace made out of shells and wood. “Yeah. Like Jasmine’s goin’ to do anythin’ about anythin’.” Lynne pops some gum in her mouth. “Hey, Andy. Ye want to play some football after school?”

  Andy? Andy? No one has ever called me Andy. I’m definitely not an Andy. But it’s Lynne. I start to say “Sure,” but I’m not a big fan of the initial sh sound, so I say, “Okay.”

  “We have a TGFC match at four o’clock. At Hazelhead Park.”

  Becky says, “We’re playing Thistle Juniors. They’re like our archenemies. Bunch o’ posh little princesses.”

  I nod, like, of course, TGFC, but then I figure I better ask. Slowly. “What’s T-G—?”

  “Tough Girls Football Club. That’s our local side. My da’s our coach.”

  Tough Girls Football Club?! Yeech! What a goofy name, but this must be the travel team Mr. Dryden mentioned!

  Lynne says, “It’s actually Tristen Green Football Club. We’re a U-14 club. Tristen Green is our neighborhood, but some people call us Tough Girls F.C. as well. It’s a bit of a joke, y’know.”

  I smile, like I understand about jokes. Then Lynne asks, “Would ye be wantin’ a tryout?”

  I try not to leap up and down and scream. Yay! Yay! Yay! Speak slow. Keep it short. “Yeah. Great.”

  Lynne punches me on the shoulder. “See ye at Hazelhead at four, then.”

  14

  TASMANIAN DEVIL

  Small ferocious carnivorous marsupial.

  HAZELHEAD Park is right on North Donside Road and only about a mile from Ingleside. I borrow a bike from Mrs. Eversole’s garage and ride over. The park is not that big. There are only two fields. On one field there’s a boy’s game going on. A blue and white team and a maroon and gold team. On the other field, two groups of girls with those same colors are warming up and right away I see Lynne. She spots me, too, and yells and waves. “Hey!”

  I park the bike on the side of the field and she comes over. “So. Ye made it,” she says.

  “Yeah,” is all I can manage.

  “Here. Put this on.” She hands me a white mesh jersey. I pull it on over my T-shirt. It says TGFC in blue letters on the front, #17 on the back. It feels good to put on a uniform jersey. Like I’m really a soccer player again. I tighten my shin guards and then my cleats. My stomach is jumping around. I’ve been to tryouts before, but this is like I’m trying out to be friends.

  A big man with a blue Windbreaker and silver hair comes striding over. He puts a hand on Lynne’s shoulder and reaches out to shake with the other. “Hello,” he says. “I’m Archie Alloway, Lynne’s da.”

  “Hi,” I manage. I try to figure out what to do with my hands. They are starting to shake a little. I finally grab and pinch the sides of my shorts.

  “So, Lynney tells me ye fancy center forward. How about if ye start there today and ye ken show us what ye ken do?”

  I say, “Okay.”

  “Okay, then.” He smiles. “C
’mon, let’s huddle up with the others.”

  The three of us jog over to the middle together and Mr. Alloway calls the rest of the girls over. Most are girls from recess, but there are a few I’ve never seen before. Becky comes over out of the goal. She doesn’t look at me. We do some stretches together, then Mr. Alloway quickly gives us a rough idea of what he wants us to do. I glance over at the boy’s game and that’s when I see Stewart.

  He’s in his shiny maroon and gold jersey, running swiftly down the sideline carrying the ball. Actually, he’s flying down the sideline.

  A defender charges up at him and shoots in for a slide tackle. Stewart tips the ball up slightly, catches it on his thigh, hurdles the kid, and on his way down lets the ball drop in front again. It is an awesome move!

  I think my mouth must be open. Who would guess goofy Stewart would be so skilled?

  Next thing, he crosses the ball perfectly to a kid open in front, then zips down toward the goal. It looks like he’s going to get the return pass . . .

  “Andrea.”

  “Huh?”

  “Pay attention,” Lynne says.

  I look back to Mr. Alloway. “Right then. Any questions? Okay, then. One-Two-Three! Who are we?”

  Everybody except me yells, “T-G-F-C!”

  As we run out, Becky walks along next to Lynne. I am behind them. Becky says, all casual and low, “Ah didn’t know you were invitin’ the retard to play with us.”

  The next thing I know, I have Becky flat on the ground and I am punching her in the head. My brain is on fire and I’m like a Tasmanian devil or something. She gets one hand on my jersey and pulls me over. She is strong. She punches me in the ear, and then the ref and Mr. Alloway are pulling us apart.

  “What are ye doin’? Here! C’mon! What is this?!” Mr. Alloway is yelling and red-faced.

  I don’t know what to say.

  “I was just messin’, ye infant!” Becky yells at me.

  Lynne’s face is white and looking very guilty. She says, “It was just a misunderstandin’, da. It’s fine now, right, girls?”