Payback Time Page 2

  Then came a full-contact scrimmage. The first play called for me was a simple slant over the middle. I went out a couple of steps and cut across the middle, just as in drills. Horst led me perfectly, just as in drills. I brought the ball in, took about half a step, and... BOOM! The ball flew in the air and I went down as if I'd been shot. That was nothing like drills. I stayed down, my head spinning. The linebacker who'd belted me was beaming. Far, far away I heard Coach Shoeman call out: "Now, that's a hit, men. That's what we're after."

  I wobbled off the field to the bench. After what seemed like a long time, Shoeman came over. "Next time, brace yourself after you make the catch. You've got to hang on to the ball."

  I nodded.

  "Okay. Get back out there, and remember what I told you."

  The first two plays were runs, but on third down and three, Horst called the slant pass again. "Don't drop it this time," he barked. "We need this first down."

  On the snap, I took two steps forward and made my cut. I tried to concentrate on the ball, but my eyes searched instead for the linebacker who'd laid me out before. Horst's pass hit me in the chest, right between the numbers, and bounced away. A millisecond later, the same guy unloaded on me again.

  For the second time I climbed off the deck and wobbled to the sideline. Five minutes ... ten minutes ... fifteen minutes. I sat on the bench, head woozy and legs like rubber. When the scrimmage was just about over, Shoeman came back to me. "Next punt, I want you out there on the coverage team."

  I watched the game, praying there wouldn't be another punt, but there was. Shoeman nodded to me and clapped his hands. "You've been hit hard twice. Now you hit someone." I pulled on my helmet and lined up as a wide-out. The punter booted the ball, and I raced downfield, praying somebody else would tackle the returner, and quickly.

  At first the play was moving away from me, but the punt returner suddenly reversed field, broke into the clear, and now was barreling right at me. I was the last guy with a shot to tackle him. When he was right in front of me, I lurched to the side as if he were a bull and I were a matador, and he roared by me. I spun around and watched him cross the goal line. When I turned back, Horst was glaring at me.

  Shoeman blew his whistle. "Same time tomorrow."

  I was dragging myself off the field when Shoeman called me back. He looked down at me as if I were a stinkbug. "A football player has to be able to take a hit. If you can't, you need to quit this game and find another."

  I didn't find another game, but I did quit, and Horst stopped knocking on my door.

  That summer, Lenny Westwood's family moved into the brick house on the corner. Westwood is a tall, skinny black kid with a quick first step and good hands, exactly the friend Horst wanted. In the fall Horst's mom had her twin girls, and by December they'd moved into their huge house near Sunset Hill Park.

  7

  AT THE NEXT NEWSPAPER MEETING, Alyssa did a double take when she saw me at the big table in the center of the room, and then she came over. "I thought you were quitting," she said quietly.

  "I never said that."

  "I thought you did."

  "Well, I didn't."

  "I'm glad, because you can add a lot to the newspaper."

  "Thank you, Alyssa," I said. "That's nice of you to say."

  "It's true, Mitch. I mean Dan."

  "Call me Mitch."

  Her long brown hair had fallen into her face, so she pushed it behind her ear. "This'll work, Mitch. And who knows? You might uncover a big sports story that will shake all of Seattle."

  "Sure," I said. "And maybe I'll star in a Hollywood movie."

  Her temper flashed. "Well, you don't know for sure, do you? It could happen."

  "What? Me starring in a movie?"

  "Very funny." She rose, but before she walked away, she fixed me with a steely stare. "Mitch, if you're not going to do the job right, tell me and I'll get somebody else."

  "Don't worry. I'll do my job."

  She stayed on me. "That means you'll have a football preview ready to go for September's issue. And you'll cover girls' volleyball, too."

  She was being serious, so I owed her a serious answer. "I won't have time for any minor sports. But I will do the major sports, both girls and boys, all year long, and that's a promise."

  She nodded. "I'm going to surprise you, Mitch. Last year there were four newspapers. I'm going to put one out every month, or close to it. And every single one of them is going to be better than anything we did last year. That's a promise, too."

  She walked to the front of the room and called everyone to attention. As she ran the meeting, I thought about big sports stories that reporters had broken. There'd been articles on steroids, and there'd been a book on Bobby Knight and how crazy he was as a coach. The more I thought, the more I came up with. Baseball, basketball, football, cycling, soccer—every sport had stories that went way beyond the games. I'd have to get lucky, but maybe Alyssa would be right. Maybe something would happen at Lincoln.

  8

  THE FIRST FOOTBALL PRACTICE was August 15. Lincoln's coach, Hal McNulty, is one of those gruff, Marine-sergeant types: crew-cut hair, bulging muscles, pants and shirt pressed, shoes shined. He's a PE teacher as well as a coach, and I had him my sophomore year. Some PE teachers ignore fat guys, and some torture them. He was a torturer. He made me attempt every gymnastic move, including cartwheels, and he snickered when I flopped on the mat like a tortoise without a shell.

  He'd had a head coaching job at some Division II college in the Midwest but had gotten himself fired for having tutors write essays for the players who didn't know their left shoe from their right ear, or at least that was the rumor. When he was first hired at Lincoln, he told Chet Jetton, the high school sports reporter for the Seattle Times, that his goal was to win a state title so he could get back into college coaching.

  I don't know whether it is because of McNulty's coaching or Horst's quarterbacking, but Lincoln has taken the league the past two years, though both times they lost in the first round of the playoffs. Those losses had to eat at McNulty—he'd come so close.

  I work afternoons in the summer at my parents' business, so it was early in the morning on August 14 when I headed to Lincoln High hoping to corner McNulty before practices started and get him to talk. I wanted him to respect me as a reporter, so before I left, I stood in front of the mirror and practiced sucking in my gut as I introduced myself. "Hello, Coach, I'm Mitch True. I'll be covering the team for the Lincoln Light this year." I tried three or four different voices, but none sounded right. Besides, regardless of the voice I used, I had to breathe, and when I did, my flabby gut would hang over my belt.

  I parked my mom's Ford Focus by the gym, eased out of the front seat, and looked around. When I spotted McNulty loading tackling sleds into a school van, I tensed. To him, I'd always be a fat loser and nothing more. But a reporter has to have the courage to approach people, ask them questions, and get them to talk. "I'm Mitch True," I said as I neared him. "I'm the school sports reporter. I'd like to ask you some questions."

  "I was hoping you'd come around," he said. "Step into my office."

  I gaped, dumbfounded. He was hoping I'd come around? When I recovered, I nearly had to run to catch up as he strode across the field and into the coaches' office in the gym. He took a seat behind a neatly organized desk while I squeezed into a wobbly blue plastic chair across from him.

  "What's your name again?"

  I told him again.

  "You were in my gym class last year, right?"

  "Two years ago."

  "Well, Mr. True, you are now an important member of the Lincoln Mustangs football family."

  I smiled.

  "What's funny?" McNulty said, his blue-gray eyes glittering like shiny stones.

  Like an idiot, I patted my jiggly belly. "Me? An important member of the football family? How?"

  He leaned forward, pointing his pencil at me. "You are the person who sends in a game recap to the Seattle Times.
You write exciting articles, and the Times will push them to the top of the high school page. That happens, and other newspapers will pick them up, which translates into publicity for the players and for me. It also means a byline for you, some cash, and a summer internship to boot. You remember last year's sports writer, Boyd Harte. He interned at the Bellevue Journal."

  I hadn't thought about the connections I'd be making, but as sports stringer, I'd be dealing with editors of real newspapers, something that wouldn't have happened if I'd remained the news reporter for the Lincoln Light— unless the big dailies suddenly became interested in the accomplishments of Lincoln High's chess club. "Sounds great," I said. "In fact, it sounds fantastic."

  McNulty leaned back. "See. We're all part of one big family."

  I cleared my throat. "How about we get started? I've got some questions. First—"

  "No, no, no," McNulty said, pointing the pencil at me again. "No questions—not today not ever. This job takes forever and pays peanuts. Here's how it works. You write down or tape what I tell you. When I'm done, jazz it up however you want, but never make me, my coaches, or my players look bad. Understand?"

  Mr. Dewey had warned us about people like McNulty, but this was my first time dealing with one. "A reporter who lets himself be pushed around is a traitor to his profession." That's what Dewey had said.

  I could feel myself trying to say: "Coach, I will ask the questions I want to ask, and I will write what I want to write."

  In the classroom, practicing with bald, bowtied Mr. Dewey, I had spit out similar words like a machine gun spits out bullets. But McNulty's eyes were scary. I squirmed as he stared at me, feeling like a snot-nosed preschooler who'd been caught marking a wall with crayons. "Understood?" he said again, a threat in his voice, as though he might force me to do cartwheels in front of the football team if I argued.

  "Yes, sir."

  From a drawer he took out three sheets of paper covered with black type and shoved them at me. "Here's the information for the football preview. Horst Diamond will be the focus, and you'll be leading every game story with his name, too. He's a lock for a D-I scholarship. UW is drooling over him, but he's got a shot at a bigger school—Notre Dame, or even USC. Your job is to get him publicity."

  I scanned the three sheets. "But what if somebody else has a better game?"

  "Nobody's going to have a better game. Run or pass—everything we do goes through Horst. I want a swarm of college coaches around here. They'll see him, and they'll see me and the program I run. I do not intend to spend my life coaching high school."

  McNulty stood. "Read those pages, prepare a few questions, and before practice tomorrow you can interview Horst. He'll be at the field fifteen minutes early. Have your photographer come along for that." He paused. "You've got a photographer, right?"

  "A photographer?"

  "Every sports story needs pictures. Either you've got to take them yourself, or you've got to get a photographer. Didn't you know that?"

  9

  BACK HOME, I washed down an almond pastry with a cup of hot chocolate. While I ate, my mind spun in circles. When Mr. Dewey had told us to be courageous, he'd been talking about journalists uncovering corruption. But Coach McNulty? Horst Diamond? They were just sports figures. Sports is—well—sports. So why make a big deal out of nothing?

  As I started on a second almond pastry I remembered what McNulty had said about the photographer. All I know about cameras is that I hate having my picture taken. I called Alyssa.

  "Relax, Mitch," she said. "I've got you a photographer."

  "You do? Who?"

  "Kimi Yon."

  "Kimi Yon?"

  "She's into sports photography, or at least that's what she says. Personally, I think she wants to get some photos published because that would look good on her college applications. Harvard, Yale, and Princeton are the only schools good enough for her."

  "You don't like Kimi?"

  "I like her okay. I'm just being bitchy. Don't tell her what I said, okay?"

  "I won't." I paused. "Does Kimi know she'll be working with me?"

  "Mitch, don't say it that way. Besides, it's not like she's going to the Winter Ball with you." Alyssa laughed at the thought, and I managed to laugh along.

  "Could you give me her number? I've got an interview tomorrow with Horst Diamond."

  "It's 789–9365. Mitch, I'm sorry. What I said was mean."

  "Forget it."

  "Look, I've got to get off. I told you about my dad and minutes. "

  Kids who don't like Kimi joke that there are actually two Kimis: the one who gets an A on everything and the one who gets an A+. When I first met her, I thought she was totally into herself and her grades, but my opinion of her changed one day in AP American History.

  We were the only sophomores in a class filled with juniors and seniors. Our teacher, Ms. Simonson, was new. "I'm going to use the same methods that Socrates used in ancient Greece." That's what she said on the first day her eyes shining, and every day she tried to get discussions going. Most days, nothing much happened. She wasn't a great teacher, but she worked harder than any teacher I've ever had.

  Ms. Simonson was also short, fat, and ugly. Early in November the seniors started calling her Yoda, after the little Zen guy from Star Wars. They'd whisper, but they'd whisper so loudly that everyone could hear. I laughed the first time; she did look a lot like Yoda.

  Only they wouldn't stop. Mario Chalmers, a basketball player and one of the big shots in the school, was the worst. He'd make some Yoda comment, and his friends would roll around in their chairs and laugh. Ms. Simonson pretended not to hear, but her face would turn bright red. It was like watching somebody pull the wings off a fly. What could I do, though? I was Mitch, and he was Mario Chalmers.

  Then, one Friday, Kimi Yon stood up, right in the middle of class, and glared at Chalmers. "Stop it!" she shouted after he'd made yet another Yoda joke. "Just stop it!" Her eyes glowed with rage. "You're not funny."

  The whole room fell silent. Even Ms. Simonson stood like a statue. Chalmers's face looked as if a vampire had sucked the blood out of him. He glanced around for help, but his buddies had their heads down. He turned back to Kimi, and her eyes were still on fire. He shrugged, dropped his head onto his chest, and slouched deep into his chair. After that, Chalmers and his friends messed around some, but they never called Ms. Simonson Yoda again.

  Now Alyssa had just told me that Kimi Yon—beautiful, brilliant, courageous Kimi Yon—was going to be my partner. If I had been any other guy I'd have been out-of-my-mind happy at the thought. But I wasn't any other guy, and that was the problem.

  Even though I make jokes about being fat, that doesn't mean I'm happy about it. When school ended in mid-June, I promised myself that I wouldn't return to Lincoln in September with a stomach as soft as a jelly roll. But once you get out of shape, it's hard to get back into shape. And my parents' business doesn't make it any easier.

  They run a catering service that supplies fancy desserts to expensive restaurants like Ray's Boathouse and Canlis. Because they run their own business, I never have to job hunt. They don't believe in having me work during the school year, but in the summer I put in twenty hours a week, mainly helping with the afternoon deliveries.

  That's the good part. The bad part is that bakeries are always bringing new pastries to my mom, and I'm her guinea pig. Every night after dinner, my dad goes off to read the newspaper, leaving my mom and me alone in the kitchen. She puts a piece of chocolate cake or peach-blueberry pie slathered in whipped cream in front of me. Then she sits down across from me, her own dessert in front of her. "Try a few bites, Dan," she says. "I want to know what you think."

  Once either of us starts eating a dessert, we don't stop until it's gone, which is why we're both overweight while my dad isn't. I finish the whole thing, grade it as though I'm some sort of food expert, and my mom smiles and thanks me. It's as if eating huge desserts is part of my job. So June and July and half of August ha
d slipped by, and pies and cakes had slipped down my throat. And now I'd be going places with Kimi Yon. Standing next to her, I'd look fatter and shorter and paler. If only I'd started exercising and stopped eating.

  There was no point in postponing the inevitable. I flipped open my cell phone, punched in the numbers as fast as I could, and hit the green call button.

  "Hello." A man's voice—her father. Alyssa had given me Kimi's home number, not her cell.

  My palms got sweaty. "Is Kimi home?"

  "Who is this? My daughter not talk to boys unless I know."

  "I'm Mitch True. I'm the sports—"

  In the background I heard her voice. "Dad, give me the phone." Her father said something in what I figured was Chinese, and then Kimi came on the line. "Hello. Who is this?"

  "It's Mitch True," I said. "You know me, I think, from Ms. Simonson's class. But maybe you don't know me. I'm sort of—" I stopped. How could I describe myself?

  "I know you, Mitch. Everybody knows you. I'm glad to be working with you."

  "You are?"

  "Sure. You're the best writer in the school." She paused. "When do we start?"

  I swallowed. "Well, I've got an interview with Horst Diamond scheduled for tomorrow, and pictures would be great."

  "Okay. What time?"

  "Eight forty-five at Gilman Park."

  "The Fifteen bus goes right by Gilman. I'll be there."

  In the summer my mom always drove in to work with my dad so that I could use her car. I took a deep breath. "I can give you a ride."

  Silence.

  I'd crossed the line—Kimi wouldn't want to be seen in the same car with me. "Look," I said, "it's okay if you'd rather take the bus."

  "I'd rather get a ride. It's just that my father is so weird. He's the most incredibly stereotypical Asian dad. He'll ask you a million questions, and then he'll follow you down the street shouting driving instructions."