CHAPTER 4

IT PAYS TO KNOW THE SCORE

That night, Mom, Dad, and I piled into the car and went to Kevin’s first game as an Indiana football player. Actually, it was his first game as a football player, period. But that didn’t stop him from being totally psyched, like he’d been living here all his life.

The Jonasburg Whales opened the season against the Ikeville Eels. I wondered why two schools in the guts of America, hundreds of miles from an ocean, had sea creatures for mascots. Once again, I shared this thought with the only person who wouldn’t find it annoying—me.

I walked into the stadium with my parents but hoped I wouldn’t have to sit with them. It wasn’t that they embarrassed me, but… well, okay, maybe they embarrassed me a little. Mom had come right from the studio and was wearing a denim jacket spattered with paint, and her head was wrapped in a rainbow-colored bandanna. Dad had on his leather jacket with tassels and a beret. Let’s just say they stood out from the other parents.

We were passing the concession stand when I saw Ben Barnes, Avni Garg, and Jacob Alexander, all from my grade and all in the fantasy football league. “Hey, Mitch!!” one of them yelled.

Okay, maybe it wasn’t exactly a yell. I may have imagined those exclamation points. But that’s how it sounded to my ears. And it felt pretty good.

I turned to my parents. Dad was already waving me off. “Go with your friends,” he said. “But unless you want to walk home, find us after the game.”

“Got it.”

As I left to sit with Ben, Avni, and Jacob, I could see Mom smiling. And I knew why.

All summer I’d heard (and overheard) my parents whispering about “Mitch’s adjustment.” Kevin would be fine. It was me they were worried about. I got good grades, sure, but I couldn’t play sports. I annoyed people. I didn’t usually fit in.

And now here I was, at my first football game, and people were yelling (or at least calling) my name. Mom figured I was making friends already. No drama, no problems. Take that, adjustment period!

The mood turned sour, though, once the game started. Kevin caught three passes, which might sound like a lot, but they were the only three passes that Jonasburg completed. The quarterback, Neil Butwipe (I’m not making it up, that was really his name, though he claimed it was pronounced boot-wee-pay), was… let’s just say not that great. Over and over again, he would throw incomplete passes and the crowd would groan. (And can you imagine having “Butwipe” stitched in shining gold on the back of your jersey for every game?)

“Aim the dang ball! Either that or move over and let someone else play quarterback!” yelled one woman—the backup quarterback’s mom, I bet.

“Who’d he throw that to?” one man wearing a Jonasburg jacket yelled in frustration. “I have a vacuum cleaner that doesn’t suck this much.”

Not bad trash talk. Jamie would be impressed. But even so, it wasn’t really nice or fair.

In the first place, Neil was a kid, not a pro. Plus, it wasn’t all his fault. In history class we learned about non-aggression treaties, when one country agrees not to fight another. Jonasburg’s offensive line played like they had signed a non-aggression treaty with the other team. What’s that? You want to sack our quarterback? Why, go right ahead! Right this way! If there had been a stat for the number of grass stains on your uniform, Neil would have gotten game MVP honors.

But the offensive line was only part of the issue. The real problem was something that the fans in the bleachers didn’t yell about, like they didn’t even notice it. But I did.

Coach W. was making bad decisions. I mean, awful decisions.

He was good at teaching players how to do things, whether it was throwing passes into the wind or tucking the ball into your body when you ran so the defense couldn’t strip it away. And he was a master motivator; I’d seen that at the pep rally. Kevin announced after his first practice that he would “run through a brick wall for that guy.”

But the choices Coach Williams made out there on the field sometimes didn’t make sense. In the second quarter, Ikeville was leading 13–0. Jonasburg scored its first touchdown when Neil scrambled, couldn’t find an open receiver, and ran the ball into the end zone to make it 13–6. Instead of kicking an extra point, Coach Williams had the Whales try a two-point conversion, which didn’t make any sense. Even if the two-pointer had been successful, Jonasburg would be down by five and still need a touchdown to move ahead. Making a two-point conversion is a lot harder than kicking an extra point, so why do it if the benefit is basically the same as kicking the easier extra point? The two-point try failed when the Ikeville team gang-tackled poor Neil.

Another time, Jonasburg had the ball at the Ikeville thirty-yard line and it was fourth down with two yards to go. Coach Williams had a choice: punt or go for it. He decided to punt, giving the ball back to Ikeville. Julio Haberberg, a shaggy-haired kid whose sister rode my bus, jogged onto the field. He took the snap and booted the ball—into the end zone. So Ikeville got the ball on the twenty-yard line and eventually scored seven plays later.

Again, I disagreed with Coach W.’s choice. If Jonasburg had gone for it on fourth down, they might have kept the drive alive and had a chance to score. Coach W. was probably worried about not getting the two yards on fourth down and having to give the ball back to Ikeville. But by punting the ball he gave it back to them anyway. And only ten yards farther down the field than if he had tried and failed on fourth down. It seemed like Coach W. gave up a huge opportunity—trying to keep the ball and score—for a small cost of possibly giving the ball back to Ikeville, which he did anyway by punting!

At halftime, I walked with Ben Barnes to the concession stand, where I ordered a pretzel and a large lemonade. Ben was tall and skinny and on the basketball team, and he ate the kind of stuff my mom would faint if she saw on my plate. Sure enough, he ordered something called an “Indiana taco.” It was a bag of corn chips that someone had opened up and filled with a heaping scoopful of beef, topped with cheese and sour cream.

“Hey, health nuts,” came a voice from behind us.

As I spun around, I could feel my face breaking into a smile.

“Hi, Jamie,” I said. “How you doin’?”

“I’d be doing better,” she said, “if Coach Williams had remembered to turn his brain on. What’s he thinking out there? Or, better yet, is he thinking?”

Amazing.

We had thought exactly the same thing. Other kids and parents were buzzing about how well Ikeville was playing or complaining about the Jonasburg quarterback. Jamie and I were the only ones to realize that Coach Williams wasn’t helping.

“He should put lipstick on his head and make up his mind,” she said.

“Huh?”

“Get it? Lipstick? Make up his mind. Makeup?”

“Ugh,” I said. “That’s a lame one.”

“Why didn’t he go for it on fourth down?” yelled Jamie. “I mean, you knew that Julio would kick it as hard as he could and end up sending it into the end zone. He might as well have just handed them the ball.”

“I know! And how about that two-point conversion call?” I exclaimed.

“Don’t get me started,” said Jamie. “We would only have been down by six points, and if he had gone for it on fourth like he should have, we would probably be ahead by one point at halftime instead of down by two touchdowns!”

I nodded. And even though we were losing, I couldn’t help but smile.

In the end, Jonasburg lost 33–20. At some point Coach Williams got so frustrated he threw his clipboard into the air. Like most of his team’s passes, it hit the ground and bounced harmlessly away.

The day after the game, Kevin and I both helped out Mom and Dad at the store. We painted a back wall and swept the floors and threw out broken shards of clay. Mom sold a painting in the morning, and Dad sold two flowerpots in the afternoon. Before Kevin ran off to a movie with his new flock of friends, Dad suggested we celebrate a successful day by having dinner as a family.

“Good idea,” Mom said. “What do you guys want us to cook?”

Mom and Dad took turns cooking dinner. It was a lot of tofu and salad and dishes our friends called “Hippie Food.” But, probably because we grew up eating it, Kevin and I never complained much. Actually, I bet most kids would prefer tofu to chicken fingers—which always sound gross to me—if they had a blind taste test.

Before I could think about what to request, Dad piped up. “No cooking! We’re going out to eat tonight.”

Going to a restaurant as a family? We hadn’t done that in a long time. Even when we drove halfway across the country to Indiana, Mom and Dad didn’t want us to eat fast food. Instead we’d find a local grocery store and make sandwiches in the car.

“Why not?” Mom said. “I could use a night out. And, anyway, we should be celebrating.”

Celebrating? I ran through everyone’s birthday in my head, making sure I hadn’t forgotten.

“Celebrating what?” I asked.

“How well it’s going for all of us in Indiana,” Mom said. “This was a big move. It was a real test for the whole family, and we’re passing with flying colors.”

I smiled a little as we got in the car. It was nice to see that Mom wasn’t worrying about me anymore.

We ended up at Grisani’s, which claimed to have “The Finest Italian Cuisine in Jonasburg,” not bothering to add that it was also the only Italian cuisine in the town. As we studied our menus, I must have made a funny face.

“What is it, Mitch?” Dad asked.

“I don’t get it,” I said. “Why write on the menu ‘a heaping portion of delicious pasta’?”

“That’s what I was going to order,” Mom said. “What could possibly be wrong with that?”

“I’m sure nothing’s wrong with the food,” I said. “But why not just call it a plate of pasta and then serve me a lot, which would be a good surprise. When you call it ‘heaping,’ my expectations are going to be high. Then you add on ‘delicious.’ If my definitions of heaping and delicious aren’t their definitions of heaping and delicious, I’m going to be disappointed.”

“If you can’t eat it all, bring the rest home in a doggie bag,” said Kevin, missing the point, as usual.

But Mom got it. “That’s true, Mitch. I guess I do expect something really good.”

“And the description made her want to order it, too. Isn’t that what a restaurant should do?” my dad asked.

“No,” I said. “A restaurant wants you to come back. If your order is disappointing, then you probably won’t.”

Everybody went back to their menus, but I hoped this idea would somehow stick in my parents’ heads when they went to their art store in the morning. Sometimes they describe the pieces in it as “beautiful” or “picturesque” or “scenic,” but if the customer doesn’t see them that way, they’re not going to buy anything or tell their friends about the store. I wish my parents understood these things better, since it was a big part of why we had to move in the first place. But we were having such a nice time that I decided to let it go.

On Sunday, I did my homework in the morning so I could be sure to watch the Baltimore-Pittsburgh game in the afternoon. Ordinarily, I would have just enjoyed the game. But I got an extra surge of excitement knowing that I had bragging rights with Jamie—and five bucks—resting on the outcome. For most of the game, Pittsburgh was leading. My grin must have been pretty obvious.

“What are you so happy about?” said Kevin. “I thought you didn’t like Pittsburgh.”

“I like them today,” I said.

“Let me guess,” said Kevin. “You have a bunch of their players on your fantasy league team.”

“Nope,” I said. “Not a single one.”

“Then you bet money on them with another boy.”

Was it that obvious?

“Something like that,” I said, deciding not to tell Kevin that he was right about the betting, but that the “boy” was Jamie.

“And you took Pittsburgh?”

“How could I not? I saw online that both of Baltimore’s best wide receivers and their starting linebacker wouldn’t be playing. And that when they play road games against passing teams, they usually lose. Especially when the field is natural grass and not turf.”

“Isn’t that kinda cheating?” asked Kevin.

“It’s not cheating,” I said, staring at him. “It’s called having more information. That’s all.”

“It doesn’t seem fair. You’re kind of taking advantage. And isn’t this exactly the kind of thing that got you in trouble in California?” Kevin asked.

“Whatever,” I shot back. “You wouldn’t understand.”

“I’m just saying,” said Kevin in a see what I care? voice. “I wouldn’t be happy if a friend did that to me.”

We watched the rest of the game. Baltimore made a comeback and tied it up in the fourth quarter. On the next kickoff, the return man for Pittsburgh fumbled. Suddenly, with less than two minutes left to play, Baltimore had a chance to win. After a few running plays, they let the game clock bleed down, and then the field-goal kicker came on with just a few seconds left.

As if he were guiding the ball with a remote control, he drilled a perfect kick between the two uprights. Baltimore won, 30–27, and their fans in the stadium went nuts. The announcers called it “arguably the best game of the season so far.” Kevin was standing up and pumping his fist. Then he looked over at me, confused. “How come you’re still smiling?” he asked. “In case you didn’t notice, your team just lost.”

“True,” I said. “But for me to lose my bet, Baltimore had to win by at least four points.”

Kevin shook his head. “You’re sneaky,” he said, “but you’re good. There should be a word for that.”

Hopefully it’s not “annoying,” I thought to myself.

As the television coverage went back to the studio, Kevin flopped down on the couch. “I don’t get it, Mitch. I never have any allowance left at the end of the week, but you have money just lying around to bet on football.”

“You look at your allowance the wrong way,” I said. “You think of it as money you found. Like, ‘Hey, here’s thirty-five dollars Mom and Dad gave me! Sweet. I’m going to buy a video game, go to the movies, and spend the rest on iTunes.’ But it’s not money they gave you. It’s money you earned. You got it for doing your chores.”

“So?”

“So it’s payment you got for doing work. You took out the trash. You mowed the yard. You’re going to rake the leaves this fall. Remember that and you’re going to spend it more carefully than if you think of it as lucky money you stumble on every week.”

Kevin thought about it. “It’s like I’m a worker getting paid thirty-five dollars, not a guy who won thirty-five dollars in one of those scratch-off games they always advertise on TV?”

“Exactly!” I said. “Lottery winners use their money to go on cruises and buy new golf clubs and fur coats and stuff they don’t need. Workers use their money to buy groceries and things they need. And hopefully they save some, too, for when other stuff comes up.”

“Maybe in a few days you can help me make some picks for next Sunday’s game. I want to do some gambling, too.”

“Sure,” I said.

“One more thing,” he said. “How many enemies have you made since we’ve moved here?”

“None,” I shot back. “What are you trying to say?”

“Just be careful, little brother,” he said. “It’s only stupid money, you know?”

Only stupid money? Sometimes I can’t believe Kevin and I came from the same set of parents.