Dylan opened the door to his basement and flashed me a grin. “Was it the barbecued potato chips or did you miss us?”
“The chips,” I told him, looking around. “This place is becoming party central.”
At our first team party everyone had looked restrained and a little uncomfortable, but now they were letting it all hang out. Heavy metal was thrashing from the speakers— I was pretty sure Shimsky must’ve chosen it. He was standing at the foosball table with Chloe, beating up on Pierre and Becca. I watched our revolutionary and our ace statistician work the foosball back and forth between offense and defense, and suddenly rip in goals. They gave each other flying high fives when they scored, and while they seemed to me like an unlikely couple, maybe Muhldinger was right and there was something going on between them.
Becca was concentrating on trying to defend against Shimsky and didn’t see me come in. Or maybe she was just ignoring me. We hadn’t exchanged a word or a text since the Maysville game. I couldn’t help noticing that she was wearing tan shorts and a red V-necked top—the same outfit she had worn on our first date. She looked great, even though she was getting annihilated at foosball.
This wasn’t easy music to dance to, but Zirco didn’t care. He danced too close to the Ping-Pong table and almost collided with Jenks, who was in a heated match with Frank. As I watched, Jenks tried to slam the ball and let go of his paddle, which clipped Zirco on the side of the head, knocking him over the black leather couch. He got up, rubbing his scalp, and went right on dancing.
It was pure Losers mayhem, but everyone was having a good time. Dylan’s mother carried a pitcher of lemonade down the steps and I saw her smiling at her son, who had his right arm thrown carelessly around Meg’s back. My friend had lost his shyness in record time, and looked very comfortable in his new roles as boyfriend and host.
A hand touched my shoulder. “Good to see you, Jack.” Coach Percy hadn’t come to our first soccer team party, but he was at this team meeting—or whatever it was—dressed fairly normally for him in jeans, a white shirt, and a blue jacket.
“Good to see you, too,” I said. “Strange day at school. Muhldinger could have used your quote.”
“Which one?” he asked.
“The one from Caesar about how no one is so brave that he is not disturbed by something unexpected. Our fearless principal looked a little off his game.”
“It wasn’t his best day,” Coach Percy agreed with a smile. “American schools are turning out to be more dramatic than I thought.” We were alone for a moment and he lowered his voice. “Jack, at halftime in the Maysville game, you mentioned that you aren’t much of an actor—unlike some people. Were you referring to anyone specific?”
I looked back at him. “I just think people should be straight with each other.”
“I agree,” he said. “If you ever want to talk about this further, let’s have a chat just between the two of us.”
“Fine,” I said. “But I think Dylan is calling this meeting to order.”
Our host was banging a Ping-Pong paddle on the table.
We gathered around. “I got a call a little while ago from Chief Duggan. They connected Lowry to the beating ’cause they searched the Stevens and found his shoe prints in the mud. The goon wears size fifteens.”
“Done in by canoe feet,” Frank called out, and people laughed.
“They brought Lowry to the station and put a scare into him, and it wasn’t long before he cracked and gave them Davis and Barlow. Lowry told them exactly how it all went down, and who did what. They’re going to charge all three of them as adults with aggravated assault, which is a felony.”
There was applause, but no more laughter. I guess everyone understood that there was nothing funny about the word “felony.” “Was it really serious enough to be ‘aggravated’?” Chloe asked.
“They broke his wrist,” Meg said protectively.
Dylan gave her a smile. “Because of the seriousness of my injuries and because three ganged up on one, they think they can make the felony charges stick. Chief Duggan told me not to talk about the legal stuff with the press”—he broke off for a moment and glanced at his mom—“and I won’t. But he didn’t say anything about talking to my friends. And I don’t think the Losers should let themselves be gagged. Especially not when we have the forces of darkness on the run.”
There were shouts of “They’re going down!” and “Muhldinger for janitor!”
“A word of caution,” Percy cut in. “This school has been run by certain … elements in the same way for many years. It would be a mistake to think they won’t strike back.”
“Every revolution has its counterrevolution,” Shimsky chimed in ominously.
“That’s exactly why we shouldn’t back off or be afraid,” Becca said. “We should all go to the football game tomorrow and sit as a team, wearing our soccer shirts. Let’s make a statement.”
“Yeah,” Meg agreed. “Losers for Lynton!”
Lynton was the town the Lions were playing tomorrow. They were competitive with us in basketball and baseball, but when it came to football we always beat the crap out of them. I guess they were willing to take their lumps on the gridiron, because I’d seen us dish out some pretty ugly thrashings and they kept coming back for more, year after year.
I spoke up: “We can go and sit together but I don’t think we should cheer for Lynton.”
“Why not?” Meg asked.
“Because we go to Fremont.”
“So we should cheer for the people who broke Dylan’s wrist?” Meg demanded.
“The three guys who did that have been arrested,” I reminded her. “We can’t keep whipping this up.” I looked around at Frank, Dylan, and Becca, and I could tell they didn’t agree with me, but they held their tongues.
Coach Percy walked next to me. “I happen to agree with Jack. You should listen to what he’s saying.”
“Making this bigger and angrier and more violent won’t help anyone,” I said. “Dylan got hurt, three guys were arrested, and that’s enough.”
“It won’t be enough for Muhldinger,” Pierre called out. “He likes dishing out pain.”
“You really want to get him?” I asked. “I have a way.”
They all waited.
“Most of you know Rob Powers. The backup quarterback.”
“Meathead,” Shimsky called out.
“Misogynist,” Becca added.
“I don’t even know what that is,” I admitted. “But I’ve known him for years and he might’ve gotten a meaty head from being on the football team, but deep down he’s a good guy. Muhldinger’s always had it in for him, and Rob hates Muhldinger as much as anyone in this room. He wants to join our team.”
I could tell from their faces they didn’t like the idea. Chloe said loudly, “We don’t need anybody else. Especially a football player.”
“We’ve never turned anyone away,” I pointed out. “One of the best things about the Losers is we’ve had an open door. I don’t see how you can slam it on Rob just ’cause he’s a good athlete.” I paused and added, “And if you want to push things without violence—this is a great way. I know Muhldinger, and if his backup quarterback quits to join us, that will piss him off more than anything else you could do.”
They put it to a team vote, and to my surprise it narrowly passed. I got the feeling most of them didn’t want Rob on their team, but my friends knew they had treated me badly and owed me one.
I ate a last handful of chips and was on my way out when Becca appeared right in front of me. “Leaving without saying goodbye?”
“You didn’t say hello when I walked in.”
“I didn’t see you walk in,” she said.
“You weren’t exactly looking.”
We stood there glaring at each other. I wanted to turn my back on her and walk out of the basement, but I also wanted to grab her and kiss her. “So what’s a misogynist?” I asked.
She gave me a little smile. “Don’t play dumb.”
“I just don’t study vocab words all the time.”
“It’s someone who hates women.”
“Are you kidding? Rob has more girlfriends than anyone at this school.”
“And look at the way he treats them,” she pointed out.
“They seem to like it.”
“It’s a technique some guys use to take advantage of girls with low self-esteem,” Becca explained. “Sometimes girls don’t know what they want. But that doesn’t mean he’s not a jerk. C’mere.”
There was a back room in Dylan’s basement, really just a giant closet, filled with the water heater and the electricals for the house. Becca drew me into it and pulled the door closed. The little room was hot and stuffy, and when the door was shut the only light was from a partially blocked window and the illuminated dials on the machines.
“You were right about my college essay,” Becca admitted. “In fact you were so right that you made me feel guilty. I owe you an apology.”
“So you are writing about the Losers?”
She nodded. “My college essay is now called ‘Revolution and Counterrevolution at Fremont High.’”
“It sounds a little more impressive than ‘Knight and Shadow,’” I told her. “Not that I have anything against your horse.”
“To get into Stanford or one of the top Ivies you need a story, and I think I’ve found mine.”
“You definitely have. Just don’t start a civil war and burn our school down to impress the admissions people.”
“I don’t think that will be necessary,” she said. “But, Jack, I didn’t know that any of this would happen when we were floating on our backs on Hidden Lake and I first mentioned joining the team.”
“You were so nervous that day about asking me out for a date that you couldn’t have been thinking about anything else,” I told her.
“Don’t flatter yourself,” she said. “Seriously, it’s also not why I talked to that reporter from the Star Dispatch about our team. I don’t want you to think I’m super calculating and that I’d been planning this all along, or that I used your family and your father—” She broke off. “’Cause I swear I didn’t. It all just sort of happened.”
“Okay, I believe you,” I said. “My dad and I had a talk the other day and things are better between us.”
“I’m glad,” Becca said. “Things are a little better with my father, too. I had lunch with him and he was really trying not to be a jerk. He’s full speed ahead with the divorce, but he’s making it as painless as possible. He’s giving my mom the house and the car, and pretty much everything she wants. It’s uncontested, and moving ahead at record speed.”
“Well, isn’t that good?” I asked. “At least it’s not a bitter fight.”
“I suppose.” She nodded. “Except that it makes me feel strange. Doesn’t he have any feelings for our house where I grew up? It’s like he’s trying to escape from everything we shared. Part of me wishes that it was a little more contested. And he wants me to meet his new friend, Emily.” Becca fell silent for several seconds. “At lunch he kept stressing the word ‘painless,’ as if he was going to inject us all with Novocain, like one of his patients. But maybe you’re right and painless is better than the alternative.”
“I preferred painless when they were gluing my teeth back together.”
“I know you don’t like dentists,” she said with a little smile. “And I also know how much you care about your old friends. I said some stuff at the hospital I regret.”
“Me too,” I told her. “And you were absolutely right that it was guys on the football team who beat up Dylan.”
“Actually, you were the one who said it first. So you were right.”
There was a machine in the little room that suddenly made a thwump-thwump sound, like a racing heartbeat. I looked into Becca’s hazel eyes and waited for it to finish thumping, but it kept going and even seemed to speed up. “Is there anything else we need to apologize to each other about?” I finally asked.
“I don’t think so,” she said. It was hard to tell in the low light, but I thought she’d started blushing. “I missed you,” she whispered. “A lot.”
“Me too.”
“Really?” she asked. “That’s a little hard to believe. Because you couldn’t say you loved me. And you’ve been completely ignoring me.”
“I wasn’t ignoring you, I was pissed off at you,” I told her. “But I guess I couldn’t have gotten so angry if I didn’t care about you so much.”
No, she wasn’t blushing. It was something else. Her eyes glowed.
Becca stepped toward me and I put my arms around her, and then the electrical room suddenly got a lot hotter.