Losers Take All (29 page)

But now the park was cold and empty, and Muhldinger was sitting by himself. He spat once on the ground and looked away from me, back out at the frozen duck pond.

I grabbed the purple Frisbee and ran back to Dylan and Frank. If we stayed another few minutes they might spot him, and for some reason I really didn't want that. “Hey, guys,” I said, “I'm freezing. Let's go for pizza.”

“The wind's dying down. We've got all afternoon for pizza. Let's play a little more,” Dylan said.

“Let's go now,” I told him. “My hands are so numb I can't feel the Frisbee. Come on, I'm treating.”

“Big spender,” Frank said enthusiastically. “Did I mention I'm feeling like three slices?”

“Fine,” I said. “As long as you don't eat so much that you can't save goals tomorrow.”

“My eating ability and my goaltending skills are not linked,” he assured me.

I glanced quickly back toward the duck pond at the sad figure sitting motionless under the willow tree, and then I said, “Let's put that to the test,” and we headed off to binge on hot pizza with sausage and mushrooms.

 

39

It wasn't the biggest crowd we had ever played in front of, but for a cold November afternoon it was still pretty impressive. More than five hundred fans sat in the bleachers of Gentry Field, waiting to see if the Fremont Losers could actually win a game. License plates in the parking lot included some out-of-staters, but when we ran out onto the turf to warm up I scanned the crowd and saw plenty of faces that I recognized.

My dad and mom were sitting with Ed Powers and his wife, Stephanie, in second-row seats. It was a little strange seeing them there because I was used to seeing them together at football games, cheering for the Lions. As I watched, my father leaned over to Ed and gestured toward the field, and I knew he was explaining something about soccer to his old teammate. Who would have ever thought my dad would become a soccer expert?

A few rows back I spotted Mr. Knight with Emily. He was wearing a dark suit, and glanced at his watch as if wondering whether the game would start on time. Emily wore a light-blue ski coat with a hood trimmed in white fur. She saw me looking and waved, and I found myself waving back.

“Your dad's here,” I told Becca.

“Yeah, I saw. Must be a slow day at the office for dentists and party planners. My mom's here, too. On the other side of the field, thankfully.” I followed her gaze and spotted Mrs. Knight sitting with Meg's mom and dad.

Jan Brent filed in with a tall man I'd never met, but I knew his name was Sam Magee. Sam was an assistant soccer coach at Rutgers, and he'd told me he'd be coming. I'm pretty sure this was the only time Sam had ever scouted a team called the Losers, and knowing that he would be watching gave me a little extra jolt of excitement.

There was only one camera crew on hand to film our last game, from a local news station. A guy in a leather jacket was taping a stand-up while the scoreboard clock ticked down to start time. When there were five minutes left the ref blew his whistle and shouted, “I need the captains.”

I walked out to midfield where the Lynton captain was waiting. He was an inch taller than me, with a heavier build and a super-confident smile that could also be read as a sneer. “Last game of the season,” he said. “Ready to go?”

“Let's play before we freeze,” I said. “I hear you guys are undefeated.”

“Undefeated and untested. We've been coasting. We need better teams to play.”

“That's a good problem to have,” I told him. “We've been getting crushed.”

“Yeah, it sounds like you guys have turned losing into an art form. I can't wait to see the show.” He was smiling the whole time he said it, but it clearly wasn't meant as a joke. Right then and there I decided that we would have to beat Lynton that day.

“Lynton, call it in the air,” the ref ordered. He flipped the coin and their captain called heads. Sure enough it was heads, and he took the side of the field that didn't face the afternoon sun.

“Shake hands, guys,” the ref said.

“Good luck,” I told their captain as we shook. “Congrats on your great season.” I looked him in the eye and added: “But it's not over yet.”

“It's over,” he said, and then turned away, and we walked back to our teams.

“Which side do I have?” Frank asked when I approached our bench.

“Facing the sun. Maybe it'll keep you warm. By the way, try not to let the Lynton captain score.”

“Jerk?” Frank asked.

“Total jerk. Thinks we're garbage.”

“We are garbage,” Frank said. “Dump us into the truck and turn on the compactor.”

“Buddy,” I told him, “I know you voted against trying to win today, and since you're our goalie you can screw this game up single-handedly. But I'm asking you as a favor not to do that.”

“Why is a stupid soccer game so important to you?” Frank wanted to know.

“My dad's here, with my mom,” I said. “First one she's ever seen.” I hesitated. “There's a scout here, too.”

“Like an Indian scout?”

“No,” I said, “like a scout from Rutgers.”

It's hard to surprise Frank, but I'd managed it. “You're being recruited at a Loser game?”

“Please keep it to yourself. And I guess the last reason I'd like to win is that Lynton thumped Fremont so badly in football. They crushed our whole town in their stupid mud pit. It doesn't make you a jerk to want to win one back for the place you grew up.”

“Not sure I agree,” Frank said. “That actually sounds to me like the place where all the stupidity starts. But we've been friends since I ate your lunch in kindergarten and made you cry.” He shot me a grin. “I might be able to save a few today, if they're not kicked too hard.”

“Keep us in the game,” I told him. “That's all I'm asking.”

The countdown clock showed two minutes. Coach Percy called us in and we circled around him. He was wearing his weirdest outfit of the season: plaid pants, a yellowish tweed coat that zipped up to his chin, and a black fedora that looked like it belonged in a Mafia movie. “Well, team,” he said, “we've climbed the Alps. It's time to descend into Italy and lay waste to Rome … or at least to Lynton.”

“It's cold enough to be the top of the Alps,” Becca complained, shivering.

“My feet are frozen, so how can I kick a soccer ball?” Meg asked. “Not that I can even when it's warm.”

Coach Percy looked around at us and smiled. I think he genuinely liked this team, with all our grumbles and goofiness. “When Hannibal reached the crest of the Alps, a blizzard blocked all the paths down,” he told us. “His generals came to him and said they were within sight of Italy but there was no way to descend. He told them: ‘
Aut viam inveniam aut faciam
,' which means, roughly: ‘I will either find a way, or make one!' I don't expect you to win this game the way a normal soccer team wins, but I'm sure you'll find a way or make one! Losers forever, on three.”

I wasn't sure I wanted to be a loser forever, but we put our hands in the middle and counted: “One, two, three—Losers forever!” and ran out onto the gleaming emerald turf of Gentry Field.

 

40

I lined up at center mid, with Rob behind me at stopper. “Just to be clear, Jack,” he said, “we're trying to win today, right?”

“This is the famous Logan-Powers partnership, second generation,” I told him. “Take no prisoners.”

“You got it.” He glanced over at his father in the stands. “I kind of owe Dad something to cheer about. I guarantee the defense will hang tough today.” After that promise he turned toward the one news camera that was filming us and flashed a thousand-megawatt smile.

The ref blew his whistle, and our final game was on. Pierre kicked the ball to Jenks, who tripped over it like it was a giant mushroom that had suddenly sprouted in his path. A speedy Lynton forward scooped the ball up and sliced through our midfield before we knew what was happening. Rob stepped up to stop him but he slid a pass sideways to their tall captain, who was making a parallel run. The captain one-touched a whistling shot from thirty yards away right through Frank's upraised hands into our goal. Lynton had scored in under ten seconds—I'm not sure the ref had even had time to lower his whistle.

Their captain did a little victory dance and tapped his wrist as if saying, “Check your watches. Record time!”

Frank dug the ball out of the back of the net and bounced it twice, angrily, before handing it to me. “Even I'm embarrassed by that one. I swear I was trying to stop it.”

“It wasn't your fault,” I told him. “We all fell asleep.”

“There's still plenty of time to get back in this game,” Rob assured us.

“There's still the whole game to get back in the game,” Dylan pointed out. “That took about three seconds.”

Pierre kicked off again, and this time he passed it to Becca who kicked the ball back to me. I took one touch and instantly three Lynton players swarmed me and got the ball away. One of them passed it to a short striker on the right wing, who made a darting run down our sideline. Chloe and Zirco ran to intercept him and when he swerved they collided so hard I could hear their bodies smacking together thirty yards away. Zirco flipped completely over Chloe, and it looked like a clown routine except that they both went down painfully hard.

The Lynton striker didn't kick it out of bounds at the possible injury—instead he lofted a cross over our goal toward the long corner. Frank jumped to punch it away, but vertical leaps were never his strong point and he barely got off the ground. The ball grazed his fist and when it came down their tall captain was in the perfect spot to snap his head and bang it into the netting.

This time he rotated three hundred and sixty degrees while holding up two fingers. Then he tapped his wrist again to let us know he had drawn blood twice in two minutes.

Zirco got to his knees but he looked shaky. Chloe lay on the turf, pressing her hands to the right side of her face. We eventually helped her to her feet, and she put an arm around Percy and an arm around Meg and hobbled off the field. The Fremont fans clapped for her, but not one person in Gentry Field was laughing.

*   *   *

The collision hadn't been funny and neither was the score—two to zero in record time. Something had changed on this cold autumn day, and our gags and screw-ups that had amused people in late summer sunshine now made them shake their heads and cover their eyes.

I tried my best to get us back in the game, but a Lynton defensive specialist had been assigned to mark me all over the field, and he stayed with me like a shadow. Whenever I touched the ball he was quickly joined by a second teammate and even a third. They bumped and banged me and I couldn't shake them. When I tried to dish out quick passes, there was no one nearby.

Our defense got mad after Chloe limped off the field, and we held Lynton for a while. But they scored their third goal on a penalty kick after Zirco used both hands to stop a shot. Then, just before halftime, their short striker sensationally nutmegged Rob and kicked a screamer into the right corner for their fourth goal. He celebrated with a front flip and a victory yell:
“Perfect season!”

The ref blew his whistle for halftime and we walked over to our bench.

“Sorry about that last one,” Rob said. “That little guy made me look like a chump.”

“Don't worry about it,” I told him.

“I don't like it that my dad saw it,” Rob muttered. “And I didn't appreciate the gymnastics routine.”

“What does it matter?” Dylan asked. “We all suck. This was much more fun when we were trying to lose. They're pounding us.”

“That's because we're trying to be something we're not,” Shimsky said. “What you've forgotten is that it's okay to suck. We used to take pride in being pounded. What happened to feeling the thrill of defeat and the agony of victory?”

“I feel more pain than pride right now,” Chloe told him, holding an ice pack to her bruised cheek.

“One of their players called me lard-ass,” Pierre reported. “I'm not sure exactly what that is, but it doesn't sound like a compliment.”

Frank walked by, shaking his head. “Out of my way, lard-ass.” He clearly wasn't happy about the way things were going, either. He said to me in a low voice, “Sorry about the college scout. Maybe you'll get in on your grades.”

I glanced over at Sam Magee. I was surprised to see that he and Jan were both still sitting there, given how little I had done. Every time I'd touched the ball, I'd been mugged. It wasn't just that Lynton was covering me tightly—they were being rough, knocking me off the ball any way they could. When I tried to pass, it was like being on a raft with sharks circling and nobody around to help.

I walked over to Coach Percy, who was standing with his hands in the pockets of his tweed coat. “Not much to be done, I'm afraid,” he said.

“Probably not,” I agreed, “but here's a suggestion. Let me play striker and bump Rob up to attacking midfield.”

“He's the only thing holding our defense together,” Coach Percy noted.

“Every time I touch the ball I've got three of them on me,” I said. “I need an option. We're going to lose anyway.”

Coach Percy thought it over for a moment and then gathered us in for his final pep talk. “Don't look so discouraged,” he told us. “We wanted to win today, but if we lose you all have a lot to be proud of.”

“We suck and we're not funny anymore,” Meg said. “What else is there?”

“We never have to play soccer again,” Becca called out, as if that was a positive thing. Then she looked at me and said, “But, okay, let's try to avoid total disgrace.”