Penalty Shot (2 page)

Jeff reacted instantly. He stopped the puck with just enough give to keep it from bouncing back into the middle of the ring.
He sent a controlled pass across to Hayes.

After that, the competitive juices began to
flow as each player tried to outsmart his opponents. One player after another had to leave the circle. Soon there were only
four players left: Bucky Ledbetter, Shep Fredrickson, Michael Gillis, and Jeff.

Bucky had just received a pass from Shep when Coach Wallace blew his whistle. Jeff glanced over at the coach, ready to learn
about the next drill.

Wham!

Out of nowhere came a pass so hard and powerful it almost knocked the stick from his hands. As the puck skittered away, Jeff
looked back to the circle in disbelief. Bucky was grinning at him.

“Sure you’re ready for this, Connors?” Bucky asked snidely. “A season away from the squad seems to have dulled your reactions.”

Jeff had opened his mouth to reply when
the coach called for him to retrieve the puck. With a last backward glance, Jeff skated down the ice, scooped up the disk,
and hurried back to hear what the coach was telling the other players.

“Okay, same two groups,” he said. “Outs, you split in half again, eight to a goal. Choose six guys to rotate in as defensemen,
one player at a time. The remaining two guys will take turns playing goalie. Got it?”

The outs nodded and skated off.

“Ins, form three lines at mid-ice at the right-wing, center, and left-wing spots. Half face one goal, half the other. Your
job is to get by the defenseman and take a shot on goal if you can. Easy does it on the goalie, okay? I don’t want any injuries.
After your run down the ice, skate back and get ready to attack the opposite goal. Got it?”

The ins nodded and scrambled to form
their lines. In less than a minute, the drill started.

Jeff’s heart raced with excitement. Sometimes practice could be dull, but drills like this really gave players a chance to
shine.

His group was up first. Jeff was in the right-wing slot. When he saw that Bucky was in center, his enthusiasm flagged a bit.
Then he shook his head, reminding himself that he and Bucky might be on the line together on the team. He had to start working
well with him, just in case.

Coach Wallace blew his whistle, signaling them to begin the drill. Bucky’s brother, Hayes, was at left wing. He took a pass
from Bucky, then tried to shoot the puck across the ice to Jeff.

It didn’t make it. Kevin skated in and stole it.

Bucky groaned. “Good move, little brother, real good move! Why don’t you just
pass it to the other team next time and save us all the trouble of trying to set up a play?”

He skated to the sidelines in disgust. Jeff followed him.

“Hey, Bucky, lighten up! We all send bad passes, you know,” he said.

“Hayes can take the criticism. He knows I want him to get a fair crack at a place on the team this year. Unlike
last
year, when he was beaten out by someone who couldn’t stick it out.” Bucky cast a sidelong glance at Jeff that spoke volumes.

Jeff reddened. Darn that Bucky! He makes it sound as if I got kicked off the team on purpose!

But he swallowed his anger and skated back in line. For the rest of the afternoon he concentrated on playing as hard as he
could. As a result, he made few mistakes and left practice feeling that he had given it his best shot. Now it was up to the
coach to decide if
Jeff was worth giving a second chance. Jeff knew he’d have his answer in less than twenty-four hours. Coach Wallace would
post the team roster for all to see sometime the next day.

H
i, Mom!” Jeff called out from the mud-room next to the kitchen. “Anybody home?”

“Mom’s at the dentist,” came a voice from upstairs. “There’re some killer brownies she just made on the counter. Oh, yeah,
and there’s a letter for you. She put it on your bed.”

“Thanks, Candy,” he called back to his sister. Candy was a few years older than he was. Her life revolved around her friends
in high school. Still, they had a warm relationship most of the time.

As he hung up his coat and walked into the kitchen, he wondered about the letter. He had just taken a bite out of one of the
brownies when he realized who it must be from. He raced up the stairs two at a time.

There on his pillow lay a big envelope. The return address read “The National Hockey League,” along with a team name and address
in red-and-blue letters. With a yelp, Jeff tore it open. A glossy black-and-white photo fell out. It was a picture of his
favorite player, Eric Stone! Jeff had written to the team’s fan club more than a month ago. He had started to think his letter
had been lost. But here was the photo, signed and everything!

Jeff propped the picture up on his desk and was about to crumple up the envelope when a piece of paper fell out. He picked
it up and stared at it, not believing what he
saw. It was a letter, written to him by Eric Stone himself!

Jeff sat on the bed and read it.

Dear Jeff,

Thank you for your letter telling me how much you enjoy watching me play my favorite game
—
hockey. It makes it all the more exciting for me knowing that there are fans like you out there rooting for me and my team.
I hope I’ll live up to your expectations this season and not do anything to let you down.

Being a good hockey player takes a lot of practice. Since you say that you might want to be a professional hockey player,
too, let me give you a little hint. It’s not just how well you skate and handle a stick.
No,
you have to be a smart player, too, to get ahead in this
game. That means you need a good education. That’s the best way to train your mind to learn everything you have to know as
a pro.

So work hard out there on the ice, but work just as hard in the classroom. Remember: keep your grades up and your stick down!

All the best,

Eric Stone

As Jeff read through the letter, he felt his excitement drain away. “Keep your grades up!” “Train your mind!” It was as if
Eric Stone knew Jeff had had trouble in school before.

Then he began to wonder: had there been some mistakes in the letter he’d written to Eric? Maybe a misspelled word or a grammar
problem? It hadn’t been a very long letter
but, still, he knew it was likely it had been riddled with “sentence faults” and “paragraph faults,” as his teacher called
them.

Why didn’t I ask Candy to look over the letter before I sent it? He groaned inwardly. But he knew why. He would have felt
like a little kid just learning to write. He hated feeling stupid.

Jeff took one last look at Eric Stone’s letter, then crumpled it slowly in his hand. A quick toss and it was headed for the
wastebasket— just as Candy walked into the room. The letter bounced off her knee and to the floor.

“Whoa, I’m unarmed!” Candy joked. She scooped up the wad and was about to toss it back at him. Then she stopped and smoothed
out the paper. “Isn’t this the NHL emblem? Are they writing to you to say you’ve been selected as the number one draft pick?”

“Very funny,” said Jeff, trying to act as though it were nothing. “Here, give it to me.”

But Candy was already reading the letter. Jeff turned his back on her and picked up one of his schoolbooks.

After a moment, Candy said, “I don’t get it. Eric Stone is your big hero, isn’t he? So how come you’re throwing away a letter
from him? That’s better than an autograph on a program, even.”

Jeff spun around and replied, “Yeah, you’re right. I wasn’t thinking. Maybe I will keep it after all.”

Candy held it out to him but before she let go, she asked quietly, “Are you upset about what he said about the importance
of doing well in school?”

Jeff snatched the paper out of her hand and stalked over to the desk, not answering her question.

“Because if you are, I’m sure you could do better with a little extra help. Mom and Dad said they’d get you a student tutor
if—”

“I don’t need a tutor! I’m not stupid!” Jeff said angrily. “I just need a little peace and quiet so I can get to work on my
composition. It’s due tomorrow and I don’t want to spend all night on it.” He tore a fresh sheet of paper out of his three-ring
binder and sat at his desk.

“I didn’t say you were stupid,” Candy said as she left the room. “At least, I don’t think you’re stupid in the way
you
think I mean.” She slammed the door behind her.

Jeff stared at the photo of Eric Stone for a few minutes. Then, with a sigh, he turned the picture over, picked up his pencil,
and tired to remember everything the teacher had told the class about writing a composition.

The clock on his wall ticked loudly. Downstairs, he heard his mother come in the back door. A truck drove by the window. Eventually,
he heard his father’s car turn into the driveway. Soon it would be time for dinner.

The paper was still blank when he pushed himself back from the desk and headed downstairs.

Oh, well, he thought. I’ll give it another try later. After I eat.

I
s the roster up yet?” Kevin asked breathlessly as he hurried into school Friday morning. Jeff yawned widely before answering.
He had stayed up late the night before finishing his composition.

“Not yet,” he replied. The rink was next to the school and he had just had time to stop by on his way to school. But the list
hadn’t been tacked to the door. Now they would have to get permission at lunch recess to check again.

Morning classes dragged by. At lunch, Jeff sat with Kevin and a few other hockey players,
but he was too nervous to eat more than a sandwich and a banana. He wasn’t the only one. When the bell signaled the half hour
of after-lunch free time, everyone at the table jumped up as if he’d been stuck with pins.

“I’ll get the okay from Ms. Collins,” Jeff said as he headed over to the teacher on duty.

Ms. Collins agreed that they could take a quick walk to the rink to see if the roster was up. As he moved to rejoin the others,
Jeff heard her call out to him.

“I’ll see you in English class, Jeff. I’m looking forward to reading your composition.”

In the excitement, Jeff had almost forgotten about it. Well, he’d stayed up half the night working on it, so no one could
accuse him of not trying. Still, as he gave Ms. Collins a half wave to show he’d heard her, he felt a knot tighten in his
stomach.

No time for that now, he thought. He sprinted to catch up with the rest of the boys. Together they hurried to the rink.

The list was there! Jeff pushed his way forward and scanned it for his name. At first he didn’t see it. Then he read through
the roster again — and there it was! He let out a sigh of relief.

Kevin, Bucky, and Hayes had all made the squad, too. So had most of the other players from the year before. There were a few
new names, too, including two way down at the bottom under the heading of “Alternates.” At the very bottom of the page was
a note telling players there would be no practice that day but that they should stop in and get their uniforms.

Jeff ran down the steps and searched for Kevin. He spotted him with Bucky, Hayes, and a fourth fellow he didn’t recognize.

“Hey there, fellow Blades!” he called.
Kevin was all smiles as Jeff clapped him on the back.

“Hey yourself,” he replied. “We were just talking about getting in a little weekend practice down at the pond. Interested?”

“Sure, sounds good,” said Jeff. He glanced curiously at the new person.

Kevin introduced the two to each other. “Jeff Connors, this is Sam Metcalf. He just moved here. He’s going to be the team
manager!”

Jeff shook Sam’s hand. “That name sounds familiar,” he said.

Sam shrugged. “If you read the local district sports pages, you might have seen it in a few columns about hockey last year.
I led my old team in scoring. I had hoped I’d be able to play here, too. But I missed the tryouts for the Blades because we
were moving.”

Jeff shook his head sympathetically.
“That’s rough,” he said. He was going to ask Sam some more questions but was cut off by the bell.

As the boys headed back to school, they settled on a time to meet for a pick-up game on the pond on Saturday.

“I’ll be there,” Jeff promised. “But now I have to turn in my English composition.” He groaned.

“Something the matter?” Sam asked.

“Jeff has trouble writing,” Hayes cut in before Jeff had a chance to speak.

Sam shot Jeff a sideways glance but didn’t say anything.

Jeff reddened. “Yeah, well, Hayes is so good at it he thinks anyone who doesn’t get all A’s has a problem. He’s lucky.”

Hayes smiled at him and nodded. “You’re right. I am lucky.”

Jeff was the last one to arrive in class. He turned in his composition and began to struggle to keep his mind from wandering.
He liked Ms. Collins and really did want to do well in her class. But the afternoon sun was slanting through the tall classroom
windows. Jeff found himself staring at the dust whirling in the sunbeam and daydreaming.