Sticks (12 page)

Mom gets up, swings her big black purse over her shoulder. Camille calls it the Black Hole. Things go in there and never come out. “Well, guys, I’ve got to go to work.” She motions me to come. “I’ll drive you to school, Mickey.” She stands there a minute, gets her car keys. “Thank you, Joseph.”

“Anytime.”

Mom and I get in the Chevy. Joseph Alvarez bunches up the greasy towel.

Mom concentrates hard on the road and drives off.

“Boy,” I say, “it was really nice of him to do that, huh?”

Mom’s holding the wheel tight. She stops at the
red light by Jacoby’s Pest Control. Jacoby’s new sign has a rat on it the size of Arlen.

“Yes it was.” Mom rubs her forehead. “Fixing a car is a nice thing, Mickey, but it doesn’t fix everything.”

Mom’s hanging on the sidelines watching Joseph Alvarez and me play. I even get her to play a rack of rotation pool with us, which she hasn’t done in forever. Mom can’t bank shots for anything. I beat her bad. She says I’m an awesome player and getting real fine coaching.

“Thank you for what you’re doing,” she says to Joseph Alvarez.

“Thank you for letting me, Ruthie. I could give you a couple of tips on a better way to hold the stick . . . .”

“That’s all right, Joseph . . . .”

“Wouldn’t take much, Ruthie. You’re holding it a little high, which is throwing your aim a bit and—”

“
No thank you
.”

Joseph Alvarez is going to Buffalo tomorrow with a load of motor oil and then halfway across Canada,
which he said might take two weeks. This isn’t great news, because, as far as I know, Carter Krantz isn’t going anywhere.

“You just practice with all you’ve got.”

“I will.”

“I got one more thing for you to work on, but you don’t do it at the table. You practice clearing out your mind and focusing. Shut out the world, shut out the noise, shut out all the things in you that say you can’t do it.”

“Blinders,” I say, “like my dad.”

“You’ve got it.” He gives my hand a firm shake. “Well, it looks like you’ve found your
ganas
.”

I smile big and say I sure have.

“Then you let it drive you,” he says. “And start playing other people, Mickey. Good to get a lot of game experience before the big day.”

I nod.

“But don’t play Buck,” he advises. “It’s not that you’re not good enough, just don’t give him the edge, you know?”

“Yeah.” I want to give him a hug goodbye, but that wouldn’t be cool.

“We’ll practice when I get back.”

“Okay,” I say.

Joseph Alvarez tips his hat and heads for the door. I run after him.

“Drive careful,” I say.

“I’ll do that, son.” He looks down smiling, gives me a good hug, and heads out the door into the night.

*   *   *

It’s seven days since Joseph left and I’m getting good. Everyone can see it.

I think Buck’s nervous.

Joseph sent me a postcard from Toronto, Canada, that said to not look at anybody else, just worry about which ball I’m going to shoot next. “Pool games are won one ball at a time,” he wrote. I taped it to the base of my Replogle globe and say, “Pool games are won one ball at a time,” every night before I go to bed.

The tournament’s four weeks away and I think I’m pretty close to ready. It’s feeling more like spring now—you can almost go outside without a jacket. Arlen’s had to stay after school every day this week to get his enrichment needs assessed because he’s gifted.

“They don’t want me to be bored,” he explained.

“How come?”

“They’re afraid of what I’ll do.”

The days blend into each other. I’m charting Joseph’s trip by the postcards he’s sending.

Ottawa.

Winnipeg.

Moose Jaw.

Medicine Hat.

Mom’s impressed that the postcards keep coming. I say I think that’s the sign of a really responsible person, don’t you, and she says maybe. Big Earl’s been playing me, and Poppy’s taken extra arthritis medicine and shot a few rounds of straight pool. Straight pool’s a hard game. You’ve got to call
your shots—that means saying which pocket the ball’s going to go in when you hit it. Poppy never got into nine ball. You play her in her hall, you play her game.

Snake Mensker touches that rattler scar on his cheek and says I’m becoming downright deadly even though he still beats me pretty bad. I wipe Petie Pencastle over the table and blow off Danny Couriter and Nick Savlanas. I’m playing for serious position now and controlling my game. I even won one game off Perry to his five, which really says something. Perry’s helping me like he helps everybody else. Buck’s practicing death drills, gunning for me.

“Don’t pay any attention to him,” says Perry.

“I’m not.”

I look over at Buck, who’s half laughing. “Where’s the cowboy,
Vernon
?”

“Just ignore it,” says Perry.

Buck walks over, rolling up the sleeves of his shirt, planting his workboots right in front of me, and leans up close to my face.

“I said, where’s that stupid cowman of yours,
Vernon
?”

Perry says, “Get lost, Buck.”

I look right at him. “Take back what you said!”

“I don’t take nothing back!”

“He’s a better coach than you’d know what to do with!”

“Oh yeah?”

“
Yeah
!”

“Prove it,
Vernon
!”

Buck storms over to table eight and stands there. “You show me how good he coached you, little boy!”

Perry’s standing in front of me telling me not to listen. “Joseph said not to play him, Mickey. You got to save it for the tournament.”

“Chicken?” Buck sneers at me.

“Rack ’em!” I say.

*   *   *

There’s a story about my dad when he was twelve and a man in the hall challenged him to a game. Dad ran ninety-seven balls before missing and the man just sat there and kept asking, “What’s inside you that lets you do that, young fella?”

Dad said he guessed it was that he wanted it so bad.

Ganas
.

I rack the balls on table fifteen. I want this bad.

Buck wins the toss and gets to break. My heart’s thumping in my stomach. People are beginning to gather around the table. Petie Pencastle, T. R. Dobbs, Shelty Zoller.

Wham!
Buck crashes the cue ball down the table and slams the balls apart. The two ball zooms into the corner pocket.

“You can’t beat me,
Vernon
!” He makes the one ball in the side.

I look right back at him. “Yes I can!”

But it’s like everything Joseph Alvarez taught me went down the sewer.

My hands are shaking.

My palms are sweating. Buck makes another ball and misses an easy bank.

“Didn’t leave you anything,” he says, snarling.

“Yeah you did.”

I bend over the table. My brain is fogged in, my heart is feeling crazy. I bank the four in the side in a really good shot. I nail the five, the six. I miss the seven.

“Tsk, tsk,” he says. “You’re history, little boy.”

Buck makes the seven in the side and stands over the eight like a vulture over a dead animal. I’m losing to him again.

I beat Perry once. Buck can’t beat Perry and I’m losing to him again!

He beats me one game, two. I bend over to break. I make the eight ball, miss the one.

Buck whispers, “So where’s the cowman now to help you?”

“
Stop it!
”

I fly at him, pushing him down. I’m punching him, kicking him. “
Stop it! Stop it!
”

Guys are trying to break it up. I’m going to get him! Hurt him! We’re punching each other on the floor; he throws me off. I land hard on my hand.

“
Ahhh!
”

Perry runs over.

I see Big Earl’s worried face over me.

“My hand!”

I can’t lift my left hand, can’t bend it.

Big Earl’s helping me up. I’m dizzy. The pain is bad. He shouts at someone to find my mother. T.R. tears upstairs. Earl says if I got to throw up, go ahead and do it.

Mom rushes into the hall.

“Dear God!”

Earl and Mom help me out to the car. We’re going to the hospital.

I’m crying, “My hand! He broke my hand!” as Mom rams her old Chevy through traffic.

The doctor in the long white coat stands back and adjusts the splint on my left hand. Her face looks tired. She says she’s got a boy just my age, like that’s supposed to make me feel better. Two nurses help a man with a bloody eye lie down. Mom is standing next to the doctor looking plenty worried.

“That’s a mean sprain you’ve got,” the doctor says. “You’re lucky it didn’t fracture. Are you right-handed or left?”

“Right.”

“Well,” she says, “at least that’s something.”

“I’m a pool player!” I shout. “I’ve got a tournament in four weeks.”

She shakes her head. “No pool for three to four weeks, Mickey.”

“I’ve got to practice!”

“Not with that sprain,” she says firmly. “You’ve got to let it heal.”

I flop back on the hospital cot. “The tournament . . .”

The doctor sits down. “I’m sorry about that, using it for
anything
! We’ll check you in three weeks.”

“That’s not enough time!”

I close my eyes and try to push back the tears.

I might as well be dead for being so stupid.

Mom puts a hand on my shoulder and I just lose it, crying and sobbing like a baby.

*   *   *

Mom drives me home. I can’t talk. We pull up in front of Vernon’s and see the poster for the tournament in the window.

I close my eyes—I can’t look at it.

It won’t be me.

Poppy’s all upset and Big Earl is saying, “Okay now, you’re going to get through it.”

I don’t tell him he’s wrong.

I’m not going to get through it.

To beat Buck I have to practice every day!

Camille comes over and hugs me, which she hasn’t done for a long time. She makes her special hot milk chocolate with little marshmallows, but I can’t eat the marshmallows because I need a
spoon and I’m using my good hand to hold the mug.

I can’t put my pajamas on without everything hurting. I get put to bed like a baby with the medicine the doctor gave me for pain. Nothing ever hurt worse. Mom pulls the covers over me like she did when I was small. I feel like my whole wrist has been chopped off.

Mom touches my head. “Oh, sweetie . . .”

I bite my lip and start to cry.

“I have nothing smart to say, Mickey. I just want you to know that it’s not going to hurt forever. I know it seems like it will, but it’s not.” She kisses my forehead. “Keep that hand elevated. That’s what the doctor said.”

I can’t believe I didn’t listen to Joseph!

*   *   *

It’s been a long, mean school week.

I sleep a little and wake up and the pain’s still there, hovering over me like a thick, dark cloud.

I failed Joseph Alvarez, failed the Vernons.

And the postcards keep coming.

From Thunder Bay: “Remember to center-stroke the ball.”

From Toronto: “Remember—easy stroke, easy win.”

I’m not winning anything!

I can’t get my coat on without help. I can’t get my bookbag on my back without someone lifting it up there because I have to wear a stupid sling.

“I can do it myself!” I scream at Mom when she tries to help me.

“Sit down,” she says.

I sit, but I don’t want to hear.

“Let me tell you about something that I am well acquainted with, Mickey. Disappointment. When you look it in the face, admit how much it hurts, when you can forgive the people involved, including yourself, you can move on.” Her face looks gray. “I don’t always follow my own advice. I wish someone had told me this when I was your age. It would have made things—”

“I’m okay,” I lie, trying to zip my jacket.

Mom’s eyes are so sad, they take over her face. “Think about what I said.”

I’m too busy being miserable.

I can’t take gym.

I can’t do good work on my Zulu warrior mask in art because I need my left hand to hold it steady while I’m painting.

I’m researching my soldier letter. Arlen and I both picked Valley Forge as the place where our soldiers were stationed. It was such a bad winter for the American army: not enough food, cold weather, sickness. They’d lost some important battles, too. All their hope was gone while the British hung out in Philadelphia, warm and well fed. History sure can be hard. I’m trying to picture Lieutenant John Q. Milner, wondering how he felt.