The Swap (2 page)

But inside? Between you and me? Laughing actually makes me feel even worse, because there isn't really anything funny about being insulted by your best friend since kindergarten, who has apparently decided you aren't her best friend anymore, two days before the start of seventh grade.

Nothing really funny about it at all.

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

HarperCollins Publishers

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“YES, SIR,” I SAY.

I'm talking to my father, and this is how you have to talk to my father.

“Yes, sir, what?” he asks.

“Yes, sir, I understand,” I answer, trying not to look at him but trying to seem like I am, because you can't really get away with no eye contact when talking with The Captain. I answer with a quick glance but keep my eyes straight ahead, staring through the windshield of the truck into the glare of the oncoming headlights and the pitch-black darkness.

We're on our way to hockey—I play year-round. I'm on the Boston Junior Bruins. I made the team last April. I'm the first eighth grader to ever make the roster, the youngest player in franchise history. It's pretty unbelievable. Our first game is Monday night. I have a lot to prove. I have to compete for every shift of every game. I can't take a minute off. I don't want anyone to think I haven't earned my spot—that I got here just because of who my brothers are. I always have to prove myself. It's about battling. I go 100 percent, 100 percent of the time. If you really want something, working hard for it shouldn't ever be a problem.

My dad isn't speaking. He hasn't said anything in at least ten miles of driving through the dark. In The Captain's world, this means my answer was not acceptable.
I need to try again
.

“I will be more respectful of your time by being on time?” I say. I try to remember what it is he's been lecturing me about, what he told me I needed to fix. What I did wrong. I honestly don't really know what I did this time. He was in a bad mood before I even tossed my hockey bag in the back of his truck and hopped up into the front seat beside him.

Let me tell you, there's nothing worse than when my dad gives you the silent treatment. Even though it's dark, I feel his eyes on me.

I search my brain for the right words. “I'm sorry?” I try again.

Nothing.

The Captain reaches for the radio and turns it on. He likes classical music. I think it calms him down.

“Jack.” My dad finally speaks. “I don't want to hear ‘I'm sorry.' It's inexcusable behavior. I won't tolerate it. How many times do I have to tell you? Actions speak louder than words. If you want to be a man, you need to get things done. You need to be accountable.” He looks over at me.

What I want to say is:
Nothing I do is ever good enough
. But of course I don't say that. I'm not crazy.

“Jack?” My dad sounds mad. “Jack!” he repeats. “Have you not been listening to anything I've said?”

Exactly!
I think to myself but obviously don't say, because I value my life and I don't want my dad to pull the truck over and chew me out for the next fifteen minutes. Instead, I just keep my mouth shut and think about how much fun I had today.

Today was one of the last days of summer, and it was perfect. Me, Owen, Sammy, Demaryius, Dominic, Brayden, Trey—we just chilled at the pool all day and swam and did crazy backflips off the diving board and ate nothing but hot dogs and greasy French fries from the snack bar. The night before, we were all at Owen's for a sleepover and played video games on his sixty-inch flat-screen TV in his man-cave basement paradise.

Now summer is over.

I press my head up against the truck's window and close my eyes. I just try and, like, breathe and not fight with The Captain. Not say the wrong thing at the wrong time. Not screw up.

School is going to start in two days, and if I'm not careful my dad might yank me out of Thatcher and make me go to Saint Joe's. Saint Joe's is where all three of my older brothers go, and at Saint Joe's you have to wear a collared dress shirt, a striped necktie, and a navy-blue blazer. No jeans. No girls.
No thanks
. The only reason The Captain is letting me go to Thatcher is because it fits better with my hockey schedule.

No one loves playing hockey as much as I do.

Hockey is the one thing The Captain and I agree on.

Hockey is my life. My brothers and I all play. It's just how it is—we all got handed a stick when we were, like, two years old. As soon as I could walk, I was put up on skates, pulling my dad on the ice with an inner-tube tire around my waist. All three of my brothers have already committed to Boston College.

I've always been the youngest on my team because my dad wants me to work harder and get better and tougher. There's nothing I'd rather do than play hockey the rest of my life. And there is a plan. I write it down every single night (only after I complete exactly two hundred push-ups, two hundred sit-ups, and recite the prayer to St. Sebastian seven times). This is what I do. This is who I am. I write it in the red-covered spiral notebook I keep tucked under my mattress. My mom told me to do it. She said—“If you believe it, you can achieve it.” She told me to write down my goals. And I have ever since.

I write the same three things. Every single night.

       
1. Play for Boston College.

       
2. Get drafted in the first round of the NHL.

       
3. Sign an NHL contract.

And you might think it's weird to have a secret notebook filled with the same three sentences written down every day since I was ten years old, but whatever. It's my dream, and I don't really give a crap if anyone thinks I'm weird about it. I've worked my whole life to take the next step. I'm still young. I still have a lot to work on. When I go to bed, I see myself signing my letter of intent to play for Boston College. I see myself getting drafted, slipping an NHL jersey over my head. I see myself doing
everything
. In my mind, I've already done it. I just have to go out and do it. Put in the work. Be unstoppable. My dad tells me all the time, “The true test of a man's character is what he does when no one is watching.”

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

HarperCollins Publishers

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I'M STANDING ON THE CEMENT
steps of the Riverside Sportsplex, my shin guards still on, my pink Thunderbirds soccer bag hanging from my shoulders. I'm sweaty and sticky and my hair is pulled back tight in a ponytail, like I always wear it. I'm standing here waiting for my mom to get me, when Claire walks up. She's smiling, but only for a second.

“Hey,” she says to me. “I just want to say, like, I'm really sorry to hear about everything that happened.”

“Um, what do you mean?” I ask. I'm looking over Claire's shoulder and watching Sassy and Aspen skipping across the parking lot all the way to Sassy's mom's minivan. We have just finished the first day of tryouts for the Thunderbirds thirteen-and-under indoor travel team. Sassy and Aspen are leaning into each other, arms looped, and shrieking with laughter like they are in on some big joke that none of us are cool enough to possibly ever get. Usually Sassy's mom gives me a ride too. But ever since Sassy's been acting like I don't exist, their car is suddenly “
full
.” As in—“Oh, sorry, Ellie, we're, like . . .”—Sassy will pause to glance at Aspen, sharing an entire sentence without saying a word—“We're, like, yeah, we're not going straight home.”

I turn back to Claire. She has a funny look on her face, and my heart starts to hurt right then. Right that second. It's so weird, isn't it? How your heart can hurt. How your heart sort of knows more than you know.

“Oh, forget it, nothing.” Claire looks at me as if she is really embarrassed, like she wasn't supposed to say anything. She quickly tries to change the subject. “Hey, so are you excited for school tomorrow?”

“Wait, what were you going to say?” I spot my mom's car turning into the Sportsplex and try rushing things. “You can tell me,” I say. My voice sounds so soft, and in the gap of quietness I force a shaky smile.

“Oh, I guess, like . . . ,” Claire starts, but stops herself.

I stand there.

I don't move.

My heart is pounding and my cheeks get really hot.

“Well, um . . . there's no easy way to tell you this.” Claire looks at me uncomfortably, as if she's warning me that she is really very sorry for what she's about to say. “I guess you didn't see the thing Sassy wrote on Facebook?”

I shake my head.
I don't have Facebook
.

Neither of us speaks for a few seconds.

I glance over at my mom waving me toward the car and put my finger up as if to say, “One sec.”

“She said . . . uh . . .”

“You can tell me, Claire,
please
?” I am practically begging at this point.

“She said, um . . .” Claire pauses and looks around her as if she's scared of Sassy overhearing her, even though Sassy is long gone. “She said, like, you . . .” Claire's voice trails off just as her ride pulls up. She back steps at first, before whirling around toward the car, then right before she opens the door she looks back over her shoulder.
“Sorry,
” she mouths.

“Wait, Claire,” I call after her. “What did she—”

But by then it is too late. Claire is already in the car, with the door shut.

Six older boys burst out the front doors of the Sportsplex and practically plow me over because I am completely in the way. And I just stand there for a few seconds, kind of frozen and kind of shocked. I guess that's when it really hits me. Finally. I get it. I've been officially, unofficially,
dropped
.

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

HarperCollins Publishers

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“SON?”

“Yes, sir?” I pause, my hand on the truck door handle, and turn toward my dad. This is what we always do before The Captain drops me off at practice. I don't know if it's a superstition or just a routine, but I always stop right before I get out of the truck, and listen. My dad is tough. He pushes us. He was a captain in the army, and before that he was an All-American for Boston College, so, I mean, he knows what it takes.

“Go in there and work hard. Give it all you have. No regrets,” he tells me.

“No regrets, yes, sir,” I say back. We do a nod, and I finally open the door and leap out of the truck.

The Captain rolls down the window on my side and leans toward me. “Win those battles in front of the net,” he tells me. “Be strong on your feet. Play a two-way game.”

“Yes, sir.” I stand at attention outside the truck, my bag slung over my shoulder, my two best sticks in my hand.