Say It Ain't So

by Josh Berk

  I laughed. “You are a terrible liar,” I said.

  “Yeah,” he said with a laugh. “That’s one trait I wish you’d inherited instead of just my dashing good looks. You’re too good at lying. It’s troublesome.”

  “Not lying,” I said, lying. I pointed to my eye. “Just a baseball. I’ve been helping Mike practice. Throwing him some cheese.”

  “You know I threw some serious cheese back in my day?” he said.

  “So you claim,” I said.

  “My best pitch, though, was the Vulcan change.”

  I looked at him skeptically. He held his hand up like the guy from Star Trek. Two fingers together on each side with a space in the middle like scissors fingers.

  “You’re making that up,” I said.

  “Total real pitch,” he said. He grabbed a ball off my dresser and sort of lodged it in there and went into a windup. “Live long and prosper!” he yelled, pretending to throw the pitch.

  “You are an idiot,” I said with a smile.

  “It’s the batter who looks like an idiot,” he said. “Works every time.” He raised his arm like an umpire. “Strike three with the Vulcan change! The crowd goes wild!” Then he got all serious out of nowhere in that weird dad way. “You know, you can talk to me about anything,” he said.

  “Yeah,” I said. “I know.” I paused. I wanted to tell him. But I couldn’t tell him. I tried to keep it vague. “So listen,” I said. “If, let’s say, there was maybe someone that you trusted—like really trusted—but you maybe suspect that maybe they did something, like, kind of bad—like maybe pretty bad—what would you do?”

  Dad paused. He sighed. He rubbed his hand across his dome. “I think you know the answer, Len,” he said.

  “You tell someone?” I said.

  “No,” he said. “You talk to them about it.”

  This was not the answer I expected.

  “Listen,” he said. “If it’s something serious, like this person is hurting themselves or doing something major, then, yeah, you tell a grown-up. You tell me right now. But if it’s something that a friend is doing—I’m sorry, maybe doing—and you need to find out, you talk to them about it. Man to man.”

  It sounded so heavy in my heart. I knew it had to be true. It was also the first time Dad had ever referred to me as a man. Felt pretty good.

  “Oh,” Dad said. “I almost forgot. There was a message on the machine for you from before. Some kid from school.”

  “Who?” I asked.

  “Kyle Webb,” he said.

  “Weird,” I said.

  “No,” he said. “Webb.”

  “You’re hilarious, Dad,” I said in a tone that I hoped made it pretty clear I was kidding.

  Dad seemed to not get it, though. He grinned like he was really proud of himself. “I know,” he said. “So who is this Kyle Weird?” He handed me the piece of paper he had taken the message on. It had Kyle’s name and phone number.

  “Skinny guy. Plays first base. No idea why he called me.”

  “Gonna call him back?”

  “Maybe,” I said.

  “Just don’t call him String Bean,” Dad said.

  “Got it,” I said.

  Dad finally left the room. I had no idea what Kyle wanted or even how he got my number. He was relatively new to school—not someone I grew up with or spent a lot of time hanging out with or anything. Why was he calling me? What did he want? I would have to wait to find out. It was time to call Mike. Man to man.

  I dialed the number I knew so well. It rang a few times. Mike’s sister, Arianna, picked up the phone. “Hello?” she said.

  “Is Mike there?” I asked.

  “Who may I say is calling?” she said.

  “Ari, it’s Lenny.”

  “Lenny who?” she asked.

  “Lenny Norbeck,” I said.

  “Lenny Norbeck who?” she said.

  “Lenny Norbeck, the person who is going to make your life miserable if you don’t give your brother the phone, that’s who!” She was seriously the most annoying person in the world.

  “Sheesh,” she said. “Who pooped in your milk?”

  After a few seconds Mike was back on the line. “Hello?” he said.

  “Hey, it’s Len,” I said.

  “I know,” he said. “No one else gets Arianna as angry as you.”

  “Why does she hate me so much?” I said.

  “Probably your face,” Mike offered helpfully. “So, listen, didn’t you just call, like, five minutes ago? What is going on here?”

  “Mike,” I said. “About the whole thing with Kyle’s dad’s phone … is there something you want to tell me?” I asked.

  “No,” he said. “Not really.”

  “Nothing?” I asked.

  “Listen, Lenny,” he said, “if you’re accusing me of something, just go ahead and accuse me.”

  There was a pause and then I blurted it out.

  “I think you took Mr. Webb’s phone and put it in Davis’s shin guard to get Davis kicked off the team.” There was no response, so I kept talking. “I totally get it,” I said. “Davis is a jerk; plus, you wanted to be the starting catcher. No one can blame you, really. Two birds, one stone.”

  There was silence on the other end. Then Mike spoke slowly, in a voice shaky with anger. “The only bird here, Lenny,” he said, “is the one I’m giving you.”

  “What?” I said.

  “I’m giving you the bird into the phone. You can’t see it. Trust me. I am.”

  “Why are you doing that?” I said.

  “Why do you think?” he said. “You’re supposed to be my best friend! We’ve been friends our whole lives! And you think I’m a thief?”

  “I’m not saying you’re a thief,” I said. “Just that you had one second where you, uh—”

  “Stole something? Because that kind of is the definition of a thief.”

  “I think you knew they’d find it. I think you knew Mr. Webb would get it back. It wasn’t about stealing. You didn’t even keep the phone.”

  “Because I didn’t take the phone!” he screamed. “I’m not a thief and I’m not the kind of person who would frame a teammate to get a starting job. And you know what else I’m not?” he said.

  “A ballerina?” I ventured, going for a joke.

  “Your friend,” he said. “I’m not your friend. Not anymore. Good-bye, Lenny. Don’t call back.”

  My head was reeling. What did Mike mean that he wasn’t my friend anymore? Sure, it wasn’t the first time he had said something like that. It wasn’t the first time he had said exactly that. When you’re friends with someone for as long as we’ve been friends, you fight sometimes. And then five minutes later you make up. But this felt different. This didn’t feel like when we were six and we’d get into a huge argument about who got to be Spider-Man. This was serious stuff. I had accused Mike of something pretty bad. And he was pretty mad. And I was pretty sad. Even rhyming wasn’t going to cheer me up.

  I was just zoning out in my room, lying on the bed. I still had the piece of paper with Kyle’s number on it. I doubted he would cheer me up. Talking to Kyle was just about the most depressing thing you could do. But what’s the expression? Misery loves company? I sure was miserable. Might as well have some company.

  I dialed the number. “Hello?” said a glum voice on the other end. It sounded like a talking rain cloud, so I knew it was Kyle.

  “Hey, Kyle,” I said. “It’s Lenny Norbeck. You called?”

  “Oh, hey, Lenny, yeah,” he said.

  “Um, did you have a, uh, reason for calling or …?”

  “I don’t know,” he said. “The rumor around school is that you’re some sort of detective.”

  “Yeah?” I said. “Well, not anymore. The detective game doesn’t lead to anything but trouble.” I thought about telling him how Mike was mad at me, but I didn’t want to drag Kyle into this. More to the point, I didn’t want to drag Kyle’s dad back into this. If he found out it was really Mike an
d not Davis who took the phone, well, let’s just say there would be trouble. More trouble. Maybe Mike didn’t want to be my friend anymore, but I still didn’t want to have Mr. Webb on his case.

  “Too bad,” Kyle said.

  My curiosity kicked in. “Why?” I said. “You have a case for me?”

  “Maybe,” he said. “Sort of …”

  “I’m listening.”

  “I thought you were done being a detective.”

  “Maybe I am, maybe I’m not,” I said. I didn’t want trouble, but I did want a distraction. Kyle’s case might be something interesting. Something different to think about.

  “Well, I’m not really sure if this is a case for a detective, but I just … I don’t know who else to call.”

  “Spill it,” I said, going back to my detective voice.

  “Well, I want to get my parents back together. The divorce, Lenny, it’s killing me. I know they can get back together. I just know it.”

  I didn’t want to say anything. I had seen enough movies to know that this kind of thing never works. Kids can’t save their parents’ marriages and no one ever has a cell phone signal when a bad guy is around. These are the two things I’ve learned from movies. But I didn’t want to say anything. Kyle seemed so desperate. I just made a noncommittal um-hurm sort of noise.

  Kyle continued. “I think somehow if I get a message to my mom and make her think it’s from my dad apologizing, that would just be enough. That would get it all started and it would go from there.”

  “Um-hurm,” I said again.

  “So do you think you can help me?” he said. “I, uh, I can pay you.”

  “You had me at ‘pay you,’ ” I said.

  “That was the last thing I said. You can’t say ‘You had me’ about the last thing. It’s supposed to be the first thing.”

  “Well, okay then!” I said.

  “So you’ll take the case?” he said.

  “I’ll tell you what,” I said. “I’ll think about it. If I come up with something, you’ll hear from me.”

  He told me his address and again I wished I had a notebook. I didn’t have any desire to take this impossible, ridiculous case Kyle was trying to hand me. But I did want to write something else down. He was giving me … a clue.

  It was Saturday. I had a few cases cooking. But nothing going on with any of them. Not really. I wasn’t sure where to go next. Why wasn’t real life more like baseball? You just try to go from base to base until you’re home. Just score more runs than the other team and you win. Solving cases wasn’t like that. Life wasn’t like that. You never knew which direction things would fly off in. And sometimes even if you got what you were looking for, you’d find you didn’t want it at all.… Okay, there was also Kyle’s case.… Well, was that even a case? Maybe a job for a spy, not a detective. I told him I’d think about it, but that was a lie.

  I wasn’t coming up with anything in my sign-stealing investigation either. I had some theories—at least I thought I did. But I couldn’t prove any of it. Plus, I really didn’t want to get punched in the face again. It was so weird. I couldn’t turn to Mike for help. I couldn’t turn to Other Mike either. I honestly had no idea what to do.

  I sort of wanted to talk to my dad about it, but somehow the conversation would come back to my “shiner.” I was already committed to that lie. I enjoyed a certain amount of freedom and didn’t want to compromise it. Would they let me go off on my own if they knew I was sneaking around, investigating crimes, getting shiners? No, they would not.

  So I had nowhere else to turn but to Maria Bonzer.

  I didn’t have her phone number or email or anything, but I did know where she lived. And I had nothing to lose. It was a slow Saturday at the Norbeck house. I don’t know if I mentioned this before or not, but my mom GOT RID OF, LIKE, ALL MY TOYS. So I decided to bust out the bike and go knock on Maria’s door.

  I couldn’t help but feel nervous on the ride over there. It was close to Griffith Middle School, which meant it was close to where I got punched in the face. I didn’t like to admit it, but it was sort of traumatic. I kept my eyes peeled for ninjas, or anyone else who might want to fight me.

  I crossed Center Street and found Maria’s house, at least the one I thought was hers. They kind of all looked the same. Thankfully, there was a Phillies flag stuck in the planters outside the one I was pretty sure was hers. I rang the doorbell and waited.

  Two seconds later, she opened the door.

  Three seconds later, she slammed the door.

  Then she opened it again. “Ha-ha, just kidding, Lenny. What’s up?”

  “Nothing,” I said. “What’s up with you?”

  “Nothing? You’re the one who rode your bike all the way over here. You must want to talk to me about something. You have any developments in the case?”

  “Developments in the—No. Can I come in?”

  She looked back over her shoulder and seemed to think about it for a while. “How about I come out there?” she said. “Just let me find some shoes.”

  I stood outside the door for what seemed like way too long. Maybe she didn’t really want to talk to me. Maybe shoes were really hard to find. Girls were strange, that much was obvious.

  Finally she showed back up at the door. “Let’s walk and talk,” she said.

  “Took you long enough,” I said.

  “Things are weird at home,” she said.

  I didn’t ask for additional information, but she offered it anyway. “My parents used to fight all the time. Then they got a divorce. For the longest time I would have done anything to get them back together. I used to have crazy plans, like if I could just trick them or something.… Anyway, my mom’s doing much better. But she really hates men, I think. Boys too.”

  “Sorry?” I said.

  “That’s okay,” she said. “I assured her that you weren’t really a boy.”

  “Thanks?” I said.

  “You know what I mean,” she said, and punched me in the arm. I suspected that I did know what she meant, but I wasn’t sure I liked it. I didn’t have time to dwell on it, because she started peppering me with questions.

  “When is Hunter’s next game?” she asked.

  “Wednesday,” I said. “Against Highland.”

  “Okay, fine. If he pitches well there, we know what that means.”

  “What?”

  “That Griffith was stealing signs.”

  “Yeah, probably,” I said. “Or that Highland stinks like rotten eggs.”

  “Do you have any leads? Any suspects?” she asked.

  “Well, just the one,” I said. I told her about how Davis got kicked off the team for stealing. And about how he comes to all the games.

  Then I told her all about how—and why—I suspected Mike of framing Davis. I told her how we had a big fight and how he said we weren’t friends anymore.

  “So why did you just tell me that whole thing about how Davis did it?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “I’m just trying to convince myself.”

  “But you are convinced it was Mike?” she asked.

  “Pretty convinced,” I said.

  “That’s seriously messed up,” she said.

  “I know,” I said. “That’s why I’m asking you for help.”

  “This was a wise choice,” she said with an evil grin.

  “Hey,” I said. “Didn’t you say that your phone got stolen back in Philly?”

  “Yeah,” she said.

  “Think they’re connected?” I asked.

  “Um, they’re all connected, because everyone in the world has a phone these days. That’s like saying that because that one guy has a face and that other guy has a face, they must be brothers.”

  “Totally,” I said.

  “Are you even listening?” she asked.

  “Yeah, I’m listening. Totally. Total face brothers.” But the truth is, I wasn’t listening. I was thinking. Dangerous, I know. I was doing some good thinking. Then I was yelling.
“I think I solved the case!”

  “You know who was stealing Schwenkfelder’s signs and how?” Maria said, coming to an abrupt stop on the sidewalk. She turned to face me.

  “No!” I said.

  “You know who but not how?”

  “No!”

  “You know how but not who?”

  “No!” I said again. I knew it was getting annoying, but I couldn’t stop. “I know neither who nor how,” I said. “I have solved the other case.”

  “Is it the question of who the most annoying person in the universe is?” she asked, starting to walk again. “Because I think I have solved that one too.”

  “The case I have solved is the question of the missing cell phone. Now, I don’t like Davis Gannett and you don’t either,” I said.

  “I have never met him,” she said. Not helpful.

  “Whatever,” I said. “The point is this: He’s a jerk. And I wanted to believe that he was the one who stole the phone. We all wanted that. But he insisted that he was innocent, and Other Mike believed him.”

  “Personally, I’m not totally sure we should trust Other Mike’s perspective on this or anything else,” she said. “But carry on.”

  “Other Mike is kind of a genius, if you haven’t noticed,” I said.

  “I haven’t,” she said.

  “Well, he said he thought Davis was innocent, and that someone else must have been the one to steal the phone. That’s why I started to suspect Mike. But it wasn’t Mike.”

  “Yes, but who?” she said, her voice dripping with sarcasm. I ignored the sarcasm.

  “Yes,” I said. “That is the question. Who else would steal Kyle Webb’s father’s cell phone? And why?”

  “Yes,” she said. “Those are the questions.”

  “Well, don’t ask me,” I said. “Let’s go ask the thief.”

  I really did wish I had that notebook. As it was, I had to trust my memory. There are trustier things out there, let me tell you that much. But I thought I remembered the address, more or less. Something with some fours and fives in it anyway. “Come on, Maria,” I said. “Let’s go to Kyle Webb’s house.”

  “What?” she said. “Didn’t you just say Kyle was the guy who had his phone stolen? And we’re going to see the thief? Who steals their own phone?”