by Todd Hafer
Cody took a tentative step toward his potential opponent. Who was he supposed to be in a case like this, long-suffering brother Joseph, or jawbone-wielding Philistine slayer Samson? “Hey—” he began.
Neale spun around to face him, their eyes locking on each other like tractor beams.
This wouldn’t be such a bad time for the second coming, Cody thought. He waited a moment to hear a trumpet blast or some rolling thunder.
Instead, he heard a booming voice, but it wasn’t the voice of the Lord. It was that of Principal Prentiss, and it was impressive in its own right.
“Did we not hear the bell, people?” he asked.
At that, the students scattered like ants. In the frenzy, Cody lost sight of Neale. He followed Robyn into the life science classroom and took his customary seat behind her. After she sat down, she twisted around in her chair. “So, Cody—were you going to defend my honor out there?”
Cody shrugged.
Robyn frowned.
Cody balled his right hand into a fist and smacked it into his left palm as hard as he could. Robyn smiled at him and then turned around as Mrs. Emmons began her scintillating lecture on the frog’s digestive system.
The open Greta abuse didn’t vanish completely in the days following, but roughly half of the former antagonists decided to become neutral. Alston and his gang still went through the motions, probably as much to test Robyn as to insult Greta. Robyn didn’t deliver any more speeches, but she made sure to cling to the wall, plug her nose, and hold her breath—puffing out her cheeks as if she were storing plums in them—each time Alston, Neale, or any of the Alston posse passed her in the hall.
Cody’s heart hammered whenever this happened. One of these days, he thought, one of those guys is gonna say something really vile to Robyn, maybe even slap her or something. And then I’m gonna have to “defend her honor,” even though I don’t truly know what that means.
Cody hoped that if someone retaliated against Robyn, it would be Neale or one of the weak members of Alston’s mangy pack. He prayed that it wouldn’t be Alston himself. Alston would turn his face into hamburger.
Meanwhile, the Raiders opened regular-season play—and made hamburger of their opponents.
In the season opener at Holy Family, Cody didn’t start, but Coach Clayton put him into the game two minutes into the first quarter, after Keenan Jones schooled Brett Evans on three straight possessions.
“Martin!” Coach Clayton barked. “Next to me—now!”
Cody left his position at the end of the bench and stood eagerly in front of his coach.
“Sit!” Coach Clayton said.
Cody obeyed.
The coach coiled his arm around Cody’s shoulder. “You’re still my dawg, right, Martin?”
Cody smiled and nodded.
“Okay then. Get out there and take a bite outta Keenan Jones. He’s killin’ us.”
Cody approached the scorer’s table and pointed to the number 15 on his jersey. When the ref waved him into the game, he pointed at Brett, who shook his head and trotted toward the bench.
“Good luck, Cody,” Brett said as he passed by. “KJ’s even faster than last year. Watch that jab-step of his.”
Cody nodded and picked up Jones on the right wing. Not surprisingly, Mack—Holy Family’s point guard—fed the ball to the team’s star immediately. Jones shot Cody a quick smile, jab-stepped with his left foot, then drove right, toward the baseline.
Cody moved with him like a shadow. He got to the baseline a half second before Jones and planted his foot on it.
You’re gonna have to go out of bounds or plow right over me if you want to get to the bucket this way, Cody thought.
Frustrated, Jones picked up his dribble. He tried to head fake Cody into the air, but Cody stayed on his feet. He had seen that head fake work on Brett. Jones pivoted away from Cody, looking for help.
Unfortunately, his teammates had cleared the entire right side of the floor, expecting their captain to dominate any one-on-one matchup the Raiders threw at him. Jones had no one to pass to. Cody could see the panic in his eyes.
The referee blew a rippling blast on his whistle. “Five-second violation,” he called. “Red ball!”
On Holy Family’s next possession, Young—a pear-shaped five-foot-ten center—came out to the right wing to set a pick on Cody.
“Pick left!” he heard Pork Chop shout.
Cody nodded. As he felt Young close in, he deftly stepped around the pick and cut off Jones as he drove to the basket. Again, Jones stopped his dribble, held the ball above his head, and scanned the court for help.
As Jones’s eyes darted left and then right, Cody saw him relax his grip on the ball.
Like a boxer throwing a jab, Cody shot out his left hand and poked the ball free. Alston picked up the loose ball and dashed upcourt. Cody followed, about three strides behind.
“You got help behind you, T!” he shouted.
Alston angled for the middle of the lane. Mack, who had hustled back on defense, appeared to be in position to thwart Alston’s drive. Alston rose toward the basket, holding the ball high over his head with his left hand, like a waiter delivering a pizza. Mack leaped to defend the shot—and appeared to be high enough to block it.
But Alston didn’t shoot the ball. With a flick of his wrist, he passed it over his left shoulder, into Cody’s waiting hands. With Alston screening Mack, Cody had a candy five-footer, which he banked off the backboard for the score.
As Cody headed back to play defense, Alston drew alongside him. He said only one word—“Sweet!”
Cody did his best to keep his smile from spreading all the way across his face.
For the duration of the game, Jones never released a shot without struggling to get it over, around, or under Cody’s active hands.
Jones finished the game with eight points, four on free throws. Grant won, 43–29. Cody looked at the scoreboard as the final buzzer sounded and recalled that last year, Jones had scored twenty-nine on the Raiders—all by himself.
Grant faced East in the second regular-season game. Cody started, for the first time in his basketball life. Coach Clayton assigned him to Bobby Cabrera, who, next to Macy, was the best shooting guard in the league.
Coach Clayton’s pregame instructions to Cody were simple. “Dawg, you stick to Cabrera like stink on a skunk!”
Cody complied. He cut off passing lanes, overplayed to Cabrera’s dominant left hand, and countered every drive with quick footwork.
With three minutes to play in the first half, Cabrera had yet to score. Frustrated, as Cody mirrored his every move during a full-court press, Cabrera launched an elbow at Cody’s throat. Like all of his shots, this attempt missed—sort of.
Cabrera’s bony elbow glanced off Cody’s left shoulder. He took two steps backward and looked to the lead official for a foul call. The lead man had missed the elbow, but the ref trailing the action saw it all.
He whistled a technical foul, then clamped his right hand on the back of Cabrera’s narrow neck and marched him to the East bench, where his coach stood, wagging his head in disapproval.
Cody felt Pork Chop’s hand on his shoulder. “You okay, Cody?” Chop’s face was red with anger.
“I’m good, Chop. That one might leave a mark, though. But you know how the chicks dig bruises.” He forced a laugh.
Pork Chop didn’t appear amused. “Hear me now, Cody. Cabrera will pay. I’m gonna foul him so hard that his family is gonna cry out in pain—and that includes the relatives who are already dead!”
“It’s okay, man. Don’t retaliate. We’re spanking ’em. That’s what counts. Bruises heal, but a loss stays a loss forever.”
Pork Chop nodded unconvincingly.
East’s coach kept Cabrera out of the game until late in the third quarter. Then, as he jogged onto the court, he detoured in Cody’s direction.
“Stay off me, Martin,” he said evenly, “and keep those long monkey arms down. Or I’ll stick you again.”
“I’m just playing the game,” Cody said quietly. He hoped he could count on that proverb about a gentle answer turning away wrath.
The third quarter ended without incident. Grant held to a ten-point lead as the fourth quarter began. On East’s first possession, Cabrera took a pass on the left wing and blasted toward the basket. Cody anticipated the drive and moved into position to roadblock Cabrera’s move. He braced for the impact that he knew would come. Just before he collided with Cody, Cabrera dipped his shoulder and caught him squarely in the stomach.
Cody felt the air being forced from his body. He hit the floor with a groan and a thud.
Well, maybe I didn’t turn away all his wrath, Cody thought as he struggled to breathe.
Both refs tagged Cabrera for charging, but that didn’t appease Coach Clayton. He sprung from the bench.
“That was a flagrant foul!” he shouted. “For the love of Dennis Rodman, get that punk outta there!”
As both refs went to calm Coach Clayton, Cody saw Cabrera standing over him, like a victorious gladiator, his arms crossed in front of his chest.
“You got something to say, Martin?” The question was bait, and Cody knew it.
“Just two words,” he half-gasped.
“Yeah? Let’s hear ’em.”
Cody rose to his feet and looked Cabrera in the eye. “Our ball,” he said.
Thirty seconds later, Pork Chop issued his own statement. As Cabrera chased Alston through the lane, Pork Chop left his man and set a vicious pick. Cabrera didn’t see it coming, and the impact was like a poodle colliding with a refrigerator. Cody wasn’t sure if the cry that rose from Cabrera’s lungs was in pain, shock, or both. He slumped to the floor as if someone had removed all his bones.
Pork Chop smiled and raised his right hand high over his head, acknowledging a foul.
After the game, which Grant won 48–36, Pork Chop and Cody stayed late and took turns shooting free throws.
“Did you see that pick, Cody?” Pork Chop said with a laugh. “If Cabrera has any fillings, they’re loose now!”
Cody smiled sadly. “You didn’t have to do that for me, Chop. I told you that.”
Pork Chop left a free throw an inch short. “Well, maybe I didn’t do it for you. Maybe I did it just for me.”
Cody rolled his eyes. “My turn to shoot.”
As he positioned himself at the line, Cody saw Robyn enter the gym’s south doors, sipping a can of root beer. She angled straight for Pork Chop, who was standing under the basket.
“Good game, Deke. The way you played makes me hungry for girls’ season to start. And that was cool how you stood up for Cody out there.”
Pork Chop gave her his best aw-shucks shrug. “Ain’t no thang.”
Robyn was smiling, but Cody didn’t like the look of her smile. “No, it was a ‘thang,’ Deke,” she said. “It’s noble to defend someone. Very noble.”
Pork Chop went into full shrugging mode again.
“Too bad you don’t defend someone who really needs it—in real life, not just in a game.”
Pork Chop froze in mid shrug. “‘Scuse me?”
“I can’t excuse you, Mister Porter. Not as long as you do that up-against-the-wall garbage like Alston and his mindless followers. And don’t you deny it. I’ve seen you.”
Pork Chop looked to Cody for help. Now it was Cody’s turn to shrug.
“You at a loss for words, Deke Porter?” Robyn said, snapping off each word like a bite of licorice rope.
“That’s a first.”
Cody had rarely seen Pork Chop this helpless, at least outside of algebra class. He thought of the Weitz incident and the approximately nine-hundred other times Pork Chop had saved him from severe beatings. He cleared his throat.
“C’mon, Hart,” Cody said. “Chop’s not like those other guys. He’s not vicious or anything. He’s just being a goof, you know? Hey—he even teases me sometimes.”
Pork Chop nodded enthusiastically. “Yeah, I’m always bustin’ on Cody about his bird legs and spaghetti arms. I goof on everybody.” He paused and eyed Cody, who was nodding encouragingly. “Besides,”
Pork Chop said slowly, “if Greta would take a bath and wash her clothes once in a while, she wouldn’t catch so much abuse.”
Cody saw the color rise in Robyn’s face. “Can you hear yourself, Deke Porter? Can you hear what’s coming out of your mouth? Do you think Greta is at fault for her problems? Do you think anybody would choose to be the way she is?”
“I dunno. I mean . . . maybe she doesn’t know any better. She does seem kinda slow.”
Robyn ripped the ball from Cody’s hands and fired a baseball-style fastball at Pork Chop’s knees. Chop tried to leap and avoid being hit, but, as Coach Clayton often pointed out, the Raider post man “couldn’t jump over the Manhattan phone book—Manhattan, Kansas!”
The ball struck Chop’s right kneecap with a smack and ricocheted almost fifteen feet.
“What’s wrong, Deke?” Robyn said, her voice dripping sarcasm. “You seemed ‘kinda slow.’”
Pork Chop was doubled over, rubbing his knee as if it were a magic lamp. “That was harsh, Robyn. Can’t a brother get some love? I can’t believe you did that. On my bad knee and everything.”
Robyn snorted. “You don’t have a bad knee.”
“I do now.”
“If all you have is a bad knee, you’re way ahead of Greta, Deke. She has a bad life. And you’re responsible. You can’t deny it. And then you have the nerve to suggest she’s slow! Ugh!”
Cody went to retrieve the ball, which had eventually rolled to midcourt. He stooped to pick it up and then paused. He stood and, with his left foot, booted it softly to the other end of the court. Best not to give Robyn another shot at Chop.
He walked slowly back to the conversation, or inquisition, or whatever it was.
Robyn was invading Chop’s personal space in a big way. She kept stepping toward him, and he kept retreating. Eventually his back was plastered to the gym’s south wall, and for all of his 190 pounds of farm-built muscle, he looked as helpless as a newborn kitten.
“Let me ask you this,” Robyn said, continuing her interrogation. “You say Greta is mentally deficient—how do you know? Have you ever talked with her—and I mean besides hurling hateful insults at her?”
“Well, no. But nobody talks with her.”
“Wrong, muscle head. I talk with her. She’s a smart girl. She’s poor, but she’s sharp.”
Pork Chop shook his head slowly. “I just don’t understand. If she’s smart, then, why, uh—”
“I’ll show you ‘why-uh.’ Come with me right now. Both of you.”
Cody and Pork Chop flashed each other the same look. A combination of “What now?” and “Why me?”
“Robyn,” Cody protested, pulling on his sweats, “where are we going? We’re tired. We just won a big game—a tough game. We need some downtime. We just wanna go home and chill, you know?”
“No, I don’t know. There’s something more important than chilling, okay? There’s something you need to see. Now. Deke, you have hurt an innocent girl. I want you to learn a little more about your victim.”
She turned to Cody. “And you. You’re not much better. You don’t take part in the hatefests, but you don’t do anything to stop them, either. Don’t you remember what Blake said at that youth rally last summer? He’s your youth pastor, for heaven’s sake! He said, ‘All that is necessary for evil to prosper is for good men to do nothing.’ Do those words ring a bell up there in that head of yours? You are helping evil prosper. It’s as simple as that.”
Cody looked at Pork Chop, who raised his eyebrows and mouthed one word—“Busted.”
With that, he jogged from the gym, as Robyn rained insults on him. “Go ahead—run away, Deke! You’re too weak to face the truth, huh? You know, they shouldn’t call you Pork Chop; they should call you Lamb Chop!”
That one caused Chop to stop, but only for a moment. Without turning aro
und, he disappeared from sight.
“Keep up—will you, please?” Robyn called impatiently over her shoulder. “I’d like to get there before dark.”
Cody quickened his pace, trying to keep up with Robyn’s brisk steps without having to break into a jog. That would be uncool.
They had left downtown Grant—with its antique shops, shoe stores, donut shop, and Merv’s Men’s & Western Wear store—behind them. They were headed southeast, toward what Cody had heard people call “the wrong end of town.” As they moved, Cody noted how patches of crabgrass and weeds pushed their way up through cracks in the sidewalk. They walked past a pawn shop, a rent-to-own furniture store, and three consecutive boarded-up storefronts, which used to house a dry cleaner, a pipe and tobacco shop, and the Log Cabin Chinese Restaurant, which Dad could never mention without rolling his eyes.
Once they were past the El Dorado Motel, whose weather-beaten sign proclaimed “NO ACANC,” Cody and Robyn crossed the oil-stained asphalt of Chuck’s Used Cars and veered due east toward Clear Creek. They followed the creek as it meandered out of town and into a land of high weeds and thick trees. The aspen leaves had already turned. The brilliant rusts, gold, and red were fading, and soon the winter winds would strip the trees bare until they looked like white skeletons.
Suddenly, Robyn held up her right hand, like a scout in an old western movie. “Be quiet now,” she ordered.
“I haven’t said a word since we left the school,” Cody observed.
Robyn whipped her head around and narrowed her eyes at him.
Tentatively, he held up his fingers in a peace sign and gave her what he hoped was an endearing grin. She rolled her eyes, turned away, and resumed threading her way through a patch of tall wild grass. They crossed under Highway 7 and began a slow, steady descent. Cody had explored his share of Grant since moving there in second grade, but he was in unfamiliar territory now.
“Robyn—”
She turned to him and shushed him like a kindergarten teacher. “It’s over there,” she said quietly, “on the other side of the creek, about fifty yards north.”
Cody leaned forward, squinting his eyes, because that’s what those TV scouts seemed to do at times like this.