Athlete vs. Mathlete

by W. C. Mack

  But in those last thirty minutes, we learned something even more important.

  Russ and I stood under the basket, watching Dad come in for a shot. Without anyone telling him what to do, Russ lifted his hands and blocked it.

  “Nice move!” Dad said, thumping him on the back and passing me the ball. “Let’s try it again. Owen?”

  I went in from the other side and when I aimed, Russ knocked the ball loose and it hit the pavement behind me.

  “Denied!” Dad shouted, totally excited.

  I couldn’t believe what I was seeing.

  We took a bunch more shots, and Russ stopped almost half of them.

  “Whew!” Dad said, wiping his forehead with the sleeve of his T-shirt. “Nice work. Let’s call it a day.”

  On the walk home, I told Russ I was impressed with how hard he’d tried, and how he hadn’t given up.

  “Thanks, but I’m still pretty nervous about this, Owen,” he said quietly.

  So was I. Sure, it had been cool to see Russ kind of start to get the hang of basketball, but trying hard wasn’t exactly the same as being good.

  And that’s when an awesome idea hit me. An idea that could save us both at tryouts. “Look, we know you’re not the best player.”

  “Thanks a lot.”

  “You know what I mean. But that doesn’t matter.”

  “It doesn’t?” he asked, surprised.

  “No, you’ve got something the other guys don’t.”

  “A sixth-grade math trophy?”

  “No. Well, yeah, but something better.”

  He looked at me like that was impossible.

  I smiled. “You’re tall and you can block a lot of shots.”

  “So?”

  “So?” I laughed. “So all you have to do on Wednesday is stand there and wave your arms.”

  It was genius. He wouldn’t embarrass himself (or me!) and tryouts would be quick and painless.

  I watched Russ limping next to me.

  Well, maybe not painless.

  Still, the plan was pretty brilliant.

  “Just stand there?” he asked, looking at me like I was nuts.

  I nodded and grinned. “Just stand there.”

  Negative Impact

  Our next Masters of the Mind practice was on Tuesday, followed immediately by a practice session with the Beaumont Middle School team.

  When I got to Jason’s house, his dad was watching a Blazers game in the living room.

  “How is DeShawn Williams playing, Mr. Schmidt?” I asked.

  His head whipped around so fast, I thought it might come right off his neck. “Fantastic,” he said, grinning. “He’s hit every free throw.”

  “He’s shooting seventy-four percent for the season so far,” I told him, remembering the statistic I’d seen in our morning newspaper. It was kind of strange that what would have been a C grade in school was headline news in basketball.

  “Do you want to watch?” he asked, hopefully. “I’ve got three kids in this house and no one likes basketball.”

  “Thanks, but I should get to the meeting.”

  “Masters of the Mind,” he said, with a big sigh.

  He sounded just like my dad.

  When I opened Jason’s bedroom door, everyone was sitting on the floor, squeezed between his bed, his tuba, and a prize-winning Lego battleship.

  It wasn’t the perfect arrangement, but it would work.

  As soon as I sat down, I saw Jason staring at my new Nikes, and I felt proud of how cool they were. In fact, I was so busy admiring them that it took me a minute to notice the gloom in the room.

  “What’s going on?” I asked.

  Before anyone could answer, the bedroom door swung open.

  There stood Arthur Richardson the Third, dressed in brand-new khakis and a red golf shirt embroidered with a Harvard emblem. His blond hair was parted so perfectly that I wondered if he’d done it with a ruler instead of a comb.

  “Hey, Arthur,” Jason said.

  Arthur looked down his nose at all of us (which isn’t really as bad as it sounds because our faces were at his knee level).

  “We’re sitting on the floor?” he asked. His eyes were wide, like he couldn’t believe what he was seeing.

  “Uh, yes,” Jason said, glancing at Sara, who shrugged.

  Arthur Richardson the Third sighed and sat down next to me.

  “I’m Russell,” I said, reaching to shake his hand.

  He ignored it. “I know.”

  “I’m Nitu,” our math whiz said, with a smile.

  “I know that,” Arthur said, impatiently. “I know who all of you are.”

  There was a moment of awkward silence.

  “So … welcome to the team,” Sara said, quietly.

  Arthur raised one eyebrow in her direction. “I haven’t committed yet,” he said. “I’ll make my decision after the meeting.”

  Since I was the one who’d pushed the rest of the team to give him a chance, I tried to smooth things over. “Sure,” I said, nodding slowly, “you’re trying out for us and—”

  Arthur looked at me like I’d told him the square root of sixteen was seven. “No,” he said. “You’re trying out for me.”

  Nitu, Jason, Sara, and I exchanged a look.

  I cleared my throat. “Well, we’re glad to have you here today, to uh, consider joining our team. Masters of the Mind is great way to—”

  “Have you ever won Nationals?” he interrupted.

  I took a breath. “No.”

  He sniffed. “State?”

  I glanced at Nitu, who was scowling at him. “No,” I admitted.

  “Regionals?”

  I cleared my throat. “We’re a fairly new team and—”

  “A yes or no is all I need,” he said.

  “Then no,” I answered, feeling my entire body tensing.

  Alkaline earth metals: beryllium, magnesium, calcium.

  “I see,” he said. “So, you’d like me to join a losing team.”

  “No, we wouldn’t,” Nitu said, and I turned to see a dangerous look in her eyes.

  I quickly jumped in. “What Nitu means is that we don’t want you to join a losing team. We want you to join a team with the potential to win.”

  “We can take the heat when it’s time to compete,” Jason said, cracking a smile.

  “When we get a high score, we work for more,” Sara added.

  “If we—” Nitu began.

  “What are you doing?” Arthur interrupted, frowning.

  “Uh,” Jason said, glancing at me before explaining, “sometimes we rhyme.”

  “Sometimes you rhyme?” Arthur looked disgusted, like he’d just been told we pick each other’s noses.

  “It’s like a warm-up,” Sara said, looking embarrassed.

  “Okay,” I said, ready to move on before Arthur ruined the whole meeting. “I’ve been thinking about this egg challenge and—”

  “We have a problem,” Nitu said.

  It seemed like we had a lot more than one.

  Strontium, barium, radium.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  No one said a word as I looked from one face to the next, waiting.

  Finally, Sara spoke. “The school will only pay half of our entry fee for the district competition.”

  I was stunned. “What do you mean?”

  “Just what she said,” Jason told me. “We have to pay the other half ourselves. By Monday.”

  “That can’t be right,” I told the group.

  “It’s right,” Jason said. “I mean, it’s wrong, but it’s right. We’re doomed.”

  “Half the entry fee?” I asked again.

  Sara nodded. “Nitu and I talked to Mr. Wills this afternoon, and those are the rules.”

  “And we don’t have the money.” Nitu sighed.

  “Let me get this straight,” Arthur interrupted. “You want me to join a losing team with no budget?”

  “Not really,” Nitu said, shooting him another look.
>
  “Listen, Art. We—” I began.

  “Arthur,” he corrected.

  “Okay, Arthur. This team is—”

  “Lucky I came along,” he interrupted. “Not only was I the top student at Connecticut’s Walter Borderton Preparatory School, but my family is …” He paused and looked down at his hands, as though he was embarrassed, but we all knew he wasn’t. “… very wealthy.”

  “How nice for you,” Nitu said through gritted teeth.

  “I’ll have my father write a check.”

  “No, thank you,” I told him.

  “Why not?” He pointed at Sara. “She already said you don’t have the money.”

  I took a deep breath. “It’s our responsibility to raise the money,” I said, relieved when the rest of the group nodded. “So we’re lucky that this is a problem-solving club and—”

  “Don’t be stupid,” Arthur interrupted. “My father can just—”

  Stupid?

  “I’m team leader, Arthur, and I’m calling a vote.”

  It took about two seconds for three hands to fly into the air and reject the idea of Arthur’s father paying our registration fees.

  Arthur sulked while the rest of us tried to come up with a real solution.

  “What about a fund-raiser?” Nitu suggested.

  “What kind of a fund-raiser?” Jason asked, and the brainstorming began.

  The meeting had already exhausted me, and it had barely started.

  As the minutes passed, I liked Arthur a little bit less every time he opened his mouth. And that was often.

  Eventually, I did something I’d never done at a Masters meeting before. I started daydreaming about something else.

  And even more surprising?

  That something else was basketball.

  When we finished up at Jason’s house, we walked over to the public library on Northwest Thurman to meet the Beaumont team. They had a great track record, but we weren’t going to let that bother us.

  However, it looked like we might be in trouble when Beaumont’s team of five filed into the library wearing matching T-shirts and serious expressions. They each carried a black briefcase, embroidered with the Masters of the Mind logo.

  Uh-oh.

  Halogens: fluorine, chlorine, bromine and astatine.

  The team leader, Peter, introduced himself.

  “Hi, I’m Russ,” I told him, gripping his hand firmly.

  “Russell Evans,” he said, with a quick nod. “Winner of the sixth-grade math award. Consistent appearances on the Lewis and Clark Middle School honor roll.”

  “Whoa,” Jason whispered.

  “Jason Schmidt,” Peter continued, without being introduced. “Second-place finish in last year’s district Science Fair for a project on lunar landings.”

  “Uh, yeah,” Jason said.

  Peter worked his way through Sara and Nitu’s achievements, then stared at Arthur. “You’re not in my file.”

  He had a file?

  “Arthur Richardson the Third,” Arthur said, ignoring Peter’s offer of a handshake.

  Peter pointed to his teammates and very quickly said, “Emma, Jorge, and the Digby twins.”

  “Oh, I’m a twin, too, but—” I started to tell him.

  “We know,” Peter said.

  Was there anything they didn’t know?

  “Okay,” I said, trying to regain some control. “We thought we could start with—”

  “I printed meeting agendas for everyone,” Peter said, taking a seat at the head of the table. The rest of his team surrounded him, none of them saying a word.

  I signaled to my team to sit as well. They all looked as nervous as I was. Except for Arthur, anyway. He looked like he smelled something he didn’t like.

  But he always looked like that.

  For the next two hours, Beaumont put us to the test.

  And believe it or not, we passed.

  Nitu, Sara, and Jason put their brains in high gear, going toe-to-toe with the competition while Arthur Richardson the Third went a step further. He dominated our practice session with fast, smart answers and didn’t make a single mistake.

  The truth was, everyone shone but me.

  I just couldn’t wrap my head around even the simplest problems. And when I did give an answer, it wasn’t a very good one.

  For the first time since I’d joined Masters of the Mind, I was struggling.

  And I didn’t like it.

  Free Throw

  My alarm clock went off on Wednesday morning, and I could think of only one thing.

  Tryout day!

  I stared at the ceiling, imagining running drills and seeing my name on the team list. I was sure I’d make the roster, but my stomach felt weird, like there were jumping beans in there.

  I had a shower and grabbed the Adidas box from my closet. I’d been planning to save the shoes for the Pioneers’ first game, but having an edge at tryouts wouldn’t hurt. I took off the lid, pulled the tissue paper out of the way and smiled.

  Mint condition!

  They were dark blue with white stripes and light-blue stitches. It had been hard to choose between them and a red pair, but I’d decided I wanted my shoes to match my Pioneers uniform.

  Just like Russ.

  I lifted one shoe out of the box for a closer look. When I first saw them, I’d thought they were the coolest shoes on the planet. But that was before I saw my brother’s. I stared at the Adidases and realized they weren’t half as cool as his Nikes.

  I closed the box and shoved it into my backpack, trying not to think about it. I was supposed to be supporting Russ, just like he supported me. It wasn’t about shoes. Or T-shirts. Or those awesome shorts with the stripes down the sides that he got two pairs of. Or the sweet hoodie I wished was hanging in my closet.

  It was about making sure Russ didn’t embarrass me (or himself, of course) at tryouts. Period.

  And besides, I could forget about the gear because Russell’s basketball career was going to be over in like, seconds. All he’d have left after tryouts were the shoes.

  The Nikes would be souvenirs, like the “parting gifts” they gave to people who lost on game shows.

  “Big day,” Mom said as I walked into the kitchen. “I made waffles.”

  “Awesome,” I told her, even though they were Russ’s favorite, not mine.

  “Any sign of your brother?” she asked.

  “I think he’s in the shower,” I told her through a mouthful.

  “I hope he does well today,” Mom said quietly. “I know your dad gave him a pep talk last night, but—”

  “He’ll be fine.” All he had to do was stand there. He could do that. Even the maple tree in our front yard could do that. In fact, it did. Like, twenty-four seven.

  When I left the house, Chris was waiting for me on the corner with a ball under his arm.

  “Finally,” he said when I caught up with him. “Are you ready?”

  “Yup. I’ve even got brand-new shoes.” I pointed toward my pack.

  “Cool. I’m wearing my lucky underwear.”

  If it was the same underwear he’d worn all the way through last year’s semifinals, they weren’t lucky.

  In fact, I felt sorry for them.

  “I’ve been working on my jump shot,” he said when we were about halfway to school.

  What?

  “You have a jump shot?” The jumping beans in my stomach started moving.

  I didn’t have a jump shot!

  “I haven’t mastered it yet,” Chris said. “But my brother said seventh grade is when coaches want to see what you can do from the field.” He shrugged. “You know, three-pointers.”

  What? No one told me that!

  “But last year was free throws and layups,” I reminded him. “And staying close to the hoop.”

  “That was last year.” Chris shrugged again. “My brother said the school record is thirteen three-pointers in seventh grade.”

  “Are you kidding me?”

&nb
sp; I’d never scored a three-pointer in my whole life! Sure, I’d been close, but like my grandpa always said, close only counted in horseshoes and hand grenades, whatever that meant.

  Would Coach Baxter really be expecting us to make jump shots?

  Would I be able to do one under pressure?

  Could I do one at all?

  I doubted it.

  I made it through my morning classes, and during lunch me, Chris, Nate, Paul, and Nicky sat together to trade snacks and talk about what was going to happen that afternoon.

  “Did you say jump shot?” Nicky asked Chris.

  “Uh-huh.” Chris grunted, biting into Paul’s apple.

  “No one said anything to me about jump shots,” Nicky muttered.

  “Tell me about it.” I groaned, glad I wasn’t the only one who couldn’t do them.

  “I can only make maybe two out of five,” Nicky said, and sighed.

  “What?” I practically choked. Maybe I was the only one, after all.

  “I can only hit a three-pointer in about one out of ten shots,” Paul said.

  That made me feel a little better.

  But only until Nate said, “Dude, this is tryout day! You’ve gotta do better than that.”

  I tried to drown my jumping beans with a juice box, but they seemed to know how to swim.

  After lunch, I was on my way to social studies and trying not to freak out when I overheard Russ and some other kids in the hallway.

  “Man, those shoes are awesome!” Ryan McNichol told him.

  What?

  I forgot all about jump shots and three-pointers. Russ was wearing his brand-new shoes? To school? Sure, he’d worn them to practice at Sunset Park, but to school?

  He wasn’t saving them for the gym floor?

  I shook my head. Of course he wasn’t.

  I mean, saving them for what? He wasn’t going to make the team, so why not wear them every day? Why not mess up the most awesome shoes on the planet without even thinking about it? What difference did it make?

  “Thanks,” Russ said. “My dad got them for me.”

  “I heard you’re trying out for basketball,” Jeff Billings said.

  I peeked around the corner. Russ looked way more comfortable than I would have expected, considering it was a conversation about sports, not space stations.