Victoria and I have nothing in common, so why can’t I just ignore her? Hopper ignores almost everybody, but I can’t seem to ignore anybody. Especially this girl.
I look out the living room window and wait for the school bus to bring Quinny back to me. But when it stops at our corner, only Piper gets off.
“Hopper?” It’s Mom talking behind me. “Quinny’s dad called to say she went to play with Victoria this afternoon.”
Oh. But we made a plan. She said she was coming here today.
I turn away from the window and stare at the floor.
“Sorry, honey, maybe you guys can hang out tomorrow.”
“I don’t care.” I shrug. “No big deal.”
“Do you want some pistachio ice cream? Or a Popsicle?”
I shake my head.
“Well, you should probably go back upstairs and get some rest.”
I don’t feel like arguing with Mom, so I obey. If Quinny didn’t want to come over, I wish she would have told me so I didn’t waste my whole day looking forward to it.
Soon I hear Dad’s car pulling up the driveway and then him thumping up the stairs.
“Hey, buddy.” Dad smiles at me from my doorway. He’s got his work suit on, but his tie is loose. He looks eager. I don’t have a good feeling about this.
“I came home early to take Ty and Trev over to the game—wanna come watch?”
I don’t answer.
“Caleb’s going to be there, too.”
Hearing that makes me feel even worse.
“My throat is still healing,” I finally say. “I’d better stay home and rest.”
Dad steps into my room. “You felt good enough to go play with those chickens this morning,” he points out.
“I wasn’t playing, I was helping. Quinny’s been doing it all by herself lately.”
“Come on, Hopper—it’ll be fun. Caleb’s parents invited us all out for ice cream after.”
That means I’d have to stay for the whole game. I don’t know Caleb that well.
“Hopper?” Dad is waiting for me to say something.
But I’m still thinking about Caleb. He doesn’t tease or hassle people, like Alex Delgado does. But if he keeps hanging out with Alex, he’ll probably start to do that stuff, too, sooner or later. I really don’t want to get sucked into all that. I also get the feeling sometimes that Caleb is nice to me because my brothers are soccer stars in our town. They’re on a team that usually wins, and they’ve been in the newspaper before.
“Hopper, what do you say?” Dad is still looking at me, hopeful.
Why can’t he leave me alone? He’s always saying what a fast runner I am and that soccer has lots of running. But it also has yelling, pushing, and crowds. I don’t like that stuff. I don’t like always having to win, especially while a crowd of grown-ups wants you to win so bad that they yell their guts out. I’ve been to my brothers’ games. That’s what it’s like.
“No thank you,” I repeat.
Dad throws his hands up. “Okay, fine.”
“Jason, don’t.” Mom comes into my room now. “He’s not fully healed yet.”
“No one expects him to run around. Come on, Hopper—even Quinny loves going to soccer games. She pushed to come with us on Saturday, and she had a blast.”
But Quinny told me they forced her to go to that game. I get chills down my back.
Mom smiles at me and pulls Dad away. “Just get some rest, sweetie,” she says.
I hear them arguing in the hall.
“Be reasonable. He just had surgery,” Mom whispers.
“It’s not like I asked him to run laps!” Dad doesn’t whisper. “It’s a beautiful day. Sorry for trying to spend time with my son—”
“You’re pushing too hard, Jason. He’s still recovering.”
“Well, fine. Let him stay home and recover. Let him stay in that room his whole life and stagnate, if that’s what he…but it’d be nice if he gave something a try at some point!”
Something? I guess juggling doesn’t count and drawing doesn’t count. Dad thinks my science books are weird, my anatomy models are weird, my aquarium is boring. Nothing counts unless it’s something he likes, something that’s about sports and crowds and noise.
And Mom doesn’t say he’s wrong. I listen for her voice. She feels bad, I can tell, but Dad talks right over her. It’s almost like she agrees with him, deep down.
I get in bed and pull the covers over my head so I can’t hear them argue.
Not as much, at least.
In the hospital, it felt like my parents loved me just for being me. Just for being alive. It felt like I belonged to my family for once, even to my brothers. My throat hurt and I felt sick from the surgery, but I didn’t feel alone, and that was such a good, rare feeling.
That feeling’s gone now. I don’t think it’ll ever come back.
I almost fall asleep on the way home from the playdate. Being with Victoria is exhausting.
But when we get home, I perk up and head over to Hopper’s house.
“Quinny, no, it’s almost dinnertime.” Daddy blocks my way.
“But Hopper’s probably wondering where I went!”
“I called his house to explain.”
“Plus I need to tell him that Mrs. Flavio is letting us do the tonsils book together.”
“You can tell him tomorrow. Calm down.”
Daddy forces me home. I go upstairs and into my old room (which is now Piper’s room) and look out the window. Hopper’s window is a little open and his shade is half up, but his light is off. Is he in there? Is he asleep?
There’s only one way to find out. I pull out the Super Soaker water blaster from beneath my bed (where I hid it, because I’m not supposed to have water toys up here in the first place). Luckily, there’s still a tiny bit of water left in it from summer. I aim that Super Soaker at Hopper’s window, right into the open part.
Pump, pump, pump! Spray, spray, spray!
I wait. Then I wave, because there’s Hopper at his window—looking a little damp, a little startled. This Super Soaker is way better at getting his attention than a call or a knock.
“Hopper, Hopper, Hopper! Guess what! Mrs. Flavio said we could—”
But he shuts his window in the middle of my sentence and pulls his shade down.
“Out.” Piper comes into my/her room. “You’re dress-passing.”
I turn and glare at her. “It’s pronounced trespassing and this is still my room,” I inform her. “I just did Mom and Dad a favor because you know why—”
“Get out!”
Piper kicks me in the butt, so I kick her in the butt. Then she howls, but I howl harder, but then she howls even harder. Then Daddy comes in and stops all the butt-kicking and howling, and I get another lecture about setting a good example.
In the middle of that lecture, Daddy notices the Super Soaker. And suddenly I’m in a whole new puddle of trouble.
I frown through dinner. I sulk through all the bedtime books. I trudge back upstairs to brush my teeth, and then I crawl under my covers.
Sometimes the best part of the day is when it’s finally over.
Later, when I’m supposed to be asleep, I still can’t sleep. I think about Victoria.
All those lies I told her about our book being published by a fake publisher.
All that pretending that I can go to her party when I already have plans with Hopper.
All the yuck she makes me feel in the bottom of my stomach almost every day.
Why am I still curious about her even when she’s so awful? Why does something about her just poke at my heart? Why did I make Mrs. Porridge that promise?
I think about Victoria’s huge house and her dead mother and her dead mother’s dead cat. I think about how I would never stop crying if I had a dead mother and a dead cat and an empty house with a daddy who works all the time and only a Masha for company (even though she seems nice). But Victoria is no crybaby. She gets stuff done. I wish I were as gutsy
and sure about everything as she is.
The only thing that distracts me from Victoria is Cleo’s sleepy snuffles.
I get up and go over to her crib. Watching her breathe makes my own breathing slow down. I lean over and sniff that baby sister—a little sweet, a little sour, and oh so warm. I climb into her crib again. I bend my knees to fit around her all cozy, and it’s like sleeping with a real live supersoft stuffed animal who doesn’t have any problems at all. Nothing bad has ever happened to Cleo. I love that about her. I wish we could switch places maybe. Her mini hand is fat and silky, and it fits perfectly inside my giant regular hand. Her mini fluttery heart beats against my tummy.
They don’t tell you when you’re little, but being a baby is simple.
It’s growing up that’s the hard part.
It’s three in the morning, and my eyes won’t stay shut.
I get up and look up the word stagnate in my dictionary.
STAGNATE: to become inactive or still; to stop developing, progressing, moving
So that’s what Dad thinks I’m doing in here. Not juggling, drawing, reading, thinking.
I look over at my chess set, my fish tank, my model of a human eye. I pick up my juggling sacks and toss them up into a three-ball cascade. Then I throw them at my door.
Dad’s wrong. I’m not who he thinks I am.
I look out my window. Quinny feels so far away. She doesn’t sleep in the room across from my room anymore. She didn’t come over yesterday, like she said she would. She wasn’t forced to go to my brothers’ soccer game, like she said she was. She went on purpose. She had a blast and lied about it.
Dad isn’t the only one who’s wrong. Quinny isn’t who I thought she was, either.
Maybe no one really is.
Disco’s creeecreeecreee-ing wakes up the whole neighborhood again on Thursday. Maybe even the whole town. That chicken obviously didn’t listen to a word I said.
The first thing I need to do this morning is find Hopper and explain why I didn’t show up yesterday. But Mom won’t let me knock on his door before breakfast. I don’t see him at the chicken porch, either. Then Daddy says we can’t stop by Hopper’s house on the way to the bus because we’re running late (again).
Phooey.
But the good news is, it’s early dismissal in school today! Which I totally forgot about, and which means Hopper and I will have extra time this afternoon to catch up on all the tonsils book stuff we wanted to do yesterday.
More good news: Victoria kind of leaves me alone today. She still watches me, but she doesn’t pounce on me at recess, so I spend it kicking a soccer ball with Caleb and Alex and some other kids. And hey, I can actually sort of keep up with those boys.
They run faster than me, but my feet are trickier than theirs.
Their bodies are pushy, but mine is twistier.
And nobody kicks that ball harder than me.
Tricky feet + a twisty body + one good hard kick = GOAL!
I imagine the crowd cheering and clapping.
“Wow, so are you going to join the soccer team or what?” Caleb asks.
“Big Mouth on my team? No way.” Alex chortles.
Alex started calling me Big Mouth because he heard the bully twins do it. Not cool.
“Maybe I’ll join a different team so I can destroy you guys every time,” I say.
“Ooh, burn.” He rolls his eyes and smirks.
I can handle these boys. Kicking a ball around with them actually makes me happier than playing with Victoria. This is the most fun I’ve had at recess since Hopper was in school.
But there’s also grumpy news today.
After recess, Victoria comes up to me and says “I hope you enjoyed running around with those grubby boys, because tomorrow you’re playing with us again.”
Huh?
“It’s only fair to take turns,” she adds. “One day you’ll play with boys, the next you’ll play with us. I’ll help you keep track of the schedule.”
I don’t want her help. I want to do what I want to do. That’s what recess is for.
And right now I want to yell at Victoria to LEAVE ME ALONE. But we’re about to start math and Mrs. Flavio is up by the whiteboard, and I don’t want to get into any more trouble with that sub, especially since she gave me back my recess in the first place.
When I get to Hopper’s house after school, the bad news keeps going. I tell him all the exciting stuff he missed yesterday: how Mrs. Flavio gave me back my recess, and how she’s letting us do the tonsils book together after all. And I say sorry that I couldn’t come over the day before. But nothing I say makes a dent in Hopper’s frown.
“Did you have fun at Victoria’s house?” He scowls at me.
“Sorry, I told you, Daddy forced me to go.”
“Right.”
“Hopper, it’s true.”
“Just like my brothers forced you to go to that soccer game on Saturday?”
Hmmm…I don’t know what to say now.
Hopper looks at my face close-up. “Tell the truth, Quinny. You wanted to go to the soccer game. And you wanted to go to Victoria’s house. You don’t have to lie about it.”
Wow. Hopper really thinks I’m a liar. He doesn’t even know the biggest lie I’ve been telling lately. Or how scared I am to un-tell that lie.
I feel like that boy’s words just slapped me in the face.
But then why is he the one who looks ready to cry?
There’s no reason to cry. I’m not upset at Quinny. It’s not her fault my father wants to change my whole personality.
“Dad said you pushed to go to the soccer game. He said you love soccer.”
“I didn’t push,” says Quinny. “The twins invited me.”
“Is it true? Do you love soccer?”
She doesn’t say anything.
“It’s okay if you say yes.”
“I’m curious about soccer, that’s all.”
“Why?”
“Why am I curious about soccer?”
“Yeah, why?” I’m staring at her so much now. It’s rude, but I don’t care.
“I don’t know,” she says. “Maybe it’s kind of the same reason I love New York City, and my accordion, and running down to breakfast in the morning. It just feels exciting.”
Quinny smiles. Even her nose is smiling. It crinkles up like her accordion.
“And being on a team sounds fun. When you’re happy about winning, you have a whole bunch of kids to be happy with. And if you lose, you can all feel droopy together.”
Excitement. Togetherness. I get it. I wish I felt it the way she does.
“I think my dad would rather have you for a kid than me,” I whisper.
Quinny looks shocked now. I tell her about yesterday, how my dad acted. And that’s when I start to cry for real. She hugs me. I’m embarrassed, but it’s okay. It’s just Quinny.
“Geez, Hopper, I can’t believe you had that whole big fight about soccer.”
“He wants me to be like him. All he cares about is winning.”
“Winning is fun.” Quinny shrugs. “But lots of other things are fun, too.”
“It’s not fair. If you’re a boy, you have to do sports. If you’re a girl, it’s like a choice.”
Quinny says that wasn’t true back in New York City.
“I knew lots of boys who didn’t do sports….They did things like music or drama or robotics. I knew a boy at my old school who did ballet, and another one who made a whole village out of Legos for some contest that he won and he even beat a lot of older kids.”
“Well, around here, if you don’t do sports, it’s not so great for you.”
“Sorry, Hopper, that stinks. I don’t care what you do, as long as it makes you happy.”
Just hearing Quinny say that makes me feel better. Talking about how it stinks makes it stink a little bit less.
All of a sudden, Quinny’s eyes pop huge. “Wait….Hopper, isn’t juggling a sport?”
“No.”
�
��Well, it should be! It’s hard to do, it makes you tired, and people love to watch.”
“Ha. No, juggling is more like a circus act.”
“Oh, plus also, Hopper, you’re a really good runner, and that’s a sport.”
“Running isn’t a sport.”
“It totally is—”
“No, it’s something you do in other sports, like baseball or basketball—”
“No, running is a sport all by itself! Hello? Haven’t you heard of track and field? And marathons, where you run, like, a zillion miles in a row? And swimming—now, that for sure is a sport. I remember over the summer Grandpa Gooley said you’re a strong swimmer.”
I love to swim, but I don’t care about swimming faster than other people. There’s something wrong with me that I don’t care about that. Normal people care about winning. Normal people are more like Dad, and Quinny, and my brothers, and Victoria.
Victoria cares about winning and being number one at life.
Alex Delgado cares about it bad. I’m pretty sure Caleb does, too.
“Let’s work on finishing our book,” says Quinny. “I bet that will take your mind off all this grumpy stuff.”
So we do. And she’s right—it does.
I hop onto the school bus in a great mood, and not just because today is Friday.
Today Daddy is picking me up after school, and we’re going straight to Dr. Merkle’s office so Hopper and I can show him our amazing, brand-new tonsils book!
Even Victoria can’t spoil my good mood. She tries pretty hard, though. At recess, she makes me come to another meeting to plan her costume party. I try to work up the courage to tell her I can’t go to her party, but recess ends before I do. I want to start saying only things that are truly true from now on, but it’s harder than it looks.
Mrs. Porridge has agreed to watch my little sisters after school so Daddy can drive me to Dr. Merkle’s office. It’s super rare for me to get Daddy all to myself, so I try to make the most of it.
Quinny & Hopper: Partners in Slime Page 10