Big Tuna lowered his arms and slammed them onto Ollie’s back.
The impact knocked the wind out of his lungs. Not just the wind. He watched in horror as the gum shot right out of his mouth. In an instant, he felt himself losing all height, muscle, and attitude.
But the Tidal Wave sent him, and his smack-talk cards, straight over the lockers. Ollie landed with a thud on the other side, hopeful that Big Tuna was too angry to notice. Where the cards had fluttered away to, Ollie had no idea.
“Ready for round two?” bellowed Big Tuna from behind the other side of the lockers.
Ollie, small again, did the thing that he did best in a fight.
He hid.
Ollie crawled into the nearest locker and shut the door behind him. Through the grate, he could see Big Tuna lumbering around and searching for him.
“Come out and face me, Big Chew! You can’t hide from Big Tuna!”
Tuna stalked out of the locker-room doorway.
Phew, thought Ollie. That was a close one.
Suddenly, Screech Holler’s voice drifted into the locker room from the stadium. “Our next matchup is gonna be a smack-talk smackdown of epic proportions. How is new guy Big Chew supposed to hold his own against the viper herself, Silvertongue?! Well, you won’t have to wait long to find out. Put your hands together for Silvertongue!”
Oh, no.
His match was starting without him. He needed to find his bubble gum now. He knew he had only a minute, maybe two. Silvertongue would waste no time walking down the ramp, entering the ring, and taking hold of a microphone.
Ollie slipped out of the locker and crawled around on the sticky floor looking for the gum. It had to be around here somewhere, and he had to find it. Fast. What if his mom saw him back here? She’d escort him out and then he wouldn’t be able to wrestle today. Or ever again if he didn’t find the gum.
“And now, Slamdown Town,” said Screech over the loudspeaker. “It’s my pleasure to introduce our second contestant. Put your hands together for Big Chew.”
Hurry, hurry, hurry.
He crawled around, past The Bolt, who was taping her gauntlets—
“Hey, kid, did you short-circuit or something? You’re not supposed to be back here!”
—past Mack Truck, who was greasing his wheeled shoes—
“Seems like you got off at the wrong exit. Beat it!”
—and past Granny, who was sending her granddaughter a birthday card filled with the earnings she’d won betting on Big Chew’s last match.
“Back in my day, kids weren’t allowed backstage. My how times have changed.”
He managed to locate his smack-talk cards, which had scattered all over the four corners of the locker room. But his gum was nowhere to be seen.
“I shouted louder so that people who are supposed to be wrestling in the ring by now could hear me. Give it up for Big Chew!” bellowed Screech over the loudspeaker. There was an awkward pause. “Where has that guy gone to? Has he gotten cold feet?”
At last, Ollie spotted his gum. And while he didn’t have cold feet, his bubble gum sure did. He found his bubble gum stuck to the foot of the coolest wrestler in Slamdown Town: Snowman Steve.
Snowman Steve, or The Snowman, was bundling up for his forthcoming match. He had on his hat, his scarf, his parka, and his gloves, and he was lacing up his famed snow boots. And when Ollie’s gum went flying, it had come to a stop right on the heel of The Snowman’s icy snow boot.
Fortunately, The Snowman was too caught up in his pre-match ritual to notice. Ollie snuck over and went to pry the gum right off. At that exact moment, The Snowman took a step backward. Had Ollie’s hand been a few inches forward, Snowman Steve would have crushed his fingers. Fortunately, The Snowman brought his boot, and the gum, close enough for Ollie to pull the gum off instead.
Ugh, gross, thought Ollie.
“Well, if Big Chew doesn’t get here soon, he’ll forfeit the match,” announced Screech.
Ollie looked up and saw The Snowman staring at him with an icy look.
“Hey there, Snowman.” Ollie waved the gum around. “First off, you’re totally awesome and there’s no way that Sunstar should have beaten you. But yeah. I noticed you had some gum stuck to your boot there. No need to thank me. Unless you want to give me your autograph or something.”
“What are you doing back here, kid?” asked The Snowman in a chilly voice. “Now get outta here, or there’ll be trouble in your forecast.”
He didn’t need to tell Ollie twice. Ollie scrambled away into a nearby deserted hallway. Alone now, he stuck the gum into his mouth. And chomped.
Big Chew was back. And not a second too soon.
He ran as quickly as he could toward the entrance ramp.
CHAPTER 26
Ollie sprinted down the ramp and dove into the ring.
“Sorry! I’m here! I’m here!”
Silvertongue stood there and licked her lips. She was hungry for wrestling.
With a double portion of smack talk.
“So, you were dumb enough to show up,” yelled Silvertongue.
Silvertongue’s outfit was as colorful as her commentary. She wore a leather jacket with a bright pink shirt underneath. She sported cyber-yellow nail paint and electric-blue pants, and her hair had recently been dyed rainbow. Everything about Silvertongue was designed to be loud. Just like her.
Ollie looked down at the first card in the stack and read his carefully chosen first line aloud. “If you want the win so bad, Silvertongue, then why don’t you take it from me?” he asked as he pointed to the bold white letters emblazoned on his chest.
“Or are you too scared?” he added with a sneer.
Ollie saw Silvertongue’s concentration waver for a moment before she returned back to normal. But for that brief moment, her nostrils flared, her eyes bulged, and her normally cool attitude flashed red hot. Silvertongue really did hate being smack-talked to. Well, Ollie knew she had only taken the first bite of a full five-course smack-talk meal. He knew that with his cards he’d be able to beat her at her own game.
“Well, better late than never, folks,” announced Screech.
Ollie’s mom, on the other hand, didn’t share Screech’s nonchalant assessment of the situation. She marched right up to him and checked him into the match.
“You are way outside the entry-time regulations,” she said as she pointed an accusing finger at him. “Trying to keep all your new fans in suspense?”
All my new fans?
Ollie looked around and couldn’t believe his eyes. There were more people in the stands than he had seen in years. Granted, it was only, like, ten more people, but hey. It was something. But they couldn’t all be here just to see him. Could they?
“Hey! Pay attention!” said his mom, snapping Ollie’s focus back to the present.
“Oh, yeah. Sorry about that. I’m here now, though.”
“You’re just like my son! Running late every morning before school.”
He gulped. The veins on her arms threatened to pop as her black-and-white-striped shirt struggled to contain all her muscles. But it wasn’t her muscles, or her size, that made him, and other wrestlers, melt with fear. It was how quickly she could verbally slap you with a rule, or a penalty, or in Ollie’s case, a time-out in his room.
“No respect for the law,” muttered his mom. “I’ll be watching you.”
With that, she stomped off.
“And I’ll be the one beating you,” warned Silvertongue. “Normally I’d insist that a lady be allowed to go first. That’d be me. But it’d be rude not to offer the first move to a baby. I wouldn’t want you to start crying, after all.”
Then she proceeded to mime a baby crying.
“Gadzooks. That one has gotta sting.” Screech sucked in his lips. “Even I felt that one from over at the announcer’s table. Someone find me a bandage.”
“My turn, Silvertongue.”
Ollie whipped out his note cards. Tamiko had urged him to memorize
them, but he had insisted on having the cards with him. He didn’t want to miss a single word. It was time to show off what he had worked so hard on. He felt more than a little confident.
“What are those?” demanded Silvertongue.
“Your doom!”
Ollie pulled up the first card. He pushed a strand of his long blond hair out of his face and cleared his throat.
“You know why they call you Silvertongue?” he read.
He savored the setup. The cards had been arranged to offer a setup and then a payoff. For now, he needed her to ask why. And he got his wish.
“Why?” she asked.
The next card had the payoff. He licked his lips, relishing the impending verbal takedown. “Ah, no can do, Silver! I have you scheduled for a beatdown right now. Saved the date and everything. See?”
Wait, he thought. That doesn’t make any sense.
“Now, folks, that don’t make no sense,” said Screech.
Ollie panicked. His cards were out of order! He was pretty sure his question was supposed to be followed up by something about a tongue, but he couldn’t keep it all straight. Was this going to play out just like his disastrous presentation? He recalled Mr. Fitzgerald and the entire class staring at him, and then became very aware that he was in the middle of the arena with all eyes on him. Ollie felt a bead of sweat trickle down his neck.
The cards were in the wrong order. He’d arranged them to start with setup and end with payoff. But they must have gotten mixed up after he got hit with the Tidal Wave.
Silvertongue could win the crowd and defeat her opponent with words alone. In fact, the crowd had come to expect it. He had to give them something. Or else.
Ding, ding, ding!
“I’m in trouble,” Ollie said aloud to himself.
His fingers fluttered over the cards as if he were preparing a game of solitaire. They needed to be shuffled into order. And fast.
“You want trouble? Well, come get some!” shouted Silvertongue. She wasted no time as she grabbed on to Ollie and launched him into a power slam.
He shook off the hit and scrambled back to his feet. A quick rearrangement of the cards and Ollie was sure he’d gotten some semblance of order back. Then he read from the next card as he bounced off the ropes and ran at her at full speed.
“Oh, you wanna do this another time?”
So far, so good.
He pulled out the next card as he raised his arm to clothesline her.
“Because second place is all your lil’ smack-talk game is good for.”
“What in the world are you even trying to say?” asked Silvertongue.
Ollie wasn’t sure, to be honest.
Meanwhile, Silvertongue ducked his clothesline, spun behind him, and grabbed Ollie by the back. Then she squeezed, like a cobra trapping its prey.
“They don’t call me the viper for nothing!”
Ollie felt the air rush out of his lungs. He couldn’t talk if he couldn’t breathe.
He had been trying to say the payoff about schedules and calendars from earlier. If this continued, he’d be done for. He’d have to rearrange them on the fly. He began to shuffle the cards with increasingly twitchy fingers.
“I don’t know about you folks,” said Screech, “but does it seem like Big Chew just can’t deliver the smack-talk goods?”
This sent a wave of laughter around the arena.
But Screech was right. Looking around, Ollie noticed that the Slamdown Town crowd—minus Tamiko and Hollis—was chanting and cheering for Silvertongue. The wrestler who dished the best smack tended to win over the crowd. And the wrestler who had the crowd behind them was able to use that advantage to emerge victorious. Silvertongue used the crowd as her armor. Ollie needed to get his smack talk in order as soon as possible, or Silvertongue would be able to use that armor to take any punishment he dished out.
Cards flitted between and around each other in a blur. He’d have these cards organized in a few short seconds.
But he also needed to pay more attention to the match. Silvertongue scooped him up and pulled off a brain buster, a throw noted for its ability to bust one’s brain and leave the recipient dazed and confused, which made Screech Holler yelp.
“Less reorganizing, more wrestling, Big Chew!” he heard Tamiko yell from the stands.
Stumbling to his feet, Ollie wobbled. He shuffled back. And forth. And back one more time for good measure. He had eaten an intense brain buster. But it had all been worth it, because he had finally gotten his cards in order. Pulling off his cape, which had become wrapped around his head in the throw, Ollie returned his attention to the cards clutched firmly in his right hand. He made sure to read the next insult from start to finish before opening his mouth. Then he knew he’d deliver his first stunner of the match.
“Prepare to be amazed,” he said. He climbed to the top rope and pointed at her. “What’s on the tip of your tongue? Oh, yeah. My fist!” He dove off the ropes and onto Silvertongue. But instead of crushing her, Ollie was caught by his opponent in midair.
Oh, no!
Even with his best line, Silvertongue remained unaffected.
She held him aloft as the crowd roared.
“You’ve got the words but not the venom,” she hissed. “You’re way out of your league. Maybe Slamdown Town Tiny Tykes is more your size.”
Then she dropped him to the mat and body-slammed him. The move sent not only him flying, but his note cards, as well.
“Not again!” he shouted as he found himself hurtling toward the corner of the ring.
She grinned. “Seems like the forecast calls for a large chance of pathetic insults!”
He watched, helpless after still being dazed from his turnbuckle collision, as Silvertongue gathered up the cards from the mat.
“Let’s do something about that.”
She jumped out of the ring and grabbed a trash can from the first row of spectators. Ollie, clambering to his feet, watched as she climbed back into the ring while holding it. His mom immediately charged over.
“Hey! No waste bins in the ring.” She motioned to the trash can. “Get that outta here!”
“If you say so! But first . . .” She held the cards above the trash can. Ollie’s only hope of matching her smack talk was about to be thrown away.
“You wouldn’t,” he pleaded. She bared her teeth.
Silvertongue dumped his cards inside the bin. Then she raised the trash can overhead and readied herself to throw it at Ollie. She leaned forward and . . . only pretended to.
But Ollie still flinched.
“Got you,” said Silvertongue with a laugh.
The crowd roared with amusement. Ollie felt like he was back in the lunchroom on the day Hollis had gifted him the gum. He knew he was big, but he didn’t feel big.
And feeling big was the key to smack talk. The very same downfall had happened to Ollie when Hollis made him feel like he could never be as big as his older brother. Right now, Ollie felt that same feeling of being smaller than small.
With the trash can still held high over her head, Silvertongue turned and chucked it over the ropes and clear out of the ring. And with it, any chance of Ollie’s going toe-to-toe—or rather, smack talk–to–smack talk—with the viper.
“No more cheat sheets,” hissed Silvertongue with a devious smirk.
CHAPTER 27
Silvertongue had Ollie pinned in the corner. His mom circled as Silvertongue landed (legal) kick after (legal) kick. He would not be able to withstand her attacks for much longer. And yet, he could not break himself free.
“Come on, Big Chew!” Hollis’s drawling voice drifted down from the crowd. “Silvertongue’s a pushover. You got this! You can stop pretending to be terrible now.”
Ollie groaned. Hollis had a voice that reminded him of the feeling he got each time his alarm clock woke him up to go to school. But even more annoying. He could just imagine how Hollis would be up in the stands right now: wearing his band shirt with the rip on the front a
nd breathing his infamous room-clearing breath and exhibiting his know-it-all attitude, gorging himself on snacks that would only make his stubborn acne worse.
And that’s when it clicked.
Ollie adored Silvertongue. Insulting her was difficult. But he had been wrestling with Hollis his whole life. And during their matches, they insulted each other all the time. With his brother, it was all fun and games. Well, at least it used to be. Now Ollie was pretty sure that Hollis meant all the nasty things he said. But before, they’d try to one-up the other with the most insulting, gross, and mean things imaginable. Just like their favorite smack-talking wrestler, Silvertongue. Usually, it would end with both of them on the floor, laughing until their stomachs hurt. And when Hollis’s stomach hurt he would burp, or fart, or do both at the same time, and then they’d start laughing even harder.
Ollie shut his eyes and pictured himself a few years younger, back in his own room, caught in another wrestling contest with his brother.
And just like that, loads of insults popped into his head.
“You smell like a pair of unwashed gym shorts dipped in old cheese,” he said, recalling the time Hollis had worn their mom’s unwashed gym shorts on his head and shoved his mouth full of cottage cheese. Hollis stood proudly on the bed and declared himself the Cheese Monster. He dove off the bed, landed on Ollie, and blew cheese in his face. It was hysterical, until their mom made them clean it all up.
Ollie opened his eyes. The flurry of blows had stopped.
“What did you just say to me?” she asked.
“That you smell like a pair of unwashed gym shorts dipped in old cheese.”
Her jaw hung open in shock. The fury in her eyes was replaced with embarrassment. The once-proud wrestler now appeared to be a bundle of nerves.
He had finally poked a hole in her armor.
“Hey, I have a condition, and three times a day I have to—” she started.
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