“Go around it!” Coach Franco rasped.
“Wow,” I breathed, watching as the kid tripped over every single tire he was supposed to run through in the next part of the course. “Who’s that?”
Daniel beamed at me. “That would be Noah Youkilis.”
“But”—I honestly thought my head might explode—“that’s a boy.”
“They have guy cheerleaders too, you know.”
“Yeah, but we don’t!”
He shot me a disapproving look. “That’s sexist.”
I was babbling. “I mean, we never had guys before. Why would he want to join an all-girls squad?”
“You and I might not be smart enough to understand. Noah Youkilis is gifted.”
“What’s his gift?” I demanded. “An internal gyroscope set on random?”
Daniel laughed appreciatively. “Good one.”
My stomach twisting, I watched Noah take on the rest of the course. He knocked over orange cones. He knocked over garbage cans. He even knocked over a couple of the guys who were trying to pass him from behind.
That wasn’t the worst of it. Sure, he couldn’t overcome the obstacles, but what was really horrifying was the way he ran between them—headlong, flailing, all four limbs moving in different directions. He looked like a spider that fell into the toilet and was swimming for his life.
Daniel was laughing now. “Lots of luck explaining this to the lacrosse team.”
“This isn’t over yet,” I said grimly.
As I stormed through the halls, sixth graders scrambled to get out of my way. Be positive, I reminded myself. We cheerleaders were trained to keep smiles on our faces at all times—even if a meteor fell out of the sky and flattened the field in the middle of our routine.
But this was much more serious than that.
My destination: Ms. Torres, the cheerleading coach. She taught science for her regular job.
She left her class in the lab and I confronted her in the hall. “What’s so important, Megan? There are seventh graders with Bunsen burners in there.”
“Ms. Torres, someone named Noah Youkilis signed up for the lacrosse cheerleaders and—”
She held up her hand like a traffic cop. “Say no more. I know all about Noah. Just because we’ve never had male cheerleaders before doesn’t mean they’re not eligible. Those are the rules. Everybody is welcome to join any club or team. No exceptions.”
“I don’t care so much that it’s a boy,” I pleaded. “I care that it’s that boy. He’s the most uncoordinated person I’ve ever seen. He could never learn our routines.”
I got the stop sign again. “That’s enough. When I saw his name on the sheet, I went to see Noah. Not your typical eighth grader, I’ll grant you. But I think he could be good for our squad.”
“Good?” I choked. “How?”
“To be honest, when I met with him, I was planning on talking him out of it. Instead, he wound up talking me into it. He wants to be a cheerleader out of pure school spirit. That’s something we don’t see enough of these days. It might help some of the girls to cheer alongside someone who isn’t just doing it for glory, attention, and a cute outfit.”
That made me bristle. “No offense, Ms. Torres, but that’s a little insulting. Some of us take cheerleading seriously. It’s not about the outfit. I mean, the outfit is pretty cute . . .” I drifted off topic for a moment, thinking about our cheerleading costumes, which were perfection. Designed by me, of course. “Wait—what’s he going to wear?”
She laughed. “Not the miniskirt, obviously. We’ll keep it simple. Plain white pants, and white sneakers instead of those tasseled boots. I think the jacket will fit. He’s not very muscular.”
Understatement of the century. Noah had arms like bent coat hangers and shoulders the width of a fire hydrant. Next to all those top-heavy lacrosse guys, he was going to look like a string bean with Coke-bottle glasses.
“Everybody’s going to laugh at us,” I predicted mournfully.
Her expression turned disapproving. “You’ve just illustrated exactly why we need Noah on our squad. It’s fine to impress people, but it’s not fine when you start trying to weed out the people you don’t think are impressive enough. If you’re such a good choreographer, develop a routine that suits his style.”
“His style is falling down and wiping out everybody around him,” I protested.
One thing about Ms. Torres—she expressed her anger by becoming extra quiet. “Well, Megan, if you can’t hack it, I’ll accept your resignation as head cheerleader.”
That shocked me a little, but I kept my cool. There was no way Ms. Torres was going to kick me out. I was the best cheerleader to come around this place since the legendary squad that inspired me to become a cheerleader in the first place. It would take a lot more than Noah Youkilis to change that.
Stay positive, I coached myself. I wasn’t anti-Noah; I was pro-squad. Which meant I couldn’t let that clumsy little twerp make us look like idiots in front of every lacrosse fan in the county.
It was time to bring out the heavy artillery.
4
SUPERATHLETE
HASH TAGGART
Megan Mercury just didn’t get it. Nobody went to a lacrosse game to watch the cheerleaders. When it came to sports, I was the authority, not any pom-pom girl. Not only was I the star middie at lax, but I also quarterbacked the football team. At wrestling I didn’t hold any specific role. I was just a beast.
So when Megan came to me in full freak-out mode, blubbering about some dude named Noah who wanted to join the cheerleaders, my reaction was, “Chill out, Megan. I mean, stinks to be you. But what am I supposed to do about it?”
Until I got a load of this Youkilis kid at the big pep rally. We held it in the cafeteria because there was still no gym. Coach Franco introduced the team first. The players got a pretty good ovation, especially me. Then the cheerleaders came out. There was the standard hooting mixed with the usual buzzing of a few idiots who barely knew what they were there for.
Noah came on last. I’d seen plenty of guy cheerleaders. Trust me, this was different. It was impossible to come up with only one word to describe the kid. He was like a dweeb/shrimp/goober/stick-bug/klutz. When he first shambled out, total silence greeted his arrival. Then as the crowd began to realize that they were actually seeing what they thought they were seeing, a wave of laughter and cheers began to rise.
Thinking this was a welcoming ovation, Noah took a deep bow, bonking his head on our team flagpole, knocking it over into the front row of seats. Kids scattered in all directions.
Now Noah really did get an ovation—a standing one. People were practically losing their minds and screaming their heads off.
I thought back to Megan’s words: Believe me, Hashtag, no one’s going to notice there’s a team on the field once that train wreck gets going!
She was right. Here we were, center stage, in our own cafeteria, in front of our own fans, and nobody was even looking at us. All eyes were on the train wreck, who was jumping around like someone had put ten thousand volts through him, waving to the crowd with one hand, and holding his rapidly swelling forehead with the other.
If this kid stayed on the cheerleading squad, this wouldn’t be a lacrosse season; it would be a sketch on Saturday Night Live. In sports, if you’re not respected, you can’t be feared. And it’s impossible to be feared if your opponents are too busy laughing at the dweeb/shrimp/goober/stick-bug/klutz in the cheerleading suit.
So I made a mental note to have a little conversation with this Youkilis kid to discuss his cheerleading future, and the fact that he wasn’t going to have one. At first, I staked out the girls’ locker room, because that’s where the cheerleaders change.
Megan set me straight when she came out in her street clothes. “Of course he doesn’t dress in here with us! He’s in the guys’ locker room!”
That was even worse. It meant he’d be with the team. Not only would we be stuck with him on the field; every g
ame would start with a little preview of dweeb/shrimp/goober/stick-bug/klutz. No one would be able to pay attention to Coach Franco. I was more convinced than ever that Youkilis had to go—for the good of the Hornets.
So I waited outside the guys’ room. Five minutes. Then ten. No dweeb/shrimp/goober/stick-bug/klutz. Finally, I decided I’d better go in just in case he’d flushed himself down the toilet and needed a lifeguard.
He was there all right, running around in his underwear, peering into lockers and bins.
“What’s the problem?” I asked him.
“Oh, hi,” he said to me. “You wouldn’t happen to know where my pants are, would you?”
I looked up and there they were, right where I expected them to be—draped over the blades of the ceiling fan, turning slowly. I reached up, grabbed a dangling leg, pulled them down, and tossed them to their owner.
“Get dressed,” I told him, looking away because those pale skinny legs were burning my eyes. “We have to talk about how you don’t want to be a cheerleader anymore.”
“But I do!” he exclaimed, stepping into his jeans—and then out again so he could put them on the right way. “It’s the least I can do to be true to my school.”
He must have been a great actor, because I could have sworn he was sincere. “All right, kid, I’m not brain dead. What are you trying to prove?”
“Prove?” He frowned. “You can prove a mathematical equation by demonstrating it holds true for any of a domain of numbers, but I don’t see how that concept applies to cheerleading.”
My eyes narrowed. “What are you, a wise guy?”
“I used to be,” he admitted. “I’m an average student now. I might even get to take remedial classes.”
I breathed a silent apology to Megan. Noah Youkilis was the most annoying person who ever stumbled across the face of the earth. He was obviously messing with me, calling me stupid or something. I didn’t take that from anybody.
I grabbed him under his arms and lifted him off the floor. I couldn’t help noticing that both his feet were sticking out of one pant leg. This clown had the nerve to insult me, the captain of three sports teams. “Hang up your pom-poms, little man,” I told him. “You’re done.” And I walked out of there, leaving him to find his second pant leg all by himself.
Before the door eased itself shut behind me, I heard him say, “There are no loops to hang them by. It’s a design flaw.”
The next day, when I jogged out onto the field for lax practice, I glanced over to the sidelines where the cheerleaders were working out and I couldn’t believe my eyes. It was Noah! I thought I’d been speaking English yesterday, not Swahili. I had made my message 1000 percent clear!
Megan shot me an accusing look, like I’d epically failed at my assignment. Actually, she was right.
I ran over, pulled him out of formation, and hissed, “What are you doing here?”
He beamed at me and held out one of his pom-poms. “Look. I’ve installed a loop of elastic fabric, affixed with industrial staples, so it can hang from any peg or hook. I told the girls it was your idea.” He tried to wink, but he couldn’t even get that right, blinking both eyes.
I swear, I just stood there with my mouth hanging open. I might still be there if Coach Franco hadn’t blown his whistle to get started.
Practice was terrible. The other players were okay, but I just couldn’t get my act together. It’s impossible to throw and catch with a lax stick unless your head is in the game. And if I was off, all the guys were off, because every play went through me at some point. Coach Franco practically passed out from blowing his whistle so often.
He had a lot of suggestions about what we needed to do to improve. I didn’t listen to any of them. I knew that what really needed to improve was the Youkilis situation.
I kept an eye out for Noah around school, staking out his locker, cornering him in the lunchroom. “You haven’t quit yet! That better be because you’ve got laryngitis, so you’ve got no voice to tell Megan the bad news.”
“Oh, no, my voice is exemplary,” he replied cheerfully. “A fine thing that would be—a cheerleader who can’t cheer.”
“That’s what I’m trying to tell you,” I insisted. “You can’t cheer. It’s over.”
“On the contrary, the season hasn’t even started yet.”
“Listen, man, this is a cheerleading squad not including you. You’re not on it.”
“Certainly, I’m on it. I’ll show you the list.”
“I know you’re on it, but you’re off it!”
“That,” he informed me, “is a logical impossibility.”
I was getting more ticked off every day. So was Megan. Not at him. At me!
“I don’t want to be negative, but he’s ruining our routines!” She was trying to remain calm, but I could sense her anger crackling under the surface. “When everybody else turns left, he turns right. We’re in tight formation, and he’s all over the place. He measured our human pyramid with a protractor! He translated our fight song into Latin! You’ve got to do something!”
“So how’s that my problem?” I shot back. “You’re the head cheerleader! Kick him off the squad.”
“Ms. Torres won’t let me. She says he has more school spirit than the rest of us put together. For some reason, she’s protecting him.”
“Protecting him?” I echoed. “He doesn’t need protection! The kid’s an alien, sent down from the mothership to drive everybody crazy. We need protection from him!”
“Oh, come on!” she exploded. “Some tough guy you are. Stop giving the guy supernatural powers. He’s not an alien; he’s just plain clueless. Stop being so subtle! You’re going to have to get right in his face and tell him how it is.”
I agonized over that. Noah Youkilis had become almost an obsession. He was so far inside my head that I couldn’t do things on the lacrosse field that were practically second nature to me. I saw his eager goofball grin in my sleep. Was it possible that he wasn’t evil at all—that he simply didn’t understand what I was telling him?
The more I thought about it, the more sense it made. You couldn’t lean on a guy who barely had the sense to notice he was being leaned on. I had to threaten him, pure and simple. I’d already told him to quit the cheerleaders. What I hadn’t said was quit the cheerleaders or else. Two extra words that made all the difference.
It would be an ugly scene, but it would be worth it. Youkilis would be gone once and for all, and then the Hornets could get back to lacrosse.
But I couldn’t risk confronting him at school. There was too great a chance of being overheard by one of the teachers. Coach Franco had a zero-tolerance policy on bullying. If you got caught, you were off the team. Even if you were only doing it out of team spirit.
No, this had to be done outside of school. Hardcastle was a small town. Noah couldn’t hide forever.
5
SUPERSCUFFLE
DONOVAN CURTIS
Kandy had a playdate on Saturday. His sister, Marie Curie, was visiting. Chloe Garfinkle, Marie’s owner, was on the robotics team with Noah and me. Chloe went to the Academy full-time, like Noah should have, and I used to, by mistake.
Marie Curie was already housebroken, which was a lot more than I could say for our Kandahar, who was still dribbling—and worse—all over the carpet. Marie had a nice quiet chew toy, not that instrument of torture, the bowwow bone. She was better-looking than Kandy, too. She had been spared the enormous feet of the absentee father, so she could cross a room without tripping. She was definitely smarter—and not just because she was named after a famous scientist. I experienced a pang of guilt for thinking bad things about Kandy. He might have been an ugly, untrainable, mongrel, but he was my ugly, untrainable mongrel.
The two pups rolled around the backyard and seemed to have a good time together. It was a great reunion—much better than Marie’s with her mother, Beatrice, who ignored her like she wasn’t there. The cinnamon chow chow was sulking because Brad wasn’t paying any atte
ntion to her. He was walking up and down with a fussy baby Tina, trying to keep her quiet while my sister napped upstairs.
Brad’s back was straight as a telephone pole, his posture upright, his free arm swinging in a controlled arc at his side. His other arm supported his daughter as if she was a rifle and he was marching in tight military formation.
“Come on, Tina. Naptime means lights-out for you. This fussing isn’t regulation.”
Chloe had a suggestion. The Academy kids always did. “Your posture’s too good.”
My brother-in-law frowned. “Too good?”
“It’s motion that soothes a crying baby,” Chloe explained. “Your body position is so straight that poor Tina might as well be standing still. Try slouching a little.”
The tank commander looked completely blank.
“You know,” she added, “walk like Donovan.”
Brad examined me a moment, and then rounded his shoulders, unstraightened his back, and allowed his head to droop a little. The change in his gait had Tina bobbing with every step. She quieted almost immediately, lolling against her father’s chest. Within seconds, she was fast asleep. Brad tossed a whispered “Thanks!” over his shoulder.
“I slump like that?” I asked Chloe.
She shrugged. “No kid has the carriage of a Marine officer.”
“You didn’t answer my question,” I said, slightly miffed.
In spite of everything, I was glad to see Chloe. I saw her a lot at the Academy, but then it was always robotics business. Heavy Metal was really taking shape. Latrell, who did most of our hands-on metal work, had completed the stainless steel body, so we were way ahead of schedule. Getting the new robot ready was our goal for the rest of this semester, but he wouldn’t be going into competition until next year, when we’d be freshmen in high school.
“How’s Noah doing?” Chloe wanted to know. As smart as Noah was, she always felt protective of him.
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