Lizzy Legend

by Matthew Ross Smith

  [Smirks.] That’ll stay between us.

  Chad Stephens—Channel 7 News

  Yeah, I was the sideline reporter. I knew I had to get to Lizzy, get her reaction. This was the biggest moment of my career!

  Tad Wexler—Bells TV Announcer

  It was hilarious. I watched the whole thing. This cheesy sideline reporter, this guy Stephens, from Channel 7, he comes sprinting out from beneath the basket, holding his microphone. “LIZZY! LIZZY! LIZZY!” He’s almost to her and then—

  Bill “Chalk” Rasner—Nationally Syndicated Sportswriter

  Bam. This humungous black kid with a flat-top comes out of nowhere and body-checks the reporter.

  Tad Wexler—Bells TV Announcer

  Stephens goes flying.

  Lizzy Trudeaux

  The most athletic thing Toby’s ever done. By far. [Laughs.]

  Bill “Chalk” Rasner—Nationally Syndicated Sportswriter

  So now it’s just the two of them there at midcourt—best friends—and the black kid pulls out his phone and starts recording, broadcasting the whole thing live, no stupid questions, they’re just dancing, just pure joy, they’re dancing all goofy, laughing—

  Tad Wexler—Bells TV Announcer

  And then all her other middle school teammates join in, even the big goon-looking kid.

  Bill “Chalk” Rasner—Nationally Syndicated Sportswriter

  This wild dance party breaks out on the court, and all the kids are broadcasting it live as it’s happening, while all the adult broadcasters look on in their fancy suits and cameras and microphones, pointless, irrelevant.

  Toby Sykes—Trudeaux’s Best Friend

  I didn’t notice this in the moment. But you can see it on YouTube. In the middle of all this craziness—I’m doing the worm at midcourt—Lizzy sneaks over and—

  Lizzy Trudeaux

  [Looks up at Dad.]

  Rick “The Wizard” Trudeaux—Lizzy’s Father

  [Presses lips together.]

  Lizzy Trudeaux

  [Presses her face into his chest.] That smell just washed over me, man. Old Spice and gasoline. I peeked up at the rafters, and I knew Mom was looking down too. It was the happiest moment of my life.

  So yeah.

  As you might imagine, it’s been pretty crazy since that final game. I’ve decided to stay offline for a while—it’s just too much—but Toby’s been updating me on the latest developments. He says the original video of me shooting at the tryout is now at over six hundred million views. The one of the no-look shot in New York has five hundred seventy million.

  And the crossover? The game-winning shot against Cleveland? 1.2 billion.

  i let u have that one, Sidney said to me last night.

  I laughed. oh yea?

  didn’t wanna ruin ur special moment . . .

  Except now I’m not talking to the poster on my wall anymore. Now I’m talking to the real Sidney. He’s busy ’cuz his team’s still in the playoffs, but we text sometimes and talk trash.

  So yeah.

  Things have changed.

  But in other ways things are kinda the same. I still hate math class, for instance. I asked Dad if I could drop out of school because, you know, I’m a professional basketball player and all now—a free-agent point guard, to be specific—but he said [Dad voice]: “If you’re gonna live under this roof, you’re gonna make up every last—”

  So yeah.

  That’s another thing that’s the same.

  And always will be.

  Dad’s still stubborn.

  He didn’t tell me, but I know from snooping through our mail that he’s started to apply for loans so he can open his own auto shop, so he can make his own hours. It’ll be hard because of all his debt, but, um . . . have I mentioned that he’s stubborn?

  Toby’s still my best friend. And he’s still a jackass. The last episode of The Toby Sykes Show! had forty-seven thousand viewers, a personal record, and as you can imagine, he won’t shut up about it. We took the train down to Philly the other day, to the Mack Center, just like we did on that—jeez, I was gonna say all those years ago.

  It feels like years ago.

  But really it was just weeks.

  Crazy.

  So we took the train down and found Coach Mack boxing up all his stuff in the locker room.

  “They finally fired you?” I joked.

  “Only took five thousand years,” Toby added.

  “Got me a better job,” Coach Mack said.

  “Golden State?” I guessed.

  He frowned. “What the heck am I gonna do in California?”

  “Good point.”

  “New York?” Toby said.

  “St. Ann’s,” he said, closing up the final box.

  I laughed.

  He crossed his arms. “I ain’t jokin’, kid.”

  “What age?”

  “Seventh and eighth grade.”

  “Head coach?” Toby asked.

  Coach Mack glared. “First assistant.” He clamped a bubblegum cigar between his teeth. “You done all right, kid. But you got a lotta work ahead of ya. Don’t get lazy on me now.”

  “I won’t, Coach.”

  I was over by my locker. My Bells jersey was still hanging there. And right beside the jersey, where I’d pinned it, was the tryout list from when I’d been cut from the middle school team. The paper was all wrinkled and faded. I folded it up and put it in my pocket. Call it a souvenir.

  The three of us all walked up the tunnel to the empty arena—just like that first day—and stood at the edge of the gleaming hardwood. “You seen that Lizzy Trudeaux play?” Toby asked Coach Mack like I wasn’t there.

  “Yeah, I seen her.”

  “Not bad, right?”

  “Eh, she’s all right.” He nudged me, smirking. “For a girl.”

  Somewhere, right now, at this very moment, some little boy is standing in front of a mirror, singing into a hairbrush. Out back, his little sister’s on a stump, delivering her inauguration speech to an audience of squirrels. Up the street, the police chief’s kid is backed against a fence, hands in the shape of a gun, saying to his partner, “Are you hit? Are you hit?” The Girl Who Watched Too Many Disney Movies is twirling down the sidewalk in a homemade ball gown, bluebirds fluttering all around her.

  And over at the playground, on the ghost-lined basketball court, a girl with duct-taped sneakers is smearing dirt under her eyes like war paint, preparing for the biggest, most important, most pressure-packed shot of her life.

  That last one, of course, is me.

  I’m back here, where it all started.

  It’s a little rainy this morning, but hey—

  There are no rainouts in basketball.

  I got up early, like always, so I’ve already swept the court from end to end. I weeded the cracks in the lane. I zigzagged between little orange cones. I dragged the twenty-pound tire. And now I’m counting down to the final shot.

  Three . . .

  Two . . .

  One . . .

  The ball swishes through.

  I jump up on a rain-warped bench, pump my fist.

  She did it!

  She did it!

  Lizzy Trudeaux’s done it again!

  I’m just uncorking an imaginary bottle of champagne when, out of the corner of my eye, I spot a mythical figure. He hasn’t been seen around these parts in a long time. I’m so stunned, I dribble the ball off my foot.

  The Wizard—disguised in a cheap baseball cap and a gas station shirt—picks up the rolling ball and spins it on his finger. He’s coming straight from a twelve-hour shift, so he must be exhausted, but he doesn’t complain. He sits on the ghost-lined court with his elbows hooked outside his knees.

  I sit beside him.

  “Missed one,” he says, nodding at a stray weed that’s shot up through the cement.

  I reach over.

  Pluck it at the root.

  “If you’re gonna do something,” he says.

  “Ye
ah, yeah. I got it.”

  I reach into my pocket—my personal savings bank since the age of five—and I take out a folded-up envelope. Inside is an eight-thousand-dollar check, my first and only pro paycheck, signed by Mr. Hal Kurtz, owner of the Philadelphia Bells.

  I give it to him like I’ve always dreamed.

  Well, I try.

  But he won’t take it. The stubborn old goat.

  I lean over and force it into the front pocket of his gas station shirt.

  “I’ll just deposit it for ya,” he says, frowning, and looks away.

  The rain has stopped. It’s still cloudy, but a few rays are breaking through, shining on the abandoned factory with all the windows knocked out. Wet plastic bags hang limply from the barbed-wire fence.

  “I can’t sleep sometimes,” Dad says, still looking away, his knobby elbows still hooked outside his knees.

  I think he’s talking about regret.

  About all that he had in front of him once, and lost.

  And I want him to finally open up, to pour out his guts once and for all.

  But I’m wrong.

  He’s not talking about regret.

  He says: “I just lay there thinkin’ about all the things you’re gonna do. My heart starts racin’. I think of all the things you’re gonna see, the people you’ll . . .”

  He stops.

  This is the most consecutive words I think he’s ever said in his life.

  He narrows his eyes.

  Presses his lips.

  And I understand completely.

  Dad picks himself up off the court, dusts his hands.

  “Look at you,” he says, glaring down at me.

  “What?”

  He pats the check in his shirt pocket. “You’ve been a trust-fund baby for, what, thirty seconds? And you’re already lounging around like a bum?”

  “Oh, please,” I say, laughing.

  He offers me his hand.

  But I knock it away.

  And I pick myself up.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I probably wrote a million words and threw them all away before I got to Lizzy. It’s been a long road here to the beginning. I’d like to thank the following for their help along the way:

  My early readers—Mark Smith, Liam Moriarty, Jim O’Brien, G. W. Hawkes, Phillip Le, Jason Finau, Meaghann Schulte, Becca Venuto, and Kevin Casey—for your wisdom and encouragement.

  My all-world agent, Melissa Edwards, for listening to my ridiculous pitch about a girl with duct-taped sneakers and magical powers and thinking yeah, this could work.

  My wonderful editor, Fiona Simpson, and the team at Aladdin Books—Mara Anastas, Elizabeth Mims, Steve Scott, Samantha Benson, Caitlin Sweeney, Sara Berko, and illustrator Oriol Vidal—for taking the girl with the duct-taped sneakers and getting her ready for prime time.

  My students over the years (too many to name) who have challenged and inspired me.

  My family, who put up with me locking myself away on vacations . . .

  Quentin, you’re not old enough to read this yet, but soon you will be—and that’s the cool thing about books, my words are right here where I left them for you.

  Zelda, you’ll never be able to read because you’re a dog, but you’re sleeping beside me as I write this, and I feel bad.

  And, finally, most of all—Georgia—I’m thankful not just because you helped me figure out this story (although you did), but because you’ve transformed the whole way I see the world. I love ya.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  For several years, when he was starting out, Matthew Ross Smith wrote biographies for people with Alzheimer’s. Each memory was written on a postcard, which was then mailed to the interviewee’s kids and grandkids. Doing this hundreds of times taught him how to see and express the world from many different points of view. For more about the author and other fun stuff (including writing programs for your classroom!) please visit him at matthew-ross-smith.com.

  ALADDIN

  Simon & Schuster, New York

  Visit us at simonandschuster.com/kids

  Authors.SimonandSchuster.com/Matthew-Ross-Smith

  This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  ALADDIN

  An imprint of Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing Division

  1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, New York 10020

  www.SimonandSchuster.com

  First Aladdin hardcover edition January 2019

  Text copyright © 2019 by Matthew Ross Smith

  Jacket illustration copyright © 2019 by Oriol Vidal

  All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.

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  Book designed by Steve Scott

  Jacket designed by Steve Scott

  Jacket illustration copyright © 2019 by Oriol Vidal

  Author photo by Andrew Piccone

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Smith, Matthew Ross, author.

  Title: Lizzy Legend / by Matthew Ross Smith.

  Description: First Aladdin hardcover edition. | New York : Aladdin, 2019. | Summary: Unhappy at not being allowed to play on the boys’ basketball team, Lizzy Trudeau, thirteen, wishes to never miss another shot and soon finds herself playing in the NBA against her hero, the greatest player of all time.

  Identifiers: LCCN 2018015201 (print) | LCCN 2018023946 (eBook) |

  ISBN 9781534420267 (eBook) | ISBN 9781534420243 (hc)

  Subjects: | CYAC: Basketball—Fiction. | Ability—Fiction. | Wishes—Fiction. |

  Middle schools—Fiction. | Schools—Fiction. | Sex role—Fiction. |

  Fathers and daughters—Fiction.

  Classification: LCC PZ7.1.S6447 (eBook) | LCC PZ7.1.S6447 Liz 2019 (print) |

  DDC [Fic]—dc23

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018015201