And with this memory, Mickey’s face lit up.
“Come on! Get up already, you dork! I just had an idea.”
Meanwhile, we were still training down by the lake, but we still hadn’t managed to pass the ball ten times. Five passes at the most and it was over. Sox was just too fast and we were about to give up, when Larry suddenly got up and showed us a different side of him, a side we had never seen before. He danced around us like a goblin, ran alongside us, lame leg or no, encouraging us.
“Come on, Kevin, right. Pass to the right. Julian is free! Yes, that was good. That was number four! Yes, and Tyler, you have to go to the left. To the left, now you are free and, you see, that was number five! Yes, and now shoot it to Joey with your heel. Six! Man, you guys are good! And Joey, look, right there, it’s Kyle in the middle. Come on, Kyle, run!”
But Kyle stood still, and Sox caught the ball. Embarrassed, Kyle looked at Larry, but Larry just applauded enthusiastically.
“Hey, man, that was a new record! You see? All you need to do is to keep moving, and Kyle, you need to move towards the ball. Approach it. Don’t wait for it. Then Sox won’t stand a chance! Come on, let’s go. Next time you’ll get it right, and then you won’t only be the best soccer players around here, you’ll be the best soccer team in the world!”
We were still skeptical, but Larry’s enthusiasm was contagious. He danced around us again, and with his orders and tips the ball moved through our ranks like butter on a hot plate. We couldn’t believe it when we reached number seven and number eight.
That’s when Larry withdrew. He didn’t say another word and sat down on the grass. But his eyes sparkled, that’s how thrilled he was by our game.
We managed number nine and number ten and still kept playing. Sox ran between us, but it was all in vain. Finally, he yelped angrily and gave up at number seventeen. He stood in front of us, panting, barked one last time, then ran towards the tree, yelping. Then he lay down on his stomach and covered his eyes with his paws until I put him on the leash. Sox was done with soccer for the day. We ran towards each other, embraced each other, embraced Larry, and then, for the first time, formed our circle.
Larry counted to three, and for the first time, without any discussion, we yelled out what would become our battle cry. All of us roared: “ONE, TWO, THREE WILD!”
But as soon as our battle cry had died away, a mocking “woof” answered.
We whirled around. Sox had never barked that way. That’s because it wasn’t Sox, it was Mickey the bulldozer. We retreated a few steps until we realized that we were already surrounded. We could see them approach from all sides: Humungous, Mow-down, Juggernaut, Octopus, the Grim Reaper, and Kong.
Sox growled at those morons. He sounded like a wolf and was so convincing and wild that even Mickey the bulldozer got nervous. He checked at least three times that Sox was on the leash. Only then did he bark his “woof!” again and stopped in front of Larry.
“Pro, huh? And that’s how you coach? Wow …”
Larry was embarrassed.
“I see. I almost thought this was a doggy school.”
At his command, all the morons around us laughed. The Bulldozer turned away from Larry and approached us.
“Did he teach you just those tricks? I mean the great tricks you only know if you’re a pro?”
We got mad.
“So what?” I spat. “What do you care?”
“Who, me?” Mickey asked, and lifted his arms as if he was innocence personified. “Oh, I don’t care at all.” “So? Why are you here then?” I hissed. “Did you get lost?”
“Did you hear that?” The Bulldozer laughed. “You’re that courageous twerp, aren’t you?”
He leaned over me, his rasping breath was suffocating. “Don’t worry, twerp. I won’t do anything to you. Today. Today I mean you no harm. After all, tomorrow is our game and we want it to be really good. Am I right or am I right?”
“For once you’re telling the truth,” I spat.
“Exactly!” Mickey whispered into my face and I almost threw up. Then his voice was booming again.
“And that’s why I’m here. To tell the truth. Just came to tell you your coach, Larry the Boozer, never was a pro. Am I right or am I right, lame leg?”
The question was addressed directly to Larry, but he kept quiet, and instead looked at us, embarrassed and unsure.
“Tell him, coach!” I yelled.
“Tell him it’s a snappin’ lie!” Danny demanded.
“You said it to all of us!” Tyler begged. And Julian encouraged him: “You are the best coach in the world!”
But Larry just looked at the ground, ashamed.
“What did I say?” Mickey the bulldozer roared. “Lame leg is one big lie. He told you a tall tale and — oh, I am so sorry — you tortured yourself for ten days straight, and all in vain. Or do I look like a dog?”
The morons laughed again at his command.
“Woof woof!” Mickey barked, and he laughed so loud that the fat underneath his Darth Vader shirt seemed to be dancing with the stars.
“Woof woof!” he barked again. “Which other animals did you pretend to be? Were you the crickets in the woods and the tadpoles in the puddles? Oh, snap! I’m going to die laughing! Ribbet, ribbet, ribbet!”
Mickey the bulldozer and his Unbeatables were shaking with laughter, and there was nothing we could do other than steel up and bear it. Finally, Mickey caught himself and wiped the tears from his face.
“Oh, never mind, twerps. Think of what I did for you as just a service between friends. I hope we’ll still see you tomorrow morning at ten. And if not, then I know where I can find you. At the zoo. With the monkeys.”
The Bulldozer screeched again with laughter and held onto his fat belly, making sure it didn’t roll away. The other jerks joined in, then all of them wobbled away.
We stayed put and waited until they had vanished. Then we looked over at Larry.
“Is that true?” I asked.
Larry looked pitiful.
“Is that true?” I asked again.
“You know, I tried to tell you,” he stammered.
“You said we should be honest!” Tyler reminded him.
Larry lowered his eyes.
“I know,” he answered.
“And what are we supposed to believe now?” Julian asked.
“That we’re going to beat the Unbeatables?” Danny mocked.
Larry looked at us. He pleaded: “You are the best soccer players in the world! You can believe that.”
“And you are a liar, Larry,” I stated. “We never want to see you again!” Larry turned away from us and rubbed his eyes. I think he was crying.
“Let’s go!” I called out to the others. “There’s nothing left for us here.”
Without a word, we all walked past Larry and then headed home. It was over. We not only lost the soccer field, we lost all confidence in ourselves.
A Dark Night and an Even Darker Morning
None of us slept that night. The same thoughts tortured us all. We were so disappointed. We worked so hard. We had given it our best. And we had believed in Larry. It was because of him we endured the muddy field, the tennis ball, the heat, the mosquitoes, and Sox’s howling. For a brief moment we had reached the summit. We really believed we were the best soccer team in the world. But then Mickey the bulldozer showed up and shot us down. We fell thousands of feet into the abyss, and that’s where we were now, defeated and lifeless. We were a joke, nothing but a laughing stock, and our confidence had been revealed as a cheap lie.
“But we beat Sox!” Tyler blurted out below me. It was probably three in the morning and he was still resisting the truth. You know, Tyler never gives up, and usually that’s great. But in this case it just meant further torture.
Larry lied to us, and so, everything he taught us wasn’t worth snap.
“But we beat Sox!” Tyler repeated at around three-thirty.
“So what!” I answered. “Did you f
orget what Mickey the Bulldozer does to dogs?”
“He pulls their ears off,” Tyler said.
“Exactly!” I explained. “And that’s why Mickey the bulldozer is not a dog. He’s a monster. Have we beaten any monsters lately?”
There was no answer from Tyler this time.
“Tyler! Larry was never a pro, and we are not the best soccer team in the world.”
“But we’re still going to play the Unbeatables, right?” Tyler asked. He just couldn’t leave it alone.
I just stared at the ceiling. Then I asked: “What’s the point?”
At some point we must have fallen asleep, and in the morning even Tyler was so tired that he didn’t want to get up. All of us tossed and turned all night. Our parents wanted to wake us, but we sent them away.
“The game has been cancelled,” we said.
“Mickey the bulldozer broke his legs.”
“Our ball is flat.”
Then, at One Woodlawn Avenue, Alex opened his eyes. His father stood in his room, holding a brand new soccer ball in his hand. It was dark black.
“Nike,” Alex’s father said spinning the gleaming ball in his hands. “Limited Edition. There are only 5,000 of these babies in the world. I think it’s just the right ball for a new collection.”
Alex’s father smiled at his son: “Assuming that you don’t chicken out today.” Then he was serious: “My son does not chicken out, am I right?”
He was. Alex jumped up and out of bed, grabbed the ball and stormed out of his room.
A few seconds later, Danny’s mother stood at Danny’s bed, handing him the phone.
“Hello? What’s up?” Danny moaned into the phone but didn’t get an answer.
“Dang it, Alex! What do you want from me? Oh no! Please don’t tell me you want to play!”
Alex stood in his kitchen on the other end of the phone line, intently looking at his ball.
“Alex, you are nuts. There’s no point to going out there,” Danny said, but Alex just shook his head. He fought with himself and finally won. He said: “Yes, there is.”
Danny flew out of bed.
“Dude! This is too much. Why did you have to choose a moment like this to start talking? Listen, I’m never going to forgive you! Oh, snap! Mom, where are my cleats?”
Five minutes later, a small pebble clicked against Julian and Josh’s window in the house across the street. Josh jumped out of bed and looked outside. He saw Danny, Alex, Tyler, and me standing below. Josh panned his gaze over to his sleeping brother, thought about it, then yelled down into the street: “Sorry, but Julian can’t come. He wet his pants when I told him you were playing.”
In a nanosecond Julian was at the window, pushing Josh aside.
“That’s a lie! I’m not afraid!” he yelled at us.
“Then what are you doing up there?” We grinned mischievously.
The five of us continued. It was already nine-thirty when we got to the trailer park to pick up Joey. But Joey’s van was already gone and a neighbor told us Joey and his mother left in the middle of the night. Just up and left. That was a double-whammy, because now nobody knew how to imitate the eagle cry that would call Kyle. What would we do? Ringing the bell and asking for Kyle could mean the end of soccer for him. But if he was tossing and turning in his bed, he’d never find out that the game was on.
So I took heart, and even though the door was as big as a castle gate, I rang the doorbell. We waited forever and were about to leave, when suddenly somebody appeared. The guy holding a silver tray in his hand looked like a penguin.
“Oh, bonjour. May I ‘elp you?” he asked.
We didn’t understand a word: Why was this guy so polite? We were just kids. Adults aren’t polite to kids.
“Edgar, who is it?” said a female voice with a nasal pitch. And then I saw another strange inhabitant of the house.
That inhabitant peeked out of a door behind the penguin, was stuck in a bathrobe and had a pound of lettuce on its face.
“Oh-la-la, you’re ‘ere to see zee lady of zee ‘ouse?” Edgar asked us. “ But ov course, zee newspaper interview. One moment please. Madame, zee gentlemen of zee ‘erald are ‘ere.”
The bathrobe with the lettuce on its face shrieked in horror and slammed the door so hard that it shook the house. Horrified, we looked at the penguin.
“But, but we’re not from the Herald,” Tyler stammered.
“Shhh!” Edgar said and winked at us. “I ‘ave a message for you. A zeecret message. It is top zeecret.”
Again, we didn’t know what he was saying.
“A message from junior. But first I need zee zeecret code.” Edgar smiled.
“Dang, dude! What secret code and what junior are you talking about?” I asked and stomped my food impatiently. “We just want to see Kyle, that’s all.”
“I’m zorry, but vizout zee zeecret code I cannot tell you anyzeeng.” Edgar was being difficult and looked just like a penguin again. “You are zee Vild Bunch, no? And you ‘ave zees battle cry, no? Vat is it?”
“ONE, TWO, THREE WILD!” we yelled, and Edgar jumped a mile.
“Shhh! Not zo loud, it’s zeecret, remember?”
“Well, then tell us already, penguin!” Danny urged, and Edgar looked at him with surprise.
“Penguin, oh-la-la! C’est bon!” he laughed. Then he leaned down to us. “‘ere’s the story, junior, I mean Kyle, ‘ad to go play golf viz ‘is father. But ve just called ‘im.
As you can zee, Madame is at the end of ‘er rope, and ve don’t believe she can ‘get zrough zee morning vizout zee monsieur.”
He smiled at us, but we didn’t understand a word. “What is that supposed to mean?” I asked. “Is Kyle on his way?” Danny asked. “Where is that golf club, anyway?”
“‘alf an ‘our from ‘ere,” Edgar answered and looked at his watch. “Oops, zat vill be very tight.”
“You can say that again!” I hissed. It was quarter to ten already. “And you know what, penguin. I hate golf!”
Then we hurried off.
Be Wild!
Diego was waiting for us in front of the soccer field. Oh man, what a lucky break. At least there were six of us now.
“Hey man! Did you get over the flu?” I greeted him enthusiastically, but Diego, breathing heavily, shook his head.
“Then how did you get out?” Danny asked. “Did you ice a fly again?”
“No, I … I just took off!” Diego gasped, and that was when we realized he was having an asthma attack. But this one wasn’t from the grass.
“What’s wrong?” Tyler asked, worried now.
Diego just looked at him and pointed with his head to the soccer field.
We followed his gaze nervously and walked through the gate. For one split second we all thought we would have a group asthma attack, that’s how lousy we felt. What was left of Larry’s stand was strewn all over the ground, and the Unbeatables stood waiting behind it. They had torn their t-shirts and pants, and painted their faces. Then they roared:
“UAAAHH! UAAAHH!”
We stopped dead in terror. Now I knew for sure that I had been right. These guys were monsters, and what was ahead of us was no longer just a soccer game. I swallowed hard.
“Is Larry here yet?” I asked no one in particular.
“Larry? Are you kidding?” Mickey the bulldozer roared with laughter. “Larry has gone underground,” he mumbled as if he was drunk, “if you know what I mean. Burp!”
We looked at the ground, ashamed. Mickey the bulldozer looked at his watch, gloating. It was ten sharp.
“Show time!” he rubbed his hands together. “Let the slaughter begin! What are you waiting for?”
“F-for Kyle,” Diego gasped. “Seven aga-against six is not fair.”
“Ohhhh!” the Bulldozer whined in response. “Quick! Call the wah-mbulance! Who ever told you life was fair?” The morons all laughed at his command.
“And that’s why we’ll kick off and you’ll play with the sun in you
r eyes.”
Octopus, the Grim Reaper, and the others laughed again.
“That’s how it is with duels. The one who’s been challenged gets to choose the weapons.”
Mickey the bulldozer placed the ball at the center mark.
“I suggest we play until one team has scored ten goals. That way I’ll be back home in twenty minutes. I have plans later.”
The Bulldozer searched his pockets and found a whistle. We still held back. We needed to play for time. We walked to our side of the field in slow motion, but the Bulldozer didn’t wait. He blew the whistle and kicked the ball to the left. That’s where Kong was waiting. We ran now, and I yelled orders to the others.
“I’ll be goalie. Diego, play left. Danny, play right, and Julian, Alex, and Tyler, you stay back here with me.”
But the others didn’t hear me. They ran after Kong, who was almost as fast as Danny. That’s why Mickey the bulldozer was free when Kong cross-passed. I ran out of the goal and threw myself into Mickey’s shot. The ball thundered against my fists and I thought they’d break off. Still flying, I watched the ball roll over the goal line.
“One!” Mickey grinned, and I yelled at the others. “What kind of bull are you guys playing?”
But now we kicked off. We got ourselves into a line-up. Diego played to Danny, and Danny ran off. He ran as fast as he could straight at Humungous, Mow-down, and Juggernaut.
“Diego! Where are you?” he yelled. But Diego still stood at the center mark gasping for air. Danny had to go on by himself. He played the ball past Mow-down on the right, and ran around him on the left. Mow-down looked rather stupid, but Juggernaut came to his rescue and simply blocked Danny’s way. Danny bumped into him full force, bounced off, and fell down. Juggernaut didn’t even notice. He turned around, took the ball, and passed it to the Grim Reaper on the right.
Tyler attacked, but the Grim Reaper just pushed him to the ground.
“Hey! That was a foul!” I yelled, but Mickey the bulldozer just laughed.
“Body contact. Totally allowed.”
Tyler was doubled up in pain, holding his ribs. Julian became all wild.
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