Control Freak

by Steve Moore

  But I decided to mess with Jimmy’s scheme.

  At practice that day, I made sure that Ronnie got all the help he needed from the Magic N64.

  Whenever Ronnie took a handoff, he zigged and zagged and then beat cheeks into the end zone without even getting touched by a defender’s pinkie finger.

  Coach Earwax was very pleased. He jotted a top-secret note in his clipboard that I’m pretty sure said “Give the ball to Ronnie.”

  Then I turned the Magic N64 toward Jimmy.

  I wanted to sabotage his practice drills and make it look like Jimmy suddenly came down with a severe case of the drooling dweebs.

  I admit that it was kind of a shady thing for me to do, and I felt sort of guilty, but my sneaky sabotage didn’t even work.

  I thumbed the buttons and joystick to disrupt Jimmy’s motor skills so he’d slam right into Mosi Humuhumunukunukuapua’a’s huge chest. Instead, Jimmy juked and zigged and zagged and sprinted all the way into the end zone!

  Maybe the Magic N64 had a mind of its own—and it didn’t like my sneaky sabotage.

  The Mighty Plumbers’ next game was Homecoming.

  Homecoming is a really big deal where students and teachers welcome back to campus everyone who ever attended Spiro T. Agnew Middle School. But only a few really ancient alumni ever actually show up.

  On the day of Homecoming, students and teachers wear a piece of clothing in our school color, which is teal. (In case you don’t know, teal looks like the color you’d get if you mixed broccoli and milk in a blender.)

  Everyone on the football team wore their jerseys, of course, and the cheerleaders were dressed in their perky outfits. Jessica Whitehead was inside the Mighty Plumbers mascot suit the entire day. Even though she was acting as the school’s beloved mascot, Jessica still got the same treatment in the hallways between classes.

  All through the day, there were special events to get everyone pumped up and filled with Mighty Plumbers school spirit.

  We had an “Onward to Victory” lunch on the lawn in front of school. Cafeteria workers were dressed up like plumbers, and they barbecued Spiro Burgers and Agnew Dogs that had been dyed teal with food coloring.

  The best part of the school day was that I got to skip last period. That’s Mr. Spleen’s math class where I go to face my worst nightmares.

  In honor of Homecoming, the entire student body got out early to get psyched up for the game.

  After all the festivities and the pep rally and the teal-colored hamburgers and hot dogs, the actual Homecoming game was a letdown.

  The Mighty Plumbers played A. E. Neuman Middle School, “Home of the Raging Madmen.” But their football team didn’t stand a chance against the Magic N64, which I used on our new running back, Ronnie Howard.

  The Mighty Plumbers were ahead by about a hundred to zip in the fourth quarter. With five minutes left on the clock, Ronnie got injured, but it was pretty minor—a jammed knuckle that the athletic trainer wrapped in tape.

  So I stuffed the Magic N64 back in my equipment bag. I didn’t want to waste any of its mojo, and Ronnie’s injury made me a little nervous.

  After the game, we had a Homecoming dance in the cafeteria. Normally, I’m too chicken to walk up to a girl and ask her to dance because I don’t want to risk humiliation if she says no.

  But I spotted Becky standing by herself at the back of the cafeteria. Jimmy was hanging out on the other side of the room with his kiss-up posse.

  I remembered something my mom once told me: “If you never ask, the answer is always no.”

  So I asked Becky to dance. And she said yes.

  The dance didn’t last very long, though, because Jimmy spotted Becky and me out on the dance floor and he hustled over and cut in.

  But for about maybe one minute, I danced with the girl at Spiro T. Agnew Middle School with Nature’s Near-Perfect Smile.

  CHAPTER 17

  I continued to use the Magic N64, and the Mighty Plumbers continued to win. But it seemed like every victory came with a price. I was starting to think the magic really did have a dark side.

  With only two league games left in the season, we traveled to play Simplot Middle School, “Home of the Blazing Spuds.”

  Sports pundits had predicted that Simplot’s football team would be one of the best in the league.

  In case you don’t know, sports pundits are know-it-alls who make predictions about how teams will perform during the season. When their predictions turn out to be totally bogus, the sports pundits disappear from the face of the earth until the next season when they return and make wrong predictions all over again.

  Joey would be a lousy sports pundit because all of his predictions are accurate.

  Anyway, I kept the controller stashed in my equipment bag for the first half of the Simplot game. I wanted see if the Mighty Plumbers could prove all the sports pundits wrong and beat the Blazing Spuds without any magic.

  The game started off with Jimmy Jimerino trying to win the game all by himself. He either passed the ball or took off running. Ronnie Howard’s jammed knuckle had totally healed, but all he did for the entire first half was block for Jimmy. He never got a single handoff.

  Jimmy was trying to be the Great Spiro Hope. But every time he made an amazing play, something out of his control would happen and the Blazing Spuds defense would get the ball.

  The only bright spot was Mosi Humuhumunukunukuapua’a.

  He dominated on both sides of the line. Still, it wasn’t enough. We were getting creamed.

  Carlos tried to inject some game-changing momentum by ripping one of his legendary belches to get us on the scoreboard.

  His gigantic gut bomb blasted across the football field and stunned the Spuds players and their fans.

  Our players and fans were pumped up, of course, and Coach Earwax even gave Carlos the ultimate coach compliment.

  “Atta babe, Carlos!”

  The Mighty Plumbers’ offense broke out of the huddle and practically sprinted to the line of scrimmage because they were so inspired by Carlos’s burp. Jimmy took the snap. He dodged a tackler, rolled out, and threw a perfect spiral right into the hands of a wide-open Skinny Dennis.

  A Simplot defender grabbed the deflection and ran fifty yards for a touchdown.

  At the end of the first half, the Blazing Spuds were leading, twenty-one to zip, and it was looking like the sports pundits were right.

  CHAPTER 18

  This time, there was no inspirational talk at halftime. Instead, Coach Earwax had a “heart-to-heart talk” alone with Jimmy Jimerino in the very back corner of the locker room where the rest of the team couldn’t listen in.

  It was clear that Coach Earwax was not happy with Jimmy, who hung his head and shuffled his feet. And Coach did not have his car keys hanging out of his ear, so Jimmy took it seriously.

  Everything changed in the second half, including Jimmy’s attitude.

  He no longer tried to win the game all by himself. Instead, Jimmy followed Coach’s strategy, which he called a “balanced attack.”

  Basically, it meant that the Mighty Plumbers offense wouldn’t rely on Jimmy’s talents alone. We would pass the ball and run the ball. Everyone would be involved—including me, since I’d decided it was time to bust out the Magic N64.

  On our first offensive play of the second half, Jimmy took the snap and handed it off to Ronnie Howard. Ronnie took the ball, lowered his head, and ran right through a hole that Mosi had blown open on the right side of the line.

  I had the Magic N64 in my hands and I thumbed the controller.

  Ronnie dodged left and got jostled in a rough manner, but he brushed it off. No drama. Then he juked right and faked out a tackler.

  I shoved the joystick forward with my thumb and Ronnie sprinted down the sideline and dove headfirst into the end zone, just beyond the reach of a Blazing Spuds defender!

  The game momentum had shifted.

  Jimmy Jimerino—the Great Spiro Hope—had made the switch from “winn
ing the game by himself” to winning the game as a team.

  The Mighty Plumbers defeated the Blazing Spuds by a field goal in the final seconds. Becky and I celebrated with fist bumps and high fives.

  On the bus ride home, I was sitting next to Coach Earwax while he yanked hairs out of his nose. Jimmy stopped at my seat and whispered in my ear.

  Even he couldn’t get me down, though. The Mighty Plumbers had won the game, and no one on the team, including Ronnie Howard, had been injured.

  I was relieved to know the Magic N64 wasn’t jinxed after all, but the relief only lasted until football practice the next day.

  Ronnie Howard was stretching out on the sidelines when he suddenly collapsed on the ground and curled into a fetal position, even though there was no scary threat anywhere in sight.

  Ronnie had been sort of battling a stomachache, but he thought it was from the beef Stroganoff he’d eaten in the school cafeteria. Now, Ronnie’s stomachache had become a stabbing pain in the lower right side of his belly.

  Mr. Joseph hauled Ronnie off to the hospital in the back of his filthy pickup truck. Coach Earwax told us later that our running back had been struck with “acute appendicitis.”

  Poor Ronnie Howard had an emergency appendectomy. The surgeon cut him open and yanked out his inflamed appendix, which is a weak and useless organ that just sort of hangs out in the belly and mooches off of the other hardworking organs.

  No torn anterior cruciate ligament. No leg bone snapped in two. Not even a dislocated shoulder! Ronnie Howard was lost for the season because a freeloader bodily organ conked out.

  And now I was certain the Magic N64 was a jinx.

  CHAPTER 19

  The Mighty Plumbers had one more league game, this one against K. L. Enron Middle School, “Home of the Screaming Bulls.”

  I’d intended to use the Magic N64 to help us win, but I was worried. The controller’s mojo won games, but it also was causing painful injuries.

  Unfortunately, Enron was a do-or-die game for the Mighty Plumbers’ season.

  Even though we’d gotten creamed by Nike Prep, we could still win the League Championship.

  Why? Because the Enron Screaming Bulls had creamed the Nike Prep Platypuses by about a hundred to zip.

  So if we could beat the Screaming Bulls, we would be tied with the Platypuses in the standings, and a playoff game would determine the League Champion.

  Before the kickoff, I told Joey and Carlos about my discovery that the Magic N64 was both a blessing and a curse.

  Joey just shrugged his shoulders and squirmed because his central nervous system was low on sugar. Then he made another one of his psychic predictions.

  Sin? Win?

  Carlos wasn’t interested in the blessing-and-curse thing, either. He was standing behind the bench in front of the student cheering section, talking to the Mighty Plumbers mascot—also known as Jessica Whitehead.

  Apparently, during the course of the season—and without Joey and I even noticing—the school genius had developed a crush on grumpy Carlos. There was undeniable proof.

  With no help from my friends, I decided it was all up to me. This game was too important to lose. I needed to use the Magic N64.

  Skinny Dennis took over as our running back. On the very first play, he took the handoff from Jimmy. I engaged the Magic N64. Skinny juked and dodged. I pushed the joystick forward and Skinny scrambled down the sideline and scored.

  But he had a hard time putting on the brakes.

  Skinny ran through the end zone and plowed into the side of Mr. Joseph’s filthy pickup truck. This turned out to be really handy because they didn’t have to move Skinny very far. He was lifted into the bed of the pickup truck and rushed to the hospital with a broken clavicle.

  Coach Earwax was desperate. He was running out of running backs. With the do-or-die game on the line, Coach put in our punter at the cursed position.

  Scotty Anderson’s nickname was “Arrow” because he could run very fast, but only in a straight line. Scotty ran in strict geometric angles. No juking. No dodging.

  Scotty took his first handoff, and I jammed the joystick forward. He ran at an acute angle from the line of scrimmage all the way into the corner of the end zone!

  The Mighty Plumbers had won, and we were headed into a playoff game with Nike Prep for the League Championship.

  But the curse was about to strike again—in a very unusual way.

  Scotty was the hero of the game, and we carried him off the field on our shoulders. He took off his helmet so that the cheering crowd could get a good look at the player who had won the game. But it was like unbuckling a seat belt in a moving vehicle.

  As we exited the field through a tunnel into the locker rooms, Scotty smacked his forehead on the overhead archway.

  Mr. Joseph hauled Scotty to the hospital in his filthy pickup truck. The team later learned that he had a concussion and, out of “an abundance of caution,” he would not be available for the championship game.

  CHAPTER 20

  I was done with the cursed Magic N64.

  When I got home from the Enron game, I threw it into the back of my closet, which is the only spot in our house that Mom reluctantly allows to be messy.

  (She gave up trying to make me clean it because I have a bad habit of wearing the same athletic socks for three days in a row, then tossing them into my closet, where they stink so bad it could blow your nose off.)

  If the Mighty Plumbers were going to win a League Championship, we would have to do it on our own, with no help from a supposedly “magic” antique game controller.

  I slammed the closet door.

  But looking back, I guess I didn’t slam it all the way closed.

  Early the next morning, I awoke to what sounded like two vicious dogs fighting over a bone.

  When I jumped out of bed, I noticed that my closet door was wide open. I pinched my nostrils shut and rifled through my stanky athletic socks. The Magic N64 was missing.

  In the backyard, Frenchy and Cleo were locked in a tug-of-war. Frenchy had his teeth in a death grip on one end of the Magic N64 and Cleo had her lipless beak clamped onto the other end.

  They were doing that dog thing where each one yanks their head backward in jerking spasms, trying to rip the controller out of the other one’s mouth.

  I pulled Cleo off and tried to grab the Magic N64 out of Frenchy’s mouth, but he backed away and shook the controller violently, as if he was trying to kill it.

  Then he dropped it and ran straight into his “doghouse” underneath my bed. I think he realized that he had lost control of his temper, and poodles hate that.

  I picked up the magic controller and tossed it back into the pile of stinky athletic socks in my closet. Then I made sure the door was shut tight this time.

  The week leading up to the League Championship was once again filled with school-spirit events. It was like Homecoming, only it lasted for five days—but it didn’t include all the geezer alumni wandering around all teary-eyed because of nostalgia, talking about how they missed the “good ol’ days.” Whatever that means.

  Everyone was in a good mood—even Carlos, who had begun spending a LOT of time with Jessica Whitehead.

  There was giddy chatter in the cafeteria and bursts of spontaneous cheers everywhere at school—except in the carpeted hallways.

  And nothing got done in class because all the teachers were excited about the Spiro T. Agnew football team, and they weren’t in the mood to talk about the French Revolution or Shakespeare or amoebas. Even Mr. Spleen had a hard time blocking out the Big Game and focusing on math.

  Poor Ricky Schnauzer got so excited thinking about organizing all the team equipment for the Big Game that he started hyperventilating during lunch.

  Fortunately, Jessica Whitehead knew exactly what to do.

  At football practice, Coach Earwax made a couple of changes at key positions—running back and punter. Vinny Pascual would be the new running back. And Carlos would replace Sc
otty Anderson as the punter. Why? I don’t know. You’d have to ask Coach Earwax.

  Carlos’s punts always wobble out of bounds, never more than twenty yards from the line of scrimmage.

  The team was so depleted by injuries that Coach Earwax had to pull Joey off the bench and put him on “special teams.” Those are the players who run downfield like maniacs on kickoffs or punts and throw their bodies at the opponents without any regard for their own lives.

  Joey actually is a pretty fearless guy, but it was clear during practice that he wasn’t going to make much of an impact on special teams.

  CHAPTER 21

  The Big Game was played at Nike Preparatory Academy’s Phil Day Stadium. From a mile away, everyone on the team bus could see the facility. It was that big. It looked just like an NFL stadium.

  Quick Time-Out about Phil Day Stadium

  It is named after a Nike Prep alum who became a zillionaire when he cashed in on the Beanie Babies craze way back in the ancient 1990s.

  Apparently, Phil Day REALLY enjoyed his time as a student at Nike Prep, because he decided to “give back” by shoveling a ton of hard-earned cash into his alma mater.

  In Phil Day Stadium, there are luxury skyboxes for the rich Platypuses fans, and the less-expensive sections have padded seats and cup holders—even for the poor slobs in the bleachers.

  The stadium concessions are strictly gourmet. No hot dogs, peanuts, nachos, or churros. Instead, they sell fancy stuff like sushi, grilled T-bone steak, lobster tail, and steamed broccoli. BROCCOLI!

  The stadium scoreboard is ginormous—bigger than my house. And Nike Prep has its own radio and TV stations with an on-air “Voice of the Platypuses” who comments in a deep, dramatic voice about every little thing that the Nike players do on the field.

  As our bus approached the school, we could see a Goodyear Blimp floating over Phil Day Stadium just like in the NFL, and I’m not even making that up.