Big Mouth (13 page)

CHAPTER 11

I was late. It was insane to be late for anything at 6:40 a.m. on a Saturday morning, but I was. I should’ve been coasting my bike down my driveway at least five minutes ago. Still, if I hustled I could probably make it to the gym before wrestling practice started. In the wee hours of the morning, I’d come up with a plan to get by without Lucy, and I didn’t want to waste a second putting it into action.

The sun was barely even up.
What genius decided to start practice this early?
I’d laughed when Gardo first told me about it, but I wasn’t laughing now.

I pedaled as fast as I could…which meant I was panting and gasping like a dying fish. There was a reason I rode the bus to school. A mile and a half and nineteen minutes later, I was threading my chain through the spokes at the gym bike racks, hoping I wouldn’t die. I hadn’t stopped to walk my bike once, and now I was paying the price. Sweat dripped from my forehead onto the blacktop, and my legs wobbled as I walked from the bike racks. At least I was upright.

I came to a set of double metal doors painted white, with a big red dot in the middle of each one.
Proud Home of the
was stenciled in red across the top of the left door, and
Plum Tomatoes
stretched across the right. Weird that those doors hadn’t been mustard tagged. They seemed like great targets. I grasped the handle and, after taking a few calming breaths—
you can do this, Shermie
—I pulled it open.

I’d never been in the gym before. Not being on the wrestling team or the basketball squad or the badminton team, I’d never had reason to be. The very thought of me in a red-and-white
Proud Plum Tomato
uniform was a joke. I couldn’t have hit a shuttlecock if it hit me first, and I didn’t dribble except at the table. I certainly didn’t hug other guys in tights. That was just the way of it.

The gym wasn’t what I’d expected at all. It was dark and gloomy. Only the lights in the center were on, way up high over a patch of red mats. From my dark corner tucked in an alcove between the end of the bleachers and the side gym wall, I could see a dozen guys in red sweats and red hoodies spread out on the mats in a large circle, all bent in jackknife stretches. White helmets were scattered at their feet. In the center of the circle, like the bull’s-eye in a target, was a guy wearing a white hoodie, bent over like the others, shouting into his kneecaps.

“ONE one hundred, TWO one hundred, THREE one hundred, FOUR one hundred…”

Captain Shane was working his troops.

I lingered in the bleacher shadows. Six-fifty-nine and they were already into their warm-ups. Maybe this wasn’t the best idea. I didn’t see Gardo over there stretching, so maybe there was still a chance of catching him in the locker room before he joined the practice.

But before I could move toward the double red doors marked
Locker Room,
they swung open and the enormous Finns emerged, with their bent noses and their red sweatpants and red hoodies. I backpedaled deeper into the bleacher shadows.

“…the real power position is behind the front man,” one was saying, his voice low but intense. “If he goes down, we’ll still be standing. So just do like I said and stop arguing. Let the jerk have his precious spotlight.” He suddenly cut off and whipped his head my way when his brother’s face registered my presence. “What are you doing here?”

They towered over me, eyeing me like a bug that needed stomping. I almost bolted right then and there. But I didn’t. I
couldn’t,
not if I was going to make this happen.
C’mon, Shermie, earn the Thuff Enuff legend.

I pointed to the locker room doors. “I’m looking for Gardo. Is he in there?”

“Who do I look like, Sherlock Holmes? Go find him yourself.”

But when I stepped toward the doors, the other Finn grabbed me by the arm.

“Hold it. You don’t just go waltzing in there. That locker room is for team members only.”

“Then how am I supposed to—”

“That’s not our problem, now, is it?”

Shane’s voice droned in the background. “And to the LEFT one hundred, TWO one hundred, THREE one hundred…”

The Finn let go of my arm, but they didn’t walk away. I’d just have to leave and wait until after practice to get Gardo’s help.

“Excuse me, ladies!” Shane hollered our way. I nearly dove under the bleachers. “If you two don’t get over here by the time I finish this count, you’re joining Esperaldo on his bleacher tour.
Aaaaand
THREE one hundred, FOUR one hundred…”

I followed the Finns’ eyes up into the darkened bleachers next to me. A figure in a singlet topped by a hoodie was jogging up a set of steps in the center. His toe snagged on a step and he fell forward, catching himself with his hands on a higher step. He righted himself and kept going. A few steps higher, he shoved his hood back so he could see. It was Gardo.

I almost stepped around the bleachers for a better look. “What’s he doing up there?”

One of the Finns snorted. “Laps. Again.”

“Why?”

“Talking smack, probably. Idiot’s gotta learn who to mouth off to and who not to. Hurry up, Blayne.”

They hustled off toward Shane like a set of loyal bulldogs.

I stared at Gardo. He was running down some steps now, not far from me. It was too dark for me to see his face well, but his feet were moving fast and sure. Too fast, in my opinion. Part of me wanted to shout out to him to slow down. If he tripped again at that pace, he’d tumble straight to the bottom and break his neck for sure. At least that would’ve been my fate if that were me doing a bleacher tour. But Gardo wouldn’t have slowed down even if I told him to. He’d call that being a wuss. As if there was some dignity in doing punishment laps well.

As soon as his foot hit the gym floor, he spun and headed in my direction, toward the next set of steps. I ducked back behind the bleachers again. I couldn’t let him see me. He didn’t need to know that I’d witnessed his humiliation.

Moving to the set of doors I’d come in through, I was just starting to push down on the exit bar when a door on the other side of the gym crashed open against a wall.

“Shane!” It was Coach Hunt. Short like Shane but densely muscled, the man stalked across the gym like a bulldozer in a rose garden. “What are you doing still stretching them out? It’s seven-oh-two, you should be into drills by now. If you want to lead, missy, you need to act like a leader. Go join Esperaldo. Move!” He jabbed a finger at the Finn nearest him in the circle. “Blayne, take these girls through bottom man drills.”

“Coach Hunt, sir, I’m Wayne.”

“That’s what I said. Hurry up!”

“Yes, sir! You heard the man. Partner up, ladies! Let’s go!”

“Not you, Blayne. C’mere. I need the new warm-ups moved to the equipment room. The keys are in the office. Usual spot. Double time!”

“Yes, sir!” The other Finn took off at a run.

I slipped through the door to the outside world, squinting in the budding sunlight. No way did I want Coach Hunt spotting me and thinking I was spying on his precious practice or something. I wasn’t interested in wrestling, and I certainly wasn’t interested in being sent up the bleacher stairs to pull a Humpty Dumpty in front of the whole wrestling team.

After all, I had a rep to protect now.

“Shermie, wake up.”

I opened my eyes. Gardo’s face was inches from mine.

“Wake up, man. What are you doing here?”

I blinked rapidly, trying to keep out the bright sun. It was high and strong now, reflecting off everything. When I’d ducked out of the gym and sat down against this wall to wait, the sun was climbing fast but the moon still dominated the sky. I must’ve dozed off. My stomach rumbled, reminding me that I’d rushed out this morning without breakfast. “What time is it? Is practice over?”

“Yeah. It’s after nine. Coach cut practice short today. Shane pulled a groin muscle, the poor baby.”

He reached out his hand and helped me pull myself up. My legs had stiffened while I dozed.

“I swear,” he said, “you’d think Shane is paralyzed or something. I don’t know who took it harder, him or Coach. For crying out loud, when you’re an athlete, things happen. Get over it or get out.”

“What a wuss.”

“Seriously.” He slung a backpack over his shoulder. He’d changed his clothes to gray sweats and a gray hoodie with a big black T-shirt over it.

“Hey, that’s my Galactic Warriors shirt.” I’d forgotten he wore it home last night.

“I know. I like it.” He swung his arms around like he was flagging down a plane. “It’s nice and roomy. I’ll get it back to you after I wash it.”

“Keep it. I don’t like black, anyway.” I slapped some blades of grass from my shorts. “I hope you don’t mind me stalking you at practice, but I wanted to ask you something and I kind of didn’t want to wait.”

“No sweat. C’mon, talk and walk. I need to work out a kink.”

Together we walked in the direction of the football stadium, which our school shared with the high school on the other side, Del Heiny High #3, home of the Black Cherry Heirlooms. There was a lot of shouting down on the field, and muffled music, like from bad stereo speakers. Every couple of steps, Gardo stuck his right leg out to the side and gave it a quick shake. “What gives?”

“Well, you know how I want to beat Tsunami….”

“Yeah.”

“Well, see, to do that I need to…well, the thing is, Lucy said…” Wow, this was pretty embarrassing, now that I had to say it out loud.

“Spit it out. The best way to remove a Band-Aid is to just yank it.”

We were rounding the fence into the stadium. I motioned for him to follow me to the metal railing in front of the home team bleachers. Yellow toilet paper was wrapped around the bar like wilted candy cane stripes. On the field below us, the high school’s marching band was drilling on the left, zigzagging like purple-shirted ants, holding instruments but not playing them. On the right, Black Cherry Heirloom cheerleaders were practicing a synchronized dance. Their boombox was blasting muffled, bass-heavy dance music as they jerked and froze, jerked and froze, smiling mechanically while their ponytails cracked like whips with each crisp move. Dark purple pom-poms were flying every which way, and so were purple-shirted somersaulting cheerleaders.

“So what’s the big secret?” Gardo asked.

“It’s not a secret, I just…I just want to know if you can help me lose my…this…” I took a deep breath.
C’mon, Shermie, you have to do this.
“…my belt of fat.”

There. I’d done it. I’d ripped off the Band-Aid.

Gardo looked down where my hand was resting, on my gut. How could he
not
? I’d practically told him to. Then he leaned over the railing next to me and rubbed his hand over his face.

“You can answer any time now,” I said, feeling more mortified by the second.

He moved his hand from his face and met my gaze. “Does Lucy know you’re asking me to help?”

“No. That doesn’t matter, though, she’s not my coach anymore.” Gardo hadn’t heard us down the hall last night. He thought she’d left so suddenly because my Halloween candy reversal grossed her out.

“I don’t know anything about graphing and HDB ratios,” he said.

“You don’t need to. I have all the graphs I need. But those are for eating. What I need is for someone to tell me how to get rid of this.” I pulled up the front edge of my shirt, exposing my belly button—and all the belly around it.
This is Gardo,
I reminded myself,
you can trust him.
“My stomach can’t expand with this in the way. That’s why the skinny guys win the eating competitions, they don’t have a natural belt restricting them. I’ve seen pictures of them after a contest, and it’s like they’re about to give birth to quadruplets, their stomachs are so stretched out. If I’m going to beat Tsunami, I have to be able to expand.”

“And you think I can help?”

“You have to cut weight for wrestling. You know how to do this.” I lowered my shirt. “Will you help me? Please?”

He stared out over the field, studying it intensely. The grass down there was a green too bright to be real. The crisp white yard lines were permanently painted, and the end zones were a deep Black Cherry Heirloom purple. In the center of each end zone was a giant Del Heiny Ketchup Company logo: a tomato outlined in white, with a big happy face grin and two humongous eyes, one winking like it knew some private joke.

“You’d have to do everything I say,” Gardo finally said to the field. “And no back talk. I know how you are. You’re an athlete now, and athletes do what their coaches say, even if they don’t like it. Can you handle that?”

“I’ll do whatever you say.” I crossed my heart and spit over my left shoulder.

He stared at me hard for a moment. Then he nodded. “Okay, then, I’ll do it. I’ll be your weight coach.”

“Yes!” I slapped him a high five and danced a little jig. The serious look disappeared from his face.

Smiling, he pointed his finger firmly at my nose. “Just remember, anything I say.”

“Anything.”

I leaned back on the mustard-swirled railing, the flood of relief relaxing my shoulders. I hadn’t realized how tense they’d gotten. I looked over again at my buddy and smiled. Yeah, I’d done the right thing, trusting him. No way would I be able to do this if he hadn’t agreed to teach me what he knew.