Hero (7 page)

She went back into the living room. Zach followed her, watched her grab her book off the coffee table and settle in on the couch.

“But what if the B is happy being a B?” he said. “What if it turns out that it was an overachieving C before it shocked the world by becoming that B?”

She gave him one of those mother-of-all sighs.

“Be
gone,”
she said, pointing up the stairs.

“What if it’s that one B that’s making all the other B’s in the world so darn proud?” he said.

He went upstairs and worked on history for a while. When he was done, he went out on the balcony and stared out at the park, wishing his mom hadn’t caught him before he could sneak out. He thought about going back on his computer. But he wasn’t in the mood to be researching his dad tonight, reading about him instead of talking to him.

He was missing him too much.

That never stopped. That was something he couldn’t let go of, the way he couldn’t let go of his suspicions—his
belief—
that the accident wasn’t actually an accident. There were times when he wanted to talk about it with somebody, with his mom or Kate or
somebody
who wouldn’t look at him cross-eyed when he opened up about this stuff. But he hadn’t come up with anything beyond his own conspiracy theory.

And the one time he had run it by Kate, she’d acted like she pitied him.

Poor, sad, deluded Zach Harriman.

As much as Kate Paredes loved being right, she was dead wrong about the crash that killed his dad, and one of these days Zach was going to prove it.

And there was no way she understood him and his feelings, because Zach wasn’t close to understanding them himself.

What did he understand on nights like this, clear as the lights of the city in front of him?

His dad was never coming home.

Zach would sit out on the balcony, and for a few minutes he would think this was like all the other missing-dad nights in his life. For a few minutes he would feel exactly the way he used to when his dad was away, and trick himself into thinking he was coming back next week.

But then a much worse feeling would come in right behind it, like he’d been sucker-punched, and he’d remember all over again.

His dad had promised to take him to a Knicks game soon. And over the Christmas break, he had promised they’d go skiing, just the two of them, up in Vermont. All those promises, and more, would never come true now. So that was the emptiest feeling of all.

It was why what should have been good memories now felt like bad ones, because they hurt too much. When his dad used to surprise him and come back early from a trip—no e-mail, no call, no warning—there he’d be, waiting in front of the building when Zach got home from a practice, opening the door with a flourish like he was Lenny the doorman. And whatever age Zach Harriman was at the time, he’d drop his backpack like it was a bad habit and hug his father for all he was worth.

It was as if his dad had some kind of sixth sense, would know exactly when Zach was walking home from Parker, the precise moment when he’d be coming down the street.

Like there was this weird radar between them. And the next morning, without fail, no matter how jet-lagged his dad should have been, no matter where he’d flown in from, he’d walk Zach—and Kate—to school.

Saying at the front door of Parker: “See you after school, kiddo.”

“Swear?” Zach would say.

“On more honor than a whole Boy Scout troop,” his dad would say. Before he’d add: “Where else would I be?”

Though they both knew the answer to that one. The correct answer was he could end up almost anywhere, at a moment’s notice.

There hadn’t been any notice when his dad was finally taken away from him forever. When he was just gone.

The way the old Zach Harriman was gone for good, the one who never wanted to fight back.

His dad used to go off and save the world?

Lately his son just wanted to beat it up.

Spence Warren wasn’t in love with the idea of having Zach Harriman as a teammate on the eighth-grade basketball team at the Parker School.

But then Spence wasn’t in love with the idea of Zach sharing the same oxygen he breathed.

Spence played center for Parker, not because he was all that much taller than the rest of the team, but because he was the strongest guy they had. He was also the best athlete on the team and he had a center’s mentality.

As much of a total jamoke—another Dad word—as Spence could be everywhere else at Parker, he was a total jock once he got on the court or the playing field. That meant he wanted to win the game. And he knew that for their eighth-grade team to win, Zach’s outside shooting needed to be a part of it.

It didn’t mean he ever gave Zach a total pass on the court. He’d still make his snarky comments when Zach screwed up a play or missed an open shot, make sure he’d do it in a way that ensured Zach would hear the insult and Coach Piowarski would not. But for the most part, the place where Spence had always tortured Zach the
least
was on a basketball court.

Until today.

Today Spence was messing with Zach’s head every chance he got, to the point where Zach thought it was ridiculous to even think about this in terms of
practice.
Because when it came to this kind of chop-busting, Spence didn’t need practice, he was practically in the Hall of Fame.

Today he was showing Zach up every chance he could in front of the team, picking his spots like a champ, always managing to do it when Coach P. was looking the other way or talking to somebody else. As usual, Spence had this way of boring in on Zach at his lowest moments, and there had been plenty of those today, because he was totally off his game.

He wasn’t off by a lot. But you didn’t have to be off by a lot to look like a complete scrub in basketball. He was just a step slow on defense, which meant giving up too many easy baskets and running into one screen after another, ending up on the floor. He ran the wrong way
twice
on one of their basic offensive plays, a play designed to get him an open shot from the corner. Instead of Spence hitting him with a quick pass out of the post, he wound up throwing the ball out of bounds, right past the spot where Zach was supposed to be. After the second time, he glared Zach all the way into the East River for causing another turnover.

Coach P. had seen enough. He blew his whistle, told them to get a drink of water and then come back and see if they could run the play correctly. As Spence ran past Zach, he got into his ear and said, “Hey, is there any chance that if we fly the clue flag today, you might be able to salute it?”

Zach didn’t even think of responding. When you were playing like a scrub, you weren’t allowed to do anything with trash talk except take it.

Sometimes you even had to take it from the coach, who grinned at Zach as he said, “And this time, let’s not have some of us going the wrong way down a one-way street.”

It never got better. Zach’s head and body just weren’t in the game. And now the blue team—the second unit—was beating Zach’s red team.

The Reds were down by two points when Spence called a time-out with one minute to go in the fourth. David Epstein had just broken away from Zach for an easy layup. Spence knew what was riding on the last minute because everybody in the gym knew—the losing team had to run after the scrimmage was over. Not just run, but run
suicides.
One of the killer basketball drills of all time. Everybody on the baseline, running fifteen feet and touching the court, then sprinting back to the baseline. Then up to half-court, touching the floor there, coming back. Then the same deal, up to the other foul line, all the way back to the baseline. Finally to the
other
baseline, the full length of the court and back, with whatever legs and wind you had left.

It was a bear of a drill anytime but much,
much
worse after you’d played the equivalent of a full game.

In the huddle, Spence looked right at Zach and said, “
You
are
not
going to be the reason the rest of us have to run today.

“Your girlfriend would be doing more for us today than you are,” Spence continued, red-faced. “Maybe we can get her out of play practice before we’re all on the baseline and Coach starts blowing his stupid whistle.”

“Leave her out of it,” Zach said in a quiet voice, not even looking at him. “This one’s on
me.”

“How ’bout you get on your
man,
freak boy,” Spence said, “and look like an actual starter for at least one minute today?”

Zach knew he was right. And he did try as hard as he could during that last minute. Tried so hard that he forced a bullet pass into Spence that was too low and too hard to handle. The pass bounced off his knee and right into the blue center’s hands. He looked up and saw a wide-open David Epstein streaking toward the basket, completely uncovered.

Last two points of the game.

Coach P. blew his whistle and said, “Tragically, the reds must go and line up now, because apparently our second unit is stronger than our starters.”

“Because of one guy?” Spence said.

“Hey,” Coach said, “ you know my philosophy. It’s never one play that loses a game and it’s never one guy.”

Spence made a point of getting next to Zach.

“Sorry about comparing you to a girl,” he said under his breath. “’Cause if you think about it, that’s really,
really
insulting to girls.”

Coach blew his whistle. And the red team ran. And ran some more.

When they were finished, all of them totally gassed, Coach told Zach and Spence to pick up the balls.

Sweet,
Zach thought.
More alone time with my best friend in the world.

Spence picked up the balls, tossed them to Zach, who put them on the rolling rack. Neither one of them said anything until Zach said, “You take off, I’ll put them in the storage room.”

He was nearly to the gym’s double doors when the ball Spence Warren whipped at him hit him on the back of his head.

Zach stumbled forward into the rack of balls, which went bouncing away from him. When he wheeled around, the back of his head stinging like he’d been slapped, Spence had his hand up, the way guys in tennis did after they’d gotten a fluke winner off the top of the net.

“Sorry,” Spence said, grinning at him. “Thought you were looking.”

Fifteen minutes later Zach
was
looking.

Looking for Spence.

ZACH
took the stairs down to the front door of the school. But instead of walking down Madison in the direction of his apartment building, he walked over to Fifth Avenue, crossed the street and went into Central Park.

Spence, he knew, lived on Central Park West, over on the other side of the park. Spence had proudly pointed out the building one day last spring when their class had taken the short bus ride over to the West Side, a field trip to see some tall ships cruising their way down the Hudson River. Spence, of course, acted as if he owned the entire building.

Zach knew that if you entered the park at 86th Street, it was practically a straight shot to Spence’s building. So this had to be his way home.

Maybe the old Zach would have let this go, not just the ball hitting him in the head, a cheap shot if there ever was one, but the entire way Spence had acted at practice today. Ragging on him every time he saw an opening. And even when he didn’t.

The new Zach wasn’t letting it go.

If he could come into this place at night and scare off a mugger, he could do this with Spence once and for all. Still plenty of daylight left. Coach P. made sure practice started at two-thirty sharp every day so that the kids who lived close enough to Parker to walk to school—or the ones who took the subway home—could get home when it was still light out.

He saw Spence coming.

Listening to his iPod, earbuds in his ears, bopping his head to music Zach couldn’t hear.

Zach hadn’t imagined the scene playing out this way. He’d pictured himself calling out Spence’s name, getting his attention, telling him they needed to have a talk.

Only now Spence wouldn’t be able to hear him.

So Zach ran up ahead and hopped the stone wall. He was waiting for Spence as he came around a bend in Park Drive, planning to jump out at him the way the guy at the reservoir had been planning to surprise that woman jogger the other night.

Not quite.

Spence noticed him and shook his head, more annoyed or just plain disgusted than surprised. He pulled out his white earbuds.

“What?”
he said.

“What?” Zach said. “You’re not happy to see me?”

“Harriman,” Spence said, “as much fun as it is to jack you up from time to time—”

He started to pass, but Zach blocked his way.