Shutout (15 page)

In a way, it felt like my entire high school career was on the line. If I played well, I'd be a hero, and if I didn't, I'd always be the girl that humiliated CHS, the girl who couldn't really play.

I lay down in my bed that night, but I didn't know who I thought I was kidding. I stared at the ceiling for a while. I closed my eyes and tried to breathe, tried to find the same kind of serenity I felt at yoga class. No luck. I guess the breathing wasn't enough—I had to be bending and sweating too.

I tried to think good thoughts about stopping every single shot on goal, but I knew that was just a fantasy, and my fantasy of a shutout kept turning into horrible visions of goals raining down on my head and bleachers full of people booing me. Or sometimes I pictured Beasley pulling me because I obviously couldn't play that day, and walking off the field and having the fans of the other team cheer wildly for everything I'd done for them.

Finally I got up and wandered downstairs.

I wasn't surprised to find Dad down there. What did surprise me was that he had a big movie theater tub of popcorn on the coffee table along with a box of Milk Duds and two gigantic sodas in movie theater cups.

“What took you so long?” he asked, smiling.

“Dad, where did you get this stuff?”

“You know that paper supply warehouse in Jamaica Plain?”

“Of course I don't! What the hell are you talking about?”

“Yeah, well, anyway, that's where I got the movie theater cups. I had to buy like fifty of these popcorn tubs, so we're going to have to make this an insomnia tradition for the next
ten years or something. Check this out!” he said, turning the popcorn tub toward me. I saw red cursive writing there, but my eyes were still adjusting to the light. “Enjoy the show!” Dad chirped. “How cool is that!”

“So you made this whole insomnia plan, with the Milk Duds and everything?”

“Well, I thought I'd be prepared in case you weren't sleeping.”

“Dad, you knew I wouldn't sleep. The biggest game of my life is tomorrow!”

“Right, and remember two things about that. The first is that whether you sleep or not is not going to affect you. You'll have the adrenaline to carry you through. So you don't have to stress about not sleeping.”

“You know, I'm so stressed about everything else that I totally forgot to stress about that.”

“Great!”

“Until now.” Dad's face fell a little, and I had to add, “Just kidding.”

“Okay. The other thing is, and I haven't said this because Mom tells me I'll annoy you, but she's asleep now, so here goes. This is a totally high-pressure situation for the other team, and completely low-pressure for you.”

“How do you figure that?”

“Imagine you're on a varsity team. How's it going to look if you lose to the JV from another school? That's going to be a humiliating defeat. But for you guys—I mean, if you win the game, it's a spectacular, almost miraculous victory, and if
you lose, well, you're playing a much better team than you've played all season. JV is supposed to lose to varsity. You know what I mean?”

“I guess.” It seemed both parents were right. Mom was right that Dad was annoying, but Dad was also right that I hadn't really thought about the whole thing from the perspective of the other team, and when you looked at it that way, it seemed like we had everything to gain and nothing to lose. But for some reason it's always really hard for me to hold any reassuring thought like that in my brain for very long.

I sat down in the chair and asked, “So, what's our movie selection for tonight?”

“Jamie Lee Curtis double feature. The queen of scream in
Terror Train
and
Halloween
. What's your preference?”

“You actually rented movies?”

“Yeah. Like I said, I wanted to be prepared in case you couldn't sleep.”

I looked at Dad for a second, and I immediately knew that he'd planned this not just for me, but for him too. Even if by some weird chance I had managed to fall asleep, there was no way Dad could sleep with me about to play in the state championship. It was really sweet, and it was even better because Dad didn't say anything about it and get all goopy.

“
Halloween
, I guess.”

“Good choice. A classic that's widely believed to have created the entire slasher movie genre.”

“What an achievement.”

We watched, ate popcorn and Milk Duds, and sipped our
caffeine-free sodas. It was really pleasant, except that every time Dad reached for popcorn, he gestured to the writing on the side and asked, “Enjoying the show?”

Like the eighth time he did that, I finally said, “Dad, it's not that funny. It's actually not funny at all.”

“Eh, I'm amusing myself,” he said, and grabbed another handful of popcorn. “Real butter, you know. Can't get that at the movie theater. None of that ‘topping' stuff here. Isn't it weird how they ask you that? ‘Would you like topping?' What is that stuff, anyway?”

“I don't know, Dad. Hey, can I ask you something?”

“Of course. Unless it's about what's in movie theater topping.”

“Agh, Dad, nobody but you even cares about that.”

“Okay. So what is it?”

“Why did you—I mean, if you were planning this big insomnia party, why exactly did you pick these movies?” As soon as I said it, I realized I'd made a mistake, because Dad might admit to some teenage crush on Jamie Lee Curtis, which I didn't want to hear about, or worse yet, he'd find some way to start talking about Mom—the dead one—and he'd get weepy.

He surprised me, though. “Because,” he said, “these movies, despite the knife-wielding maniacs, are fundamentally upbeat and positive.”

“Dad, what could you possibly be talking about?”

“Look, here's a girl, a very tall girl, by the way, one who was a sex symbol to millions”—he was getting dangerously close to admitting a crush, but he swerved away at the last
minute—“a girl who is beset by problems that would crush most people. That
do
crush, or more accurately slice and dice, most people. She's pulled out of her normal life and forced to be strong in order to survive. And she has the strength not just to endure, but to prevail. That's what these movies are fundamentally about, kid. They're about finding strength you didn't know you had. You know what I mean?”

“Honestly, Dad, I kind of tuned out about halfway through that speech.”

Dad laughed and said, “Okay, I'll shut up. This is the best part anyway.”

We watched as Jamie Lee Curtis shoved a coat hanger right into the masked killer's eye, and sometime later, I woke up covered in popcorn with Dominic watching
The Fairly OddParents
on the TV.

I sat bolt upright. “Oh my God! What time is it?” I yelled.

Dominic looked at me like I was incredibly dumb. “
Fairly OddParents
comes on at seven-thirty,” he said. “And it's almost over, so I guess it's almost eight.”

“I'm going to be late! Why didn't anybody wake me up?” I bellowed to the rest of the house.

Mom came running into the room. “Will you please stop yelling,” she whispered. “Conrad's still asleep, and you know what he's like when he gets woken up this early.”

“But my game!” I said.

“Amanda. Your game starts in five hours. I think you'll make it in plenty of time.”

“But we're supposed to be at school two hours before the game so we can get the bus and get to the field—”

“Sweetie, school is two blocks from here. If you decided to crawl there, you'd still be two hours early. Now just relax. Come and have some breakfast.”

“There's no way I can eat. I'm totally nauseous.”

“Too bad,” Mom said. “More brioche French toast for me.”

Dominic and I followed her into the kitchen. She'd done that special occasion thing where she went to the bakery and got the sugar brioche loaf I loved—it was all eggy and sweet to begin with, and then she'd coat it in her vanilla French toast eggy goo and fry it up with almonds on the outside. It was too delicious for words. And Dominic was too much of a goofball to appreciate it.

“Ew,” he said. “Not that gross stuff! I want Golden Grahams.”

I looked at Mom, wondering if she was going to give him the smack upside the head he so richly deserved. Sadly, she didn't. She never did. “Why don't you go turn off the television, and then you can pour yourself a bowl of Golden Grahams,” she said through a smile that was clenched a little too tightly to be real.

“Can't believe I have to pour my own cereal. Miss Special Soccer Star gets whatever she wants, but . . .” He kept talking, but he'd gone to the living room to sulk about how Mom wasn't waiting on his ungrateful self, so we couldn't hear him anymore.

“Okay, let's have some breakfast, shall we?” Mom said.

I was still feeling a little groggy, and I looked over at the stainless steel carafe of coffee that Dad had set up to brew on a timer. Dad was nowhere to be seen—maybe he'd stayed up for the second half of the double feature.

“You think I could have some of that?” I asked, gesturing at the coffeepot.

“Oh God, I knew this day would come. Your dad will be so proud of you.” Dad was a total coffee fiend, and he was the only one in the house who could stand the stuff, so we all teased him about it.

Except that right now it smelled really good, and I thought it might help with the grogginess. “Do you want to wake him up and hear a lecture about the proper ratio of cream and sugar, or are you going to live dangerously and mix a cup up without instructions?” Mom asked.

“I guess I'll go for it,” I said. I poured about two-thirds of a mug full of coffee, then topped it up with half-and-half and stirred in a packet of Splenda.

I took a tentative sip. It was sweet and creamy and bitter and awful. I started laughing. “Now I know why Dad likes this.”

“Why?” Mom said. “It's still a mystery to me.”

“Because it's like life,” I said, smiling and taking another sip. Mom looked at me like I was nuts, but I knew when I told Dad he would totally get it.

Of course, Dad was going to be all over me to talk about my feelings, which was going to be incredibly annoying, whereas Mom just made me a delicious breakfast and ate it with me without asking anything about how I felt.

“Hey, we're invited to the Williamses' house after the game,” Mom said. “I said that was fine. I hope it's okay.”

“Yeah,” I said. “Weird that Shakina didn't mention it to me.”

“I don't think she knew. You know, sometimes we parents actually think and act independently of our children.”

“Really? Why?”

Mom laughed. “Reminds us of our lost youth, I guess.”

We ate the rest of our delicious breakfast, and sure enough, Dad showed up, and the first thing he asked was “So, how are you feeling today? Feeling good about the game?”

Mom swatted him. “If she wanted to talk about it, she'd be talking about it. Don't be annoying.”

I mouthed “Thank you” to Mom, and then said, “Hey, Dad, guess what I had to drink this morning? Cup of coffee!”

Dad's face lit up like I'd just told him I won a Nobel Prize or something. “How'd you like it?” he asked.

“I like it. It's like life.”

Sure enough, he smiled and nodded. “It certainly is, my dear,” he said, “it certainly is.”

“You're both nuts,” Mom said. I cleaned up the dishes with Mom, and then, before Dad could annoy me by asking about my feelings again, I ran up to my room to call Shakina so I could talk about my feelings.

“I'm totally freaking out,” I said.

“I know. Me too. I hardly slept at all.”

“Me neither. But I'm strangely hyper. But maybe that has something to do with the coffee.”

“Oh, great—caffeine again. I guess we can look forward to some screaming then,” she said.

“Probably.” And then, “It's gonna be okay, right?” I nearly whispered. “I mean, whatever happens, it's going to be okay.”

“It's already okay,” Shakina said. I took a minute to digest that.

“That's deep.”

“Namaste, bitch.”

“Namaste, bitch. See you later.”

“Okay.”

Mom knocked on my door. She had a yoga mat under her arm. “Hey, I'm going to hour of power over at the Charlesborough Yoga Studio. You wanna come, or do you have a full schedule of fretting and barking at your brothers?”

“Well, when you put it that way, okay.”

So Mom and I went to hour of power, but it didn't help much. For one thing, it's usually only at the hour mark that I can turn my brain off, so I didn't get that nice sensation of not thinking. But even if it had been a ninety-minute class, I don't think I would have been able to do it. Not today.

We went home and I showered, which was probably stupid since I was going to go get all sweaty again, but whatever.

“You want a ride to the bus?” Dad said when I got downstairs. I struggled to remember that he was trying to be nice and not just treating me like a little kid who couldn't walk two blocks by herself, so I said, “No thanks. I think a little fresh air will be good for me.”

“Okay,” Dad said. “We'll see you there, sweetie. You're awesome.” He gave me a big hug, and then Mom came over and gave me a big hug and Dominic gave me a big hug, and even Conrad, who had just gotten out of bed, shuffled over and punched me on the arm. “Kick some ass,” he said.

“I'll do what I can.”

The game was in some suburb about forty-five minutes away. As we rode the bus in silence, I remembered how much fun it had been to ride to watch the varsity regional game, and how I'd imagined how tense the varsity bus was. Well, we were varsity now, and even though Geezer was sitting quietly in her assistant coach role and not screaming at anybody, it was quiet and tense and no fun. I couldn't help feeling like we were being led to our doom. All I could think about was the air full of balls I couldn't stop, the humiliation I would feel when I got scored on in the state championship.