The Birth of Super Crip (6 page)

Taking one last glance around, Red felt certain that
he was alone. There were some cars parked in the back of the
firehouse, but they were all empty as far as he could see. More
trees lined the volunteers’ parking lot, but he had an angle on the
spray-painted square strike zone.

He squeezed the ball one more time, focused on the
red dot in the center of the square, cocked his arm, and stepped
into a throw that felt like the best one of his life. Seeing the
ball leave his hand, he pushed it with the wave. A split second
later he hunched his shoulders and looked around again in shock
after hearing the thud of the ball hitting the wall.

Red stopped at the trees between the end of the field
and the beginning of the parking lot. He could see where the ball
had hit. The red dot was gone, replaced by a gouge in the brick
wall. Debris lay on the ground. Red took solace in the fact that
the gash didn’t seem to go through the wall, though he quickly
realized that fact probably wouldn’t appease his parents if they
found out what he’d done.

“Heads up,” Scott yelled from behind.

Red whipped his head around to see the Duke football
hurtling toward him. At the last second he raised his hands to
protect himself, knowing it was already too late to gather himself
for a catch. Using the wave, he lightly pushed the ball back in
Scott’s direction before it reached him.

As the ball hit the ground about twenty feet from him
and rolled toward his brother, they briefly stared at each other.
Scott’s gaze moved to the ball in disbelief. Red knew he would have
to explain.

“How the hell . . . ?” Scott started to ask.

“Shut up and get over here,” Red said, trying to yell
and whisper at the same time.

Scott scooped up the ball and ran over to his
brother. “What’s going on?” he asked. “How the hell did you just do
that?”

Red pointed toward the broken bricks. “Same way I did
that,” he said.

The look on his brother’s face told Red he was
confused.

“I threw the ball at it, and it just broke up,” he
explained.

Scott still didn’t understand. “You did that with the
Nerf?” he asked. “From where?”

“Back where I was playing catch with you,” Red said.
“I just wanted to see if I could hit the strike zone.”

“And you put a freakin’ hole in a brick wall?” Scott
asked in disbelief.

Red couldn’t help but smile. He looked at his brother
and said with a shrug, “Nailed the strike zone.”

“Dude, what is going on with you?” Scott asked. “How
are you doing this stuff?”

“I don’t know,” Red said.

“Is it the same thing that happened with Chuck?”

Red hesitated, examining his brother’s face for
he-didn’t-know-what. “I think so,” he said. Scott’s expression
never changed, and Red turned back to the firehouse. “Dude, I just
want to get the ball and get out of here.”

“Why? What are you waiting for anyway? What’s the big
deal?”

“For one thing I don’t see it,” Red said. “And I was
waiting to see if anyone came out. I don’t think it would be a good
thing if I have to explain that I was the one who put a dent in the
wall.”

“That’s true,” Scott said, starting to look for the
ball.

Red looked back at him and rolled his eyes.

“Holy shit,” Scott said, spotting the ball. “There it
is. It’s wedged under a tire.”

Looking in the direction his brother was pointing,
Red finally saw the ball. They both walked over to the Camaro that
had half of a Nerf football sticking out from under its left back
tire, which was already starting to flatten.

“This is that guy Billy’s car,” Scott said. Billy was
known for his long blond hair, racing his car down the street even
when the volunteers weren’t rushing to the station because of a
fire, and chasing after kids who put a ball anywhere near his
Camaro.

“Can you get it?” Red asked hopefully, kneeling down
next to Scott as he tried to pull the ball out from under the
tire.

Scott shook his head. “No chance. I can’t budge it.”
He looked past his brother to see if anyone was coming. “Can you .
. . do the thing?”

They heard one of the bay doors begin to open in the
front of the station, and both looked toward the firehouse in
panic. Red quickly turned his focus back to the car. He pushed the
wave into the bumper, lifting the back of the car with ease.

Stunned, Scott didn’t move. “What the . . . ?”

“Will ya get the ball?”

Scott grabbed the ball and stood up. Red relaxed and
looked at his brother, and the car crashed to the ground.

“Shit!” they said in unison. Realizing they needed to
stay quiet, they froze.

Again, they looked back toward the firehouse. They
could hear a couple guys working out front, but no one seemed to be
coming.

“Can you fix it?” Scott asked in a whisper, motioning
toward the tire.

“What the hell d’ya want me to do?” Red asked.

“You know, whatever it is you’re doing.”

Red started to stand up, leaning against Scott, who
helped him to his feet. “Yeah, I’ll meld it back together with
laser beams that come out of my eyes,” he quipped. “Who am I,
Superman?”

“Well, I don’t know.”

“Let’s go.”

They started running back to their house, Scott
slowing his pace to scoop up the other football they had left
behind the trees and stay with Red.

Chapter 9

It didn’t take too much for the boys to get past
their mom’s interrogation when they ran into the house so shortly
after Scott had rushed back outside with the Duke football. His
excuse that it was starting to get cold didn’t convince her of
much, but when Red added that his legs were getting tired, she was
appeased—if not quite satisfied that nothing suspicious was going
on.

“I’m just glad she didn’t notice the Nerf was
practically cut in two,” Scott said in response to Red’s
questioning whether or not their mom had believed them.

Red looked over at the old plastic trash can that
served as the ball container per their mom’s orders. “Did you bury
it in there?” he asked, passing the Duke football to his brother
with a two-hand shove, the way he would pass a basketball. He sat
on the picnic bench, which had been put away until next spring
after an unusually early frost one night the previous week.

“It’s under a few other balls in there,” Scott said,
distracted by the way his brother caught the return pass in his
gut.

Red sent another basketball-like pass his way. “Do we
have any other Nerfs?”

“Crappy ones,” Scott said. “Why? And why are you
doing that?”

“Doing what?”

“Throwing the ball that way. And catching it in your
gut.”

“I can’t grip the Duke. You know that.”

“Dude, you just put a hole in a brick wall from about
150 feet away with a Nerf, and it bounced off so hard it wedged
under a car tire.”

Again catching the return pass by letting it go into
his gut and wrapping his arms around it, Red tried to grip the ball
to throw it. If he just let his hand rest on the leather, it looked
like he could throw the ball with no problem. But the second he
actually tried to hold the ball with one hand, the muscles spasmed
and he just couldn’t get a grip on it.

He shrugged at Scott. “Just like always,” he said.
“My hands are too small.”

“Too small to make up for the spasm,” Scott said. “I
just thought added strength would help.”

Red pushed the ball into his right hand as hard as he
could with his left but he just couldn’t grip it. “I should work
more with those rubber balls Dad gave me,” he said. “I can squeeze
the metal hand grip thing a couple times now, but it’s still
hard.”

“That’s not what I’m talking about,” Scott said. He
walked over and held the ball in Red’s hand. He put his other hand
on the back of Red’s hand. He whispered, “Now just do that
thing.”

“What?”

“However you threw the other ball so hard, use it to
hold this one.”

Red glanced up at the stairs to make sure his mom
wasn’t coming before he explained. “It doesn’t work like that,” he
said, almost whispering. “It’s not like my cerebral palsy is
getting any better. At least I don’t think it is. I don’t have more
control, or better balance. You hear my speech—it’s not any
better.”

“So, what is it?” Scott asked, searching for better
words. “I mean, how . . . ?” His voice trailed off.

“I really don’t know,” Red said, wishing his brother
had found a way to finish his question. “It’s like this force . . .
or wave or something that stirs up in my brain. It first happened
when Chuck started with me yesterday. I’m just so sick of him, and
I knew he was going to start once I saw him standing there. He does
it almost every day. By the time I went to push him, it just
happened. I really never did touch him. But . . . I’m pretty sure I
pushed him with this wave thing.”

“So, it’s just if you’re mad?”

Red shook his head. “I guess it kind of seemed that
way at first,” he said. He told Scott about shattering the chalk in
Mr. Francis’s class.

“That was you?” Scott asked with a smile.

“The asshole said I was an example of genetics!”

“I heard about that,” Scott said. “So, you shattered
the chalk?”

“I wanted to do a lot more to him.”

“But you did it with this wave?” Scott asked.

Red nodded. “You can’t tell people.”

“I won’t. I won’t,” Scott said. “So, when I started
to chase you, were you using it?”

Red nodded. “To push you off. And a little bit it
felt like I was running faster, but I don’t know if I really
was.”

Scott took the ball from him and smiled. “I knew you
couldn’t beat me on your own.”

“No,
I
did beat you.” Red took the ball back
and squeezed it with both hands. “It’s already getting easier and
easier. If I focus on something . . .”

He held the ball out in front of him and locked his
eyes on it, but he couldn’t push it. The wave just wasn’t coming.
Without realizing it, Red had relaxed so much from the warmth of
the house after playing outside in the cold that the wave had
calmed.

“Well?” Scott teased.

His brother’s needling helped Red stir up the wave
just enough to push the ball across the basement. It smacked
against the wall with the force of a soft toss, but it was enough
to make Scott’s eyes widen in amazement. “Holy shit!” he
yelled.

Red waved at him to keep his voice down, but it was
too late.

“Boys!” their mom yelled.

“Sorry, Mom,” Red replied, still waving at his
brother to keep quiet.

After they were sure the moment had passed, Scott
said, “What? You’re not going to tell Mom and Dad?”

“Oh, sure,” Red said with an exaggerated shrug.
“‘Hey, Mom, I can push things without touching them. And I lifted a
car after I put a hole in a brick wall with a Nerf.’ That should go
over well.”

Scott thought for a minute. “What else can you do?”
he asked.

Red laughed. “I don’t know,” he said. “Why?”

“Outside, you were catching the ball really easy.
Better than I’ve ever seen you. Were you pulling it in with, you
know, the thing?”

He shook his head. “No,” Red said. “I don’t think so,
anyway. It
was
easier though. It was weird. I mean, more
weird. It was just sort of happening. Like I could gently push
against the ball and slow it down just enough to catch it.”

“How come you weren’t doing it in here?”

“I don’t know,” Red said with a shrug. “I guess from
running in and coming down here and everything, I was just kind of
tired and not really trying to.”

“Is it hard?” Scott asked. “To do it?”

“I’ve only done it on purpose a couple times, I
guess,” he said, thinking about it. He nodded toward the ball.
“That was really the first time it took a second. It’s almost like
after I do it once, it’s easier to do stuff.”

“So, maybe you can do stuff you don’t even know about
yet,” Scott said. He pointed at the ball still lying on the ground.
“Try to pull it to you.”

Just as intrigued as his brother, Red focused on the
ball. The wave was there. He knew he could dent the basement wall
with it if he wanted, but pulling it to him just wasn’t
happening.

He could see Scott’s wheels spinning. “Does it hurt?”
his brother asked. “Like, when you do it, does it hurt?”

Red barely shook his head, still focused on the ball.
He suddenly
wanted
to be able to pull it to him. He loved
the idea of it.

Scott watched as his brother seemed to try to stare a
hole through the ball. Red could feel the wave swirling in his
head. I can push it, why can’t I pull it? he thought, almost
demanding it of himself.