Toby Wheeler (2 page)

         
2

O
utside, it was a bright blue afternoon—the first day of sunshine after a week of steady rain. All around the neighborhood, people were raking, cleaning gutters, and gathering fallen branches. That night would be cool, crisp, and clear: perfect trick-or-treating weather. JJ and I had gone out every Halloween since my family moved to Pilchuck from Seattle. When Dad got a job with the Landover Lumber Company, a small lumber company in Washington State, Mom grumbled a bit because she thought the lumber companies were to blame for everything, but she came around when she realized how close Pilchuck was to the mountains. That was five years earlier.

Today, fall was in the air, and I was enjoying the walk home with JJ. Outside in the breeze, the emotion from the game evaporated with the sweat. It was a feeling of accomplishment. I had played my butt off all afternoon. It would have been nice to beat Pesto, of course, but there would be other days.

To get back to our street from the rec center, we cut through the empty lot next to the ranger station and continued down Wentworth Street. JJ was quiet—nodding slowly to a beat in his head while he drummed a stick against fence posts, mailboxes, stop signs, and whatever else we passed. He wore his favorite green track jacket zipped to the top and baggy pants over duct-taped shoes. His hair was hanging loosely too, falling over his ears and into his eyes. It used to be buzzed short, like mine, but since summer he had let it grow long.

We came to the light at Verlot Street, where the logging trucks passed through town on their way to and from the mountains, leaving behind a permanent trail of wood chips and sawdust. Strung across the middle of Verlot Street was a sign that said in giant forest-green letters:
BASKETBALL SEASON STARTS NOVEMBER
5
TH. LET’S GO, CHUCKERS
!

The same words were written across the top of the schedule I was clutching in my right hand—the piece of paper the new coach had handed me.

Then there were the signs that had nothing to do with basketball. They were tacked to telephone poles and taped to store windows. Some said
SAVE THE SALMON
, while others said
SAVE OUR JOBS
. These particular signs had appeared over the summer, when Landover Lumber announced plans to harvest the south slope of Butte Peak, which we called Butt Peak because that was kind of how it was spelled—and how it looked. The town had seen a hundred fights like this and I figured we’d see a hundred more until either the trees were gone, the salmon were gone, or both.

JJ was still quiet as we turned off Verlot Street and made our way through a wooded area of mossy fir trees where we used to build forts out of stumps and fallen logs. Once we were on Boardman Street, I started plotting out our route for later. The houses on our block were smaller and much older than the newer houses on the edge of town. Most were built before I was born, when Pilchuck was just another logging town in the middle of nowhere. Back then, I guess, one house looked like every other. Over time, though, things changed. Some of the Pilchuckers who once made a living cutting down trees sold their homes to people who were moving up from the city. People like my parents, who bought the houses and fixed them up. But a few others, like JJ’s family, stayed, and a lot of those houses never got backyard decks, paint jobs, or new kitchens.

When we were halfway down our street, I kicked through another pile of leaves and said, “I was thinking this year we should start on the edge of town and work our way in. If we start on our street, by the time we get out to the bigger houses, all the good stuff might be gone. Maybe my dad can drive us there so we don’t lose any trick-or-treating time walking.”

JJ tossed his stick away. “I’m not sure,” he said.

“Okay, okay. We can walk. But we should hurry. It’s three now. Sundown is five-oh-one. How soon can you get dressed?”

“Not about driving, Toby. About trick-or-treating.”

That was when I saw Stephen coming up the street with Valerie. Stephen and Valerie had moved to Pilchuck over the summer while I was bird-watching on the Washington coast with my parents. Now Stephen and JJ had a band. Stephen had shaggy hair, wore an old green hat wherever he went, and was always high-fiving people. Valerie was his stepsister. I wasn’t sure what JJ saw in her. She was always saying things she didn’t mean, like “nice pants.” From what I could tell, her only other friend was a pocket mirror.

“Hi,” Valerie said.

“What’s up?” JJ said.

We stood in a circle near the curb. A witch and a ballerina passed by, lugging bags of candy. Nobody said anything. I watched Valerie shiver, then inch closer to JJ.
Is this what he does with Stephen and Valerie? Stand around and look at each other? Boring.
To pass the time, I began bouncing the basketball off the vertical pole in front of me. I made five in a row. Then ten in a row.

I was on twelve when Stephen pulled a drumstick from his back pocket and said, “So, are we on?”

Let him down easy, JJ,
I thought.

But JJ said, “Let’s do it, man.”

Whoa! Personal foul! What happened to trick-or-treating?

My hands slipped as the ball flew forward.

The ball sailed past the pole and collided with Valerie’s forehead.

“Ow!”
she shrieked, falling to the ground.

“Sorry,” I said, watching anxiously as JJ helped her up. That was worse than usual. Normally, around girls, I just stuttered, turned red, and ran for my life.

“So do you guys want to come inside?” JJ asked Valerie, obviously hoping to move past the incident.

I was running out of time! “Aren’t you forgetting something?” I asked.

“Um, no. I don’t think so,” JJ said.

Valerie said, “JJ, what is he talking about?”

Ignoring her, I turned to JJ. “You know…” I held my hands out like I was holding a bag. “Ding-dong.”

They stared at me. Man, did I have to spell it out for these people?

“Ding-dong,” I repeated. I waved my hands around.
“OOOHHOOOO.”

This was getting awkward.

“Trick-or-treat?”
I whispered.

“Wait,” said Valerie, rubbing her forehead and putting it together, “you want to go
trick-or-treating
?”

“Is there something wrong with that?” I asked. “JJ, you want to go too, right? You just told your dad you were coming out with me.” Of course, JJ had not told his dad he was going
trick-or-treating
with me—he’d just told him he was going out. It hit me like the basketball had hit Valerie. JJ was embarrassed to go trick-or-treating. I could see it in the way he was looking at his shoes. He didn’t want to face his new friends.

Stephen spoke next. “Valerie, why do you have to talk like that to people? If Toby wants to go, he should go.”

“I was just
clarifying
that he wanted to go trick-or-treating. I wasn’t judging,
Stephen
. Why do you always have to stand up for people?”

“Maybe because you’re always putting them down.”

“That’s just my voice. I can’t help it.” Valerie flipped her head around to face me. “Have fun trick-or-treating, Toby,” she said. “I think it’s great you still want to do that stuff.”

As Valerie took JJ’s hand to lead him away, he turned and said, “Sorry, man. I wish I could.”

“Save us some candy,” Stephen added.

“So, is that a no?” I called to their backs.

Down the street, Valerie laughed at something JJ said.

“Call me if you change your mind!” I shouted.

But they were gone.

Watching them disappear up the street, I felt very small. All around me now were ghosts and witches—all of them much shorter than me. Was that how JJ and his friends saw me? As a little ghost who still wanted to dress up on Halloween? Well, so what if I did? I bet part of JJ wanted the same thing, even if he was too ashamed to admit it.

The wind picked up, blowing cold air down from the mountains. I stuck my hands in my pockets. The crumpled-up schedule was there. I pulled it out and looked it over. Ten games. Two months of practices. Every one of those nights and days was another hour when JJ would be doing something else without me—and now his free time was all about the band, and the girl. Shaggy and Snotty. What could I do about it? I didn’t play an instrument. I didn’t know the first thing about girls. All I had was basketball.

         
3

W
hen I came into the kitchen, Dad was fixing a tinfoil axe head to a broom handle. He was wearing a red flannel shirt, wool pants with suspenders, and work boots. Across the room, Mom was standing with her arms crossed. She had antlers. Her nose was painted brown.

“Nice costume, Dad,” I said. “Where’s your ox?”

“I don’t have an ox tonight,” he said. “Just a grouchy deer.”

Mom smiled at me, adjusted her antlers, and said to Dad, “I just don’t see why you have to wear
that
costume every year.”

“I do work for a lumber company, Maureen.” It was true. Except Dad didn’t cut down trees. Dad’s job was to sell the wood chips left on the mill floor to home improvement stores, where people bought them for garden mulch and playgrounds. When he and Mom agreed to leave Seattle, part of the reason was that Dad thought he had a bright future with Landover Lumber. Dad was kind of a dreamer, but I didn’t think selling wood chips was the stuff of his dreams.

Dad stomped over to the middle of the room and leaned his giant axe against the island. “What do you have against Paul Bunyan, Maureen?” he asked.

“Paul Bunyan is a symbol of reckless deforestation,” Mom said as the doorbell rang. Before she left the kitchen to hand out candy, she added, “I don’t think we should be celebrating the destruction of natural habitats.”

Mom wasn’t just talking. She worked at this place called the Cascade Group. When you lived where we did, there was always some marsh or stretch of woods about to be cut for lumber or to make room for a housing development. The Cascade Group was supposed to protect those areas by making a lot of noise in the newspapers and on television. Right now, Mom was fighting to save the south slope of Butte Peak from being harvested by Landover Lumber. It had something to do with salmon. I wouldn’t want to be Landover Lumber with Maureen Wheeler on the case. Mom’s really the competitive one in the family, even if it has nothing to do with sports.

“Destruction of natural habitats,” Dad muttered when we were alone in the kitchen. Then he snapped his suspenders and said to me, “I don’t care what she says. I think I look great.” He clapped his hands excitedly. “Did I tell you Warren Goodman at work recommended me for a promotion?”

I looked Dad in the eye. It wasn’t hard. He was barely taller than me, meaning he had about a half inch on the average eighth grader. He wasn’t carrying much in the middle, either. His belt was cinched in to the last hole. If a tree had fallen in the woods and Dad had been standing nearby, I think the breeze would have blown him over.

“What kind of promotion?”

“In the main office, Toby. Working with the big boys. No more wood chips.” Dad pulled a soda out of the refrigerator. When the can was open, he caught his reflection in the mirror. He stood there for a moment admiring the image before looking at me. “No costume for you tonight?” he said.

“No,” I sighed.

Dad sat at the kitchen table. “You’re not going out with JJ?”

“He’s with his
other
friends,” I said, sitting opposite Dad as Mom came back from the front door. We were all at the kitchen table now—the gym rat, the deer, and Paul Bunyan. “He said he thinks we’re too old to trick-or-treat. Can you believe that? All of a sudden he just decides he doesn’t want to do it anymore. He’d rather play his guitar and stand around doing nothing with Valerie. How can that be more fun than trick-or-treating?” I tore open a candy bar. “It’s all their fault.”

“Whose fault?” Dad asked.

“Valerie and Stephen. If they hadn’t come along, JJ would be out there with me, just like every other year.”

Dad squeezed my shoulder. “If you’re not spending as much time with JJ as you used to, maybe you should find something you both like to do.”

“Like what?”

“You can work at the mill,” said Dad. “We’ll pay you to bag wood chips after school. You can do it together.”

“JJ has basketball after school,” I said.

Dad tried again. “Then why don’t you join the basketball team?”

“I met the new coach today,” I told them. “He said I could come to practice on Monday.”

“What did you say?” Mom asked.

“That I would think about it.”

Dad was quiet for a while. “You know, I never played on sports teams when I was in school,” he said. “I always felt I was missing out on something. The football team seemed like an army unit to me. It made me jealous. You just don’t find that kind of camaraderie in the Latin club.”

“I play sports, Dad. Just not on the team.”

“There’s a difference, Toby,” he replied. “I’m not sure you’re really giving yourself a chance to be what you can be by avoiding real basketball.”

That made my neck burn. “Pickup ball
is
real basketball. We play with ten guys, two hoops, and one ball. Just because we don’t wear uniforms or have a coach doesn’t mean it’s not basketball.”

Mom stared me down. “Don’t speak like that to your father,” she said. “He has a good point. If you want to spend more time with JJ and you want to prove yourself as a basketball player, then you have no reason not to give the team a shot.”

“You didn’t even want the school to hire a basketball coach,” I said. Coach Applewhite was the first full-time basketball coach Pilchuck had ever had. Before him, a teacher or parent had always run the team. After a string of losing seasons, though, the school board had decided enough was enough. I thought it was great, but some people, like Mom, thought the town had better things to spend its money on—like saving the south slope of Butte Peak.

Mom popped an M&M into her mouth. “Well, now that we’ve got one, we might as well use him.”

That night I lay awake in bed. I was thinking about what Dad had said about missing out on something. I didn’t know exactly what he meant, but from the look in his eye, there was no doubt he was telling me something real. I remembered a night less than a year before. It was a home game. JJ hit the winning shot at the buzzer. The crowd went wild, of course. But what stuck with me was watching his eleven teammates carry him off to the locker room, while I stood halfway up the bleachers, wondering what it would feel like to be one of those twelve. JJ and I were best friends. It should have been my arm around him after that game. If we were on the same team, maybe he would see me as an equal, and not as his friend from across the street who still wanted to go trick-or-treating. By the time I faded to sleep, I was still confused. It was the next day, at the rec center, when Vinny Pesto cleared everything up.