Выбрать главу

“That’s the great thing,” Eytan said. “We’re the underdog. Nobody expects the underdog to do well. It’s perfect.”

I don’t see how it’s perfect. I see another long year toiling in obscurity, arguing about sheep-grazing rights with Latvia. When I told Eytan I was excited, I was lying. I just didn’t want to hurt his feelings. Now I have to go down to Model UN and fake it for two hours.

I slam my locker closed and spin the dial twice. I turn around and run right into Ugo’s sweatshirt.

“People call you JP now. That’s funny,” Ugo says.

I look up and down the hallway. Nobody. Why is it you can’t get two seconds alone all day in high school, but when you actually need people, there’s nobody around?

“Jurassic Pork,” he says, trying to get a reaction out of me.

“I’m not scared of you,” I say.

It’s a total lie, and he knows it. He cracks his knuckles.

It’s go time.

Suddenly I think about Dad. If I get into it with Ugo, Dad’s going to be pissed. Ugo and I had a fight last year, and Dad had to come in for a thirty-six-minute conference. That’s $210 in Dad’s world. If you add drive time back and forth from work, one stupid fight cost Dad $455. I know the exact number because he wrote me up a fake bill to teach me a lesson.

Now I’m thinking it’s going to happen again, only Mom will have to deal with it alone, and she’ll freak out. Dad will have to spend seventy-six minutes on the phone talking her down, and forty minutes yelling at me for making his life difficult. I don’t want to see what that bill looks like.

So when Ugo makes his move, I do something different.

I run.

It’s total wuss behavior. I won’t deny it. It’s not only wuss, it’s just plain stupid because I’m fat, and I can’t run. They don’t put you in Slow Gym because you set records in the hundred-meter dash.

But I’m not thinking clearly in the moment. I’m running for my life.

I’m barely halfway down the hall before Ugo snags me by the back of the shirt and reels me in like a whale on a harpoon. He jerks me around and sends me flying over his thigh. It’s like I weigh nothing at all. That’s how strong he is.

Once I’m on the ground, he starts kicking me in the ass. “Holy shit,” he says, “you’re so fat my foot almost disappeared!”

I wish I had super ass cheeks. I’d grab his foot and tear it off with my ass. That would teach him a lesson. But I don’t have a super ass or super anything else. I have protective fat and the good sense to cover my balls. That’s about it.

Ugo leans back on one foot, getting ready to kick me again. I close my eyes and nothing happens.

I open my eyes and he’s not there anymore. I roll over just in time to see him traveling backwards, pulled by some invisible gravitational force. I don’t know what’s going on until I notice there’s an arm pinned around his neck. Someone is pulling him from behind.

O. Douglas is pulling him.

He spins Ugo around, unwinding him like a top until they’re face-to-face. It’s an expert move, like something you’d see on WWF.

“What the hell?” Ugo says.

“Back off the kid,” O. says.

“What’s it to you?” Ugo says.

He waits for an answer.

I wait, too, because I’ve got no idea. I’ve never even met O. Douglas before. He’s got no reason to save me. He doesn’t give a reason. He just holds his hands out to Ugo, palms open, and shrugs. Ugo looks at me over his shoulder. He’s like a lion who can’t get to his meat. I’m practically pooping my pants, but O. doesn’t flinch.

“Take off,” O. says quietly.

“Whatever,” Ugo says, and he drifts away down the hall.

I’ve never seen anyone stand up to Ugo. This is one of those historic moments in the history of high school. I wish I had it on video so I could play it back for Eytan. He’d upload it to YouTube, see if we’d get e-mail from some lonely girls in the Midwest.

But it doesn’t seem to be a big deal to O. Almost like business as usual.

“You okay?” he says.

“I guess.”

He holds out a hand to help me up, but I don’t take it. I don’t want him to think I’m some little kid who can’t stand up on his own. I get up by myself and brush dirt off my pants.

O. says, “The bigger they are, right?”

I don’t know if that’s right or not. Do the laws of physics apply to Ugo? Or is he some kind of anomaly? A giant, sweat-shirted version of a black hole.

O. motions towards the stairs. “You headed down?”

“Sure,” I say.

And just like that, we start to walk downstairs together. It’s hard for me to conceive of it—the head of the football team and me walking together through school. Surreal.

“What’s your name?” O. says.

“Andy.”

“I’m O.”

He says it like I haven’t heard of him. Like the whole school hasn’t. In one way it’s ridiculous, but it’s also kind of cool that he doesn’t just assume I would know him.

“Hold up a sec,” he says when we get to the bottom of the stairs.

He licks his fingers and starts to nervously fix his hair. It reminds me of an actor getting ready to go onstage. After a couple seconds he says, “Ready.”

And we walk out into the hall.

There are kids everywhere—talking, laughing, and splitting into groups before heading for their various clubs. The minute we step out, people begin to say hi to O. Not just a few people. Practically everybody. I’m used to walking down the hall without really being seen—fat but invisible—but O. is like a celebrity. Some people call his name, others nod, still others stop to ask him how he’s doing. He negotiates it effortlessly, moving in a straight line while everyone reacts around him. He seems comfortable with it all, except I notice he reaches up and checks his hair from time to time.

I check a lot more than that. I make sure my fly is up and my stomach is sucked in. I hold my head up a little so it doesn’t accentuate my double chin. Mom taught me that one.

But then an amazing thing starts to happen. I begin to feel like I’m taller. Thinner, too. I know I haven’t changed in the last ten minutes, but I feel different. I walk with my shoulders up, and I nod at people I’ve never met in my life. All this just from standing next to O.

Just as I’m starting to enjoy myself, a guy with a thick neck cuts between us. He gives O. some kind of triple handshake that ends with them bumping fists.

The Neck notices me standing there.

“What do you want?” he says.

“We were talking,” O. says.

“Right. Whatever.” He turns away from me. “You ready to kick ass and take names?” he asks O.

“Let’s do it,” O. says.

O. nods to me once, and then he’s off, walking side by side with the Neck. Actually, it’s less like walking than it is strutting. They own the hall. People move out of the way to let them by.

I’m so stunned by what just happened, I stand and stare.

There’s a group of people stopped at the end of the hall waiting for them. Lisa Jacobs and crew. The popular girls. One of the girls reaches down to unzip her backpack, and I see April.

O. slides into the middle of that crowd, and they all greet each other. He even says hello to April. It’s not like they hug and kiss, but I’m amazed they even know each other. How did April get to Hello Level with O.? A week ago she was at You Don’t Exist Level.

I’m too far away to hear what anyone’s saying. I watch it all like a scene through a window. April nervous, shifting from foot to foot, playing with her hair and smiling a lot.

Suddenly I feel sick to my stomach.

Eytan walks up doing a stiff-legged march and singing something unintelligible. I cover my ears.