“Are you feeling better Coolie?” mom asked as I sat at the kitchen table eating Campbell’s chicken noodle soup out of a bowl. I nodded. I had opened the can and heated it up myself on the stove.

“Oh good”, she said as she turned back to a big metal tray full of little paper cups with dirt and small shiny green plants in them that she called “cuttings”. She had her garden clippers and was cutting off parts of some of the bigger plants and putting those new “cuttings” in a bowl that looked like it had a white paste in it. It was Friday, and I had been home from school all week.

I had thrown up Sunday night after I had gone to bed, which was one of the things I HATED the most to do, because it was so uncomfortable and yucky. It was just like the other times, I would try so hard not to do it, mom or dad would give me some Pepto Bismol, but I would feel it getting worse and worse in my stomach. And then I would think that it would be even worse if I threw up in my bedroom, because it would make a mess and mom or dad would be mad at me and have to clean it up and I’d feel like a stupid little kid who didn’t know enough to go in the bathroom. So then I’d finally go into the bathroom and sit by the toilet, but still try to make a deal with my stomach not to do it. But that would never work, and finally I just couldn’t keep it in any longer. And after I did it I would feel so much better, I’d wonder why I waited so long.

Then the next morning when I woke up my whole body felt really bad, like something had sucked all the energy out of me. Mom took my temperature and it was 102, so she gave me some aspirin and said I should stay home from school. She called the doctor guy and he said it was probably the “flu”, and I might be better tomorrow or it might take longer. The next morning it wasn’t better, so I ended up staying home all week. At least today, Thursday, I was finally feeling better.

Mom was “baking dirt” in the oven and it smelled really strange. Not bad exactly, just strange. She had taken a couple plants that had been in big pots in the house but had died and dumped out all the dirt into that big shiny black metal baking pan that she used to cook a turkey or a ham. Then she put it in the oven to bake it. She said she had read in a gardening magazine that it got rid of all the bad “bacteria” from the old plant and made the dirt better for growing other plants.

“Once it’s done baking”, she said, “I’ll use it to plant this new batch of Pachysandra cuttings in more little dixie cups. Then maybe by the end of next month, I’ll be able to plant all these new plants in the beds in the front yard.” She looked at me, smiled and winked. “You’ll see”, she said, “With all these new plants the beds will be thicker, more like groundcover.”

“How do you know when the dirt is done baking?” I asked.

“Well”, she said, “I figure it’s like cooking a ham or a turkey. So I filled one of my metal baking dishes with all the old dirt and stuck the meat thermometer in the middle of it. When it gets to about 150 degrees, I figure it’ll be done.” She bent down and looked in that little window on the front of the oven door. “145”, she said, “It’s almost there!”

“Of course I’ll let it cool down before I use it to plant all these new cuttings”, she said smiling.

We heard the front door open. It sounded like David, home from school for lunch, coming in and taking his jacket off inside the front door.

“Hey Mister D”, mom called out.

“What’s that… smell?” he asked, as he came around the corner into the sitting room and peeked into the kitchen.

“I’m baking dirt, sweetie”, mom said to him, “How was your morning?”

“We sang the pledge of allegiance song”, David said.

“You did?” mom asked.

David started to sing it. He wasn’t shy about singing in front of other people like I was…

I pledge allegiance to the flag
Of the United States of America
And to the republic for which it stands
And to the republic for which it stands
One nation, under god
One nation, indivisible
With liberty, with liberty
And justice, and justice for all

I could tell David really liked that he remembered all the words.

“That’s very good, sweetie”, mom said, “But you know you don’t have to sing the ‘under god’ part if you don’t want to.”

“I know”, he said, like she didn’t have to tell him that, “But the other kids in my class said I should, just in case.” Mom laughed a little bit through her nose.

“Well”, she said, “You can believe in god without thinking that our country has to answer to him, or some religious person’s idea of what he thinks is right or wrong.”

“I know”, he said, sounding a little mad now, “Coop doesn’t even BELIEVE in god.”

I couldn’t BELIEVE David said that, and I got worried that mom would think that I was bad because I didn’t. I had never told her or dad whether I believed in god or not. I guess I must have told David sometime, though I couldn’t remember doing it, and I figured I better watch it from now on when I told him ANYTHING that I didn’t want mom or dad to know about.

“David”, she said fiercely, “That’s your brother’s business. Not YOURS or MINE!”

“Well you and dad believe in god, right?” he asked her.

“That’s MY business”, she said, still kind of fiercely, “And you’ll have to ask your dad about his thoughts on the subject. But yes… I do. But I also think that organized religion is not a good thing, and is responsible for most of the wars and a lot of the other bad things that have happened in history. But please don’t tell anyone I said that. As I said, that’s MY business. I’ll share my thoughts on that topic with others when it feels like the right time and place. Got it?”

“Geez mom”, David said, wrinkling his nose, “You don’t have to get all mad about it.”

“I’m not mad”, mom said, making a big smile, “I just feel very strongly about this and I’m letting you know my feelings.” She did one of her big smiles.

“Okay okay”, David said, shaking his head like he didn’t want to talk about it anymore, “Is there still ham and cheese?” Both mom and I nodded. David opened the refrigerator.

Mom looked at me and she made her eyes really big like she was saying, “That was a very interesting discussion”. Mom liked interesting discussions, arguments, and even “fights”, as long as they were just talking ones and not hitting ones, but I didn’t want to discuss, argue or fight about this god thing anymore.

“So were the older kids at school playing soccer this morning?” I asked him, as he got the ham and cheese out of the refrigerator. He nodded.

“Yep”, he said, “They’ve played every morning. That really tall guy told me to tell you to get better because they need you back.” I was glad to hear that at least one of my friends was thinking about me.

Mom made a clicking sound with her mouth. “Well that’s thoughtful”, she said, “I’m glad you two are making nice new friends. And David, you have your old friend Eddie just around the corner on Baldwin, Arnold next door, and what’s his name, Al? In the next house.” David nodded.

“And the boy next door to him”, mom said, “Steinhauser’s son.”

“Gus”, David said, but like he didn’t want to talk about his friends with mom.

“Oh”, mom said, now looking at me again and wagging her finger in the air, “Speaking of kids on the street. I talked to your teacher yesterday afternoon on the phone about the work you missed this week. She said I could stop by the office today and pick up the assignments you missed in math and history, but she’s not worried you’ll have any problem getting caught up. And she said you’re so far ahead in the ‘reading program’ that you can just pick up where you left off when you’re back.

“She did say that there were a couple science experiments done in class last week that you missed that will be on the test on Monday. She said you should try to borrow and copy the notes from another student to get caught up, and thought Abby or Beth took good notes and we could ask one of them. Abby just lives across the street. Maybe you could walk over there after dinner and ask her?”

That got me worried again. I hadn’t really talked to any of the girls after school or in the park where the other boys might see me and tease me about having a “girlfriend”. So Abby might think it was weird for me to come to her house after being sick all week, when I’d never really talked to her before. I looked at mom and I knew she could tell what I was thinking. She could always tell. I didn’t like that she could.

“If you’d rather”, she said, “I could call Abby’s mom and see if you can borrow Abby’s notes.”

I nodded, but didn’t want to say anything else about it. I didn’t want to talk about girls with mom. I was afraid she would ask me something about if there was a girl that I liked or something. And if I didn’t want to say then she’d think I was still such a little kid because I didn’t.

So I just said, “Thanks mom!”

***

So being sick and staying home all week, I had spent a lot of time up in my bedroom. It didn’t have a table yet, but mom said she and dad were looking for a used one. So I would set up one of my Avalon Hill wargames on the floor under my bed. Even when we got a table in our room, it was probably better to set one of those games up down there, because I usually wanted to set them up for a long time, maybe even a week or two. They took a long time to figure out the rules, and then to set up the units on the board at the beginning, specially the side that had to defend. I could look at one of the game board maps for an HOUR just figuring out where to put one unit. But that figuring out was fun, and I pretended I was a real general trying to decide on the best places to have my soldiers go in a real place with all its cities, rivers, mountains and forests.

I now had five Avalon Hill games. That first D-Day game I had bought a year ago when we still lived at our old house. Then for my ninth birthday last year my friend James had gotten me the Bismarck game. Then over the summer I had made money mowing the lawn and babysitting David and bought the Stalingrad game. This fall I also used money I got to buy the Waterloo game, which was different than the others, because it wasn’t a World War Two game but about Napoleon, which was like 250 years ago. And for Christmas mom and dad got me the Le Mans game, which wasn’t a war game at all, but a car racing one.

The Bismarck game was different than the other four because you really couldn’t play it by yourself. The thing that made it fun was that your ships were hidden from the person playing the other team, and their ships were hidden from you. The person playing the British team had to search for the German ships by calling out an area on the map where the British had ships. If the German ships were in that area too, you’d have to tell him and then you’d fight a sea battle. If you played both sides by yourself, you knew where all the ships were, so all that wouldn’t work.

The Germans tried to sail the Bismarck through the Atlantic Ocean around England and Scotland and get to one of their “friendly” ports in France without getting found and sunk. Even though the British ships weren’t as good as the Bismarck, they had a lot of them, so they could divide them up to do a lot of searching. But if they divided them up too much, their ships that found the Bismarck might not be good enough to sink it, and it would sink some of theirs instead. I had played it with Paul last summer before we moved, and a couple times since when mom called his mom and had him come over to our new house.

But the other games I could play by myself, and when I did, I would spend a lot of time just setting them up. I spent a long time trying to figure out the absolute perfect way for the Germans to defend France against the Allied invasion in D-Day. And then when I’d finally figured that out, I’d spend more hours trying to figure out the best area for the Allies to invade. For me, setting up a game was more fun sometimes than even playing it. It was the same kind of thing in Stalingrad or Waterloo. I could spend a WHOLE HOUR just trying to figure out the best place to put one unit. And after staring at the gameboard maps for hours and hours, I knew where all the cities, rivers and mountains were in France, Russia and Belgium.

My racing game, Le Mans, was really easy to set up and play, because all the cars started in one place. I could actually play a whole race in a couple hours, where the other games could take days and days to play, and I might just get bored and not finish them at all, and instead, start thinking about setting up another one, because that was the best part.

And while I played the games I would listen to our five big “album” records, which were all by the Beatles. My old friend Gabe had gotten me the first one, “Meet the Beatles”, for my birthday last April. “The Beatles Second Album” was the first record I bought with my own money at that Discount Records place where my new school friend Arthur’s older brother worked. Then after dad took David and I to see the Beatles’ movie, “A Hard Day’s Night”, mom and dad got David that record because he liked it so much and he said he wanted records that were his own and not all mine. Then I got “Something New” with my own money and mom and dad got us their newest album, “Beatles 65” for Christmas.

I had heard all the songs on the Beatles records so many times that I didn’t really need to listen to the words anymore but still heard them and knew them, even though some of those words didn’t make sense. And when one song finished I knew what the next one was. I figured the Beatle guys weren’t grownups but older kids like Margie or those college student guys, so I better listen to what they were saying, because they were part of my team instead of the grownup team. They seemed to mostly be singing about the same thing, “love”, and all the different problems an older boy could have with his girlfriend.

Like he wasn’t sure if she was really bad or good…

She’s got the devil in her heart
No, she’s an angel sent to me

You had to give her stuff so she’d like you…

That her baby buys her things, you know
He buys her diamond rings, you know

But even if you did, it might not work and she might still not like you…

Well, I gave you everything I had
But you left me sitting on my own
Did you have to treat me, oh, so bad?
All I do is hang my head and moan
Tell me why you cried
And why you lied to me?

And he’s so mad that he lost his girlfriend that now he’s going to get revenge by being bad and “breaking the hearts” of all the other girls…

I’ve got every reason on earth to be mad
‘Cause I just lost the only girl I had
…
But I’ll come back again someday
And when I do you’d better hide all the girls
I’m gonna break their hearts all round the world
Yes, I’m gonna break them in two
And show you what your lovin’ man can do

And girls would “break his heart” too…

You know, if you break my heart, I’ll go
But I’ll be back again

And your girlfriend could even lie about being in love with you…

Well, how can you say you will, when you won’t
You tell me you do, baby, when you don’t?
Let me know, honey, how you feel
Tell the truth now is love real
Ah-hah, oh honey don’t

And trying to have a girlfriend was like playing a game where either you won or she won…

Of all the love I have won, and have lost
There is one love I should never have crossed
She was a girl in a million my friend
I should have known she would win in the end

Your girlfriend’s parents lie to you but you still find out she is “cheating” on you with another guy…

I tried to telephone
They said you were not home
That’s a lie
‘Cause I know where you’ve been
And I saw you walk in your door
I nearly died, I nearly died
‘Cause you walked hand in hand
With another man in my place

That whole “getting you” thing again, like even if your girlfriend doesn’t really want you, you still have to go out and “get” her, like capture her…

So I’m telling you, my friend
That I’ll get you, I’ll get you in the end
Yes, I will, I’ll get you in the end

It just all seemed so complicated and not nice or fun “getting” and keeping a girlfriend, but older boys just had to do it anyway, or maybe they were just a sissy. But then there were a few songs with words I liked better, about being nice to your girlfriend and liking being “in love” with her…

A love like ours could never die
As long as I have you near me
Bright are the stars that shine
Dark is the sky
I know this love of mine will never die

Or like being good friends and helping each other…

If you need somebody to love, just look into my eyes
I’ll be there to make you feel right
If you’re feeling sorry and sad, I’d really sympathize
Don’t you be sad, just call me tonight
Any time at all, all you gotta do is call, and I’ll be there

Or like the way it used to be with Molly and me, we just knew what each other was thinking…

Someday, when we’re dreaming
Deep in love, not a lot to say
Then we will remember
Things we said today

And then that one about how the moon helped you get a girlfriend, though it was kind of silly…

Mr. Moonlight
You came to me one summer night
And from your beam, you made my dream
And from the whirl, you sent my girl
And from above, you sent us love
And now she is mine I think you’re fine
‘Cause we love you Mr. Moonlight

But there were at least a few of their songs that weren’t about love at all, and those were my favorites…

That’s why I go for that rock and roll music
Any old way you choose it
It’s got a backbeat, you can’t lose it
Any old time you use it
It’s gotta be rock and roll music
If you want to dance with me
If you want to dance with me

***

The next morning was Friday and I was feeling a lot better. Mom had gone to the school office yesterday afternoon and gotten my “assignments”, and gone over to Abby’s house and borrowed her science notes and talked to Abby’s mom. Mom liked talking to all the moms and dads and other grownups on the street whenever she got the chance. She said most of the dads worked at “the University” and she was working hard to get to know all of them plus their wives.

“These are my kind of people”, she said, “Educated, progressive, political, and care about what’s going on in the broader world. I’m much happier here than when we lived on Prescott. And we have a living room with nice looking furniture now, so I feel more comfortable inviting people over or maybe even having a party!” She opened her eyes wide and made a big smile.

I was really glad she was happier, because I could still remember when she had that “panic attack” last spring in our old house, when she said she couldn’t breathe and I was the only one home and I thought she might die. That was REALLY BAD and I didn’t want that to ever happen again. And dad seemed happy that mom was happy, and that he got to be a real “professor” now at that “Eastern” place.

Mom said I needed to hurry up and copy Abby’s notes, so both Abby and I could use them to study for that science test on Monday. I wanted to too, because I always wanted to get really good grades on my tests so my teacher would keep thinking I was really smart. So I sat at dad’s old desk, in his wood chair that spun around that mom had now painted green. I felt smart like dad when I sat at the desk, but I also liked looking out the window where I could see some of the park and my school.

I had my science notebook and Abby’s. Mine just had the word “Science” written on the cover in cursive. Hers said “Abby’s Notes” on the cover, written in big regular letters, and then she’d drawn neat little pictures around the words, of the Earth, a test tube, the head of a guy that looked like George Washington, a cannon, a ship, a triangle inside a circle inside a square, some kind of plant in a pot, a lightning bolt, and a cat. It looked pretty neat.

Inside the cover she had written notes from all the science experiments plus notes about what our teacher had said about history and even math. She wrote in neat printed letters instead of cursive. Each new thing she took notes on started at the top of a new page, and it looked like she tried to get the whole thing on one page, though sometimes two if there was a lot of stuff to write down. At the top of each page was the name of the experiment or the thing the teacher was talking about, in bigger printed letters than the words on the rest of the page.

I flipped through the pages and saw names of all our class experiments since the beginning of the year, like “Boiling Water”, “Balloon Powered Car”, “Melting Ice”, “Growing a Bean Plant”, “Magnets and Iron Filings”, “The Angle of the Sun”. But also math stuff like “Types of Triangles”, “Multiplying Decimals”, “Converting Fractions to Decimals” and “Measuring Circles with Pi”. And history stuff like “Parts of the New World”, “Problems with Britain”, “Battle of Saratoga”, “Westward Expansion” and “Native Americans”. I remembered all those science experiments, and our teacher talking about those things about math and history, but I didn’t remember all the things Abby had written down about each one.

And instead of writing whole long sentences, with all the words and a period at the end, she just wrote down a few words, like “Water boils at 212o Alcohol at 173o“, “Green plants need soil, water and sun”, with the word “Green” underlined, I guess because other kinds of plants that weren’t green didn’t need all those things. In her history notes she kept things shorter by using just the “initials” of people’s names, like “GW” for George Washington and “BF” for Benjamin Franklin.

The notes I had written in my notebook were longer and in cursive, so when I looked at them later it was hard to figure out what I was writing about. And I didn’t have big words at the top of each page to tell you what the other notes below it were about. When you just looked at a page of notes it was harder to pick out the words written in cursive. The words written in print were much easier to see and find. And her pages of notes, all nicely printed and arranged on the page, were just more NICE and FUN to look at and read than mine. It was like she had fun making her notes, like she was making a picture with words that was nice to look at.

So when I started copying her notes for the science experiments I’d missed, I decided to copy them in printed words her way, and try to make my pages look nice too like hers. It took longer to print the letters instead of writing them in cursive, but since her way used less words, it wasn’t so bad that it took longer. And it just felt good when you were done too. So I decided that when I went back to class, whenever I took notes I would try to do them her way instead of my old way.

***

I worked for a long time, because the end of morning class bell rang at eleven thirty over at the school and I looked out the window and saw all the kids coming out of the doors. I could see Mike, because he was so tall, talking to two other kids who I figured were Andy and Arthur. It was interesting how the kids in my grade divided up into small groups that they were more friendly with than kids in the other groups, even making fun sometimes of the kids in the other groups. Not like they didn’t like them, but that they were different and even silly sometimes, and didn’t want to play with them as much.

So Mike, Andy and Arthur were one group. They were all really smart and knew a lot about what was going on in the world. Mike was like a giant kid and really good at sports, like soccer and football. And in gym class he could run faster than anyone else, both the fifty yard dash and that really long six hundred yard one, and do the most pushups or situps. Andy was also good at sports, like I was, but he and I weren’t super good like Mike. Arthur didn’t like sports at all, but he was also really smart and knew a lot too, especially about music, like all the music from England, like the Beatles, the Rolling Stones and his favorite band, the Kinks, so I guess that’s why he was part of their group. I guess they were the most like my old school friends at Bach – Gabe, Herbie, Jake and Amanda.

Then there were Frankie and Stuart. They were like super “cool”. They weren’t that good at school, not because they weren’t smart, but they just didn’t care about school. They were both “into music”, that’s what they said, and they said they both played guitar and had their own “band”, and were always singing parts of songs to each other. They both REALLY LIKED Motown music, and their favorite group was Martha Reeves and the Vandellas, who they said were better than the Supremes because they were “way more hip”. They also liked the “local bands”, from Ann Arbor I guess, like the “Iguanas” and the “MC5”.

Then another group was Billy, Gil and Teddy. They all lived next to each other across the park on Granger, and I think they’d known each other since they were little kids even before they went to regular school. Billy always seemed like he was in charge of that group, at least he liked to think he was. He talked like he knew everything about everything, but I don’t think he knew much at all, and he wasn’t really smart at school or very good at sports. He was a really bad goalie when we played soccer against the sixth-graders before school, but he thought he was good. Whenever he saw me he would say silly stuff like, “Hey Coop my man, how’s it going?”, like he wanted me to be part of their group.

And Gil thought Billy was really neat, and was like his helper all the time. Mike said that Gil was Billy’s “sidekick”. He wasn’t very smart in school or good at sports either. Stuart said that Billy and Gil were “twerps”, whatever that was.

Teddy was more like a regular kid. He was taller, smarter, better at sports, and knew more about the world, but I guess he had always played with Billy and Gil so he still did, and they really wanted him in their group. Stuart didn’t think Teddy was a “twerp”.

The girls I didn’t know so much about, because girls and boys here at Burns Park didn’t seem to play with each other at all. We didn’t do recess anymore at school, where you could at least see what the girls were doing and maybe listen from far away to what they were saying. And our gym classes that we had instead of recess were just girls or just boys. There weren’t any girls like back at Allmendinger or Bach School like Molly or Amanda or even Mary, who liked doing stuff with, or would at least sometimes talk to, boys.

There were three girls I kind of knew about who were friends with each other. Beth and Abby who sat on either side of me at school and their other friend Myrna, who seemed like she was in charge of their group. All three of them were really smart and tried to do really good in school, kind of like Amanda and Mary did at Bach, but they weren’t enemies like Amanda and Mary were. Beth was also super pretty, like Mary had been in my class at Bach, or at least all the boys thought so, though none of them would ever talk to her. I only talked to her sometimes at school because we sat next to each other and we both tried hard to be really good at the SRA reading program. Talking about school stuff with somebody, even if they WERE a girl, wasn’t the same thing as talking to a girl about regular stuff.

Abby lived across the street from me and had made all those really neat notes that I was copying. But even though she sat next to me in school on the other side from Beth, I hadn’t talked to her very much. Because we lived across the street we would see each other sometimes going to school or coming home and she would always wave at me and I would usually wave back, at least a little bit, unless I was walking with other boys, because I didn’t want them to think I was talking to her or she was like my girlfriend or something.

Looking out the window, as all the kids walking home from school got farther away from the school and more spread out, I saw David walking with Al and Gus from our street, and his best friend Eddie. I decided I better go downstairs right now and make my sandwich for lunch, in case there was only one piece of ham left, since I was liking that now better than baloney, and I didn’t want David to get the last piece.

***

After dinner that night, David wanted to play our new hockey game. He really liked it, even though I was better at playing it than he was.

“Santa”, who was really mom and dad, had gotten David and me a tabletop hockey game for Christmas and we played it a lot together. Since I was better at it than he was, I could usually win if I wanted to, but he was good enough that it was fun playing it with him and it didn’t get boring. Since I had never been good at skating, I never played hockey for real on the big ice rink over in the park. But playing it on the tabletop game, David and I learned what the different positions were and kind of how you played the game by passing the puck up to your “wings”, or to your “center”, so they could get good shots on the other team’s goal, while the other team’s “defensemen” tried to get the puck away and pass it up to THEIR wings and center.

So when we found out that real hockey games were on TV every Saturday night on Channel 9, David and I started watching them, and I at least started to figure out how the real game was played. The show was called “Hockey Night in Canada” and it was on just about every Saturday Night over the winter. Canada was a different country than America, but it didn’t seem that different, because the Canada announcer guys on the show pretty much talked like we did. It wasn’t like France or Germany, where they spoke different languages I couldn’t understand, or even England, where they spoke the same language as us but it sounded really different, because they had one of those “accents”.

Our little TV was now up in the office upstairs instead of the living room. Mom and dad had gotten furniture for that part of the living room and mom said having the TV there “ruined the aesthetic”. She now called that part the “sitting room”, I guess because there were now lots of places to sit down. She and dad had bought a used couch from some friends who were getting rid of their old couch because they got a new one. She said it was “kind of an ugly duckling”, but she bought some blankets with patterns on them to put on top of it so she thought it looked better. That part of the living room also had that wood “deacon’s bench”, so there were now a lot of places to sit. She was inviting her and dad’s friends to come over now, like Eddie’s mom and dad, and they would all sit in the sitting room and talk while Eddie played with David in the basement or outside.

But wherever the TV was, it was hard watching hockey on our little black and white TV because there were so many guys skating around and they looked pretty small. It was really hard for David, because he was only six, and I remember when I was six trying to watch football games on our little TV, and even when dad tried to explain it to me, it didn’t make much sense. There were just too many guys running around crashing into each other on the tiny screen. I’d seen some of a football game on Molly’s big color TV at her house across the street on Prescott before Molly’s mom and dad got divorced, and it was MUCH easier to figure out what was going on.

But even though the screen was small and the guys weren’t in color, I was figuring it out, and I could tell for each team who the “center”, the “wings”, and the “defensemen” were. But hockey wasn’t like baseball or football. In those games everybody was always stopping, getting ready in their positions and then starting again. Hockey was more like basketball where you just kept going back and forth without stopping when a guy on the other team got the ball, or the puck in hockey. And I don’t think hockey had timeouts like football or basketball, but they did have “faceoffs” where things stopped, which were pretty neat.

And the names of the positions in hockey were kind of like in basketball. Both had a “center” guy, who was usually super tall in basketball but just regular sized in hockey, and was usually close to the basket or goal whether his team was playing defense or offense. And the “wings” in hockey were like the “forwards” in basketball, usually on either side of the basket or goal. And the “defensemen” in hockey were like the “guards” in basketball, they would usually bring the ball or puck from their side over to the other team’s side and stay the farthest away from the basket or goal.

So I was trying to explain all that to David as we watched hockey games on our little TV, but I could tell he had a hard time figuring it out. Our tabletop hockey game was a lot slower and made more sense, even though it was really different than real hockey. But it was still fun.

Real hockey on TV was also different because of the “penalties”. Football had penalties too, and basketball had “fouls”, but in hockey if a guy got a penalty, he’d have to sit in the “penalty box” and no other guy on his team could play instead of him. In the other sports you alway had the same number of guys playing, but in hockey, if a guy got a penalty, his team would have to play with one less player, or even TWO less players if a second guy on that team also got a penalty. When one team had more guys playing because of the other team’s penalties that was called a “powerplay”, which was a pretty neat name.

Fights almost never happened in the other sports. But in hockey they happened all the time, and they’d let players fight with each other, at least for a while, before the referee guys stopped them and gave them penalties. Though if two guys on one team both wanted to fight with one guy on the other team, that wasn’t a “fair fight”, so THAT wasn’t okay. Another guy from the team with only one guy fighting would grab that second guy and try to keep him from fighting the first guy, though sometimes those two second guys would start fighting each other. But I guess that was okay because one guy on one team fighting one guy on the other team was a “fair fight”.

And the people on the TV watching the game for real seemed to really like it when guys got in fights, and would cheer the guy on their team fighting when he got a good punch on the guy from the other team. Dad said that that was why the referees would let the guys fight for a while, because the people watching liked it.

That “fair fight” stuff between two men happened on other TV shows, specially the Western ones. If two guys had a real big argument with words and got really mad at each other, it was okay if they then had a fight with their fists as long as it was just those two guys fighting, which made it a “fair fight”. Once one guy hit the other guy really hard to make him fall down, then the fight would usually be over, though the guy that got knocked down and lost the fight might try to start a new fight with the other guy later. And in the Western shows, if one guy was a goodguy and the other was a badguy then they could have a fight with guns and that was a “fair fight” and okay too, even if one or both of the guys got shot or even killed!

***

It was Saturday morning and I was feeling much better. I was over in the park playing basketball with the “Billy Boyds” – Billy, Gil and Teddy. It was cold, and some kids and grownups were skating on the big ice rink. But there wasn’t a lot of snow left, and the court was clear. It wasn’t perfect weather for playing basketball, but we still played. Since they were showing basketball games on TV, pro and college, it felt like WE should be playing too, and pretending we were star players too, even though we weren’t.

Billy and Gil weren’t very good at basketball, but Teddy and I were pretty good. But Billy made it fun because he was really into the pretending part that we were the “allstar” pro players. Billy said that since Teddy was the tallest of the four of us he was the Center, Bill Russell. I was the next tallest so I was the Forward, Eljin Baylor. Billy and Gil were shorter so they were the Guards, Oscar Robertson and Jerry West.

We were playing four other kids in the park who were younger than us, so maybe they thought we were better than we really were, so that made it more fun. While we played, Billy also pretended he was that announcer guy talking on the radio or TV telling you the “play by play”, which made it even more fun.

Billy had the ball and was dribbling down the court. “Robertson brings the ball down the court”, he said, “The Big O looks for an open man.” Then he passed the ball to Gil and said really excited, “He finds West open on the right side.” Gil took a shot and Billy said, even more excited, “He shoots!”. But Gil wasn’t a very good shooter, and as usual his shot didn’t go in, and Billy said, “Ohhh… just off the rim”.

Teddy got the rebound and two of the kids on the other team crowded around him with their hands up in the air, while Billy said, “Russell’s got the rebound ladies and gentlemen.” And when Teddy passed it out to me, since no one was guarding me, Billy said, “Russell dishes it to Baylor open on the left side.” I was able to dribble in and do a layup and Billy said, “Baylor drives the basket for an easy score!”

It was fun for everybody playing, even the kids on the other team. They were younger so they expected us to be better and win, but Billy made it all more pretend real.

I heard a bell ringing. It was the one mom rang when she wanted David and I to come home from the park, because it was time for dinner or we had to go somewhere.

“I gotta go”, I said to Billy.

“What”, he said, “Is that your mom or something?” He said it in a way that didn’t sound good if it was, so I didn’t want to tell him that. So I made something up.

“We’re going to a restaurant for lunch”, I said, “And I don’t want to get left behind and miss the good food.” That sounded like a pretty good reason.

“Which restaurant?” asked Gil. I figured I had to come up with a good answer. A place they might like too.

“The Frontier Beef Buffet”, I said, thinking that one sounded good, because everybody liked roast beef.

“Isn’t that a place you go for dinner?” Gil asked. He was right, it usually was. We heard the bell ring again. I thought about what to say next.

Then Teddy said, “Hey Gil, that’s really none of our business I think. That IS my family’s favorite place and I think they do have those french dip sandwiches for lunch.” Gil didn’t say anything more like he didn’t want to get in trouble with his friends.

“Yeah GIL”, said Billy, teasing him.

“Shut up, Billy”, GIL said, looking worried and mad, “I was JUST WONDERING!”

“Okay, okay”, said Billy, like he was in charge of figuring things out. He looked at the four younger kids we were playing against. “Hey, we can still beat you with just three of us!” he said.

He looked at me nodding and said, “Go get yourself some lunch my good man”, like he was in charge and had decided it was okay for me to go.

Playing along with his whole thing I said, “Thanks! See you guys later”, and ran towards my house.

When I crossed the street by our front yard mom was standing on the porch with the bell. I looked toward the basketball court and I figured my friends couldn’t see the porch with mom standing on it. Even though I’d made up a good reason I still didn’t want them to see it was my mom ringing it, like she was in charge of me.

“Cooper”, she said to me, she was holding Abby’s notebook, “We really should be getting Abby’s notes back to her sooner rather than later. When a person is really nice and lets you borrow something like notes that she needs too, you should honor that by not making her wonder and even worry about when she might get them back. Don’t you think?”

I nodded, but asked, “Couldn’t you just take them back?”

She looked at me like she wasn’t happy with that question. “I COULD”, she said, “But she did a big favor for you and I think you need to acknowledge that by personally telling her thank you.”

“Okay”, I said, sounding like she won and I lost, as usual.

“I know you’re shy about talking to girls these days”, she said, “But I think it’s important.” I couldn’t believe she just said that.

“MOM”, I said, before I could even think about what I wanted to say.

“Look”, she said, “You can tell her that your mom made you do it!” She laughed through her nose.

“That would be even WORSE”, I said. Mom shook her head and looked just a little mad.

“Okay, whatever”, she said, “I’m giving you her notes and you decide what’s best.” She came down the steps from the porch and handed them to me. “Let me know if you need my assistance any more at this point.” I took the notes. It made me mad what she said, more so because she was right, AS ALWAYS, and always seemed to know things better than I did.

So now I HAD to take these notes back to Abby at her house across the street RIGHT NOW, or mom would think I was a bad kid, which I really didn’t want. Why couldn’t she just stop trying to help me all the time!

But I didn’t want my friends to see me knocking on Abby’s door or maybe even talking to her if she opened it. I looked out across the street into the park where they were still playing basketball with those four younger kids. They could still kind of see me if they looked. But when I walked a little bit down my street away from the park right across from Abby’s front door, they couldn’t see me anymore, so I figured it was safe.

The only problem now, was if Abby talked to me and liked it, she might try to talk with me or say things to me when we were both walking home from school or playing in the park. Then my friends would see and tease me about her being my girlfriend. I actually LIKED talking to girls. They were interesting and sometimes had different ideas that weren’t as stupid as some of the boys’ ideas. But I DIDN’T LIKE talking to other boys ABOUT girls, because it was like girls still kind of had cooties, even though nobody used that word. Girls were like aliens from outer space that you had to keep your eye on but might be dangerous to talk to because they could change you somehow.

So I walked across my street to Abby’s front door, looking over towards the park to make sure my friends still couldn’t see me. I rang her doorbell and felt kind of worried about what was going to happen while I waited for someone to open the door. Finally Abby’s younger brother Steve opened the door and just looked at me.

I heard the voice of a grownup woman who I figured must be Abby’s mom. “Sweetie, who’s at the door”, she asked.

“I think it’s David’s brother”, he said to her.

“Oh… okay”, she said, “Why don’t you invite him in. Where’s your sister?”

“Upstairs with her friends”, he said, “I’ll go tell her!” Then he ran up the stairs.

Their mom peeked her head out of the kitchen, and said, “Steven! You don’t have to bother your…”, but it was too late, he was already up the stairs.

She looked at me, rolled her eyes and said, “I assume you’re just returning Abby’s notes.” I nodded my head and she said, “Just put them on the table there. I’ll make sure she gets them. Are you feeling better? Your mom said you’ve been out sick all week. I’m really enjoying getting to know her.” I nodded again. Every grownup I talked to that knew mom said stuff like that about her.

Abby’s brother came down the stairs with Abby right behind him and Beth and Myrna from our fifth grade class behind her. I wasn’t sure what was going to happen now but I was a little worried. I hadn’t really talked to girls since I came to Burns Park, not like I used to with Molly, Amanda, Marybeth and sometimes even Mary back at Bach and Allmendinger. I had barely ever talked to any of the three of them outside of class. In class I had just talked to Beth about how far we each were in that SRA reading program. She and I were at a higher level than anyone else in class.

“Your classmate Cooper was just bringing your notes back dear”, her mom said, looking at me, “Sounds like they were a big help.” I knew mom would ask me if I said thank you to Abby and get mad at me if I didn’t. I didn’t want to have to lie to her that I did, because she might talk to Abby’s mom again and find out that I really didn’t.

“Thanks Abby”, I said, looking at her, “Your notes are really good and they helped me out a lot.” Abby looked back at me from the stairs behind her brother and nodded her head.

“I know”, she said.

Myrna made that clicking noise with her mouth that some of the girls made when they didn’t like or were surprised by something. “You gave him your NOTES?” she asked, like she couldn’t believe it, “You said you’ve never even talked to him.” Abby was still looking at me and suddenly looked scared and then embarrassed.

I wanted to help her, so I said to Myrna, “Well my mom talked to Abby’s mom and asked to borrow her notes. So I just came over to bring them back and say thank you because they were really good.” Abby looked less embarrassed after I said that.

“Hmm”, said Myrna.

“Anyway”, I said, “I gotta go home.”

“It was good to finally meet you Cooper”, Abby’s mom said. I nodded as I opened the front door, went outside, and closed it behind me.