Basketball (or Something Like It) by Nora Raleigh Baskin

Author:Nora Raleigh Baskin [Baskin, Nora Raleigh]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-06-204415-0
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2005-10-15T04:00:00+00:00

Anabel saw the whole thing. She was sitting with Brigit and Erin, her two best friends. She watched until that new boy, Jeremy, suddenly jumped up and rushed all the way over from the other side of the cafeteria to where Hank Adler was standing. Normally somebody rushing, even somebody running, wouldn’t seem so unusual, but there was something so deliberate about Jeremy’s motion. Anabel thought she could sense a change in the actual atmosphere in the room. And even though she really had never seen it before, Anabel knew something very aggressively boylike was about to happen.

“What’s going on?” Erin said. She was just about to take everything out of her lunch bag.

“Looks like a fight,” Brigit said. “That new boy just ran over there like he was going to hit somebody.”

“Jeremy Binder,” Anabel said.

“You know him?” Brigit asked.

“He’s on my brother’s basketball team.”

“He’s cute,” Erin said.

“Yeah, and he’s going to be killed,” Brigit added. “That’s Carter and Alex over there. It’s going to be terrible.” She stood up. “Let’s go watch.”

Erin and Anabel didn’t hesitate.

It’s just that there were not many good fights in North Bridge. Not any at all, really. Just the occasional shoving, pushing, name-calling, send everyone to the principal’s office. Last year a kid got in trouble for stealing another kid’s Palm Pilot from the gym lockers. And of course there was a rumor that Carter Bunnell beat up an eighth-grader who had cut in front of him in the lunch line. But Anabel had never talked to anyone who had really seen that themselves. Or even knew who the eighth-grader was. Only half the kids believed it happened at all. The other half had a completely different story about a backpack or something like that.

Not that she didn’t think it was possible. Boys do all sorts of weird stuff. Having an older brother at home gave Anabel special insight. Hitting, farting, grabbing, running, burping, kicking, tripping, cursing, all seemed to be male favorites. Reciting lines from stupid movies was right up there.

But fighting ranked high.

By the time Anabel, Erin, and Brigit made their way into the circle, the fight was over. You could tell nothing had happened. It was a standoff, a name-calling flop fight. At least, that’s what all the kids were saying as they began to wander away.

“Everybody go back and sit down,” Mrs. Ossie, the cafeteria lady said. She had one hand on Carter’s shoulder.

But Anabel saw something else. She saw Jeremy standing next to Hank, right next to him, for no other reason than they were on the same team. Jeremy probably didn’t even know Carter. Or Alex. He probably had no reason in the world to get into a fight with either of them (although something told Anabel that if there had been a fight, Jeremy would have won it).

But there he was. No questions asked. Jeremy had come from all the way on the other side of the cafeteria to take Hank’s side. To be on his side.

Hank knew it, too.

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