“Hey,” he called from behind. “Hey! Darius!”
I ignored him and went faster.
“Wait!” Chip shouted again, his voice echoing off the concrete walls of the stairwell. I had just hit the last landing when he tugged on my backpack.
“Let go.”
“Just—”
“Leave me alone, Chip.” I jerked forward to loosen his grip.
Instead, my backpack experienced a non-passive failure, splitting across the seam holding the main pocket together. My books and papers spilled down the stairs, but at least my tablet stayed Velcroed in.
“Oh.”
“Really, Chip?” I knelt and grabbed for my papers before someone could kick them away. “Thanks. Thanks a lot.”
“Sorry.” Chip handed me a book from a few steps down. He had this goofy grin on his face as he shook the hair out of his eyes. “I was just gonna tell you your backpack was open.”
“Wasn’t my bike enough?”
“Hey. That was just a joke.”
“Me not having a bike anymore is a joke to you?”
“What are you talking about? Your tires were right in the bushes.”
I glared at him.
How was I supposed to know that?
“You never found them?”
“Leave me alone, Chip.”
The warning bell rang: One minute to make it to class.
“Come on, man. Let me help.”
“Go away.” There was no way I was going to trust Cyprian Cusumano to help me.
He shrugged and stood. “Okay. I’ll tell Coach Fortes you’ll be late.”
I got all my papers into a mostly straight pile and sandwiched them between my econ and geometry books.
My backpack was totally unsalvageable: With the seam blown out, the straps had failed as well. The only usable part was the pouch in front holding my pencils.
The tardy bell rang. I knotted the two loose straps together so I could sling the derelict hulk of my backpack over my shoulder like a satchel, gathered my stuff up, and hurried to gym.
* * *
Coach Fortes shook his head when he saw my pile of books and the remains of my backpack. “Cusumano told me,” he said.
Why do gym teachers always call guys by their last names?
“Sorry, Coach.”
Why do guys always call their gym teachers Coach and leave off their name?
“It’s fine. Go get dressed.”
We were doing our Net Sports Unit, which meant two weeks of Badminton, two weeks of Ping-Pong/Table Tennis, and the grande finale: two weeks of Volleyball.
I was terrible at Net Sports. I wasn’t that good at any form of sportsball, really, although I used to play soccer when I was a kid. I did better at the ones where I could at least run around, because I was not bad at running. I had a lot of stamina and I was pretty fast, which surprised people since I was kind of overweight.
Well. Not kind of. I was overweight, period, which is why Stephen Kellner was always handing me the salad bowl.
As if salad would counteract the weight gain from my meds.
As if lack of discipline was the root of all my problems.
As if all the worry about my weight didn’t make me feel worse than I already did.
I pulled on my gym clothes—black swishy shorts and a red Chapel Hill Chargers T-shirt—and ran out to join warm-ups. I caught the tail end of sit-ups, and then we had to run laps for five minutes.
Chip Cusumano caught up with me on our third lap. “Hey, D,” he said.
Now that he was at Chapel Hill High School, with an enforced Zero Tolerance Policy toward bullying, he couldn’t add the -Bag.
I ran faster, and Chip kept pace with me, but at least he wasn’t smiling anymore. “I was just gonna tell you your zipper was open. I didn’t mean to split your backpack.”
“Whatever. At least you can’t hide truck nuts in it.”
“And I’m sorry about your bike. Really.”
I almost believed him.
Almost.
* * *
Unlike the rest of the Net Sports Unit, which was haphazardly arranged, we had assigned teams for volleyball. Coach Fortes set us up to play tournament-style. There were no eliminations, but the team with the best record would get extra credit.
I did not understand the point and purpose of assigning extra credit to the winners when they were—statistically speaking—the most likely to be athletic types and therefore the least likely to need the extra credit.
Me being me, I was stuck on a team with Fatty Bolger, which gave him even more opportunities to joke about balls flying at my face.
Like I said. At least he was predictable.
Trent served first—he always served first—and we bump-set-spiked back and forth, while I tried to stay out of Trent’s way, because he was a very intense volleyball player. He was especially intense since we were playing against Chip’s team. Despite being best friends, Chip and Trent battled like Emotionally Compromised Vulcans when they were on opposing teams.
I didn’t get that at all. If I’d had a best friend—Javaneh was my closest friend, but we weren’t anything approaching best friends—we would have always been on the same team. Not in the sense of a Net Sports team, but in the sense that I’d be happy for them if they won, and they’d be happy for me if I won.
Fatty elbowed me out of the way to set the ball for Craig, who was in front of us, to spike.
“Get with the program, Kellner!” Coach Fortes shouted.
I was with the program. It’s just that Fatty Bolger seemed to be operating a different version of it.
So the next time the ball came at me, I planted myself right under it, locked my elbows and bumped it.
But instead of going upward, the ball shot straight forward, right into the back of Craig’s head.
I was terrible at Net Sports.
Craig looked back at me as he scooped up the ball.
“Sorry.”
Craig shrugged and tossed the ball under the net to Chip, who was serving next.
“Watch where you’re aiming,” Trent said. “Terrorist.”
This was not the first time I had been called a terrorist. It didn’t happen often—no teacher let it slide if they heard it—but school was school, and I was a kid with Middle Eastern heritage, even though I was born and raised in Portland.