Contents
* * *
Title Page
Contents
Copyright
Dedication
Gameplay
Wake Up Call
Questions
Why couldn’t your dad
In the elementary school spelling bee
Giddy-up
Mom
Blackjack on the Way to School
Ms. Hardwick’s Honors English class
The Beautiful Game
The thing about daydreaming
Busted
After School
At Miss Quattlebaum’s School of Ballroom Dance & Etiquette
Chivalry
The Pact
Ever since first grade
Best Friend
Bragging Rights
The Letter
Dad’s back in town
Trash Talk
PUT. THE. PHONE. AWAY, Nicholas
Trouble
Dean and Don Eggelston
Fists of Fury
The library door
When you walk inside
Welcome to the Dragonfly Café
Hey, DJ, Drop That Beat
Skip MacDonald
Huckleberry Finn-ished
Class ends
Usually at dinner
Breaking the Silence
No Heads-Up
Thought
Broken
For the rest of the week
Conversation Before the Match
Playing Soccer
Game two
No Problemo
Problemo
Conversation with Mom
Dear Nick
You Want to Talk About April, but Coby’s Mind Is on the Dallas Cup.
Nothing Good About Bye
The Way a Door Closes
The Next Day
In the hallway
Conversation with The Mac
First Dinner Without Mom
I’m sorry
Hanging Out at Coby’s
Conversation
Let’s call April, he says
Home Alone
Why You No Longer Play Football
The next morning
The Homework Questions
Texts from Mom
Texts to Mom
Jackpot
Insomnia
Standing in the lunch line
Big Trouble
Stand Up
Back to Life
Do-Over
Consequences
The day after
Conversation
The Last Time You Got into a Fight
Last night you couldn’t watch TV
April is
Caught
The walk to her desk
Then She Smiles
Limerence
Coby’s Back
Blackjack in the Library
You and Coby
Note from April
Change of Plans
Conversation After Soccer
Conversation with April
The only thing
Probability
Boy rides his bike
Kentucky
Breakdown
A Good Cry
What are you doing here?
1 on 1
This morning
Conversation with Mom
And Just Like That, Things Are Out of Control Again
Dressed in camouflage sneaks
Conversation with The Mac
Shrink
You miss
When Mom Starts Crying, Dad Takes Her Out, Leaving You Alone with the Shrink
Doctor Fraud
Chimichangas
How Did We Get Here?
Introductions
Alarm Clock
Cool?
Not Cool
Bad
After Soccer Practice
You wake up at four a.m.
The Big Match
Game On
Score
Right before halftime
Guess Who’s Back?
Halftime
Coach asks
Second Half
Nine Minutes Left. Can’t This Be Over Already?
Booked
Hospital
Ankle sprains
Surgery
Fact
How are you feeling, Nicky?
Bad
Worse
Only
The End
TV Therapy
This Sucks
New Rules
Mom kisses you goodbye
The Next Morning
Breakfast
Conversation with Coby
Dear Skip
Rapprochement *
Visitors’ Day
Hello, Nicholas
This has got to be a sweven.
You’re not really into baseball
All the Broken Pieces
The Next Day
Conversation with The Mac
Read Aloud
He sounds
Texts to April
Text from April
Discharged
Driving Home
Out of the Dust
You dial April’s number
Phone Conversation
Books You Find on Google
Dreams Come True
Today, Coby called
Knock Knock
Twain *
Nerds and Words
A Long Walk to Water
Your Suggestion
Bye, Nick
Family Meeting
Text to Coby
When April
Rock Horse Ranch
Afterward
You absolutely love
Thank You
Later, at Dinner
Conversation with Mom and Dad
What happens to a dream destroyed?
On the way to the airport
Sinking
Conversation with Dr. Fraud
Regular Communication
At Miss Quattlebaum’s
Regular Communication
After School, You Stop in to See The Mac
Playoffs
Text from Mom
Regular Communication
Winnifred may be a gadfly *
Waiting at the Bus Stop When a Police Car Pulls Up
Thirty Minutes Later
I’ve been thinking
Conversation with Dad
Hey, Mom
Mom Calls Immediately
Blue Moon River
Inside the Bag Is, Get This, FREEDOM
Sub
After the Game
While you and Coby
HEY, DEAN, you scream
One Down, One to Go
Ouch!
Freedom
Sample Chapter from THE CROSSOVER
Buy the Book
Middle Grade Mania!
About the Author
Footnotes
Copyright © 2016 by Kwame Alexander
Text on page 284 used by permission of HarperCollins Publishers.
All rights reserved. For information about permission to reproduce selections from this book, write to trade.permissions@hmhco.com or to Permissions, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company, 3 Park Avenue, 19th Floor, New York, New York 10016.
www.hmhco.com
Cover photo © 2016 by Steve Gardner
Cover design by Lisa Vega
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file.
ISBN: 978-0-544-57098-6
eISBN 978-0-544-78771-1
v1.0416
For Lynne, Stacey, Mary Ann, John, and Deborah,
some of the coolest librarians and teachers on the planet;
and to the best English teacher I never had:
Joanna Fox, the real dragonfly lady.
Gameplay
on the pitch, lightning faSt,
dribble, fake, then make a dash
player tries tO steal the ball
lift and step and make him fall
zip and zoom to find the spot
defense readies for the shot
Chip, then kick it in the air
take off like a Belgian hare
shoot it left, but watch it Curve
all he can do is observe
watch the ball bEnd in midflight
play this game faR into night.
Wake Up Call
After playing FIFA
online with Coby
till one thirty a.m.
last night,
you wake
this morning
to the sound
of Mom arguing
on the phone
with Dad.
Questions
Did you make up your bed?
Yeah. Can you put bananas in my pancakes, please?
Did you finish your homework?
And what about the reading. I didn’t see you doing that yesterday.
Mom, Dad’s not even here.
Just because your father’s away doesn’t mean you can avoid your chores.
I barely have time for my real chores.
Perhaps you should spend less time playing Xbox at all hours of the night.
Huh?
Oh, you think I didn’t know?
I’m sick of reading his stupid words, Mom. I’m going to high school next year and I shouldn’t have to keep doing this.
Why couldn’t your dad
be a musician
like Jimmy Leon’s dad
or own an oil company
like Coby’s?
Better yet, why couldn’t
he be a cool detective
driving
a sleek silver
convertible sports car
like Will Smith
in Bad Boys?
Instead, your dad’s
a linguistics professor
with chronic verbomania*
as evidenced
by the fact
that he actually wrote
a dictionary
called Weird and Wonderful Words
with,
get this,
footnotes.
In the elementary school spelling bee
when you intentionally
misspelled heifer,
he almost had a cow.
You’re the only kid
on your block
at school
in THE. ENTIRE. FREAKIN’. WORLD.
who lives in a prison
of words.
He calls it the pursuit of excellence.
You call it Shawshank.
And even though your mother
forbids you to say it,
the truth is
you
HATE
words.
Giddy-up
she hollers,
SMASHING the ball
to the edge
of the right corner
of the table
with so much force,
it sends you diving
into the laundry stack,
trying and failing
to lob it back.
Loser does the dishes tonight.
You can’t say that now, Mom. It’s game point.
She drops a shot
right over the net
that you can’t get to.
You’re a one-trick pony, young boy.
Stick to soccer, she jokes, then
headlocks you,
hits you on the backside
with her paddle,
and soaks your forehead
in kisses
after beating you
for the fourth game
in a row.
Mom
used to race horses,
but now she only trains them.
Correction: she used to
train them,
which was pretty awesome,
especially when you
got to cowboy
around the neighborhood
or watch
the Preakness
from luxury box seats
with unlimited Coke and shrimp.
But she doesn’t do it anymore
since there are no horses
in the city.
Last year,
she did get asked
to train
a horse named
Bite My Dust,
but when she revealed
that we’d have to move
to some small town
with no university
(or travel soccer team),
Dad said No
with a capital N.
Blackjack on the Way to School
With two sevens showing, you
say, Hit me! Coby curses
when you get a third. BLACKJACK!
Ms. Hardwick’s Honors English class
is one boring
required read
after another.
So you’ve become a pro
at daydreaming
while pretend-listening.
The Beautiful Game
You’re pumped.
The match is tied
at the end
of extra time.
Players gather
at center circle
for the coin toss.
You call tails
and win.
Real Madrid scores
the first goal.
Ours bounces
They make
the next two
in a row.
We make three.
They miss
their final two.
It’s 3–3.
Your turn
to rev the engine,
turn on the jets.
Score, and you win.
Teammates
lock arms
for the final kick.
The crowd roars,
screams your name:
NICK HALL! NICK HALL! NICK HALL!
Like a greyhound
coursing game,
you take off
from twelve yards out,
winding
for the kill.
But right before
the winning kick
of your Barcelona debut,
Ms. Hardwick
streaks
across the field
in her heels and
purple polyester dress
yelling:
NICHOLAS HALL,
PAY
ATTENTION!
The thing about daydreaming
in class
is you forget
what was happening
just before ninety thousand fans
started CHEERING you
to victory.
So everything blurs
when your best friend whispers
from behind,
She’s talking to you, bro,
and your teacher SLAMS
you with a question
that makes no sense:
The expression “to nip something in the bud”
is an example of what, Nicholas?
Uh, to nip it in the butt
is an example of
how to get slapped by a girl, you reply,
as confused
as a chameleon
in a bag
of gummy worms,
which sends
almost everyone
in class
into fits
of contagious snickering.
Everyone except
Ms. Hardwick.
Busted
Nicholas, I’ve warned you
about not paying attention
in my class.
This is your final warning.
Next time, it’s down to the office.
Now, can anyone answer
the question correctly?
I can, I can, Ms. Hardwick, says Winnifred,
the teacher’s pet (and a pain in the class).
What is the correct phrase, Winnifred?
Nip it in the bud, not butt, Ms. Hardwick, she answers, then adds,
Sorta like when you prune a flower
in the budding stage, to keep it from growing.
Then she rolls her eyes. In your direction.
Precisely. It is a metaphor
for dealing with a problem
when it is still small
and before it grows
into something LARGER, Ms. Hardwick says,
looking dead at you.
Ironically, Nicholas, by not paying attention,
you have stumbled upon another literary device
called a malapropism.* Do you know what it means?
And of course you do, but before
you can tell her Winnifred raises
her hand and starts spelling it:
M-A-L-A-P-R-O-P-I-S-M, from
the French term mal à propos, meaning
when a person, or in this case, a boy,
uses a word that sounds like another
just to be funny.
Excellent, Winnifred, and since
you’re such a comedian, Nicholas, Ms. Hardwick howls,
how about you finish reading
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
and find
an example of a malapropism
in the text
to present
in class next week.
ARRGGGHH!
After School
Better pay attention,
or Ms. Hardwick’s gonna
give you a good kick
in the grass,
Coby says
while you both wait
for Mom
to pick you up.
That was a malaprop, he jokes.
I know what it was!
Wanna play soccer? he asks.
Of course you do,
but you can’t
because
it’s Tuesday
and you have a ridiculous,
mind-numbing