Rivals by Tommy Greenwald (the speed reading book txt) 📗

next game against Ackton. It will mean missing the whole season. It will mean jeopardizing your development as a player and your ability to get ready for high school ball and beyond.”

“I get it, I swear.” But the truth is, I don’t get it. I don’t get math at all, I never really tried to get it, I never asked for help, and I definitely never admitted to myself that not getting it could ruin everything.

“Are you set for this test?” Coach Benny asks.

“I hope so,” I say, which isn’t a lie, technically.

“Good.” He scrunches up his eyebrows, which makes him look extra scary. “Because you have to figure out a way to pass this thing. Do whatever it takes. Just pass.”

He finally takes his hand off my shoulder and walks away. Eddy, Lucas, and Sham are munching away, but I’m pretty sure they heard the whole thing.

“I’m in trouble,” I say. No one looks up from their food at first. Then Eddy says, “So, what are you going to do?”

I shake my head. “Pass the test, somehow.”

“You been studying?” Lucas asks.

“I don’t know. A little, I guess. We’ll find out.”

“Hold up,” Sham says. “Coach told you to do whatever it takes, right?”

I nod. “Yeah. I’ve been trying to figure out what he meant by that.”

Eddy looks confused. “What do you mean, ‘what he meant by that’?”

“I mean, like, did he seriously mean whatever it takes? Because, you know, ‘whatever it takes’ could mean a lot of things.”

“Yeah,” Eddy says. “It could mean a lot of things.”

I take a bite of my sandwich, with a bunch of thoughts and questions racing through my head. If I get kicked off the school team, will I get kicked off the AAU team, too? Will it really affect my development as a high school player? Will it ruin my chances at getting a college scholarship? And what will my mom do if she can’t watch me play basketball?

I look back at Eddy and ask him, “Are you thinking what I’m thinking? And are you cool with it?”

“Yeah,” he says, “I guess so.”

“Are you sure?”

He doesn’t look up from his meatball hero. “I’m sure. Now can we stop talking about it?”

And then we finish our lunches without another word.

ALFIE

There’s a different kind of quiet in a classroom when kids are about to take a test. It’s like this low hum of nervousness. People bite their nails or bounce up and down on their feet, and no one is really looking at each other. It’s super tense.

And that feeling goes double when it’s a math test.

As we all stumble in, our teacher, Ms. Vallone, stands in front of her desk. “Okay everyone, let’s take our seats and get straight to it. The quicker we get started, the quicker this long national nightmare known as the fractions/ratios/percentages test will be over.”

She’s trying to be funny, but no one laughs. It’s not a great time.

Ms. Vallone hands out the tests, and as I grab mine, I notice something a little strange: Carter Haswell, who is sitting two rows in front of me, slides his desk just a tiny bit closer to the kid sitting next to him, Eddy Dixon. They whisper something to each other, but I can’t hear what it is.

Then Ms. Vallone says, “You may begin,” and I do.

CARTER

I remember the last time I was really nervous.

It was last year, third game of the season, and I got fouled with two seconds left and our team behind by one point. I had to make both free throws for us to win, and the whole gym was completely silent. I missed the first shot, but somehow managed to make the second, and we won in overtime. I can still feel my knees knocking together, and I can still see my hands shaking. It was bad.

But it wasn’t half as bad as right now, as I slide my desk slightly closer to Eddy’s. I’m trying to do it as softly as possible, but the scratching and scraping is loud enough to wake up dead people. At least, to me it is. But when I glance around the classroom, it doesn’t look like anybody noticed a thing. Ms. Vallone hands out the tests. I glance down at mine, and I feel shame. Shame because I’ve never really admitted to myself that numbers are like a foreign language to me that I can’t understand. Shame because I was too embarrassed to ask for help from the teacher. Shame because I didn’t tell my parents about my math problems, because I convinced myself that they had too much other stuff to deal with, even though I knew that was just an excuse and the real reason was that I was just too lazy to deal with it.

But mostly, I feel shame because of what I’m about to do.

I make sure no one is looking, then I glance over to my right as Eddy turns his paper slightly in my direction, just enough so I can see it.

And then I write down the first answer.

ALFIE

At first, I don’t think anything of it. Everyone looks around during tests. People’s minds wander, or they’re trying to think, or it’s just something to do as they sit there and squirm their way through something they definitely don’t want to be doing.

But then I see it again. Carter scans the room, then slowly turns his head to the right. His eyes drop down to Eddy’s test. He leans in, just an inch or two, for a better look. Then he goes back to his own test and writes.

I watch Carter do this four times in a row. Then he doesn’t do it for a while. Then, about ten minutes later, I see him do it again, three more times. I look around the room to see if anyone else saw what I saw, but it seems like no one did.

Just me.

I’m so freaked out that I almost forget to finish my test.

CARTER

“Okay! Pencils down! Calculators