The World's Greatest Underachiever Is the Ping-Pong Wizard Read online

  There was nothing I could do about it, so I settled down on one knee and tried to look like I was comfortable in that position. All I kept thinking about was why you had to be on one knee. Wouldn’t it be so much more comfortable to sit on your rump, which has built-in cushions? I guess it’s because “All right, players, take a rump” doesn’t sound very sporty.

  “This is all-inclusive football,” Coach Gilroy began, “so as of now, all you men are on the team. You’re the Green Hornets. What are you?”

  “Green Hornets!” everyone shouted. His son Patrick, a tall kid with bright blond hair, was shouting the loudest.

  “I can’t hear you!” Coach Gilroy shouted back.

  “Green Hornets!” we shouted even louder.

  “What’s the matter, cat got your tongue?”

  “Green Hornets!” I shouted so loud, I thought my tonsils were going to fly out of my throat.

  “That’s more like it, men,” Coach Gilroy said. “Now listen up and listen good. What we’re going to do at these tryouts is assess your skill level so I know how to play you. I’ll be watching each of you very carefully.”

  I am not liking the sound of this. Truth time: I am hating the sound of this.

  “Take a look around,” the coach said. “See the red and black team? They’re the Avengers. The gold and blue team? They’re the Earthquakes. The orange and white team? They’re the Thunder Clouds. We’re here for one purpose and one purpose only: to beat them all. Are you with me?”

  We all said yes.

  “That was a wimpy yes, men.”

  “Yes, sir,” we all shouted. Patrick was shouting so loud, his face had gone purple.

  Wow, this Coach Gilroy was one tough guy. I wondered what it was like living at his house. Patrick probably has to do push-ups before dinner, march in a straight line to bed and, before he falls asleep, shout good night in a really loud, manly voice.

  Coach Gilroy pointed at Frankie. “You, what’s your name?”

  “Frankie Townsend.”

  “Are you with me, Frankie Townsend?”

  “I’m with ya all the way,” Frankie answered.

  Oh man, that Frankie. He even sounded like an athlete.

  “You,” Coach Gilroy said, pointing his big, fleshy finger at me. “What’s your name?”

  “Hank Zipzer,” I said. “With a Z. Actually with two Zs.”

  “This isn’t a spelling contest, Zipzer. I’m here to know if you’re with me. Now, are you?”

  “Coach, if I were any more with you, I’d be attached to your shoe.”

  The other guys on the team started to laugh. I could hear Nick McKelty laughing louder than the rest, like a hippo snorting.

  “There’s always one,” Coach Gilroy said. “The funny guy. OK, funny guy, let’s see if you dribble as well as you joke. On your feet.”

  Before I could even stand up, he passed me the ball his left foot was resting on. It hit me on the outside of the ankle, which isn’t exactly the first move you want to show your coach.

  I looked down at that ball and desperately tried to make friends with it.

  Come on, please, Mr Ball. Just this once. Stick close to my foot.

  There was a line of orange cones set up in front of us.

  “All right, let me see you dribble that ball round each cone. Keep it sharp. Go!”

  I froze. It was as though he had said, “Stand still and don’t move a muscle.” If he had only said that, I would have been perfect. I stood there like one of the bronze statues in the park.

  “Zip,” I heard Frankie say. “Breathe. Oxygen is power.”

  I took a deep breath.

  “Good, now dribble.”

  “OK, Zipzer with a Z, what are you waiting for? The grass to grow?”

  I took off, keeping the ball close to my feet by tapping it ever so lightly, first with one foot, then the other. I wanted to control the ball. The last thing I wanted was for the ball to take off without me.

  Good, Hank. You’re round the first cone. OK, this isn’t going so badly. Just slowly.

  I was proud of myself. Apparently, Coach Gilroy wasn’t.

  “Could you go any slower, funny guy? The polar ice cap could melt by the time you’ve got round two cones.”

  The team laughed. I could hear McKelty laughing the loudest, naturally.

  Don’t look up, Hank. And don’t listen. You need to concentrate. One foot, then the other. One cone, then the next. Focus. Concentrate.

  All of a sudden I heard the blast of a whistle from somewhere across the field. Before I could stop my head, it had turned almost by itself, following the sound of the whistle. My feet, however, were moving in the opposite direction. Bam! I tripped over the ball, fell on the cone, and landed face down in the grass. I was eye to eye with a line of ants carrying a leaf to their anthill. I wished I could join them. Carrying is something I can do.

  “You’ve got to learn to focus, Zipzer,” Coach Gilroy said.

  “If I could, I would, sir,” I said.

  “Are you being a smart alec?”

  “No, sir. Focusing is one of my problems.”

  “Well, you’d better fix that if you want to play on this team,” he said. “Now get over yourself, and get to the back of the line.”

  I had never been so relieved to go to the back of the line. It was safe there.

  “Who thinks he can show Zipzer how it’s done?”

  Of course one hand shot up in the air. It was Nick McKelty’s.

  “What’s your name?” Coach Gilroy asked him.

  “Nick McKelty,” he said. “But you can call me Striker. See this foot? It only knows how to kick goals.”

  “You’ve got a lot of confidence, McKelty.”

  “You would, too, if you had been trained by the uncle of the first cousin of the Brazilian football team’s cook. I got connections, big-time.”

  “Good for you,” Coach Gilroy said. “Let’s see if you can connect your foot to the ball.”

  Nick the Tick placed the ball in between his size-twelve feet. He kicked the ball and took off towards the first cone, but instead of going round it, he knocked it down like a bowling pin.

  “The object is to go round the cones, McKelty, not through them,” Coach Gilroy shouted.

  McKelty was as graceful as an elephant on ice skates. He knocked down every single cone, his big, floppy feet kicking up clumps of grass and mud as he went down the line. It was ugly. But, as usual, McKelty was proud of himself. The guy has no idea how clumsy he is.

  “How’d you like that, coach?” He grinned when he had finally finished.

  “I didn’t,” Coach Gilroy said. “What do I have here? All the rejects from the girls’ team?”

  That was a nasty remark. I thought of Ashley and what a great football player she is. Coach Gilroy should only be so lucky to get a girl player like Ashley.

  “Is there anyone who can handle a ball?” I heard him say.

  Matthew Barbarosa raised his hand. “I volunteer Frankie Townsend,” he said. “He’s good at everything in and out of the classroom.”

  “I’ll be the judge of that,” Coach Gilroy said. “Hey, Zipzer, set up the cones so Townsend can take a try.”

  Set up the cones? Oh yeah, now there’s something I can do. And I can do it fast too.

  Frankie got up and bent over to touch his toes, which is all he needs to do to warm up. Coach Gilroy tossed him a ball, which Frankie caught on his knee and let drop in between his feet. With almost no effort at all, he dribbled the ball in and out of the orange cones, making sharp little turns and keeping low to the ground. When he reached the last cone, he turned the ball round and came back down the line, taking half as much time to do both as I had done to complete one.

  Everyone applauded. Even Ashley’s mum, Dr Wong, had looked up from her reading to watch Frankie. He was something to see.

  Coach Gilroy nodded and wrote something down on his clipboard. It probably said something like, “That Townsend kid is great.”

/>   I wondered what he’d written about me on his clipboard. Probably something like, “That Zipzer kid is great at setting up cones.”

  Which, when I think about it, is pretty much my best football skill.

  For the rest of the practice, Coach Gilroy gave a long motivational speech about how we were no longer individuals but part of a winning team. And he must have pointed out at least six times that there is no “I” in “team”.

  As for me, I was trying to concentrate on what he was saying, but other things just kept rolling around in my mind.

  Ten Things That Roll Around In Your Mind When Your Coach Is Making a Motivational Speech

  1. I wonder what’s for dinner. Whatever it is, I hope it involves French fries.

  2. If French fries could talk, would they have a French accent?

  3. If I had two tongues, would I still be able to whistle?

  4. I wonder if red ants are really red, or are they just sunburnt?

  5. What would people look like if they had ankles where their knees are and knees where their ankles are?

  6. What’s the point of hair growing in your nose? Is it supposed to keep the inside of your nose warm?

  7. Will they ever change the name of New York City to Old York City? I mean, it’s not really that new any more.

  8. If pickles were blue, would I still like to eat them?

  9. What if balls were square, would they still—

  “Zipzer, did you hear anything I said?”

  “Oh yes, Coach Gilroy. Every word. And it was so interesting.”

  When you’ve had a bad day at school, followed by a bad day at football tryouts, I think you should at least be able to come home and enjoy a great dinner. Say, a juicy burger, some crispy fries drenched in ketchup, maybe a big frothy chocolate milkshake. Finish with a dessert that leaves whipped cream all over your face – like banoffee pie or black cherry jelly. Yeah, that’s a great bandage on a bad day.

  In my house, there is no such thing as a hamburger and fries dinner. My mum runs The Crunchy Pickle deli, which when Papa Pete ran it served great food. But when my mum took it over, she promised to bring deli meats into what she calls “the realm of healthy eating”. So at my house, we have healthy dinners that alternate between the realms of taste-free and taste-bad.

  “Come to the table, everyone,” my mum called that night. “Dinner’s ready.”

  I leaped like a gazelle out of my desk chair, down the hall, across the living room and into my dining-room chair. My mum was just coming out of the kitchen carrying a steaming plate.

  “Hope you don’t mind being guinea pigs,” she said. “It’s a new recipe.”

  A new recipe? Oh boy. She hasn’t even got the old ones right yet.

  Even though I tried to keep a straight face, my dad must have seen my nose twitch because he shot me one of his Stern Dad looks.

  “Hank, your mother is being adventurous,” he said. “Replace that smirk with a smile.”

  Sure, that’s easy for him to say. He wasn’t counting on dinner being the highlight of a very, very bad day. And besides, we all know that he keeps a stash of chocolate bars on his bedside table to make up for adventurous dinners.

  “What have you cooked up, my darling daughter?” Papa Pete asked. My grandpa was there for dinner, which is a good thing because he’s a very fun guy.

  “Maybe it’s better if we don’t know,” I said. My dad shot me another look.

  “Hank, you have to learn to be supportive of other people’s creativity,” Emily said in her Miss-Know-It-All voice, which by the way is her only voice. My mum did look pretty excited to present her new dish, and I decided to put on my most positive attitude.

  “OK, Mum, tell us all about it,” I said. “Spare no details.”

  “This is a festival of tofu,” my mum said, gesturing to the plate that was filled with a beige, watery mess. “I’ve prepared it in three different ways: braised tofu with curried mango, shredded tofu with strained prunes, and steamed tofu in its natural juices.”

  Let me just say right now for the record, its natural juices smelled like McKelty’s bad breath.

  “So, Emily, since you’re so supportive of creativity, let’s see you take the first helping.” I gave her a big smile and passed the plate to her.

  “Oh, I just remembered,” she stammered. “I had a big snack at Robert’s house before dinner and, wow, am I full.”

  “Maybe Katherine would like some,” my mum said. “She always enjoys my cooking.”

  Katherine, the queen of the pet iguanas, usually sits on Emily’s shoulder during our family dinners because my sister can’t stand to be apart from reptiles for even a second.

  My mum put a helping of the steamed tofu in its natural juices on Emily’s plate. Katherine’s long, grey tongue shot out of her mouth and snatched up a chunk of it. I thought she was going to swallow it, but suddenly, she flicked her tongue sideways and shot the tofu chunk against the window behind me. It stuck like it had suction cups.

  I glanced over at Papa Pete and saw him biting his lower lip, the one that you can barely see because of his bushy moustache. He always does that when he wants to laugh but isn’t supposed to.

  “Emily, you know we don’t tolerate food throwing at the table,” my dad said. “Would you please remove the lizard and take her back to your room.”

  “She has a name, Dad, and you know it very well,” Emily said.

  “Yeah, Dad,” I chimed in. “It’s Big Kathy, the food slinger.”

  I could see Emily starting to get steaming mad. In fact, she looked like the steaming tofu, with smoke coming out of her ears.

  “Everyone, settle down,” my mum said. “No one has even tried the tofu yet. Give it a chance.”

  She dished up a big dollop of it to all of us. Papa Pete took the first bite because he’s brave and he’s nice too. He tried the shredded tofu with strained prunes. He rolled it around in his mouth for a while, then took a big gulp of water to help it slide as quickly as possible down his throat.

  “That is something my mouth has never experienced before,” he said. “And it was quite an experience. Yes, it was.”

  The rest of the family tucked in. I put a chunk of tofu on my fork, but I didn’t have the guts to pop it in my mouth. Papa Pete caught my eye. “Just push it around on the plate,” he whispered. “I brought your favourite snack for later.”

  I knew exactly what it was. A giant, crunchy dill pickle.

  “So, Hank, tell us all how the football tryouts went,” my mum said as she chomped down on a big bite of her braised tofu with curried mango. There’s nothing she loves more than having a family dinner with lots of conversation. I have never understood why sitting round a table talking is so much fun for adults, but I know it is.

  Before I could answer, my dad chimed in.

  “I’m so proud of you, Hank, for trying out for the football team. It’s a great sport. I don’t know if I ever told you, but I played it myself as a boy. As a matter of fact, I might even have my shin pads in the storage room in the basement. Want to borrow them?”

  I don’t know which was worse. The badbreath tofu on my plate, or the idea of my father’s mouldy old shin pads on my legs.

  “Thanks a lot, Dad, but Coach Gilroy told us to get a special kind of shin pad so we can all have the same kind.”

  “Sounds like you’re bonding with your coach,” my dad said, “which is very good, because he’ll give you a lot of playing time. Coaches are people, and they have their favourites.”

  “I might be his favourite, Dad, but my skills are not,” I said, trying to let him down easy.

  “What are you talking about, Hank? You’re fast. I can see you dribbling down that field and kicking those goals.”

  “Dad, all I can tell you is that my brain and my feet are not on the same field. My feet want to dribble, but my brain says no.”

  “You just have to concentrate, that’s all. Focus.”

  There was that word again. Focus. Everyon
e tells me to focus all the time. That word makes me want to throw up. It’s not like I don’t try to focus. I try. I tell my brain to focus, and it runs the other way. Don’t they know how bad it makes me feel that I can’t do it?

  Papa Pete cleared his throat and came to my defence. Thank goodness for Papa Pete.

  “You know, Stan,” he said, “some people are good at one game, other people are good at other games. I, for one, am good at bowling. Not so good at basketball. Maybe Hank should try his hand at some other games.”

  “Pete, that’s the problem here,” my dad said, putting his fork down, which he does when he’s having a Serious Talk. “Hank starts things and doesn’t finish them. If he’s started football and signed up for the team, he’s made a commitment. He can’t let the team down.”

  “Dad, exactly how am I helping the team by sitting on the bench, polishing it with my butt?”

  “Don’t you think you’ll get to play, dear?” my mum asked.

  “I’m the worst one on my team, Mum. And the coach let me know that loud and clear.”

  “But isn’t playing football supposed to be about exercising and running around in the fresh air?” my mum said. “I think the point of playing a game is to play.”

  “If you’re Frankie it is. If you’re me, it’s about setting up the cones. On a good day, I bet I’ll get to carry the ball bag on to the field.”

  “Practice makes perfect, Hank,” my father said, looking me square in the face. “You keep going to practice and trying your best, and the coach will notice you. Coaches reward effort.”

  I wanted to tell him that I sit in Ms Adolf’s class for six hours a day and that’s no fun. And then I go and play football and get yelled at and that’s no fun. I wanted to tell him that I wasn’t having any fun, but my dad was already on to another topic, telling Emily how he was working on the crossword puzzle with his left hand to exercise the other side of his brain.

  So I didn’t say anything. Then I heard something.

  Plop.

  The little chunk of tofu that Katherine had flung on to the window had slid down the window and landed with a plop on the floor. Cheerio, our wonderful pet dachshund, jumped into action, ran to the tofu and lapped it up with glee. Then he let out a happy yip and started chasing his tail in a circle.