Miracle on 49th Street Page 15

  He’d come here?

  Without even giving her a heads-up?

  She took a deep breath, then looked at the seats by the other basket where Mr. Ford was pointing, deciding how she wanted to play it when he saw her looking up at him.

  Only it wasn’t the him Molly thought it was.

  “Miss Miss!” a familiar high-pitched voice boomed out from the upper seats, in Prescott’s old-fashioned gym.

  Molly smiled.

  There was L. J. Brown waving at her.

  And Mattie.

  Molly couldn’t help herself. She ran straight down the court, past the players on the Bartlett team, and jumped right into L.J.’s arms.

  She hadn’t been this happy to see anybody—with the exception of Sam Bloom—since she’d put her game face on and kept it on after New York.

  L.J. squeezed her tight and said, “Looks like Miss Miss has been missin’ me as much as I’ve been missin’ her.”

  “More,” she said.

  She pulled back her head and looked over at Mattie, who winked.

  Molly said, “What’re you guys doing here?”

  “Mattie told me what happened.”

  Molly gave Mattie a raised eyebrow. Sam said it was one of her best looks, right up there with the innocent look she’d give teachers when she’d get Sam giggling in the back of class sometimes. “Told you what?”

  “She just said the star made you mad, so mad you run off on him in New York. And that now you don’t want to come around anymore.”

  Mattie winked again, then made a motion like she was zipping her lips.

  “I thought you guys had a game in Cleveland tonight,” Molly said.

  “Game’s here, Miss Miss. Thought you knew the schedule by heart.”

  “But usually when they give you a back-to-back, you have the home game first. Or they’re both on the road.”

  “Schedule maker gave you a little head fake there, didn’t he?”

  Molly said, “Maybe I was just more worried about my game than yours.”

  He laughed his laugh. “Maybe I am, too.”

  “So Mattie told you about my game, too?”

  “I called the star ’bout this appearance we got tomorrow at the State House,” he said. “Mattie answered. I said, ‘Whassup with my girl?’ Meanin’ you. Mattie told me about New York first, then she said, wait a second, let me check something, my girl might have a school game today.”

  “You know my schedule?” Molly said to Mattie.

  “Along with everything else,” Mattie said.

  “Molly!” Mr. Ford yelled from down in front of the Prescott bench. “Would it be rude or some kind of imposition if I asked you to join us?”

  “Be right there, Coach,” she yelled. Into L.J.’s ear she whispered, “Behave. I mean it.”

  “What?” he said, acting offended. “You think I don’t know what manners to put on at Miss Miss’s School for Good Girls and Boys?”

  She jumped down and sprinted back down the court. Feeling pumped for the game now. Feeling better about things than she had since she got back from New York. In the huddle Mr. Ford said, “L. J. Brown is a friend of yours?”

  Molly gave him and her teammates her best possible no-biggie shrug.

  “We go way back,” she said.

  After that, Bartlett had no chance against Miss Miss’s School for Good Girls and Boys. It wasn’t just that Molly played her best game, by far, with L.J. and Mattie watching. It was more than that.

  On this day, Molly was doing things on the court she didn’t even know she could do.

  She wasn’t showing off. Well, maybe a little bit. There might have been a couple of passes where she looked one way and threw the ball the other. And maybe a couple of Josh Cameron step-back shots when she might have held her arm up in the air a second extra, the way she did when she was playing H-O-R-S-E with L.J.

  But in Molly’s mind, it was all right. It wasn’t so much the showing off as having someone to finally show off for, that’s the way she looked at it.

  Prescott was ahead by twenty points at halftime. She went up and got L.J. then, because the two coaches had decided it would be a cool thing for him to come down and sign autographs for the players on both teams. And the teachers who had suddenly appeared out of nowhere. And the moms and dads and siblings in the gym.

  Even Kimmy Evans had shown up after ballet.

  “Okay, it’s official,” Kimmy said. “I want to be you when I grow up.”

  Was she being sarcastic? Or just Kimmy? It was one of those times when Molly wasn’t sure.

  “No, you don’t,” Molly said.

  “What, you don’t think I’d make a good team mascot for the Celtics?”

  “I’m not their mascot,” Molly said. “I’m not their anything these days.”

  Kimmy gave a little nod at L.J. “Could’ve fooled me,” she said, and got into the autograph line.

  When L.J. finished, he came over and sat down with Molly behind the Prescott bench. “Gonna call you Star from now on,” he said.

  “I’ve learned from the best,” she said.

  “J.C., you mean.”

  “Uh uh,” Molly said. “I learned my best moves from L.J.”

  He put out his hand so she could give him five and said, “That’s what I’m talkin’ about!”

  By the time the fourth quarter started, Prescott was ahead by thirty and Mr. Ford had ordered Molly and her teammates to pass the ball at least five times before they even thought about shooting. And had told Molly to stop shooting entirely, which was fine with her. Halfway through the quarter, he finally took her out for good. And for this one very awesome moment, Molly felt like one of the Celtics, one of those games when they had such a big lead that Coach Gubbins would take out his first stringers one at a time, so each one of them could get a cheer all to himself.

  She was worried that L.J. might make a fuss, being L.J. But he still had his manners on. He applauded along with the other people in the gym. When Molly caught his eye, he just smiled and nodded. She noticed that Sam was with him. He stuck two fingers in his mouth and whistled, just to make sure Molly, and everyone else, knew he was in the house.

  When she changed back into her school clothes after the game—no girl on the team had ever taken a shower after a game that Molly knew about—L.J. and Mattie and Sam were waiting for her in the gym.

  Mattie said, “I called Miz Evans, and she said she’d call Sam’s mom. L.J. and me will run you both home.”

  Sam answered for both of them, of course. “We’re good with that.”

  The Prescott School was on Exeter Street, around the corner from where Niketown was on Newbury. L.J.’s own Navigator—bright red—was parked right in front of Niketown, as if the No Parking sign was a meter. He pointed his keys at it, and the doors unlocked.

  Molly opened the back door on the sidewalk side.

  Before she could get in, Josh Cameron stepped out.

  “You’re not the only one who can stow away in somebody’s car,” he said.

  Molly shook her head.

  “You don’t give up, do you?” she said.

  He said, “Where do you think I get it from?”

  CHAPTER 23

  They all stood on the sidewalk until Sam said, “I’ll sit over by the window. Mols, you can get in the middle in the back.”

  Molly thought about going right back into the school and calling Barbara, but she knew it wouldn’t do any good, so she got in next to Sam.

  Mattie sat up front with L.J.

  “You guys knew about this?” Molly said.

  “I did,” L.J. said.

  “And you helped him out …because?”

  “Because I’m a good teammate,” he said.

  “You’re my friend,” Molly said.

  “His, too,” L.J. said. “And his first.”

  “What about you, Mattie?” Molly said.

  “You two need to talk this out,” Mattie said. “So we’re gonna go home so you can talk it ou
t. Then whatever you decide after that—and I mean you, little girl—that’s just fine with me.”

  L.J. turned around. He still hadn’t turned the key in the ignition. “It’s the right thing for everybody, little girl.” He put up one of his huge hands. “I know, I know, you don’t think you’re little. But you are to me.”

  L.J. looked hard at her now and said, “Fathers and daughters need to talk.”

  Molly whipped her head to the side and looked at Josh. He shook his head.

  Then she looked at Mattie. “Did you tell?” L.J. said, “Nobody had to tell me, Miss Miss. It was me told them.”

  Quietly, Sam said, “We’re having some fun now.”

  “I got eyes,” L.J. said.

  Molly slumped in her seat. “This isn’t a fair fight,” she said.

  To Josh she said, “Do you have anything to say?”

  “Just waiting my turn.”

  Mattie turned all the way around in her seat, reached over the armrest, and offered her hand, which looked like it could have fit into L.J.’s hand the way a penny would have. Molly took it. As usual, Mattie’s hand felt as warm as the inside of a soft glove.

  “We’ve gone way past what’s fair and what’s not in this world, haven’t we?” she said.

  Now L.J. turned the key and put the Navigator in gear.

  They dropped off Sam first. By the time they got to Two Commonwealth, it was five-thirty and getting dark, the kind of dark at that time of day that made you know how fast winter was coming on.

  Josh and Mattie got out first. Molly just sat there in the backseat.

  L.J. turned around and smiled at her one last time and said, “Behave.”

  She got out. As she and Josh and Mattie got into the elevator, Molly said to Josh without looking at him, “Shouldn’t you be at the game by now?”

  “It’s late, because it’s on TNT tonight,” he said. “So we’ve got some time.”

  “Maybe you do,” Molly said, staring straight ahead and looking at the numbers. “I’ve got a paper due.”

  “You’re not going to make this easy, are you?” Josh said.

  “It’s like L.J. always says,” Molly said, still watching the floor numbers, like it was the most interesting thing she was going to see all day. “It is what it is.”

  She almost blurted out in the elevator, right as the doors were about to open on the first floor of his place, that she was moving to Los Angeles and what did any of this really matter?

  But she didn’t. If this was it for the two of them, she might as well hear him out. She pretty much knew what she wanted to say to him. Which was basically that nothing he was going to say was going to change her mind. Her mom had always told her to trust her heart. And even that first day, when he had peeled rubber and left her there in the parking lot, she knew in her heart—a part of it, anyway—that he didn’t want her around.

  When they all got inside, Mattie said she was going to leave the two of them alone, but did Molly want anything, a snack or a drink, before she went upstairs?

  There wasn’t a single time Molly had ever been here when Mattie didn’t act as if Molly must have just gone three or four days without eating and might be starting a hunger strike.

  “You know what I’d really like?” Molly said. “A ride home.”

  “I’ll take you when we’re done,” Josh said. “We can ride over or walk.”

  “Mattie can take me.”

  To Mattie Josh said, “We’ll figure this out later and call you.”

  He went to the kitchen, came back with one of those small bottles of Coke, because he knew Coke in a small bottle was Molly’s favorite.

  “I’m not thirsty,” she said.

  “Just in case you get thirsty,” he said.

  “Why are we here?”

  “Because Mattie’s right,” he said. “The way she’s always right.” He gave her one of his lopsided grins, where it was like one half of his mouth tried to fall right off his face. “The way your mom was always right.”

  “Right about you,” Molly said. “She didn’t want to be with you in the end, and she didn’t want me to be with you ever. I should’ve listened to her.”

  “Me too,” he said. “Listened to her, I mean.”

  “About what?” Molly said.

  “Believing in stuff,” he said.

  Molly knew how big her mom was on believing, and how if you did, you could make things come true. She believed and kept believing, even when she had to know she was wasting her time believing she was going to get better.

  “Mom thought faith was like magic,” Molly said.

  She looked out the window. The tallest trees in the Public Garden were swaying, almost in slow motion, in a big wind. Josh didn’t seem to be in any hurry to get to his game, and so she wasn’t going to worry about it. It was like L.J. had said once, that the only “on time” that mattered with Josh Cameron was “game time.”

  “Your mom told me once,” he said, “that if I’d just believe we’d always be together, then we’d always be together.”

  “Then you blew it.”

  “Yeah,” he said. “I blew it.”

  Molly had been watching the trees and the lights beyond them while she talked to him. Now she took a sip of Coke, right out of the bottle. It was still cold.

  “That’s all you have to say?” Molly said. “You blew it?”

  Josh said, “I didn’t figure out until after she was gone that she was pretty much the best thing that had ever happened to me.”

  “I never asked you before. How come you never went after her?”

  “The truth?”

  “No,” she said, “lie to me a little more.”

  “Wow,” he said.

  “Yeah,” Molly said. “Wow.”

  “It was my stupid ego,” he said. “My jock ego. She didn’t want me? Fine. Then I didn’t want her.”

  Now Molly was watching him. Almost like I’m guarding him, she thought to herself. Waiting for him to fake her out again, the way he had just about every single step of the way.

  But she wasn’t letting her guard down for a second.

  Even if he actually seemed to mean what he was saying for once.

  “She was gone,” he said, “and I was in the pros.”

  “You had turned into Jooooooosh Cammmmmmmmeron!” Molly said, trying to say his name the way the announcer at the Banknorth Garden did.

  “Pretty much,” he said. “We weren’t just living in different countries, it was like we were living in whole different worlds. And I didn’t know what to do about that. So I ended up doing nothing.”

  Molly said, “And now, what, I’m supposed to feel sorry for you?”

  “You? Never in a million years.”

  “’Cause I don’t.”

  He put his feet up on the coffee table, which would have made Mattie yell at him. She noticed he was wearing new sneakers. Nikes for a change. Molly had to admit they were cool-looking.

  “We have more in common than you think,” he said.

  “Right.”

  “No, really. We both figured out a way to live without your mom.”

  “I haven’t,” Molly said.

  “You have,” he said. “More than you think, anyway.”

  “I’m never going to.” She took another big swallow of Coke, squeezed her eyes shut.

  A way to stop tears before they started.

  “Listen,” he said.

  “I’m all ears.”

  “I’m not saying things between us could ever be the way you want them to be.”

  Molly cut him off.

  “You don’t want them to be anything,” she said. “I heard you that day in New York. You’ve just been trying to buy yourself some time, or whatever, to figure out a nice way to get me out of your hair. And don’t tell me you were just saying that, or you can call up to Mattie right now.”

  “Okay. I won’t.”

  “Just so we’re clear.”

  “Crystal.” He leaned forwar
d on the couch. “But I got clear on something else the last couple of weeks,” he said. “I kind of like having you around.”

  “Wow,” she said, mimicking the way he had said it. “What a compliment.”

  “I mean it.”

  “Even when you were with me,” Molly said, “you weren’t with me.”

  “That’s not true.”

  “I was there, remember? Or maybe you didn’t notice, on account of you were on your cell. Planning your escape route.”

  “I was trying to figure it out.”

  “You weren’t trying at all.”

  “You’re wrong,” he said. “If I wasn’t trying, you wouldn’t have been hanging around in the first place.”

  She looked at him. Really looked at him. Watching for one of his fakes. For him to start messing around with his hair.

  But he didn’t.

  All of a sudden she didn’t want to tell him there was no point to this. Because they were doing what Mattie wanted them to do, which meant really talking about stuff. The way they had only one other time, when they were walking back to the hotel from Wollman Rink.

  And how did things work out that time? she was thinking.

  “Molly?” he said.

  “Huh?”

  “Where’d you go? I think I lost you there for a second.”

  “You lost me a while ago.”

  “I don’t think so. If I did, you wouldn’t be here with me now.”

  Her head was starting to spin again. She had enough to think about for one day.

  “I need to go,” she said.

  “Yeah,” he said. “With me. To the game.”

  “It’s going to end too late.”

  “Only makes it better.”

  For once, he was right.

  Barbara wasn’t thrilled with the idea, because of when the game was starting and because they’d sprung the plan on her so late, but in the end she decided to let Molly go. Knew she had to, for Molly’s sake.

  “Be careful, though,” she said. “He’s just trying to turn on the old charm.”

  “I’m not making a big deal out of it,” Molly said.

  “We’ll see,” Barbara said.

  We’ll see, Molly knew by now, was part of some code for grown-ups, where they said that instead of what they really wanted to say, which was that you had no idea what you were talking about.