Benched Read online

  By Rich Wallace for younger readers:

  Sports Camp

  Kickers

  #1: The Ball Hogs

  #2: Fake Out

  #3: Benched

  #4: Game-Day Jitters

  THIS IS A BORZOI BOOK PUBLISHED BY ALFRED A. KNOPF

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Text copyright © 2010 by Rich Wallace

  Illustrations copyright © 2010 by Jimmy Holder

  All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Alfred A. Knopf, an imprint of Random House Children’s Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.

  Knopf, Borzoi Books, and the colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

  Visit us on the Web! www.randomhouse.com/kids

  Educators and librarians, for a variety of teaching tools, visit us at www.randomhouse.com/teachers

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Wallace, Rich.

  Kickers: benched / Rich Wallace; [illustrated by Jimmy Holder]. — 1st ed.

  p. cm.

  Summary: Nine-year-old Ben learns some lessons in self-control and sportsmanship when his behavior on the soccer field gets him sent to the bench.

  eISBN: 978-0-375-89709-2

  [1. Soccer—Fiction. 2. Sportsmanship—Fiction.] I. Holder, Jimmy, ill. II. Title. III. Title: Benched.

  PZ7.W15877Kg 2010

  [Fic]—dc22

  2009034695

  Random House Children’s Books supports the First Amendment and celebrates the right to read.

  v3.1

  THE BOBCATS

  Team Roster

  Contents

  Cover

  Other Books by this Author

  Title Page

  Copyright

  The Bobcats

  Chapter One - Scraped Up

  Chapter Two - Too Much Thinking

  Chapter Three - Kicked Out

  Chapter Four - No Rewards

  Chapter Five - Big Talk

  Chapter Six - On the Run

  Chapter Seven - The Mascot

  Chapter Eight - Play-off Pressure

  Chapter Nine - Hamburger and Butterfly

  Chapter Ten - More Trash-Talking

  Ben’s Top Tips for Soccer Players

  CHAPTER ONE

  Scraped Up

  ——————

  Ben stared at his quiz paper, trying to remember the capital of Pennsylvania. He knew that it wasn’t Pittsburgh. Was it Scranton?

  He glanced across the aisle at his best friend Erin’s paper, but she hadn’t reached that question yet. So he tried to see all the way across the next aisle to Loop’s.

  “Ben!” his teacher said sharply. “Keep your eyes on your own paper.”

  Ben looked down. He didn’t want to cheat. He just wondered if anyone else was struggling the way he was.

  The last state on the list was New York. He wrote Albany in the space. He was sure he had eight of the ten capitals right, but he’d left Maine blank. Was it Portland? Or was that the capital of Oregon? He just couldn’t concentrate this morning.

  At recess, Ben kept to himself instead of joining his usual game of four square. He hadn’t had enough sleep last night. His parents had been arguing about something until nearly midnight.

  Mom and Dad had been very quiet at breakfast this morning. Ben could tell that something was wrong.

  So he took a seat on a swing and slowly moved back and forth, staring into space and thinking. Usually he’d be running and jumping and burning off energy with the other fourth graders. But right now, he had no energy at all.

  A red ball was rolling quickly past. Ben stopped the swing and put his foot on it. When he looked up, Loop was running toward him.

  Ben picked up the ball and tossed it to Loop, who grabbed it with one hand and bounced it. “What are you doing over here?” Loop asked.

  Ben shrugged. “Just thinking.”

  Loop took a step closer and leaned toward Ben. “Eyes on your own paper!” he said, imitating the teacher.

  Ben frowned. “Very funny.” He and Loop were friends but rivals. They competed hard against each other in sports and games.

  “I thought you were the perfect student,” Loop said. “What did you do, forget to study?”

  “I studied. I was distracted this morning.”

  “Still thinking about that beating we gave your team a few weeks ago?” Loop said with a laugh.

  “Maybe I’m thinking about the beating you’ll be getting if you don’t shut up.” Ben made a fist and held it up.

  Loop raised both hands as if to surrender, but he had a big grin. “Look how scared I am,” he said. “I’m shaking.”

  “Get lost,” Ben said. He pumped his legs hard to get the swing moving again.

  Loop went back to the four-square game. Ben kept swinging. The October sun was warm on his bare arms.

  It was true that Loop’s team had shut out Ben’s team in a Kickers League soccer game. Ben was still sore about it, but that wasn’t the trouble today. Besides, Ben’s team had won its most recent game and was in the chase for a spot in the play-offs. It looked as if the Bobcats would get in if they won two of their last three games.

  “Ben!”

  Ben looked up. Loop was waving him over to the four-square game. “We need you,” he called.

  Ben could see his classmate Nigel sitting on the ground with his head back, pressing on his nose. There was blood seeping through his fingers.

  “What happened?” Ben asked as he walked over.

  “Nigel took a whack in the nose,” Loop said. “We need another player.”

  A teacher came over and helped Nigel to his feet, then led him toward the school. There were drops of blood on the front of Nigel’s shirt.

  “Did he get hit with the ball?” Ben asked.

  Loop shook his head. “The ball was on the line and he and Mark both dived for it.”

  Ben looked at Mark. Mark frowned and rubbed the top of his head.

  “Okay, so what square am I in?” Ben asked.

  “First, of course,” Loop said.

  Ben didn’t feel like playing, but they needed at least four for a game, so he stepped in. Then he noticed Erin walking over, so now there would be five players.

  When Ben looked back, the ball was already coming toward him. He lunged for it, but it bounced in his square and went out-of-bounds.

  “I wasn’t ready for that,” Ben said.

  “Too bad,” Loop said. “You were at the square.”

  “I was here for about half a second!”

  “Doesn’t matter. If you’re at the square, you’re ready.”

  Ben stood still with his mouth hanging open. Then he gave Loop a hard look and stepped to the side of the court. Erin replaced Ben in the first square.

  That was no fun, Ben thought, folding his arms. I might as well go back to the swings.

  But with only five players, he’d be back in the game as soon as this round ended. First chance he had, he’d get back at Loop.

  Mark muffed an easy shot and stepped off the court with a sheepish smile. Erin moved up one square and Ben came back in.

  The ball moved quickly around the court. Ben knocked it into Erin’s square, then returned a volley from Jordan. He was biding his time, waiting for the perfect chance to smack that ball hard into Loop’s square.

  Here it came. Jordan hit the ball softly and it bounced straight up in front of Ben. Ben whipped the side of his hand into the middle of the ball, chopping it on a line drive at Loop. The ball dipped and just barely caught the inside of the square,
then bounced across the playground.

  “You’re out!” Ben said.

  Loop was jogging after the ball, but he turned his head and said, “No way.”

  “Yes way.”

  “No slams allowed,” Loop said. “You know the rules.”

  “That wasn’t a slam,” Ben said. “A slam has to bounce higher than your shoulder.”

  “It did.”

  “No, it didn’t!” Ben took several quick steps to come face to face with Loop. “You’re out,” he said.

  “You’re out.”

  “Quit being a baby,” Ben said, giving Loop a shove.

  Loop shoved back harder.

  Ben was in no mood for talking. He took a swing at Loop, hitting him in the shoulder. Loop swung back but Ben ducked.

  Head down, Ben wrapped his arms around Loop and tackled him to the pavement. Immediately they were circled by dozens of kids, all yelling at once.

  Loop rolled on top of Ben, but Ben dug in with his heels and flipped Loop off of him. Two teachers pushed through the crowd. Mr. Kane grabbed Ben by the shoulders and pulled him away, yelling, “Stop it this instant!”

  Ben shook free and glared at Loop. Loop glared back.

  “That was a clean shot,” Ben said.

  “What was? The slam or the punch?”

  Mr. Kane stepped between them. “Enough!” he said. “Both of you start marching. Right to Mrs. Nolan’s office. Now!”

  The principal’s office. Ben shut his eyes and scowled. Then he looked down and saw that his pants were ripped below the right knee. His arm was scraped from the pavement.

  Loop was scratched up, too.

  Mr. Kane followed them to the office. Ben and Loop sat across from each other in folding chairs. They had to wait a long time.

  Whenever Ben looked up, Loop was staring at him. Loop mouthed the word “jerk” several times and rubbed a fist into his palm when the secretary wasn’t looking. Ben wasn’t scared, but he was still angry.

  When they finally got into the principal’s office, she said, “It seems that there’s been a lot of tension over four square lately.” She looked directly at Ben. “A lot of it has involved you.”

  Ben nodded.

  “Why is that?” she asked.

  Ben jutted his thumb at Loop. “He said I slammed the ball when I didn’t.”

  “That’s not what I care about,” Mrs. Nolan said. “I’ve had several reports of arguments, and now this fight. I don’t expect that from nine-year-olds. A game isn’t worth that kind of distress.”

  Ben looked at the floor and chewed on his lip. Mrs. Nolan told them they’d be staying in for recess for the rest of the week, and there’d be no four square for either of them for another week after that.

  “Now both of you go wash up and get back to class,” she said. “Can I trust you to get along?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Loop said.

  “Yes,” said Ben.

  Loop walked ahead of Ben along the hallway. He stepped into the bathroom and let the door swing back at Ben. Ben caught it with his scraped-up arm and winced.

  There were four sinks. Ben stood at the one farthest from Loop and pushed the soap dispenser, then carefully lathered his arm. He looked into the mirror to see what Loop was up to, but Loop was looking down at the sink.

  Loop finished washing and shook his hands rapidly. Then he cleared his throat and pulled some paper towels out of the dispenser. As he dried his hands, he leaned toward the mirror to inspect a tiny cut below his eye. “Maybe that wasn’t quite a slam,” he said.

  Ben patted his own scrape with a paper towel. “Yeah, well, maybe I should have been ready for that first serve.”

  “Then again,” Loop said, “it probably was a slam. Otherwise I would have returned it.” He turned to Ben and grinned. Then he threw the wad of wet paper towels at him.

  Ben caught the wad and threw it back. It thumped against a metal trash can and fell to the floor.

  “Now that was a slam,” Loop said.

  Ben laughed. “What are we supposed to do all week with no recess? I’ll go nuts just sitting in the classroom.”

  “Me too,” Loop said. “Three days of that.” He shook his head. “That’s what I call distress.”

  CHAPTER TWO

  Too Much Thinking

  —————

  His mom’s car was in the driveway when Ben came home from school. She worked part-time at a bank. Ben arrived at the house before she did a couple of days a week, and he hadn’t expected her to be home today.

  She was waiting in the kitchen as Ben walked in.

  “Hi, Mom!” he said, trying to sound as upbeat as he could. He walked past her and set his knapsack on the table.

  “Come over here,” Mom said. She examined the scrape on Ben’s arm. Then she put her finger under Ben’s chin and tipped his head up. “I had a call from Mrs. Nolan this afternoon.”

  Ben swallowed hard. He looked back down. “Oh,” he said.

  “What’s the problem, mister? You know better than that.”

  Ben shrugged. “It was nothing.”

  “Principals don’t call parents about nothing,” Mom said. “And boys don’t get their clothing and skin cut up from nothing.… I thought Loop was your friend.”

  “He is.”

  “So why were you two fighting?”

  Ben didn’t have an answer for that. He knew he’d been feeling rotten all morning. Surprisingly, he’d felt much better after the fight.

  “No answer?” Mom asked.

  “Nope.”

  “Then you’d better spend the rest of the afternoon in your room,” she said. “You think about why you were fighting. And think about why you shouldn’t.”

  “I already spent the whole day thinking about it,” Ben said.

  “Well, go think some more.”

  Ben lay on his bed with a rubber ball, tossing it toward the ceiling with one hand and catching it with the other. He tried to get the ball as close to the ceiling as he could without actually hitting it.

  Tired of that, he opened his dresser and took out the standings for the town soccer league.

  Ben’s team—the Bobcats—would be playing the Tigers on Saturday. The Tigers had won the first time they’d met, back in the opening game of the season. Ben’s team had improved a lot since then, but they needed to keep winning. Only the first two teams in each division would qualify for the league play-offs.

  Ben glanced out his window. The sun was still shining. He wished he was outside shooting baskets or kicking his soccer ball around the yard.

  He heard a knock on his door.

  “What?” Ben said sharply.

  “It’s me.” It was Ben’s older brother, Larry, who was thirteen.

  “Oh.”

  Larry opened the door. “Heard you had a fight, knucklehead,” he said. “Let’s see that arm.”

  Ben held it up. Larry whistled. “That’s a nasty scab,” he said. “I guess I’m the only one in this house who hasn’t been fighting lately.”

  Larry laughed, but Ben didn’t think that was very funny. “What was that all about last night?” he asked softly.

  Larry shook his head. “I don’t know. Mom and Dad were talking about the bills while I was watching TV. It wasn’t until after I went to bed that it got heated.”

  “They never fight,” Ben said.

  “Everybody does. You just don’t notice it much because adults fight quietly.” Larry smiled. “Unlike you.”

  Ben scowled. “That was nothing. Me and Loop get mad at each other all the time. It doesn’t mean a thing.”

  “I know. But take some advice: If you’re going to get in a fistfight, do it on the grass.”

  Ben twisted his arm so he could look at his scrape again. Most of it had started to scab up, but there were still a few scratches that were raw. “There isn’t any grass on the playground,” he said.

  “You could have walked ten feet to the field.”

  “Sometimes you can’t delay it.”


  “Why not?” Larry asked.

  “A teacher would have seen what was happening and broken it up. Loop shoved me. What else was I supposed to do?”

  Larry shrugged. “Whatever you say.” He sat on the edge of Ben’s bed and picked up the ball. He threw it to Ben, who tossed it toward the ceiling again.

  “I wouldn’t worry too much about last night,” Larry said. “Mom and Dad were just working something out, I guess. I heard them say something about credit cards.”

  “They sure were loud about it.”

  Larry stood up. “Yeah,” he said. He put his hand on the doorknob but didn’t turn it. “I’ve never heard them yell that much. But like I said, I wouldn’t worry about it any more than I would about your elbow. Things like that usually heal pretty fast. Then you forget about it and start over.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  Kicked Out

  —————

  Ben stared into his cereal bowl on Saturday morning. The flakes were soggy, so he just stirred them around in the milk.

  “You’d better eat,” Mom said. “You’ll have no energy for the game if you don’t.”

  “Can I have something else?” Ben asked quietly. His parents had been arguing again and he had no appetite.

  “You could have a banana.”

  Ben had tried not to listen last night. The argument had something to do with money again. They hadn’t been yelling this time, but he could tell from their tone that they didn’t agree at all.

  “Your father will drive you to the game,” Mom said.

  “Aren’t you coming?”

  “I’d like to, but I have to work at the bank this morning,” Mom said, patting Ben on the shoulder.

  “You never work on Saturdays.”

  Mom frowned. “I’ll be working one Saturday each month, starting today.”

  Dad was quiet in the car on the way to the field. He chewed on his lip and looked straight ahead. Ben tried to think about soccer. This was a huge game for the Bobcats.

  Ben was late. Both teams were already on the field, with the Tigers in their orange shirts warming up near one goal and the Bobcats at the other, in blue. Ben slammed the car door and sprinted to join his teammates.