Stand-Off by Andrew Smith Page B

tottered along, grunting from the weight of the bottle carriers, which probably doubled gravity’s pull on him.
    And somehow the Abernathy had managed to appear there at the big metal double doors to the locker room at the start of practice every day since becoming manager, dressed in baggy shorts and a Pine Mountain Rugby Football Club hoodie big enough to function as his sleeping bag. I never asked him about it—because, you know, I don’t actually converse with the larva—but I had to wonder if he made Coach M or the rest of the staff leave the locker room at the end of lunch so he could change into his adorable little manager’s costume.
    The guys on the team instantly adopted the Abernathy as a sort of mascot, too. They couldn’t help themselves; after all, the kid gave off this fluffy-baby-chick-in-an-Easter-basket vibe that kind of made you want to hold him inside your cupped hands. Until he ran out of oxygen, in my case.
    But I had to be nice at practice. Well, at least I had to not be mean, since I was captain and had to set an example of all the ethical andresponsible stuff that frequently went against my gut instincts.
    Spotted John walked in front of me and rubbed the Abernathy’s head. That was something else everyone on the team did too. Every day on the way into the locker room and on our way out at the end of practice, all the guys rubbed Sam’s hair and called him Snack-Pack. JP Tureau seemed to take pleasure in pointing out at any opportunity how Snack-Pack Abernathy also happened to be my roommate.
    â€œHow’s it hanging, Snack-Pack?” Spotted John said.
    â€œHi, Spotted John. What happened to your pants, Ryan Dean?” the Abernathy annoyingly persisted in his investigation into my trousers.
    I fantasized about putting Snack-Pack Abernathy in a chokehold and washboarding my knuckles on his head with enough friction to start a fire. But Captain Ryan Dean outmuscled Immature Ryan Dean. And, speaking of this inner struggle, I was absolutely convinced that Immature Ryan Dean was far more likely to go skinny-dipping with Annie Altman than Captain Ryan Dean, who responsibly and wholeheartedly embraced Mrs. Blyleven’s all-boys Health class Ten Commandments to My Penis.
    â€œThere’s a wolverine back there by the soccer field,” I said. “It tried to tear my leg off.”
    I winced and looked away as I touched the Abernathy’s dirty little-boy hair. You know, rituals and customs, you have to do them in rugby, even if they’re completely disgusting.
    â€œReally?”
    â€œNo. Not really. And stop talking to me.”
    And while I was getting changed into my rugby stuff, our little manager-fetus told on me. Not because I was mean to him; the Abernathy told Coach M that Captain Ryan Dean was bleeding from his kneecap, which meant I had to go back inside the coaching office and allow manager-grub Sam Abernathy to clean and tape up my cut, since there are very strict laws against playing rugby while hemorrhaging from open wounds and stuff, and taping up semidetached body parts was one of the things rugby managers sometimes had to do, along with collecting up all the dirty uniforms and towels from the locker room floor at the end of a game.
    Why anyone would volunteer to do such a thing mystified me, and I refused to consider—as Annie had theorized—that Sam Abernathy only volunteered to manage the rugby team because it was his singular mission to become friends with me.
    I’d told her he was more likely trying to give me a burst blood vessel in my brain.
    And the Abernathy’s hands were too small for medical gloves. When he put them on, it looked as though skin was dripping like melted wax from the ends of his tiny baby fingers. He even got one of the fingertips stuck beneath the pressure wrap when he wound it around my knee.
    â€œSo, how did you do this, again?” Sam Abernathy asked.
    â€œI told you. A