When Jomo Rodger’s junior varsity football teammates give out goofy trophies at the end of the season, he gets the “If He Was Just a Little Bit taller, He’d Be a Big-Time Baller” award. It’s better than the “Most Likely to be Kicked in the Ass By the Coach” award, but not by much. And of course his best friend Jayson gets the only serious trophy of the bunch: “I Bet That Brother Will be Playing on Any Given Sunday.” Jayson never would be described like Jomo: on the big side of impishness. He’s been gifted with DNA that makes him a nearly effortless team star, and the charisma to back it up. He might as well be wearing the captain’s C on his helmet now, and he’s already got introduction letters from every major college coach out there.
Jayson would never make his best friend feel bad about it, but Jomo knows if he just gained 10 pounds of muscle, he’d be better on the field. A small college might even notice him. Jomo’s dad, the professor, would never understand putting more effort into football, which might risk his straight-A schoolwork, though. And Jomo doesn’t have Jayson’s God-given football star DNA—even with early-morning weight training during the summer, he can’t seem to get built as fast as he wants to. He’s gone over the approved list of shakes and supplements from the health store. His trainer calls them a shortcut. But Jomo is sick of getting the “You’d be good, if only” awards and the “If only you applied yourself” talks from the coach. If he wants to get noticed, then he should take the shortcut. He can always cut back later. And not the halfway shortcut—everyone knows there’s only one way to get real results. Now he just needs to find out where to get the juice.
The big side of impish? Nobody will call him that anymore. Jomo Rodgers is going to be a shooting star.
In his new book, Fredrick McKissack, Jr. gets the locker room language right, brings the adrenaline out in his descriptions of play on the field, and doesn’t turn away from what happens when teens make questionable choices.
No comments:
Post a Comment