There’s nowhere to kick a ball around like we did with Dad at home, so Dad takes us to the park if the weather’s all right. Those are the best times. As long as Dad threatens Wills beforehand that there will be no basketball the next day unless he behaves, it’s good fun, apart from when Wills trips me, which he does too often. I wonder for how long the no basketball threat will work, because Dad uses it all the time.
“If you don’t clean that mess up off the floor, William, there’ll be no basketball tomorrow.” Or, “If you use language like that again, William, there’ll be no basketball in the morning.” Or, “If you don’t do as I say now, William, I shall stop you from going to basketball, and I mean it.”
I don’t think Dad does mean it, because for an hour of the weekend he can leave us to Clingon while he goes home to read the Sunday paper, which is his favorite thing to do on a Sunday. I bet Wills knows Dad doesn’t mean it, but so far he’s not pushing it, which shows he can behave if he wants to. He sometimes sniggers though when he sees Dad is about to make his threat, and he leaps in first.
“I know, Daddy-waddy,” he says. “If Wills isn’t a good little boy, then Big Daddy won’t let him go to basketball. Waahhh!”
When we watch sports at Dad’s, it’s like being at home, except there’s no Mom to bring us a cup of cocoa, and Dad tries not to yell at the television because of the thumping on the ceiling. It’s like being wrapped up in a cocoon in Dad’s tiny living room. It’s all nice and cozy, except when Wills bounces up and down on the sofa or drops food on the floor or swears at the television, which upsets Dad. Then the last place I want to be is in that cocoon, but I think how good it would be if it was just me and Dad in there.
The nighttime is the worst. I bet you nobody could sleep in the same room as Wills. I’ve moved out on to the couch in the living room. At least there I can read myself to sleep without being interrupted every other word. It’s a bit small and every time I turn over the comforter falls off, but anything’s better than hippo snorts. I still get woken up though, when Wills goes for his midnight feast and comes in crunching chips to watch the television. He sits on me because he thinks it’s funny, and showers my bed with soggy crumbs. I try to ignore him and pretend to be asleep when he speaks to me. Eventually he gets bored and goes back to his bed. It takes me ages to get back to sleep then. I lie there, wondering how Mom is and if she’s missing us, or if she would rather be on her own all the time because it’s so peaceful.
Basketball doesn’t get any better for me. I feel like a goat competing with a herd of giraffes. I keep hoping Wills will decide that he doesn’t mind going on his own. NO SUCH LUCK.
“You’re my guardian angel, bro,” he says. “It’s like you’re watching over me.”
He pats me on the head and I push him away. He’s joking, but I know he’s scared of being left on his own with nobody to stick up for him if he goes psycho.
“It’s all right for you,” I moan. “You’re good at basketball. I’m terrible at it, and I feel like a girl next to all of you.”
“You look like a girl when you dribble,” snorts Wills, then he goes all soppy and says he doesn’t mean it and that he’ll practice with me and that he’ll ask Mom to buy us a basketball hoop to go in the yard. That makes me feel even worse, because he’ll nag me to play with him twenty-four seven, as if an hour a week isn’t bad enough.
“Why can’t you get one of your friends to go with you?” I want to know.
Wills looks at me sharply. “What friends?”
“The ones you’re always hanging around with.”
“Not likely,” he grunts. “Anyway, they’re too old.”
That’s the problem. Wills doesn’t have any friends his own age, not real friends, not friends who invite him to parties and sleepovers. Who would dare? Even my friends don’t like coming to our house if Wills is there. They think he’s hilarious sometimes, especially when he does things they wouldn’t dare, but most of the time they think he’s a pain the way he keeps barging in on us and ruining our games. It’s much better for me if I go to their houses. I wish I could have a sleepover for my next birthday, but I know Wills would ruin it. He ruined my tenth birthday. Mom had invited a magician. Every time the magician tried to do a trick, Wills shouted out that he knew how the trick was done and jumped out of his seat to show us. One of the tricks was with a rabbit. Wills launched himself at the hat the magician was holding, and the rabbit escaped into the yard. We spent the next half an hour trying to catch it again, which wasn’t easy because if you were a rabbit and five ten-year-olds and an elephant were trying to catch you, you’d hop faster than a crazy kangaroo.
You’d think basketball would tire Wills out, but he’s even more psycho when we get back to Dad’s. He uses anything he can find as a ball,
