Read Voices - A Special Abilities Novel Series Page 12

  Chapter 11

  Basketball is easy

  On our way to Miami, for game two we drove Marty’s truck so we could take Stacy’s buggy, rather than her regular wheelchair. Her buggy fit into his truck bed easily which was nice since she pretty much was never going to be happy with a regular wheel chair again. Stacy said she didn’t know how she’d ever survived without all that horsepower.

  It always made Marty happy to hear her talk about how much she liked her gift. I believe they had her up to about sixty mph now, on just about any surface. I’m sure they were working up new gadgets for that thing. Marty was never satisfied with things being normal for any length of time.

  We arrived about three hours ahead of our team to give Stacy some time to get into the stadium and meet the Miami players as they arrived. They weren't supposed to be quite as tough opponents as Duke with two of their starters out for minor injuries. Stacy was going to talk to as many players as possible asking them direct questions that would get them to admit their strategy or lie about it. Either way we were going to know the real truth.

  We would then filter this information back to our team so they would know what to look for and have a good game plan coming out of the locker room. At the same time I had Meea dress as a Native American Indian and stand at the entryway to the arena where the players would enter. This is where Meea was going to hand out flyers about how to save the forest or some junk that Marty dreamed up.

  Meea was without question irresistible in her short Indian maiden dress, and her shapely dark legs looked creamy smooth down to her tiny calfskin moccasins. She was a beauty right out of the Pocahontas novel.

  I positioned myself close enough to eavesdrop. Every player on the team stopped and talked to her as planned. I wasn't happy with some of their comments to Meea, but she was pretty good at giving them the boot after they got enough words out for me to hear. I used the team program roster to help me pick out the key players on the opposing team. I only needed to really get the top seven players voices down pat. It would have been a stretch to remember which voice went with which face if I had to remember all fifteen guys on the team in one pass like this, but I could handle seven.

  I volunteered to keep stats for this game so I would be given a seat at the scorer’s table. A seat there would allow the range of my voice to reach the three-point line on both sides of the court. The only problem was I would have to throw my voice louder than I ever done before in order to have it heard over the crowd. Marty, once again in a mascot costume was in place as our back up, but I really wanted to avoid using him tonight if I could.

  I wanted to win each game in a separate way which is what I believe the intent was for this assignment, and I knew I would need Marty back at home for game three.

  The game started and went through half time without any intervention from me or my team. There was always a chance we would just dominate the game using Stacy's scouting report and I wanted to give our players a chance to do just that before we stepped in and gave them any more help.

  There was only a two-point margin in our favor at half time. This was fine for a normal game but I couldn't wait any longer to make sure the outcome would be as required. At the start of the second half when the ball crossed half court I used the voice of Miami’s point guard and threw it quickly to the forward that had the ball past half court to pass it back! He heard the voice he was used to listening to on the court automatically flipping the ball back to the guard who had not made it cross half court yet. The whistle blew signaling half court violation and the Saints got the ball on the turnover. With ten minutes left to play our strong offensive play and a few more well timed arrows from me gave PBHU a nice 20-point lead heading into the final minutes. It only took a couple more interventions on my behalf to ensure an easy 15-point margin of victory.

  After the game we made our way through the fairly quiet parking lot. A win for the away team had the large hometown crowd pretty subdued as they filed out of the arena to the parking lot. Marty started the truck for the ride home, as the truck roared to life you could tell it had plenty of muscle under the hood.

  “Let me tell you something, Wilson, if we get called on to do this for the NBA it’s your turn to be the one in the mascot suit.”

  “Sorry about that, Marty, one more game though, OK?”

  “I at least get to participate in that game, right?”

  “Yeah, it's all about you next time, baby,” Stacy said as she reached up from the rear seat to stroke the back of his neck. Meea and I both smiled.

  Sarcastically Marty chuckled “I pick where we eat tonight since I wore that dumb suit for three hours and didn’t even get to help.”