The heavy fullback went down right on top of him. I heard this terrifying scream come out of Kurt. Kurt was not usually a screamer. I'd never heard him utter the slightest whimper of pain, ever. He was as tough as they come.
A whistle blew. The ball had missed the net. Nobody knew what I knew. I was over the rickety fence and running onto the field. The referee pulled the Fairview goon off of Kurt, but Kurt was still curled over on the grass.
Coach Kenner yelled at me to get off the field. He and Jason both came chasing after me. They thought I'd lost my mind. A kid falls down in a soccer game, big deal. But I knew better.
Was this supposed to be a change? No way. We lived here every day of the year. I knew every detail by heart. I knew the neighbor across the street would come out the next minute to water his lawn. And he did.
This wasn’t going to be a vacation at all. A vacation is when you go somewhere special and see new things and do stuff you’ve never done before. A vacation means going, not staying . . .
“A stay-cation,” I said to Max. “I wonder where Dad got that one.”
“I’d rather go on a go-cation.”
Then he laughed his head off.
* * *
“See that orange truck?” Max whispered. “The guy inside it is an ax murderer.” He ducked his head. “Here he comes. Stay down!”
An ax murderer? What was Max talking about?
The next minute, an ancient truck moved past our house, so slowly I could have beaten it in a foot race. The truck didn’t have any doors, and standing at the steering wheel was a man even more ancient than the truck. The lines on his face were so deep you could have drowned in them. He was steering with one hand and ringing a bell with the other.
The truck was covered with drawings of knives, scissors and axes.
“Look – knives!” Max whispered. “I told you so.”
The truck stopped right in front of our house. I could have explained to Max that it was Tony the Knife Sharpener and not Tony the Bloodthirsty Criminal, but why not have a little fun? After all, there wasn’t anything else to do.
“You’re right,” I said to Max. “We’d better go investigate.”
