Jim & Me Read Free Page B

I’ve got to have a really good reason. I won’t risk my life just for the fun of it or to meet some famous baseball player.
    Besides, why should I do any favors for Bobby Fuller? What did he ever do for me? He’s been tormenting me since our T-ball days. It’s not my job to help arrange his family reunions.
    It was obvious that the only reason Bobby was suddenly being nice to me and my mom was because he wanted a favor.
    â€œI know you don’t like me, Stoshack,” Bobby said.
    He got no argument from me there. Bobby reached into his jeans pocket and pulled out a wad of crumpled bills. There were some tens and twenties in there. He might have had a hundred dollars or more. I didn’t even want to guess what illegal thing he had done to get that much money. But he held it out to me.
    â€œHere.”
    â€œYou’ll pay me to take you back in time to meet Jim Thorpe?” I asked.
    â€œYeah,” Fuller said, “like you’d pay a cab driver to take you someplace.”
    I’m not a cab driver. I didn’t take the cash. If I went back in time with Bobby Fuller and got hurt—or even killed—his money wouldn’t do me any good.My life is worth more than a hundred bucks.
    But there was another reason I didn’t take the cash. Even if I’d wanted to help Bobby, I couldn’t.
    â€œI’m sorry,” I told him, “but in order to go back in time to meet Jim Thorpe, I would have to have a Jim Thorpe baseball card. And I don’t even know if there WERE any Jim Thorpe baseball cards.”
    And with that, Fuller reached into his pocket and handed me this:

    I started to feel that tingling sensation in my fingertips.
    The card was worn and wrinkled. Probably not worth much in that condition. But as I held it in my hand, I started to feel that faint tingling sensation. It was sort of like the feeling you get when you touch a TV screen. It didn’t hurt. It was a pleasant feeling.
    â€œThis card has been in my family for years,” Bobby said.
    The tingling got stronger, and in a few more seconds my whole hand felt like it was vibrating. Then my wrist. Then my arm. I knew from experience that if I held on any longer, I would reach the point of no return.
    I dropped the card.
    â€œLet me think about it,” I told Bobby.
    â€œThink hard, Stoshack,” he said. “This is important.”
    He snatched the last cookie off the plate before I could get it, jumped down the steps, and walked away.

4
Pros and Cons
    WHENEVER I WANT TO IMPRESS MY TEACHERS AT SCHOOL , I use the word “ambivalent.” It’s a great word because most kids don’t know what it means.
    Well, I’ll tell you what it means so you can use it at school and impress your teachers. It means having mixed feelings. Like when you can’t make up your mind about something and it really tears you apart. This is a problem I seem to have a lot.
    When Bobby Fuller asked me to take him back in time to meet Jim Thorpe, I promised him I’d think it over. So I did.
    Before I made any decision one way or another, I figured I’d better get some information. The Louisville Library is just a couple of miles from my house, so I hopped on my bike the next day after school and rode over there.
    Yeah, I know the Internet is easier. I could havejust Googled “Jim Thorpe” and found a zillion websites about him. But I like to look through books. I like the feeling of paper on my fingers. Maybe I’m old-fashioned. And I get sick of staring at a screen all the time. It hurts my eyes.
    Anyway, there’s only one number in the Dewey Decimal System that I know by heart—796. That’s the number for sports. If you walk into any library in America and go to 796 in the nonfiction section, you’ll find a shelf or two of sports books.
    I scanned the shelves until I found some books about the greatest athletes of all time. If Jim Thorpe was as amazing as