Slamdown Town Read online

  PUBLISHER’S NOTE: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data:

  Names: Nicoll, Maxwell, author. | Smith, Matthew, 1989- author.

  Title: Slamdown Town / Maxwell Nicoll and Matthew Smith.

  Description: New York: Amulet Books, 2020. | Summary: A birthday wish and vintage chewing gum transform eleven-year-old Ollie into wrestler Big Chew, which might win back his older brother's respect but destroy his friendship with best friend Tamiko.

  Identifiers: LCCN 2019026723 (print) | LCCN 2019026724 (ebook) | ISBN 9781419738852 (hardcover) | ISBN 9781683356394 (ebook)

  Subjects: CYAC: Wrestling—Fiction. | Brothers—Fiction. | Best friends—Fiction. | Friendship—Fiction. | Magic—Fiction.

  Classification: LCC PZ7.1.N536 Sl 2020 (print) | LCC PZ7.1.N536 (ebook) | DDC [Fic]—dc23

  Text and illustrations copyright © 2020 Abrams

  Illustrations by Christian Garland

  Book design by Hana Anouk Nakamura

  Published in 2020 by Amulet Books, an imprint of ABRAMS. All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, mechanical, electronic, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission from the publisher.

  Amulet Books are available at special discounts when purchased in quantity for premiums and promotions as well as fundraising or educational use. Special editions can also be created to specification. For details, contact [email protected] or the address below.

  Amulet Books® is a registered trademark of Harry N. Abrams, Inc.

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  To our mothers,

  who shared their love of storytelling

  and taught us to be good brothers

  CHAPTER 1

  “If you want it so bad,” mocked Hollis, “why don’t you take it?”

  Ollie Evander couldn’t believe his rotten luck. For starters, Hollis had stolen his flyer. Ollie had jumped up and down trying to grab it back from him, but every time he got close, Hollis yanked it away. As if that weren’t bad enough, Hollis had pinned him to the sticky, popcorn-covered floor of Slamdown Town Arena.

  Ollie struggled to speak under his annoying—scratch that, infuriating—older brother’s girth.

  “Can’t you just go get your own?” he groaned.

  Ollie had first noticed the stack of neon-blue flyers on the side of the ticket counter.

  SLAMDOWN TOWN ARENA

  NEW WRESTLER TRYOUTS

  THIS WEEK ONLY

  TWO ENTER THE RING, ONLY ONE EXITS

  He had pointed them out to his best friend, Tamiko Tanaka, who immediately dared him to try out. A dare was a dare. So he snagged one off the pile and pinky-promised that he’d be first in line and the first one signed to Slamdown Town. But then Tamiko had run off to grab snacks from the concession counter, and Ollie’s jerkface brother had swooped in and started, well, being a jerkface brother.

  “Go get my own? But I want this one. And you were so nice to hand-deliver it to me. Besides, they wouldn’t let some ten-year-old kid wrestle anyway,” said Hollis. “Especially not one as pea-size as you.”

  “First off, I’ll be eleven in two days,” grunted Ollie. “And secondly, at least I’m not pea-brained.” Ollie’s blond, shaggy hair fell over his eyes. He tried to push Hollis off him but failed. He didn’t know how much more he could take.

  “You know, I think I’ll take this flyer for myself. Who knows. Maybe I’ll try out.”

  “Sure. They won’t hire an eleven-year-old, but a thirteen-year-old with a disgusting hair monster above his lip totally stands a chance,” said Ollie, still straining to speak.

  Hollis smiled and stroked his patchy lip hair. “I think it makes me look cultured.”

  “No. It makes you look like a . . .” But Ollie’s mind blanked. He had never been great when it came to comebacks. Smack talk was more Tamiko’s thing.

  What’s taking her so long? thought Ollie.

  He mustered all his strength to push Hollis off him, again, but failed, again. Well, he guessed strength wasn’t really his thing, either. Saturdays weren’t supposed to be spent wrestling and smack-talking his brother. They were supposed to be spent watching wrestling. Real wrestling. Something he and his brother used to watch together all the time.

  If he didn’t find a way out of this grapple soon, he might miss the first match.

  And he hadn’t ever missed a match.

  “Why don’t you pick on someone your own size, Hollis,” said a familiar voice.

  Finally! Ollie turned an eighth of an inch—it was all he could muster under the circumstances—to find Tamiko standing over them. Her hair was a familiar, tangled mess. She wore her wrinkled Slamdown Town official tee. And she had only one sock on with a big hole that went from her ankle all the way up to her kneecap. He wondered if she always had only one sock on; Ollie hadn’t seen his friend from this angle before.

  “You know. Like a hippo,” Tamiko went on, her voice casual. “Or a baby giraffe. Those things are bigger than you think.”

  In her right arm she held a stack of sour strips, a super slushie brimming with sugar, and nachos doused in cheese. In her other hand, as always, she held her phone.

  Tamiko was always playing games on her phone. Last month it was Ninja Kitten, and before that, Postcard Detective. This month’s mobile game was Jewel Heist, an addictive-but-simple game where you tap-tap-tapped away to uncover hidden treasure.

  In every game she played Tamiko held the first, second, and third highest scores. She could play—and win—while carrying on a conversation, or taking a math exam, or, in this case, balancing a tower of snacks.

  She was that good.

  “By the way, Ollie, I think I got enough snacks to get us through the first match.” She cradled her armful of food to her chest, a strand of cheese marring the white of her tee with a vivid orange stripe. “But we’ll definitely need to make another run at intermission.”

  “Oh, joy,” grunted Hollis, pulling his torso off Ollie at the sound of the word snacks. Ollie seized the opportunity to roll out from under him. “It’s the second member of the baby brigade. What’s on today’s agenda? Let me guess. Naptime and sippy cups?”

  Ollie stood carefully and checked his shins for bruising.

  “I’m free!” he gasped.

  “How long were you under?” asked Tamiko, ignoring Hollis entirely.

  “Too long.” Ollie took several deep breaths to regulate his breathing, as recommended by his favorite online video series on calming meditation.

  “And too close to Hollis’s butt, it looked like.” Tamiko’s upper lip quivered in distaste. “I’m shocked you held on to your sanity.”

  “Hey, Tamiko. Those nachos look heavy,” said Hollis as he lumbered toward her and grabbed a chip right out of the tray. “Lemme help you make it a little easier to carry.”

  Hollis popped the best, saltiest, most cheese-drenched chip in his mouth.

  “Hey! Get your sweaty paws off my snacks!” yelled Tamiko, pulling the chips away as fast as she could. Her sudden movement sent a blob of gooey cheese soaring into the air. It hovered above them for one deliciously cheesy moment before falling and landing directly on Hollis’s oversize belly.

  “My shirt!” yelled Hollis like a screeching monkey who just dropped his lunch. Hollis used the flyer to wipe the cheese from his shirt. Under other circu
mstances, Ollie might have tried to stop him. But the damage was done. Hollis wiped himself clean with the flyer—Ollie’s flyer—then crumpled it up without a second thought.

  He tossed it to the ground.

  “Really? After all that?” Ollie cringed at the sound of his own squeak.

  “You got cheese all over my most photogenic shirt,” groaned Hollis. “Now I gotta teach you a lesson.” He pointed and lunged toward Ollie, who squeaked again despite himself and leapt out of the way, causing Hollis to double over in laughter.

  Ollie rolled his eyes at Hollis’s use of the word photogenic. Using big words was clearly a part of his unending desire to prove he was more mature than he actually was.

  Hollis was taking this whole newly thirteen-year-old thing very seriously. He was older than Ollie, yes—Hollis was in eighth grade (barf) and Ollie was in sixth—but he certainly wasn’t more mature. If anything, Ollie thought that Hollis had become less so.

  “Let’s go, Ollie. You know your bro is way out of your weight class,” Tamiko said, nudging Ollie in the rib cage with her elbow. Ollie would have squeaked again—Tamiko’s elbows were sharp—but he had his pride to consider.

  “But,” pleaded Ollie, “I can’t just let him get away with it.”

  “Oh, he won’t. There’s more than one way to beat a level ninety-nine boss.” She was referring to their favorite fantasy adventure co-op computer game, Revenge of Kragthar.

  “Hey, Hollis!” called Tamiko over to Hollis. Tamiko pointed to his shirt. “Say cheese!” She snapped a photo with her phone.

  Ollie almost fell over laughing.

  “You just wish you were half as sophisticated as I am,” said Hollis. With that, he lumbered off in the direction of the restrooms, exhibiting all the dignity he could muster with a blob of cheese on his shirt. Ollie knew that Hollis would find some way to spin this—he’d probably say that cheesy-blob shirts were “in” and that Ollie just didn’t understand.

  Ollie dove forward onto the sticky lobby floor and reached for the crumpled flyer just as a passerby—oblivious to Ollie’s plight—ground into it with his heel, nearly smashing Ollie’s fingers in the process. It was not Ollie’s day.

  “Dude. Not worth it,” Tamiko told him. “We can just get you another one.”

  Ollie smoothed out the gooey, dirty, foot-printed flyer.

  “No. I won’t let Hollis win,” he said, folding the paper gently into a square and pocketing it. “This one is fine. And besides, it’s printed on Slamdown Town letterhead. Do you even know how much this thing will be worth someday?”

  “Just as much as this one without any gross slime on it,” said Tamiko, waving her own cheese-free flyer. But Tamiko didn’t understand. Sure, they were identical flyers. But keeping the one he’d chosen meant Hollis’s blundering attempt to steal it had failed. And that made this flyer a trophy of sorts, one worth holding on to.

  Ollie’s room contained many treasures from his wrestling adventures. The ticket stub from his first-ever match, where Mini Fridge defeated Rick Rodgers. A first-place ribbon that he and Hollis had won for best tag-team outfits at fan costume night, back when they still got along. The photo of him and Tamiko with huge smiles as they sat in the stands, cheeks stuffed with kettle corn.

  But none held a candle to the signed poster of Professor Pain, Ollie’s favorite wrestler, which his mom had gotten him for his birthday a few years back. He was certain no other, future gift would come within a mile of topping that one.

  Even so, the cheese-stained flyer would fit nicely into the tableau.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls. Please take your seats,” said a crazed voice over the Slamdown Town speakers. “The matches are about to begin!”

  The hairs on Ollie’s arms stood straight up. A surge of energy shot through his body.

  “Come on.” He tugged on Tamiko’s wrist. “Let’s get to our seats!” Hollis forgotten, the two dashed through the buzzing fluorescent archways and into the belly of the arena.

  CHAPTER 2

  Wrestling was exactly what Ollie needed to get over Hollis. Their mom said Hollis’s behavior of late was all part of getting older—but if that were the case, would his brother ever not be terrible? As much as Ollie wished he could take Hollis down a peg or two, he knew he was too small to kick his brother’s butt, and that his brother’s ego was too big to reason with. So instead, he’d watch other people kick each other’s butts, which usually ended with a chair to the gut.

  “Let’s do this!” yelled Tamiko, freeing her hand from a bag of sour strips to give Ollie a high five. The friends marched across the sticky, unwashed lobby floors. Ollie had entered the arena more times than he could count. But he still felt goose bumps travel up his arms the moment he entered the belly of the arena and saw the wrestling ring in all its glory, far below in the center of the room. Above the ring, a flickering, worn marquee displayed the following message:

  SLAMDOWN TOWN ARENA

  TONIGHT’S MAIN EVENT

  “WEREWRESTLER” VERSUS “THE BOLT”

  “Today’s gonna be the day Werewrestler loses,” Ollie predicted as they headed toward their regular seats. He inhaled the familiar smell of body odor and vigor.

  Mainly body odor.

  “He better,” said Tamiko, rolling her eyes. “This unbeaten streak is about as exciting to watch as my dad’s talent-show auditions.”

  Having witnessed several excruciating audition tapes himself, Ollie couldn’t help but agree that it was time for Werewrestler’s streak to come to an end.

  They passed a number of floor-to-ceiling hanging posters that depicted the current lineup of popular Slamdown Town wrestlers. Fan favorites like The Bolt, Werewrestler, Big Tuna, Gorgeous Gordon Gussett, Silvertongue, Lil’ Old Granny, and Barbell Bill. And last but not least, a poster of Linton Krackle, the greasy, slimeball owner and CEO of Slamdown Town. The poster was adorned with green-and-yellow graffiti that read LINTON SOCKS, which Ollie had always assumed was supposed to say LINTON SUCKS.

  But the typo had spawned an arena tradition.

  He and Tamiko snapped their socks—or, in Tamiko’s case, sock—as they passed.

  “Linton socks!” they shouted.

  It was true. Linton did sock—er, suck. He would make appearances—which were met by uproarious boos from the audience—every so often to set up big matches or make an important announcement. But usually he just sat in his back office counting money.

  “Last one to our seats has to touch Hollis’s dirty underwear!” shrieked Tamiko as she ambled up the steps toward their seats: center row, center column, with the best view in the house.

  Ollie knew firsthand that Hollis had a whole hamper, bathroom, and bedroom floor full of dirty underwear. In fact, Ollie wasn’t sure Hollis even owned clean underwear. But he chased after Tamiko anyway. They bolted up a flight of uneven stairs, took a hard left at the first broken window, leapt over the old pothole that was created when Lil’ Old Granny pile-drove Barbell Bill in an out-of-the-ring brawl, and—finally—arrived at the set of rickety seats they claimed as their own.

  “Too slow. I win!” yelled Tamiko. She hoisted her arms up in a victory celebration.

  “Yeah, because you had a head start,” he panted.

  “See this?” Tamiko slowly ran in place. She exaggerated her movements, as if she were jogging on the moon. “This is you running.”

  Ollie laughed. She wasn’t wrong. Plus, he could never be mad mad at Tamiko. She was his best friend, after all. The one who’d added her name—in permanent marker, no less—to the back of the seat she was currently sprawled across.

  “It’s tradition,” an even tinier Ollie had squeaked all those years ago. “Look!”

  He had pointed to his own name on his seat and to his brother’s name in the seat adjacent. He and Hollis had gotten quite the talking-to from their mom at the time, back when they were still an inseparable tag team—but they didn’t care. These seats were their thrones, the arena their palace, and they
wanted everyone to know.

  But now of course Hollis was too adolescent—in the literal sense rather than the insulting sense—to sit next to Ollie and Tamiko. He was seated several rows down, the lone kid with the huge water stain engulfing a slightly less huge, faded orange splotch on his shirt. But wishing things could go back to the way they used to be wouldn’t make it happen. They had grown apart as Hollis started getting older, and he would just keep on getting older. Luckily, Ollie had met Tamiko in third-grade math class and found out that she liked wrestling just as much as he did. He had traded his brother for a best friend. Well, not traded.

  Tamiko couldn’t replace what he’d had with Hollis. Not entirely anyway.

  Ollie buried the pang of their faded friendship, turning from the sight of his brother and refocusing on the scene unfolding below.

  The arena was never very full. Even less so in recent years. Probably because it was run-down and lackluster and it hadn’t been updated since Linton Krackle had taken over as owner and CEO. He prioritized ticket sales—and money—over improving the arena, and it had subsequently fallen into disarray. But to Ollie, that was all part of the charm.

  Besides, fewer people meant that when they were there, the arena belonged to them. To Ollie, there was no better wrestling arena in the tristate area.

  No. No better wrestling arena in the world.

  They scarfed down most of the nachos, sizzled their taste buds on sour strips, and slurped the slushie dry before scraping the bottom of the cup for remnants.

  The two friends bounced with cheese- and sugar-fueled excitement.

  “So how long would it take you to pin The Bolt?” asked Tamiko.

  Ollie smiled. It was their favorite pre-match discussion.

  “Before she even had time to pull off a Static Shock,” he said casually.

  Tamiko grinned and tossed a gooey nacho into her mouth. With her other hand she continued to tap away furiously at the game on her phone.

  Ollie, meanwhile, took out the flyer and began to doodle a drawing on the back. While Ollie may have been too small to actually wrestle, and too timid to smack-talk, he did possess a talent for drawing wrestlers.