by Nina Revoyr
"So what's he telling you?" I asked about the evening's coach, who looked, I thought, like Governor Deukmejian.
She sighed. "That I'll start for them and we'll win the NCAA next year. That all of his players are outstanding, motivated, brilliant people who are gonna go on and win the Nobel Prize."
"Yeah, but can they do this?" I asked, and stuffed the entire sandwich into my mouth.
Raina laughed. "Probably not," she said. "Maybe if you go and show the coaches that, they'll decide they wanna sign you too."
There were some schools that needed both a shooting guard, which was Raina's position, and a forward, which was mine, and those coaches met with both of us at once. These were all good places—Iowa, Connecticut, Washington, and Virginia—but not one of the head coaches made it through the evening without making a joke about killing two birds with one stone. We didn't really mind, though—especially me. I liked being there with Raina, and I wanted to get a sense of whether she was interested in any of the schools. As we sat on the couch together, I wondered if these coaches, these strangers, could see what I saw—the intensity in her face, the anxiousness, the way she always leaned forward slightly, whether standing or sitting, as if she needed to get going somewhere. There were some awkward moments, though. There was the coach who told my father and Claudia that they were fortunate to have two preseason All-America picks in their house, as if our parents were supposed to feel lucky to have the honor of supporting us (besides, we were only Honorable Mentions). There was the coach who asked, "Who wins when the two of you play one-on-one?"—to which Raina and I hemmed and hawed, and didn't look at each other, and answered truthfully that we'd never done it. There was the coach who remarked that he hadn't realized Japanese kids could be so tough, and then congratulated me on uplifting the race. And there was the coach who was clearly uncomfortable in our neighborhood and who asked what we did when we heard gunshots nearby, to which Raina answered, wryly, "We duck." Otherwise, though, the coaches were tactful, and didn't give one of us more attention than the other—which was good, because I definitely paid attention. I was glad that Raina and I played different positions—even if some of these schools later focused their efforts on one or the other of us, at least we weren't competing for the same spot.
By the end of the whole process, the four of us were exhausted. We were sick of the parade of coaches coming through the house; we were sick of the similar messages. The visits had completely consumed our lives for two weeks, making it almost impossible for Raina and me to do our homework, and there'd been days when we'd had more than one. Despite this bombardment, though, my thoughts about the future still weren't any more clear. The early signing period was in mid-November, and I knew I wouldn't be prepared to choose a school by then—I didn't even want to visit them yet. All I wanted by the end of the home-visit process was to be left the hell alone.
The last home visit was on a Thursday, and it was Long Beach State, for Raina. Since she was as tired of the visits as I was, I figured she'd want to let loose and celebrate once she'd been released from this final appointment. I waited for her in my room, eschewing the staircase—I'd heard the spiel too many times, by then, to want to eavesdrop on another variation. The coaches were done with her a little before eight, and as soon as they were out the door, I hustled downstairs. I was going to ask Raina if she wanted to do something before she had a chance to make other plans. Everyone was in the kitchen and so I started to go there, but then, as I was passing through the living room, the doorbell rang. I figured that one of the coaches had forgotten something, and wondered if I should wait for Raina to come answer the door. Then I decided that was stupid and, without looking through the peephole, unlocked the door and answered it myself. But it wasn't a Long Beach State coach I found waiting on the doorstep. It was Raina's girlfriend, Toni.
I don't think she'd ever been to the house before, but when I opened the door, she raised her eyebrows as if it were me who was out of place.
"Wassup?" she said, and it sounded like a challenge. "You're Nancy, right?"
"Yeah," I said. "You're Toni."
"I've heard a lot about you," Toni said.
I wondered if this was true. "Oh yeah?"
We stood there sizing each other up. I'd seen her around—at tournaments, at college games with Raina—but I'd never been this close to her before. I didn't particularly like the view. Toni was a little shorter than me, but her swaggering ego seemed to make up the difference. She was not especially attractive—her dark skin was a little blotchy, her features too small for her face—but she had an air of knowledge about her, and a barely restrained aggressiveness that made people stop and take a closer look. Although I thought, of course, that Raina was too good for her, I knew this air was part of what she saw in her, and I understood why she liked it. Toni exuded danger, and this made her sexy. She just had, as they say, a way with women.
Raina arrived in the living room as we were conducting our little stare-down, and when I moved aside so she could see who was at the door, her face lit up like a child's. A ball of jealousy formed in my stomach. Toni glanced at me as she passed, and there was no mistaking her look—I wasn't worthy of being considered a rival, it said; she'd dismissed me as no possible threat.
"Hey," she said to Raina. "Ready to go?"
Raina was still smiling. "No. Long Beach just left a minute ago. I feel kinda slimy from all the coaches I've talked to, so let me go change my clothes."
As she ran up the stairs, taking two at a time, Claudia and my father came into the living room to finish cleaning up. Ann trailed along right after them. She trotted over to Toni, wagging her tail cheerfully, and I realized that our wonderful watchdog had failed to bark at my mortal enemy.
"Nice dog," Toni said, petting her, and I cringed. I did not want her touching my dog. I wanted my dog to bite her hand off.
"Hello, Toni," Claudia said, sticking her chin out a bit, and there was a definite coolness in her manner. I wasn't sure what this was about—whether Claudia disapproved of Raina's having a girlfriend, or whether she objected to this particular choice. Since Claudia was understanding, I knew, about Raina's love for women, it was conceivable that it was the latter. Toni was no great prize. She was two years older than us and neither worked nor went to school, yet from what I could tell, she seemed busier than we were. No one knew what she did with all of her time, but none of her activities seemed directed toward any foreseeable end. Toni floated. A couple of years earlier she'd been a decent high school player with two or three scholarship offers, which she'd turned down because she didn't want to have to be so serious about basketball. Knowing a little about her, this didn't surprise me. You play the way you live.
"Hey," Toni said to Claudia now, crossing her arms, not sounding particularly friendly herself. "Bet you tired of coaches by now, huh?"
"Yes. We are," said Claudia. That was all.
Now Toni turned toward my father, who was picking up two coffee cups from the table. "How you doin?" she asked.
"All right. All right," my father replied, not looking at her. "And you?"
As they were having this exchange, it occurred to me that my father had met Toni before—probably at Claudia and Raina's place, before they'd moved in with us. Suddenly I wondered if he knew about Raina, knew what significance Toni had in her life. I wondered, too, if he and Claudia ever talked about Raina's love life, but it was conceivable that they didn't. Silence on personal matters was one of the fundamental rules of our house.
I had no desire to stick around, so I went into the kitchen and hid. Claudia and my father made polite conversation with Toni, whose short, terse answers made it clear she was uncomfortable. I liked that. Soon Raina came back downstairs and said goodbye to the parents, assuring her mother that she'd be home by eleven, and then she and her girlfriend were gone.
I stood in the kitchen for a moment, until the parents came in carrying dishes and discussing the promises of the Long Beach State coach. The dog was mauling o
ne of her squeaky toys in the living room, so I went and played with her for a few minutes until she ran into the kitchen to receive a bone. After she was gone, I lay flat on my back on the floor, staring straight up at the ceiling and feeling jealousy move through me like a large piece of hot, jagged metal. Then I did the only thing that one can do in a situation like that: I went outside and shot some baskets.
CHAPTER 5
The next day, Friday, I went home after school and took a nap. When I woke up around seven, there was no one else in the house—Claudia and my father were at his team's football game, and Raina, who must have come in while I was sleeping, had left a note saying she'd gone out to a movie with Toni. I decided not to call anybody—it was so rare that I had the house to myself that I wanted to make the most of it. I fed the dog, who looked injured because I served her dinner late, and then made myself a bowl of Top Ramen. The two of us took a quick walk up and down the street, and then I stood in the shower for twenty minutes and let the heat coax the soreness from my muscles. When I went into my room to get dressed, the big pile of brochures, folders, and media guides I'd collected over the last two weeks seemed to shout at me from its place on my dresser, so I went downstairs to escape it. There, on the couch, I nodded off in front of Miami Vice, until I heard my father's voice, loud and animated, as he and Claudia approached the door. Ann heard it too. She jumped up with a start and beat my dad to the door, wagging tail thumping the wall.
The key turned in the lock, and then Claudia and my father were in the hallway. "Hello there, sweet puppy dog!" my father said, as Ann jumped up and licked him on the chin. "Hello, delinquent daughter!" he called out to me. Then he extricated himself from the dog, set down his bag, and grabbed Claudia by the shoulder and arm. He sang some tune I didn't recognize, spun her around the living room with exaggerated dance steps, dipped her low while she shrieked with laughter. The dog backed out of the room, ears cocked.
"Are you guys all right?" I asked, pressing the mute button on the remote control. I had seen my father act happy after a football victory—he'd been coaching for ten years—but never before had the outcome of a game warranted a full Fred Astaire imitation.
"We're fine," my father said, letting go of Claudia and smiling at me. "We're wonderful."
"I take it you won," I said.
Claudia smiled at my father, and pushed the hair from her eyes. "In several different ways."
"What are you talking about?" I asked.
My dad came over and sat down on the love seat. He was wearing a thin black tie, slightly loosened, which made his already broad chest seem broader. "Well, you know how Larry's son, Eric, is the starting quarterback?"
Larry was Larry Henderson, the head coach of my father's team, and the brother of Julie Henderson, who was one of the members of the Hawthorne City Council. Eric Henderson was his son, a big bulky kid with a squarish body and crew-cut sandy hair; he looked less like a quarterback than a linebacker from an earlier era.
"Yeah," I said. "What about him? Did he do something awesome?"
"No, no," my father said, sounding impatient, as he loosened his tie even more. "Eric never does anything awesome. About the most awesome thing he's ever done is get the flu this week, which kept him at home throwing up for the last three days."
Claudia sat down next to him on the love seat, resting her hand on his thick forearm. "And so one of your father's little protégés stepped in and—"
"Hey," my father said, "let me tell the story." He grinned at her, then turned back to me. "So the backup quarterback is this kid named Eddie Nuñez. Real good kid. His mom's a maid, she doesn't speak much English, and she always comes to all the games even though Eddie hardly ever gets to play. The thing is, though, he should be playing. Eric was definitely the better player when they were both freshmen, and Eddie actually played JV. But then Eddie made varsity last year, and improved a lot, and I think he surpassed Eric around the end of the season. In practice, Eddie just schools Eric Henderson now. He takes that boy to town." He paused for a moment, and shook his head. "But Larry still insists on starting his son. I don't know. I guess fielding the best team possible is not his number-one priority."
Claudia pressed a hand to her cheek and gave an exaggerated gasp. "Are you saying that Eric might be the starting quarterback just because his father's the coach?"
My father placed a hand over his heart and smiled. "I would never say such a thing."
"Okay, okay," I said, laughing. "What happened?"
My father turned to me. "So anyway, Eric Henderson's at home barfing his guts out."
Claudia bent over and did a fake retch.
"Right," he said. "And Eddie Nuñez has to start at quarterback. And we're playing the defending league champions, who we haven't beaten in about three or four hundred years, and who supposedly have this unstoppable defense. And Eddie just tears it apart."
Claudia jumped up off the couch, pranced around, pretended to throw a football. I had never seen her act so silly; my father was clearly having a terrible effect on her. Ann, who'd just reentered the room with one of my father's shoes in her mouth, dropped it and stared in amazement.
"Four touchdowns, he had," my father said, leaning forward and pounding his knee. "Three passing and one rushing. We won 28–20, and the kids were the most pumped I've ever seen them." He straightened up again, and nodded in satisfaction. "You know the last time Eric Henderson was responsible for four touchdowns? Probably in some wet dream he had when he was twelve."
"Dad!"
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Anyway, the point is, Eddie Nuñez should be the starting quarterback. And I've thought so since last year, but Larry's been determined to play Eric." He smiled. "Maybe after tonight he'll reconsider."
Claudia sat down next to him again. "Are you going to talk to him about it?"
"Yeah," my father answered. "Yeah, I am." He paused for a moment, shook his head in disgust. "And while I'm at it, maybe I should also talk to him about his son's attitude. Eric's in my fourth-period Trig class, you know, and all he does is sit there and preen like a goddamned king."
"Is he a senior?" I asked.
"No. He's a junior. And so's Eddie, which is why I'm so concerned.
I mean, Eddie might actually be good enough to get a scholarship somewhere, but if Larry keeps starting Eric, no one's ever going to get to see him play."
Claudia shook her head. "Poor kid." She looked at my father thoughtfully. "How do you think Larry's going to react to all of this?"
My father sighed. "I don't know. I'd like to think he'll be reasonable about it. Larry's not a bad guy, you know, he just has a blind spot when it comes to his son. But even so, he has to realize that Eddie's the better quarterback. Larry's a coach, and part of being a coach is doing what's best for your team. I'm sure that he'll eventually come around."
* * *
But when my father came home from school the next Tuesday, he was so grim and distracted that he didn't even bother to pet the dog. He went straight to his room, and didn't emerge again until Claudia got in at eight. I was at the table just outside of the kitchen, doing my math; Raina was over at Stacy's.
"I'm hungry," I heard Claudia say to no one in particular. She came directly into the kitchen, stepped out of her heels, and put three big steaks on the broiler. Then my father finally appeared in the doorway, looking drained. He allowed Claudia to kiss him, and then opened the refrigerator and pulled out a bottle of Sapporo.
"Tough day?" Claudia asked, as he sat down across from me at the table. There was a small pass-through between the kitchen and the little nook where the table was, and a thirteen-inch television took up most of the space. Claudia had to bend down in order to see him.
He took a long, slow drink from his beer, and then set the bottle on the table. "Tough practice," he said. "But I guess I should have expected it. Eric was out sick again yesterday, and the kids were still riding high from Friday's win. Eddie was the quarterback in all the drills we ran, and the players all
seemed to like it. In fact, a bunch of them came in this morning to tell me that they thought Eddie was the better player and that they were more comfortable with him on the field. They wanted me to talk to Larry about it, and I told them I would." He paused. "But then Eric came back today. And Larry immediately put him back into the starting squad, which means that Eddie's with the second string again."
Claudia looked at me and gestured toward the table, which was her way of telling me that I should set out the plates and silverware. Then she turned toward my father. "Well, did you get a chance to talk to Larry?"
My father sighed, and shook his head, and kept his eyes on the table. He ran his fingers through his hair and then rested his hand on the back of his neck. "Yes. We went back to the coaches' office after practice today, and I asked him if he'd consider making Eddie the starter. And he gave me a whole list of reasons of why he wouldn't."
I got the plates out of the cupboard and set them down on the table, knocking one accidentally against my father's beer bottle. Claudia put three potatoes in the microwave, set the timer, and looked at my father. "Like what?"
"Like Eddie's too short, which I don't agree with. He's 5'10", which doesn't make him the tallest guy in the world, but we're not talking the NFL here. And besides, the five extra inches that Eric has on him sure haven't helped the strength of his arm. Anyway, that's one thing. Larry also said that Eddie doesn't have enough experience, which is stupid, because how the hell's he supposed to get experience if we don't let him play? Larry also thinks it's a problem that his first language is Spanish, but that's bullshit. Half the kids speak Spanish anyway, and it's not like they don't also speak English. Besides, it's not just the Mexican kids who're pushing for Eddie. All the black kids are in his corner too."