Diego the Tornado

by Joachim Masannek

  “Where is that stupid dog?” Mickey shouted. “Where is it!?” He shook me in panic. “Asthma, I’m not kidding, where is it?”

  “There!” I said. “In the parking lot, between those cars, see him? He’s coming for you, meathead. Prepare to die!”

  “Where,” he screamed. “I can’t see him.” “He’s right behind you!”

  Mickey jumped three feet, then let go of me and ran like he was being chased by a T. Rex. Octopus, Grim Reaper and Kong were right on his heels.

  “Run, Mickey, run!” we shouted after them. Then we screamed with laughter, because Sox wasn’t nearby. In fact, he wasn’t even in town. He was on vacation on the East Coast with Kevin’s mother. But Mickey the bulldozer didn’t know that, and that’s why he ran away from the parked busses, stormed into school, and slammed the door behind him.

  We laughed and laughed.

  “That was tight, Diego!” Danny praised me, and we laughed until Fabio drove up in his dad’s car. Talk about awesome. Giacomo Ribaldo, the Brazilian star striker, was driving the car himself. He wore his training gear, obviously on his way to the Fire daily training. Fabio sat in the back, looking at us.

  “Hey, Fabio!” I shouted.

  “Sick, dude!” Danny greeted him.

  “I’d love to live that,” Roger exclaimed, “Giacomo Ribaldo driving me to school!”

  Julian shook his head. “And to think, Fabio just calls him ‘Dad’!”

  “Yes,” I said impressed. “But that’s some dad.”

  We looked over to Fabio, who pointed at us. Obviously he was telling his father about us. We were bursting with pride, and it was almost unbearable when Giacomo Ribaldo himself looked at us. It wasn’t exactly a look. It was more of a glare. Something was wrong. Then he shook his head. Fabio tried saying something, but it looked like his father cut him off. The matter was closed. Fabio remained seated, but then his father obviously ordered him to get out of the car, and he obeyed.

  “Hey, Fabio!” we shouted. “What’s up?” Fabio looked back at his father, but there was no reaction.

  “Nothing!” he said, and marched right past us.

  “Fabio,” I shouted. “Wait!”

  But Fabio walked straight into the building. We watched him until he disappeared inside. His dad watched him too. Then he drove off, without even a look our way.

  I was confused and angry. “Nothing,” I imitated Fabio’s answer, “Right! I’ve heard that before. You know? I don’t believe him. Something is up.”

  “Right on,” Danny said. “What are we waiting for?”

  Actually, we weren’t waiting for anything, so we ran across the playground into the building and our classroom, marched up to Fabio’s seat and stood in front of him like a wall.

  Fabio glanced at us briefly. Then he fumbled with his backpack.

  “What’s up?” I asked. “Not talking to us anymore?”

  Fabio shook his head. It wasn’t an answer that came from someone who decided on something, it was more an embarrassed, humiliated twitch.

  “Any reason why not?”

  Fabio looked at me, but didn’t say anything.

  “Come on, dude, talk to me.”

  “I’m too busy for this nonsense!” Fabio shot back. “I have to concentrate on school.”

  That’s when our teacher showed up, but I didn’t care.

  Fabio was more important.

  “What about practice?”

  Fabio looked at me. Then he shrugged his shoulders arrogantly. “Practice? What’s the point? I can’t learn anything from you guys anyway.”

  His gaze was cold, only his eyes glistened a bit, as if one or two tears had lost their way. But we couldn’t see that. We were too angry and too disappointed. I had been right after all. Fabio was not our friend. He was just messing with us, like we were some minor distraction.

  Later, we sat on the field, sad, not in the mood for practice at all. Our lemonade was getting warm, and we were playing around in the grass with sticks.

  “He’s as arrogant as his father!” said Danny, as he finished his report to Larry.

  “I think I know what’s going on here,” Kyle said, “It’s not Fabio at all. It’s his dad.”

  “I don’t know.” I shook my head. “A father wouldn’t do something like that.”

  “That’s what you think,” Kyle responded. “Mine sure does. I tell you, he’ll do anything to keep me from playing soccer.”

  “Okay so maybe yours doesn’t care much for soccer,” Kevin responded, “but Fabio’s father is Giacomo Ribaldo. He doesn’t exactly play Monopoly for a living!”

  “Right,” Kyle mumbled. “But why? I don’t get it. Yesterday Fabio was playing on our team. He was totally cool.”

  “Very true,” Larry said. “And that’s why maybe the problem isn’t Fabio or Ribaldo. Maybe the problem is you.”

  “What?!” Kevin burst out angrily. “Now you’re not making any sense. What did we do?” We stared at Larry, hoping this was another lesson about Apache warriors without a warpath, Luke Skywalker, and abolishing Major League Soccer. But Larry was serious, more serious than he’d ever been before.

  “I think it’s time you understand what’s really going on here,” he said. “And if you don’t get it, then go to Fabio and Ribaldo’s house. I’m sure they’ll be happy to explain it to you. I’ll eat my hat if they don’t.”

  We stared at him.

  “Ribaldo’s house?” I asked.

  “You want us to go to Giacomo Ribaldo’s house?” Danny asked. “Are you serious?” “You want the truth, don’t you?”

  “OMG!” Roger sighed.

  “Maybe we will pay him a visit,” I challenged him. “Wait a minute,” Roger said. “I bet the house is secured and gated and their yard is crawling with more bodyguards than fruit flies.”

  “And they have guns!” Josh added. Then he shot an imaginary gun and fell to the ground, gurgling as if shot to death.

  “We can’t just show up on his doorstep,” Tyler explained. “Giacomo Ribaldo is a celebrity. A real soccer star.”

  “Correct,” Larry nodded. “And exactly what you all want to be some day. Right?”

  We couldn’t disagree.

  “So what are you waiting for?”

  We stood up hesitantly. A thundercloud darkened the sun, and I looked down at Josh, still lying in the grass as if he were dead. He was only playing, of course, but I couldn’t help feeling that soon all of us would be lying on the ground like that. Defeated. Except in our case, it wouldn’t be a game. It would be real.

  At Heaven’s Gate

  Giacomo Ribaldo lived on a street called Heaven’s Gate. We’d always heard about this area, but none of us had ever been anywhere near it. And now we were marching right up to it. We expected to see castles floating in the clouds. Instead, the very moment we stepped onto the street, the castles dropped from heaven and plunked down their sky-high walls right in front of us. There were no houses, only huge gates, silently warning us: ‘What do you want? You have no business here.’

  If you ask me, the gates were right. But we knew Fabio’s address, and so we approached one of the iron gates anyway.

  It said “9,” which was Giacomo Ribaldo’s number. It was also Fernando Torres’s number, the Spanish soccer striker who happened to be Kevin’s idol. It was Mia Hamm’s number, the greatest American female soccer player of all time. But that number was the only thing that welcomed us.

  We stood in front of the towering gate, unsure of what to do. Thunderclouds hung directly on top of us, like a message from above. Danny nervously whistled a tune: “Knocking on Heaven’s Door.” He said this was what his father did every time he was afraid. Danny was still whistling as he rang the bell.

  Nothing happened for what seemed like an eternity. Then a voice answered in Portuguese. That’s the language they speak in Brazil, we knew that much. But we didn’t understand a word.

  “Excuse us!” Danny stammered and scratched his head. “We’d like to se
e Fabio?”

  The speaker croaked back something, as if Danny had asked to marry Fabio. Then it was quiet. We were about to leave when the buzzer startled us. One wing of the dark iron gate swung open, and beyond it, we could see the house in the mist.

  Wow! Compared to this house, Alex’s fancy home on One Woodlawn Avenue was a tool shed and Kyle’s father’s mansion was a creaky old boat house. This was a castle and the garden surrounding it was not a garden, it was a park.

  Slowly, knees buckling, we slid through the gate. The path to the house was as long as the highway to heaven. But this heaven was dark and grey. Lightning lit up the clouds and thunderclaps disturbed the peace. Suddenly we remembered our fingernails. We tried to clean them with our teeth and used spit to wipe the dirt from our faces.

  “What do you want with Fabio?” a frosty voice greeted us.

  We shuddered. One last time the low sun broke through the clouds, blinding us as we looked around. But then we saw them. They stood near us on the terrace. Giacomo Ribaldo, the soccer star, had his arm around Fabio’s shoulders.

  “Oh, ah, we wanted to …” Danny stammered. “We wanted to … well, we didn’t mean to bother you.” He flashed his irresistible smile, but it didn’t work at all.

  “Good,” Giacomo Ribaldo nodded. “Anything else?” He shot a threatening glance our way.

  “Well actually w-we want Fabio to play on our team,” Tyler spat it out quickly. The Brazilian soccer star squinted. So I added quickly: “He’s our friend.”

  I looked at Fabio: “Am I right?”

  But Fabio didn’t meet my gaze.

  “Is that what you want, son?” Giacomo Ribaldo asked drippingly. “Look at me!” he added sternly.

  Fabio looked directly into his father’s eyes. He hesitated, I could see it in his eyes, clear as day, but then he shook his head.

  I couldn’t believe it.

  “Good. That’s good, son” Giacomo Ribaldo said and turned towards us. “There you go. You have your answer. Good day.”

  We stayed put.

  “He’s not going to play soccer?” I asked softly.

  The Brazilian star laughed. “He’ll play. But not with you. My son will play with a club team – the Furies. Someday, Fabio will be somebody.”

  “We’re going to be somebody too. We’re going to be professionals!” Kevin dared to say.

  Giacomo Ribaldo looked at him, and laughed even louder.

  “Sure. If you’ve got what it takes.”

  Kevin glared at him: “Was that supposed to be an insult?”

  We twitched. Even Fabio held his breath. But Giacomo Ribaldo seemed impressed. His smile faded.

  “Not at all,” he said coldly. “But if you really want to be a soccer pro, I wouldn’t waste my time with this team.”

  His eyes wandered from Kevin to Roger to me. I have to admit I was so upset that my asthma caught up with me. But Kevin is different. He’ll rise to any challenge.

  “It’s not a waste of time to play with this team,” he shot back, squinting at Ribaldo. “You know why? Because this is the best team in the world!”

  For the tiniest moment Giacomo Ribaldo was speechless. Kevin looked at Fabio.

  “I hope you heard me, Fabio,” Kevin said with pride.

  Fabio returned his gaze, and I thought he might agree, but then his father stopped him short.

  “Don’t be ridiculous!” he said coldly. “This is no team. You are nothing but a bunch of boys kicking a ball around, dreaming the dream every little boy in the world dreams. To become a real player, like me.”

  Lightning shot from the clouds, and thunder followed immediately afterwards.

  Then it was quiet. We stood there, paralyzed, as if an evil sorcerer had turned us to stone.

  Only Tyler still moved. He shook his head slowly: “Sorry. That’s not what I’m dreaming!” he said with resolve, looking Fabio directly in the eye. “Nobody here wants to be like you, except you.”

  Fabio held Tyler’s gaze. Then he freed himself from his father’s embrace and ran back into the house. His father looked after him, surprised.

  “That goes for the rest of us,” Danny confirmed as lightning and thunder cracked down upon us.

  Giacomo Ribaldo looked at us one more time. It was an arch gaze none of us could stand. We were mortified, and so we ran. We ran back out into the street and kept running until we reached the soccer field. There, we hoped we’d be able to shake that look he gave us.

  But we were not that lucky. Larry was waiting for us.

  It’s All Over

  Larry was closing up his stand, carrying the newspapers into the wooden shed.

  “So? What did he say?” he asked casually as if he was talking about the weather. But the question wasn’t casual at all, because when he came out of his shed, he looked at us as if he knew everything. Even worse. Larry’s’ glance was like Ribaldo’s: merciless and humiliating.

  As we stood there, out of breath, angry, the first rain drops hitting our faces, the realization struck us like a thunderstorm. Giacomo Ribaldo was right. We were no soccer team. None of us had what it takes to become a soccer pro. Our dreams burst like soap bubbles in the piercing rain. And let me tell you something: if you don’t have a dream, you don’t have anything.

  “So?” Larry asked. “Now what?”

  We looked at him, desperate and angry. For the first time in a long time, we didn’t know what to do. What kind of question was that anyway? Wasn’t that his job? He was our coach. He was supposed to tell us what to do. But Larry didn’t even consider it. He limped to the stand and locked up the windows and the door. Kevin clenched his fists.

  “Okay, there’s only one thing we can do,” he said. “We play the Furies!” he shouted. “We’ll show that snob Ribaldo. We’ll kick the Furies straight to the moon, right along with his sniveling little son, Fabio.”

  Larry looked at Kevin.

  “Are you saying what I think you’re saying?” he asked.

  “Read my lips,” Kevin hissed. “Yes.” Larry nodded. “Great idea, Kevin.” But then he sighed.

  “Too bad the Furies won’t accept the challenge. They’ll laugh you right out of town. Yep, that’s what they’ll do, unless.”

  He thought for a moment, but then he shook his head.

  “No, I don’t think it’ll work. It’s over. Go home!”

  Larry limped to his beat-up motorcycle and unlocked it.

  “Oh, and before I forget to tell you, practice is over, too, and not just for today. The soccer field is off limits to you. I don’t want to see any of you ever again. Is that clear?”

  He looked at us one last time.

  “And if you don’t know what I mean, just take a look in the mirror. The Wild Soccer Bunch I knew … is history.”

  He floored it and drove off.

  We stood like statues in the pouring rain. We couldn’t believe it. One by one we sat down on the grass, thunderstruck. I knew if we stayed we would all catch pneumonia, but I didn’t care. I remembered Josh and the feeling I had when he was lying in the grass playing dead. I could hear Ribaldo’s laugh and his words, “If you really want to be a soccer pro, you shouldn’t waste your time with this team.” Then I heard Larry, “I don’t want to see any of you ever again. The Wild Soccer Bunch is history.”

  And I saw Fabio shake his head again and again when asked if he’d want to be our friend.

  None of us could believe it. Even Kevin bit his lips, wiping a drop of water from his face as if it was a tear. The Wild Soccer Bunch was history.

  What were we going to do? We were clueless, so we just sat there in the rain getting wetter and wetter, until the fierce cold finally got to us. Then we walked home. Each of us by himself. Alone.

  Scattered in the Wind

  My mother got real scared when she saw me. I stood in the kitchen, shaking from the cold, sopping wet, not saying a word. I couldn’t. I was waiting for her to get angry with me. “Diego, are you crazy? Are you trying to catch your deat
h of cold? I thought you were a responsible young man. I must have been wrong. No more soccer for you. Is that clear?”

  That is what I was waiting for. Hoping for, actually. My body was numb and my head was wrapped in cotton balls. I was stuck in a nightmare and I was hoping someone would wake me up.

  But my mother didn’t say anything. She just looked at me. She looked at me like I’d been skinned, quartered, and shot by seven deadly arrows. Then she took me in her arms and put me in the bathtub. And after that she made me some hot chocolate. She behaved like an angel. She took care of me as if I was a seriously wounded knight who had won the tournament. But I wasn’t wounded. I was also no knight and I sure hadn’t fought in a tournament. I was a loser, with a big L on my forehead. I had been beaten without a fight. I had lost everything: Larry, our coach; the soccer field; and the center of the world, my friends in the Wild Soccer Bunch. And worst of all, soccer, which was everything to me.

  That’s why my mother’s care didn’t help one bit. Okay so she made sure I didn’t catch pneumonia or a cold, but I read that as pity. Pity? Give me a break! Can you believe it?

  In such an important moment of my life, pity was the worst thing that could happen to me. I needed something different. I needed someone who would kick my butt; someone who would tell me I should take my head out of the sand; someone who would take away my fear and give me back my courage; someone who would tell me what to do to get my pride and my dreams back. I needed my dad. But he was long gone. All I had was my mother, and she felt pity. Bummer! So that’s why I refused to talk to her that first night and kept my lips zipped for the next few days. Not a word.

  Things weren’t much different for the other guys in the Wild Soccer Bunch. From one day to the next our world had changed, as if a meteor had swooped down from space and destroyed everything. Even the climate had changed. At least that’s what it felt like. Summer turned to fall. The rain poured down incessantly from dark clouds hanging above the trees like black sulfur. We couldn’t look each other in the eye. We just stared at our feet.