Football Hero (2008)

by Tim Green

  TY'S SNEAKERS SLIPPED OUT from under him and down he went, flat on his back. Calvin grabbed his own mouth and howled, doubling over and pointing at Ty as Michael Poyer threw the ball wildly up into the air for an interception.

  Calvin ran and grabbed a teammate, pointing at Ty and continuing to howl. Ty hopped up, slipped again, and tumbled back down into the mud. His hands and face were slick and cool with it. This time, he got up slower and jogged to the sideline as the gold defense streamed out onto the field. He looked at Coach V, who simply twisted his mouth up and shook his head.

  "That's okay, buddy," the coach said. "Don't worry. Football's not for everyone."

  Ty stumbled, suddenly dizzy enough so that he felt behind him for the wooden plank of the bench and sat down.

  One Saturday when Ty was just ten, he and his parents watched Thane drop a pass in the end zone that lost the game for Syracuse. In a sea of fifty thousand people dressed in orange and blue, Ty and his parents were the only ones who didn't boo. Tears blurred Ty's image of the faces in the crowd as his parents dragged him out through the waves of growling fans who spilled from the stadium. The next day, Sunday, while his parents visited a friend in the hospital, Thane showed up at the house unexpectedly with a big bag of laundry.

  "Thought I'd clean some clothes," Thane said. "You okay?"

  "I'm okay," Ty said. He followed his brother downstairs into the basement, where their mom kept the washing machine.

  "You don't look okay," Thane said, glancing back as he stuffed some clothes into the machine.

  "I just feel bad. That's all."

  "About the game?" Thane asked, turning to his wash.

  "The same people who cheer, now they're booing at you?" Ty said. "That's not right."

  Thane surprised him with a smile. "That's the game."

  Thane let the top of the machine fall closed with a bang. He turned around and knelt down in front of Ty, putting his hands on his shoulders, the smell of laundry soap heavy in the air.

  "Yesterday? That stinks, but football is about getting up," Thane said, his hazel eyes glinting even in the dim light. "Anyone could do it if you caught touchdown passes every time and the crowd cheered for you in the end zone. That's not what makes you a football player.

  "What makes you a football player is getting up after you get knocked down, or going out to catch another pass after you just dropped one. The harder the hit, or the worse the drop, the more important it is to keep going. That's the game. That's what a real football player does. If you can't do that, then you shouldn't play."

  Ty sprang up off the bench. He poked Coach V in the ribs until he looked down.

  "Put me back in, Coach," he said. "I can do it."

  Coach V hesitated.

  "Everyone gets knocked down," Ty said. "It's about getting up."

  A smile crept into the corners of the coach's lips.

  "Okay," he said, "go."

  Ty slipped out of his shoes and stripped off his socks.

  "What are you--" Coach V started to say.

  Before he could finish, Ty sprinted out into the huddle and tapped the Z receiver on the back, telling the boy that Coach V had sent him in.

  Then he looked at Poyer and said, "Run the nine."

  The quarterback looked at Ty's bare feet, then to the sideline.

  "Run it!" Ty said. "I'll be open."

  "Let's go!" Coach V shouted with his hands cupped around his mouth.

  Poyer called the play and Ty sprinted to the line, setting his feet and looking back in at the quarterback. From the corner of his eye, he saw Calvin saunter up with his hands on his hips.

  "Looking to get knocked on your butt again?" Calvin asked.

  Ty scowled and set his mouth.

  "Oooh, I'm scared," Calvin said. "You look so mean. You shoeless beggar."

  Ty clenched his hands, then flexed his fingers as Poyer started his cadence. At the snap, Ty darted inside, turning his shoulders to narrow the target Calvin could punch at. A hand grazed Ty's back and he slipped by, surging up the field. Two steps later, he felt a jolt in his neck and he was nearly yanked off his feet.

  Calvin had grabbed hold of his gold pinnie--illegal, but effective.

  Ty leaned forward and kept digging in his feet, despite the sharp pain in his throat.

  A loud rip set him free. Calvin looked at the torn pinnie a moment too long. Ty sprang forward and sprinted toward the end zone. An instant later, the ball was in the air, a long, high arc, too far for Ty to reach.

  Then, he found something deep, another gear, another surge of energy, of speed.

  Ty ran as fast as he could run. His lungs burned and his joints seemed to melt. He looked back.

  The ball came down fast.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  TY STRETCHED EVERY FIBER. He felt the sharp ache of straining ligaments in his shoulders. His fingers touched the ball, saving it from the ground the way a desperate flipper keeps a pinball in play. His eyes locked on it like a laser-sighted weapons system, following the arc of the ball as it tilted wildly, redirecting his hands so they could keep it from hitting the ground.

  His left hand connected, fingers groping, but the ball had a mind of its own and sprang into the air once again. His right hand reined it in. The left caught up. He had it between his hands, and his feet kept moving, catching him from tumbling to the wet grass. One, two, three long, off-balance strides and he was back up, running full speed into the end zone.

  Ty slowed and raised the ball in one hand, turning, erect, chin up, and grinning at his teammates fifty yards away, moving toward him in a ragtag heap, cheering wildly, spinning and dancing and bouncing. Even without his glasses, Ty could see the glow of Coach V's smile from the sideline.

  A cigarette hung from Uncle Gus's lower lip, suspended there by some unknown force, tipping at an angle that promised to tickle his chin with its burning ember. His eyes were half closed. Two empty pint glasses stood next to a third, where only a bit of foamy beer remained. His head jerked up and his upper lip pinned down the cigarette to its lower sister, hiding the filter in his weedy mustache.

  "What?" he said, squinting through the tendril of smoke.

  "I'm finished," Ty said. "I caught a touchdown pass. I won the game."

  "I won the game," Uncle Gus said, mimicking him with a high-pitched whine.

  "Thank you, Uncle Gus."

  "Thank you Uncle Gus," he said, brushing pretzel crumbs off his chest, then stubbing out his cigarette as he stood to go. "I'm sorry I wasted your Saturday afternoon."

  "I'm sorry if I did," Ty said, unable to extinguish his happiness completely.

  "They let you play, huh?" Uncle Gus said, pulling a limp five-dollar bill from his wallet and flopping it down on the bar. Then he froze and pointed at Ty's muddy, bare feet.

  "I kept slipping," Ty said, "so I took off my sneakers."

  "Humph," Uncle Gus said, shaking his head and heading toward the door.

  As they drove, Ty replayed the touchdown catch over and over in his mind. The fresh cigarette smoke barely registered with him, even though his uncle kept the windows up because of the rain. Ty recalled Coach V's thick, callused hand pumping his own while he patted him on the back with the other. He remembered the faces of the parents, peering out at him from under umbrellas and hooded raincoats, pointing and whispering. He even heard someone call him Tiger Lewis's brother, and the memory of that sent a chill down his spine.

  "So you just keep smiling like that when you see your brother tonight," his uncle said from out of nowhere.

  "I'll be happy to see him," Ty said.

  "I got a business idea for him," Uncle Gus said. "It'd be good for the family. That's you, too, right?"

  "Yes," Ty said, shifting in his seat. "But Thane's a biology major."

  "That means he can't go into business?" Uncle Gus said angrily. "You don't have to have a college degree to be in business. Lucy's a millionaire and he dropped out in the tenth grade. Don't talk to me about biology."

/>   "Okay," Ty said, and they rode in silence the rest of the way home, splashing through the muddy puddles along the track that led through the weeds and coming to rest beside the blue tarp extending from one side of the low, crooked house.

  "Split a cord of that wood, then get cleaned up before your brother gets here," Uncle Gus said, slipping out into the rain without looking back.

  Ty sighed and climbed down from the truck. As he swung the ax, he pretended it was part of a training regimen Coach V had put him on to get ready for the season, counting out his strokes as he hacked away.

  Under the blue tarp, Aunt Virginia filled half an old oil drum with water from a garden hose. The drum, split down the middle and tipped on its side, left a fine silt of rust floating on the water's surface that sparkled on Ty's skin long after a bath. To avoid total humiliation, Ty kept his underwear on, even though Aunt Virginia always pursed her lips and declared she'd seen it all anyway. When he got out of the bath, Ty hurried back inside, shivering, and dried off on the washroom floor. Atop the washing machine, Aunt Virginia had laid out a set of clothes normally reserved for church.

  From the kitchen came the warm, delicious smell of cooking caramel.

  Ty winced as he buttoned up the white shirt with its stiff collar and wedged his feet into a pair of old brown shoes that came from the Salvation Army. He knew better than to argue, and a part of him thought it was only right to dress this way for something as important as Thane's being drafted into the NFL. Ty parted his hair on the side and combed it straight the way he knew his aunt liked it.

  He followed the smell of hot caramel into the tiny kitchen, where his aunt shooed him away from the steaming pot on the stove. He then wandered into the living room, where Uncle Gus had taken up his usual spot in the musty old reclining chair directly in front of the TV. Uncle Gus took a swig of beer from his can, belched, and looked up at Ty with glassy eyes.

  "Sit down," he said, waving his can at the couch. "I got an idea."

  Ty sat.

  "We can call it Tiger's, after him," Uncle Gus said, slurring his words a bit.

  "What, Uncle Gus?"

  "Tiger's, or Tiger's Place, or Tiger's Lair. I like that, but I'll even let him decide."

  "A place?"

  "A bar," Uncle Gus said. "I told you, Lucy, he's a millionaire. A bar with a little gambling action on the side. That's how you do it. You think I want to clean crappers for the rest of my life? Do you?"

  Ty shook his head.

  "I read it in the news," Uncle Gus said, grabbing a handful of the morning paper from the floor beside his chair and rattling it in the air. "They say he might go to the Jets! The third pick! His signing bonus, six, seven, eight million dollars!"

  Ty swallowed and pushed himself back into the couch.

  "We could get a class place up and going for a couple hundred thousand," Uncle Gus said. "Maybe three hundred thousand. What's that to him? Nothing. Not now."

  Ty felt the excitement of seeing his brother drain out of him, replaced by a tightness that made him start to sweat.

  "What's that look?" Uncle Gus said, glowering, the vein in his forehead beginning to show. "You don't want to help?"

  Ty didn't know what to say. His head went up and down and back and forth, jiggling like a baby's toy. The rumble of a big engine from out front saved him. Charlotte shot into the room, flinging aside the curtains so she could see out.

  "He's here," she said. "Look at that limo."

  Uncle Gus gave Ty a final scowl as he struggled up out of his chair and stumbled to the front window. Ty followed, peeking out. Even under the cloudy sky, the stretch Hum-V limousine gleamed like a jewel with its sparkling chrome grill, hood ornament, and rims. The long black side reflected a perfect image of the house that looked like a trailer and the trees beyond. The back door popped open, and Thane, or Tiger, as Uncle Gus said in a whisper, hopped out and strode up the broken slate path toward the front door.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  THANE STOOD SIX FEET, two inches tall with broad shoulders and a long torso that dropped to a narrow waist. He wore a new, dark blue Nike sweat suit with white turf shoes from Syracuse University that had orange stripes. His hair, brown with a hint of red, was swept back off his face and fell in waves all the way past his collar. His nose was narrow, long, and straight above a delicate mouth that broke out into an easy smile when he saw Ty poking out from behind Uncle Gus in the doorway.

  Ty felt the warmth from Thane's hazel eyes. Their look reminded him of his parents, and that immediately choked him up so that he couldn't speak, even when Thane asked him how he was doing.

  "He's great," Uncle Gus said, grinning wider than Ty had ever seen. "Look at that ride. Tiger Lewis has arrived."

  Thane blushed and looked at Ty, mussing his hair.

  "ESPN sent it," Thane said. "You ready, pal?"

  Ty nodded.

  "Oh, you have to come in," Uncle Gus said, "for a minute anyway. Your aunt made caramel apples, just for you. If the Jets pick you first, you'll be a big hero around here. You can't not come in. Maybe we could take a family picture. Then one for Charlotte that she can take to school. Ty, too. You'd like that, wouldn't you, Ty?"

  Uncle Gus had his hand on Ty's shoulder and it tightened as he spoke.

  Ty nodded again, Thane shrugged, and they went inside.

  The living room seemed even smaller with Thane standing there, his head nearly touching the brown water stain on the ceiling. Uncle Gus offered Thane a beer. Thane smiled, shaking his head and holding up a hand to say no thanks. Aunt Virginia came out with her apron on, carrying a tray with a dozen caramel apples lined up in four rows of three.

  "Sit, sit," Uncle Gus said, offering Thane his chair.

  Thane sat next to Ty on the couch and took an apple. Ty reached for one, saw his aunt grimace, and pulled back his hand. Thane stopped just as he was about to bite into his apple and looked at their aunt, who flashed a big smile.

  "Go ahead, Ty," she said. "Take one. He loves candy, doesn't he?"

  Ty wanted to say he hadn't had a piece of candy in six months but figured it would be best to keep quiet. Charlotte and Uncle Gus grabbed apples, too. Aunt Virginia set the tray down on the coffee table and stepped back. That seemed to be the signal to begin, because they all bit into their apples, snapping away hunks of the crisp fruit coated in sticky caramel. Ty closed his eyes and let the warm sweetness melt in his mouth and drizzle down the back of his throat.

  After his second bite, Thane set his apple back down on the tray, explaining that his training called for him to watch every single thing that went into his body.

  When Thane saw Ty frowning at his apple, he said, "Don't you worry. You don't have to start doing the diet thing until you're in college."

  "I'm gonna play in college, too, you know," Ty said, blurting out the words so fast he choked on a hunk of apple.

  "Easy," Thane said, patting him on the back.

  They talked for a few minutes about the draft while Ty gobbled the caramel apple down to the core before setting the wooden stick back down on the tray. Thane told them about the combines, a place where the top three hundred college players went to be measured, weighed, examined, and tested by all thirty-one NFL teams' doctors, training staffs, and coaches.

  "They treat you like hamburger," Thane said.

  "But now you get paid," Uncle Gus said with a wink before taking the last bite of his apple and a swig from his beer can. "And when you do, I've got a little business proposition for you."

  Thane stiffened and said, "I don't want to spend any money until I've got it, Uncle Gus, and right now I've got two hundred and seventy-three dollars in my bank account. That's it. So, unless you're thinking about a lemonade stand or a paper route, let's just put it on hold."

  Uncle Gus jerked back with a look of shock on his face. He touched his fingers to his big gut and said, "I'd never try to push you into anything. Don't get me wrong, Tiger. When you're ready, that's all. It's something you're going to want
to do with someone, I'm sure. And so, when you do it, I'm just hoping we can do it together. Better with family than someone you can't trust. That's a good idea, right?"

  "Sure," Thane said, slapping his knees and standing up. "Well, let's do those pictures. We've got to get into the city. We're meeting my agent for dinner and I don't want to be late."

  They took a bunch of pictures in the living room, and Thane smiled patiently like a pro before leading Ty out to the limo. Ty glanced back at his new family, waving to him from the cinder-block stoop like they never had before. Ty gave them a quick wave, then ducked into the back of the limo, sitting on the bench seat along the side and marveling at the TV, the rows of tiny golden lights along the ceiling, and the twinkling glasses lined up on the bar. In the front, a mirror surrounding the small opening into the front seat reflected the image back at them and made the string of lights on the ceiling appear to go on forever.

  Thane yelled good-bye, then climbed in and closed the door.

  "Whew," Thane said. "You okay?"

  Ty nodded.

  "To dinner, Mr. Lewis?" the driver asked, his voice sounding small from all the way up front.

  "Sounds good, Randy," Thane said. "Randy, my brother Ty. Ty, Randy."

  The driver looked back through the small opening and waved, then put the big machine into gear, easing out of the front yard and down the rutted track.

  "Come on over here," Thane said, patting the seat beside him.

  Ty shifted into the back. Thane put an arm around him and hugged him close, kissing him on top of his head the way their father used to do to both of them.

  Ty heard his brother sniff, and when Thane took a deep breath it was ragged and he realized that Thane was crying.

  "It'd make them happy to see you and me like this, wouldn't it?" Thane asked. "A big limousine? Tomorrow, a big day?"

  Ty looked up at his brother's face and the tears streaming down his cheeks. He felt his own tears well up in his eyes, and even though Thane cried first, he held them back as long as he could before burying his nose into Thane's sweat suit and letting go.