The Year of Living Large

Chapter One

Someone vs. Someone else

August 12th? 13th? 

Some tournament—the final? Who knows? Who cares?

Somewhere--far from home

"Wake up. We're here. We're late." Tro shoved my shoulder. 

I opened my eyes, not sure where here was, who we were, not sure of anything but that my arm was on fire from sleeping on it wrong. Something hit me on the shoulder--my cleats--followed by a pair of black and white striped socks I had never seen before. The cleats spewed death fumes. The socks floated in a flowery cloud of laundry detergent, one whiff knocking me back to the last time we'd been home, carnitas on the stove, my mother yelling at Tro, Es solo un nino. 

"Up. Put these on. You're playing in fifteen minutes." We were speaking Spanish, of course, and not the kind you learn in school. But no worries. I’ll keep it English for you Anglos, keep it clean for God.

 Mostly English. Mostly clean. 

I sat up, wiped the drool from my chin, and squeezed my eyes shut against the blinding sun. It seeped in anyway--orange, red, and black. 

One: I'm in the back of Tro's 1982 Honda. 

Two: Tro is screaming at me. 

Three: I have to play soccer. 

This much I understood, so I pulled on the socks and cleats, still half-asleep. I stood, stiff from yesterday’s try-out, shaking a million invisible needles out of my arm. "Where are we?" 

"Stamford Bridge," Tro said. 

“Hilarious.” 

"Illinois. Near Chicago. C’mon.” 

Right. I remembered the sun going down behind the Land of Lincoln sign as we crossed out of Kentucky. Tro must have pulled into this dirt parking lot in the middle of the night and gone to sleep without bothering to wake me up. I liked the thought of the empty lot at three a.m., two skinny-butt humans in a broken-down, rusting Honda, the first pilgrims come to worship. The minivans and SUVs probably started to roll in around seven but I’d slept right through the flood. Judging from Tro’s impatience, so had he. 

He tossed me a black uniform jersey. It reeked of motor oil from months stewing in some team manager’s trunk. One more nasty smell, and they were gonna have to bring in the guys in hazmat suits. I checked the jersey--number ninety-nine. "No way." I threw it back at him. 

He threw it back at me. "Guesters can't be choosers. Put it on." 

Ninety-nine was a douche number. Not a team player. But since this was a trial, I'd be a douche. At least it wasn't moldy like yesterday’s practice jersey. I pulled off the ripped Just Do It T-shirt that doubled as my pajamas and put the thing on. Panthers was written across my chest in girly script. I was a douchy gay cat. "Shorts?" 

"He said anything black is fine. You're good." 

I was relieved that I didn't have to strip in the parking lot. Hot mamas and not-so-hot-mammas and abuelas and snotty gorditas holding the hands of their guapas big sisters were streaming through the rows of parked cars like fish on a glittering reef. This was one of those huge complexes with fields as far as you could see, cars even further. A field house in the distance was lit up by the blazing sun, a burning ship on the horizon.