There are only seconds left. I take a seat on the bench and wait for it to be over, squeezing in between two guys nicknamed Henny and Ferg. From far away, we all look the same. Our green and blue jerseys that have an angry-looking shark stitched on the front. Our identical helmets and pants and padded gloves. Then there are our skates, two carbon fibre boots with steel blades screwed into their bottoms, three-quarters of an inch thick, and sharp.
Read MoreCoach sent the four slowest boys home and told the rest of us if we were late the next day we might as well not bother showing up. He was still making cuts.
Read MoreThe players huddled on the sideline, grass-stained and weary.
You’re playing like owls, Coach said. Gimme hawks!
How’s that? asked Bobby. He was co-captain, an Aries.
You’re owls! Coach yelled. I want to see hawks!
We got that, said Sally. She’d been warming the benches. Just—what’s the key difference? Tell us again.
Read MoreJeff Bordick rose from his seat and pedaled hard. Everyone said the baseball card crackling between his spokes sounded like a motorcycle, but he didn’t think they were really listening. Sounded more like a bird, like one of those plump and shiny robin redbreasts that hop around the yard until someone bursts outside and spooks them. The card flapped like robins fleeing to safety, their little wings beating, only their sweet chirp missing.
Read MoreLook at him. Already out there in the middle of the ring, pacing around. Where’d he come from? He got no introduction, no walk-in music, no pyrotechnics, no fancy costume, no cool nickname. He appeared and no one noticed. Did you catch his real name, even? Paul or Dean or Richard, who knows? He looks like a Ron. So now it’s Ron…
Read More“Marching steps!” the skating coach calls, and I watch my little Kara trip over her tiny boots, blades catching on the ice. My heart skips a beat when she falls. She looks so small on the wide expanse of white ahead of her, so clumsy as the coach comes to an unnaturally graceful stop by her side.
Read MoreIn the top of the fourth, Randy Papke, the beer guy for sections 121 and 122, sits down. After a two-hour rain delay, there are plenty of empty seats. He finds a nearly abandoned row behind the Giants’ dugout, avoiding the spot where old Louise had been sitting, further down. He slides the insulated crate into the walk-space and follows it. He’s on the verge of being canned but sits down anyway. Well, the boss practically ordered him to. He can still sell Bud Light but the fans will have to come to him. They’ll have to pour their own.
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