Food, Girls, and Other Things I Can't Have

by Allen Zadoff

  I’m overmatched. There’s no doubt in my mind.

  A smart guy would quit now. Get out before it turns really bad or really embarrassing. But the thing is, I’m curious.

  I look at Everest. I want to see who he is, how he’s managed to pull off the size thing.

  He turns away for a second to adjust his equipment. He cracks his neck and stomps his cleats like a bull scraping earth. That’s when I see the back of his shirt. It says: EVERS.

  That’s his name. Evers. That’s where “Everest” comes from.

  The thought makes me laugh. Everest is just a guy. A high-school student like me. I’m up against a person, not some force of nature.

  It’s kind of silly, but it motivates me.

  This time when I hike, I spring up fast, pushing up and out like Coach taught me, and I hit Evers full-on, chest to chest, shoulder to shoulder. I hit him and dig in with my cleats. I use my elbows in there, too, just to show him I’m not afraid to get up close and personal.

  I push and he pushes back, and for a second I think I might go over backwards again, but I dig in even harder and windmill my arms to shift my center of gravity—

  And I hold.

  It takes every ounce of strength I have. It seems to last a long time, but I’m sure it’s only a second. The whistle blows, and the play is over. I release and walk back slowly, trying to catch my breath.

  I held my ground against Evers.

  O. grabs my face mask and pulls it close to his.

  “Way to play the game,” he says.

  We stand like that for a second, looking into each other’s face masks.

  Guys are tapping us on the back, but we don’t move.

  “Get a room,” one of the Brookline guys says.

  A whistle blows.

  O. signals for us to go without a huddle. He does a quick call, and we hit the line fast.

  This time after the snap, I use my height—or my lack of height—to my advantage. Instead of hitting Evers chest to chest, I hit him lower. I aim my shoulder into the space just beneath his ribs. It’s like putting the back of a chair beneath a doorknob. No matter how hard you try to push it open, it won’t budge.

  More physics.

  I hit him in that soft place and wedge upwards, and there’s an “Oomph!” as the air is pushed from his lungs.

  He’s too good to let it take him down. But it does stop him dead in his tracks.

  We don’t convert the first down, but that’s okay. When Evers walks back to the bench, I notice he has one arm pressed against his belly. I hurt him. Just a little.

  We gain two more possessions before the half. We score once, and Brookline scores once to counter us. I’m mostly able to hold my ground against Evers. One time he tries a fancy sidestep. He gets by me and sacks O., but O. isn’t hurt.

  More importantly, I learn the move, and I don’t let it happen again.

  i can try.

  By the second half, the sun is down and the field lights are on. I notice Eytan sitting in the stands, all the way at the top in the corner. It makes me feel good to see him there. Down below, Mom and Jessica are nervously eating bagels. Below them, Dad is clutching Miriam’s hand. The whole crowd looks agitated. We’re tied 7–7 with Brookline. Anything could happen.

  I move up to the line again.

  With the lights on, I can see into Evers’s mask. When we lean down towards each other, I look him in the eye.

  “Round two,” he says.

  His voice startles me. It’s soft, not like you’d expect from such a big guy. I want to say something back, but you know how it is. You always think of the right thing to say an hour later when you’re in the bathroom.

  “Hup, haa-eee!” O. screams, and I snap the ball. Evers and I collide, our pads grinding against one another.

  Second half.

  We hit again and again, warriors on the field. It’s Evers and me, me and Evers. The rest of the world disappears. I don’t hear the shouts anymore. I forget that Dad is watching. I’m not even angry at O.

  A question pops into my head.

  Who do I want to be?

  I want to be someone who hits hard, so I do. I want to be strong, and I am.

  The next time I glance up, the game is tied 14–14 with six minutes left to play.

  We’re in the middle of a long campaign, twelve downs in a row, when Coach calls for a time out.

  Guys are sucking down Gator like it’s going out of style. Green, red, blue. It doesn’t matter anymore. Cheesy even has some private stock of pickle juice he calls his superhero sauce. He offers it to me, but I turn him down. If I’m going to have pickles, I want hamburgers, too.

  “How are you holding up?” Coach asks me.

  “I’m holding.”

  “Your asthma?”

  “It’s okay.”

  I breathe in and out. I move my limbs one at a time. I’m numb all over, but everything’s functioning. There’s no specific pain, just a full-body ache covering about 87 percent of me.

  The whistle blows. Coach pats the side of my helmet.

  I run out with the other players and take my place in front of Evers.

  “Round three,” I say to him. Not original, but at least I opened my mouth.

  We hit each other, separate, and hit.

  O. starts up our drive again, doing a hell of a job of moving us inside their forty. That’s when Brookline starts to panic. Their coach calls two time-outs in a row. He’s trying to destroy our rhythm. He starts yanking players off the line and replacing them with subs.

  Evers and I wait together on the field. He looks me up and down.

  “What’s your name?” he says.

  “Andy. What’s yours?”

  “Eugene,” he says.

  “No way. Your name is really Eugene?”

  “Sucks, huh?”

  “Not really. Eugene Evers. E. E.—like the poet E. E. Cummings.”

  “That’s not bad,” he says. “I never thought of that.”

  He reaches out and pats me hard on the arm. I think it’s a pat. It feels more like being hit with a sledgehammer.

  “You ever read T. S. Eliot?” Evers says.

  “Yeah, but I don’t love him. I’m more of a Dylan Thomas fan.”

  “Dylan Thomas died young,” Evers says, and he cracks his knuckles like it’s a threat.

  “Be careful or you’re going to join him,” I say. And I crack my knuckles, too.

  Evers smiles. “You’re okay, Andy,” he says.

  “You’re okay, too,” I say.

  The whistle blows, and I fall back into the huddle with the guys.

  “What the hell are you doing?” the Neck says. “You were fraternizing out there.”

  The guys look at me suspiciously.

  “How do you know Everest?” Rodriguez says.

  “I don’t,” I say. “We were talking postwar poets.”

  O. stares at me. Maybe he’s wondering if I’m setting him up. I play hard all game, then I let him get crushed in the final minutes. It would be a brilliant strategy.

  Bison throws me a dirty look. “I don’t know if we can trust you. A guy who disappears before the game.”

  “Drop it,” O. says.

  “But, O.—” Bison says.

  “We’re doing the Trojan Horse,” O. says.

  “Bad idea,” Bison says.

  “It’s not your call,” O. says.

  “Are you sure?” Rodriguez says.

  The Trojan Horse. My play, the fake-out. O. is going to hand off to me.

  If he hands off to me, I’ll have to run. If I run, I won’t be in front of him anymore.

  Evers will.

  O. looks at me. “Can you do it?”

  “I can try.”

  “Then try. Break!” O. shouts, and everyone rolls out of the huddle.

  O. makes a big show of whispering in Bison’s ear. It’s what Coach calls Psy-Ops. Psychological Operation. O.’s telegraphing the handoff to Brookline. Telegraphing it in the wron
g direction.

  I get up to the line, position myself opposite Everest. A running play. My hands are shaking. I can’t do it. I’m going to get killed. I’ll make a fool out of myself.

  That’s when I think of the song. “True Colors.”

  Everest snorts.

  I listen to the song in my head.

  I feel O.’s touch, pulling me back to the moment.

  “Haa-eee!” he shouts, and I press the ball into his hands.

  I hit Everest hard and at an angle, but instead of continuing to drive forward, I use the collision to spin me around backwards towards O. It’s an elegant move. Like dancing.

  I feel Everest hesitate for a second, surprised that I’m not up in his face. I twist around and cup my arms.

  O. fakes towards Bison, then shifts back and pops the ball hard into my stomach.

  I pivot off to the left, trying to hide the ball in the center of my gut. Out of the corner of my eye I see Everest headed directly for O., but it’s not my job to protect him this time. Instead I push off and run as fast as I can towards the goal line. I hear a crash behind me as O. gets splattered. But I don’t look back.

  A couple of Brookline players notice me go. I hope they think I’m confused, or maybe I saw a hot dog on the sideline that I couldn’t resist. They can think whatever they like, because I know what I have.

  The ball.

  By the time they catch on to what’s really happening, I’m past them, running for all I’m worth. Unfortunately, all I’m worth is about fifteen yards. That’s when I get winded and slow down.

  The Brookline defensemen easily catch up to me. I don’t get the touchdown. I get massacred.

  Whatever.

  The important thing is that I make it inside the twenty-yard line before they wrestle me to the ground. That’s field-goal range. And Cheesy is known to kick a hell of a field goal.

  He kicks one now.

  We win. 17–14.

  the glow of nothing special.

  There’s chaos on the field. We shake hands with the Brookline guys, and they quickly retreat as the stands empty and we’re mobbed by fans. The last thing I see is Everest looking back at me, giving me the nod. I gesture with my hand like I’m tipping my hat to him.

  Coach gets a barrel of Gator poured over his head. It’s the only time I’ve seen his moustache droop. It looks like there’s a wet mouse sleeping on his lip.

  O. gets hefted on top of the guys’ shoulders. I watch him up there, his eyes twinkling. He lives for this stuff. Not just winning. Football. I knew it from the first practice when I saw him on the field. It reminded me of Mom when she’s in the kitchen. Or Dad in his office. They’re perfectly in their element.

  The field is O.’s element. He may get to play college ball or he may not. But he’s home now. All the guys are. I can feel it.

  Suddenly I’m sad because I know I’m not like them. I practiced with them. We played together, and I held my own. Tonight we’ll celebrate together.

  But I don’t love this game. Not the way they do. Which brings up an interesting question. If not football, then what do I love?

  Dad appears out of the crowd. He runs towards me, smiling and calling my name.

  “That was fantastic!” Dad says. “I couldn’t believe it was you out there. It’s like I had another son and nobody told me.”

  “It was okay,” I say. “I didn’t score.”

  “It was more than okay,” Dad says. “Outstanding.”

  Coach comes over, wringing green liquid out of his shirt. He’s smiling, too.

  Dad thrusts his hand out towards Coach. “I’m the father,” he says.

  “Pleasure to meet you,” Coach says. “Hell of a game, wasn’t it?”

  “I was just saying as much to Andrew,” Dad says.

  Coach puts his arm around my shoulder. “I’ve got big plans for your boy, Mr. Zansky.”

  “Do you hear that, Andrew?” Dad says.

  “Big plans. We’ve got ourselves a natural talent here. A diamond in the rough, so to speak.”

  “You’ve got three years to polish it,” Dad says.

  “A little guidance, some strength training. This is just the beginning.”

  Dad looks so proud, and Coach is really excited. I can see he’s thinking about winning, not just this year, but next year when O. is gone. That makes it hard to say what I have to say, but I take a deep breath, and I do it anyway.

  “No thanks, Coach. I quit,” I say.

  “Quit what?” Coach says.

  “Football.”

  Dad laughs. “You’re joking, right?” He nails Coach in the ribs with his elbow.

  “I never really liked football. I only did it to impress a girl.”

  Dad looks at me like I’m crazy. “What’s wrong with that?” he says. “That’s how I met your mother.”

  Coach nods like it’s a fact of life.

  “If I’m going to impress someone,” I say, “I’d rather impress them doing something I like.”

  “But you’re good at this,” Dad says. He sounds desperate. I know Dad wants me to succeed. Maybe he thinks this is my one chance.

  Do you only get one chance? I hope not.

  “I’m good at a lot of things,” I say.

  “Not like this,” Dad says.

  I think about that for a second. Dad’s right. There aren’t a lot of things that three thousand people watch you do in a stadium. I imagine taking the American History AP exam in the middle of the field with people watching. I bubble with a number-two pencil and the fans go wild. Never going to happen. Then I imagine writing a short story. That’s something else I want to do. But people don’t jump up and down when you write a story.

  “Take some time to think about things,” Coach says.

  “I’ve had lots of time.”

  Coach twirls his droopy moustache. “Take some more. You don’t want to do anything you’re going to regret.”

  A bunch of guys rush past, and they grab Coach and pull him along with them.

  “I’m serious,” Coach calls back to me. “This team is championship material.”

  I turn back to Dad. He just stares at me.

  “You’re quitting?” Dad says. “Why would you say something like that?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I think you do.”

  “You wouldn’t understand, Dad.”

  “Try me.”

  You can’t out-argue a lawyer. I forget that sometimes.

  “It’s like I did everything for the wrong reasons,” I say.

  I think Dad is going to yell at me, but instead he says: “Right and wrong. It gets confusing sometimes, doesn’t it?”

  “Yeah.”

  “You think it gets easier when you’re older, but it doesn’t.”

  Dad shuffles uncomfortably and kicks the turf with his loafer.

  “I don’t want you to go to New York,” I say.

  As soon as I say it, I wish I hadn’t. Even though it’s what I’ve been thinking for months. Even though it’s the truth.

  “You don’t just give up an opportunity like this, Andy. They don’t come around every day.”

  I’m not sure if Dad is talking about his new job or football. Before I can ask him, Miriam comes walking towards us across the field.

  “Sorry. I had to run to the little girls’ room.”

  “She has a tiny bladder,” Dad says. “It’s like living with a gerbil.”

  “Stop that,” Miriam says. “It’s your son’s big day.”

  “Exactly why you should hold it until we get back to the apartment.”

  I clear my throat. “Mom’s giving me a ride home.”

  “Okay, then,” Dad says. “You’ll come by the apartment before we leave?”

  “Absolutely,” I say.

  He musses the top of my hair like he used to do when I was a kid. Then he gives me a hug.

  It starts out like the usual Dad hug—more symbolic than anything else—but then he doesn’t let go. Neithe
r do I.

  “Whatever you decide, you did a good job today. You should be proud,” Dad says.

  “I am,” I say.

  I walk away towards the parking lot. When I glance back, the two of them are still there, watching me. Miriam has her arm hooked in Dad’s, and they’re both waving and smiling.

  Maybe it’s mean of me, but I don’t wave back.

  the long short ride home.

  “What’s O. Douglas really like?” Jessica asks from the front seat. This is her ten thousandth question about the game, and it’s only a fifteen-minute ride home. I feel a little embarrassed for her, the way she’s so obviously obsessed with the popular crowd. Who’s hot, who’s not, et cetera.

  All the same stuff that I was obsessed with.

  So I don’t get angry with her like I usually do. I answer her questions as best I can. I try to tell her the truth, share my experience of it all.

  I tell her about the time I was playing in O.’s backyard, and I had an asthma attack. I tell her about my secret deal with O. about my inhaler. I tell her how I had a crush on April, how we talked at the party, and I thought she was going to be my girlfriend. I talk about my theory of love at second sight. I know Mom’s listening, so I leave out the stuff about the alcohol at the party. But I tell most everything else.

  Mom and Jess seem really interested, even during the boring parts. They sigh and gasp, ask a lot more questions.

  A funny thing starts to happen.

  The more I tell the story, the more it stops feeling like something that happened to someone else, and starts feeling like it happened to me.

  When I finish, Mom says, “What an amazing story. You should write some of this down.”

  “Maybe I will,” I say.

  Mom turns the corner onto Boylston Street.

  “I saw you talking to your father,” Mom says.

  I think she might get angry, but she doesn’t. She just says, “It was nice of him to come to your game.”

  “I think so, too,” I say.

  “And bring his friend—” Mom doesn’t even finish the sentence before she starts to cry. She takes the corner too fast as she digs in her purse for a tissue. Mom’s driving is never great, but when she’s driving and crying, I get concerned for our lives.