“Clifton United can ball!” I said to Diego and Speedy during the water break between end-of-practice sprints and end-of-practice free throws.
“This is what I call a team!” Speedy said. “You’re fearless under the boards.” She double-fist-bumped Diego. “Fearless.”
“That was tight,” he said, bouncing like always.
“You outjumped Super-Size!” Speedy said. “On that one play, you got the rebound over him and then scored on that crazy pass from Elbows. Fearless!”
But it was more than just that one play. Diego and Speedy put on a show all practice. The two smallest kids on the team played bigger than everyone.
“You’re a menace on defense,” Diego said to Mimi as she walked up. He gave her a pound.
“A menace!” Speedy hopped to Mimi and double-fist-bumped her as well.
Diego pivoted to me. “You’ve got the insane-in-the-membrane crossover dribble.”
“The Iverson crossover!” I air-dribbled. “Unstoppable.”
“Yo, check out Red,” Diego said, resting his arm on my shoulder.
Red was talking with Maya by the stage, hopping from foot to foot and basketball-smiling.
I pumped a fist by my side. Maya was now part of my Get-Red-to-Come-to-the-Showdown Plan, too. Her job was to make Red feel like an indispensable member of Clifton United, something Maya was doing even before I told her about the plan.
“He has to come to the Showdown,” Speedy said.
“He’d better come to the Showdown,” Mimi added.
“Trust me,” I said. “Red’s getting on that bus next Friday.” I shook out my hair and turned to Elbows and Super-Size, who had joined us. “Coach Acevedo’s a little different from your coach, right?”
“A little?” Elbows said.
“He’s usually not this intense,” I said. “This is the most—”
“You call this intense?” Elbows cut me off. “Coach Acevedo’s a playful puppy compared to our old coach.”
“Coach Acevedo’s a playful puppy dog,” Diego baby-talked.
We laughed.
“I can’t understand how you played for Coach Crazy,” Speedy said.
“He was the only parent available,” Super-Size said.
“Whose parent was he?” I asked.
“Our big guy,” Elbows said. “The one who almost cracked open that kid’s head.”
“Coach Crazy is Mega-Man’s dad?” I held up my hands. “No way!”
“Yeah,” Super-Size said. “Coach Roth is Charlie Roth’s dad.”
“No way!” I said again.
“Is Mega-Man anything like his father?” Speedy asked.
Super-Size shook his head. “He’s real quiet. No one liked hanging with him because of his dad.”
“I thought you were good friends with him,” I said.
“Not me,” Super-Size said.
“Me neither,” Elbows added. “I never knew what to say to him, especially when his dad was losing his mind.”
“Which was all the time,” Super-Size said. “But what bites is now we have no coach and no team.”
“Yo, you have a team.” Diego rested his arm on Super-Size’s shoulder. “You have Clifton United.”