Kid Owner Read online

  “I don’t own anybody, Jackson.” I lowered my voice. “I don’t even own the team for sure, but I think Coach Cowan likes my mom and if I do end up owning the team, I think he wants me on his side.”

  Talk of Coach Cowan “liking” my mom made my face hot with Izzy sitting right there. “Anyway, let me work on this thing. I don’t want Coach Hubbard going back to the old offense if Simpkin comes back.”

  “Would he?” Jackson asked.

  “I saw Simpkin’s parents after the game and I didn’t like the way they looked at me. I think because they run the youth team that people listen to them,” I said.

  Izzy whispered in my ear. “Tell him about the Cowboys game tomorrow, right?’

  I nodded like it was the next thing on my mind. “Hey, and Jackson, do you want to go with me and Izzy to the Cowboys game tomorrow? We got sideline passes and if we’ve got this owner-type status, I bet we’re going to get to go in the locker room.”

  The phone went silent, but I thought I could hear Jackson breathing.

  “Jackson?”

  “Dude, are you serious? If you are, I’m gonna have to check my drawers.”

  “Drawers?” I wrinkled my face.

  “My shorts, dude, in case I just messed them.”

  “Jackson, that’s gross.” I laughed. “No one’s gonna want you in the locker room with a mess in your shorts.”

  He laughed. Izzy made a disgusted face and shook her head.

  Jackson said he’d have his mom drop him off and agreed to let me try and work my magic with Coach Hubbard.

  “Ry-Guy?” Jackson said.

  I liked the new nickname. “Yeah?”

  “You’re the best friend I ever had, dude.”

  That hit me hard. Jackson was intense about everything and I knew he meant it for real. I had the feeling he’d do anything for me, like support me calling pass plays near the end zone to build up my stats. But I couldn’t be totally sure. I guess it was because I wasn’t used to having such a good friend. I wanted to trust that he’d be on my side, even if it cost him a few touchdowns here or there, but I just couldn’t. I knew I was safe keeping him in the dark, working my game with Coach Hubbard and solidifying my spot as the number-one quarterback.

  I felt bad, though, especially for not inviting him over because I was mad he’d gotten all the attention after the game. It kind of made it hard for me to talk and what I said came out as a little sound that embarrassed me even more.

  “Me, too,” I squeaked.

  “Okay. See ya tomorrow,” he said.

  “Tomorrow,” I said, trying to sound casual and tough, and hung up.

  Izzy smiled. “I really like how you guys are such good friends. It’s cool.”

  “You and me, too.” I suddenly felt a tingling in my head.

  She tilted her head at me and gave me an amused, warm smile. Her voice was soft. “We are friends, aren’t we? Good friends, right? Really, really good friends?”

  “Sure.” I could barely speak.

  “Well,” she said, swallowing, “I’d like to know how you’d define really, really good friends. Like, what’s it mean? To you?”

  A few weeks ago, I never would have thought a girl like Izzy would have any interest in me at all, but as the kid owner, anything was possible. A thrill went through me and the idea that I might ask her if she wanted to be my girlfriend perched on my lips like an eagle ready to swoop.

  60

  I couldn’t do it.

  I wanted to. I think she would have said yes. The look on her face and the sound of her voice practically asked me out. I knew what Jackson would have told me to do. But, in the end, I froze.

  “Hey, Ry,” my mom said, opening the back screen. She and Coach Cowan saved me from too much torture by appearing and sitting down in the big wicker chairs on either side of the couch.

  “Well,” Coach Cowan said, “it worked. Your coach is heading over here with the Eiland film. I think he understood. Not sure about that completely, but I’ll watch some film with him and give you some plays that should work.”

  “That’s great.” I looked over at Izzy to see if she realized how well this was all working out for me, but she frowned and looked away.

  Coach Hubbard got there so fast I wondered if he took a rocket ship. I thought it was strange that Izzy stayed with my mom outside while I went in with the two coaches to watch the Eiland film in our game room. I pretended it was more about her not feeling comfortable being the only girl rather than any issues about the bonfire.

  Coach Cowan got my mind off Izzy darn quick. He was amazing. I could see why people called him a football genius. He watched Eiland’s defense for about twelve plays before he shut it off and proceeded to explain to me and Coach Hubbard everything they were doing and how we could pretty easily destroy their defense with the spread offense. He gave us half a dozen plays, each an extension of the other that looked very similar, but each attacking the defense in a different spot.

  “See?” Coach Cowan pointed with his pen to the notebook he’d put in front of Coach Hubbard on the coffee table. “They’ll drop their other safety to get double coverage on both sides. They have to, and when they do, you run the read option play where Ryan either hands the ball off to the big guy or keeps it depending on what the defensive end does. It’ll shred them.”

  There it was again, the word “shred.” It sent a shiver down my back.

  We kept strategizing for another hour. Coach Hubbard apologized that he couldn’t stay for dinner when my mom asked. “My little lady makes a mean beef stroganoff and she likes to get the baby down by seven, so I’m off, but Coach . . .”

  Coach Hubbard shook his head and clasped Coach Cowan’s hand. “I don’t even know what to say.”

  “Well, just keep it between us and that’ll be all the thanks I need, Coach.” Coach Cowan patted him on the back as we saw him to the front door.

  “I’d never say nothing to no one, no how, Coach.” Coach Hubbard’s face was shiny with sweat and sincerity. He gazed at Coach Cowan for a long moment before climbing into his car. We said good-bye and watched Coach Hubbard’s vehicle cough blue smoke as it passed through the gates.

  Coach Cowan sighed. “Well, we’ll see.”

  “Thanks, Coach.”

  “Hey, my pleasure. It’s fun, really.” Coach Cowan scratched his neck and looked through the house back toward where we’d left my mom and Izzy. “I can’t believe Eiland is as good as they are running a defense like that. They’ve got some pretty serious players, and they’re even more impressive when you see how bad their scheme is.”

  I didn’t know if Coach Cowan was trying to remind me of my half brother or not, but that’s what he did. I thought of how tall and mean-looking he was, and obviously very good at football, not just because of all the awards I’d heard about. On the film we’d watched, I’d seen Dillon firsthand, chasing down running backs and blindsiding quarterbacks. He was all over the field. It made me a bit uncomfortable, but at the same time, it made me kind of mad. My father—Thomas Peebles—had left that team to me, hadn’t he? That’s what he wanted. Maybe he knew his other son was a jerk?

  Or maybe he felt bad for me, that he was never there, that I was fatherless, undersized, and with no outward chance to be associated with the highest levels of football unless I hit the jackpot. Well, I’d show everyone that I was meant for the game as much as Dillon Peebles, and not just as a kid owner, but as a real player. We won my first game as a starting quarterback, right? My numbers were impressive. What if I had a real coach, one who knew the spread the way Coach Cowan did? What would my limitations be then?

  I might not have been tall and fast and mean in a predatory way, but I was smart, on the field and off. I must admit, I felt rather proud of myself and actually had a slight taste of confidence.

  “They have great players, Coach. They’re bigger, faster, and stronger.” I held up the notebook I’d been writing in all the while that Coach Hubbard was being schooled. “But D
illon’s team will be playing checkers. We’re gonna play chess.”

  Coach Cowan got a laugh out of that. “Hey, speaking of your half brother, let’s make sure you don’t let on about all this either, right? You’re sure to see him tomorrow at the game.”

  “You think?” I asked. I hadn’t even thought of that.

  “Yeah,” Coach Cowan said. “On the sidelines for sure.”

  I had no desire to see Dillon and I’d hoped the stadium was a big enough place that we wouldn’t have to run into each other.

  61

  I’ll admit that I designed a couple missiles I would have ready to launch if Dillon said anything nasty to me on the sidelines the next day. But of all the things I thought he’d say, I was in no way ready for what he really did say.

  I walked out into the huge open space of the field with my mom, Jackson, and Izzy. Sunlight spilled in through the open roof, heating the turf so that the baked scent of it filled the air. We marched straight to the Cowboys bench, where we found Mr. Dietrich. The four of us stood with him in a clump even with the fifty-yard line in front of the Cowboys’ bench. Around us, men the size of water buffalo swarmed, some huffing from the effort of warming up, others rotating arms and legs like the first turns of a windmill. Faces like John Torres, DeMarco Murray, Jason Witten, and Sean Lee jumped out at us, faces we’d seen plenty on TV, the internet, and billboards around town. Excitement was high. Energy steamed up out of the turf, making us light-headed.

  Mr. Dietrich seemed at ease in his flannel gray pinstriped suit, looking not only rich but intensely serious. The tension of the upcoming contest with the Cardinals seemed to weigh as heavily on Mr. Dietrich as it did the players.

  Dillon must have been waiting for him to step away because it wasn’t more than five seconds after Mr. Dietrich escorted my mom to the back of the bench to have a chat with the TV announcer, Joe Buck, when Dillon appeared. He, too, wore a suit that made him look five years older than me and my friends. I felt suddenly silly in my dress shirt rolled up at the sleeves with my thin tie, khaki pants, and sneakers.

  It became clear that it was Izzy he had eyes for. “Hey, girl, you are way too good-looking to be with this guy. What’s your name?”

  I was ready for every kind of direct insult you could imagine: things about my father finally getting it right with a panther-like son, my mother being unmarried, me being short, my school having inferior sports teams, Coach Cowan being overrated as an offensive strategist and downright incompetent as a head coach. I was ready for anything that jerk Dillon might say to me. Everything but trying to kiss up to Izzy.

  Izzy wasn’t ready for it either. Her face turned red and her back straightened. “I . . . Ryan and I are friends.”

  “You just got prettier in my book. You feel bad for the little fella. A girl with feelings.” Dillon grinned like a wolf and he stepped closer.

  When he reached out to touch Izzy’s hair, I felt outraged and helpless at the same time.

  62

  “Wow.” Dillon smiled at Izzy.

  I hadn’t known Izzy that long, but I’d never seen her unable to speak. She wore the expression of someone who’d dropped her toothbrush in the toilet bowl. She stepped back and swatted his hand.

  “Feisty.” Dillon gave her a short nod. “I like it.”

  He turned to me. “Zinnia, that’s a flower, right? Enjoy the view from down here while you can. My mother and I are planning to keep the sidelines clear before the games, no minority owners or anything like that. Try to keep the little kids from getting hurt and the team getting sued or something. Ha-ha. Just kidding, buddy.”

  Before I could find a single word worth saying, he removed an iPhone from his pocket, which he got seriously interested in. He began typing something as he sauntered away just before Mr. Dietrich appeared without my mom. “Getting caught up with your brother?”

  I didn’t know if he was serious, but I had to say something. “Half brother. Yeah, he’s a charmer.”

  Mr. Dietrich tilted his head. “Your father always liked to be unique.”

  I waited for him to continue.

  He motioned his hand toward me, then toward Dillon, who was now right out in the middle of the field talking to John Torres like they were buddies. “Having a kid run an NFL team. It’s his way of showing how little he cared about the game. The Cowboys were like a fancy car for him, or a yacht: big, flashy, but not something that entered his consciousness on a daily basis.” Mr. Dietrich snorted. “I promise you, there were times when he didn’t ask a single question about this team for weeks. Think of it.”

  I looked at my trustee’s cold blue eyes, glowing in their frame of snow-white hair and tan bald head, and I realized that he never really cared for my father at all. They were business partners, period. So his next words didn’t surprise me.

  “I’m different.” Mr. Dietrich got a faraway look. “I care about this team. I was a lawyer working for a developer and I did the closing on Don Meredith’s mansion. He invited me for a barbecue. That’s the kind of guy he was. You don’t even know who Don Meredith is, do you?”

  His eyes seemed a bit damp from his favorite memories and I stared at him, hard, talking fast to cut off Izzy because it would be just like her to chime in at this moment. “I think my favorite Don Meredith moment was against Washington in ’67. They were down 14–10 when he hit Dan Reeves for a thirty-six-yard touchdown pass to win it.”

  There was a flicker of light in Mr. Dietrich’s eyes, but then it was gone. “You can google anything these days, right?”

  I didn’t bother to point out that I hadn’t googled anything. Dietrich was no dummy. He knew I didn’t google it. I just couldn’t imagine what he had going on behind those glinting glasses and cold blue eyes. I felt like he should be on my side, but that he wasn’t.

  I didn’t have time to think about it, though, because first my mom reappeared and then Coach Cowan did, too. He was jittery and glazed in sweat, acting like he’d had too much coffee. The calm, confident coach I’d come to expect was entirely gone.

  “Gotta get this one. Big one today. Big one. Good to see you Mr. Dietrich. Ryan.” He patted us both on our shoulders, chewing gum a mile a minute and then tugging on his Cowboys cap like it itched his head. He turned to Jackson and Izzy. “Hey, kids. Have fun.”

  He saved my mom for last and his face seemed to relax for the five seconds he spoke to her. “Katy, how are you? Lots of excitement, right? I hope you enjoy the game. Have fun. I’ll see you later.”

  Then he was gone, moving through the crowd of players, who were now beginning to filter back toward the tunnel that led to the locker room.

  Mr. Dietrich raised an eyebrow. “Anyone you kids want to meet? Take a picture with?”

  No way was I going to look like a rookie, but Jackson couldn’t contain himself. “Can we get a picture with the cheerleaders?”

  “Cheerleaders? Really, Jackson?”

  “Well, they’re kind of famous,” Izzy said.

  I looked at Izzy with disbelief.

  “How about John Torres and the cheerleaders?” Jackson suggested.

  Mr. Dietrich smiled and seemed to like Jackson’s choice.

  Other Cowboys players passed us on their way into the locker room, smirking and clapping and laughing at the sight of us all.

  “That’s that kid owner,” I heard one of them say.

  “Naw,” said another as they jogged past, “kid owner is that Dillon boy with the hot mom.”

  I nearly pointed to my own mom and shouted at the player, “How about her, you fart head! You think Dillon’s mom’s hot?”

  Of course, I said nothing. Maybe if I owned the team, I’d cut that guy. I didn’t recognize him, but I memorized his jersey number.

  I was so flustered by Dillon and the dumb photo with a gaggle of cheerleaders that I honestly couldn’t enjoy the tide of fans, or the hustling TV cameramen, or my proximity to the giant players cracking each other’s pads. By the time my blood started to cool, the
players had all migrated to the locker room without me even really enjoying the spectacle. With Mr. Dietrich as our guide, though, we got to follow the team through the tunnel and into the locker room. I looked over at Izzy and Jackson. They both seemed as jittery with excitement as I was.

  There was no fun waiting for us in the locker room, though. Instead, it was a quiet and hostile place. The only thing missing was the tick, tick, tick of a time bomb. Players strapped on their last pieces of equipment like soldiers getting ready to jump from a plane onto the battlefield. Coaches ground their gum or gnashed their teeth. It was eerily silent.

  When I saw Dillon Peebles standing in the far corner, surveying the scene like some kind of emperor, I wanted to barf.

  Mr. Dietrich ended the discomfort with a knowing nod and directional wag of his head intended to signal our departure. We followed without a word and I glanced at my friends’ faces as we advanced down the concrete tunnel toward a reserved elevator.

  From the light in their eyes, I knew that excitement burned bright in their hearts and minds, and that frustrated me. I didn’t care that I’d been out there in the bustling midst of America’s Team. I didn’t feel it. Like well-chewed gum, the flavor of excitement was gone.

  It had been worn down like a pencil by Dillon’s appearance and my inability to dust him from the scene. He was a dark cloud that hovered over everything. As we shot up the elevator into the luxury level of the stadium, Mr. Dietrich’s cold gaze made me feel like some furry little animal who’d been trapped in a cage. The luxurious surroundings of an owner’s box, the trumpets and smoke, columns of fire and thundering cheers from the crowd mean nothing if you feel small and weak.

  As we all sat down and the coin toss went off, Mr. Dietrich left my mom and my friends at the buffet table and escorted me to the edge of his box where the two of us could talk alone. With an arm draped over my shoulders and a firm grip on my collarbone, my father’s old partner sighed with cheerful anticipation.

  “Ryan,” he said, “I want to explain to you exactly what’s going on and tell you what you’re going to have to do if you want to control this team.”