Because of my poor throws, Cliff and I get knocked out of the Kubb tournament early, losing the five bucks my brother fronted me, and this is when Cliff asks me to help him move some India Pale Ale out of the Asian Invasion bus. When we are inside of the bus, he closes the door and says, “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” I say.
“You weren’t even looking to see where your batons landed, you were so distracted during the Kubb games.”
I say nothing.
“What’s wrong?”
“You’re not in your leather seat.”
Cliff sits down, pats the bus seat, and says, “Pleather will have to do today.”
I sit down in the seat across from Cliff and say, “I just feel bad for T.O. That’s all.”
“He’s getting millions of dollars to endure this type of criticism. And he thrives on it. He brings it on himself with those touchdown dances and the hoopla. And these people don’t really want T.O. to die; they just don’t want him to perform well today. It’s all in good fun.”
Now, I know what Cliff means, but it doesn’t seem like good fun to me. And regardless of whether T.O. is a millionaire or not, I’m not sure T-shirts encouraging anyone to shoot himself in the head should be condoned by my therapist. But I don’t say anything.
Back outside the bus I see that Jake and Ashwini are in the final game of the Kubb tournament, so I try to cheer for them and block out the hatred that surrounds me.
Inside the Linc, all throughout the first half, the crowd sings, “O.D.—O.D., O.D., O.D.—O.D.—O.D.” Jake explains that the crowd used to sing, “T.O.—T.O., T.O., T.O.—T.O.—T.O.” back when Owens was an Eagle. I watch Owens on the sideline, and even though he doesn’t have many catches yet, he seems to be dancing to the rhythm of the crowd’s O.D. song, and I wonder if he is really so immune to seventy thousand people mocking his near overdose or if he really feels differently inside. Again I can’t help feeling bad for the guy. I wonder what I would do if seventy thousand people mocked my forgetting the last few years of my life.
By halftime Hank Baskett has two catches for twenty-five yards, but the Eagles are losing 21–17.
All throughout the second half, Lincoln Financial Field is alive; we Eagles fans know that first place in the NFC East is at stake.
With just under eight minutes to go in the third, everything changes.
McNabb throws a long one down the left side of the field. Everyone in my section stands to see what will happen. Number 84 catches the ball in Dallas territory, puts a move on the defender, takes off for the end zone, and then I am in the air. Under me are Scott and Jake. I’m riding high on their shoulders. Everyone in our section is high-fiving me because Hank Baskett has finally scored his first NFL touchdown—an eighty-seven-yarder—and of course I am wearing my Baskett jersey. The Eagles are winning, and I am so happy that I forget all about T.O. and start to think about my dad watching at home on his huge television, and I wonder if maybe the TV cameras caught me when I was riding high on Jake’s and Scott’s shoulders. Maybe Dad saw a life-size me celebrating on his flat screen, and maybe he is even proud.
A series of tense moments get our hearts beating at the end of the fourth quarter, when Dallas is driving, down 31–24. A score will send the game into OT. But Lito Sheppard intercepts Bledsoe and returns the pick for a TD, and the whole stadium sings the Eagles fight song and chants the letters, and the day is ours.
When the clock ticks down, I look for T.O. and see him sprint off the field and into the locker room without even shaking the hand of one single Eagle. I still feel bad for him.
Jake and Scott and I exit the Linc and run into the Asian Invasion—which is easy to spot from far away because it consists of fifty Indian men, usually clumped together, all in Brian Dawkins jerseys. “Just look for fifty number 20’s,” they always say. Cliff and I run up to each other and high-five and scream and yell, and then all fifty Indian men start chanting, “Baskett, Baskett, Baskett!” And I am so happy; I pick little Cliff up and hoist him onto my shoulders and carry him back to the Asian Invasion bus as if he were Yoda and I were Luke Skywalker training on the Dagobah System in the middle section of The Empire Strikes Back, which is—as I told you before—one of my all-time favorite movies. “E!-A!-G!-L!-E!-S! EAGLES!” we chant so many times as we navigate the crowds and find our way back to our spot behind the Wachovia Center, where the fat men are waiting with ice-cold celebration beers. I keep hugging Jake and high-fiving Cliff and chest bumping the fat men and singing with the Indians. I am so happy. I am so impossibly happy.
When the Asian Invasion drops me off in front of my house, it’s late, so I ask Ashwini not to blow the Eagles chant horn and he reluctantly agrees—although when the bus rounds the corner at the end of my street, I hear fifty Indian men chant, “E!-A!-G!-L!-E!-S! EAGLES!” I can’t help smiling as I enter my parents’ home.
I am ready for Dad. After such a big win—a win that puts the Eagles in first place—surely Dad will want to talk to me. But when I enter the family room, no one is there. No beer bottles on the floor, no dishes in the sink. In fact, the whole house looks spotless.
“Dad? Mom?” I say, but no one answers. I saw both of their cars in the driveway when I came home, so I am very confused. I begin to climb the steps, and the house is deadly quiet. I check my bedroom, and my bed’s made and the room is empty. So I knock on my parents’ bedroom door, but no one answers. I push the door open and immediately wish I hadn’t.