Cliff played it cool and did not say hello to me, which I realize was his way of saying, “It’s your call, Pat.” He simply faded away into the other Dawkins jerseys, so I would not have to explain our relationship, which was kind of him.
When we have our tent resituated, when the fat men are inside watching television, Scott says, “Hey, Baskett. Why did you let the dot heads have our parking spot?”
“None of them have a dot on their head,” I say.
“Did you know that little guy?” Jake asks me.
“Which little guy, me?”
We turn around, and Cliff is standing there with a sizzling platter of vegetables and meat cubes skewered on sticks of wood.
“Indian kabobs. Quite delicious. For allowing us to park the Asian Invasion bus in its usual spot.”
When Cliff lifts the platter up, we each grab an Indian kabob, and the meat is spicy, but delicious, as are the vegetables.
“And the men in the tent—would they also like one?”
“Hey, fat-asses,” Scott yells. “Food.”
The fat men come out and partake. Soon everyone is nodding and complimenting Cliff on his delicious food.
“Sorry for the trouble,” Cliff says so nicely.
He’s been so kind—even after hearing Scott call him a dot head—that I can’t help claiming Cliff as a friend, so I say, “Cliff, this is my brother, Jake, my friend Scott, and …” I forget the fat men’s names, so I just say, “Friends of Scott.”
“Shit,” Scott says. “You should have just told us you were friends with Baskett here and we wouldn’t have given you any trouble. You want a beer?”
“Sure,” Cliff says, putting the empty tray down on the concrete.
Scott hands everyone a green plastic cup, we all pour bottles of Yuengling Lager, and then I am drinking beers with my therapist. I am afraid Cliff will yell at me for drinking when I am on medications, but he doesn’t.
“How do you guys know each other?” one of the fat guys says, and then I realize that by “you guys,” he means Cliff and me.
I am so happy to be drinking beers with Cliff that I say, “He’s my therapist,” before I can remind myself to lie.
“And we are friends too,” Cliff quickly adds, which surprises me but makes me feel pretty good, especially since no one says anything about my needing a therapist.
“What are your boys doing?” Jake asks Cliff.
I turn around and see ten or so men rolling out huge sheets of Astroturf.
“They are rolling out the Kubb fields.”
“What?” everyone says.
“Come on, I’ll show you.”
And this is how we came to play what Cliff calls the Swedish Viking game while tailgating before Monday Night Football.
“Why do a bunch of Indians play a Swedish Viking game?” one of the fat men asks.
“Because it’s fun,” Cliff replies, so cool.
The Indian men are quick to share their food and are also so knowledgeable regarding Eagles football. They explain Kubb, which is a game where you throw wooden batons to knock down your opponent’s kubbs, which are wooden blocks set up on opposite baselines. The knocked-down kubbs get tossed to the opponents’ field and set up where they land. To be truthful, I am still not exactly sure how it all works, but I know the game ends when you clean the opponents’ field of kubbs and knock down the kubb king, which is the tallest block of wood, set up in the center of the Astroturf.
Cliff surprises me by asking if he can be my partner. All afternoon he tells me which blocks to aim for, and we win many games in between bouts of eating Indian kabobs and drinking our Yuengling Lager and the Asian Invasion’s India Pale Ale out of green plastic cups. Jake, Scott, and the fat men assimilate into the Asian Invasion tailgate party very nicely—we have Indians in our tent, they have white guys on their Kubb fields—and I think all it really takes for different people to get along is a common rooting interest and a few beers.
Every so often one of the Indian men yells “Ahhhhhhhh!” and when we all do the chant, we are fifty or so men strong, and our “E!-A!-G!-L!-E!-S! EAGLES!” is deafening.
Cliff is deadly with his wooden batons. He mostly carries our team as we play Kubb against various groupings of men, but we end up winning the money tournament, in which I did not even know we were playing until we won. One of Cliff’s boys hands me fifty dollars. Cliff explains that Jake paid my entry fee, so I try to give my brother my winnings, but Jake will not let me. Finally, I decide to buy rounds of beer inside the Linc, and I stop arguing with my brother over money.
After the sun sets, when it is just about time to go into Lincoln Financial Field, I ask Cliff if I can talk to him alone, and when we walk away from the Asian Invasion, I say, “Is this okay?”
“This?” he replies, and the glassy look in his eyes suggests he is a little drunk.
“The two of us hanging out like boys. What my friend Danny would call ‘representing.’”
“Why not?”
“Well, because you are my therapist.”
Cliff smiles, holds up a little brown finger, and says, “What did I tell you? When I am not in the leather recliner …”
“You’re a fellow Eagles fan.”
“Damn right,” he says, and then claps me on the back.
After the game I catch a ride back to Jersey on the Asian Invasion bus, and the Indian men and I sing “Fly, Eagles, Fly” over and over again because the Eagles have beaten the Packers 31–9 on national television. When Cliff’s friends drop me off in front of my house, it’s after midnight, but the funny driver, who is named Ashwini, hits the horn on the Asian Invasion bus—a special recording of all fifty members screaming “E!-A!-G!-L!-E!-S! EAGLES!” I worry that maybe they have woken up everyone in my neighborhood, but I can’t help laughing as the green bus pulls away.