Field of Schemes (14 page)

The team parents were a mixed lot. Some looked normal and low-key, and others were clearly posturing, trying to establish their identity in the group. An anthropologist would have a field day observing us. Dick and Bobby immediately adopted Leo, the Puerto Rican guy with major dadditude, and Raymond, the father of Violet, the Hot Shots shooter with the rehabilitated ACL.

I wished Darcy understood that I don’t follow sports. When she referred to Raymond as “Earl Woods,” I had no idea that she was making a joke and comparing him to the over-the-top father of Tiger Woods. Simply leaning toward me and whispering, “Oh no, we’re stuck with Earl Woods this year,” wasn’t enough of an explanation for me. I had to find out who Earl Woods was the hard way.

Raymond gave me a puzzled look when I called him Earl, which I mistook as a signal that I needed to address him more formally. “I’m sorry, Mr. Woods. It’s a pleasure to meet you. I’m Claire Emmett.”

“Mr. Woods?” Raymond questioned. “You calling me Earl Woods?”

“Isn’t that your name?” I asked.

He said nothing and turned away indignantly. I heard him muttering to the other dads about the “white bitch” who thinks all black people look alike. They all turned to look at me, and Leo made a clicking noise with his mouth before exclaiming, “Snap, that’s tight.”

I didn’t think it would help matters to explain that Raymond was nicknamed Earl Woods because of his intensity, not his skin color.

“Earl Woods is dead!” Loud Bobby barked.

I thought Paulo, the Italian biker, would be a natural fit for the dad clique, but the fat four didn’t adopt the insanely fit father of Giovanna, the little girl who came to tryouts with the elderly mafia widow. In fairness, Leo wasn’t fat as much as he was doughy. He looked as if he could be in fighting shape after about eight doughnut-free weeks of working out. Ray looked pregnant, but also had bony elbows and hollow cheeks. Dick and Bobby were simply lard mountains from their chins down. Paulo wore his bicycling shorts and a bright yellow Tour de France shirt, looking as if he’d just finished biking fifty miles with his team.

I whispered to Darcy, “Why don’t you think they’ve taken this guy under their wing?” She shrugged. A veteran of club soccer, Darcy was not nearly as interested in the parent culture as I.

After Mimi gave her rallying speech, she told the girls that they could go downstairs to the media room and watch the new Coerver training DVD, or play video games, air hockey and ping pong. She told the girls that the parents needed to go over the “boring details” and stuck her tongue out to the side as if to tell them that they got the better end of tonight’s deal. She was the brand of mother who wanted to be friends with her daughter and her peers, the kind who might let the girls drink beer or turn a blind eye when boys showed up at Cara’s slumber parties in a few years.

When the girls were gone, Mimi suggested we go around the room and introduce ourselves and talk a bit about our daughters’ experience and expectations. She would then tell us about the team and club structure and how our season would play out. I always wondered why people asked about our expectations if they already had a program in place.

Nancy, who I came to know as Whole Foods Mom, introduced herself and told us that her daughter left the Turf club because it was too intense. “I want Deborah to grow as a player but also as a person, and I found the coach to be far too focused on soccer,” she said.

Her soccer coach was too focused on soccer? What did she want him to focus on?

Mimi raised her eyebrows and said, “Okay, well welcome. I hope Kix is more what you’re looking for.”

Gia brought her husband Tom and her boobs with her. Daddy Warbucks thanked the team for their amazing support and friendship, and said that if Sapphire’s experience was as positive as it was last year, he’d be happy. Wow, he was incredibly undemanding. I imagined him sitting in a smoke-filled boardroom, pounding on a table, shouting that if things didn’t improve, heads were going to roll. The other thing that surprised me about Tom and Gia was their utter lack of sexual chemistry. I mean, sure, most twenty-five-year-old pop tarts are hardly growling with lust over their geezer grooms. But the husbands are usually a little more attentive to their playthings than Tom was.

Our team had three Katies, who were coincidentally mothered by two Jennifers and a Jessica. They all seemed to go to the same hairdresser, the guy who cuts a straight line across the shoulders, blows it under and flips the bangs under a little too tightly with a curling iron.

From the looks of Darcy and Ron, they were the perfect couple. No one would ever suspect Darcy resented the hell out of her husband, or that Ron flirted with soccer moms at tryouts. Maybe he wasn’t flirting with me. Maybe I was projecting my attraction onto him. It’s been a long time since I’ve had to use my vibometer. Perhaps it was on the fritz. They sat together smiling as if they were posing for their holiday card.

Like the compulsion to pick at a scab, I couldn’t help looking at Ron to see if I was still in heat. Would he look like the constipated guy on the toilet, or the hot fudge sundae?
Shit! Hot fudge sundae!
I couldn’t understand why the realization that he was Darcy’s husband—and completely bad news—didn’t kill my attraction for him. I had
never
been into bad boys. Brad Pitt went down a notch when he stole Geena Davis’s money in
Thelma and Louise.
Even now, so many years after he played the rogue character, I look at him and think:
Those girls really needed that money!
Not to mention the whole heartbroken Jennifer Aniston thing. Why couldn’t I turn down the heat on this real-life taboo?

I introduced myself and told the group that we were thrilled to have my daughter on the team because Rachel loved soccer and we recently moved to Santa Bella, so this would be a good opportunity for her to make new friends.

Mimi immediately jumped in. “I need you to understand, Claire, that this is a serious team, not a social outlet for your family.”

“Oh, um, I know that,” I stumbled. “I just meant that it’ll be nice to get to know all of you throughout the season.”

“Right,” Mimi interrupted.

Dick spoke for his package, saying that his girls moved from Hot Shots because the coach didn’t know what he was doing and the team’s record wasn’t what it could’ve been. “We’re here to win State Cup, plain and simple. The younger my girls win at State, the more they get used to the idea they’re champions. I’m always tellin’ parents colleges are looking for skills, but they also need to see confidence, and nothin’ gives a player that winnin’ feeling more than kicking ass on the field. There’s only so much scholarship money out there and I want my kids at good colleges.”

College scholarships?

“Amen to that,” Raymond said as Leo nodded emphatically.

“Straight up,” Loud Bobby added.

When we got to Mimi, she stood in the red carpet pose, held her clipboard and flashed a wide smile. “Most of you know me. I’m Mimi Shasta, the team manager, and my daughter is a returning defender. Like the shirt says, soccer is my life. I played in college, so I absolutely love this game and congratulate you all on your choice not only in sports, but in clubs. Kix is simply
the best
soccer club for girls in Southern California.” She paused for Dick and Bobby to end their side conversation, then continued. “Girls who play sports are more likely to do well in school, stay away from drugs, delay sexual activity and reap a whole host of other social benefits.”
Wow, I didn’t know that!
“Eighty percent of the women CEOs at Fortune 500 companies played sports in their youth,” she added.
Really?!
“That’s why I am all about girl power. Girls playing sports is the single most effective way to keep your daughters on the right track in life,” she said. Parents nodded their heads.
Thank God Rachel made the team,
I thought, shaking away the image of my crack-addicted pregnant little dropout turning tricks on the corner of El Camino and Via del Mar.

Pointing at our mute coach, Mimi continued. “You all know how lucky we are not only that your girls made the team, but to have Gunther as our coach.”
Was he going to speak?
“A lot of excellent players were cut from the team this year to make room for new girls—”
Did she just glare at me?
“so Gunther’s got a big job ahead of him getting our rookies in shape, but he knows what he’s doing, so I’m sure everyone will be fine.”
Is she talking about Rachel? Didn’t Gunther think she was in shape if he took her on the team? Why wouldn’t she be fine?
“I’m sure you already know that Gunther was the youngest player on the German National Team and scored more goals in the World Cup than any other single player
in the world
in two decades.”
Whoa! Okay, the guy wasn’t a talker, but clearly he was a shooter.
“Say hello, Gunther,” she said, nudging him slightly.
Please dear God, do not let him reply, “Hello, Gunther.”

“Hello team,” he said.
Oh. My. God! He sounded like a robot. This guy was some sort of German lab experiment. No human had such a monstrous voice. He sounded like he was operated by hand crank.

Mimi continued.
That was it from Gunther?
“Okay, so what I need you to understand about the team structure is Gunther needs to be all about the coaching. If you have questions about practice, game time, anything like that, I need you to call me.” We nodded. “So, let’s say it’s the night before a game and you don’t know where the field is, who do you call?” She stood waiting for a reply. “Okay, this is
not
a good sign, folks,” she laughed and shook her finger at us playfully. “Let’s try again. Who do you call?”

“You,” the group replied half-heartedly.

“Who?!” she shouted like a cheerleader.

“You!” we all shouted.

“That’s right. You call me. Gunther is all about the coaching. I am all about the management. Oh, and the fitness, but I’ll get to that in a minute.” She flipped through her notes. “Practices will be on Tuesdays and Thursdays at Diablo Field from 4:30 to 6 p.m., so make sure you adjust your schedules, move dance classes or what-not you have on those days. This year I’m going to need at least one parent from every family to be at every practice. Except for Mariah and Tandy, who are represented by Dick.”
Maybe Rachel needs an agent. Not.

Last week when we got the call from Preston, I felt like my equilibrium had returned. I was no longer the lunatic who got into brawls over German jerseys. I was level-headed Claire again. As soon as I heard Preston’s voice say those magical words, “We’d like Rachel to play halfback for Gunther,” the crooked horizon straightened. Now that Rachel had made the team, we could get back to normal.

Mimi flipped another sheet. “We need parents to be fluent in Gunther-speak,” she said in response to a parent’s concern about her being able to attend practices.
Gunther-speak?
“When you talk about games, tactics and strategy, we need you to be speaking the same language as we are at the club.”
We’re supposed to talk about these things at home?
“Because I was a college athlete, I’m familiar with the type of fitness training the girls need to excel at in soccer. Gunther asked me to be the fitness trainer for the team. If we’re serious about taking State Cup, these girls are going to need to be in top physical form, especially our rookies,” she said, looking at me again. Flipping onto the next page, she continued. “We’ll play in eight weekend tournaments this summer before the regular season starts, which will give us a serious edge over the other teams.”
Eight tournaments? There were only ten weeks of summer vacation!

Dick and Bobby hooted, while Leo asked how much this was all going to cost. “If money is an issue, I need you to talk to me about it afterward,” Mimi said. “We have a very generous foundation that provides scholarships for our families with limited means.” A few people laughed at Mimi’s reference to the foundation, though I wasn’t quite sure why. Darcy later filled me in that Mimi’s family funded the foundation. “Okay, so I also believe that in order to win as a team, we need to bond as a team, so I’ll have the girls do homework here before practice and run—and I mean run—them over to Diablo Field and get them started on their fitness regimen.” She sighed and flashed a megawatt smile. “Okay, I’ve done a lot of talking. Who has questions for me?”

One parent asked about game schedules, which Mimi said she would email to us as soon as the league got it to her. “We usually won’t get our game schedule until a few days before the season starts. Men run the league, what do you expect?”

I raised my hand. “Who makes the banner?”

She looked at me as if I was a pitiful little purple sparrow hit by an eighteen wheeler on the freeway. “We don’t make
banners
in club. Okay, so any other—”

“When do the girls choose their team name?” I asked.

Impatiently, she explained to the others, “Rachel comes to us from the rec side of Kix, so we’re all going to need to bear with a few of these types of questions until Claire gets oriented. Claire, we don’t name the teams after little plants and animals in club. Our name is Kix Girls Under Thirteen White.”

Yeah, girl power right back at you, Mimi.

Ron leaned toward me. “I’ll fill you in on everything later.”

“Thanks,” I said, nodding perfunctorily.
He smelled yummy. Why wasn’t my constipation visualization working?!

“Okay, so we need to talk about legacy numbers,” Mimi continued. “Gunther and I discussed the matter and we both agree that returning players should have first pick at their old jersey numbers.”
Yawn.
“Some of you have already called me with your requests, and I’m thrilled to tell you that they’ve
all
been accommodated.”
Who wouldn’t be thrilled?
“Dick was fast to grab numbers for his girls, which only leaves us with a few.”

“You got number two?” Leo asked, or as he would pronounce it,
axed.