Drive with your Knees
At fifteen, I played on one of the premier soccer teams in Texas. At that time in my life, it wasn’t enough to just win, it was important to be the best, even if it meant spending all day on the field. The car ride home after every game and practice became a cruel debrief on my performance.
As Dad enumerated my shortcomings, he liked to say things like, “Soccer players have a reputation for being soft, but the good ones will kick you square in the jaw the second you let your guard down,” and then mutter just loud enough to hear, “course, you’d have to be fast enough to catch someone to ever pull that off.” Other times, he’d offer more succinct maxims that felt needling and pithy. “Windows, not walls,” was a personal favorite that both criticized my positioning and implied I didn’t know the difference between open field and a defender’s back.
He would pass along this fatherly wisdom as he drove with a double cheeseburger in one hand and a 20-oz. coke, spiked with whisky from a boot flask in the other. Shredded iceberg lettuce tumbling into his lap. Secret sauce mingling with the gray of his beard. His slightly larger eye would bulge at me as he turned and jabbed me with his finger and gave me life advice. But the part I’ll never forget is that he did all of this while he steadied the wheel with nothing but the top of his knee.
You’d expect him to swerve as he wildly gesticulated about soccer practice, about the need to keep my eyes downfield, about how my killer instinct had been blunted by my mother hugging me too frequently, but he didn’t swerve. The car didn’t so much as drift an inch. An actual arrow in flight bent and curved more than our 80 miles per hour course down the highway.
He was incredible at it. And it pissed me off. I don’t know how it couldn’t.
The evening everything started, he was on another one of his tears. “When you’re on the attack you go. You just go. There ain’t anyone who can stop you when you go. What I saw out there today was someone who didn’t know how to go. Wasn’t in it. Wasn’t hungry.”
He took a bite of his burger. I glanced at the dashing streaks of white on the road wondering when his eyes might return forward.
“Well, you’ll get hungry. We’ll see to that. That new kid, that piece of work show-off, he was hungry.”
I glanced at the bag sitting in the center seat between us. I reached towards the opening and he swatted my hand away.
“You’ll eat when you get home. You’d make a mess in my truck with the way you played today.”
He looked back to the road and sucked on his teeth. “You think you’re good because you made a select team, but you’re complacent. You ain’t shit.”
Here’s how the game went down. Coach introduced a new element to the team: an unknown by the name of Caleb. When Coach told us to circle up, and Caleb emerged from behind a soccer chair like a wraith from the mist, we didn’t know what to think. He stood there, unassuming, with his hands behind his back, long black hair covering his eyes, looking at the ground. Did he bow to us? Or did I simply imagine that? We didn’t know where he came from, but the red penny jersey he wore over his team uniform told us he’d be playing goalie.
His play was nothing short of miraculous. A gazelle couldn’t have turned on a dime, leapt and bound with more grace, more power than he. High sailing shots, curving ones, bullets coming straight for his face, none of it daunted him. Every ball that came to him was within his reach. But the strangest part was that with every save, he kissed the ball and whispered something to it before sending it back to us.
At halftime, it was tied, 0-0. The opposing team kept shooting on goal, and Caleb kept making save after save. I kept wondering what it was he whispered to that ball. What secrets they conversed about.
After another save, Caleb paused. His sweaty hair clinging to his face and his eyes staring almost trancelike ahead. He cocked his head to one side, like a hound keying into some curious sound no one else could hear. He then whispered something to the ball and took a few steps forward. He dropped the ball and punted it across the field and all at once we realized that Caleb had a leg like the Second Coming. We gasped and felt the air sucked out of the field and out of our chests like the ball was trying to draw our souls heavenward with it.
A spherical object shouldn’t be able to fly. Regardless, Caleb’s ball flew. It became a tiny dot above us careening towards the other side of the field. A silence descended upon us as the ball continued skyward. We all stopped and stared, gawking upwards at the unimaginable. Then finally, it returned to us, and we must have all been amazed by the sheer velocity of the thing and how it paradoxically floated above us and how bizarre it all felt because even their goalie didn’t know how to react. At the last minute, he returned to himself, and he overcorrected and missed the ball as it bounced into the goal. Our goalie had scored for us, and the crowd went nuts.
The five minutes left in the game were spent in a daze. I don’t remember running up to celebrate with him. We were all too stunned by the sudden arrival of this stranger and the miracle of a play he pulled off. Or maybe it was the dynamic of our team. We were a little more cutthroat than high school. But if Caleb was stunned himself, he didn’t show it. The look on his face, black hair once more plastered across his face, was one of certainty. I don’t even know if he felt the need to watch the ball as it flew across the field that day.
Afterwards, my dad merely pointed to the truck as I approached.
“Where do you think he’s from?” I wanted to ask, but with my dad, silence about these things was the best policy. Sit through the dissection and the criticism. Internalize it. Stare ahead or out the window, make it through without crying.
Two days later, we had practice. Coach with his perfectly feathered blonde hair and pearly teeth greeted us with a smile.
“You ready to lock-in Tommy?”
“Yessir,” I replied.
“Good. We need you out there bud.”
Coach told everyone to circle up and reminded us of our last success. When he began to talk about capitalizing on this, I began to drift off. I couldn’t help picturing what it’d be like to load up all of my gear after practice into his 4Runner with Kyle. How we’d all go home together, eat a nice family meal. Something involving chicken. Not just spaghetti or stir fry or burgers.
My mind was jerked back by my old man shifting into view. It was always a bit jolting when he did it. That eye of his was enough to wrench anyone out of the most rapturous daydream.
I looked around and saw Caleb, sitting in lotus pose, head turned with an ear toward Coach, listening.
In practice I noticed he wielded the same grace as in a game. It was impossible not to admire him.
“That piece of shit kid is going to ruin your team.” My dad told me on the way home. “You get a Prima Donna like that on your team and it tears the fabric apart.”
I opened my mouth to speak.
“Don’t bother talking to him. He’s the enemy. Remember that son. You’re on a team, but every teammate is out for your blood.”
Next practice, I brought a bag of orange slices alongside my jug of water. Caleb was standing close as I fished one out, so I offered him one during our water break. This time, I was sure he bowed.
Dad said, “You aren’t scoring because you’re just giving him the ball. You got to kick it. Kick the ball so hard you kick his teeth in.”
I kept thinking about that bow.
He continued, “not that he uses that stupid mouth to say anything.”
Wildly long fingers placed together almost in prayer. The index fingers touching his brow. The thumbs just below the nose. And a curt movement of the head. Caleb’s bow.
“An ego the size of Texas and he’s only a goalie. You need to make yourself known on that field, son. If you’re doing your job, he never gets to touch the ball.”
We had another game. And driven by some menace in my feet, I scored a goal. We did so well I don’t think Caleb took a step in any direction the whole game.
Dad sat silent then on the way home, and it didn’t bother me so much, the way he drove, now that he wasn’t slandering my talents or teammates.
The next game, I scored again and I saw Caleb crack a smile. Encouraged, I raged against the other team. I took shot after shot. At halftime, Caleb offered me some gummies in a Ziplock bag. He motioned to his mouth to eat. I did. They melted like ambrosia.
I didn’t care on what sinister periphery my father floated. He was a bystander while I took the field. It was Caleb and me against the world, and we were winning.
A hot sun hung in the sky directly above us. It was too hot to cheer. Our parents glared from their chairs and under portable canopies. On that shadowless, unnatural day, Caleb let a ball go by. We were all dumbfounded. He must not have believed the ball was real, because he didn’t pick it up afterwards. The ref had to run and get it himself. None of us moved.
After that, our defense wilted like spinach and shortly afterward, the opposing team charged Caleb again. The ball ricocheted like a pinball between their players. My soul faltered at the prospect of another score. But Caleb didn’t.
The player kicked and Caleb caught the ball. We looked to him to roll it out to a defender, but instead he rolled it out in front of himself. He began sprinting down the field, juggling the ball with such deftness and subtlety. Had we ever seen a soccer player before this day? Surely not. We’d seen clumsy teenagers take the field. We’d seen arrogant adults stumble across open turf. We’d never seen what it means for the ball to be an extension of yourself. Effort, grace, and speed combined in some holy trinity. My knees went weak. I moved into position to take a pass. I was open. It’d be an easy score, all eyes were on our goalie. He wove, cut, spun. He strode over slide tackles with ease. The ball anticipated his movements and met him where he needed it. I waited for my pass.
Caleb looked at me. For a brief moment, I saw the dark pits of his eyes. He looked away. Pulled his leg back, and launched the ball into the opposing team’s goal.
Somewhere, almost inaudible underneath the raucous applause, I think I remember my dad yelling, “You’ve lost control of your team coach! You going to let a kid pull himself from the goal? Get him off the field!”
Before that, I pictured myself as a staunch defender of Caleb against my dad. Maybe not vocal, and maybe not active. More like the way a boulder squats in a field, shielding a small section from the passage of the wind. Afterwards, I couldn’t help but find myself worn-down, doubtful, tired.
“He’s coming for your job, son. Time to show your teeth.”
“He’s not coming for my job.”
“He is. And if you can’t see that, you’re blind.”
“I was open. I could have scored if he’d passed it.”
“If you think you were open, you’re blind.”
I simply glared at him.
“Remember, windows not walls.” He had begun to point and glare at me. His knee guided the car down the freeway as we drove. “Windows, not walls.”
“There were no walls. He had an opening to pass and he was selfish and took a risky shot.”
“He was selfish, but the kid has game and guts. Something you lack. Where’s your drive? Your will to win?”
“Did you want me to steal it from him?”
“You need to prove you’re an asset now or you never will.”
The road stretched on ahead, rapidly disappearing beneath us he drove on.
“I’m looking at the second best player on that team right now and everyone knows it.”
It was silence on the ride home after that.
Over the course of the season, things moved quickly and with a logic to them that leaves you feeling helpless and disoriented as a player.
Coach moved Caleb to striker. That made sense. The way he seemed to phase in and out of existence when a defender approached, how his legs cut and pivoted in ways that belonged more to the savannah than the field, and his supernatural connection to the ball– he belonged there. And I understood when he became a vortex and every pass came his direction, when the game became less soccer and more Caleb’s Game. We all existed there to push the ball to him.
Then I was moved to midfield. The idea was that I was good enough to run up and down the field and get the ball to Caleb. The team valued my endurance, Coach told me. Get the ball to Caleb, Tommy.
In the car, dad said: “You give that kid one more goal, they’re going to nickname you ‘The Assistant’”
“We have to score dad.”
“Last I checked, you’ve quite the talent for scoring.”
I looked away without responding.
“Eyes up.”
“Yessir.”
“Have a plan.”
“Yessir.”
“Fake or pass. It’s how you get to the goal. But don’t pass to him. And what do we do if nothing is there?”
“Start over. Push it back and find a new way. Look for windows.”
“We’re past that son. You need to prove your worth again to this team. Show them that this new kid is a flash in the pan. Show them what real grit and talent can do. Drive through.”
I looked over to my dad, and I didn’t see the spiteful person I’d begun to resent at the beginning of my season. He’d always been on my side. It was Caleb who had been against me.
During practice one day, we had a scrimmage. It was hot even as the sun had begun to sink below the horizon. Bits of turquoise had begun fading to lavender, hesitating on the edge of darkness. The lights of the field had turned on. Caleb and I were on opposite teams. It felt like a big game, like some great victory or loss hung in the balance.
It was my best performance yet. I defended Caleb, sprinted down the field, passed to a teammate who passed back to me, I scored. I was the electricity powering the stadium. All eyes were on me. We managed it so that the ball didn’t even get to Caleb. The opposing team couldn’t touch it. Our side was up by two.
But then something changed. It came suddenly, unannounced, like cold winds announcing a thunderstorm. The tides of a game will sometimes change like that. The exact cause is often unknown. Only this time, we knew what changed. We could feel it. It was Caleb. He turned up his performance again, showing us some new tier of play, like he had been holding something back all this time. He got the ball and he scored. He scored again. In less than five minutes, the game had reversed and we were tied and I was winded. Caleb bowed to me as he walked away from the goal. I’d never seen a gesture I’d learned to hate so much.
I thought about the car ride before practice. Thought about some of the things my father had said. Things that couldn’t be acted upon. He’d said, “it’s awfully hard to score without a knee,” and simply shrugged.
I looked to where he sat in his folding chair. Something in his thermos other than just coke. He knocked on his knee twice and nodded. I shook my head. I looked back to Caleb returning to his position and my teammates patting him on the back.
I’ve spent a lot of time since that scrimmage going back over what happened, trying to find the moment when my actions began, to find any point when I could have turned back. But I can’t. It was all supposed to be a game. Only in mid-movement do you realize that you’ve begun an action. Only when the dust settles do you realize you’ve done something impossible to retract.
Defending Caleb that next kickoff, I tried so hard to prevent him from scoring. You have to understand. I wanted the ball. I wanted to win. I did everything I could. I kicked at the ball, but it was never where it was before. Caleb never was either. He got past me and I chased him. From behind, I drove my knees forward, pumping with all my might, driving with every bit of competitive nature within me. I began to gain ground. I was right behind him. I kept thinking Faster, faster. Drive. Then I saw the opening. I stuck out my leg and swept it and for the first time that whole season, a defender landed a slide tackle on Caleb. He stumbled and fell and crumpled to the ground.
All I could think of was the ball. All I could think of was taking it and running and not even passing it because all the glory was mine. The world froze around me. Tiny wings attached to my feet carried me to the other end of the field. I saw the goalie stupefied before me. Godlike, I sent the ball into the net.
I raised my hands in triumph and I turned and saw the rest of the team gathered around Caleb on the ground. A new fear and dread in their eyes. Through the gaps in their legs, I saw him clutching his knee. Across the distance came a pitiful moan of pain.
“You did what you needed to do. Don’t ever apologize for that,” my dad said on the car ride home. He turned to me, hands full and knees on the wheel. He poked me on the chest to drive the message home. “You’ve got the killer instinct to win. He doesn’t.”
I couldn’t say anything.
“The team is yours again. You’re their leader.”
Still silence. I stared at his knees.
“Eat up. You did good out there. 3-2.”
I looked at the burger in my lap. I’d unfolded it from its wrapper, but couldn’t take a bite. I didn’t have an appetite.
I looked back at his knees. I keep remembering that ride home. I keep thinking how easy it would have been to do the right thing, to lift up my cleated foot and drive it home on the person who deserved it.
© Sean Knight
Sean Knight is a writer living in Dripping Springs, TX with his wife, daughter, and dog. He graduated from the University of Texas at Austin in 2014 with a Bachelor’s in English. Previous publication credits include Half-Light Press.
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