Sherman Alexie - The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian

"We have Arnold Spirit," Coach said.

"Me?" I asked.

"Yes, you," Coach said. "You're starting tonight."

"Really?"

"Really. And you're going to guard Rowdy. The whole game. He's your man. You have

to stop him. If you stop him, we win this game. It's the only way we're going to win this game."

Wow. I was absolutely stunned. Coach wanted me to guard Rowdy. Now, okay, I was a

great shooter, but I wasn't a great defensive player. Not at all. There's no way I could stop Rowdy.

I mean, if I had a baseball bat and bulldozer, maybe I could stop him. But without real weapons—without a pistol, a man-eating lion, and a vial of bubonic plague—I had zero chance of competing directly with Rowdy. If I guarded him, he was going to score seventy points.

"Coach," I said. "I'm really honored by this. But I don I think I can do it."

He walked over to me, kneeled, and pushed his forehead against mine. Our eyes were,

like, an inch apart. I could smell the cigarettes and chocolate on his breath.

"You can do it," Coach said.

Oh, man, that sounded just like Eugene. He always shouted that during any game I ever

played. It could be, like, a three-legged sack race, and Gene would be all drunk and happy in the stands and he'd be shouting out, "Junior, you can do it!"

Yeah, that Eugene, he was a positive dude even as an alcoholic who ended up getting

shot in the face and killed.

Jeez, what a sucky life. I was about to play the biggest basketball game of my life and all I could think about was my dad's dead best friend.

So many ghosts.

"You can do it," Coach said again. He didn't shout it. He whispered it. Like a prayer. And he kept whispering again. Until the prayer turned into a song. And then, for some magical reason, I believed in him.

Coach had become, like, the priest of basketball, and I was his follower. And I was going to follow him onto the court and shut down my best friend.

I hoped so.

"I can do it," I said to Coach, to my teammates, to the world.

"You can do it," Coach said.

"I can do it."

"You can do it."

"I can do it."

Do you understand how amazing it is to hear that from an adult? Do you know how

amazing it is to hear that from anybody? It's one of the simplest sentences in the world, just four words, but they're the four hugest words in the world when they're put together.

You can do it.

I can do it.

Let's do it.

We all screamed like maniacs as we ran out of the locker room and onto the basketball

court, where two thousand maniac fans were also screaming.

The Reardan band was rocking some Led Zeppelin.

As we ran through our warm-up layup drills, I looked up into the crowd to see if my dad was in his usual place, high up in the northwest corner. And there he was. I waved at him. He waved back.

Yep, my daddy was an undependable drunk. But he'd never missed any of my organized

games, concerts, plays, or picnics. He may not have loved me perfectly, but he loved me as well as he could.

My mom was sitting in her usual place on the opposite side of the court from Dad.

Funny how they did that. Mom always said that Dad made her too nervous; Dad always

said that Mom made him too nervous.

Penelope was yelling and screaming like crazy, too.

I waved at her; she blew me a kiss.

Great, now I was going to have to play the game with a boner.

Ha-ha, just kidding.

So we ran through layups and three-on-three weave drills, and free throws and pick and

rolls, and then the evil Wellpinit five came running out of the visitors' locker room.

Man, you never heard such booing. Our crowd was as loud as a jet.

They were just pitching the Wellpinit players some serious crap.

You want to know what it sounded like?

It sounded like this:

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

We couldn't even hear each other.

I worried that all of us were going to have permanent hearing damage.

I kept glancing over at Wellpinit as they ran their layup drills. And I noticed that Rowdy kept glancing over at us.

At me.

Rowdy and I pretended that we weren't looking at each other. But, man, oh, man, we

were sending some serious hate signals across the gym.

I mean, you have to love somebody that much to also hate hem that much, too.

Our captains, Roger and Jeff, ran out to the center circle to have the game talk with the refs.

Then our band played "The Star-Spangled Banner."

And then our five starters, including me, ran out to the center circle to go to battle against Wellpinit's five.

Rowdy smirked at me as I took my position next to him.

"Wow," he said. "You guys must be desperate if you're starting."

"I'm guarding you," I said.

"What?"

"I'm guarding you tonight."

"You can't stop me. I've been kicking your ass for fourteen years."

"Not tonight," I said. "Tonight's my night."

Rowdy just laughed.

The ref threw up the opening jump ball.

Our big guy, Roger, tipped it back toward our point guard, but Rowdy was quicker. He

intercepted the pass and raced toward his basket. I ran right behind him. I knew that he wanted to dunk it. I knew that he wanted to send a message to us.

I knew he wanted to humiliate us on the opening play.

And for a second, I wondered if I should just intentionally foul him and prevent him from dunking. He'd get two free throws but those wouldn't be nearly as exciting as a dunk.

But, no, I couldn't do that. I couldn't foul him. That would be like giving up. So I just sped up and got ready to jump with Rowdy.

I knew he'd fly into the air about five feet from the hoop. I knew he'd jump about two feet higher than I could. So I needed to jump quicker.

And Rowdy rose into the air. And I rose with him.

AND THEN I ROSE ABOVE HIM!

Yep, if I believed in magic, in ghosts, then I think maybe I was rising on the shoulders of my dead grandmother and Eugene, my dad's best friend. Or maybe I was rising on my mother and father's hopes for me.

I don't know what happened.

But for once, and for the only time in my life, I jumped higher than Rowdy.

I rose above him as he tried to dunk it.

I TOOK THE BALL RIGHT OUT OF HIS HANDS!

Yep, we were, like, ten feet off the ground, but I was still able to reach out and steal the ball from Rowdy.

Even in midair, I could see the absolute shock on Rowdy's face. He couldn't believe I was flying with him.

He thought he was the only Indian Superman.

I came down with the ball, spun, and dribbled back toward our hoop. Rowdy, screaming

with rage, was close behind me.

Our crowd was insanely loud.

They couldn't believe what I'd just done.

I mean, sure, that kind of thing happens in the NBA and in college and in the big high

schools. But nobody jumped like that in a small school basketball gym. Nobody blocked a shot like that.

NOBODY TOOK A BALL OUT OF A GUY'S HANDS AS HE WAS JUST ABOUT

TO DUNK!

But I wasn't done. Not by a long shot. I wanted to score. I'd taken the ball from Rowdy and now I wanted to score in his face. I wanted to absolutely demoralize him.

I raced for our hoop.

Rowdy was screaming behind me.

My teammates told me later that I was grinning like an idiot as I flew down the court.

I didn't know that.

I just knew I wanted to hit a jumper in Rowdy's face.

Well, I wanted to dunk on him. And I figured, with the crazy adrenaline coursing through my body, I might be able to jump over the rim again. But I think part of me knew that I'd never jump like that again. I only had that one epic jump in me.