Why We Fly: Chapters 5–9

My head was too far back. James tried to compensate.

Besides, it doesn’t take much brainpower to whip up my staple, the egg white, arugula, sprout, and chèvre omelet I’ve made every morning since Nelly and I discovered Quinoa Mitchell’s Healthy Mornings cookbook when we were twelve.

With his season opener just a few weeks away, Coach Brown has the team doing two-a-days, and Three’s dad has him on a bulking-up regimen I couldn’t hope to contend with.

“Morning,” I say, heading to the refrigerator and trying to dispel the ominous feeling that accompanies their silence.

It’s way too hot in this car, and I surreptitiously fan myself with the collar of my shirt.

He takes my hand and doesn’t let go until we’re ushered into Dr. Ratliff’s office, which is a small industrial room with a fake wood desk and bookshelves laden with medical textbooks, two chairs, a few degrees on the wall, and nothing else.

His deep brown eyes watch me intently, but he waits.

The doctor clicks around interminably on the computer, reading with his mouth pursed.

“Based on this post-impact assessment, I’ll clear you to return to play under the following protocol.” Dr. Ratliff types as he talks. “One week of noncontact drills. As long as your symptoms do not return during that time, then—”

Enjoy that one, dear, she would have said in her sassiest accent.

It’s not a shock that she’s already garnered admiration from our team, though it’s only her first full season with us.

After the fifth person talks about their summer exercise regimen, I wonder if anyone besides Skylar and myself are going to have anything productive to add to this conversation.

Once everyone has voted, I’ll tally the ballots in my office, and we’ll reconvene for the announcement.

“It’s a nice one. Clearly you’re a connoisseur.”

I guess I need to check my internalized misogyny. Don’t ever let anyone tell you how to behave.

But one thing is for certain—I have been an integral part of building this team.

When I arrive at the Bumblebee, I tune SiriusXM to the baroque station, close my eyes, and breathe.

I’ve known him well since he helped me through an uncomfortable situation a few years ago when Nelly and I joined a competition squad that prayed before every tournament—in Jesus’s name. His guidance gave me the guts to ask the team to change the prayer to something more egalitarian, and he’s been a close family friend since.

But most of the noise comes from the teeming backyard, where we find the bulk of the partygoers.

I feel a few of the soap bubbles careening around in my chest burst.

“Hey, Greenberg,” he says softly.
“Hi, Three,” I whisper back.
We’re not as discreet as we think. Nelly frowns at us, and Mr. Walters looks down his nose, his brow furrowed, as he notes how close Three stands to me.

He’s too attuned to it, and not in an indulgent way.

“Son, that’s an eight-figure arm you’re using as a jungle gym,” Mr. Walters intones.

Now all the media can talk about is how he’s come back stronger than ever and the sidelining didn’t dampen his rhetoric at all.

While he glares at Aunt Rhonda, the image on-screen flips to two pundits engaged in a heated debate over the new league rule that says any player who kneels for the anthem will be fined.

“That’s my point exactly. You had a white player kneeling for years to protest women having reproductive rights, and nobody bothered about that. The league didn’t impose any fines. Seems to me what we’re all really riled up over isn’t the knee. It’s the man and the cause.”

I have years’ worth of pictures of myself—from consecration, my bat mitzvah, and confirmation—posing in front of the one representing the tree, because my father insists we’re descended from Asher.

I don’t know if that’s exactly what Rabbi Spinrad is talking about, but it’s likely, since he’s both a sports fan and the head of the social justice initiative at the synagogue.

We are silent in the face of their disparagement. You may wonder: Rabbi, what has this got to do with me? Well, I would argue that it has everything to do with us. We have a moral obligation to bear witness to injustice in society.

Our tradition insists it is our responsibility to protect the marginalized and to partner with other communities to confront the powerful who perpetuate injustice.

Our tradition insists it is our responsibility to protect the marginalized and to partner with other communities to confront the powerful who perpetuate injustice.

What’s more, we will have to account for our actions or our inaction. To me, that is a part of our covenant.

I decide to bravado my way through the embarrassment.

Her smug smile sends a boiling wave of anger over my skin. She’s mistaken if she thinks she knows anything about me.

Mr. Knight was fined an undisclosed amount for defying the league’s edict regarding appropriate posture during the anthem.