Life Among Giants by Bill Roorbach Page B

her own favorite phrase thrown back in her face. Kate suddenly turned and, pushing past her pals, raced heedless through the quad and off across campus.
    â€œCan you open this?” I said to Dr. Chun. “Open this door.”
    Ling-Ling Po stood in Mom’s way.
    Th e chauffeur was impassive, holding Linsey back.
    â€œ Th e door, ” I said.
    â€œLizano, let’s let her go,” said Sylphide.
    My mother made a movement toward following Kate, thought better of it—she would have had to knock Ling-Ling on her butt—then stood still as a trophy, undone.
    D R. C HUN PARKED the Bentley in a space marked RESERVED in a row of other fancy cars at the edge of the parking lot closest to the Yale Bowl, a gorgeous old stone stadium. I was about to point out the parking restriction when I realized that one of cops on duty was directing us to a spot: everything had been taken care of.
    Dr. Chun hopped out efficiently, opened my mother’s door, waited. But Mom was frozen.
    â€œPerhaps I should be going back to try to speak with her,” Sylphide said at length, very gently. “Dr. Chun could be taking me back. I’m thinking we miscalculated, you and I.”
    My mother threw a sigh, brightened as best she could. “It’s no one’s fault,” she said, meaning that it was her own fault, the closest she got to apology, ever.
    Gradually we climbed out of the car, dazed survivors suddenly deposited in a parking lot. Our space was in the no-man’s land between Yale fans and Princeton fans; there was a lot of good-natured banter and taunting back and forth across this DMZ, pennants waving, air horns tooting, little boys going out for passes across the blacktop, little girls jumping cheers, Frisbees flying, also half a hundred flags, crew cuts, flattops, effortlessly American. It wasn’t a place you were going to see peace signs or smell pot burning. Hamburgers on charcoal, that’s what I smelled, hot dogs, toasting buns, ketchup, mustard, apple pie, humiliation.
    I pulled my hair out of my collar and let it blow in the breeze. I preferred no one look at me, take in my size and think, Jock. Emily was the only brown-skinned person in sight. And with Dr. Chun one of the only Orientals, as I would have put it back then. He got to work pulling an elaborate stainless-steel barbecue out of the Bentley’s boot. It unfolded in ingenious layers, produced its own legs, refused to stand straight. I went to Dr. Chun’s aid, and together we got all the latches right. With nothing else to focus on, the women watched us closely. Th ere was a table, damask tablecloths, matching cushions for the chairs.
    We were attracting considerable attention. Several of the women in the crowd had recognized Sylphide: you could see her name on their lips. Oblivious, the great dancer breathed in the air, breathed it out again, someone who knew how to contain her emotion. For Linsey, she pointed out a clown on stilts, a Princeton tiger costume, a bikini girl on roller skates selling pennants. “Sylphide!” someone called, but to no reaction. Emily followed the great ballerina’s lead, breathed the air, pointed out her own sights, the Goodyear Blimp coming into view, a television perched on the hood of a car. By the look on her face you’d think it was her name the voices called out. I didn’t dare look at Sylphide, stood between her and Emily, close as I could to both.
    A stray football wobbled through the sky directly at us. I reached just in front of the great ballerina’s face at the last second as if casually, grabbed the ball out of the air with one hand. I could have been a tight end, fingers like that! Th e man who’d thrown it—a Yale freshman, beanie and all, waved comically, cried “Here!” And I fired a pass those thirty yards straight as a string, a bullet that drilled his chest and knocked him down, all to the screaming laughter of his friends. He leapt