Living Up the Street by Gary Soto

an eight, so he went first, slowly building a spine of dominoes.
    “You do it like this,” he said. He connected a four to a four that ran in a new direction. “And don’t use your blank ones until you gotta.” In the end Alfonso won, and wanting to try again I turned them over to mix them up.
    I smiled, eager now that I understood the game. “Let’s play another.” Instead of answering me he swung his legs from under the table and ran to the game room, leaving a small impression of wet cut offs on the bench. He cameback with a large four-square ball that was pressed to his chest like a bag of groceries.
    “Let’s play this.”
    With Marsha and Esteban, I joined him on the asphalt. He was only seven but he played like a tiger. I had to crumble to a knee on one shot and pick up my glasses from the ground when he hooked a shot at my feet and the ball rolled up my chest to my face. I won by two points. We played once more, and again I won. Marsha, a quiet girl with stringy hair, played next and I let her win a few points. She played without looking at me, and I played with my attention locked on her face: She looked like my sister at her age, except Marsha’s eyes were greenish-brown and her disposition was soft and almost angelic.
    I called her by her name every time she made a point or tried to make a difficult play.
    “Good girl, Marsha. Almost, Marsha.”
    Esteban, her younger brother of about six, stepped into the square, and I played exaggeratedly slow, carrying the ball instead of tapping it across the line. He was like his sister, so shy that he wouldn’t look at me; he looked downward at my feet and when I said “Good, Esteban” his face wouldn’t answer back with a smile or words. As with his sister, I let him get a few points in our game to eleven.
    Alfonso was ready to play again, but Calvin, who had been talking with a neighbor at the fence, returned to say that it was closing time. Alfonso moaned. He bounced the ball in mock irritation. Marsha and Esteban ran to the gate without saying goodbye, although Marsha looked back at me just before crossing the street to her house.
    I said good-bye to Calvin who thanked me for coming and said he hoped I’d come the next day. I left walking up Marsha’s street and, although she didn’t show herself, I sensed she was probably watching me from her porch. Iwalked quickly up the street whose houses were ill-kept and broken: ripped screen doors, dirt where grass once grew, and the paint fading into chalky dust. I followed the shortcut through vacant lots to Ventura Street on my way home.
    Again, after dinner the next day, I walked the four miles to Emerson Elementary, all the while thinking of Marsha and her brother Esteban. I wondered about them, why they were so shy, who their father and mother were, how they were doing in school. When I arrived sweating from the long walk, Alfonso waved at me from the line of kids who were in line at the “Slip & Slide.” Calvin was nowhere in sight.
    “Where’s Calvin?” I asked. Two kids pointed in the direction of the school. I wondered why he was over there and was irritated that he wasn’t with the kids. He should be doing more, I thought. He’s the one getting paid. But I let this drop from my mind and turned to say “Hi” to all the kids—six of them—who just looked at me or made playful bird noises at me. Calvin returned shortly and together we leaned against the fence in the shade of a sycamore. We watched them in silence before Calvin suggested that he and I go play dominoes.
    “Now you kids mind yourselves,” he warned them. Some made faces while others made bird noises and cow sounds. We walked slowly to the game room and, in spite of his disinterest in the kids, I still wanted to be his friend. I tried to start up a conversation about college.
    “Is it really hard work?”
    “Not really. Just algebra. I didn’t do too well in math. Never did.” We talked awhile about college but our talk slowly