Luke Desmarais
Summer reading
September 9, 2011
Fresh Starts
(Friday Night Lights and The Kite Runner)
It was a blistering hot day in Odessa, Texas. The kids were on the field and suited up for their first day of youth football practice. The head coach, Booby Miles, put the whole team on the fifty yard line and spoke to them. He said, “ Welcome to the football team. My name is Booby Miles and I am your head coach. I was a very successful High School running back until I blew out my knee my senior year. When I was in school, nothing mattered to me except for football. I was a horrible student, and after I got hurt, I was left with nothing. It is important to get good grades. After school you get to come to practice and have fun, playing football with your friends. I have one rule, listen to the coach. Now let’s have a good first day of practice.”
The coaches split the players up into groups based on their position and each group started doing their own drills. Practice flew by for coach Miles, teaching the running backs how to juke and spin. It made him remember when he used to play. By the end of practice he noticed that one kid hadn’t said a word the whole time. Coach Miles walked over to the kid and said,” What’s your name.” the kid replied very quietly,” Sohrab.”“Well why aren’t you talking to any of your friends,” Said Boobie. Sohrab spoke again in his faint voice,” I am new, I don’t have any friends.” Coach Miles said,” Speak up son I can’t hear you.” Sohrab said,” I just moved here from California.” Boobie replied,” That’s alright because in this town, football is a great way to make friends. When I used to play everyone wanted to talk to me because I was the starting running back.” Shortly after this conversation, practice came to an end and everybody went home.
As the year went on Sohrab still wasn’t talking to anyone and coach miles took notice. He talked to some of Sohrab’s teachers and it was the same thing in all of his classes. When Coach Miles asked Sohrab, “Have you made any friends yet.” Sohrab simply shook his head back and forth. Coach Miles then asked, “Why won’t you talk to anyone.” Sohrab shrugged his shoulders any walked away. Coach Miles could tell from the look in his eyes that he had been through a lot in his life so far. Sohrab never returned back to football or school after that day. Some people say that he moved far away, and others say he went to an insane asylum, but they are probably both rumors. Coach Miles couldn’t stop thinking of what possibly could have happened in this boy’s life to make him act the way he did. In actuality, Bobbie’s wildest imagination couldn’t come close to what actually happened to Sohrab as a child.
