will make a fortune. They’ll be set for years. Us, we’re stuck in the bottom half of the table—again—not close enough to the relegation zone to create any drama, and nowhere near even an insincere push at promotion. We’re nowhere, Danny, adrift in between something and nothing—”
The chairman interrupted. “We could have paid off years of debt and replaced the South Stand, Danny. The whole rotting goddamn thing—” He inhaled, and the end of his cigarette ignited bright orange. “The club just can’t bear under the weight of it, of what you’ve done. The Welsh lad’s finished. Maybe forever. You broke his leg in two places. Clean through. And they had plans for him. He was a good little player—”
Danny had finally had enough. “He was not,” he said.
The chairman sat himself up just a bit, annoyed and surprised at being contradicted on a football matter. “Oh, really, Hooper? He was not, was he? He was a Welsh under-21 international is what he was—”
“Exactly,” Danny said. “Spot on. A Welsh under-21 international. He was bollocks.”
The chairman’s face reddened. “There were four clubs in Manchester alone bidding for his services, a good four more than have asked about you, Danny. The transfer fee could’ve got that miserable club to 1980 without taking another decent decision. And who on earth knows what the money would’ve meant to his family. Now he’ll need a testimonial at nineteen...”
The chairman felt himself slipping, his anger getting the better of him, and he was disgusted with himself. He sputtered and waved his cigarette at Aldy, suggesting he handle the rest of this unfortunate business.
Aldy said, “Danny, I’ve known you since you were nine years of age. You’ve been...” And then he caught himself. He didn’t want to go down this maudlin road with this kid. Not today. He was still cross with Danny, and Danny had brought this all upon himself. What had he been thinking with all that Continental nonsense about short passing and clever dribbling and resisting the obvious benefits of being so goddamn big and bloody strong? And why had all that led to this? If he’d wanted to change his reputation, then why... What had he been thinking?
“Danny,” Aldy said, “you’ve been sold.”
The word hung in the smoky, close air of the chairman’s office.
Sold.
So final, so past tense, so done—and such an obvious expression of what Danny Hooper and all the Danny Hoopers were to East Southwich Albion AFC and all the East Southwich Albion AFCs: commodities, bit and pieces, odds and sods.
Sold.
No longer East Southwich Albion material, Danny Hooper.
No longer good enough for this midtable Third Division club that couldn’t knock little old Dire Vale United out of the FA Cup.
Sold.
“Danny,” Aldy said, “Danny, you’ll have been suspended for four matches, maybe more. London will throw the book at us, at you, if you stay. And we’ve naught to play for. We’ll have to move Rigby to the middle and bring in Figg from the reserves to cover for him. And the supporters—look, Danny... your season in the League is as good as done anyway, lad, done. So we’ve sold you.”
Danny looked at the chairman and then back at Aldy. “I—”
“Never a question of your commitment, son,” Aldy went on, an avuncular sympathy taking over his voice. “No one’s ever doubted your bottle, son. No one gets stuck in like you do—”
The chairman interrupted, belting out, “SOLD!” as if he had regretted giving the opportunity to say it over to Aldershot Taylor.
Danny sat back in his chair. He imagined the next headline: “Hooper Out of His Gourd, Royals Out of the Cup—Hooper Out of the Club.” He thought that his torso was very nearly tinged blue from wearing East Southwich Albion’s shirt for most of his young life; he thought that the Auld Moors wasn’t just his home away from home—the Auld Moors was his home, it was all he had; and he thought there was no other team in the entire ninety-two-team Football League he could ever imagine ever caring about. He thought, Who else would I play for?
Danny said, “You couldn’t have sent me out on loan until it blows over... ?”
“Ah,” the chairman said. “A thinker is young Danny. Suddenly your brain enters into it, does it? Thought occurred to us, aye, it did, it did—but I’m afraid we need you off the books entirely, my son. And off the books you are.”
So Danny cut to the chase and said, “Who?” which wasn’t quite right for the situation and which confused the two old gray men.
The chairman sputtered, “W-well, I’m the boss around here, lad, and I made the decision. I did. Aldy—”
“No,” Danny said. “That doesn’t matter to me. You’ve sold me. It’s done and dusted. Who bought me?” Danny braced himself for the worst. The only good news he could possibly imagine was that he’d been sold to a First Division club and would be soon staying in the finest hotels in London and Liverpool. But he knew just how unlikely that was—more likely he knew he was about to hear that he was off to Middlesby Town or Maidshead Tuesday or Bloat, or even more depressing, a non-League club, some club in a misty provincial conference that shared its ground with cricketers or greyhounds. “Just say it,” Danny said. “Say the name. Whatever it is.”
The chairman looked at Aldy and nodded Danny’s way, as if to say, Go on, man—tell the lad.
Aldy turned to face Danny and said, “You remember Graham Broome, Danny?”
“Graham Broome? Broomsie-from-Cloppingshire-United Graham Broome? He’s not in Cloppingshire anymore, is he?”
“Well, no. He is not in Cloppingshire. But where he is, he wants you. He always thought you could play, always liked your game. He’s got a new team, a team he thinks can win a championship, and he needs a number five.”
Aldy stopped, looked at Danny, looked over at the chairman, then back at Danny. “He called us, son. After he heard about what you did. We didn’t call him.”
Danny looked at the floor and then up at his former manager. “A championship?” Danny said.
“So he says.”
“That sounds good, I reckon. But I have one more question, and I expect you’ll know what it is.”
The chairman blurted a bitter “I should think you’ll have more than one, lad.”
Danny said, “The championship of what?”
The chairman sucked at his cigarette.
Aldy sat back in his chair and squinted once and then twice, as if wishing himself away. Then he said, “America.”
“America?”
“America, my son.”
The chairman exhaled more smoke than Danny had imagined his rotund body could contain and cracked a tiny grin. He extended a large, reddened hand. Danny didn’t—couldn’t—move. “Go on, son,” Aldy said to Danny. “Shake it.” Danny remained still. “Shake it, Danny. You’ll need to shake that hand, my son.”
And Danny shook the chairman’s hand.
“There are a great many players of solid English pedigree in the American All-Star Soccer Association” is what Danny repeated to his dad over a swifty two hours later. “So said the chairman anyway.”
“The American All-Star Soccer Association? A mouthful, innit?”
“I know how it sounds.”
His