Toni #4 [Paperback]

USChapter 1: Salty Coach, Sour Pickles
 
No lie, Coach Wise even yells at me in my dreams. Which is not to say my dreams are edge-of-your-seat thrillers. I’m not one of those kids who spends all night riding on the backs of flying tarantulas. I never fall off seaside cliffs or wake up in a cold sweat, afraid of shadowy things lurking under my bed. I got enough problems as is; I don’t have time to invent more for myself. Besides, you only find that kind of magical stuff in books with talking dogs or time- traveling closets. I don’t even have a regular closet. Me and my older brother Roddy keep our clothes on a broken bookshelf left behind by the last person who lived in our apartment.
 
Anyway—I was telling you about my dreams. Mostly I just kind of walk around my neighborhood, living my life, eating fried pickles, until Coach Wise pops out from behind a Dumpster or bumps into me in a crowd and starts talking trash.
 
“This is what you dream about?” he shouted last night. I dropped a letter I was holding into a sewer. He has this voice, growling and deep, that makes me think of empty stomachs. “Running errands? Where’s your generation’s imagination?”
 
Every time I think about Coach Wise, I shudder. Not a practice goes by without him chasing me around the court, whist le propped threateningly in the corner of his mouth, ready to tear me to shreds. Toni, go faster! Toni, you’re killing us! Toni, why in God’s name did you do that? When things get really bad, he suggests cutting up my jersey, making scissors out of his fingers with childlike glee. I don’t know why I make him so mad, but the one thing I do know is that you can’t go through life letting people talk to you any kind of way. Doesn’t matter who they are. Even Roddy has to ask nicely when it’s my turn to do the dishes. Sometimes I forget or I just don’t feel ll“A