And to be honest, it was. At least, at first. I got to punch that jerk Brandon in the face—I know, I know, not cool, but still!—leave school early, and hang out at the track with my new coach—because I was on a team now—who turned out to be a pretty cool dude. Me and Coach didn’t go no further into my life or nothing like that, which was a good thing because I never really told nobody about my dad. Instead Coach asked me who my favorite basketball player was. “LeBron,” I said, like it should’ve been obvious. “Who else?” “Who else?” Coach said, surprised. “Uh . . . let me think . . . Michael Jordan?” “Jordan? Come on, man. Jordan is like somebody’s granddaddy. Jordan don’t wanna see LeBron on his worst day. LeBron could be sick from a bad batch of cafeteria chicken drummies and still give Jordan the business.” Coach stood up. “See, that’s the problem with you kids. Y’all don’t know what a true champ is.” “Coach, I hate to break it to you, but LeBron is a champ.
