Every day after school
He would be the first one through the doors
Of the Boys And Girls Club
And he was usually dancing his way through
With sunglasses on
And Justin Bieber
Blasting through his headphones
‘Hey baby,’ he’d pull down his glasses
Wink at the women staff
And maybe hit them with a Michael Jackson spin move
Then he would see me,
‘HOMIE!’
Would echo through the games room of the club
We’d do our ‘secret’ handshake
And I’d ask him how his day was
75% of the time
Andrew was ‘heartbroken’ over a woman
I’d try to cheer him up
Tell him his fit looked fly today
And that there are plenty of fish in the sea
He’d look at his feet and respond with,
‘Thanks homie…’
Then he’d usually grab a pool stick and say,
‘You want to play??’
‘Of course, dude. Let's do it. I’ve already racked the balls.’
He was a freshman in High School when I met him
And we played pool five times a week
For four years
I beat him most days
But some days
He beat me
And he would gloat about it for the rest of the day whenever he did
Even though
Andrew has down syndrome
I never once took it easy on him
And almost all of our games
Were pretty competitive
He would dance and sing as we played
‘Baby. Baby. Baby, Ohhhh.’
He’d sing the most annoying Justin Bieber song
Over and over again
He was always ‘falling in love’ with the adult female staff at the club
And when they’d tell him that he was being inappropriate
He’d crawl under the pool table
Lay down in the fetal position
And pretend to cry
Sometimes it would take awhile
But we’d always get him out from under the table
And then I would take him upstairs to play basketball
Andrew was pretty good at basketball
For being a teenager with down syndrome
He had a decent jump shot
But everytime we would play one on one
I’d smoke him
It wouldn’t even be competitive
He had his moments playing pool with me
But never during a basketball game
Basketball was in my bones
I could beat him with my left hand
He’d always leave the high school room
To come to the gym
To hangout with me
I always let him
There were times where I would accidentally hit him in the face with a dodgeball
And he’d cry in the corner
And really get upset
But I could usually get him to rejoin the game
Then I’d let him hit me in the face
And he’d laugh his outrageous laugh
And point at me,
“Ha! I got you Homie! I got you!’
Andrew was about as competitive as I was back then
He was always heartbroken
And he was stubborn
This is probably why
We became fast friends
I looked forward to seeing that kid every day
And now
He is an adult
And I’m curious
How he is doing out there
In that jungle
With the people who won’t treat him like a human being
And the kids that’ll stare at him
And call him strange…
I hope he is doing alright.
-C.H.
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