Justin reciprocated Superking Son’s snubs. He ignored Superking Son’s directions and went through practice entirely on his own agenda. That first week, Superking Son and Justin interacted only through overriding each other’s instructions to Ken, Justin’s hitting partner. Every practice, Superking Son told Ken to practice drop shots, Justin said smashes, Superking Son yelled at Ken for not doing drop shots, Justin still refused to change drills, Superking Son made Ken do laps around the court for undermining his authority, and so on until Ken bailed on practice, hid in the locker room, and smoked a cigarette for his anxiety. (He stole packs from his dad, who bought them wholesale from Costco. His dad gave them out to relatives in Cambodia like candy, in an effort to pretend he was some hotshot American business tycoon.)

We had no response to Superking Son, partly because of his crazed logic, but mostly because we didn’t agree with him. It was real work to do well in school. And weren’t we supposed to want what Justin’s family had? Weren’t we supposed to go to college and become pharmacists? Wasn’t that what our parents worked for? But we couldn’t think of how to express this, how to reason against someone who carried so much emotional baggage we almost wanted to tip him for his labor.