Soccer on Sunday Read online

  “Um … yeah … right,” said Jack. His dad had told them that kids rarely played soccer when he was growing up.

  “Don’t worry,” said Annie. “It’ll become more popular with time. In fact, by 2014—”

  “Excuse me,” Jack interrupted, “but do you know when the match starts? And where it is?”

  Benny looked at his watch. “Well, it’s almost ten a.m. now,” he said. “So you’ve got two hours till kickoff at Aztec Stadium. That’s about ten miles south of here.”

  “Ten miles?” said Jack.

  “Don’t worry,” said Benny. “Public transportation can get you there pretty fast. Just walk a few blocks to the Metro Insurgentes station. That’s where you catch the metro.”

  “Metro?” said Jack.

  “It’s like what we’d call a subway train in the States,” said Benny. “Y’all need to catch the Red Line in the direction of Pantitlán. And then—”

  “Wait, please,” said Jack. He pulled out his notebook and pencil. “Could you spell that?”

  “Here, I’ll write it down,” said the guard.

  Jack gave his notebook and pencil to Benny. The friendly guard mumbled the directions to himself as he wrote them down: “Walk to Metro Insurgentes … then Red Line to Pino Suaréz … then Blue Line to Taxqueña, last stop … then a tram to Aztec Stadium.”

  “It sounds complicated,” said Jack.

  “Just ask somebody if you get lost,” said Benny. “Folks here are super nice—they’ll be glad to help.” The guard handed the notebook and pencil back to Jack.

  “Thanks,” said Jack. He tore out the sheet with Benny’s directions and put it in the pocket of his shorts.

  “I hope y’all have seats for the game,” said Benny. “From what I hear, it’s completely sold out.”

  “Don’t worry—we have tickets,” said Annie. She showed them to Benny.

  “Far out!” said Benny. “Y’all have two of the best seats in the house!”

  “Really?” said Jack. He couldn’t believe it.

  “How in the world did you get these?” said Benny.

  Annie shrugged. “We know somebody who knows somebody,” she said.

  “Well, don’t let anybody see those tickets,” said Benny. “People would sell their mothers for those seats.”

  Annie laughed as she put the tickets back in her pocket. “So how do we get to the metro train, Benny?” she asked.

  “Go up this street to the big statue of the angel, turn left onto Florencia, and after a couple of blocks, ask somebody to direct you to Insurgentes—that’s in-sur-HEN-tes,” said the guard, sounding out the word.

  “Thanks, Benny! You’ve been a big help,” said Annie.

  “Yeah, thanks,” said Jack.

  “You’re welcome! Anytime!” said the guard.

  Jack put the program, notebook, and pencil back into his backpack. Then he and Annie waved good-bye and headed away from the embassy. When they got to the sidewalk, they looked up and down the busy avenue.

  “There’s the angel!” said Annie. She pointed to the huge statue of a winged angel looming in the distance.

  “Good, it’s not that far,” said Jack.

  The air was hot and humid and smelled like car exhaust. But Jack was so excited, nothing bothered him as he and Annie walked past banks, airline offices, and fancy hotels. When they reached the golden angel in the middle of a traffic circle, Jack checked Benny’s directions, then looked around.

  “There it is,” he said, pointing to a sign that said FLORENCIA AVENUE. They hurried across the street and headed up Florencia.

  “Benny said that when we get to this street, we should ask someone for help,” said Annie. “Excuse me,” she said to a woman waiting at a stoplight, “could you please tell us where we can find …” She turned to Jack. “What was the name?”

  “In-sur-HEN-tes,” Jack said, sounding it out like Benny had.

  “Yes,” said the woman with a smile. “Just past Londres Street.” She pointed straight ahead.

  “Thank you,” said Annie. She and Jack started walking again.

  “I can’t believe this—we have the best seats in the stadium!” Jack said.

  “It makes sense,” said Annie. “Merlin gave us those seats to help us with our mission.”

  “Right, like maybe Pelé will be playing near us and we’ll get to meet him,” said Jack. “Then somehow he’ll reveal a secret of greatness. And then we go back to Camelot to meet up with Merlin!”

  “We’re super-lucky ducks,” said Annie. “Quack-quack.”

  “Look, Insurgentes.” Jack pointed to a sign on a large building that said MERCADO INSURGENTES. “That’s it—the metro we’re supposed to catch. Come on!”

  Annie and Jack joined the crowd heading into the Insurgentes building. They strolled down a corridor between stalls selling ponchos, beaded bags, wooden animals, baskets woven with palm leaves, and silver jewelry—tons of silver jewelry. The smell of sizzling meat came from food stands. Nothing looked like a train or subway station.

  Finally Jack stopped near a group of men in sombreros playing guitars, violins, and trumpets. He turned to Annie. “This doesn’t feel right!” he yelled above the noise of the music.

  “We must have made a mistake!” Annie yelled back.

  “Let’s get out of here,” said Jack. “We’re wasting time!” He and Annie turned and hurried back down the corridor between the stalls. They wove around shoppers until they escaped through the entrance of the giant market.

  A soft, warm rain had started to fall.

  “I don’t get it,” said Jack. He pointed to the sign on the building. “It says MERCADO INSURGENTES.”

  “Look at Benny’s notes again,” said Annie.

  Jack pulled out their directions. “Oh, no!” he said. “Benny wrote Metro Insurgentes, not Mercado Insurgentes!”

  “I’ll ask for help!” said Annie. She took the directions and walked over to an old man reading a newspaper on a bench. “Excuse me, sir, where is Metro Insurgentes, please?”

  The old man pointed up the street.

  “Thanks!” said Annie. She ran back to Jack and handed him the sheet of directions. Jack stuffed it into his backpack.

  “Hurry, or we’ll be late!” Jack said.

  Jack and Annie ran up the street through the warm, drizzling rain. They stopped when they came to an overpass jammed with trucks and cars. In a sunken plaza below was a round concrete building covered with posters and murals. One sign on the building said PLAZA INSURGENTES. Another said METRO STATION.

  “That’s it!” said Jack. He and Annie ran down to the plaza. They hurried by a fountain, vendors, and snack bars until they came to the rounded entrance of the metro.

  When they stepped into the station, the noise was deafening, even louder than in the market. Hordes of people were rushing up and down the stairs. Jack and Annie joined the stream of traffic going down. Beyond the stairs was a row of turnstiles.

  “How do we do this?” said Annie.

  “Watch what everyone else is doing,” said Jack.

  One at a time, people were dropping a single coin into slots in the turnstiles and then passing through. Jack pulled two pesos out of his backpack and gave one to Annie. Copying everyone else, they passed through the turnstiles onto the metro platform.

  “That wasn’t so hard,” said Annie.

  Another huge crowd was waiting on the sweltering platform for the next train. Jack pulled out their directions again. “Red Line to Pino Suaréz!” he shouted to Annie above the noise. “Then the Blue Line to Taxqueña! Then we get off at the last stop and get a tram to Aztec Stadium!”

  “Easy!” yelled Annie.

  Really? thought Jack.

  A train was rolling in. “Red Line?” Annie shouted to a woman.

  As the woman nodded, the metro train came to a stop. The doors opened. As passengers spilled off the train, people on the platform surged forward.

  Jack grabbed Annie’s hand and they moved with th
e crowd. But before they could even get close to the train, a bell rang and the doors slammed shut. The people left on the platform jumped back as the train pulled away.

  “We’ll get the next one!” Jack shouted.

  Soon another train rolled in. Jack grabbed Annie’s hand again, and they surged forward with the crowd. They were pushed and shoved as they tried to get through the doorway. Finally they were inside!

  “Safe!” said Jack, collapsing onto a seat with Annie. But they were nearly squashed as more passengers piled into the metro. More and more kept cramming in, until people were practically sitting on Jack’s and Annie’s laps.

  The bell rang. The doors closed. The train pulled away from the station. As it rumbled through the dark tunnel, the air in the car was suffocating. Jack could feel sweat trickling down his face and the back of his neck.

  “What’s our stop?” Annie yelled to Jack.

  Jack reached into his back pocket. The paper with the directions wasn’t there. He wrestled his backpack off his back and looked inside. The sheet of paper wasn’t there, either. “Do you have our directions?” he shouted at Annie.

  “No! You had them!” said Annie.

  “I must have dropped them!” said Jack, panicked.

  “Don’t worry,” said Annie. “Excuse me!” she yelled up at a woman standing over them. “How do we get to the Aztec station?”

  The woman shrugged. Then she asked a man, who asked another woman. But the train stopped and all three people hurried off without answering Annie’s question!

  “Should we get off, too?” asked Annie.

  “I don’t know!” said Jack. “We don’t know if this is the right station! They’re not announcing where we are!”

  New passengers piled into the car, and the aisle became even more crowded. Once again, as the train took off, Jack and Annie were squashed in their seats by the crush of passengers in the aisle.

  “Where is Aztec Stadium?” Jack yelled to no one in particular.

  “Get off at Pino Suaréz!” a man shouted above the roar. The man said more, but Jack couldn’t hear him. Before he could ask the man to repeat his directions, the train stopped—and the man pushed his way out the doors.

  “Is this Pino Suaréz?” Jack shouted to Annie. He looked around wildly, trying to find a sign. “This is a nightmare!”

  “Is this Pino Suaréz?” Annie yelled to a teenage girl with a large backpack.

  “Sorry, I don’t know,” the girl said. “Check the map!” She pointed to a large map on the far wall of the train.

  “Let’s look!” said Jack. But it was impossible to get to the map, as the aisle had already filled up with new passengers.

  “Too late,” said Annie.

  The metro doors closed, and the train thundered on through the dark tunnel.

  “Wait till we stop again!” Annie yelled at Jack.

  “But what if we just missed our stop?” said Jack. “What if that was Pino Suaréz?”

  “We’re stopping again! We have to check that map!” said Annie.

  As the train slowed for the next stop, Jack and Annie both got ready to jump out of their seats. But when the metro doors jerked open, hardly anyone got off. Instead, new travelers pushed their way into the crowded car. Jack and Annie hardly had room to breathe, much less stand up and check the map.

  “No way!” Jack shouted to Annie.

  “Can someone help us?” Annie called. “We need to get to the World Cup game! Where is the stop for Pino Suaréz?” Nobody seemed to hear her.

  “This is hopeless!” said Jack.

  Then he heard a small voice, shouting above the noise of the train. “Excuse me! Pardon me, please!”

  A Mexican boy squeezed through the crowd to get to Jack and Annie. “Did you say you are going to the World Cup game?” he shouted.

  “Yes!” said Annie.

  “Me too!” said the boy. “Can I help you?”

  “Yes!” said Jack, relieved. “We don’t know where to get off!”

  “The next stop! Pino Suaréz!” said the boy. “You can follow me!”

  As soon as the train stopped, Jack and Annie followed the boy, squeezing past people to get to the door. “Excuse me! Excuse me!” they said. Then all three of them popped off the hot, airless train. Half the people on the train got off with them.

  “Man, that was crazy,” said Jack. He was covered in sweat.

  “Thank you!” Annie said to the boy.

  “It’s not over yet,” the boy said, smiling. He had a cheerful, open face. “We have to catch the Blue Line to Taxqueña.”

  “Can we come with you?” asked Annie. “We lost our directions.”

  “Of course!” said the boy. “This way! Pronto!”

  Jack and Annie followed the boy down a tunnel and around a corner to the Blue Line. Hordes of people were waiting for that metro line, too.

  “My father told me to go to the end of the platform,” said the boy. “The last train cars are never as crowded.”

  As the train rolled into the station, Jack and Annie quickly followed the boy down the platform. They sped up when the doors opened. Just before the doors closed again, the three of them jumped into the last car of the train.

  The boy was right. The car wasn’t crowded at all. They got good seats together. Jack felt hugely relieved.

  “Thanks for helping us,” he said.

  “You’re welcome,” said the boy. “My name is Roberto.” He held out his hand.

  Jack shook Roberto’s hand. “I’m Jack,” he said.

  “And I’m Annie,” said Annie, shaking his hand, too. “Are you going to the game alone, Roberto?”

  “Yes. My parents gave me a ticket for my birthday present,” said Roberto. “It’s the best present I’ve ever gotten.”

  “Is today your birthday?” asked Jack.

  Roberto nodded. “I turn ten years old today.”

  “Happy birthday!” Jack and Annie said together.

  “I’m ten, too,” said Annie. “Jack’s eleven.”

  “Why didn’t your mom and dad come with you?” Jack said.

  “They could only afford one ticket,” said Roberto. “I have eight brothers and sisters. It will be my job to tell them everything I see. They will all be waiting at home for my stories about the great game.” He smiled his big smile again.

  The train began to slow down. “We get off here,” said Roberto, standing up.

  Jack and Annie followed Roberto off the metro, down an underground passageway, then out of the stifling station into the breezy, wet air. Jack felt a thousand times better.

  “Now we take tramline 53,” said Roberto.

  “That’s like a subway above ground, right?” said Jack.

  “Yes. Come with me.” Roberto led Jack and Annie across a walkway to the trolley tracks. Hundreds of people stood in lines, waiting to board the packed trams. As they joined one of the lines, Jack pulled out some pesos.

  “Everyone’s going to the World Cup championship game,” said Roberto. “People have come to Mexico from all over South America and Europe to see this game.”

  “Did you hear that it would be the game of a lifetime?” asked Jack.

  “Absolutely,” said Roberto.

  “Did you know Pelé was playing?” Annie asked.

  “Of course! Pelé the Great!” said Roberto. “He has made over a thousand goals. And his whole team is fantastic. They are called the Beautiful Team!”

  “That’s cool,” said Jack.

  “Three pesos,” said the driver at the door of the tram.

  Roberto reached into his pocket, but Jack stopped him. “I got it,” he said. Jack handed over three pesos.

  “Thank you, Jack,” said Roberto. Then they all hopped aboard the tram bound for the World Cup championship game. There were no empty seats, so they stood in the aisle and held on to a pole. As the tram began to move, Jack, Annie, and Roberto huddled together and talked excitedly.

  “Brazil has the best team in history,” said Ro
berto. “But Italy has a great team, too. Did you hear the story of Italy playing West Germany in the semifinal match?”

  “No. What happened?” said Annie.

  “Even though Italy was behind, they never gave up,” said Roberto. “Italy scored five goals in extra time!” He heaved a big sigh. “I can’t believe it. I never thought in my life I would be here today to see this game.”

  “Me neither!” said Annie.

  Jack laughed. “Not in a million years.”

  “We’ll arrive at Aztec Stadium soon,” said Roberto, looking out the window.

  “Thanks for your help!” said Jack. He really liked this kid. He was also amazed that a ten-year-old could get around the city so easily. “Do you go to the stadium a lot?”

  “No. This is my first time,” he said. “But I have practiced this trip in my mind many times. My father told me exactly what to do.”

  “Do you play soccer?” Annie asked.

  “I try. But I am not that great,” Roberto said.

  “Me neither,” said Annie. “I love it, but I’m not great.”

  “Same with me,” said Jack. “Love it. Not great.” And they all laughed.

  By the time the tram arrived at the station near the stadium, the clouds had disappeared. Bright sunshine had replaced the drizzling rain. Steam was rising from a gigantic parking lot.

  “That’s Aztec Stadium,” Roberto said, pointing out the window to an enormous concrete building.

  “Cool,” said Jack. He looked at his watch. “It’s eleven-thirty-five.”

  “Twenty-five minutes until kickoff,” said Roberto. “We made it!”

  “All because of you, Roberto!” said Annie.

  “Stay with me,” the Mexican boy said with a smile, “and I’ll take good care of you.”

  When the doors opened, Roberto led Jack and Annie off the tram. They walked down a ramp from the station and headed into the huge parking area.

  “Aztec Stadium is named for the people who built an empire in this part of Mexico many hundreds of years ago,” said Roberto.

  “Really?” said Jack. He’d read about the Aztec Empire. He could imagine the enormous stadium being similar to an Aztec pyramid.