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I won’t stop trying.”
    Then Coach Ed Dayley said, “I don’t know how much you’re going to end up playing this season, kid. But I’ve got this feeling you’re going to make a contribution.”
    Charlie hoping it would be doing something more than doing what he was doing right now: standing next to his coach.

Five
    BULLDOGS VS. ST. LOUIS RAMS the next Saturday night, Charlie and Anna in her grandfather’s suite, about an hour before kickoff.
    Anna said, “It used to be more crowded in here the first couple of seasons, even during the preseason. You could see a lot of celebrities doing what they do best: being seen.”
    â€œLike actors at Lakers games,” Charlie said.
    Anna nodded.
    â€œNow I think the ones who show up do their best acting when they act as if they really want to be here,” she said.
    â€œSome of them must be real fans.”
    â€œSome of them are. But it’s like my dad says about Hollywood people: Nobody fakes sincerity better than they do.” She made a snorting sound. “Sometimes I see them smiling and waving when the cameras are on them, especially the ones sitting next to my gramps, and want to gag.”
    â€œHey,” Charlie said, “I thought we agreed we were going to have a positive attitude tonight about our team and everything else? Your mom said if we act happy it will make your grandfather happy.”
    Anna stared across the room now at Joe Warren. “I want him to be happy more than anything else in the world.”
    It was hard for Charlie to think that Mr. Warren, the owner of the team—
Charlie’s
team—was anybody’s gramps, even if the people writing about him and talking about him and the team the way they did on the radio always went out of their way to point out what a gentleman he was. Then they’d hammer away at him again, blaming him for the state of the team, saying that nothing would change until he made the changes he needed to make in the front office, which meant firing his son, Matt.
    Kevin Fallon’s dad was usually the one leading the charge on his talk show on L.A.’s ESPN station, having taken to calling the Bulldogs’ general manager “Door-Matt” Warren.
    Somehow, in some people’s eyes, Anna’s gramps had gone from being a local hero for bringing football back, to being some out-of-it old geezer who acted as if he didn’t care whether the Bulldogs won or lost.
    â€œAnybody who thinks he doesn’t care,” Anna had said on the ride to the game from Culver City, “is dumber than all of the Kardashian sisters combined.”
    Charlie had said, “They make a lot of money for dumb people, though, don’t they?”
    â€œShut up.”
    Charlie watched Joe Warren greet each new guest as they came through the door to the suite. He was tall and white-haired, wearing a white shirt, a blue-striped tie, and the same blazer he always seemed to be wearing when you’d see him being interviewed on television. And no matter how tough the questions that were being shouted at him—the reporters acting as if the Bulldogs’ record was happening to them, making them angry—Joe Warren would smile and answer all of them politely and never lose his temper.
    He reminded Charlie more of some nice old teacher or minister than the loud owners of some of the other teams—the guys who acted like they were bigger stars than their own players.
    â€œLet’s go rescue him,” Anna said now.
    â€œHe seems to be pretty busy being a good host.”
    She grinned at him. “Gramps is
never
too busy for his precious princess.”
    â€œHe calls you that?”
    â€œGot a problem?” Anna grabbed Charlie by the arm and the two of them made their way across the suite.
    â€œHow’s the world’s handsomest grandfather?” Anna said when they got to him.
    â€œBetter now that you’re here,” he said.