In the back of the too-hot interior of the food truck, a too-tall man was putting the finishing touches on another large batch of carnitas. With each customer that appeared at the window, he took a quick glance before returning to his culinary artistry.
The spot in front of the Staples Center was coveted among truck-based food vendors, but Clint Capela made sure to get there early every morning to set up shop and prevent anybody else from taking his spot. “CC’s Taco Hideout” did a brisk business, but money wasn’t Clint’s motivation. He already had plenty of that. He just wanted one man in particular to come and try his tacos. That was why he looked at every customer.
He heard his cashier, Tanya, greet another hungry diner, and he leaned over to get a glimpse of their face. When he saw who it was, he immediately abandoned his post and practically shoved Tanya out of the way to stick his head out the window. “Hey Dwight! Remember me?”
“Oh no,” Dwight Howard replied. “What the hell are you doing working in a taco truck?”
“Waiting for you to show up, of course,” Clint answered happily. “And now that you’re here, I can remind you about how much everybody on the Rockets hated your guts and how James always calls me the best center he’s ever played with. That’s a true thing he said, by the way. That’s a total quote.”
Dwight rolled his eyes. “So you set up a food truck here in the hope that I would visit it and you’d get to harass me for thirty seconds?”
Clint nodded.
“Does that not seem completely pathetic to you?”
Clint shook his head. “What’s pathetic is how you never wanted to run the pick and roll even when playing with one of the best pick-and-roll passers ever. Speaking of James, you wanna know what else he said? You wanna know?”
Dwight glared at Clint in lieu of a response.
“He said that if he ever sees Dwight again in person, he’s going to pull down his shorts and fart on him!” Clint proclaimed gleefully. “A big stinky fart right in his face! That’s what he’ll do!”
“Somehow, I doubt that’s what James said,” Dwight replied. “Keep telling those lies though.”
Unaffected by these words, Clint reached back into the kitchen area of the truck and hit a button on the old-school boombox that he kept there to provide cooking music. He turned up the volume as a rap beat started to play. After taking a few moments to internalize the beat, Clint began to rap:
“Dwight gets passed from team to team / And to any observer it would seem / That his days of relevance have come to an end / Signing him, you cannot defend / Clint dominates him in every way / So on the Rockets he will stay / While Dwight gets yelled at by LeBron / And pays child support for his fifteenth son.”
“Can I get some tacos now?” Dwight asked. Clint shook his head and continued with his “rap”, which only loosely followed the backing beat and had no flow at all:
“A fake Christian and a fraud / Living in defiance of his own god / Cursed with a bad attitude and injuries / He’ll ruin any locker room that he sees / How far can one man possibly fall? / To become the enemy of basketball / Kobe called him soft, and he’s right / Nothing positive can be said about Dwight.”
While the line of waiting patrons grew longer behind Dwight, Clint concluded his rap with a victory dance of sorts, although his moves were limited by the small amount of space inside the food truck. “Are you crying yet, Dwight? Let me see your tears! Tears shed in mourning of a ruined career!”
“Sorry man, but your horrible poem completely failed to move me to tears,” Dwight replied. “Now can I just get your five-taco sampler plate with rice and beans? Unlike some people, I’ve actually been attending training camp, and the practice made me hungry.”
Clint smirked and returned to his post in the kitchen while a shocked Tanya meekly took Dwight’s money. After quickly assembling Dwight’s order, he walked it up to the window himself instead of handing it to Tanya like he usually did. Dwight appeared marginally surprised that he was actually being served, and that the food both smelled and looked delicious. He held up his hands to receive the styrofoam container full of Mexican food.
However, just as the handoff was about to be made, Clint upended the container and pushed it towards Dwight’s face. Tortillas, meat, cilantro, onions, rice, and beans all spilled out and hit Dwight square in the face and chest.
“Man, what the hell?” Dwight yelped, jumping backwards and immediately trying to wipe his lunch out of his eyes.
“I hate you Dwight!” Clint yelled. “Every atom of my being screams out in hatred of you! While I’m winning a championship, you’ll win the ire of every fan in Los Angeles for your lazy play!” To prevent any rebuttal, he turned off his ‘open’ sign and slammed the window shut, knowing that he had inflicted permanent damage on his enemy’s psyche.