In “Phillip,” the nar­ra­tive unfolds in late sum­mer 2021 as Phillip Cas­tane­da, a new­com­er to the Cal­i­for­nia School for the Deaf in River­side, nav­i­gates home­less­ness in the back­seat of his father’s Nis­san Sen­tra. With the world emerg­ing from the coro­n­avirus pan­dem­ic, Phillip begins his day by dress­ing in the car and mak­ing his way to Tar­get for bath­room access. The foot­ball field, vis­i­ble from his car, sym­bol­izes his aspi­ra­tions; despite his small stature, Phillip aims to show­case his speed and tough­ness on the var­si­ty foot­ball team.

Phillip’s father, Jude Ward Cas­tane­da, makes sac­ri­fices to pro­vide his son with a place to sleep, park­ing in an Arling­ton Avenue lot amid var­i­ous busi­ness­es, includ­ing a Yum Yum Donuts and a cannabis dis­pen­sary. They often stay away from oth­er vehi­cles, with Phillip using a gym mem­ber­ship for show­ers. Each night, after the shops close, Jude and his girl­friend occu­py the front seats, allow­ing Phillip the back for pri­va­cy. A gift­ed ath­lete in his youth, Jude strug­gles with his past of addic­tion and incar­cer­a­tion but is deter­mined to give his son a bet­ter chance, hop­ing Phillip wouldn’t fol­low his foot­steps.

Liv­ing in Cal­i­for­nia, where around a third of the nation’s home­less pop­u­la­tion resides, Phillip faces the dual chal­lenge of home­less­ness and a tumul­tuous upbring­ing. He has attend­ed six schools and found it par­tic­u­lar­ly ardu­ous to learn Eng­lish, which con­trasts sharply with his native Amer­i­can Sign Lan­guage. Born near San Fran­cis­co, Phillip was raised under chal­leng­ing cir­cum­stances; his deaf moth­er, who suf­fers from rheuma­toid arthri­tis and can­not work, relies on dis­abil­i­ty assis­tance.

As a teenag­er in Modesto, Phillip played foot­ball among hear­ing peers, with a friend cov­er­ing his league fees. Despite his suc­cess on the field, com­mu­ni­ca­tion bar­ri­ers often left him feel­ing iso­lat­ed. He would posi­tion him­self at the end of prac­tice drills to observe oth­ers, illus­trat­ing his deter­mi­na­tion to over­come dif­fi­cul­ties. Foot­ball becomes his refuge, bring­ing him joy and hope for a future, even kin­dling dreams of play­ing in the Nation­al Foot­ball League, as not­ed by his sis­ter, Priscil­la Cas­tane­da, who empha­sizes foot­ball as a source of hap­pi­ness for him.