The punt was nearly vertical, bending slightly as it reached its apex. Then it plummeted into a pack of offensive linemen.
“Heads!” I called.
They scattered.
“Good hang-time, baby!” called Jake, grinning.
Todd jogged over and put his arm around my shoulders. “Senior year, Rick. You only get one.” He gestured over to where Nelson was sucker-punching the tackling dummy. “Unless you’re Jaworski. You’ve got to play to the front row.”
I tried to follow his gaze. His eyes were focused on the empty bleachers of F. Scott Fitzgerald High’s third-rate football field.
I didn’t get it. “Who’s in the front row?”
He looked at me as if I had a cabbage for a head. “Scouts. College scouts.” I guess I seemed pretty bewildered because he added, “They’re not here now, but they will be!”
“What college is going to send their scouts to a dump like Fitz?” I asked.
Todd chuckled. “Come on, Rick. I’m good, but I’m not that good. They’re going to want to see me play before they offer a big scholarship. And while they’re scouting me, that’s the golden opportunity for the rest of you to get noticed!”
Jake gave me another perfect snap, and this time I got off a fairly decent punt—at least this one went forward.
Was Todd serious? College scouts? I mean, he was pretty good for around here. But I couldn’t picture Miami or Notre Dame so desperate for talent that they’d send their people to Fitz. That would be scraping the bottom of the barrel. Everybody knew that.
Even Coach Hammer knew it. Of course, that didn’t stop him from making his usual inspirational speech at practice on the first day of school. He babbled on about the great tradition of “the old green-and-gold,” which we players secretly called “the old snot-and-mustard.” Naturally, no one reminded the coach that last year the Broncos had gone six and eight in a league where even the champions were pretty mediocre. And for sure nobody mentioned that the great tradition consisted of citations for ineligible players, steroid use, vandalism, and a former coach who was presently doing time for grand theft auto.
“So it’s up to us to carry the banner of that legacy in the new millennium,” the coach finished. I wondered if he was willing to do his part by boosting a Corvette like the old coach.
He clapped his hands. “All right—ten laps and hit the showers!”
As we headed for the cinder track that ringed the field, he pulled me aside. “Not you, Paradis. We’re going to have a little talk about field goals.”
I popped off my helmet and walked to the sidelines with him. “What’s up, Coach?”
He draped a beefy arm around my shoulder pads. “I’m not stupid. I heard the guys snicker when I talked about last season. But we lost four of those games by three points or less. And let’s face it—at least once a game we blew a field goal because of a bad snap.”
I could see where he was going with this. “Jake’s great, Coach. He’s practically automatic.”
He nearly put his finger through my chest protector. “You have to be automatic too, Rick. From thirty yards or less. You can be the difference between six and eight and making the playoffs. Starting tomorrow, Jake, Todd, and you—the snap, the hold, the kick. Thirty minutes.”
“Got it.” I couldn’t help asking, “What else does Jake do on the field? Besides snap, I mean.”
“That’s it,” the coach replied. “That’s his job. Long-snapper.”
I was confused. “But you always said that quarterbacks should tackle, receivers should punt, and linemen should learn to throw. Don’t you remember? You said if you want to be a specialist, go to proctology school.”
“This guy’s different,” Coach Hammer tried to explain. “He’s not a football player. He’s too slow, he’s not strong enough, and he can’t throw. He can’t even pick up the ball with one hand. He’s got no skills.”
“So what made you recruit him?” I asked, mystified.
“I didn’t,” the coach shrugged. “He recruited himself. Last June, after school is out, I’m in my office winding up the year, and he just kind of shows up. Says he’s moving to the district and he wants to play for the Broncos. So I ask him the usual questions—what experience he’s had, what positions he’s played. Zero. He doesn’t know football from Go Fish. But he’s begging me—won’t take no for an answer. So finally, just to get him out of the office, I say, ‘I need a long-snapper. If you can be a long-snapper, you can play on my team.’ I figured I’d never see the kid again. But there he was, sitting on the floor outside my office when I went to open it up in August. And he was a long-snapper—a good one!”
I frowned. It was possible. Long-snapping wasn’t brain surgery. But why would anybody bother? I mean, it’s nice to be on a football team if you’re a football player. But if you’re not, what’s the point of finding some obscure way to sneak in through the side door? It seemed like a lot of sweat for nothing.
I looked over at the track. There was Jake, way out in front of the pack. Then I realized that he was really last, and the rest of the guys were lapping him. It was a big switch from the image of the confident, universally loved host at the party Friday night.
I stuck around and practiced kickoffs for another half-hour. So I was all by myself in the locker room when I showered up to go home. Since it was too late for the school bus, I headed for the nearest transit stop. The local bus service was pretty pathetic—students called it “the disoriented express.” I settled in for a long wait.
A well-modulated horn brought me out of my public-transit coma. A champagne-colored BMW with a twenty-four-karat shine whispered up to the curb in front of me. Soundlessly, the tinted window of the driver’s seat disappeared into the door. There at the wheel sat none other than Jake Garrett.
“Hey, baby, need a ride?”
I swear, I wish I could have had my clothes dry-cleaned before depositing myself into the leather interior.
“This your car, Jake?”
“Sort of,” he replied.
“Sort of?”
“My dad got it after the divorce,” he explained. “So since it replaced my mother, it’s sort of my car. Anyway, he’s never around to drive it.”
“I live just down the block from you,” I told him. “I can walk it from your place.”
“Uh-huh.” He acted as if he hadn’t heard. He pulled up at a stoplight and turned to me suddenly. “Listen, baby, are you in a hurry to get home?”
I shrugged. “Not really. Why?”
“I need to pick up something,” he told me. “It’s for a little get-together I’m planning for this Friday.”
I laughed. “I’ve seen your ‘little get-togethers.’ There’s nothing little about them. There were kids at school today still feeling the effects of last Friday.”
If he thought that was funny, he didn’t let on. “This won’t take long. Could you give me a hand?”
It just goes to show what a little luxury will do to you. I was grooving on the smooth ride and the soft leather and the CD player. By the time I paid any attention to our whereabouts, we were on the expressway halfway downtown.
“Hey, where are we going?”
“To college.”
I thought he was joking. But ten minutes later we were pulling up to the main gate of the Atlantica University campus.
“I’m visiting my brother,” Jake told the guard. “He lives in Throckmorton Hall.”
As we drove through, I asked, “How old’s your brother?”
He grinned. “I’m an only child, baby.”
I was blown away—not that he lied, but that he was such a natural at it.
We snaked along the tree-lined maze of roads that led to offices, labs, classroom buildings, and dormitories. When you’re a high-school senior, you tend to think of yourself as the very top of the pyramid. Looking at the college kids changed my mind about that. We were big shots now, but only a year away from being dogmeat again.
Throckmorton
Hall was a huge stone structure that had seen better days. There was a wide driveway in front, but Jake pulled up at the rear, in a narrow alley behind a very ripe garbage Dumpster. He popped the trunk.
I don’t know what I expected to find in there, but I was equal parts disappointed and relieved when all I saw was the empty keg from last Friday’s party.
This was my first time in a college dorm, so I was nervous that a couple of high-school kids would get kicked out. But when you’re carrying a keg, you just kind of fit in. Anyway, Jake Garrett seemed to be just as popular here as he was with the kids at Fitz. Halfway up the stairs, this beautiful girl threw her arms around him and cried, “Jake, you saved my life! I love you!”
Guys were slapping him on the back, ruffling his hair, and treating him like he owned the place.
At room 306, I met Marty Rapaport, who was Jake’s keg connection. Marty, who looked like a pudgy Jerry Seinfeld, was in his last year of pre-dent. He made a big show of checking my teeth. He’ll never know how close he came to getting his fat finger bitten off.
“That cross-bite should have been taken care of years ago,” he clucked disapprovingly.
“Good meeting you too,” I mumbled when I had my mouth back.
Then came the business of the day. There was quite a lot of it. We exchanged our empty keg for a shiny full new one. Jake had a little white envelope for Marty, and two thick manila envelopes for these other guys who came by. In return, those two handed small white envelopes to Jake. It was all very friendly, but really pretty secretive. For sure I was the only one who didn’t understand exactly what was going on.
Marty caught me following the parade of envelopes. “Inquiring minds want to know,” he commented.
I was embarrassed. Here was Jake, trusting me enough to bring me along to this meeting, and I was gawking like a ten-year-old at his first Playboy.
But Jake just said, “Don’t worry about Rick, baby. He’s cool.”
So I did my best to fit into the Throckmorton scene. This consisted primarily of acting bored and inserting random curse words into every ordinary sentence. I tried not to be impressed by the college girls who came by to say hi to Jake. For some reason, they all wanted to talk about their grades. “I got an A-minus;” “I got a B-plus.” Mostly, I didn’t ask what was in those little envelopes. I was pretty sure it had to be money.
Lifting the full keg was a major operation. As we struggled down the back steps, I managed to pant, “I thought you were smarter than this, Jake. If you were going to bring one of the guys, it should have been Nelson.”
He laughed. “At least I can rely on you not to drink it all before we get halfway home. The party wouldn’t be much of a success with an empty keg.”
I asked the million-dollar question: “Does the guy doing the heavy lifting at least get an invitation?”
Jake looked surprised. “Of course. In fact, if you know any cool people you want to bring along, go for it.”
That kind of caught me off guard. The way the kids at school looked at Jake these days, he was practically the Picasso of parties. I assumed he wanted to be in charge of every brush stroke.
“I don’t know, Jake,” I began. “You’ve got a pretty good thing going. Maybe the guest list should be up to you.”
We had reached the alley behind the dorm. Fumbling with his left hand, Jake dug the keyless remote out of his pocket and popped the trunk of the Beamer.
“I trust you, baby,” he told me, flashing me a look that I was beginning to call the Jake smile. I’m not sure I can totally describe it. At least half of it was paternalistic, like he was a really cool uncle you loved hanging out with. But the other half was pure mischievous fifth-grader—he was the kid you’d partner with to stink-bomb the teachers’ lounge. It was an unbeatable combination because it appealed to your responsible and rebellious sides at the same time.
“Anyway,” he went on, “a party needs fresh blood. If it’s always the same people it gets boring.” We dropped the keg into the trunk and closed the lid.
“I’ll let you know if I think of anybody,” I told him.
But he wasn’t willing to drop the subject yet. “How about that girl Todd was talking about? The one who likes you?”
“You mean Jennifer? She’s not from Fitz. She goes to St. Mary’s with Todd’s girlfriend.”
“That’s exactly what I’m talking about,” he said as we got in the car and started for home. “Fresh blood.”
The return trip took a lot longer. It was rush hour by that time. Finally, we pulled up in front of Jake’s house and began the task of hauling that ninety-ton keg out of the trunk.
“Richard Paradis,” came a disapproving voice from the other side of the Garretts’ cedar hedge. “I never thought I’d see you falling in with a bad crowd!”
I almost groaned out loud, and Jake rolled his eyes. Every community has a town crab. Ours was Mrs. Appleford, who I just realized was Jake’s next-door neighbor. My folks were friendly with her for the same reason everybody else was—they were scared to death of her. Mrs. Appleford had the complaint line for every town agency programmed on her speed-dial. If you got on her bad side, it was only a matter of time before she caught you putting out your garbage five minutes early, and ratted you out to the authorities.
“Hi, Mrs. Appleford,” I called. “How are you?”
“Very disappointed,” she replied. Everything disappointed Mrs. Appleford. If she ever said something positive about anyone at all, a whole lot of people in this neighborhood would keel over dead from the shock. “I never thought I’d see a nice boy like you involved in underage drinking.”
“Underage drinking?” I guess it was because I didn’t really drink much myself that I was able to forget I was standing in front of her with a keg on my shoulder.
Jake spoke up, smooth as always. “The beer’s for my dad, ma’am. He does a lot of entertaining for business.” He sounded so sincere I almost believed it myself.
Mrs. Appleford wasn’t buying it. “I’ve been around this earth long enough to be able to spot a phony, young man. And I’m looking at one right now. I think the police would be very interested to know what goes on at your home when your father’s away.” And she stormed off into her house and slammed the door.
“She’ll do it, you know,” I moaned. “She’ll call the police, the FBI, Interpol, and maybe even God.”
Jake was impressed. “I didn’t think she could even see as far as my place through those Coke-bottle glasses. She doesn’t miss much.”
“She doesn’t miss anything,” I assured him. “She could probably quote your driver’s license number to the cops when she turns you in.”
“I’m not going to let a nosy neighbor stop me.” It was odd the way he said it—like he was talking about a sacred quest. A high-school bash as the Holy Grail.
We rolled the keg into Jake’s garage—he wouldn’t have to start chilling it until the night before the party.
I headed for the door. “I’ll see you at practice tomorrow.”
“Thanks for your help,” he called after me. “Let me know what Jennifer says about the party.”
I stopped in my tracks. For a guy who played his whole life just about as cool as anybody I’d ever met, he sure seemed pretty hung up on this one thing.
“Okay,” I agreed. “I’ll give her a call.”
“Only if you want,” he replied airily. “It’s totally up to you, baby.”
chapter three
JENNIFER BELANGER KNEW how to dress for a party. She was an athlete—soccer, track, tennis, you name it—so the miniskirt was her weapon of choice. Another inch off that hem and she could have kissed the PG-13 rating good-bye.
Jennifer and I had known each other our whole lives. Our folks were best friends. When we were really little, we used to take baths together on vacations. The mere thought of that happening today could brown out my concentration for weeks. It was an exercise in visualization that I practiced far more often than I cared to admi
t.
She liked me—there was no question about that. But painful experience had taught me it was a brother–sister kind of like, nothing more. I was her buddy, her confidant, with a Just Friends visa indelibly stamped in my passport to Jennifer. And in that area anyway, life sucked.
“Ricky—hi!” She twirled in front of me, highlighting her outfit. “What do you think? Donna Karan.”
“She loaned you the dress?”
She laughed in my face. “Donna Karan the designer, stupid! Jeez, Ricky! I thought you were a kicker! You’ve got the brains of a nose tackle.”
“The guys’ll be drooling over you.” I had firsthand info. “Ready to go?”
“Sure,” she said. “Didi should be here any minute.”
Uh-oh. “Didi’s coming?”
She turned those brown eyes on me. “You don’t mind, do you, Ricky? Todd blew her off again. He has some family thing to go to.”
Gee, I thought sarcastically. I never knew Todd Buckley and Jake Garrett were related. Aloud I stammered, “I—I gotta use your phone.”
Well, I had to at least give Todd the heads-up that Didi was going to be at the party. Not that I cared whether or not Todd got busted. But if he decided to blame me for it, he could make things pretty difficult for me around school and on the Broncos.
The phone rang and rang. Todd had already left.
I toyed with the idea of telling the girls the party had been canceled. But then I’d end up missing out on a really great night. It boiled down to this: Was I placed on this earth for the sole purpose of making life easier for Todd Buckley?
I went back out onto the porch. “Okay, let’s saddle up—” My voice trailed off.
Didi had arrived. It made no sense that my first sight of her should always render me deaf and dumb. I mean, she was awesome, but I knew that already. Maybe what dazzled me was how flawless she was. There were a lot of good-looking people out there who still had funny noses or weird hair or the occasional zit. But Didi was pure magazine cover, airbrushed to perfection—from the big stuff, like a face that would stop traffic, right on down to the delicate curl of every single eyelash.