THE FIRST TIME THE EDGE OF THE STEAK KNIFE DRAGGED across the inner part of my thigh should have been enough. It wasn’t. I needed to hurt myself again and swore this would be the last time. A quick bandage job and no one would be the wiser. The first cut had driven away the horrifying sensation, but the next cut would bring a rewarding euphoria. Haste was a necessity because the blood from the gash was dripping down my leg and onto my pajamas and would find its way on to my bed sheets if I wasn’t careful. Placing the edge of the knife against my flesh, the promise of impending ecstasy was overpowering.
It started out as a night where all I did was gawk at the ceiling. I tried everything from counting sheep to turning my pillow over and over, but thoughts about football and Heather and everything kept jumbling together in my mind. I wondered whether it was worth bothering to sleep when I’d only have to wake-up anyway. Sliding out from under my damp bed sheets, I sat at my desk to watch my angel fish chase each other around in their tank. Ordinarily, this would settle my nerves since my fish don't make demands on me.
Zoning out, my mind was completely blank when abruptly the tense and jumpy sensation in my head started up, far worse than during my party or at the Halloween dance. It hadn’t been this intense before and it was torturous. I tried to concentrate on something - the mirror in my room, anything – the clock on my wall, to stop the sensation, but instead began to feel jumpy. I knew of only one way to make it stop. I stepped to my door and gently cracked it open, in the off-chance that anyone was watching, and looked at the three white doors leading to the other bedrooms. They maintained their steady vigils against the light in the hallway. Satisfied I was the only one awake at this hour; I made my way as quietly as could be managed to the kitchen. Rather then risk turning on the large florescent fixture, I used the small light from the stove’s overhead fan while rummaging around in one of the drawers. It didn’t take long until I was retracing my steps. Hearing a noise at the landing, I paused long enough to be certain it was my imagination and checked the large white doors again before entering my room. I didn’t realize it, but I made the mistake of failing to close my door completely.
Hanging off the edge of my bed, the sensation surged to the point where it had the same audible effect as hearing a quintet of untuned violins clash all at once.
I brought the knife down on my leg …
Nothing compares to one of her visits.
It was the night before the first football game of the season when she decided to enter my dreams. Once again, I was running down the stairs of my parents’ house and came to a stop - at the bottom of the steps was a woman with a white cat’s head. She remained motionless while watching me with her great, green eyes. Her intentions remained a mystery to me because the dream’s intensity pulled me, sweating and choking, from my sleep.
Crawling free from my bed sheets, I sat at my desk to watch my angel fish glide in their translucent otherworld. Lately I’d been feeling lonely and unhappy. Knowing that something sharp could offer me a release from the burden of those emotions, I felt the fleshy part of my left hand, but I was determined not to give into an appalling habit and instead focused on my fish. Once my nerves settled, I reflected on why the cat-headed woman haunted my dreams, but an explanation eluded me. I hadn’t suffered a visit from the cat-headed woman since the eighth grade and the dream troubled me, not since it involved a chimera, but because this particular dream served as a harbinger that something was about to go wrong. Shortly after her last visit, my grandma passed away. Eventually, dragged down by exhaustion, I climbed back into bed.
It was her visit that changed things for me. True to her nature, the cat-headed woman was trying to warn me that I was to undergo one of those life-altering experiences that I was still too young to understand. Some big shot, he was a like philosopher or something, once said that the events that shape your life are always hinged to some little, insignificant incident. For me, and I realize this might seem implausible, that little incident started with a stupid pigskin.
Everyone stared as that football spiraled through the air with me moving farther and farther towards the end zone. I had tilted my shoulder to watch as it lost momentum and drifted down from the heavens where moments earlier it had been floating after Rocky Como the god had thrown it. Extending my arms, my fingers gripped the ball and I was running with it securely curled under my arm and nothing but green field ahead of me. Intoxicated with the thought that I was about to score, I got the idea into my head to carry the ball into the end-zone torch style. I raised the ball in the air with one hand when it slipped free. It bounced ahead of me as I was clobbered by my tail and sent sprawling to the turf. An opposing player recovered the ball and carried it away from the touchdown that had been guaranteed to me. It would have been easy to get back into the game, but that would have left me open to the wrath of my teammates. Instead I faked injury and stayed on my elbows and knees and waited. Soon the coach and some of the players were standing over me.
“Easy, get him to his feet,” someone called out. The coach asked about my being able to walk and I grunted a negative response before being led off the field to mild applause. Passing a line of cheerleaders I looked for Heather’s face. Where there should have been concern, I read only bitchiness and disappointment. It wasn’t worth bothering to look towards the audience where my parents were seated.
I was parked on my team’s bench and abandoned there for the remainder of the game which left me with plenty of time to contemplate the stupidly of my showing-off and to think about the cat-headed woman dream. My team would spend the rest of Friday night trying to recover from my mistake, but we ended-up losing anyway. This is not the way any guy would want to start his junior year in high school.
I’d been playing tight-end for the school football squad since ninth grade and while for most people, football was a sport that evolved after gladiatorial games were outlawed, for me; it was the only thing that made going to school bearable. It wasn’t that I didn’t appreciate my parents spending their money to send me and my younger sister to Sherbrook Preparatory Academy; it was more of a case of there being no point in us going there. The school was co-ed, had a dress code in lieu of a uniform, and while the place was supposed to be non-denominational, everyone who went to Sherbrook was a Christian of some sort. The part that confounded me was that instead of being as focused on academics as they claimed; the teaching staff seemed obsessed with the school’s athletic programs. My parents would have saved a bundle of cash by sending us to the local parochial school, but what did I know. My father claimed my older sister made it to college on a partial scholarship for basketball because of all that she had learned at the place. All I knew for certain is that the school was old and stuffy and it was by all accounts funded by an endowment from a dead guy named Sherbrook who allegedly had been a pirate.
The Monday following the game I was stuck in English class enduring the cruelty known as silent reading. I was impatient for the day to end so that I could go for practice when a mosquito buzz sounded from my jacket pocket. Confident that my teacher’s old ears would not hear my ringtone, I slid the phone out of my pocket and held it under my desk. An anonymous text message had been sent. Opening it, I found a picture from Friday’s game of me dropping the ball with the words “SEAN FITZROY – PRIDE OF THE RAIDERS” underneath. Irritated by the deed of nameless slammer, I didn’t care when my English test came back with the letter C circled at the top of the page.
The bell rang and I sprinted out of the classroom to my locker, grabbed my football gear, and went to the change rooms on the floor one level up from the basement. I was pulling on my jersey when Jeremy, a linebacker, peeked around the corner, “Fitz, coach wants you in his office.”
“Why?” I asked.
“Haven’t a clue,” he answered as his big head disappeared behind the lockers.
It wasn’t that bad being called Fitz as moniker when I first came to this school and a few classmates started abbreviating my surname. In fact, I never gave it much thought till my father heard my nickname and indignantly explained that the name Fitzroy was bestowed on the illegitimate children of royalty. That ruined things for me, because now every time someone called me Fitz, all I heard was the word bastard.
I knocked on the door of the small office behind the equipment room and waited until the coach called for me to come inside.
“You wanted to see me?” I expected to get chewed out for dumping the ball, but in honesty, wasn’t ready for what happened next.
“Sean you don’t have to suit up today; you’re moving to Tuesday and Thursday practices.”
I heard, “…you’re moving to Tuesday and Thursday practices,” but he might as well have said, “I’m going to have you practice on Mars because your stinky performance last Friday merits having your football career come to a crashing end.”
“The prep team practices on Tuesday and Thursday,” I managed to say.
“Yes they do. You need to start reviewing the basics. With hard work, you should be able to move back up to the varsity squad in time for next season.”
Embarrassed, I felt my cheeks turn red. “The prep team is for guys who can’t play,” I whined at him.
“The prep team is for players who are learning to play or need to brush up on their skills.”
“But scouting starts this year. If I drop down now there is no way I’ll be scouted next year.”
The coach parked himself on a corner of his desk.
“Listen to me. Sean, its good having you on the team. You work hard and you never miss a practice, you’re a nice kid, but you have to realize that compared to ability, none of that means anything. I have to play the best players for the squad. You started the season rough, but if you work with the prep team for a while, you’ll improve your game. If Coach Van Horne tells me that he sees some improvement, I’ll bring you back up. You have to realize that it isn’t fair to let someone on the prep team stay down for a guy who works hard. It’s all based on ability. You must be able to understand that.”
Against my better judgment I opened my trap. “I’m a good ball player and I’ve got as good a chance as any of your favorites at getting scouted. You want to make an example of me because of one bad play.”
The coach shook his head before he made his final pronouncement.
“You’re not a big enough player to use as an example. For now, the prep team is your only option. Do you want to play ball or do you want to hand in your gear today?”
“I want to play ball,” was my answer.
The coach pointed at the door, “Out. You come back tomorrow and we’ll see how things work out.”
It took a long time to make it home. It wasn’t that I was scared to tell my father, but who wants to disappoint their old man? I dropped the news at the dinner table and in front of my sisters he started in on me with one of his lectures.
“No one wants to nag you but, you have to understand, there are three kids in this family and we’ve never asked any of you to work part-time. Your mother and I wanted your schooling to be a full-time job. It’s going to be a squeeze, paying for the three of you to go to college, and we were hoping that maybe you would pick up some scholarship money to help pay your way. Look at Shannon; she used the partial basketball scholarship she won to shave her tuition in half. Isn’t that right sweetie?”
My older sister looked down at her plate while half-heartedly nodding her head. It was easy to see that she felt sorry for me. My creepy little sister Kelly stifled a giggle.
“You have to realize that you don’t have a lot of responsibilities around the house. When I was your age I was going to school and playing basketball while holding down a part-time, and on top of everything; your grandfather piled on the chores. You know; if he wasn’t the way he is, I’d make you go spend a week with him and then you’d appreciate how easy you have it.”
My father didn’t realize it, but he was crushing me. He received a full scholarship for football and he wanted the same for me, but he was being unfair; pushing me too hard.
“Let’s be honest Sean, you have talent, it doesn’t matter what that broken-down hump of a coach tells you, he’s wrong about your ability as a ball player.”
In the end, I stopped listening and kept nodding my head in agreement, and he tired of talking at me and gave up. I promised to try harder and asked to be excused in order to go hang out in my room, but before I was able to escape my mom blurted out, “Heather called to ask if you wanted to come over and study.”
Her words stopped me in my tracks because I wanted to be alone tonight. The kicker came when my father smiled and said, “Doctor Shelby’s daughter is such a nice girl.”
Nine o’clock, about six hours since being dumped from the squad. It would have been better at home watching my fish, but instead I was in the backseat of my father’s car with the good doctor’s daughter. Parked in the alleyway behind Jim’s corner store with a grove of bushy trees for cover, no one knew we were there and nothing was stopping us from doing whatever we wanted. This worked for Heather as she unbuttoned her blouse, but for me the image of Doctor Shelby conducting my annual physical exam intruded on my thoughts. Heather was part English, part Swedish, part Latino, and part Lord knows what, and for certain she was hotter than Georgia asphalt in the summer. I couldn’t think of a single guy in my school who wouldn’t have screamed bloody murder and handed me a beating for turning her down, but that was what happened. She told me she loved me and I couldn’t disentangle myself from her. Her kisses kept landing like punches on my face and when I started to pull away she became rough.
“Do me, do me,” she gasped out, doing her best to impersonate every matinee star caught in a movie cliché.
This is what I have been dreaming about and praying for since I was twelve-years old, but her bogus passion was maddening and I pushed her off me.
“What’s the matter?” Genuine shock was in her voice.
I tried to find the words to explain things to her. We’d know each other since the first grade, her father was my doctor, and it was obvious after our first date last spring that to be more than friends was a mistake, but my folks keep pushing it because “Heather is such a nice girl.” Both of them ignorant about what a nasty girl she could be.
“Let’s get out of here,” I finally said.
“I don’t understand,” she had a confused look on her face.
“Get yourself together, I’m taking you home,” I told her.
“Don’t you want to…?” A couple of minutes passed before she repeated, “I don’t understand.” She acted as if she were about to cry.
“I got kicked off squad. The coach dropped me down to the prep team.”
“What do you mean?” She covered her mouth with her hand and in seconds went from being disappointed to angry when the realization that she was dating a loser sank in. Her voice became hard. “It’s because of that pass you screwed-up, isn’t it?”
“I guess, maybe,” I didn’t want to discuss it.
“Of course it is,” she snapped at me, “I wouldn’t have dropped that ball. What’s wrong with you?”
Hearing her say that she said she would have held onto the ball, I decided that if she had been born a guy she would have made squad for sure.
“I don’t know, my focus was off,” I didn’t want to admit to messing-up because of my showboating.
“Your focus was off, what do you mean your focus was off?”
“It’s nothing, it was - it was nothing.” Feeling tired, I turned my head away from her. She yammered, “I want to go home now.”
I crawled into the front seat and turned on the car’s engine.
It was a long ride home and the worst part was that I couldn’t even look at her. She did a good job of sounding miserable with her sniffling which made me feel horrible, but I kept my eyes locked on the road. When we arrived at her house I tried to figure out what to say, but the sound of the passenger door slamming shut disrupted my thoughts.
I called out the window, “Heather,” but she was gone and my head began to pound and my stomach started to churn. I pounded down on the gas pedal and made my father’s car peel-out in front of Doctor Shelby’s house.
At home my father was waiting for me.
“Doctor Shelby phoned. He said when you dropped Heather off she came in crying and upset, but didn’t want to talk about it. What happened?” He talked as if I had torn up a winning lottery ticket.
“Nothing happened,” I knew he wasn’t going to buy this one. What father would believe his sixteen year-old son had turned down one of the best-looking girls in school because he was not in love with her, not attracted to her, and thought her mean because of the way she treated some of the other girls.
“Nothing. Doesn’t sound like nothing? What did I tell you? When a girl says no, she means no.”
It was weird seeing my father so wound-up because he was such a controlled guy that he rarely lost his temper.
“We were only kissing and since Heather is a nice girl, as you put it; I figured there isn’t any point in us staying out late. And I’ve been thinking that maybe we shouldn’t see each other, okay?” I figured that this lie might get me off the hook since he wouldn’t believe the truth.
“That’s an incredibly selfish attitude and that’s not the way your mother and I raised you.” He gave me a stern look and I decided to freak him out.
“It beats us having to get married by a Justice of the Peace if I did the baby dance with her.”
I stifled a laugh when I saw the look on his face. To an old school guy such as my father, the words “baby dance” and “Justice of the Peace” were mortifying phrases, almost as terrifying as “your son wants to become a Priest.” He couldn’t argue with the cruel logic of what I had said. I turned and ran upstairs while my father called after me. Inside my room I locked the door to make sure that he wouldn’t invade my space.
Glancing at the books piled on my desk, I decided to do my homework during lunch the next day and tore my clothes off, letting them drop into a pile on the floor, except for my shirt. Not wanting to go outside my room to wash-up in the bathroom, I wiped my face down with my shirt and let it join the rest of my clothes on the ground. From under my bed pillow I pulled out a pair of old cotton track pants that served as my pajamas and pulled them on, then gave the angel fish a feeding before crawling into bed. I was ready to fall asleep when the smell of Heather’s perfume permeated the room. It was a delusion, but the thought of how she smelled excited me. I had tossed and turned, uncertain if I had made the right decision. At the time, I was certain I was right in putting her off, but alone in the dark with only my own thoughts I was not so sure. I tossed and turned. Finally, unable to bear it any further, I jumped out of bed and found the thumb tack on my window sill. A quick jab under my arm and I was back underneath the sheets. It did take long before I was able to drift off to sleep.
Next morning I dragged myself out of bed and off to school. My first class was info-tech and during lab time I discovered someone had taped my fumble and uploaded it to a video sharing website under the title of “hilarious football screw-up.” The footage had been edited so that the ball appeared to spurt out of my hand accompanied by a horrific farting sound. Arranged in a playback loop, the scene repeated over and over. It wouldn’t have mattered to me, except that in the twelve hours since the video had been posted, it had received almost two thousand hits.
Later, sitting in English ignoring what the teacher was saying, I spent the greater part of class alternating between thinking about getting kicked off the squad and puzzling over whether or not I had made a mistake with Heather. Restless, I realized I needed to come up with a plan to turn things around for me. Heather, to be honest, was a nasty plastic bully who had nothing in common with me. While she was popular with her own little crew, it was known around the school that the rest of the members of her cheer squad despised her and her buddy Breanne. Sure, it would be great to have bragging rights about her, but if you went all the way with a girl like that, you’d be struck with her – and for a long time. Picturing her with her mouth open and listening to all the annoying crap coming out of it made me flinch. I’d had enough of her and her friends. The only choice was to get rid of her. I’d play nice with her at lunch before ditching her later. Having been dropped down to the prep team, it won’t be hard to convince her that we were better off as buddies. If I came across as a big enough loser Heather might even think the whole thing was her idea. Pleased that I’d soon be free to chase other girls, I moved on to the more important issue of how to get back onto the squad.
I reflected on what the coach meant when he said I wasn’t a big enough player. At first I was certain that being dropped was punishment for fumbling the ball, but the more I thought about it, the more I realized there must have been another reason that made the coach pull the plug on me. You have to be careful and read between the lines when dealing with guys like my coach, he’s the type who never calls it straight because, like all teachers, I guess he’s scared of getting sued or something. I wasn’t a big enough player - it sounded all so familiar. When I first arrived at Sherbrook and tried out for football, I didn’t make the cut for either squad or prep, which disappointed my father terribly. Being a puny kid made me look like a pansy to the coach which is what cost me a chance to play, but after being schooled by some older players I found a solution that helped me to make squad by grade nine.
“Fitzroy”
Hearing the teacher bellow my name brought me back to the here and now and I saw that he was waiting for me to answer a question I had missed. Someone took pity on me and whispered the answer.
“He died in 1616,” I said hoping I was not being pranked.
“That’s correct.” He turned and wrote the date on the board and continued his boring lecture.
With my teacher satisfied, I returned to daydreaming about football.
What was the real reason the coach dropped me down to prep? The practice before Friday’s game I had trouble stopping Brent Davies when I went to block him, and at the game, I faked being hurt when I was tackled. I was certain of the answer. The coach didn’t think I needed to improve my playing; he was worried that by year’s end I would be getting mowed over by the opposing offence.
I had to become more competitive at hitting which meant I needed to get stronger and there was only one way I could do that. It had worked for me before in grade nine, but it was risky. To be stronger I needed muscle, lots of it. I could work for it hard, but even hard work probably wouldn’t be enough. I already lifted weight three times a week like everyone else who played football, but I would have to ramp it up, pump iron every day. And where Mother Nature cheated me, a chemist could make up the difference. This time around, I needed to watch myself, be more careful with my intake.
As class drew to a close, I felt happy with my plan. I would deal with Heather, get back on squad, and go after a scholarship. Maybe find a nice girl. There was an uneasy feeling in my chest when the bell rang and class was done. My first practice with the prep team was today and I was certain to feel like an idiot walking out onto the field with the other utility grade players, but that would change. After practice I’d track down the Candy Man and starting tomorrow it’d be time to seriously pound the weights. I went to find Heather.
I saw her before she saw me.
Heather was in the cafeteria seated at a table with the rest of her girl buddies. One of her friends spotted me and nudged Heather with her elbow. Our eyes met and I tried to gauge her mood, but it was hopeless. She pushed away from the table, stood, and started towards me in a slow, sashaying walk. Her tight sweater and short skirt made my heart start to pound. When she came near, I took her hand and pulled her close in order that no one would be able to hear our conversation. It seemed that the cafeteria had all of a sudden become quiet.
“I am really, really sorry about last night.”
She brushed away my apology and in an angry voice said, “You look excited, I’m certain it’s not because of me.”
I almost laughed because she was being such a bag that ditching her would be easy.
“I’m scared of what your dad might do if he caught us,” the lie came out so easy that I amazed even myself.
For a brief moment she looked bewildered and her anger seemed to vanish. I decided it was a good time to tell her about my idea on my getting back onto the squad. She became perky and was unbelievably agreeable when I told her I wouldn’t have any time for her since training at the gym would take priority. I was ready to say that I just wanted us to be friends when she gave my hand a squeeze and rained hell on me.
“I know you were scared the other night, but that’s normal. I wasn’t scared because I love you.”
She couldn’t mean it. She didn’t love me. She was only saying she loved me. This was all wrong. I didn’t love her and I wasn’t even sure I like her. What if she was telling the truth? I felt her small, soft hand and made the mistake of looking down at her fashion-magazine perfect legs.
I shouldn’t have said it, but the words came out to fast for me to stop, “I want to take things slow.”
This completely messed me up because for a sixteen-year old girl to hear that her boy wouldn’t pressure her was synonymous with a commitment of undying love.
“I love you Sean. You do love me, don’t you?”
I knew that hesitation would make things get ugly.
“Of course I do.”
She jumped into my arms, almost bowling me over, and planted a kiss on me to the sounds of hoots and hollers.
With the first part of my plan in disarray, I decided to focus my efforts on getting back into squad and would deal with Heather later. I began working myself stupid, pumping weights and doing lifts and squats, till every single part of my body was firm. I was exhausted all the time. Still, no matter how hard I worked myself, I wasn’t getting the results I wanted. I was still too scrawny and when I looked at myself in the mirror it was sickening. While there wasn’t any fat to pinch, parts of my body still appeared flabby. I gave myself some time to try and make things work Joe Weider style, but to me, I still looked like the guy who got sand kicked in his face. With the football season underway, time was running out and it became clear that things needed to be cranked-up.
Three weeks after my safety meeting with the Candy Man, I sat on a bench surveying the weight room. I made sure everyone focused on their workout before reaching into my gym bag and pulling out a medicine bottle filled with pink pills. Gym Candy. I hesitated, not wanting to go down this path again, but knowing that if I didn’t, there was no way I would make it back onto squad. In my head I swore over and over that this was just a temporary fix before popping three pills in my mouth and chugging water from my sports-bottle in order to gag them down.
You might say that, gradually, building myself up became an unhealthy obsession with me.
I trained with the prep team knowing that in order for me to go back up to squad I had to impress Coach Van Horne. Every time someone made it past me, or was able to shrug off one of my blocks, I would spend extra time in the gym, determined not to let a prep team player show me up. I became so focused on making a comeback that nothing else mattered. My social life, which had been all important to me just a month ago, went into a nosedive.
And I neglected my studies.
My decision to use chemicals to boost was validated on one of my regular trips to the weight room. I heard someone roar, “To the sides, squad coming through.” I stepped back against the wall just like the other dozen students in the hallway to make room as my former teammate charged past me in their practice gear. From under their helmets I caught a few eyes look in my direction then quickly look away. I could only watch as they vanished out the back door that led to the football field. The chant of “Raiders, Raiders, Raiders” seemed to still be ringing in the air even after the last player exited the school. Once the commotion was over, I reached into my sports bag to retrieve the medicine bottle. I hesitated before adding three more pink pills to the three that were already in my palm and then gulped them down. I continued on my way to the gym.
Standing next to her locker, I told Heather I intended to skip the Homecoming dinner, certain that she would become less enamored with me if I became enough of a wet blanket, but she wasn’t willing to let the matter slide. It would have been embarrassing for her to go to Homecoming alone since it was the night when the it-girls asserted their alpha-female status in front of the entire school. Parading in their designer dresses while being escorted by their jock boyfriends, they vamped enough glamour to outdo an awards show. It was impossible for glasses-wearing, brainy girl to compete with any of them. And it was unconceivable that Heather would miss of moment of it.
I explained that I would feel like a goof sitting at the prep team table. She didn’t care, since she would be hanging at a different table with the cheerleaders, but she didn’t want to miss out on exchanging mums and garters, something we were allowed to do as juniors. She harped on me that she had dropped fifty bucks on my garter. Her whining took its toll, and I countered that I had spent three times that amount on her mum, but nothing was going to make me go to Homecoming. Her attention shifted away from me as her eyes darted around the hallway, evaluating each passerby and occasionally doing a half wave or a crushing glare. A group of nerd girls walked past us drawing Heather’s attention. Ignoring me, she turned her focus on them and when they were almost safely away, made a cat-like hissing sound. The nerd girls froze in their tracks till the bravest of the three looked back at us. Spotting Heather, she began quick stepping away with her friends rushing to catch-up to her. This amused my girlfriend and she let out a laugh.
“Why do you do stuff like that?” I was annoyed by her behavior.
“Do what?”
“Pick on those girls.”
“Oh, them, they bring it on themselves.”
She began rubbing her hand against my bicep provocatively and telling me how nice my body was becoming before asking for an update.
“Have you heard back from the coach yet?”
“No, not yet, but I’ve been working hard.”
“You need to wash your face after each work-out because your pimples are coming back.”
“I’ll try to remember.”
“My parents won’t be home till suppertime, you could come over,” she whispered.
“I need to go to the gym.”
Her eyes flashed, “Do you know you’re becoming a bit of a drag?”
Here was my opening, I should have said that we were finished, but instead I whined, “You don’t get how it feels to be dropped from squad.”
Too quickly she became sympathetic and said, “I understand how you feel. Don’t worry; you’ll be back on squad before you know it. In the meantime I’ll work something out for us,” she promised, then, “I love you.”
I thought, “Not again,” but the words that fell out of my mouth were, “I love you too.”
She gave me a deep kiss before pulling away and walking off.
I called her that night to find she had fixed things in order that she wouldn’t have to attend the Homecoming solo. She ordered me to stay home sick while she attended the dinner with Rocky Como as a friend. Rocky was seeing a girl who attended Montgomery High and since he was captain of the football team, it would appear as if Rocky Como the god was doing his sickly friend a favor. With the way my marks were going, I couldn’t afford to miss school, but I didn’t want to set Heather off. The following day I told my parents I wasn’t feeling well and stayed home lifting weights, while Rocky gave Heather her mum on my behalf.
While I had successfully dodged taking Heather to Homecoming, the Halloween dance was a different situation. She had declared we would go as Anthony and Cleopatra and would not be put off. I had intended to take her, but on the day of the dance I started to have this feeling which is hard to put into words. I can only describe it as a sensation which made me feel tense and jumpy. It was easy to dismiss as nothing other than I had been trying to shrink my body fat by eating less. I called Heather to say I didn’t have the energy to deal with another overblown school event and asked if she wanted to skip the dance and crash at my house. I figured she might choose to go with her friends, but instead she went atomic and told me that she was going to pick me up when the big hand was on the twelve and the little hand on the six and to be ready or else. She yelled into the phone and disconnected. I know it sounds paranoid, but seemed like she planned the whole thing just so she could throw a fit. Rather then pulling out my costume and change; I lay on my bed. My lack of energy caused me to doze off while staring up at the ceiling.
I had been having a weird dream when a soft knock on my bedroom door woke me.
“Aren’t you taking Heather to the dance tonight?” My father had asked.
I stirred in time to hear our front door bell ring and later wished that my father had worked late because when he beat me to the door and swung it open, he received a real surprise. Standing before him was Doctor Shelby’s daughter in a slightly less then sheer toga. It had a plunging front that went all the way down to her belly-button which was adored with a shiny navel chain.
It’s funny, but never again did either of my parents voice the opinion that “Heather is such a nice girl.” And while not wanting to go, I ended up taking her to the Halloween dance because we were a couple whether I wanted us to be or not.
I should have broken-up with Heather, but I kept messing up every time the right moment came along. Despite everyone calling her high maintenance; she actually became so low maintenance that a confrontation – a confrontation where for certain she would turn into a she-devil - didn’t seem worth the effort. As long as I occasionally went with her to socials she never complained no matter how much I neglected her. I decided that breaking-up with her, for the moment, wasn’t a priority. Plus, other jocks might sneer at me for losing my spot on the squad, but there was no hiding the jealous looks on their faces when they saw me hanging with one of the it-girls of Sherbrook.
It only took a couple of returned test papers to realize how much my studies had started to slide. I deluded myself into thinking that I’d play catch-up once I was back on squad and didn’t have to focus as much on getting strong.
Getting strong came at another cost as well. During this time I found myself standing alone. Some unspoken rule declared that I was no longer allowed to hang around with members of the squad, and I guess that was to be expected, but the friends I had that weren’t into sports, Ajax and D.J., also copped an attitude towards me. Once, my girl-buddy Cindy called me a jerk and told me to stop acting like a p-wade all the time. It was funny, but my girlfriend, if that is what you’d call Heather, was the only one okay with things since she was occupied with her own friends. While I often felt lonely, not having them make demands on my time might have been for the better since two times a week I would head for practice with the prep team and five days a week I would go to the school gym and work the weights. While I was at practice it was all business, no socializing. At the gym I became an obsessed jerk. I wouldn’t talk with anyone; I wouldn’t spot for any of the girls who asked. I pumped iron till I was too tired to bench any more weight and went home.
The days turned into weeks as I waited to be called back up to squad.
“Can’t anyone play in this stupid group?” I had yelled. I couldn’t believe how crappy some of my teammates were at playing football. I had looked around to see angry faces glare back at me from the ranks of the prep team. “Well, it’s true,” I continued, not realizing that I was still yelling. They all had such a lax attitude towards the drills that I couldn’t understand why they even bothered playing.
“If you think you’re that good, how come you were cut from squad?”
I didn’t know who said it, but I was dying to mix it up with him.
“All right, everyone, hustle in. We going to go for one more play before we call it a day,” I heard Van Horn, the prep team coach, bellow. As I passed him, he stopped me.
“Cool it and keep the comments to yourself,” he warned me.
It was the last practice of the year and the cold made it hard to be enthusiastic about playing outside on the damp grass. I jockeyed into the huddle and listened to the quarterback’s call before taking up my position. The ball was snapped and handed off to the running-back. I shuffled out and saw he was going to try to run up the sideline and went to cover. At first I thought a bus had hit me. The impact flipped me backwards and I somersaulted before landing headfirst. My helmet flew off as I crashed to the ground. Unable to breath; I struggled to push myself up, first to my knees and then to my feet. The outside linebacker that had nailed me handed me my helmet and asked, “You okay squad? Let me know if it things get too rough for you.” I wanted to take him on, but it felt as though he had broken all my ribs and ruined my back. I limped over with the rest of the team to listen to Van Horn’s comments on the play before being told to hit the showers.
Grubby pants and a number 80 jersey fell to the change room floor as I stripped off my gear. I wrapped a towel around my waist and started towards the showers while trying to figure out why I was still getting mowed down after all I was doing to bulk-up.
“Hey Fitz”
Eric was calling me, which was unusual since I didn’t waste time exchanging words with other members of the prep team.
“Is something the matter?” I asked
“No, nothing’s the matter,” he leaned against the wall, “football is over and my parents are away Saturday. They said it wasn’t a problem to have a few friends over for a party. I get tired of looking at your sad sack face and decided I’d ask you if you wanted to come over.”
It was surprising that he was asking me to hang out since I had been keeping my distance from everyone. I was ready to say no, but realized that if I did he’d be insulted.
“Yeah, I’ll come,” I heard myself say before adding, “Can I bring the girlfriend?”