Trent Reedy - Divided We Fall

Friday brought the first football game of the season. Coach posted the starting roster on Thursday, and I was glad to have my shot as one of the starting wide receivers.

In the locker room Friday night, Sweeney had some of his screaming, thrashing metal music blasting from the new high-powered speakers that he’d bought for his comm this season. TJ and Dylan traded fierce licks on pretend guitars. Cal wore all his gear except his helmet and cleats. He walked back and forth with his fists pressed to the side of his head, his biceps bulging. He was whispering something so fiercely that he looked like he could literally kill someone. Timmy Macer wasn’t watching where he was going and only stepped out of Cal’s way at the last second.

“I want to hurt somebody!” Our starting center Brad Robinson threw fake punches at his locker door. “Rip their guts out!”

This was what it was all about. The intense concentrated rage, the anticipation. Football was half the reason I bothered showing up at school. JoBell was probably the other half. Tonight, though, with everything that had happened, I couldn’t get myself into it. I sat there in my football pants and shoulder pads, holding my helmet and shoes.

Mike Keelin walked by me on his way to his locker. “You ready to rock, Wright?”

I couldn’t take it. I heaved myself up off the bench and headed out of the locker room into the gym. Sweeney was playing catch with our tight end, Randy Huff, and with TJ, who had somehow snagged the other starting receiver slot.

“Dude, where you been?” Sweeney fired a perfect pass right to me. “We need to get warmed up.”

I caught the ball.

“We’ve been waiting for you forever,” said TJ. “Some of us actually want to win this game.”

I whipped a hard pass straight for TJ’s head and kept on walking through the gym out to the school lobby and drinking fountain. The door to the gym closed behind me, and I ducked down to get a drink. A moment later I heard someone slam into the door, throwing it open.

Sweeney walked up and leaned against the wall by the fountain. “Okay, Wright, it’s game night. Time to get focused. So tell me. What’s your problem?”

I stood up and wiped my mouth. “Nothing. I just can’t stand when TJ—”

“Cut the bullshit. This isn’t about TJ. You’ve been weird all week.”

“You want to warm up?” I said. “Fine. Let’s go throw the football around.” I started back for the gym, but Sweeney pushed himself off the wall and grabbed my arm.

“We’ve known each other since we were both shitting our diapers. Something’s wrong. You have to tell me.”

“I can’t get into it tonight. Into football, the zone, whatever.”

Sweeney stared at me. He wasn’t going to let this go. I tried to get past him to the gym, but he stepped in front of me.

Fine. The governor could stuff his orders. I needed someone to know what was going on. I checked the hallway to make sure nobody was around. “The other night when you had your pontoon party? I didn’t stay home to take care of my mom.”

“What? That was a cool party. You should have been there. Where did you go?”

“I went to Boise with the Guard.”

Sweeney almost always kept his cool, but now his jaw dropped right open. Before he could start asking a million questions, I told him everything that had happened, swearing him to secrecy when I was finished.

“Of course I won’t tell. You know you can trust me. But dude, JoBell is pissed about this. You have to talk to her.”

“I know she’s mad! Why do you think I can’t tell her? She’s taken this up as her personal… political… whatever. She set that stupid photo of me as her comm’s background. Every time I almost work up the guts to tell her, she cuts in with the latest bad news or some rant about how terrible I am for what I did.”

Sweeney held his hands up. “Whoa, whoa, whoa. First, she doesn’t know it was you. Second, she doesn’t know what really happened. Third, and most importantly—” He grabbed me by the shoulder pads. “Danny, we have a game tonight. We’ve waited for this forever. Plus you had to work extra hard to prove you were good enough to start at receiver after missing all the summer workouts. You know how Coach is always telling us to leave it all out on the field? Let’s do that tonight. Right now… forget all that other stuff. Just put it all to the side and let’s play some football.”

“I don’t know if I can. That’s what I’m trying to tell you.”

Sweeney shook me. “Sure you can. It doesn’t matter anyway.” He put his arm over my shoulder and led me back toward the gym. “Since I’m the quarterback, I’m telling you right now, you better get open, because I’m gunning for you.”

“Don’t,” I said. “I’m really not up to it.”

“Then we’re gonna get our asses kicked tonight, because the ball is coming for you whether you like it or not. So be ready.”

Our team got off to a strong start, marching down the field with a bunch of seven- and eight-yard gains along with a couple quick passes to Randy. Then Cal broke open a crazy thirty-eight-yard touchdown run. I made it downfield to block one safety. I thought the other one had him, but Cal ran him right over.

Our defense slipped up, though, and the Sandpoint Pirates did much the same as we had, driving downfield a little at a time, until their tailback weaseled his way in past us for a forty-eight-yard touchdown.

Our kickoff return brought us to our thirty-five-yard line. We were huddling up waiting for TJ to run the play in from Coach Shiratori. Sweeney leaned over and tapped his face mask against mine. “Coach is probably going to call for a pass play. Run the first part of your route and then get deep. I’m bombing it to you.”

“Don’t do it,” I said.

“It’s coming to you. Get in the game or not. Your call.” Sweeney heard the play from TJ and then called it out. He was right. The play called for both receivers and our tight end to run pass routes.

The huddle was broken and I went to the line, split off from our offensive tackle. I looked over to the middle to see if I could get Sweeney’s attention, but he was all business. “Damn it, Sweeney,” I whispered. The ball was snapped and I shot out ahead, faking inside and then dodging outside of an outside linebacker. Then I cut a slant across the middle, feeling the Sandpoint cornerback right on my six.

TJ was wide open on the out he’d run. Sweeney could have connected with him for at least twenty yards. For a second I thought he would, but he pump-faked and looked back to the left. A defensive end tore through our line, but Cal knocked him out, giving Sweeney more time. Randy scrambled and escaped his coverage. Any sane quarterback would have thrown to him, but Sweeney moved to dodge another defender. That one hooked an arm around his middle, but Sweeney held on to the ball and twisted free.

“Damn it, Sweeney,” I whispered again, and then shot off downfield. The Sandpoint safety had screwed up, thinking our quarterback had a brain and was going to pass to Randy. He slowed down, and I sprinted back behind him into the open field.

Sweeney cranked back his arm. I kept running, checking back as I went. The ball was sailing toward the end zone. I sped up. Checked again. Reached out and caught the ball on the tip of my fingers. It bobbled for a second and I was sure I’d drop it, but in the next instant I snapped it in close to my chest.

The other safety crashed into my side out of nowhere. I spun to my left, but kept my feet pumping toward the goal line, high-stepping backward with the safety hanging off of me. When the strong safety nailed us both, I fell back and hit the ground.