Second Down
Copyright© 2025 by Lumpy
Chapter 34
My headache and most of the soreness was gone by Monday morning, but Mr. Lassiter still had me come by first thing, even before I started training with Coach Greer, so he could check me out again.
He said I looked good, that there was no sign of any lasting damage, and cleared me for practice, although I found out that afternoon that he told Coach Holloway he didn’t want me getting hit during practice this week.
We only had one more game this season and it was coming up on Saturday, although we had the first week of playoffs next week. If we got to the championships, the games would go right to the last day of school for the semester, although competition this year was tough.
Although we didn’t normally do any hitting at practice, I guess Coach was taking it extra careful with me, because he sat me to watch film all through Monday’s practice, and Tuesday, I was only allowed to throw. I wasn’t even allowed to take part in the scrimmage.
Andre had it a lot worse. Coach was definitely punishing him for what happened on Saturday, critiquing every little thing he did wrong and generally being all over him. Part of me wanted to tell the coach to take it easy on him, since mistakes happen, but there was a big difference in giving the team a talking-to and saying something to Coach.
Andre was at least holding up to it well, without complaining or pouting. I think he’d kind of wanted something like this, as maybe a form of penance. He’d felt really bad about it and had tried to apologize every time he saw me at school the day before.
He wasn’t the only one going through it.
After practice, Melanie was waiting by the gate that led out toward the field house. She didn’t meet me every time after practice but if the timing worked out, between when cheer practice finished and her ride was ready to go, she came by to see me.
It was a great way to end my school day, for sure.
She broke into a smile when she saw me, bouncing forward to wrap me in a hug before giving me a quick kiss. The PDA between us had ramped up after homecoming. We hadn’t talked about us being official or anything, but I think most people had assumed we were together, and we’d just kind of gone with it.
Even in my dream life, the ‘what are we’ conversation had always been awkward, so if she was willing to just roll with it, so was I.
“Want to walk me home?” she asked.
I paused, surprised. “Don’t you usually get a ride with Emily?”
“Changed it up today.” She shrugged, turning and walking down the sidewalk toward the field house. “Coming?”
I just shook my head and jogged to catch up. That was the first hint that something was wrong. Melanie liked routine and she liked riding with a senior every day. I guess it made her feel like she wasn’t just the average freshman.
I got my stuff from the field house and we started the short walk to her house. It meant a little longer walk for me, but if she wanted me to walk with her, then I would.
The more we walked, the clearer it was that something was off. Melanie was usually a chatterbox, filling any silence with stories about whatever drama was happening, and there was always drama, or just ... whatever. She abhorred silence.
So the fact that she was quiet was telling.
“Okay, what’s wrong?” I asked after we’d gone a block without speaking.
“Nothing.”
“Come on. You wanted to walk ‘cause something’s bothering you and you want to talk about it. So hit me with it, instead of making me drag it out of you.”
She thought about that for a second and said, “Brandy’s been running her mouth.”
“About what?”
“About me trying out for varsity. She’s telling everyone I’m not good enough and I started dating you so they’d consider me. That I’m not good enough to make it on my own.”
I frowned. “Why would dating me matter for varsity cheerleading?”
“Don’t be stupid, Blake.” She stopped walking, turning to face me with her hands on her hips. “Everyone’s talking about how you turned JV around. The way you played against Monterey. People notice that stuff.”
“I mean, I’m still just on JV...”
“You’ll be varsity next year,” she cut in. “Everyone knows it. And you’ll probably start your junior and senior year. Kenneth only got one year as a starter since he was backup last year, and Ben will only have next year before he graduates. You’ll be the first quarterback to start two years in a row in forever.”
“That’s a lot of assumptions.”
“It’s not assumptions, it’s obvious. They may not say it to your face, but everyone’s talking about how you won the Monterey game all by yourself, and how you almost brought us back to win against Midland until Andre slipped. Why do you think Jorden’s so pissed? He knows he’s going to have to stay on JV and you’re going to sail right past him.” She started walking again, slower this time. “I got lucky, you know? Landing you right before you broke big.”
I know she was complimenting me, but the words hit me wrong. For a second, I remembered what Elijah said about Melanie using me to get closer to varsity.
But I only thought about it for a second. Looking at her face, the genuine worry in her expression and how she looked at me when she said she got lucky, I knew that wasn’t true. It was just my own insecurities playing me.
“No,” I said, reaching for her hand. “I think I got lucky.”
It had been the right thing to say, and it got me a little smile, but she wasn’t done with her venting.
“It’s just bullshit. She cornered Tammy after practice today, going on about how I’m not ready, how putting me on varsity would be a mistake.”
“They’ve seen you practice. She has to know that isn’t true.”
“Does she? We mostly practice separately from them, and other than Hanna and Emily, everyone else is backing Brandy. She’s been telling people I’m too busy ‘cause I have to work on a hardship permit and how it would look to have someone like me on the team.”
“What does she mean like you?”
“White trash. I heard she was telling people her daddy gives her an allowance bigger than my paychecks. Like, it’s somehow shameful that I have to work because we need the money. Like that makes me trash or something. She’s also telling everyone that Donna had an abortion her freshman year, and disappeared the last few months of school because of it.”
“How would she know anything about your sister? There’s a huge age gap between the two of you.”
“Her gold-digging mom. That’s why she has money; she married Brandy’s dad who was, like, twenty years older than her and rich. Her mom went to school with Donna; they were on cheerleading together in middle school. And now she’s telling everyone how Donna gained all this weight freshman year and then vanished, and when she came back that summer she was skinny again.”
I’d only met Brandy’s parents a couple of times. They’d always been busy any time I went to her house. At the time, I’d thought it kind of cool how much free rein she was given.
“Melanie...”
“It’s not true. None of it’s true.”
“Brandy’s always been like this,” I said. “She’ll step on anyone to get ahead. What if I talked to some of the varsity guys, Kenneth especially? His opinion carries a lot of weight with both teams.”
“No,” Melanie said instantly. “Absolutely not.”
“But...”
“I’m not having my boyfriend fight my battles for me. They already think I’m dating you to get ahead. If you go out and defend me, it’ll only get worse.”
“That’s not what I...”
“I know, and I appreciate it, I do. But I need to handle this myself.”
“Okay, but if it gets worse, let me try to help,” I said.
She just smiled and squeezed my hand. This was all well outside of my area of expertise. Even in my dream life, girl politics was nothing I’d really understood.
But I had noticed she’d called me her boyfriend.
That was something.
We were getting close to Thanksgiving break, with only one full week of school left to go, and my teachers were so focused on midterms that they put a hold on any more extra work to get me on level until after we got back from break.
I didn’t mind. While I definitely wanted to do everything I could to be on level next year, we still had another full semester to get there and I’d been go, go, go since the second week of school. I could use a break.
Better yet, all the extra classwork meant I was ready for the tests. I’d do some studying over the weekend and the day before, I had to take each of my midterms, but I didn’t need to stress about it.
So I finally had some free time.
I was supposed to have what was becoming our regular Friday night date the next night with Melanie but she said she had some stuff to do. Thankfully, Eduardo was free.
The last thing I wanted to do when I had a night off from schoolwork was to just sit at home.
He hung around at practice, watching us play, and sometimes talked to a few of the guys from the lunch table. After practice, instead of walking home, we headed down Broadstreet to the bowling alley. It was easily fifteen blocks, almost all the way down to the factory on the western side of town, but it was also the only place with arcade games aside from the dinky sit-down Pac-Man game at Napoli’s.
Although they only had six cabinets, and most of them were several years old, it was as close as our town got to an arcade. They’d also just gotten Street Fighter in at the end of the summer, but I’d been too busy to actually get to play it, so I’d had to listen to Eduardo tell me about it while we worked on his house.
Of course, when I’d suggested we head to the bowling alley so I could finally play it for myself, it didn’t click that Eduardo had been playing it all year, which gave him a big head start.
I figured out my mistake pretty quickly, though.
I pushed the buttons on the Street Fighter II cabinet rapidly, desperately trying to counter Eduardo’s Ryu with my Ken, but it was no use. His Hadoken caught me mid-jump, and my character crumpled to the ground.
“Yes!” he said, pumping his fist in victory. “Seven straight! You might want to stick to football, cause you suck at this.”
“Yeah, keep talking trash. Game’s rigged,” I muttered, fishing another quarter from my pocket. “Has to be.”
Eduardo laughed. “Sure, that has to be it. Mr. Quarterback, big-man-on-campus, can’t accept he just sucks.”
I laughed and put in another quarter. I could take the teasing.
“So how are things with Sarah?” I asked, trying to distract him long enough to get some hits in.
It didn’t work and he kept kicking my butt as he answered, his eyes never leaving the screen.
“Things are good. We talk a lot during lunch. And, you know, sometimes between classes.”
“I saw you two holding hands in the hall yesterday.”
Childish, yes, I know, but he was too timid. She was doing everything she could to signal him that she liked him, and he was taking kiddie steps. I knew he was shy, but he needed to get over that fear if he didn’t want her to get frustrated and find someone who would show their interest.
“Have you kissed her yet?” I prodded when he didn’t say anything.
The fact that I was able to land several hits when his hand suddenly froze in place said everything I needed to know.
“So that’s a definite no. Man, you really need to make a move. She likes you. I guarantee if you ask her out, she’ll say yes.”
“I just ... I want to get comfortable first.”
“Comfortable with what? With her? You just said you guys talk at lunch every day and sometimes between classes. If you want to get more comfortable with her, you’re going to need to take it to the next level.”
“No, I mean just ... comfortable in the school. You’ve been around these people your whole life, remember? I’m new here.”
“You were new three months ago; you can’t keep using that excuse forever. You’ve got friends at school. What else is there to get comfortable about?”
The match ended, with me losing brutally again, even with him distracted.
He stepped back from the cabinet and said, “There’s a lot to get comfortable with. It’s just different here. I still feel like an outsider, and probably won’t feel comfortable until that stops happening.”
“Why do you feel like an outsider?”
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