Chapter 4: Unmasked

Tuesday January 19

I stepped out of my apartment and all but fell on my ass. Duke looked at me like I’d tried to kill him. It had sleeted yesterday and it froze overnight. I began to wonder why I hadn’t just stayed in LA.

My part of the shoot had ended yesterday. The cast and production staff had a going-away lunch for me. I’d found several new friends, especially Zak. He was older than I was, but he was a lot nicer to me than Craig Wild had been. I really hadn’t figured out that all the hazing was just him being mean. I’d had dinner with Bree and Elizabeth, after we all signed our contracts, and they clued me in. I guess he’d also been a dick to them. I didn’t feel quite so bad that I’d be making more money than he would on the next two movies.

Speaking of money, Caryn was worried. She didn’t think our accountant was the best person to manage the funds I was given; we needed a real money manager. I gave her permission to start looking for one. She also wanted to hire people. I think she has plans for an empire. She wanted to hire some of the Mennonites to help with the farm. She needed an office person to take care of the bookkeeping. And she needed someone to be her assistant.

Caryn had agreed that my mom’s new real estate company, Dawson Realty, was a good investment. The people she hired for the office would have to work for both my mom and Caryn.

Ari had also called her. He had the numbers from the movie and we had won the week again. Second place went to Ride Along 2 at $35 million. We’d done $37 million. Ari said the studio was ecstatic. They projected that we might actually get to $450 million worldwide.

I tentatively eased my way to the house. Duke found Precious in our backyard. She’d figured out she could slip through the driveway gate. That was another thing: we now had a fence around our property with security cameras to monitor the yard and all entrances.

I was surprised to see Fritz sitting at the kitchen table with dad. He saw my surprise, and smiled tiredly.

“I decided to make a quick visit to look over your home security with your father. With his approval, I’ve arranged for a company to monitor your property for you. You’ve had the odd fan and a few paparazzi try to visit while you were away,” Fritz explained.

Fritz and my dad warned me that there would be a camera in the living room of my apartment. Inside the main house, there would be three cameras. One would be in the basement and activated by a motion sensor; our basement was a large open room. A second camera would monitor the back door, and another would monitor the front door from the inside. There were, of course, also going to be cameras around the house. If someone wanted to enter, they’d have to get in either through the driveway or front gate, where there already was a camera and intercom. Our cars all had a special infrared attachment that the gate would recognize to allow us to drive in.

Dad and Fritz wandered off to inspect the rest of the house to be sure nothing else was needed. While they were doing that, I looked around and spotted one of my grandma’s ‘gag’ gifts waiting to be put up, and decided it was the perfect time to do it. Nothing like embarrassing a parent while they were entertaining company. Now if I could just keep from grinning while I explained it to Fritz.

Fritz came in as I was finishing putting it up. He looked at it, amused.

“Why are you putting up a second clock in your kitchen?”

I gave him a superior look.

“Because Dad always loses track of the time, especially when it’s time to pick Grandma up to take her somewhere. Grandma said he should have two now so he can’t sit with his back to one and ‘forget’ to do the important things, like shopping.”

Dad looked up from his paper with an aggrieved look.

“Why is she saying just me?” he grouched. “I seem to recall a young man who used to be late for everything!”

I gave him my best pious look, and turned back to Fritz, still trying to look like a misunderstood holy man.

“See what I have to put up with?” I asked in my own aggrieved voice.

Fritz just snorted. Then he gave a speculative look at the clock.

“David, you know a lot of the ‘he said/she said’ moments in a famous person’s life happen in the kitchen and the living room, right?”

“Yes. So... ?” I responded.

Fritz turned to my dad.

“Will you be okay if we install cameras behind the clock faces? Their feeds would be downloaded to a system that holds enough information that it doesn’t have to be changed out for years, and no one would be able to look at it unless an issue comes up. We’ll also put cameras up in the living areas of the house. Will it be okay if I install a passive system like that?”

My dad looked at me, and I shrugged.

“So no one can access anything on the system unless there’s an issue, and it would be a passive thing that wouldn’t affect anything or anyone otherwise?”

“That’s exactly what I’m saying,” Fritz replied.

“Go ahead, then,” Dad said as he nodded, then went upstairs.

With that piece of business seemingly out of the way, I opened the back door and called Duke. He raced in with Precious hot on his tail.

“No, you don’t,” I said as I scooped her up before she could run loose in our house.

I was happy to see that the cat from hell decided to let me hold her and give her some loving before I set her down so she could go home. This time last year she would’ve clawed me for sure.

Mom came down and put Little David in his high chair, with Duke immediately sitting next to him, checking him for something. Mom was pouring coffee.

“You want one?” she asked.

“Please.”

“Your brother and his family will be over tonight, so be home at a reasonable time.”

I looked around and realized that Rosy wasn’t here to cook me breakfast. She had spoiled me the last several weeks. Something smelled good, though. I peeked in the oven and someone was making a breakfast casserole. The oven timer went off and both Dad and Peggy came downstairs. I pulled the casserole out of the oven and checked it. There is nothing worse than runny eggs. It seemed to be done, so I got out plates and served everyone.

I let the conversation wash over me as we ate. It was nice to get back to normal and be home with my family.

No one was outside the school when I arrived; it was too cold. It felt good to be able to wear my jeans and a sweatshirt. Mom had picked me up a new one that proclaimed we were State Champions again. I walked in with that and my letterman jacket on. I had to go to the office to get my class schedule. School had started last week, so I would need to catch up.

The secretary had it for me when I entered the office. Crud, more AP classes. It wasn’t that I didn’t think I could handle them, it was that they were more work. I knew I never signed up for them. I thought about complaining, but the school had gone out of its way to accommodate me last semester. I planned to get to the bottom of this little mystery.

PE – Mr. Rector
Art Appreciation – Ms. Saunders
AP English Composition – Mrs. Comer
Spanish I – Ms. Cruz
Lunch
AP World History I – Mr. Stork
AP Physics I – Mr. Hicks
Principles of Business – Mr. Quiroz

I went to my locker to drop off my jacket. I noticed that as I walked down the hall, people seemed to make way for me, turn and stare. I checked my fly, but Mr. Happy hadn’t decided to make his presence known, and my fly was closed. When I got to my locker, Pam and Tracy were leaning against it.

“Ladies.”

“I hear I’m moving in with you,” Tracy said.

I looked at Pam, and she seemed to be interested in my boots.

“How’s your dad’s job search going?” I asked.

“He said you should call Kendal. I think he’s worried about her,” Tracy said.

“Can you have him call Caryn? She’ll be doing the hiring. If Kendal needs a reference, I can put in a good word for her.”

The bell rang, so I put my stuff into my locker and grabbed my duffle bag for PE.

Coach Rector was our new defensive coordinator for football that we’d hired when Coach Zoon left. Coach Rector had come from Springfield. I needed to start sucking up to him now if I wanted to play defense my senior year. He was young, at 24, and had played college ball at Northern Illinois as a linebacker. He looked like he could still play.

He saw me and called me into his office.

“I wanted to welcome you back. It’s time to get to work.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Today just have some fun with open gym. Tomorrow the trainer will be in and he’ll get you set up with a training program,” he said, and then it seemed he thought of something. “Do you plan to go out for baseball this year?”

I didn’t promise him one way or the other.

“I’d advise against it. You need to focus on football. I’ve talked to Coach Hope, and we’ll be joining a seven-on-seven league during the spring. It’ll need to take priority over baseball.”

I wondered if he told Moose that. I hated to tell him, but I planned to play baseball.

“Okay,” I said noncommittally.

Damn, why didn’t I just let him know what was in the works?

All the other football players were lifting. I went and played some basketball. Towards the end of gym class I wandered into the weight room. Jill and Becky were there, coaching the guys up. It looked like they had taken the intensity of lifting up a few notches. The guys looked like they had just completed a hard practice.

I was glad to see Tim Foresee working out under the trainers’ watchful eyes. He looked like a beast from the waist up, and his legs both looked fine, even though the one he’d injured last fall was wrapped.

Tim saw me watching and smiled.

“What are you looking at, pussy?” he smirked.

“I was just hoping you don’t sprain your dick. Obviously it’s not getting a ‘regular’ workout, unless it’s a Rosy Palm massage,” I retorted.

Tim sat up and did a neck roll. You could hear things pop, but that wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. Then he scratched his head and looked down for a second, then back up at me.

“You can’t really know how isolated I felt after I went down last fall. After some initial visits, things dropped off pretty quickly. You and Wolf were the only two who kept visiting me no matter what.

“I have some goals, and the big one is competing through college and maybe beyond, hopefully on the same team you’re on. Now I’m doing whatever it takes to be ready for next fall. The good thing is we have people now who can guide us through a good weight program, and who helped set me up a workable rehab plan. Believe me, I’m gonna take full advantage of it,” Tim explained.

I remembered Tim was the only one who actually came up to me last summer asking to work out with me. He showed that initiative, and it meant a lot to me.

Tim was a good guy; not the most brilliant student, but a solid ‘B/C’ student who always got his work done and who didn’t want or expect things to be handed to him. He wasn’t the most socially adept guy either, and mainly was the ‘go along, get along’ sort—except when it came to football, and except when it came to his dream, which was to be an architect.

Most importantly to me, he was a good friend whom I could trust. It was beginning to sink in to me how rare and valuable that was.

Oh, yes. He was also an absolutely lights-out middle linebacker when he was healthy!

I smiled happily at my friend and comrade, gave him a ‘bro’ handshake, and then went off to see what else was going on.

I ambled over and watched Wolf as he did squats. We had a new squat rack that was designed to hold the bar just below shoulder level. You would get under it and then lift the weight, do the squat, and then you could put it back into the slot. It had a safety feature that wouldn’t allow the bar to go below a certain level.

Wolf would go all the way down and then jump. It wasn’t like he was doing light weights. There had to be two hundred pounds on the bar.

“What are you doing?” I asked when he was done.

“Coach Rector says I need to learn to jump better. He has me doing this exercise so that if someone’s hanging on me, I can handle the weight, and learn to land correctly so I don’t get injured. You’re going to love this guy. I’ve been working with him for a month and a half, and already added two inches to my vertical jump,” Wolf bragged.

“Wow, he doubled your vertical jump in just six weeks?” I asked, acting shocked.

“If I wasn’t so tired, I’d kick your ass. Welcome home, I missed you,” Wolf said, and then tried to hug me.

He was a sweaty mess, so I made a hasty exit to the locker room.

My next two classes were Art Appreciation and English Composition. Ms. Saunders and Mrs. Comer each gave the class a quiz and then had me come to their desks and caught me up on what I’d missed the first week. My next class was Spanish. I really hadn’t wanted to take it, but after living in LA I knew I needed to be able to at least understand what people were saying about me. I had a clue about what Rosy had said, but I wanted to surprise her when I could respond.

“Hola, tomen sus asientos,” Ms. Cruz said as we entered the room.

I just nodded and took my seat. Ms. Cruz was older and had a kind face. I wondered if I’d entered an advanced class, because each student answered her in Spanish. When the bell rang, she looked at me.

“¿Quién eres tú?“

I looked confused. Lily was sitting beside me.

“She asked who you are.”

“David, David Dawson,” I said.

“Hola, David Dawson. Welcome to Spanish One. In this class, we will speak Spanish as much as possible. When you came in, I greeted each student and they greeted me back. Tomorrow I expect you to say hello. Do you know any Spanish you can share with the class?” Ms. Cruz asked.

“Gracias, la comida era deliciosa and su lindo,” I said.

Lily shook her head at my poor attempt at Spanish.

“So you like my cooking and think I’m cute,” she translated.

“Sí,” I said.

“He’s a bit of a flirt. You should be careful,” Lily said.

I could tell I would like this class.

Coach Stork taught AP World History, which was followed by the second semester of AP Physics I with Mr. Hicks, our athletic director. Finally, I had Mr. Quiroz and Principles of Business.

I found Alan was in all my afternoon AP classes. The class rankings had come out, and Gina was number one. I was in third place behind Brook Davis, and coming in fourth was Zoe. Alan had dropped to number five because he had gotten a ‘B+’ in PE. I felt for him because I’d almost gotten a ‘B’ in PE in swimming my freshman year.

After school, I found Cassidy at my locker.

“I thought I might stop by in case you thought you’d sneak out on sixty minutes of hell your first day back.”

That had been my plan.

“I’ll meet you there,” I tried.

She reached into my pants pocket and snagged my keys.

“Hey,” I complained.

“You get these back after class,” she said, and left me wondering if I should just walk home.

I went and put on my gym clothes to join everyone, but before I made it out of the locker room, Moose reached out and snagged me.

“David, I’ve heard Coach Rector wants you to go out for seven-on-seven football this spring,” he said with a watchful look on his face.

“Coach, it’s a nice offer, but I really want to play baseball this year. I have a chance to make the National Under 18 team as an outfielder, and that’s a dream I just won’t pass up,” I said.

Moose looked relieved.

“David, you’ll have to tell me about that when you have more time.”

I thought that was it, but he went on.

“I’ve been kind of watching you, and I think you could go far in baseball, with the right coaching. The only problem is you have so many things pulling you in different directions.

“Now I’m glad to know you’ll be there when formal practice starts in March, but do what you can to keep your skills up and get ready before then, if you can. I really want you to be ready to focus on baseball once formal practice actually starts. Do you think you can do that for me?” Moose asked.

He was already worried about that, and I had to admit he had a good reason to be worried.

“Coach, I’ll do my best, and I’ll try like hell not to let you down.”

He looked at me, nodded and turned to walk down the hall.

Cassidy was frowning at me when I ran to join the group.

“Well, at least you can run fast,” was all she said.

Cassidy must have been feeling extra evil today because she worked us hard. Surely my being late didn’t have anything to do with it!

I was glad to see I wasn’t the only one struggling. I admit I hadn’t been as diligent as I should’ve been while in LA, but I was still in good shape. All the work I’d put in the last couple of years didn’t just go away in six weeks.

Cassidy was finally happy when my half-brother had to run outside and puke. When we were almost done, Coach Hope stuck his head in the gym and motioned for me to join him. Cassidy gave me a dirty look, but I just shrugged as if her dad’s request was out of my control. I happily followed him to his office.

“Welcome back. You ready to get back to it?” he asked.

“I am.”

“That’s good, because Coach Mason has sent over the new playbook. From what I see, he plans to minimize you running the ball. You’ll also be under center most of the time.”

“I figured as much, but you can’t argue with his offensive production,” I said.

I was a little disappointed, because I felt that my running the ball helped us. I also knew I wouldn’t run the ball nearly as much in college, and I’d run it even less in the pros. Everyone wanted a mobile quarterback that could extend plays and pick up first downs with his feet, but the flip side was the danger of his getting hurt. There just weren’t enough elite quarterbacks, so you had to protect them.

“With that in mind, Coach Rector has suggested that we put together seven-on-seven teams this spring to help learn the new offense,” Coach Hope said.

“He told me that it would take precedence over baseball. I’m not sure I can do that.”

“I know you like baseball, but your senior year is going to be important.”

I thought about it for a second, and decided not to throw Moose under the bus.

“While I was in LA, the movie I was doing originally called for me to play baseball. Part of my deal was that I’d get the services of a hitting coach. They sent me to a high-level training facility, and I was lucky enough to get the Cubs’ hitting coach. He was impressed enough to call in one of their scouts. They feel I should switch to play center field. My coach is submitting my name for consideration for tryouts for the Under 18 USA baseball team. The top 108 baseball players in the country are invited.

“I guess what I’m saying is that my dream was always to play professional baseball. I love football, but I need to give this a chance, too. You know I’ll do whatever it takes to help us win football games. I just want to have the chance to be able to decide what’s best for me in the end. To do that, I’ll need to focus on baseball in the spring,” I said.

“I’m not really in a position to help you baseball-wise. If you remember, you roped me into helping last year.

“As far as football goes, I’ve been around you long enough to know that you’ll do what it takes to be ready for next year. This might be an opportunity to build some depth. I’ll need players after you graduate,” he reasoned.

“Thanks, Coach.”

He gave me access to the football software so I could start learning the plays. He also told me he would smooth things over with Coach Rector.

“Oh, one other thing,” he said as I turned to go. “National Signing Day for college football recruits is on February 3rd. Try to say something nice about Jim, if anyone asks you.”

Coach and I grinned at each other before I turned and finally made my escape. He knew I’d find something fun to do about it.

He really was my coach, and not a fellow prankster. Right?

Cassidy and Brook were waiting for me. I dreaded what was to come. Cassidy would have my ass for the stunts I pulled in LA, and this was the first chance she would have at me in the dojo. To appease her, I didn’t ask for my keys back. I just climbed into the back of the jeep and let her and Brook have the front seats. From the conversation, I could tell they had become friends and had spent a lot of time with each other over Christmas break.

When we arrived, I saw Fritz. I was happy to see Coach Hope show up a few minutes later. Brook went off to her class, and I went to talk to the two men.

“She’s going to hand you your ass,” Coach Hope predicted.

“I don’t think so. He’s learned a thing or two since he’s been gone. I bet he can hold his own,” Fritz said.

“Sheeeit, you can’t handle me. What makes you think you could teach him enough to stand up to my daughter?” Coach Hope asked.

“This is practicing in a dojo. If you and I were to really fight, you wouldn’t last two minutes,” Fritz said.

“Oh, really?”

“You’re both pussies,” I teased.

That comment made the old men laugh.

“I think I’m going to enjoy seeing Cassidy teach you a lesson,” Coach Hope said.

“You ready?” Cassidy said, to draw my attention from her dad and Fritz.

“They said you were going to teach me a lesson. I think I can take you now,” I boasted.

I think Shiggy must have ‘mom ears,’ because he cocked his head and then turned from his class to see Cassidy launch herself at me.

One thing Fritz had taught me was to be more physical when it came to fighting. I was a big guy, and he reasoned I should use that to my advantage. The thing was that Cassidy was lightning fast. Her normal tactic was to strike and then move away and then strike again. She’d learned how to use her small body to whip into her opponent, which multiplied the force with which she hit you.

I knew that she’d hit me. I knew that if I could get ahold of her, I could turn it into more of a fight to my liking. What I wasn’t counting on was that Cassidy was really mad at me. Her first move was to try to kick me in the balls. I knew it was just a feint, but I challenge any guy not to react to Cassidy Hope acting like she’s about donkey-kick you in the nut sack.

As I bent over, she launched herself at me with the plan to put me into a sleeper hold. I snatched her out of the air and let my forward momentum carry us to the ground with Cassidy under me. I heard the air forced out of her lungs as we slammed to the mat. Before I could follow up on my advantage, Shiggy tossed me off her.

“I will have none of that,” he barked.

“I had him right where I wanted him,” Cassidy bluffed.

“If you mean him pounding the stuffing out of you, then I agree,” Shiggy said.

I smirked.

“You,” Shiggy said, and I found the smirk had disappeared. “You can no longer spar in my dojo without me present to supervise. Is that understood?”

“Yes, sir.”

He turned back to Cassidy.

“If you want to spar with him, wait until my beginners class is done,” he ordered.

“Yes, sir.”

Cassidy gave me a tongue-lashing about holding back in an actual fight. She then had me show her everything Fritz had taught me. Cassidy was a sponge when it came to learning things like this. She would stop me when she thought I did something wrong, and have Fritz show her.

Sixty minutes of hell and then the dojo wore me out. Coach Hope volunteered to give Brook a ride home for me.

I found my uncle, my grandma, Caryn, and Greg’s family were all there for dinner, with my grandma vocally admiring the second clock, and Dad trying not to mutter too obviously. I caught my family up on my trip to LA as we ate. I remembered my AP classes. I was sure if Tami or Alan were involved, Mom would know.

“I received my schedule today, and I was signed up for a bunch of AP classes. Do you know how that happened?”

“Yeah, your dad and I changed your schedule,” Mom said.

“You did what?” I asked in my teen angst voice.

“We talked to Bo Harrington at your Elite 11 camp. He suggested that if you could handle it, we should sign you up for AP classes because they would count towards college credits and eliminate some of the entry-level classes you would need to take. He reasoned that college football would require much more of your time, and if you needed to lessen your load, it was better to do it in college,” Dad said.

“But why did you sign me up for so many of them?” I asked.

“Because we know you can handle it,” Mom said.

I put my hand over my face and massaged my temples to stave off the oncoming headache. I’d assumed it was Alan and Tami. They’d always pushed me to work hard in school. I think they sometimes thought I really was a ‘stupid boy.’

I decided not to fight it. Mom was right, in that I could handle it. I would’ve liked to have been consulted about it, though.

After we were done eating, Caryn wanted to talk to us. I wondered why Greg and Angie joined the group while Dad watched the kids.

“Your mom and I looked at office space today. We got to talking, and I told her about what one of my business professors said. He always encouraged us to increase the bottom line with multiple streams of income. How he explained it was to look at your core business and see where there were opportunities to offer other goods or services that complement your core business.

“Let’s look at your mom’s business, real estate,” Caryn said, and wrote it in the center of a sheet of paper. “In a real estate transaction there are several things you need to make the transaction work. The first are the initial inspections. The two main ones are the home inspection and then the termite or wood-destroying organism inspection.”

She wrote those two on the side.

“Then there’s the mortgage, survey, appraisal and title company.”

She also wrote those down.

“Each one of these things is a possible stream of income. Then there are also opportunities before the sale happens. Your mom pointed out that curb appeal is crucial, so there are things like lawn service and repairs that might be needed. The home may also need to be decluttered, painted and staged. Then there’s the marketing that involves video, photos, websites, social media and print.”

She also wrote down all these.

“Within real estate there are also specialties. The skills to be a good buyer’s agent are not necessarily the same as a listing agent. There are different skills needed in working with investors and commercial deals. Finally, there are rentals, which are a completely different animal with their own unique opportunities.”

“A realtor is expected to know a little bit about all these things, but no one could master them all. I can’t see us getting involved in all these potential income streams. Some would be a serious conflict of interest, like having our appraiser do work for your mortgage company.”

“She’s right. We might go to jail for that one,” Mom said.

“I’m not interested in jail time,” I said. “I also am a little leery that we could do all this.”

“I don’t think that’s the point,” Uncle John said. “I think Caryn has just pointed out how over time you could grow your business. It’s sort of like what we did when we merged the hay farm with my cattle.”

“Yes. John is exactly right,” Caryn said. “The reason I wanted to talk to you about this is because if you plan to grow your business to include other things, we would need to look at different office space. For example, we found a nice large home on Main Street that’s next to the downtown area. The downstairs would be perfect for the real estate company, and I could have my office on the second floor. If we decided to add more agents to handle different parts of the business, or a title company, we’d need more space. Your mom found a strip mall that would be perfect to grow into,” Caryn said.

“We could rent out the extra space to other businesses until we needed it,” Mom said.

“Like a massage parlor,” Angie subtly suggested.

It suddenly became clear why Greg and Angie were here. This all seemed to suddenly overwhelm me. I knew I needed to invest my money, but wouldn’t it be easier to just put it into a fund and ignore it?

I then had a horrible thought. There were stories about how friends and family took advantage of young people who came into money. I sure the heck hoped that wasn’t the case here. Two seconds later, I knew that even if I did lose all my money to this, I’d be okay with it, since it was family. All I had to do was look at the farm to see how that was working out. If I could help my mom and Greg achieve their dreams, I would help. I looked at Caryn and smiled.

“I would guess you have a plan?” I asked.

“I do, but it means you spending some money. I also want to hire two people to help me.”

Caryn then laid out her plan. She hadn’t been sitting around while I was on set making my movie. She also tied the plan in with the charities. She wanted to collaborate with the Mennonites for the farm work, with which my grandmother agreed 100%. Caryn was a little mysterious about the two hires, because she wanted to interview them first and see if they were interested or not. I was sure one of them was Kendal.