Chapter 35

EVERYONE HAD TO GO home Sunday night, but no one wanted to be parted from the others. During the movie, the girlfriends had clustered together with Dennis and just held each other. None was certain what the movie was really about. Tom left and Dennis read to Peg for bedtime. All the girls kissed him deeply before they left. Tori took Debbie and Lana home. The Armors walked Leanne and Rosie to their homes before going to their own. Diane and Judith drove home. Amy and Brenda went together to Amy’s house where Brenda was spending most of her time these days.

Dennis sat in the living room with his mother and silently watched a talent contest game show neither of them paid attention to. Dot turned off the television.

“Do you still have your father’s gun?” Dot asked.

“Um ... It’s in the money bag. I kind of buried it there so no one would see it if they discovered the bag,” Dennis said.

“Did you clean it?”

“I think the police cleaned it before they returned it. I checked and it has a full magazine. There’s one in the chamber, so nine bullets all told,” Dennis said flatly. He’d been thinking about the gun all evening.

“How did you learn all that?”

“You know me. When I put it away, I looked up all the info I could find on the gun. There was a pretty good manufacturer’s site that had a manual. I didn’t want to have it in my room without knowing what was there.”

“I would like you to bring it in here and place it on top of the china cabinet where I can reach it. Then forget about it. Make sure it is out of sight from Peg.” Dot didn’t move or turn to watch Dennis. He went to his room and got the gun out of his bag and took it to the place his mother had indicated. It scared him to have the gun so accessible, but it was also a comfort.

“It’s done, Mom.”

“Now forget about it. I have a permit. Your grandfather insisted when we got married that we both take the training and get permits. Renewing every five years has just been automatic. It’s not legal for you to have access to it, so now it’s put away out of your reach. I’m sorry you have to go through all this. You shouldn’t need to think about your dad’s gun or anything but your girlfriends and your team,” Dot sighed.

“Mom, I’m the reason this is a concern. I’m sorry you have to think about it.”

“Dennis, your father would be very proud of the kind of man you are becoming. I am very proud of you. We will see this through. Who knows? Maybe the psychiatrist is right.”

Dennis couldn’t help but scan all around him everywhere Monday, even though he knew Les probably wasn’t home from detention yet. The girls seemed a bit uptight as well and he did his best to relax them before the game Monday night. They’d met the Vikings before and won pretty handily. This was their last regular season home game and they were determined to show the fans what they could do.

With the score at 43-7 at the end of the first half, the entire second half of the game was played with the thirty-five-point continuous clock rule in effect. The Vikings didn’t score at all in the second or third quarters. It was Roberta’s turn to shine as she hit seven three-pointers to lead the scoring with twenty-one. Every Angeline player scored at least once. The final score of 78-11 was a little embarrassing, but the Vikings were excited to have played against ‘such a big school’ as they had fewer than half the students that Bartley did. The Wolverines also had their highest scoring game of the season, winning 76-43.

Tuesday, the team was on the bus before school was out, traveling nearly two hours to play the Norse. It was an unusual game for the teams.

“Uh, Coach? What are we doing playing at a college?” Natalie asked.

“We’re playing the Norse junior varsity,” Ardith said as they got ready to head to the gym for warmups. “Various colleges around the state offer a game during their season to high schools. They are assigned by lottery. You’ll be playing against girls who are a year to three years older than you are, with comparably more experience. For us, it’s a great opportunity to work against a higher caliber team than we’ve faced before. You’ll have to work for what you get tonight.”

They did have to work harder. They led throughout the game, but the Norse came back some in the third quarter. A huge difference between the teams was the number of fouls called. Six of Daniella’s fifteen points were free throws. The other nine were three-pointers. Natalie worked inside for eleven points and eight rebounds, but three of her eleven points were free throws. Amy showed that she could hit three-pointers with two of them and a two-pointer from just left of the foul line. The other ten points the Angelines scored were all free throws. That put them ahead at the end of the game 44-24. They avoided the other team after the game, going straight to their bus while the boys took on the Norse for a 60-27 victory.

“That was brutal,” Daniella said, rubbing her arm where she’d been hacked by the tall forward guarding her. The only good thing about having the big forward focused on Daniella was that it kept her out of the scrum under the basket where Natalie kept control of the rebounds.

“Do you think the tournament will be like that?” Amy asked.

“Coach is right about one thing,” Roberta said. “Well, about most things, but one thing in particular. We haven’t been playing against teams of equal caliber all season. More than half our regular season games have been against 1A teams. That includes Thursday this week. Starting Tuesday, a week from tonight, we’ll play only 2A teams until the State Champion is decided. So, assuming we play all six games to get to the championship, we’ll play as many 2A teams in two and a half weeks as we have for the whole rest of the season.”

“Why did they do that to us? We were the 3A State Champions last year,” Judith complained. “You’d think that would merit some tougher competition. I like winning, but I’ve felt like we worked a lot harder last year than we have this year.”

“A lot of people credit our short season last year for our success and don’t take us seriously,” Diane said. “When we played the Comets a couple of weeks ago, I heard a couple of the girls talking about how we weren’t as good as State Champions should be. They were going to get the 4A championship. So they said.”

“I guess we kind of put an end to that kind of thinking,” Natalie scoffed. “I seem to recall scoring twenty-four points in that game.”

“Well, we have to take them one game at a time and remember what Coach says,” Judith said. The girls nodded and all responded together.

“Every game is the championship game.”

It was a long bus-ride back to school and the girls all changed on the bus. It was dark, so no one really noticed the crew making sure their boyfriend got a chance to pet and caress a naked girlfriend as they were all changing clothes.

It was nearly ten when they got back to the school and most of the team scattered straight to their cars or their rides. Dennis took Rosie and Leanne home, making sure to walk each girl to her door and kiss her goodnight after scanning the area to be sure they were safe. Dennis parked his RAV4 in the driveway and decided he needed to clear out the other side of the garage so he could park his car inside. Not that it would get done before the tournament.

In bed, he breathed a sigh of relief and let the tension wash out of him as the text messages indicating safe arrival home came in from all his girlfriends.

Brenda’s team extended its winning streak to five Wednesday night. She sent text messages to all the Angeline girlfriends Thursday, wishing them luck in the last game of the regular season.

Dennis had time to run the after-school exercises before heading down to join his team. He had the away uniforms washed and ironed after their Tuesday night game and the girls were excited in the locker room. He and Lana went through the process of taping everyone, including the cheerleaders. Lana had picked up the Team A cheer uniforms Wednesday morning and barely got them washed and ironed before school on Thursday. Team A was traveling with the Angelines while Team B traveled with the Wolverines.

Sara sat on the bench in front of Dennis and held her foot up. The filmy panties and bra she was wearing did nothing to hide the details of what was beneath. Dennis was just a little preoccupied while he taped her ankles.

“That’s a pretty set of lingerie,” he finally admitted to Sara.

“You know we wear this stuff just for you,” she said. “If the Team B squad was getting ready at the same time, you know Rae would be sitting here stark naked.”

“I don’t understand the phenomenon, but I certainly enjoy it. You’ve got, um ... very pretty bits.”

“Thanks, Dennis. I need your help,” Sara said.

“Uh ... What do you need?”

“I need to get laid. You know, last year I was going out with Lance Weatherman? Well, he graduated and sent me a text to tell me he had a new girlfriend at Illinois. Can you imagine, breaking up with me by text? The scum. But he was a good lover and we screwed a lot. I haven’t had a boyfriend or even dated much this year. I’m constantly horny, and sitting here like this teasing you just makes me hornier,” Sara said. “Could you uh...”