Chapter 7

TUESDAY MORNING, Dennis arrived in the coaches’ new offices in the AgCentral Athletic Pavilion. Neil pointed him to a desk near the front of the office. The coaches all had cubicles in the new building with both a private conference room and a large conference room that could hold a team meeting. Of course, the coaches all had to teach classes, so it was uncommon to have the office full. In fact, Dennis was alone in the office for the first period and focused on getting his reading assignments from the previous day completed. Second period, Coach Lyle joined him for weightlifting in the new fitness room. Dennis had been lifting regularly since school began and maintained his records for his instructor at DMACC. Lyle signed off on the records each day.

Third period, Ardith was in the office and the two went over the plans for tryouts in the afternoon. Dennis had late lunch this year at 12:20. Only Natalie and Lana shared that lunch schedule.

“What’s got you down, honey?” Lana asked as she slid in beside him. “I’d think you’d be all sunny after spending the night with Tori. She was so turned on, I think she was dripping when you left yesterday.”

“I wish I’d been there to catch the drips,” Natalie said. “What’s up?”

“Tori’s planning to leave us,” Dennis said without any other preamble.

“Not soon, is she?” Natalie said. “I mean, you didn’t break up with her already, did you?”

“No. Not exactly. She said her cousins were going to visit over the holiday and she wanted to be free to enjoy them. But then she said she wanted to return to us after the holiday. I told her that wasn’t my decision and everyone would need to agree, just like we did on new girlfriends joining us. It makes me uncomfortable,” Dennis said.

“Yeah,” Lana agreed. “It’s like she wants permission to cheat on us and then go back to the way things were as if nothing changed.”

“I know she really wants to have a single relationship with a guy—and maybe a girl on the side. She just doesn’t want to share a guy with a bunch of other girls,” Natalie said.

“I understand that,” Dennis agreed. “I don’t understand how any of you can agree to share a guy. It doesn’t make sense.”

“We love each other too much to try to take you away from the others,” Lana said. “I admit, I’m looking forward to the day when there are fewer of us, just because it seems more manageable. But I’m not one who is letting go.”

“Me either, sister,” Natalie confirmed. “We should talk to the others and see how they feel. Maybe they figure it’s no big deal.”

“I can name five for whom it’s a big deal,” Lana said. “You, me, Amy, and Brenda. And Dennis. That’s half of us.”

“It’s two thirds of my lovers,” Dennis said. “Tori will go the other way and who knows what Judith will do?”

“She’s been getting wilder all the time,” Natalie agreed. “She might see Tori going and coming as permission for her to do something crazy.”

“I know this is a sensitive issue, but safe sex is important. If Tori plays around with someone outside our circle and maybe Judith decides to do the same thing, we’re all at risk.” He looked at Lana, with whom he had never used a condom.

“Let’s just make sure that Lana is the only one you have sex without a condom,” Natalie said. “And if there is a suspicion of an outsider with someone, I’m for limiting contact with my ... um ... other girlfriends to fingers only. I say others, because I can’t give up loving Lana and Amy and Brenda. I won’t give it up.”

The three agreed. Dennis had one more prep period and then walked with Neil to their statistics class.

Dennis and the cheerleaders put everyone who showed up for the session through a brutal workout, leaving everyone sweating and exhausted.

“One time with everyone in the gym for this kind of workout is fine,” Dennis said as he walked through the tunnel from the old gym to the new building with Sara. “But we have too wide a range of ages and abilities and sports to keep everyone together for the same level. I think we need to evaluate everyone and split them up into at least two and maybe three groups.”

“I agree. Even some of the younger cheerleaders were having problems today,” Sara said.

“Do you think we could split off the junior high and freshmen with the adults who aren’t athletes and have part of the cheerleaders go with them while the rest work with me and with the varsity and athletes?” Dennis asked.

“We need to make sure that people understand where to go and what we’re doing,” Sara said. “Do you think we could have the team managers help organize them?”

“Sounds good. I’ll get with them and assign jobs. They had about all they could handle today collecting the medical releases and parental permission slips. It was kind of chaotic. There will be more coming in tomorrow,” Dennis agreed. He had to rush to the gym to get things started for tryouts.

Lyle already had the potential wrestlers moving toward the weight room. He promised to put them all through the same evaluation cycle the basketball players got. Team managers were organizing themselves for instructions from the coaches with four weigh stations and new measuring equipment for the standing high jump, medicine ball push, and balance exercises. Dennis joined Ardith, Renée, and Pat.

“Okay, I’d like Debbie to work with Pat and Lana to work with Renée on the measurements. Height, weight, bust, waist, hips, inseam. We’ll let you have all the seventh through ninth graders while Dennis and I work with the tenth through twelfth graders on jump, strength, and speed.”

“Coach, we have a lot of body shapes out there this year,” Dennis said. “Some of our uniforms, like warmups and tear-aways, will need shoulder width and sleeve length, too.”

“Right. That’s on the form, isn’t it?” Ardith asked.

“Yes, ma’am. As well as equipment preferences and jersey numbers.”

“Okay. Lana, Debbie? Any questions?”

“No, Coach,” Lana answered. “I think we’ve got it.”

“Guide your coaches through it,” Ardith laughed, nodding to Pat and Renée.

“Tenth through Twelfth grade women, follow Coach Dennis. Seventh through ninth grade, follow Coach Renée,” Ardith called after she blew her whistle. “Do not assume this is your permanent place on the team! Every position is yours to be won. This is our starting point.”

“Seventh through ninth grade women, when you select your uniform number preference, remember that when you make varsity another player might already have that number. If they do, you’ll get a different number when you’re called up. This is most important to freshmen and eighth graders who should take a look at our existing roster of juniors and seniors,” Dennis called over his shoulder.

Everyone got to work measuring, jumping, lifting, and eventually running. The same was happening on the boys’ end of the gym where Dee Braxton was efficiently calling out measurements to Jill Matthews, her team manager. The guys were all sufficiently embarrassed to have their inseam taken by the attractive biology teacher. And to have the pretty freshman Jill writing them down.

On the other side of the boys’ court, the older guys were just as embarrassed to have Assistant Principal Jacobs taking their measurements and sophomore Trevor Miller writing them down. That’s the breaks.

Dennis was scrambling during the basketball drills. He worked first with the Angelines—both the JV and Varsity together—and then ran over to Coach Neil’s side to drill the Wolverines, JV and Varsity together.

“Listen up!” Coach Neil called to the boys’ teams. It was a wide range of ages, comprising the junior high and high school boys on three teams. “You need to focus on your ball handling. Coach Dennis is going to start dribbling and ball handling drills for all five teams at the same time next week. That’s after he’s worked you to a dropping point with fitness and conditioning exercises. If you can’t follow what he’s doing and focus on what he’s teaching you, you can’t be on this team. Do you understand that? You. Can’t. Be. On. This. Team. There isn’t a one of you on the court who can out-dribble our trainer. But I’m looking forward to you trying. Learn the skills. The dude’s teaching at DMACC and knows what he’s talking about.”

It was the first most had heard of Dennis’s involvement with the Bears—even though he was only doing clinics a couple of times a month. Some of the younger guys had grumbled about why the guy in goggles was trying to teach them ball handling. Dennis still wore his protective glasses on the court, though the glasses he’d gotten for fall sports were less like the goggles he’d worn the first year after he got his eyes done. Some of the older players pulled the younger guys aside and set them straight, but Coach Neil was not letting the point slide.

Dennis returned to his Angelines in time to help with a shooting drill.

“Tomorrow, we’re going to look at pairing things up. Most of you have worked together before, but we’ve got a few new faces and I don’t know yet where you fit. I will tell you that if you want to play ball, you’ve come to the right place. But we are going to work you unmercifully hard. I want to know how the new height some of you have is affecting your balance and performance. Diane, I’ve always known you were going to keep going up. Two inches since last season. That’s remarkable!” Ardith said, looking at her chart. “Karen, up four inches! Bobbie, up three inches! And what I’m seeing so far is that you are jumping proportionally higher, too. Now, when you come in for practice tomorrow—yes, I said ‘practice’—you’ll go to the new locker rooms here in the pavilion. Lana, Debbie, Noah will have your locker assignments and padlocks as you enter. And hey! Isn’t it nice to have another boy as a team manager for our JV teams? Welcome aboard, Noah. If any of you know another available team manager, Noah is going to need some help. I’d prefer a freshman girl, but it’s an equal opportunity situation. Coach Renée and Coach Pat aren’t going to be sending Noah into the locker room, though. You girls should put your heads together and get another girl in here to help him.”