Chapter 1

As I started unpacking my parents' van, I was filled with a certain amount of anxiety. Hey, who wouldn't? It was my first day at college. Stanford University, to be precise.

I'm Brendan-Brendan Carruthers. It had been a long drive to California from Chicago, but now it was finally done. Here I was, at Stanford-the place I had wanted to be since I was a freshman in high school. Of course, for most of high school I wanted to be anywhere other than high school-but Stanford was the number one choice.

I had gotten my key, and my room assignment, and headed up with the first batch of my stuff. I went to my room, and found the door open.

"Hey, you Brendan? I'm Jake, Jake Atkinson." I shook his hand. Jake was a very large human being. My parents came up behind me, and Jake introduced himself to them.

"You need some help?" he said.

"Sure. Thanks," I said. "You're all moved in?"

"I've been moved in for some time," he laughed. "Football players had to be here a month ago." Oh, shit, a football player. If there's anything I hate more...

Jake was cool, though, helping me and my parents get all my stuff in. I went downstairs and kissed my parents goodbye. They were crying. Hey, I was their only child, and here I was, going to be 2000 miles away. I didn't cry, but I was going to miss them. They were great parents.

I went back up to my room, and Jake was there, reading what I assumed to be a playbook, listening to music. "Hey. Your parents get off all right?"

"Yeah."

"Where are you from? I forgot to ask that."

"Just outside of Chicago."

"Shit, we're almost neighbors," he grinned. "I'm from Milwaukee."

"Milwaukee. Since you play football, you must be a Packers fan." He grinned and pointed at his desk. I hadn't noticed it before-an autographed picture of Brett Favre, the Packers' great quarterback.

"Are you a football fan? I take it you don't play, not with that body." It wasn't said nastily, which surprised me. I was tall, but skinny.

"No I don't, but, yes, I'm a fan. Da Bearrsss, of course."

"Of course. However, I'm not anticipating any autographed pictures of any Bears quarterbacks being your prized possession!"

"Not hardly. If I did have any, it'd be a linebacker like Urlacher. The Bears don't do quarterbacks. So, what do you do? Football-wise, I mean."

"I'm a linebacker," he grinned. "I was all-state in Wisconsin last year. U of W recruited me, as did a few other Big Ten schools, but I'm sick of snow."

"Don't I know that. I got offered a full ride by both Northwestern and U of Chicago. I decided California sounded better."

"Full ride?" he asked. "Academic?" I nodded. "Oh, goody, I get a brain as a roomie. Us dumb football players need all the help we can get," he laughed.

"Most of the dumb football players I knew in high school needed a lot more than that," I said.

"I have no doubt," he laughed. "Hey, I hold my own. I don't care how good you are at football, you don't get into Stanford unless you can hold your own. But I wasn't going to get any full rides academically from U of Chicago, I can guarantee you that."

"Most football players I knew in high school couldn't get a full ride to Kindercare."

He cracked up laughing at that. "You're not fond of football players, are you?" I just looked at him. "Hey, I had assholes on my high school team, too. I know what some of the smart kids went through."

"Yeah, pretty much."

He looked at me. "How well do you know football?"

"Well. That's your playbook, right?" He nodded. "I could understand it without much of a problem. I just don't have the physique to play."

"Well, if you can understand this, you're a better man than I," he grinned. "There's about a gazillion different defensive formations in this system."

"Of course. It's Stanford, right? The playbook was probably designed by some computer science major with too much time on his hands."

He cracked up laughing. "So, are you a computer science major?" he grinned.

"Yup," I laughed. "You?"

"Undeclared. I'll probably go for history. If the football thing doesn't work out, I'd like to be a teacher slash high school coach."

We sat there, chatting for a while, very relaxed. I liked Jake immediately. He was cool, and didn't seem full of himself. Very unlike football players I knew.

Hey, he got it right. I got picked on. I was a geek, and I knew it. I was valedictorian of my class. I was tall, geeky, skinny, and wore glasses up until senior year, when I finally got contacts... And the football players led the torment.

Was college going to be different, or was Jake just an exception? A very welcome one, considering we were rooming together, mind you. That was something to find out.