Chapter 12

I found out my first challenge of the school year on Tuesday third period in Pre-calculus/Trigonometry. My teacher was Mr. Witman. He was a young guy, probably 23 or 24. This was his first year teaching. He was very soft spoken and dry. He nearly put me to sleep discussing logarithms. I realized that I was going to have to study a lot on my own if I wanted to learn the material for this class. I just couldn't follow Mr. Witman's convoluted explanations. During class I glanced over at Penny. She had the same glazed look on her face as me.

Brandon sat with my friends and teammates at lunch. This was the first year since eighth grade when we had the same lunch period. I struck up a conversation with him.

"How are you and Penny doing?"

"I'm fine. I suppose Penny's fine. We aren't Brandon and Penny anymore. We broke up."

"Oh no, I'm sorry to hear that. What happened?" I asked.

"Nothing happened. We just don't have enough in common. We were good together when we had Algonquin to share. After that we just didn't have enough to do together."

I asked, "Are you going to be all right?"

"I'm fine. Penny and I parted as friends. I still consider her a good friend. We just weren't in love. We agreed to move on."

"I'm really sorry, Brandon. The two of you seemed to make a nice couple."

"The biggest problem in our relationship is that Penny is in love with someone else. I couldn't compete."

"Is Penny going to get together with him?" I asked.

Brandon replied, "Apparently he doesn't know she is in love with him."

"That sucks. I hope he wakes up and figures out what a great girl she is. Any guy would be lucky to have her."

"Yes. I hope so to, Kyle," Brandon replied.

Coach Caffrey ran a hard practice after school. We had three days to prepare for the Chiefs. We usually beat them, but they could be trouble this year. Their quarterback was more experienced this year. After a shaky start last year, he looked really sharp by the end of the season. We couldn't afford to overlook them this week.

After dinner Tuesday night Dad asked, "Did you get your mail today?"

"I have mail?" I asked, mildly shocked. I rarely got mail. Dad handed me four 9"x12" envelopes. They were decorated with logos for the University of Southern California, University of Pittsburgh, University of Pennsylvania and Notre Dame University. I looked through each of the packets of information. They were recruiting brochures from the universities. All of them focused on their football program and what they had to offer a prospective athlete.

I realized by the time I was done with the last packet that Zack Hayes had been right. I was going to be a hot prospect. I headed back downstairs to talk with Dad.

I asked, "Do you know what these are, Dad?"

He glanced up from the paper. "What are they?"

"All these colleges are trying to get me to play for them when I go to college. They tell me about the college, the academics and their football programs. They are recruiting me."

"Let me see, Kyle," Dad said. I handed the packets for information to him. He looked through them while I waited to see his reaction.

After he looked back up at me I said, "Zack Hayes told me I was going to have a lot of colleges interested in me. It looks like he was right. You don't need to worry about saving money for college for me anymore."

"I'm going to hold onto the money, Kyle. I don't see anything in here that says they are ready to offer you a full scholarship. Even so, they seem interested in you."

"Look at the postmarks, Dad. They mailed these the first day possible according to the NCAA rules. I bet I get a lot more of these."

"Maybe. What are you going to do with all this information?"

"I guess I'll review them and start a list of colleges that I'm interested in."

Dad asked, "Do any of these look interesting?"

"USC does. Maybe Notre Dame." I offered.

"Are you interested in Penn? I'm sure Will would like it if you attended his school."

"I know he would, Dad. I'm more interested in one of the major football schools. That's what I'm hoping for."

"OK, Kyle. That sounds good," Dad went back to reading the paper.

I went upstairs to tackle my pre-calc homework. I tried the problems but I couldn't do them. Mr. Witman's explanation didn't make sense. I understood that a 1000 was 10 to the third power. The base 10 logarithm of was 3. OK. But what was the point of all this? Why do we need other bases? I went back and read the first chapter in the text book again. I tried a couple problems. I got the right answer. I kept working until I finished the whole assignment. It was 9:15 by the time I got it done.

I still had to read a chapter for history, study my Deutsche vocabulary list, do my chemistry homework and read two chapters of a play for English. I finished my homework at 10:30. I fired up my computer and checked my e-mail. I had three messages from Julie. I turned the computer off. It was bed time so I headed to bed. Julie's messages would have to wait until tomorrow night.

Mr. Witman nearly put me to sleep again in pre-calc. Penny nudged me when she saw me nod off. The two of us walked together to our next class. I had Modern European History and Penny had Spanish. The classrooms were near each other.

When we left Mr. Witman's room I said, "I heard about you and Brandon breaking up. I'm sorry that happened. Are you OK?"

"Thanks for saying that, Kyle. I'm fine. It wasn't messy. We broke up by mutual agreement. Neither of us was really in love with the other. We're just friends. We never felt that spark, that connection. Does that make sense?"

"I understand," I answered. "You and I had that when we went out. I really feel it with Julie. I'm hopelessly in love with her."

"I know you are, Kyle. It shows. I hope I can find that again with someone."

"You will, Penny. You're a great girl. Any guy would be lucky to have you as a girlfriend."

"Here's my classroom, Kyle, I'll see you next period at Chemistry."

"See you then, Penny," I answered.

We had a hard practice Wednesday afternoon. A few of the younger players tried goofing around during practice, but Greg and I set them straight. The Chiefs may not have had a winning record recently, but we couldn't overlook them. I reminded everyone about last year when we didn't prepare enough for Cornwall and lost that game. We didn't need that with the Chiefs.

I spent half of Wednesday evening learning the day's pre-calc and struggling through the homework. This looked like it was going to be a long struggle to keep up with the class. I was burnt out by the time I finished the last of my homework.

The rest of my week went the same way. Friday morning I proudly pulled on my number 87 jersey with the 'C' indicating that I was a team captain. My friends and I had worked on preparing for tonight for over eight months. It was time for football.

After school the coaches walked us through the game plan. Everyone seemed to have their responsibilities down pat. The mood of the team was light when Coach Caffrey dismissed us to go home for some supper before we returned for our game.

My friends and I met back at the high school locker room to prepare for our game. We reviewed the game plan one last time then suited up while the JV team played. Ed, Andy and I were sitting beside each other.

I asked, "You ready, Ed?"

"You bet. I'm psyched. I was just thinking about how different things are from a year ago. You remember how nervous I was that night?" Ed said.

"You were. I told you everything would work out." I answered. I turned to my brother. "You ready for this, Andy?"

"I guess. How much do you think I'll play tonight?" Andy asked.

Ed said, "Probably you'll be in 15 or 20 plays as a receiver. You might return six to eight punts too."

I added, "We want to keep you busy, Andy. The better our defense plays, the more punts you have to return."

We finished our preparations for the game. When the time came, we lined up outside our stands, waiting for introductions. Hopefully this would be the last year we used these old stands. The football boosters had been raising money for the last year to build us a new state of the art stadium.

I took in the sights and sounds as I waited during introductions. Over two thousand people filled our stands to capacity. Most were wearing our red and white team colors too.

We stood and waited for our turn. The captains usually got introduced last. The speaker blared, "Third year starter and all-conference tight end, Number 82, Greg Harrison." Greg ran out onto the field to loud cheers. My turn was next. "Third year starter and all-state wide receiver, Number 87, Kyle Martin." I ran out onto the field high fiving my teammates as I went. I turned and waited for my best friend. "Second year starter and all-conference quarterback, Number 5, Edward Fritz."

I high fived Ed when he reached the end of the line and gave him a hug. "It's time for football!" I declared.

"Best time in the world," Ed answered. The rest of the team ran out behind us to our bench. We waited while the Chiefs were announced to polite, scattered applause.

Greg, George, Ed, Tim and I headed out to mid-field for final instructions and the coin toss. Greg called it. He had the honor of calling the first toss, since he had started the most games among the five captains. Greg had started 27 games, I had only started for 25. Greg called heads. It was. We elected to receive.

The Chiefs kicked off to Tim. He ran the ball back to our 24 yard line. Ed and I led our offense onto the field. Coach Caffrey opened things up easy for us. Our first play was a simple off-tackle run.

Things were going to be hard for the Chiefs based on that play. Our beefed up offensive line pushed the Chiefs off the line of scrimmage. Jerry Morton and Dustin Roberts opened a big hole in the Chiefs' defensive line. Ian Myers blocked the middle linebacker out of the way. Drew McCormick blasted through the hole and wasn't tackled until he had made a fourteen yard gain. We executed exactly the way Coach Baer taught us.

We tested the Chiefs on the second play too. I went on a deep pass route. I out ran the cornerback. Ed launched a bomb to me, I leapt and I caught it over top of the free safety who was helping cover me. I broke his arm tackle and raced into the end zone for our first touchdown. Hal came in and kicked the extra point. Score: 7-0 Wolverines. Time elapsed: 67 seconds.

Hal kicked off to the Chiefs. Their kick returner got the ball out to the 22 yard line. They tried a run on the first play. Our big defensive line caved in their o-line and met the running back in the back field. They lost two yards on the first play. On the second play they dropped back to pass and nearly took a sack when Travis Hall broke free. On third and twelve Jeremy swatted the pass away from their tight end.

I slapped Andy on the back as he went onto the field for his first play. "Go get'em. You'll do a good job, Andy."

"Thanks, Kyle," he said, grinning at me.

Andy fielded his first punt at our 42 yard line. He made the first two tacklers miss. They tackled Andy at mid-field. Coach Caffrey had us run the ball a few times to establish that we could do it. Drew worked us downfield to the Chief's twenty-four yard line. On the next play we ran play action pass and went for the end zone. Ed put the ball in the corner and I out-jumped two Chiefs' defenders for our next touchdown. Hal put the point after attempt (PAT) through the uprights. Score: 14-0 Wolverines.

The beginning of the game did indicate what was to come. Greg caught the third touchdown for us in the game. I scored two more before half time. Drew ran pretty much at will through their defense. He ran for 102 yards and a touchdown by halftime. The Chiefs managed a field goal on our first team defense. Coach Caffrey benched the first team at half time.

Jake ran our offense well in the second half. We played conservative since we didn't want to make any mistakes that would allow the Chiefs to get back in the game. Marcus Shaeffer, our back-up tailback, ran the ball a lot. Andy caught three passes for 59 yards. He was outstanding returning punts. He averaged over ten yards a return.

The Chiefs' quarterback had improved a little over last year. He didn't throw any interceptions. In the second half against our second team defense he managed two touchdowns. The final score was 42-17 Wolverines. Coach Caffrey awarded game balls to Ed, Travis Hall and me. It was a good night.

I slept in on Saturday. It felt nice not to have so much pressure to do things. I got out of bed around 11:00, took a shower and went downstairs for brunch. Mom offered to let me go driving with her this afternoon. I was starting to feel comfortable driving around the back roads. I was going to need to tackle Route 30 soon. Living in Paradise, I have to drive in heavy traffic some time.

When Mom and I got home I went to my room. I hadn't checked for e-mail for over a week. Things had been too busy. I logged on and found I had eleven e-mails from Julie. The first one talked about how things went her first day of school. In the second one Julie talked about going to the movies with some of the other cheerleaders on Friday night.

The third one is the one that got me. She sent it Saturday night. It was one of her sexy e-mails. She told me exactly what she was dreaming of me doing to her while she brought herself to climax with "Kyle Jr.", her dildo. I guess I should quote the final paragraph.

"I know we talked about seeing other people before I left Kyle. I just can't do it. No boy comes close to making me happy the way you do. My parents think I should date other boys but I'm not going to do it. I love you and only you. Tell me you still feel the same way.

Love, Julie."

I had felt guilty all week about screwing Alicia last weekend. Now this made me feel ten times worse. I made a promise to Julie that I would be faithful. My promise lasted all of two weeks. What kind of guy was I? I shut down the e-mail program and lay down on my bed. I grabbed my MP3 player and listened to some tunes while I thought about how I should handle my infidelity.