Chapter 48

It had been a hell of a Monday. If anyone learned anything, it was a pure accident. The school was celebrating. We were the second-best team in the state. And compared to the last several years, that was something.

We'd won the championship in '93 and hadn't even made the play-offs since.

First period, half the student body was still in the halls talking half-an-hour after the bell rang. It could have been a problem, except most of the teachers were out there with us.

Second period, we had an assembly where Larry and Jimmy, as co-captains, presented our nice shiny-if-short trophy to Mrs. Jeffries and Mr. Mulino. She cried, and he grinned a lot. We were supposed to have the presentation outside in the bleachers at the football field, but an unforecast freezing rain moved it into the auditorium.

The coach handed out our letters, along with miniature trophies for second in state. Normally, we had an athletic banquet for all the fall sports for things like that.

We got some certificates for the school, league, and state records we'd broken during the season. He also had special awards for everyone on the team. Mine was for widening his bald spot. Jimmy and Larry shared one as the heart and soul of the team. Mike got his as the team mover, and I had to admit, he'd moved the ball.

Robbie got MVP, which was the only award voted by the team instead of made up by the coach. I found out later that it was one vote short of unanimous, and I had a good guess who'd voted for himself instead of Monster Girl. I thought the coach was gonna cry during the presentation. He told a whitewashed version of how she had to trick her way onto the middle school team. He didn't mention my name, but I noticed a lot of heads turning toward me as he spoke. He said that the school and Washington football would be poorer if she'd just taken the rejection and gone on to other things.

When he pointed out that Robbie was not only the only girl to have won the award, but the first sophomore, Robbie got a standing ovation.

Then they added some future awards that Larry and Jimmy had created. Mike got Most-Likely-to-Lead-His-Team-to-a-Super-Bowl. Robbie got the First-Woman-in-the-NFL, and I got Most-Likely-to-be-Traded-by-Every-Team-in-the-League. I wondered if the coach suggested that one.

The poor basketball teams had it the worst. As we swaggered the halls, basking in our almost glory, we kept challenging them to keep the winning tradition alive. The boy's team hadn't made the play-offs since ninety-four. The girl's team had made play-offs six years in a row, but hadn't gone the distance.

Lunch was Round Table Pizza. The booster club arranged it. I don't know how many boxes of pizza and bread sticks they brought in, but nobody in the school went hungry. It was definitely a step-up from the pork-gravy-and-rice on the lunch menu.

"Sims! I want to talk to you."

Ever notice how, when one guy says something like that to another guy in a school hallway, that the center of the hall will open up, no matter how crowded it is. It was like two gunfighters squaring off in the old West.

I glanced sideways at Mike about twenty feet down the hall. "Just a minute." I finished jamming books into my backpack and closed my locker. I set my backpack, jacket and gym bag down at Tami's feet.

"What can I do for you?" I asked as I stepped out into the hall. It was unconscious on my part, but Mike and I were each in the center, with fifty or sixty students squished against the walls and lockers. I wished I'd been wearing a jacket. I could open it up and push the flap back behind my imaginary holster, then flex my fingers a few times.

"In private." He nodded his head toward Mr. Howard's room. I nodded and followed him in and closed the door. Mr. Howard's room was the only classroom in the school that didn't have a window in the door, which must have disappointed our fans.

"I don't like you," he said, when I faced him again.

Damn! Major newsflash. Stop the presses. Extra! Extra!

"That's too bad. I like you a lot. I want to be just like you when I grow up."

Mike looked like I hit him between the eyes with a baseball bat. He hesitated, then started over. "I don't like you. But I wanted to say I respect you."

Huh?

"You're a great football player. Maybe even better than me, since you play almost everywhere."

That had to hurt.

"And I realized that Robbie was right. You were trying to get me mad Friday night, to get me to play better. I realized that even if you'd thought those things, you wouldn't have said them, especially not there."

Yeah. I did all the work, and he got the trophy for game MVP.

"I know you're good. And Robbie too. And that made me work harder to stay out in front. And the coach told me that you're the one who figured out that Pasco was anticipating me."

I wondered if Mike had actually learned something or if he was trying to practice team leadership the same way he practiced passing by throwing the football through a tire.

Mike stepped closer to me and held out his hand. "Thank you for being on my team."

I decided that he was practicing team leadership. If he'd learned anything he would have said, 'Thanks for being on THE team with me.'

I shook his hand anyway. "It was a pleasure," I lied. "I learned a lot."

"You're awfully quiet," Tami observed as we walked toward the middle school. At least the rain, freezing or otherwise had stopped.

"I was just wondering if it was too early to start campaigning for team captain next year."

"Just so Mike won't get it?"

"Do you really think I'm that petty?"

Tami slip her arm around me and into my back pocket, then laid her head against my shoulder as we walked. "Yep."

Don't you just hate when a girl knows you too well?

"Ladies, this is Tony Sims. He's going to help Tami and me with the team."

Eight smiling faces looked up at me. They all had big smiles, but about half showed strain beneath the smiles. The girls were all in the splits. Four of them were all the way down and seemed relaxed. The other four were pushing down and obviously uncomfortable. Kelly was in the first group; Traci was in the second.

"We always do our team meetings while the girls are in their splits," Miss Calloway explained.

"Yeah, it's so much easier this way," one of the straining girls grunted.

I grinned at her, and she stuck her chest further out. Beneath her form-fitting leotard it looked like there were two M&M's glued to her otherwise flat chest. I wondered if they were plain or peanut.

I looked around. They were all cute. And all had the beginnings of nice bodies. Five of them wore single ponytails, two had doubles. I had an e-mail friend who was really into ponytails. I'd have to take a picture and send it to him. Between the leotards and the ponytails, he'd be in heaven.