Chapter 29:The End Of The Season

The team was scheduled to take a bus down to the University campus, where the playoffs would continue, on Thursday morning. Our semifinal game would be played Friday night, and the winners of Friday's games would meet for the championships on Sunday afternoon.

After practice on Wednesday, Kayla and I were sprawled in my family room. On this last evening before I had to leave for a few days, Jake was being uncharacteristically sensitive, making himself scarce and allowing us a little alone time. We were supposed to be doing homework, but we really weren't in the mood, so we were blowing it off in favor of some down time. The television was on, but it was just noise. We weren't paying any attention to it at all. My mother was puttering in the kitchen, getting dinner ready. Stephen was upstairs, presumably doing homework, but probably reading comic books. Michael was still at work, and Dad was probably on his way home from work. Kay had become a fixture in our household, staying for dinner about half the time during the week, and my mom was treating her more and more like a daughter, and less like her middle son's girlfriend. It was very weird.

With a quick glance toward the kitchen door, Kay came crawling across the carpet to me as I was leaning against the couch, the book I was supposed to be reading for English open in my lap. She kissed my cheek, her eyes wide open, and when I turned to kiss her lips, her eyes crossed as she puckered up. I couldn't help myself. I burst out laughing.

She kept her eyes crossed as she leaned back. "It's not nice to laugh at someone who's being nice to you," she said, trying hard to keep a straight face. She couldn't hold it, though, and she started laughing hard, holding her stomach.

Between gasps, I said, "If you keep on doing that, your face is going to freeze like that."

"But would you still love me, even if that happened?" she asked teasingly. Her eyes uncrossed, and she shook her head like a dog, getting her focus back.

"Of course I would. You're luscious even when you can't see straight," I said.

She wrapped her arms around my neck and leaned against me, resting the tip of her nose on mine, our faces so close I was seeing double. Two of Luscious. Lucky me, I thought to myself.

"And I'd still love you, even if you didn't have that adorable little scar on your lip," she said. She gave my scar a quick kiss, and then flopped back to sit next to me on the floor. She reached over and pulled her history book over and put it on her lap.

"Back to work, sluggard," she said. She opened the book and flipped through the pages, looking for the chapter she was supposed to be reading.

"You're right," I said, not moving a muscle. "I'm a no-good, lazy and stupid sluggard of a jock. I shouldn't be allowed to roam loose in public."

She peered at me. "That's true," she agreed. "Okay, no going out in public for you, jock. At least, not without a keeper. By the way, did you know that I'm a qualified keeper? Licensed and everything."

"Really? Can I see?"

She reached for her purse and pulled out her learner's permit for driving, which she had just recently gotten. She handed it to me. "See? Right there," she said, pointing. "It says that I am authorized to accompany all lazy and no-good jocks at any time. Do you want to hire me?"

"How much would I have to pay you?"

"Oh, we can work out suitable wages," she said, a promise implicit in her words and her knowing smile enough to make me break out in a sweat.

After dinner, I borrowed my mom's car to drive Kayla home. I stopped for just a moment halfway between my house and hers and turned the lights off. She was sitting next to me, and when I stopped the car, she looked over into my eyes.

"You're very bad," she said with a saucy smile.

As much as I wanted a quick make-out session with her, there was something I really needed to ask her, though. I put both hands on her shoulders and turned her toward me. Her eyes were lidded, and her mouth was slightly open, anticipating a kiss. It was too much to resist, so I kissed her softly. Her lips nibbled and caressed my bottom lip, and her tongue traced the edges of my scar, sending bolts of light and heat through my nervous system, but I knew we didn't have time to get carried away. I reluctantly broke away from her and held her so I could look into her face.

"What?" she asked, a little irritably.

"Kay, I need to talk to you for just a minute." In the dark interior of the car, I could see her eyes picking up ambient light from the streetlight, a half a block away.

"Okay," she said quietly. I saw her eyes soften as she realized how serious I was.

"I'm leaving tomorrow for the tournament," I said. "I'll be gone all weekend."

"Yes, I know."

"I... I just need to know that you'll be here, waiting for me, when I get back."

She giggled softly. "Sean, it's just for one weekend. You're not going away for a year."

I was a little flustered. "I know. It's just... last year..."

She leaned forward and kissed me softly, sensuously, a kiss full of possibilities.

"I'll be here," she whispered. "I'm not going anywhere without you."

"I had to ask, Kay..."

"I understand, Sean. I saw what happened. I'm not like her."

"I know you're not, it's just..."

She kissed me one more time to shut me up. "Go. Play well. Bring home the championship. Don't let anything break your concentration, especially worries about me. I've been here for you for longer than you know, and I'm not giving up on you, just because you're going to be out of town for a few days. Call me every night and let me know how it's going, if you'd like. In fact, you'd better call me every night, even if it's just to say hello."

She sat back, apparently satisfied that all was now settled. I guessed that it probably was, so I dropped the car back into gear, turned the headlights back on, and drove her home.

That night, alone in my bed, I made a secret vow to myself. This girl was too precious to let slip away. I knew I had to work hard to keep her on my side, and I was going to try my damnedest to not fuck up for a change.

The bus ride downstate the next day was boring. Farm field after farm field, as flat as land could possibly be, and drearily cloudy and dim. I tried to sleep most of the way, but only managed to doze off and on for much of the trip.

There was a magazine being passed around among the guys, with a lot of whispering and laughing going on. I tried to ignore it as it moved around the bus, down the opposite rows of seats from where I was sprawled. I thought it was probably a Playboy or some similar contraband that somebody had managed to sneak on, and I was a little surprised when, about halfway through our trip, I glanced toward the front of the bus and saw Coach Neville reach out and take the magazine. He opened it and read something, and then smiled and handed it back to Brett, who was sitting right behind Coach and his wife.

There was an air of good humor, and I wasn't a part of it. Grumbling, I squirmed in my seat, trying to find a more comfortable position so I could go back to sleep. Coach saw my distress, and finally stood, holding himself steady by hanging on to seats on either side of the aisle as he faced the rear of the bus.

His voice was loud, carrying over the whine of the tires on the highway.

"What do you think, team? Should we tell him?"

Tell him? What the hell is he talking about? I sat up and rubbed my face. I was feeling pretty cramped and miserable.

"Nah," said Eric. He was across the aisle from me, and he was smiling like he had a secret he was dying to tell as he glanced over at me.

"What?" I asked him crossly. "What are you talking about?"

That set the entire bus to laughing. They're all nuts, I thought, but I kept my mouth shut. See? I have learned something of value over the past few weeks.

Coach came down the aisle toward me, swaying with the movement of the bus, almost pulling himself along with his hands on the backs of the seats. He got up to my row, and handed me the Playboy magazine.

"Here," he said, smiling. "Read and enjoy."

He stood there while I took the magazine from his hand. It wasn't a Playboy, after all. It was the latest copy of Youth Soccer Today, the official magazine of the American High School Soccer Association.

I thumbed through it, wondering what was going on. On page ten there was a big article about the YST All-American Team, but I had already heard that there weren't any players on the boy's teams from our state listed.

"Try page twenty-four," suggested Coach Neville.

I flipped open the magazine to page twenty-four. The article was entitled The Top One Hundred Players To Watch. It listed the players the author and the magazine considered to be the best players, aside from the All-American selections, in the country. The players were listed in alphabetical order, and a couple of pages further on, I found that somebody had highlighted the following listing:

PORTER, Sean: A junior defenseman on a high school team ranked in the Top 20 nationwide, Porter is the anchor upon which the team's strengths are attached. Incredible firepower in their offense (averaging over 7 goals per game) this season has been achievable because of the stifling defense that shuts down opponents, no matter how powerful (averaging less than 1 goal against for the season). In fact, no team has scored more than 2 goals against this team as of this writing, and Sean Porter is the key factor.

"Is this a joke?" I asked, handing the magazine back to Coach Neville. Surely it was an elaborate practical joke. Somebody went to a lot of bother to print up this phony magazine.

"No joke, Mr. Porter," he said, a wide smile splitting his face. "I believe congratulations are in order." He began clapping, and everybody on the bus followed suit. I was in shock. I looked over to Eric for confirmation, and he was applauding along with everybody else, grinning at me.

"You the man, Seanster," he yelled.

It was very difficult for me to agree with that. I didn't feel like I had accomplished much this year. In fact, I felt like maybe I had cheated somebody somewhere along the line, to have them write something like that, something so obviously false about me. I leaned back in my seat and stared out the window desultorily, embarrassed by the attention I was getting when it was really the entire team who deserved the praise. Sure, maybe I contributed to the team's success at times during the past year plus, but to think that Eric and Trent were successful because of my play was just ludicrous. How come nobody else sees how ridiculous this all is? I closed my eyes as the noise in the bus died down again, but I couldn't persuade my brain to shut down, and dark thoughts to match the day were my companions for the rest of the trip downstate.

It was cold and rainy when we got off the bus at our hotel. Both coaches had brought their wives along, and Mrs. Neville and Mrs. Simonson helped us sort out our room assignments for the weekend. We were staying four to a room, and I was rooming with Eric, Trent, and Anthony. We only had two keys between the four of us, and we decided that Eric and Trent would be in charge of them.

We had a practice session scheduled, and Coach had requested that we be in our practice uniforms when we met in the lobby of the hotel. The bus was idling outside the door.

"Okay, men, if I may have your attention, please." Coach Neville raised his arms for quiet. "Thank you. Coach Simonson will be leading you over to the practice fields. They are about two miles from here. I will meet you there with the bus."

There was a lot of confused murmuring. Finally, Rich spoke up.

"We're not taking the bus over?" he asked.

"No, you're not," he said. "Think of it as your warm-up." He was grinning as he turned and walked out to the bus, holding his clipboard over his head to ward off the rain.

It was uncomfortable running through the streets in the rain, and by the time we got to the practice field we were soaked through our uniforms and shoes. Coach didn't give us time to complain, though. He already had his scrimmage teams set, and he handed out knit jerseys, yellow for one team and red for the other, and sent us out onto the field.

We kept at it for about an hour. By then, we were dispirited, tired, uncooperative, and miserable. We trudged to the bus, where Coach handed each of us a plastic garbage bag to sit on.

"No point in getting the bus seats wet," he said cheerfully as we filed onto the bus.

By the time we got back, I was cold, wet, and very uncomfortable. Somehow, I got chosen to be last into the shower, so I changed into dry sweats to wait my turn. I was looking forward to having hot water pound on me for as long as I could stand it, and I was hoping the hotel wasn't going to run out of hot water by the time it was my turn. I lay down on the bed and silently wished that my three roommates would hurry up already.

In the morning, it was apparent that I was not well. My throat was scratchy, and I was starting to develop a cough. I felt a little feverish, and I could feel the beginnings of some congestion trying to establish itself in my chest. I ignored it as best I could, making do with some aspirin to take the edge off.

Our game was scheduled at four o'clock that afternoon, so we had most of the day to sit around. The rain had stopped, though it was still cloudy and cold. A bunch of guys went off to look around the campus, accompanied by some student guides. Coach Simonson and Mrs. Simonson took most of the rest of the team to a long lunch, but I opted to just order a sandwich from the cafe in the hotel and stay in the room, trying to rest. The television was on, but it was just background noise. From my few days staying home from school, I remembered too well what daytime TV was like, so I refrained from flipping through the channels looking in vain for something interesting.

At two o'clock we all gathered in the lobby, waiting for our bus to show up to take us to the stadium. We tossed our gear bags into the luggage compartment below, and shuffled onto the bus for the short ride to the locker rooms.

I was feeling pretty punkish as I changed into my uniform, but I knew I would be able to shake it off for the game. How long I would last running the field was a different matter, however.

The field was still wet from the previous day's rain, and the grass was slick. The areas around the nets were patchy with brown grass and mud, treacherous ground to work on for defenders. Jorge, Brett, Anthony, and I inspected both net areas, trying to map out in our minds where it would be most slippery.

There were just a few people in the stands at the start of the game. A combination of the weather and the distance from either our town, or from Watkinsville, our opponent in the semi-final match, kept nearly everybody away.

The game started out very tentatively, both teams seeming to want to test the quality of the field and the quality of the midfielders at first. The wet grass, even though it was cut short, still held up the wet ball, so bounces were lower, passes were shorter, and the ball couldn't roll very far on the ground. It tended to compress the width of the field a little, pulling us into the chewed-up ground a little more than we would have liked.

I was just as glad the game started out slowly. I was feeling cold and lethargic, and I had to force myself to pick myself up and run at the ball, instead of waiting for the ball to come to me. Against weak teams from our conference I could have gotten away with waiting, but strong teams demanded decisive action on the ball. Any weak passes, any hesitation in attack or defense of an area, was quickly exploited at this level, so I concentrated on continually moving, jogging back and forth within my borders, staring at the ball movement to try to focus my concentration a little.