Chapter 35: The Thousand-Mile Chain

As soon as Spencer and I got settled in our apartment, I began to write to Kayla. I needed to attack my mistake, take the aggressor's role. Tough to do when you're a thousand miles away, but I had to try. I had the time to compose the proper letters, as we were there for a couple of weeks before classes started. There were a few kids who had spent the summer working in Gainesville or going to summer school who were in town, so aside from the townies, the campus was pretty much populated by the jocks. The football players, the soccer team, and the track and field athletes were about the only ones around.

We had practice twice a day, a combination of position tryouts and conditioning, along with studying film of last year's games. Eddie Whitehead and I had analyzed those films until we knew them so well I could envision what was happening on the screen even with my eyes closed, and Pick relied on the copious notes and reports Eddie and I had made on each game as he made his comments for the team.

We had three scholarship freshmen coming in. Harlan Lightfine, the speedster from California, was a frail-looking kid with bushy dark hair. He was a throwback to the sixties, calling everybody "Dude" and "Gremmy" and sprinkling his conversation with "Right On" and "Far Out." I couldn't wait to take him to meet Stone and Skye over at the Glass Onion.

And fast? We had nobody on our team who could keep up with him. In fact, just for grins, one day Pick brought in the University of Florida's conference record-holding 400-Meter Relay team. The team included Arthur Majors, a world-class sprinter who had broken the American record for the two-twenty dash the previous season while running for the Gators. We all ran five hundred-meter sprints, the soccer team and hopefuls spread out along the goal line with the members of the relay team sprinkled among us. Arthur won every one of them, but surprisingly, Lightspeed finished a very respectable third in two of the sprints. Arthur and Edu Banda, the other sprinter who consistently finished second, looked like they were being pushed just a little by Lightspeed in a couple of those footraces. I could see the four track runners talking to each other, occasionally glancing over toward Harlan. It was a true eye-opener.

The other two freshmen were a midfielder from Colorado named Chris Bolden and a backup keeper from a small town in Central Florida, Barry Marshall.

"Call me Sugar," Barry said the first day we met him.

"Why would I want to do that?" asked Jesse.

"When you see me play, you'll say, 'Why, that boy is just as sweet as sugar.'" He winked. "At least that's what all the little girls say," he claimed.

Bryan rolled his eyes, muttering, "It's going to be a long season."

I liked the guy. He kind of reminded me of Jake, a big lug of a guy who was a friend to everybody - unless you did something to cross him. He was big, wide across the shoulders, with a wingspan that served him well as a keeper, and yet he was very agile, able to switch directions and dive for the ball as quickly as anybody I had seen. I had the feeling he would be our starter in the net by the time he was a sophomore.

We went through a week of workouts before Pick made his cuts. We had quite a few new guys, particularly freshmen and sophomores, who came to campus early to try to make the team as walk-ons. Most of them seemed like they had been role players at the high school level, though a couple of them might have been their small-town team's stars. Some of them even went through the week reasonably well. They might have been able to play at the college level at a Division Three school, and done well. Division One was a different animal altogether, though, and all these kids were in way over their heads.

I learned another hard truth during that first week, too. Spending as much time in the car as I did all summer long didn't do anything for my conditioning. By the end of the week, I didn't think there was a muscle left anywhere in my body that wasn't complaining of abuse. By the end of each day I could hardly walk, and even talking was a chore. Fortunately, I discovered the rejuvenating effects of the whirlpool. I became a frequent visitor to the trainer's rooms at the end of the day.

Spencer, having benefited from spending his summer on the field, felt fine. In fact, a couple of nights he even went out with a bunch of friends, while I, on the other hand, could barely manage to crawl into my bed. He tried to get me to go along, but there was no way I was putting myself through any additional abuse. Besides, I had letters to write. I was trying to do a long-distance repair job on my love life, and it was hard work.

I also had an appointment with my counselor the following week. I was serious about declaring business as my major. If I was going to own one, I figured I might as well learn the mechanics. Even though I had Danielle essentially running it for me, I needed to know what was involved behind the scenes. Some day, Trent was going to sweep her away from me, and the two of them were going to strike off on their own. I wanted to be armed with enough knowledge to be able to step in and run my own business on that day.

At the end of the first week of soccer, Pick had his starting lineup set. Jesse, Bryan, and Luke were our forwards; Lightspeed, Spencer, and Jeremy were the front midfielders. Frenchy was defending the left, Dan Ortega and Stuart Early were our sweeper and stopper, and our keeper was a senior, Stan Voigt. I was assigned the right defensive spot. We had a very strong offensive line, we had good defenders, and we had very fast players in the middle. Our weakest spots were right in front of the goal, but I had the feeling few teams would ever get the opportunity to test that soft spot. It was going to be a fun season.

There was further occasion to celebrate the end of the first week: I got my first letter from Kayla in the mail. It was a response to one of the first letters I had sent to her, so she was answering questions I had a little trouble recalling. Still, she wrote, and it made me very happy. I redoubled my efforts to write to her, knowing full well that once classes began, my ability to consistently write to her would be compromised. I filled my letters with gossip from campus, news about tryouts and the work Pick was assaulting us with, and stuff about Spencer, Jesse, and Bryan and my first days living in an apartment. It was everyday stuff, unremarkable except that it was happening for the first time to me, and I didn't have trouble filling several pages with the most inconsequential news. It made for thick envelopes, which I figured was attractive in its own way. If I overburdened her with letters, the chances of getting her to reply went up. Or, at least, that's how my reasoning went.

I also made a very pleasant discovery. I had more money than I thought I had. Even after paying out bonuses to my senior instructors, my clinics had made a tidy profit, which was now mine. I still had to watch my pennies now that I was in an apartment and paying for my own food, but I felt I had enough in reserve I could actually make use of the telephone. Just as long as I played it conservatively, I would be fine. Reggie had told me about her phone bill the first month she was away at school, when she and Elvis were missing each other so much. Between the two of them, they had a long- distance phone bill that rivaled the federal deficit. I really didn't want to make that mistake. And so, on Friday evening, I made my first call from Florida to Kayla, direct-dial. I put my watch beside me on the kitchen counter so I could keep an eye on the time, and I hoped we would have something to say to each other. If we could talk, perhaps we could get beyond the problems we were having. I didn't have a lot of hope riding on the plan, though. All I knew was it was the best plan I had.

Nervously, I dialed, and I sat there as her telephone rang six times. I was just about to give up when Kayla answered, a little breathlessly.

"Hello?"

"Kay? Hi, It's me."

"Sean?" She was so surprised she practically squealed. "Really? It's you?"

I laughed. "Of course it's me. What's going on over there?"

"I'm having a sleepover. Jaimie's here, and Tara, and Sam, and Taylor, and..."

"Whoa, slow down," I said. "Sam? Taylor? You're having a sleepover with boys?"

Kayla laughed out loud. "No, silly," she said. "Sam is Samantha Williams, Taylor is Taylor Brewster, I don't think you know her, and Tracy is here, and Lina Stone, and Vanessa Wanamaker. Do you remember Vanna?"

Did I ever. After Kayla and Molly, Vanna was probably the hottest girl in school. She was in Jaimie's graduating class, a year ahead of Kayla. "Sure," I said, trying to sound noncommittal.

"Of course you do," Kayla said with just the hint of a snicker.

"So, all the best-looking girls are stuck without dates on a Friday night?"

"Our choice," she replied. "We decided we needed a bitch session."

"A bitching session?"

"That too," she said with a giggle. "Bitches bitching about boys."

"Uh-oh," I said.

"Uh-oh is right," she said saucily. "Your name has been prominently mentioned."

"Uh-oh again," I said.

"Oh, don't worry," she said breezily. "You've got a defender among the crowd."

"Really? You're standing up for me?"

"Not me. No way." I could hear her trying to suppress a laugh, though. "It's Tracy. I think she likes you."

I heard squeals of protest in the background, and there were sounds of a scuffle before the handset clunked. I listened, glancing at my watch and envisioning dollar bills bursting into flame, until a scraping sound came through the line. Somebody was picking up.

"Hi, Sean?" It was Tracy Evanson's voice. "Ow! No, I'm talking to him now," she said, her voice muffled as she held the phone away from somebody for a moment.

"Hello?" I didn't want to end the call, but this was getting expensive for no real reason. I had thought I was going to have a nice conversation with Luscious, and here I was trying to referee a wrestling match by long-distance.

"Sean?" Tracy sounded like she was struggling to keep the phone. "If Kayla doesn't want you, will you ask me out?" She shrieked, and I imagined Kayla trying to tackle her to take the phone away. All I could do was shake my head. Spencer, watching television in the next room, glanced over. I shrugged my shoulders and held the phone away from my ear. He could probably hear the commotion across the room. He just smiled and shook his head.

"Hello? Sean? Are you still there?" It was Kayla. Apparently, she had won the contest. The background noises got muffled as she closed the door on the others.

"Yeah. What's going on?"

"Female madness. I'm sorry."

"It's fine. Really. You should go back to your party."

"I will in a minute. Is everything okay?"

"Sure," I said. "I ... I just wanted to say hi."

"Oh." Did she sound a little disappointed?

"And ... and I wanted to hear your voice."

"Oh." One little word, repeated, but the impression was one of pleasure.

"I've been trying to be good about writing," I ventured.

She giggled. "I know," she said. "Our mailman's going to have to get himself a back brace."

"Should I feel sorry for him?" I asked, smiling.

"Nope," she said. "Keep on making his life miserable, would you?"

"I can do that," I said.

Kayla hesitated, and then said, "I should get back in there."

"Yeah, okay," I said. I was disappointed, and I knew I sounded like it.

"Thanks for calling, Sean," she said softly. "I ... Thanks."

"Kay?"

"Yes?"

"Do you think I should get Tracy's number from her, just in case?"

She laughed out loud. Whew, I whispered to myself.

"Not yet," she said.

"Okay," I said. In my head though, I was shouting, All right!

Over the weekend, students began to show up to move into apartments and dorms. Freshman orientation was beginning, and a lot of the upperclassmen also came back to school to party it up before classes began. Jesse's girlfriend, Brittany Erickson, was in an apartment a couple of blocks away from us. Jesse began spending less time with us, and more time with Brittany and her roommates. I couldn't blame him. She was certainly prettier than Spencer, Bryan, or me. Probably kissed him better than we did, too.