Chapter 14 :"That's Why"

High school football in Michigan is popular, but nowhere near what it is in some states. Here, while we usually get a decent local crowd, it seems to be made up more of parents of the students involved in the various aspects than of any real community interest. We certainly don't get the press other places get; odds are certainly not going to see two Michigan teams duking it out on ESPN's Friday Night Kickoff. Even the newspapers around here don't give it a ton of coverage; with pro teams in all four major sports, two large colleges, and two mid-sized colleges in the area, high school football brings up the distant rear in the sports pages.

That said, it was a pretty big surprise when I showed up at Roxanne's house Saturday morning and she rushed me inside.

"You've got to see this!" she excitedly exclaimed, dragging me down the hall by the hand. We entered the kitchen, where I found the rest of the Marshall family seated around the table, looking at the newspaper. As we entered, Mr. Marshall set down the paper, which he had been reading, and looked up.

"Good morning, Nick," he said, folding the paper up and sliding it to me across the table, "Congratulations." It was the Saturday edition of the Detroit News. In particular, it was the sports section, where right there on the front page in full color, was a large picture of me leading Brandon in for our final score the night before. It seemed to have been shot from just outside the end zone. Above it, the headline in big black print read, "Howl of the Wolves."

What followed was a glowing article describing our season so far. Of course, it glossed over a few things that were not public knowledge; the whole to-do with Mark was left out entirely. It did make me sound like some kind of savior to the Washington football program, which I thought was unfortunate, but on the other hand, Brandon's running skills were talked up a great deal, as well as a number of our other players. Even Coach was given his due for handling such a patchwork team, as well as for his consistently changing play-calling. All in all it was a great piece of advertising for our team, and promised to bring us some much-warranted attention. Hopefully in the form of some college scouts; after all, that was the reason I was recruited onto this train in the first place.

The next two weeks flew by. The temperatures began to drop and the leaves turned, filling the area with a spectacular showing of fall color. We steamrolled over our next two opponents, the Dakota Cougars and the Chieftains of Utica. We didn't expect either team to really put up much of a fight. We could taste the playoffs by that point, with only two games left, and Coach wanted to begin to strike real fear into our future opponents. Utica had dealt our team a bad loss the year before, and apparently Coach hadn't forgotten. He stepped on the gas early, and never let up. The Chieftains got massacred on their own field.

That left us just our final game, which, as it turned out, would determine home-field advantage through the first two rounds of the playoffs. Beat the Chippewa Valley Big Reds, and it was ours. Unfortunately, the shit hit the fan in a tremendous way Monday afternoon following the Utica game.

We were sitting around the band room after school had gotten out. Coach had given us the day off of practice after the rout we dished out Saturday night. Besides myself, there was Scott, Brian, Lexi, Roxanne, Kara, Sandra, Paulina, Rob, and a smattering of others milling about. My crew was arranged in a circle though, chatting about everything and anything. Somehow the topic turned to sex, as it's wont to do when there are a bunch of teenagers involved.

"OK, truth or dare time. Craziest place you've ever done it?" Paulina asked, directing her question at Kara.

"Oh my god, why are you singling me out?" Kara asked as she blushed.

"You're the new girl, chickee. You want to hang with us big bad band kids, you have to run the gauntlet." Then Paulina added, "Trust me, this one is easy. They get much harder."

"Can I take the dare?"

"Do not take the dare," Lexi cautioned. "Trust me."

Kara sighed, "Okay, okay. Craziest place?" She thought for a moment. "Oh, Jesus, ok. Behind the McDonalds on Smith Street."

"That's not that crazy," someone threw in, "It's dark back there."

"It was three in the afternoon," she added.

Everyone oooed appropriately. "Before you ask, yes, it was with Mark, and yes, I was in a car. It wasn't the actual parking lot. Though, knowing Mark, I wouldn't have put that past him. He was always so impatient."

"Oh?" said Lexi. "Didn't like to wait, huh? There's a surprise. Probably didn't like to finish either."

"Ugh, don't I know it," Kara continued. "He used to say the dumbest things too, while we were doing it. Like, almost every time, he'd refer to himself as "The big papi." That was his thing. "Big papi." I mean, really? Big papi? He's like the whitest white boy there is."

"He's a douchebag," Roxanne said. I heard her say that, and bits and pieces of the conversation that followed, but my attention was drawn elsewhere. I'd heard a sound, like someone catching something in their throat, and I looked around. My eyes had settled on Sandra, who looked like she wanted to alternate between turning green or white as a sheet. Either way, she didn't look good at all, and I think she was about to hyperventilate. Then, of course, she did start to hyperventilate.

"Um, something's wrong with Sandra," I said, and everyone turned. Paulina moved to her side and held her hand.

"Sandra? Honey what's the matter?"

Sandra stuttered for a moment or two, trying to say something. She looked at Kara, then up at me, then back to Kara, and continued to bounce between the two of us. Finally she managed to squeak out two words: "B-b-b-big papi."

It took my subconscious exactly two seconds to make the necessary connections in thought. "Mother fucker," I cursed under my breath, but not quite quiet enough not to be heard. I stood up abruptly, and everyone's attention turned to me. I looked at Sandra, and she looked up at me with glassy eyes.

"Are you sure, Sandra?" I asked, though only she and I knew the question. She nodded her head violently up and down. That was all I needed to know.

"Kara, where's Mark usually at this time of day?"

Kara blinked, like she didn't understand the question. "Mark?"

"Yes, Kara, Mark. You dated him forever, where does he go after school?" I was brusquer than she deserved.

"Uh, usually the gym. He shoots hoops there after school, usually. Why..." I cut her off mid stream with a wave of my hand.

"Mount up," was all I said, and I headed out the door. I didn't have to look, because I knew Scott, Rob, and Brian were right behind me.

Roxanne caught me about half way down the hall, with Kara in tow. She was pulling on my arm, trying to slow me down, but wasn't having much success. I had close to fifty pounds on her. She wasn't going to stop me if I didn't want her to.

"Nick," she said, trying to get my attention, "Nick!" I stopped.

"What?" I asked. My mind was moving a million miles a minute, plotting my exact course of action. Football, like many activities, is primarily a game of strategy and tactics. Calling the right play at the right time. I knew what I wanted to do. Needed to do. I'd worked that out in the last two minutes as we strode down the hall. It would require perfect timing and a little luck. Things would need to go just right, to accomplish my goal. I'd been lucky as of late. I hoped it'd hold up a little bit longer.

"What are you going to do?" Roxanne asked, plaintively. She acted a little frightened.

"Get suspended," I replied, "but don't worry, I know what I'm doing." I looked around, and saw that Kara was standing a little back in the group that had been trailing me down the hall.

"Kara, come here." She hurried through the crowd to my side. "I need you do something very important for me."

"What is it?" she asked, wide-eyed. She'd never seen this particular side of me. Roxanne hadn't either, and both of them were a little shell-shocked I think at the transformation to the war general the rest of my crew had seen on occasion.

"I need you to wait here for five minutes. Five minutes, do you understand?" I held up my hand in her face with my fingers spread apart, to illustrate my point. "There's a clock right there." I pointed to one of the digital clocks hanging every so often above the lockers in the hallway. "In five minutes, I want you to run down to Mr. Dallenbach's room, run, and tell him there's a fight in the gym. He should still be there. If you can't find him, go to the teacher's lounge and look for him there. Do you understand?"

She nodded, still wide-eyed. I repeated myself.

"Five minutes, find Mr. Dallenbach, his room or the teacher's lounge. There's a fight in the gym." I added, "Only Mr. Dallenbach, okay? If you see someone else, try to play it cool and keep going."

"Okay," she said, nervous. "How do you know there's a fight in the gym?"

"Trust me," I told her, then turned and headed back towards my destination, leaving her standing there. Hopefully I could trust her, and things would work out. It was very important.

"Nick, are you sure this is a good idea?" Roxanne asked me. She was worried, I could tell by her voice.

"This isn't my first rodeo, Rox," I said, without breaking stride. I unzipped my hoodie, took it off and handed to her. "Hold this for me." I then turned to Scott. "You're on crowd control. Let it go as long as it needs to. You see anyone about to jump in, you stop 'em."

"Of course," he agreed. It's always important to have a good wingman.

As we reached the gym and our group poured in to the large room, the people there milling about began to notice something was up. I marched down the steps and headed directly towards Mark Moore, who I saw standing at mid-court, holding a basketball. He finally heard the commotion and turned to see me headed in his direction. Wanting everyone's full and undivided attention, I shouted to him.

"Hey, Moore, what happened? You couldn't find any more girls with low enough standards to fuck you willingly?"

That was a perfect shot across the bow. Insult his ego. I could see his cackles rise. He took a step forwards, putting the ball at his side. "What the fuck are you talking about, asshole?"

"Oh, we know all about what you did after the homecoming dance. After Samantha dumped your sorry ass. Tell me, did you go to that party planning on drugging and raping someone, or was she just a target of opportunity." In the background I could hear the chorus of "ooooo's", along with some gasps, but I paid them no heed.

"Fuck you!" he shouted, and threw the ball at me. I was expecting it and knocked it aside one handed.

"I definitely have higher standards, and there's a waiting list. We've been over this before, remember?" I was deliberately baiting him. I knew he had a temper, and it wouldn't take long to set it off. I was counting on it.

"I'm gonna fucking beat your ass," he virtually screamed at me. Won't be long now.

"I think that's another goal you're going to find you don't have enough talent to achieve, but you're more than willing to try." That did it.

When this whole crazy ride started, I warned Kara that we liked to fight, and I wouldn't be a pushover should Mark want to throw down. I wasn't exaggerating. Mark might think he was a tough guy, but he'd never really proved it. Yeah he was big and tall, but that will only get you so far. I was only surrendering an inch or two to him height wise, and ten pounds at most.

For my part, like I told Roxanne a few moments earlier ... this wasn't my first experience with personal violence. I wasn't always built like a football player, and back in the days when I was small and skinny, I was a target. A target that learned to defend himself by any means necessary. There's a school of thought in matters of war that says though you may lose the battle, you should aim to make the cost of victory so high as to dissuade further action. And so it was for me. I lost a great many fights, and got my ass kicked a great many times. I didn't back down though, and eventually, people learned that I wasn't an easy target. Quite the opposite, in fact. The risk for my erstwhile antagonists increasingly outweighed the reward.