Chapter 2

John Windom in Aaron MacDonald's body lay restrained on a hospital bed drugged to the gills. Each time the drugs wore off enough to make him partway lucid, he screamed and yelled about the loss of his body while thrashing around like a three-year-old having a tantrum. Once he even tried to bite the nurse attending him, his teeth being the only weapon available because his arms and legs were strapped to the bed.

"The lightning strike unhinged him completely. He thinks we're aliens, that we transplanted his brain into a different skull," one nurse said to another. "I heard Dr. Stein talkin' to another doctor about transferring him to Arizona State Hospital." Dr. Percy Stein was a psychiatrist who did rounds in the psychiatric ward of the hospital. Arizona State Hospital was a psychiatric hospital that housed violent and criminal mental patients.

"No surprise there," the other nurse said. "Poor man. I understand he was a well-known, respected architect before his accident."

"All I can say is that he's lucky he has such good health insurance."

"Lucky, he's not, Agnes, good health insurance or otherwise. I think the odds against getting struck by lightning are over a million to one."

Monday morning, I wandered the halls of the high school until I located the administrative offices.

"Tough loss," a secretary said after I asked to see the principal.

"Yeah," I said.

"I saw the lightning hit the goalposts and knock you down. Are you all right?"

"Mostly," I said.

I thanked fate that the principal's name was painted on the door to his office, so I could greet him by name. "Good morning, Mr. Early," I said. "Gotta minute?"

"Sure, Coach. Tough loss, Friday," he said. "Have a seat, and please call me Tom."

"Okay, Tom. Did you hear that l did battle with lightning after the game?"

"I saw the battle take place. You can't imagine how happy I was when I saw Orville help you to your feet." He chuckled. "Not as happy as you, probably. How are you feeling?"

"I'm fine, but the lightning strike scrambled the synapses in my noggin. The doc said I have retrograde amnesia. I don't remember much about my life before the lightning strike. I remember some skills, but faces, names, and places are a complete blank. I can do my job, but I'll need help for a day or two, someone to show me the way from one class to another, make introductions, those sorts of things. I'm sitting in front of you right now because I thought you should know about my memory loss. Frankly, I would prefer keeping my problem a secret; it's embarrassing. But keeping it secret would be impossible."

He closed his gaping mouth and said, "Maybe you should take some time off until you get your memories back."

I raised an eyebrow. As Aaron MacDonald, I could not raise just one eyebrow. If I tried, both eyebrows would shoot up toward my receding hairline. How about that? A new motor skill. No receding hairline, either.

"With pay?" I said.

"To a point. You have a few sick days accrued," he said.

I shook my head. "If it's all right with you, I'd rather do my job, which I can do, Tom, with just a little help."

He leaned back in his chair and gave me a hard look. He was about fifty years old, salt-and-pepper hair in a military cut, overweight but not obese, all together, a dapper-looking man.

Finally, he nodded and reached for the phone, asking for someone named Evelyn. Evelyn, I discovered worked in the administrative offices as a clerk. Tom told her my sad tale, instructed her to dig out my schedule and show me from class to class, whatever I needed to get by for the day.

I liked Evelyn immediately. She was a short, woman, wore thick bifocals in a wire frame, about forty years old, maybe forty-five, plump and happy. She guided me to my first class, and was waiting when the class ended to take me to the next. I quickly became bored with explaining my plight to the boys and girls in class, but I doggedly persevered and got through the morning. I ate lunch with Orville in the teacher's lounge (like me he was brown-bagging it), and we talked about his new playbook, quietly because we didn't want to be overheard.

Orville said, "I think we should go back to basics, Coach, and use the single wing offense. Occasionally, we'll switch to double wing, but mostly for pass plays."

He showed me the single wing formation. "This offense is simple and plays to some our strengths. Barry, the quarterback, is big for a quarterback, and he's a good blocker, a must when using the single wing offense. We'll make Greg the tailback. He can run like the wind. Cal will be our fullback; he's like an aircraft carrier, hard to stop once he gets going, and Peter will be our wingback. Peter is our best backfield pass receiver. We'll use unbalanced line formations, placing four players on one side of the center and two on the other side, while shifting the backfield into a wing formation. Like this." He pointed at a diagram. "When we pass, we'll send three or four receivers downfield."

"Sounds great, Orville. Is the playbook finished?"

"Yes."

"Make copies. We'll pass it out after practice this afternoon, and schedule a team meeting for the start of practice on Tuesday to review the new offense. That will give me a day to get up to speed on the new plays."

Orville gave me a curious look. "No argument?"

I chuckled. "Orville, I don't know enough to argue the details in the playbook with you. Hell, we're zero and six. What have we got to lose?"

He nodded, looking pleased with himself.

Before going to my first class after lunch, I went to the office and called my bank. The wire transfer had arrived.

"Do you offer overdraft protection?" I asked the person speaking with me.

"We do?"

"With this deposit, do I qualify?"

"If you fill out an application..."

I cut her off. I wouldn't know the answers to the questions on any credit application. "How about I put five thousand dollars in a CD as security for the overdraft protection?"

"That'll work," she said.

"I have a free class right now. Would you put the paperwork together, so all I have to do is sign where I need to sign when I come in? I won't have much time."

"Certainly, Coach."

"One other thing while I have you on the phone. I'll want to open a new checking account in my name only, transfer all my funds to that account, and close the old account. My wife packed up and left me Friday. I don't want her to have access to this money."

"I'll have that paperwork ready for you, as well."

The bank was efficient. I managed to get back for my next class, but barely. By then, everyone in the school knew about my memory loss, so I could curtail the amnesia explanation. I'm sure I was the talk of the day, and the students, as students do, played some games with me during the class, games like switching names on me, and asking questions impossible to answer, memory or no memory.

"No sympathy, huh?" I said, standing with my hands on my hips in front of the class. "Well, I can play games, too. Diagram all the sentences on the second page of To Kill a Mockingbird." Although the freshman English class I was teaching dealt mostly with grammar and sentence and paragraph structure, the real John Windom had included reading and reporting on To Kill a Mockingbird in the syllabus that he'd distributed on the first day of the class. "Turn in the diagrams tomorrow. They'll count as a pop quiz."

The students groaned; the bell rang, and I headed for the teacher's lounge to meet Orville and have a cup of coffee. As I was entering the lounge, I ran into Robyn Clark, literally. The books in her hand went flying. I helped her gather them from the floor.

"I'm sorry for being an immoveable moving wall," I said, which made her smile. Hooray! "I've been told that you don't like me because I got fresh with you. For that I apologize. But surely, Ms. Clark, violence wasn't needed to put me my place. Don't you think slapping me silly was a bit extreme?"

"I do not," she said, turned and walked away.

With a shrug, I grabbed a cup of coffee to go and trudged to my final English class of the day.

Football practice was a hoot. I spent all my time trying to put names on faces, tying the names to the positions each of them played, and trying to remember whether a player was first string or second or a water boy.

At the end of the practice, Orville and I handed out the new playbook and announced a team meeting before suiting up the following afternoon. I paid my debt to Orville, telling him that when I went to the bank I discovered I had a small savings account that my wife didn't know about. I thanked him for the loan, and he thanked me for paying it.

"You might not consider me a friend, Orville," I said, "but I sure do consider you a friend."
He grunted. "Well, my attitude is changing about that."

I drove home completely exhausted but rallied after eating. Chores needed to be done, so I drove to the hospital and paid my debt there, and then drove to Ridley's. Clyde had gone home for the night. I asked for an envelope, wrote a thank you note explaining the savings account, put a fifty in the envelope with the note, sealed it, wrote his name on it, and left it on his desk. At the bank, I had determined that the credit card I carried was indeed a debit card. I'd cancelled the card, and ordered a new one tied to the new account, which would arrive via mail before the end of the week. As far as I knew, except for the monthly payments on the pickup truck, I was debt free. Halleluiah!

The shopping facilities in Ely sucked, but I located Computa Cat Corner (cutsie name, huh?) on Aultman street and bought their top-of-the-line laptop. While there, I arranged for a satellite connection to the internet, but the connection wouldn't be activated until the next day. Back at the house, I stole a nearby wireless connection I could tap into with the laptop, and logged onto the online gambling site where I played Texas hold 'em poker. I created some new profiles to include my new checking account so I could transfer funds to and from the site, and took a virtual seat at a table, but the cards weren't acting kindly to me, so I logged off when I lost $500. As Aaron MacDonald, I usually played tournaments rather than hopping into a game at a table, but tournaments took more time than I wanted to spend because I wanted to study Orville's new playbook. I went back onto the internet and researched single wing offenses, and afterwards the playbook made more sense. The computer and internet connection had cost me more than I expected, so I transferred more money from a different off-shore account (I had three of them that totaled over $500,000.) to my new account in Ely before I closed down the computer for the night.

At daylight the next morning, I put on my sweats and went for a run. As Aaron MacDonald, I'd run three days a week and visited a fitness center on opposite days, resting on Sunday. On the fitness center days I practiced tai chi, as well. The high school had a weight room. I'd use it in lieu of a gym. I was bigger now, and much stronger, but I wasn't in very good shape, I quickly realized, so I cut the run short, showered and shaved, dressed and drove away to find a place to have breakfast. I took Orville's playbook with me to study while I ate.

I found a coffee shop in the Jailhouse Casino on 5^th street and ordered a big breakfast, which was interrupted a number of times by local high school football fans. I told all of them that our offense would be using new formations for the Elko game, and invited them to come to the game. To a man, they said that they never missed a game. The entertainment venues in Ely must be limited, I figured, but then changed my mind. The town had casinos and lounges with live bands. I'd also seen a movie theater and a bowling alley. I think high school football, probably all high school sports, got a lot of attention because they offered the only live sporting events in town.

The next day was better at school. At least, I didn't have to explain my memory loss at the start of each class. At the end of the day, I thanked Evelyn and told her I wouldn't need her anymore.

The team meeting went as well as could be expected considering some of the players knew more about the single wing offense than I. A few players grumbled that it was an old-fashioned offense, complaints I squelched by saying that with no wins and six losses, old-fashioned or not, we were going to play to the strengths of some of our players. I praised Barry, telling him he was a good quarterback, and he'd still have opportunities for some pass plays using our new offensive formations, but he was also an excellent blocker, a critical key to success with the single wing offense.

"Greg," I added, "you can run like the wind. With good blocking, your end-around running plays as tailback should provide big yardage for us. Cal, you move like a freight train, hard to stop. As fullback, I'll expect you to pound out first downs when short yardage is needed. Peter, you're an excellent pass receiver. I'm looking for a lot of receptions from the wingback position on Friday. The offset line should confuse Elko, and we'll be switching the offset sides, sometimes in the opposite direction of the direction of the ball in play. Plus, we'll be sending three or four receivers downfield on every pass play. Give this new playbook a chance, men. I think you'll be surprised with how effective it can be. All right, suit up. First, we'll walk through the plays in the playbook. Then we'll run through them. Expect an extra-long practice this afternoon."

My pep talk and praise seem to work. Orville even commented that my positive attitude appeared to have a positive effect on the team.

That night I won $2,500 playing hold 'em, less the site rake-off of $250, or 10%. I'd soon be ready to join tournaments again.

The next afternoon during practice, I provided mostly positive reinforcement. If a player did something right, I praised him. If another player did something wrong, I pointed out his mistake without belittling him. It was an exercise in operant conditioning, and it was working.

As we were leaving the field, Orville said, "I hate to say it, but I'm glad lightning struck you. You're a different man, Coach, and I mean that in a good way."

Thursday, we scrimmaged using the new formations and plays. They seem to work. Friday, we beat Elko eighteen to fourteen, and the high school football fans in Ely went nuts. I felt bad about it, though. I got the credit for the win, not Orville or the team, where credit was due. Go figure.

Saturday morning, a process server handed me divorce papers. I read them carefully, noting that the documents had been drafted by a law firm in Las Vegas. Yvonne Windom wanted alimony and child support. The alimony was minimal; the child support reasonable—for a rich man, not a high school coach and teacher. My so-called wife also wanted full custody of the little girl and was disallowing any visitation rights. Full custody didn't bother me, but the no visitation rights did. I didn't know the girl, but it seemed to me that a father in her life would be better than no father at all.

After e-mailing a letter to the editor of the Ely Times, giving Orville Canton the credit for the win and mentioning a number of players that gave 110 percent, I checked out the yellow pages and made an appointment for that afternoon with a local lawyer, a woman named Elizabeth Conner. I figured a female attorney had to try harder than a man to succeed.

I had time for lunch before the appointment, so I returned to the coffee shop in the Jailhouse Casino. If I thought I'd received too much attention at breakfast earlier in the week, I was mistaken. It was only a small fraction of the attention coming my way at lunch. I had a difficult time finding the time to chew between effusive congratulations and "keep up the good work" comments. I kept mumbling, "Read my letter to the editor in the Ely Times when it comes out. I credit the win to Orville Canton and some young men who gave the game all they could give, not me." From my observations, nobody believed me.

Elizabeth Conner was a big woman without carrying an ounce of fat that I could see. I guessed her age at thirty to thirty-five and her height at six feet in her heels, and even as tall as she was she wasn't bashful at wearing very high heels. I figured Elizabeth Conner would be a presence in any room full of men or women. With monumental effort, I discouraged an urge to stare at her massive bosom, and instead looked her in the eye when I introduced myself. The introduction confused her.

"We've met previously, John," she said, her voice taking on sultry tones. "I'm surprised you don't remember me."

"I don't remember anyone, Ms. Conner," I said and went on to tell her about my memory loss. I also told her how my wife had cleaned out my checking account. "I had to borrow money from an assistant coach and the manager at the grocery store to eat. Then while cleaning the house, I found an I.O.U. from a man from my past. The I.O.U. listed a phone number. I called it, and the man wired money into my account in two payments over two days, so I paid the hospital and other debts. If your fees are close to reasonable, I think I can pay you to handle the divorce."

I handed her the papers I'd been served that morning. She skimmed over the pages, sat back in her chair and sighed.

"Besides the money in your checking account, do you have any other assets?" she asked.

She's concerned about my ability to pay her, I deduced. Then I changed my mind. She probably needed my balance sheet, so to speak, to determine how much I could afford to pay for alimony and child support.

"A pickup truck, but I still have six more monthly payments before it's free and clear. The house where I live is on a month-to-month rental. The house came furnished. Here's the lease."

She took the lease document and skimmed it like she'd skimmed the divorce papers.

"I got paid last Friday," I said and handed her the payroll stub. "Teachers get paid once a month. I don't think I can meet Yvonne's demands."

After she looked at the stub, she laughed and said, "That's for sure. Okay, John, what do you want? Do you want the divorce?"

I shrugged. "With my memory loss, I don't know the woman, but the doc told me that my amnesia is probably temporary, so it's difficult for me to answer that question. She abandoned me, took my daughter, and cleaned me out financially before she left, so I'm inclined to say yes, I want the divorce, but when my memories return, I might have a different attitude. Then again, considering her shoddy behavior, I seriously doubt that I'll change my mind. I don't have an issue with my wife having primary custody of the little girl. Although I don't remember the girl, every child should have the nurturing love of a mother, but I do think a child should also know her father. I'd like visitation rights, and I'd like to have custody of the girl during the summer months when I'm not working, say a month every year, and perhaps a few days during the Christmas break. Accordingly, I have no problem with reasonable child support."