Second Down - Chapter 33

It was weird, opening my eyes, waking up with the dark sky and stadium lights above me. It took me a second to even remember where I was, let alone why I was lying on the ground.

The world returned in stages, starting with bits of sound that slowly separated into distinct voices. Then feeling. My helmet felt tight, pressing against my temples, like it was trying to squeeze my skull. I’m not sure who, but someone thankfully slipped it off, taking away a little of the pressure.

“Blake? Blake, can you hear me?” Coach Holloway’s face swam into focus above me as vision returned next.

“Yeah,” I managed, though my voice came out raspier than intended. “Yeah. I think so. What happened?”

Nobody answered right away. Just looked at each other. Aside from Coach Holloway, Mr. Lassiter the head trainer, and Coach Easley, I could see Mickey and Andre just on the edges of the circle formed around me. Mr. Lassiter knelt down next to me and held up a small penlight, shining it in my eyes. I blinked a little against the harsh light as he had me follow it back and forth, before putting it away and feeling carefully along my neck.

“Any pain here?” he asked, pressing gently at the base of my skull.

“No, it doesn’t hurt. I’m fine,” I said, starting to push myself up, but the world tilted sideways.

Coach Holloway and Coach Easley both reached down and steadied me and, when they saw I was still determined to stand, grabbed me under the arms and helped me to my feet.

“Let’s get you to the locker room,” Mr. Lassiter said.

As soon as I was up, I pushed away from them to stand on my own. It was a little shaky, but I didn’t want to be carried out on a stretcher. I looked around the stands, which started cheering as soon as I was vertical. I couldn’t help but notice the scoreboard which read Lee 30, Wheaton 21.

The clock read zero. The game was over, but as I walked off, Lee’s special teams was headed onto the field.

“What happened?” I asked again, pulling Mickey and Joe in to help me walk off the field.

“Andre slipped on the turf,” Mickey said. “The whole line just...collapsed. Their defensive end came through completely unblocked.”

“You were pulling back to throw,” Joe added. “Ball went flying when you got hit. One of their linebackers snagged it and took it all the way back for six.”

“Shit.” I rubbed my face, trying to clear the fog. “Why didn’t anyone yell out a warning? Could’ve at least braced for it.”

“I think we were all just shocked when we saw him coming through. It happened so fast...” Mickey said before he was interrupted by a cheer from the opposite stands as they kicked the extra point, bringing our loss to 31-21.

We’d been so close.

“We’ve got to get past that,” I said, frustrated and a little angry looking at the scoreboard. “A heads up and I could’ve tried to run it in. Worst case, throw it away and we kick a field goal for overtime. Instead…”

“Blake!” Melanie yelled, running up to me and then stopping, clearly unsure if she should hug me or not. “Are you alright?”

I pulled away from Mickey and Joe, taking an unsteady step on my own, pulling her into my arms. “Yeah, just stiff.”

She wrapped her arms around me and I could feel her trembling slightly. Over her shoulder, I could see Mr. Lassiter glowering at me, clearly wanting me to continue on to the training room.

“The trainers want to check me out in the locker room before we head back,” I said, carefully extracting myself. “I’ll find you at the bus?”

“Promise?” Her eyes searched my face.

“Promise.” I managed a smile I didn’t quite feel. “Just need to get cleared first.”

I shooed her along, but she kept looking over her shoulder as she walked back toward the rest of the cheerleaders. I tried to give her a reassuring smile, in spite of what I was feeling inside. We had fought so hard to get back and were within inches of tying the game up, and one hit had erased it all.

“Let’s get you checked out properly,” Mr. Lassiter said, putting a hand on my shoulder.

Ten minutes of poking and prodding later, the trainers released me to go get changed for the bus ride home, declaring me not permanently broken. Although Mr. Lassiter did say if I felt dizzy or nauseous in the morning to go see my doctor.

Everyone was in the locker room getting changed when I got back and the whole place felt like a funeral. No one was joking or laughing or really even talking. It was a big change from how things had been even when I’d first arrived and the team was losing. I think being that close to beating Midland and then having it all fall apart had hit them hard.

None more so than Andre. He was sitting on the bench in front of the locker he’d put his stuff in, still in his pads, staring at the floor. Other than me, he was the only one who hadn’t changed clothes.

“Hey.” I dropped onto the bench next to him. “You okay?”

Andre didn’t look up. “I should be asking you the same thing. I screwed up. Bad. I cost us the game.”

“It happens,” I said, but he didn’t look like he was buying it.

“No it doesn’t happen,” Mickey said one bench over, angry. “He’s right, he cost us the game. We were right there. We could have beaten them, and that amateur shit cost us the game.”

“Back off,” Terry cut in, stepping between them. “Like you’ve never messed up before?”

“Not when it counted like that!” Mickey shot back.

“Really, ‘cause I remember you dropping a pass in the third that could have been a touchdown,” Terry said. “How is that any different?”

“That was different…”

“How?” Joe demanded. “We would have already been up if you’d caught that ball!”

“It’s different because Blake got hurt!” Mickey shoved past Terry. “Do you want to go back to how we were at the beginning of the season, when we couldn’t win a game to save our life?”

While he wasn’t wrong about the beginning of the season record, Jorden was still on the team and in the room with us, and he definitely heard Mickey, turning red and glaring at me, like I’d done anything to make him say that.

Things started to go downhill from there with more guys taking sides, the shouting ramping up. My head throbbed from the noise. I pushed myself to my feet, swaying slightly.

“Hey!” I said, trying to project my voice and cut through the noise, but nobody heard me. “SHUT UP!”

As if to make my point, I slammed my palm into one of the locker doors, banging it closed with a loud clang. That did the trick. The room went quiet.

“This stops now,” I said. “You want to talk about mistakes? Fine. I overthrew a bunch of passes tonight. Mickey dropped a big pass. Andre missed a block. We had that bad snap on the punt that kind of screwed us. We all made mistakes. We’ll keep making mistakes. This isn’t a scrimmage, we’re playing against guys who want to win just as we do, and shit doesn’t even go right in practice every time.”

“But we could’ve,” Mickey started.

“Could’ve what?” I said, cutting him off. “Could’ve won? Yeah, maybe. But we also could’ve gotten blown out. Do you remember how things were at the end of the third quarter? Lee’s undefeated for a reason. Instead, we had them scared and were winning.”

I paused and looked around the room, making eye contact with each guy I could see, making sure he was paying attention. “No one person is responsible for how we do. We win as a team. We lose as a team. And we are going to lose games. Hardly anyone gets an undefeated season. What matters is what we do when we lose. Do we give up and go for each other’s throats, or do we learn from it and get better for next time.”

For a minute, no one said anything. I think they knew I was right, and just needed someone to say it. They all looked like kids who’d just been busted with their hand in the cookie jar.

“Alright, I don’t know about you guys, but I’m ready to get the hell out of here. Let’s pack up and get to the bus.”

That broke the spell. It was quieter than before, and there still wasn’t a lot of laughing and joking around, but they did start talking again.

Mickey looked at me and then walked over to Andre and said, “Sorry, man. I was being a dick.”

“I would have too in your place. We’re good,” Andre said, whacking him on the side.

I reached down and grabbed my bag, dropping it on the bench so I could start shoving my crap in it. I really was ready to head home. As I unzipped it, I looked up and saw Coach Holloway, standing in the back of the room, watching us. When he saw me look at him, he gave me the briefest of nods and then left without a word, headed to the bus.

“Come on,” Joe said as I threw the last of my stuff in my bag. “Melanie’s probably worried sick by now.”

“Yeah,” I said, zipping it up. “Let’s not keep her waiting.”

***

When I woke up the next morning, the headache was still there. It hadn’t gone away exactly, but it had moved from the front of my head to the back of my skull, a steady dull drumming that didn’t seem like it would ever go away. After about thirty minutes of lying there, staring at the ceiling and praying I could just pass out again, I finally gave up and decided to head downstairs, hoping some coffee or breakfast might do something to take the edge off, at least a little.

When I stumbled downstairs, I found Dad leaning against the kitchen counter with his coffee cup in hand. He was already in his uniform and clearly about to head out to drive to work. I looked at the clock on the wall. He was either going to be late for his early shift or crazy early if he was working in the afternoon.

I could also tell something was wrong. He was doing that thing where he was trying to have a stoic non-expression while he stewed about something. It might have worked for people who didn’t know him, but I did. He was seriously annoyed.

I also knew he hated to be pestered when he was like this.

“Morning,” was all I said instead.

He closed his eyes for a second, took a deep breath, and when he opened them again, he seemed a little calmer. While I would always be impressed with how well the man controlled his emotions, being able to just shut them off like that, I would have preferred he shared with me what was going on inside his head.

Having lost him in the dream life, I really did not want to waste any time in this life hiding what we were thinking and feeling from each other.

“You got in late last night,” he said, his voice completely neutral. Gentle even.

“Yeah. Since Midland is close enough, the game was at seven, which means we didn’t get done till almost nine and back to the school till ten-thirty. I was wiped out and didn’t even go out after the game, just came home and passed out.”

“How was the game?”

“Not good. We were a few yards away from beating them with like ten seconds to go and Andre missed his block. I got completely blindsided and fumbled.”

“No. Are you okay?”

“I am now, but they hit me so hard I went upside down, bent in half and was knocked out when I hit the ground.”

“You what?” He said, setting his coffee down.

“I’m fine, dad,” I said, holding up a hand to stop the freak out that was about to happen. “Mr. Lassiter checked me out and said it didn’t look like I had a concussion or anything. Other than a headache still this morning and some soreness, I’m fine.”

“Maybe we should get you to a doctor. Head injuries aren’t something to mess around with, and a headache could be the sign of something worse.”

“I know, and if it keeps up for a few days, I will. From what everyone is saying, it’s normal to have a headache for a day or so after a hit like that and the trainers said I was okay. I don’t want to freak out if it’s nothing, so let’s just wait a day and see.”

“Fine. A day. But if it’s still there, I want you to see the doctor.”

He had some kind of expression on his face that wasn’t exactly worry. I’m not sure what it was, and I knew he was concerned for me, but I also knew that there was something on top of that.

Probably whatever was bothering him when I came downstairs.

“I promise.”

“Good. I guess before I go I should also give you some good news. You nailed every single bet you gave me to place. I just can’t believe you were right about Foreman. No one saw that one coming.”

“Great,” I said, not even a little surprised. “How’d we come out?”

“For you, really well. You’re now up to twenty-nine thousand, eight hundred and forty-eight dollars. You have to tell me how you’re doing this.”

“I can’t. I know it’s probably really frustrating to keep getting the same non-answer, but there’s no way to explain this that would make sense. It doesn’t make sense to me either. All I know is that I’m absolutely positive what I know is going to happen, and I’ve been proven right every single time. You just said it yourself, no one saw the Foreman result coming. But I did. I’m really hoping this is enough to prove to you that this is real and believe me.”

He didn’t look mad or upset like the last time we talked. If anything, he looked...resigned.

“It kind of has to, doesn’t it? No one gets that lucky.”

“No. No one does. I’m not sure how long I’ll be able to do this, so I want to ride what I know for as long as I can. Thirty grand is a lot, but I’m still not anywhere near what I’m going to need for three or four years of the kind of training I want to get. I’m going to need hundreds of thousands of dollars when it’s all said and done, and if this goes away, so does any chance of that.”

“So you want to keep going?”

“I have to. If it all falls apart, all I’ve lost is my initial nine hundred, and losing my best chance of going all the way with football is way worse than losing nine hundred dollars.

He stopped and looked at me again, considering.

“Okay, I’m not going to stop you. I guess consider me convinced in all of this.”

“Good, because I have three games coming up that I know are going to hit. They won’t be blowouts like Foreman, but they’ll add up. Patriots are going to beat the Vikings in overtime, in spite of the Vikings being favored by a small margin. The money there is obviously betting it will go into overtime. Next, Nebraska is going to beat Colorado, who are favored in a big blowout. I think by twenty points, basically killing Colorado’s season and relegating them to the Fiesta Bowl. And last, the Lakers will defeat the Rockets in double overtime next week, I think, whatever their first game was. Since the Rockets won the championship and looked good so far, I think they’re favored, making it an upset, but I don’t know how bad of one.”

“The Lakers were really good last year too,” his dad pointed out.

“True. The Rockets are going to have another great year and are going to win the playoffs again this year, giving them two back-to-back.”

“You’re kidding,” he said.

“Nope. Not much we can do with that now, and they’re going to be a pretty dominant team, so it’s not going to be a shock, but they will have stiff competition.”

“Man, I’m not sure if knowing this kind of stuff takes the fun out of sports or not.”

“Maybe, but being able to win a bunch of money should put the fun back in it, right?”

“No kidding. I know you said you need a lot more than the thirty thousand, and you’re right, none of these are going to have the kind of jump that the Foreman fight gave us. I think I might kick in some of my own money and put it together with yours. We’ve had a lot of bills recently and could use the money. I’ll give you a cut of my part of the winnings too, since this is all because of your gift, or whatever.”

“Dad, you don’t have to do that.”

“I think I do. The extra money would help us. And like I said, you’ve made a believer of me.”

I guess that is what I asked for, so I shouldn’t be surprised when I got it. I could also read between the lines when he said we had a lot of bills recently. I knew mom’s doctor visits were starting to add up, and I also knew they were going to get worse.

Who was I to try and keep this all to myself? Besides, I was relying on him to keep us flying under the radar, so he wasn’t going to go crazy with it or anything.

“Okay,” I said.

“Okay,” he echoed, pushing off from the counter. “I need to head to work. You sure about that head?”

“Yeah, I’m good.”

“Okay, but I have your promise. If it’s still there tomorrow, we go to the doctor.”

“Sure thing,” I said, watching him grab his bag and head out the door.

I’d actually forgotten about my headache during most of the talk about betting, which was another sign that it wasn’t too serious.

Not that I wasn’t ready for it to be gone. As soon as Dad said something about it, it came roaring back to life. Or at least I started noticing it again.

I was feeling better though, enough to be hungry anyway. I went to the fridge to see what I could make for breakfast and figure out a way to call Eduardo and let him know I needed to take a pass today, after that hit last night.

I’d just gotten my hand on the fridge when I heard something coming from the dining room. I hadn’t seen Josh all day and he usually kept to his room anyway, and I’d assumed Mom was laying down, so I went to check and see what it was.

I must have been wrong about Mom, since she was sitting at the dining room table, surrounded by like a dozen books and a bunch of little bottles and jars.

“Mom?” I asked, stepping closer.

She jumped slightly, like I’d caught her doing something wrong. “Blake, honey. You startled me.”

I picked up one of the books, called ‘The Natural Path to Wellness’. Setting it down, I looked at the others. ‘Healing at Home’ and ‘Eastern Remedies for Modern Ailments.’

“Put that down,” she said, reaching for the book. “Those aren’t for you.”

I moved around the table, reading labels on bottles. Most weren’t in English, and the ones that were had names I couldn’t pronounce.

“What is all this stuff?”

“It’s nothing for you to worry about,” she said, starting to gather the bottles into a pile. “Just some natural remedies I’m looking into.”

“Natural remedies? For what? Your headaches?”

“Among other things,” she said. “Dr. Taylor just keeps pushing pills at me without looking for the real cause. These books talk about addressing the root of the problem, not just masking symptoms.”

I had this sudden memory. Well, not memory really. More of an impression. In the dream life, before Dad had died, I’d been pretty self-absorbed. I knew Mom was having some kind of medical problem, but I never really paid attention to it.

But I did have a vague memory of her getting into some kind of eastern philosophy or something. I remember she started doing yoga at some point, which for West Texas in the nineties, had been notable.

Until right now, I hadn’t realized they were connected to her headaches. Considering where I knew the headaches were going to take her, I also couldn’t imagine this would be a good thing.

It also probably explained Dad’s bad mood when I’d found him in the kitchen.

“Mom, maybe Dr. Taylor’s trying to help until they can figure out what’s causing the headaches.”

“Help?” She let out a bitter laugh. “All he does is write prescriptions that don’t work and tell me it’s probably stress. As if I don’t know the difference between a stress headache and what this is.”

“Then maybe we should find another doctor. One who will…”

“No,” she cut me off. “I’m done with doctors who think they know everything but can’t actually help. People have been alive and doing just fine for thousands of years before the big pharmaceutical industry convinced us to start taking pills and trying to keep us sick to make money off of us, pretending we need all that crap.”

I picked up another bottle, this one filled with what looked like dried flowers or herbs. “Yeah, but they also had a really high death rate from stuff we can cure now.”

“That’s not the point,” she said, snatching the bottle from my hand. “Modern medicine is all about treating symptoms, not the person. These methods look at the whole body, the whole person.”

“Mom, please. This stuff isn’t regulated. You don’t even know what’s in half of these…”

“That’s exactly what I’m talking about!” She slammed her hand on the table, making me jump. “You sound just like those doctors, thinking you know better than everyone else. I’ve done my research. I know what I’m doing.”

“I just want to make sure you’re being careful…”

“I’m the parent here, Blake. I don’t need my fourteen-year-old son telling me how to handle my health. This is my decision to make, not yours.”

“But Mom…”

“No.” She stood up, gathering books and bottles into her arms. “I don’t want to hear anymore about this. You need to remember your place. I appreciate that you’re concerned, but this isn’t your business.”

I watched her stack everything into a neat pile, knowing anything else I said would just make her dig her heels in deeper. When Mom got like this, trying to reason with her was impossible.

“I’m sorry,” I said as she stormed out of the room.

I stood there for a minute, and then headed back upstairs. My appetite was completely gone. Dad was right to worry. This wasn’t going to end well.