Second Down - Chapter 5

The rest of my first day went well, even though I did not have a single class that did not have one of Elijah's group in it. Notably, Miguel and the rest of that group were not in the remedial classes. Only a handful of the other freshman players were in all the remedial classes, which I think showed again how bad of an influence they had been on me. It also meant that once I was out, I was not going to have to have at least required classes with them anymore. I would still see them in conditioning, which is what we had instead of PE, and if I kept taking shop classes, I would see them in those classes.

But I could at least limit how much I saw them. Thankfully, my history teacher was Coach Wilson, the special teams coach. There was not a remedial social studies class, but there were AP classes. I was not sure if "doing better" was the same thing as trying for AP, but I told him I might be interested in working to that. He was … indifferent about it. Like most of the coaches, they wanted us to do good enough to be eligible to play, but beyond that, they believed that football was our priority.

Still, he was not going to stand in my way, and worse comes to worst I could stay in the regular history classes. Beyond that, I had woodshop, for which I had already submitted a course change. One of the big things I could remember from my dream was how important computers were going to be.

They were just picking up steam now, and I remembered the big Windows release next year, where people lined up at midnight to buy a copy of it. Then there were the smartphones, the iPhones, the tablets. In ten years, computers would rule the world. In fifteen, you would have to know computers to get any job that was not straight manual labor. And even some of those would need computers.

Since I had decided to just go with my dream and all the stuff that was coming true, I would go all the way. So I was dropping woodshop for typing. I knew there were computer science classes and I think some kind of business computer classes, but I did not know what kind of grades or other classes they required, and we only had a week to change classes before everything locked down. Besides, I assumed typing would be good for all those other courses.

It was a good first step.

"Blake! Wait up!"

I looked up to see Brandy jogging towards me from the track where the cheerleaders were gathered after their practice finished.

"Hey," I said, slowing my pace just enough for her to fall into step beside me.

"Oh my god, you will not believe what happened at practice today," Brandy launched into her story without preamble. "So, Tiffany was trying this lift she learned at the camp she went to, right? But like, no one else knew it and she did not explain it well, and she nearly dropped poor Melissa on her head. Coach was furious..."

I just kind of tuned her out, just making the appropriate noises of interest when required. Instead, I just thought about seeing all the little signs every time she had been near Mason throughout the day. When she had gone back to their table at lunch, she had sat next to him. When I had come out to the field and everyone was gathering up, she was off to the side, talking to him, her hand on his arm. They had practically bounced apart when they had noticed me. It was like watching a car crash in slow motion, knowing exactly how it would end but being powerless to stop it. Worse, I was not sure I wanted to stop it.

"...and then Jessica said we should try a pyramid, but after the whole Tiffany disaster, I was like, no way..." she was saying, as she reached down to grab my hand.

Something she had done a bunch of times before. I do not know why, but I pulled away, shoving my hand into my pocket. She noticed and faltered mid-step.

"Blake? Is everything okay?"

"Yeah," I muttered. "Everything is fine."

"What is your problem?" she demanded, stopping in her tracks.

I stopped to face her. "I do not have a problem?"

"Yes, you do. You have been acting so weird lately. You do not talk to Elijah, you do not sit with us at lunch, and now you are hanging around with all those losers. What happened to you?”

“Nothing happened to me. I just realized I am done with all the drama. And those Miguel, Connor, and the rest are not losers. They are just trying to get by, same as anyone else.”

“Please,” she scoffed, rolling her eyes. “They are a bunch of nobodies. You think they are going to help you get anywhere? If you keep this up, you are going to be just like them. You are throwing away everything. Do not you care about being popular? About being respected?”

“Respect from who? Elijah? Mason? They are just a bunch of users, Brandy. They only care about you as long as you are doing what they want. The minute you are not useful, they are gone.”

"What are you talking about? They are your real friends. You guys have been together forever."

“Real friends?” I snorted. “They are not my real friends. I used to think that way, yeah. But I was wrong. I was a jerk. I am not going to keep being that guy. I have had enough of all the games.”

“I liked you when you were that guy. This new version of you? I do not know who you are anymore. And if you keep going down this path, you are going to end up a loser, too. Just another nobody who never makes it anywhere.”

"Is that why you are messing around with Mason? Because you think he is going somewhere?”

Brandy’s face went blank, her voice going up just a little too high. “What are you talking about? I am not doing anything."

“Yeah, you are. I have seen you two together. It is pretty obvious something is up. My guess? It started sometime after last school year. Maybe early in the summer, before you left for camp.”

“You are paranoid. You do not know what you are talking about. Mason and I are just friends.”

I sighed. I did not want to have a fight about this. I just did not want to have to deal with her anymore.

“You do not have to pretend, Brandy. It doesn't matter anyway. I am breaking up with you, whether there is something going on or not.”

She did not say anything for a second. Just stared at me open mouthed, like she had never even considered this was a possibility.

“What?” she finally managed.

“Come on, Brandy. You had to have seen this coming. You have got Mason now. Does it even really matter?”

I guess she decided that surprise was not working, because she switched tactics on me.

“Please, Blake,” she pleaded, stepping closer, reaching for my hand. “Think about this. You do not have to do this. I can talk to Elijah, fix things. You can be a part of everything again. Just… do not do this.”

I shook my head, stepping back. “I have already made up my mind. I cannot go back, Brandy. Not to that.”

That tactic failed, she flipped her personality again. Which just went to show none of it was real anyway.

“Fine. You want the truth? Yeah, I have been seeing Mason. And you know what? He is better than you in every way. Stronger, tougher, everything you are not.”

“Good,” I replied. “I hope you two are happy together.”

I turned and started to walk away, but she was not done.

“Blake, you are making the biggest mistake of your life,” she called after. “You think this does not matter? I will make sure everyone knows what a loser you have turned into. I can ruin you at school. You will be nothing.”

I did not even look back. I just kept walking, heading toward the road, leaving her standing there, yelling after me. Whatever she had to say next did not matter. I was done with all of it.

***

It turned out the hardest part of wanting to be better in school was not trying to convince teachers to help me. It was doing all the extra work they were assigning. I had never been a homework person, either in my dream life or in middle school, so getting into it now was a serious challenge. Even four days into school, I was finding it was not just learning the extra material; it was learning how to learn.

I had to go to the library and check out some books on study strategy, which was extra annoying since I remembered from my dream life a time when I could just open a browser and type in questions into a search engine. One thing was clear. This was not going to be easy. Or fast.

And then I had all of the study for football. That was, at least, closer to what I remembered from my dream, although I did not really do much of it until after my freshman season was over and I got over the stigma of my bad performance at tryouts.

I was also going harder at it than I had in my dream life. In it, I still treated football like a game. And it was, but it was also more than that, and I did not realize it until dream me was an adult and I spent more time learning about football. There was so much strategy to the game that I did not realize, or at least connect with, as a kid in the dream life. We were not really exposed to it in middle school, and I had the impression they only touched on it a little bit for freshmen, leaving most of it to junior varsity.

The only reason I was getting more of it was I had shown active interest and requested to learn more about it. Coach, I guess, had figured if I was wanting to learn about it, then it was worth it.

And I did. If I was going to make a serious go at the NFL, I could not just be a good high school player. I had to be great, and athleticism would only take me so far. Taking it seriously, becoming a student of the game, that was what was going to take me to the next level.

A knock on my bedroom door broke my concentration.

“Come in,” I called out, not looking up from my work.

“Hey, champ. You have been holed up in here a lot lately. Everything okay?”

I swiveled my chair around. As I did every time I saw him since that night a week ago, I took a moment before I said anything to just take him in. Alive and well.

“Yeah, I am good,” I said, gesturing to the pile of books and papers on my desk. “Just realizing how much harder high school is. I did not exactly kill it in middle school, you know?”

“Since when are you this focused on schoolwork? What did you tell me once? Who needs to know algebra to play in the NFL?”

That sounded like me. Damn, I was an idiot when I was a kid. Or last year. Or whatever.

“Yeah, I might have not been thinking clearly. I mean, there is no guarantee football will take me anywhere, right? And even if I do good enough to get a scholarship, I should take advantage of it and get a degree while I break records on the field. But, I need to get out of math for jocks if I want to do that, and maybe get good grades while I do it.”

“I will admit this is every father’s dream conversation, but I have to ask, what brought this on?”

“I guess I just realized how many opportunities I was missing out on. I want to start taking life more seriously – both football and everything else. Life is more about up here,” I said, pointing at my head, then pointing at my arms. “Than here.”

“That is good advice,” he said, smiling.

He would think so. It is something he would say when I was younger and trying to power my way through problems rather than reasoning my way through them.

Dad’s smile widened as he leaned against my doorframe. “Well, I am happy you decided to take school more seriously, but you have been locked in your room all week. Do not forget, you are still a kid. You should have some fun too. Maybe you could spend some time with your friends? Elijah and the rest of the guys?”

“Actually... I am not really hanging out with them anymore.”

“No?”

“They are... not good guys, Dad. They are bullies and jerks. Always picking on others to make themselves feel big. They find it funny to make other people’s lives more difficult.”

“Really?” he said, but not in a surprised way. More like he was confirming that is what I said. “You really are turning over a leaf.”

“Wait? You think they are jerks too?”

“I do, and I always thought they were a bad influence on you. I have dealt with a lot of kids like that, and even more who wanted to be their friends and ended up in trouble. So yeah, I am glad to see you have figured it out before they could take you down with them.”

“If you knew, then why did you let me be friends with them?”

“Because I have seen how demanding someone to get better friends goes, especially teenagers. More often than not, you would end up going more toward them, instead of listening. The whole ‘parents do not understand’ thing. All I could do was wait, try to teach you the right things, and hope you would learn the right lessons.”

I do not know if it was just because I realized what those guys really were like or because I had these memories from being an adult in my dream life, but I knew he was right. If he had told me they were no good, I would have just been annoyed and hung out with them anyway.

“Huh. I guess it finally worked.”

“I guess so,” Dad said.

“I did meet some new guys, though. They joined the team but were not with us in middle school. They seem like good guys.”

“Good. I am proud of you, son.” He crossed the room and gave my shoulder a firm pat. “Keep it up.”

As he turned to leave, I called out, “Hey, Dad?”

He paused in the doorway. “Yeah?”

“Thanks. For... you know. Everything.”

“It is what I am here for.”

***

Friday, I finished up practice and walked out of the field house. I had gone extra hard today, and Coach was impressed enough that he let me and most of the offensive guys go ten minutes early.

Well, that was what he said. As good as we were doing, the defense was really struggling, missing blocks, misjudging plays, and all but fumbling over themselves. Mason, in particular, had drawn a lot of his anger. I don’t know if he was distracted or what, but he seemed to not be absorbing what Coach Plummer was telling him. It was all I could do to keep from smirking every time he got yelled at since Coach would have had my butt for laughing.

I had to settle for enjoying him getting what he deserved.

Since Aian and Mason were held on the field, Elijah and the rest had waited out for them, so I hurried to get changed and out before they came in. Since I’d dissed them, they hadn’t done anything against me directly, but they’d given enough dirty looks and muttered curses that I knew it was coming eventually. Better to avoid them if I could.

They were just getting off the field as I got out of the field house. To make matters worse, the cheerleaders had just finished up, and Brandy came running across the field to where Mason was standing with Elijah and the rest and jumped up into his arms, wrapping her legs around his waist. He spun in a circle as the two laughed, completely wrapped up in each other.

I turned away and ignored them. It wasn’t that I wanted her back, or really even cared that they were together. She’d made her decision, and I’d rather it be out in the open than thinking there was something there while she was cheating on me behind my back.

The fact that they all stood around laughing with them just added to it. The Blake from my dream, the one who’d lived a whole other life, he’d wasted so much time with people who didn’t actually care about him. People who’d drop him the second something better came along. And they had, as soon as dream me lost everything and was no longer of use to them, they’d dropped me.

As I walked along the edge of the school building, heading for the parking lot and my route home, I saw a girl who was … hard to miss. She was incredibly tall, even sitting down, with broad shoulders and a stocky build, with shoulder-length black hair. It wasn’t just her stature that drew my attention.

It was, as seemed to be always the case lately, a memory from my dream life. It took me a moment to place her though. She wasn’t someone my dream self had thought about in decades. But then it clicked, and I felt another familiar sensation lately.

Shame. Or at least, dream shame.

She was a transfer student who’d transferred in our freshman year … this year. In my dream life, I, along with Elijah and the rest of the guys, had been unbelievably cruel to her.

The memories came flooding back, each one worse than the last. The cruel nicknames. The rumors we’d spread about her. The time someone, Aiden maybe, had stolen her backpack and thrown it in the dumpster where they threw away all the trash from the cafeteria. Half-eaten food and the like.

I’d forgotten all about her. Or maybe I’d made myself forget, not wanting to face how terrible I’d been.

I also remembered the worst of it, which I wasn’t even involved with. Elijah and Jake had played a cruel prank during our sophomore year homecoming. For weeks, they’d been slipping her notes from a “secret admirer.” The final note they’d slipped into purse, which said he’d left a gift in her locker. When she opened it, they’d rigged it to spring open, covering her in rotten food and garbage. It ruined her dress and crushed her spirit.

She’d dropped out of school after that, or at least she’d transfered. Her family moved away and I never knew what became of her.

I don’t know why, but I found myself veering off course, heading towards where she sat. Part of me was wondering what she was doing here. It was late and most after-school activities were done for the day. What was she doing out here alone?

“Hey, um, is everything okay?” I asked as I got near her, although far enough away to keep from being weird or spooking her.

“Go away,” she said, without looking up from ehr book.

“I was just checking to see…”

“I don’t care. Just go away.”

“Okay, sorry to bother you. Have a nice afternoon.”

“Uh-huh,” she mumbled, still not looking up.

I kind of akwardly spun around and walked away from her. I didn’t blame her for being closed off. I didn’t know if the bullying had started yet, but if it had, she wouldn’t be interested in being ‘tricked’ into any more friends. I think that’s why I went to talk to her. Another attempt to fix wrongs I’d never done. 

I looked back at her, and caught her looking up from her book finally, watching me walk away. The moment our eyes met, she quickly looked away, back to her book.

Maybe I’d give this one another shot later.