Fanfare (Country Roads #2) - Chapter 3

I’d warned Chef the day before that I was going to be late, although I hadn’t explained the particulars, since I hadn’t planned on anything coming from it. He, however, saw it as a good chance to run me ragged. Again.

“Okay, stop,” he said as he paced in front of me as I pushed through pushups. “You’re just making me want to cry watching this. This is the worst effort I’ve seen from you since we started. What’s going on today?”

He wasn’t wrong. Between all the running I’d done at tryouts and the first twenty minutes of Chef trying to kill me with conditioning, I was falling apart. My arms screamed at me each time I pushed myself back up and my legs felt like jelly.

“Sorry, Chef,” I said, wobbly coming to my feat. “One of the coaches at school convinced me to go to baseball tryouts today, and that’s where I was. They ran the hell out of us already, so I’m pretty beat.”

“You want to play baseball?” He asked, sounding surprised.

“I didn’t, not at first. He’d helped me avoid getting suspended when that thing happened on the football field, where the guy was chasing Cameron, so when he asked, I felt like I owed him. After playing, though, I realized that yeah, I really do want to play.”

“Are you going to have time for this with everything else you’re doing?”

“I was just thinking that on the way here. Honestly, I don’t know, but I want to give it a shot. I had so much fun today, and I realized I was missing being part of a team, you know?”

“Kind of. We didn’t really have that kind of thing when I was growing up, but living in the temple, there’s a kind of brotherhood that we get that I imagine is sort of like being on a sports team.”

“So you get it. I’m going to give it a shot. If it doesn’t work, I’ll let them know I can’t do it, but I want to give it a shot.”

“Ohh, well, I guess that kills what I was going to ask you about today.”

“What?”

“Don’t worry about it; you really don’t have the time.”

“No, Chef, tell me. Please?” I asked, making puppy dog eyes.

“Don’t try that shit on me,” he said, although I knew it worked from how hard he rolled his eyes. “Okay, fine. A friend of mine told me about a competition happening in Myrtle Beach in May that I thought you might want to go to. It’s a mixed martial arts competition and is part of Martial Arts Federated.”

“I don’t know what that is,” I said. “Also, aren’t I too new to this to compete against anyone, unless the point is me going and getting my ass kicked?”

“The MAF is the largest mixed martial arts organization in the world, and holds a wide range of tournaments and the like.”

“So it’s like the groups that send teams to the Olympics? Dad and I were at this place a couple of years ago when the Olympics were being held and they had Jujitsu or Judo or something like that on TV. I remember seeing a banner for some kind of organization on the side.”

I actually had vivid memories of that day, since it was one of Dad’s dry spells, where he actually made an effort to spend time with us, instead of disappearing to the bars as soon as he woke up. We watched the TV and talked about the two people throwing each other all over the place. Dad went on this whole thing about how neither of them would make it in a stand-up bar fight and, at the time, I believed him.

The whole thing was burned in my brain.

“No, those are different. They tend to be organizations that manage international rules and competitions for one discipline, and they tend to look down on MMA as a whole. There’s actually a lot of politics and contentiousness around it, or there was when I was competing. I know the MAF was trying to get MMA as an exhibition for several years, and they kept getting blocked by the discipline-specific groups.”

“But MMA seems way more popular. At least, I hear about it on TV all the time.”

“Well, yes and no. MMA is a broad term, and there are several organizations that deal with it, some at the regional level and some at the national level. It might be why they’ve all had trouble finding traction, but it does give lots of opportunities for people to hear about MMA in general.”

“I’m still not sure I should compete. I’ve only been learning for a few months.”

“True, but I wasn’t thinking of throwing you in the deep end. I was thinking about the juniors competition in the fifteen to sixteen division. Most of those kids have been training less than a year, so they aren’t that far ahead, and you train a lot more than they do. I guarantee you none of them train almost every day like you do. Besides, it isn’t for several more months, so we have time to really focus on it.”

“As you said though, my playing ball on top of music and school makes it not practical, right?”

“I don’t know. It depends on you. I’m sure we could figure it out if you wanted to do it. I just thought it would be good experience.”

“I guess I’m not sure this is something I want. I started learning so I could defend myself against Aaron and his friends. I mean, I really enjoy it actually, and want to keep learning, but I never really thought about it past that.”

“Well, we don’t have to decide now, but I think it would be a good experience. Right now, if you want to practice, it’s against training partners, which means everyone is being careful not to hurt each other, or it’s against some of the kids who’ve been bothering you, which has its own complications. This would be a way to practice all out against others who’ve also learned to fight, but in a way that’s acceptable to everyone. It’s fine to train with me, but training and actual experience are two different things. This would give you what you don’t get from me.”

I looked at Chef, considering. I’d told him about my fight with Aaron at the end of last semester, and he’d approved of my restraint. Now he was suggesting I get into a ring with some kid I didn’t know and we'd wail on each other. It really was a switch, although this probably fell in some sort of middle ground, since he’d mentioned before about fighting in these kinds of things.

I wasn’t convinced; both because I really didn’t have the time, and because I didn’t feel any pressing need to prove myself in a fight against others. I’d started learning because I knew I was going to continue having issues with Aaron and the like at school, and I wanted to defend myself, not to fight in tournaments.

What I did know was this meant something to Chef. Spending time with him every day, for the most part, I’d had a lot of opportunities to talk to Chef. It wasn’t always instructions or lessons, sometimes he just wanted to talk or he’d answer my questions. In none of those conversations was he as excited about something as much as he was right now, talking about this competition.

“You don’t have to do it if you don’t want to,” he said when I hesitated, almost disappointed. “I know this isn’t something you’ve thought about before, and I don’t want you to feel like I’m pushing you into it. I just thought it would be good experience and you might even find yourself having fun.”

I couldn’t imagine any context in which I actually had fun fighting someone, especially a stranger, but I also couldn’t imagine letting Chef down. He probably did mean it when he said he wasn’t trying to push me into it, but this mattered to him. Considering everything he’d done for me, I couldn’t let him down.

“No, I was just trying to figure out how I’d make this work with my schedule, especially if I’m doing baseball, too.”

“We’ll make it work,” he said, his face brightening instantly. “The tournament is at the end of the year, long after you’re done with baseball, and I’ll make sure we can work around your stuff here. We’ll have to train for it, but I’ll make sure we work around your practice schedule. Don’t worry, we can work this out.”

“Great. It’ll be fun,” I said, lying through my teeth.

The surprises weren’t done yet, however. I was so wrapped up in trying to figure out how I was going to get my rapidly filling schedule to actually work out, that I almost walked by Mom’s car without realizing how out of place it was.

Mom never got home from her second job before ten, and I couldn’t remember the last time she was home when I got back from the Blue Ridge in the afternoons. Hell, the only times I ever saw her in daylight hours seemed to be holidays and on her way to work on weekends.

I rushed around the side of the trailer and in the front door, sliding to a halt when I saw her sitting at the table in the kitchen, staring at sheets of paper with a blue cover sitting in front of her.

“Is everything okay?” I asked.

Besides the fact that she was home at all, she was also visibly upset in a way I hadn’t seen before, somewhere between angry and worried.

“Did you get in a fight just before Christmas?”

“No,” I said, mostly as a reflex, before remembering the incident with Aaron. “Well, kind of. Aaron attacked me in the parking lot and I put him on the ground. I made sure I didn’t hurt him and was just defending myself, though.”

“That’s not what they’re claiming.”

“What?”

“Aaron’s father is suing us for battery.”

“I’m going to be arrested?” I asked.

Aaron’s father was the county prosecutor, which meant he was the one who decided whose cases got taken to court or not. I assumed that means he could get anyone he wanted to arrested, since the police worked for him, after a fashion.

“No, in civil court. They’re claiming his son suffered major damage to his shoulder and arm, which puts his future sports prospects in jeopardy.”

“He attacked me! How can they sue us?”

“They’re saying it was the other way. Aaron went out to confront you and you attacked him.”

“That’s bullshit!”

“They’re saying they have witnesses.”

“There wasn’t anyone there. We were at one far side of the parking lot by Hanna’s car.”

“They’ve listed someone named Harry Torres as a witness.”

“He wasn’t even there.”

“If no one else saw it, it’s going to be your word against theirs.”

“How much are they suing us for?”

She sighed, leaning back in her chair and pinching the bridge of her nose.

“It doesn’t matter. We can’t afford a lawyer. I’m not even sure we can even afford the court costs.”

“I could ask Chef …”

“No. We can’t go asking Chef Tang for help every time we’re in a crunch. You let me worry about this. Just, please, try to stay out of trouble till we figure this out. If you see this boy, just run the other way.”

“I try to. He cornered me this time. I’m so sorry Mom, I didn’t mean for this to happen.”

“I know you didn’t, Charlie.”

“What are we going to do?”

“You’re going to go to school and do all your responsibilities, just like nothing happened. Let me worry about this. Do you have any homework?”

Normally I didn’t, but with baseball practice and then right into my workout with Chef, I hadn’t gotten a chance to do it yet.

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Then go do it. I still have to go to work tonight, but since I’m here, I’ll fix you dinner.”

“I’m so …”

“Don’t keep apologizing. Just do your homework.”

“Yes, ma’am,” I said, getting up and heading back towards my room.

The rest of the week and through the weekend was a struggle. Mom barely spoke any time I saw her, and refused to answer any questions about the lawsuit or what we were going to do. It got to the point where Willie and Chef had to sit me down and tell me to get my head out of my ass, since my performance in both practices and on the stage Friday night were far below my normal standard.

I don’t think the crowd noticed I was off my game, but Willie certainly did. I managed to put them off, just saying I was having issues at school, since I knew Chef well enough by now that I couldn’t tell him what was actually happening without breaking my promise to Mom to let her deal with it for now. Had I mentioned the lawsuit, Chef would have almost certainly stepped in and try to help. I didn’t think that was a bad thing, but I didn’t want to pile another problem on Mom, so for now I needed to keep quiet.

I did manage to make it through Saturday and Sunday without any more ‘talkings to’, but I still didn’t feel myself. I even dodged hanging out with Hanna and Kat, telling them I felt bad and wanted to stay home over the weekend. It was the truth, after a fashion. I hadn’t been able to sleep much since Wednesday night, tossing and turning most nights, worrying about Mom and what we were going to do.

Monday morning during first period I got a notice that my schedule was going to change, with my PE class switching to a strength and conditioning class in the morning. “What’s this?” I asked Ms. Morgan, the school secretary, when she handed me the new schedule.

She took it from me and looked at the small type over the top of reading glasses balanced on the end of her nose before handing it back.

“That’s the PE class student-athletes take.”

“Ohh,” I said, putting two and two together.

That must mean I made the baseball team, despite what Coach Dean had said after tryout. I also saw it had another, much more positive side effect. The conditioning class was third period, which was the same time as my history class with Coach Bryant. I’d been moved to another history class in the afternoons, with a teacher I’d never heard of. It didn’t matter how busy my life was suddenly becoming now. Playing baseball was worth it, if for nothing else than getting me away from Coach Bryant.

When I got there, some of the kids from the previous class were still collecting their things and leaving. I’d recognized some of them as being on the football team, and wasn’t surprised to see Aaron and his friends in one of the last groups to leave. I tried to skirt around the edge of the room to avoid them, but Aaron must have some kind of internal radar just for me. He zeroed in on me as soon as I walked through the door to the athletics department.

“What the fuck is this?” he asked, walking up to me, followed by several of his minions. “Did you get lost? Dance class is in the gym in the afternoon.”

His friends seemed to think that was the height of comedy, doubled over laughing and slapping each other on the backs. I just thought about what Mom said, trying to ignore him and walk around his group. They shifted to block the way again.

I couldn’t help but notice Aaron’s arm was in a sling and strapped to his chest, immobilized. I’d seen him a few times since the incident in the parking lot. It was a small town and even just going between home and the Blue Ridge, I couldn’t seem to avoid him completely.

The two times I’d seen him over the break, he hadn’t had the sling, which probably meant he was only wearing it because of the lawsuit, trying to prove he was really injured or whatever. Of course, his dad probably had witnesses lined up ready to swear on a stack of bibles that he’d been wearing it all the time.

“What makes you think you belong here, loser? Can’t even make the real team and have to play on junior varsity with the freshman.”

“Move, Aaron.”

“What, you’re going to make me?”

“What happened to your arm?”

“You took a cheap shot and got lucky. That won’t happen again.”

“Campbell,” Coach Dean said, coming up to us. “Don’t you have another class to get to?”

Aaron gave a derisive snort and walked off with his cronies.

“I have you with the other guys assigned to junior varsity. Have you done much weight work?”

“No, sir. I’ve been doing a bunch of conditioning, but it’s all stuff like pushups and lunges.”

“Bodyweight exercise is good, especially for building core strength and tone, but it won’t build strength like weight work. Let’s meet the rest of the team and I’ll get you with a buddy to start some circuit training.”

He led me to one side of the weight room where a bunch of other kids were already gathered. I didn’t really know anyone in this group. A few kids I recognized from classes we had together, but I’d never really spoken to them, before. All of the baseball players I’d met so far, mostly Marcus and his friends, were on the other side of the weight room with the rest of the varsity. The rest of the teams seemed to be grouping up with their teammates, forming clumps here and there, spread out around the weight and training rooms.

Everyone in the weight room was on the baseball team, which meant they probably split the classes up by sport, probably to keep the room from getting too crowded. For a rural school, the weight room was pretty impressive, but it wasn’t big enough to handle all the school athletes at once. For a moment I’d hoped that Harry had stayed in the football conditioning class, but they must update the schedule based on the sport you took that semester, because I saw him at the back of one of the groups with his friends. At least it meant I didn’t have a class with Aaron, which would have ended up being a problem for sure.

“Okay. I know some of you played on JV last year and know the deal, but more than half here are either freshmen or this is their first year playing, so for those of you who heard this spiel before, just bear with me. I know some of you have played at other schools or felt like you were good enough for varsity and you might be disappointed that you didn’t make the team. I want you all to understand that we do not use junior varsity as a dumping ground for kids not able to make the cut. Anyone who made it this far has the potential to make it to varsity, and just needs that little something to get to the next level. We believe in giving everyone experience in a lower-pressure environment, so things don’t become too much when you move to the next level. If you give it your all for this year, you’ll be able to make it on varsity your junior and senior years, but you need to put in the work, which starts right here.”

He lifted the clipboard he’d been carrying and looked over it for a second before looking back at us.

“Now, I’m going to call your names two at a time. That’ll be your partner for today. We’ll show you how to do a proper circuit, what types of exercises you should be doing, and what you need to be focused on. Eventually, once we’ve seen more of you out on the field and get a better idea of what your strengths and weaknesses are, we’ll start working up individual plans for each of you. I’m a big believer in lifting with a partner, both for safety and support. That doesn’t mean you’re stuck with the person you’re assigned to now. After today, feel free to pick whatever partner you want, but I do want to see you out here working with someone.”

He then proceeded to name, calling out mine about halfway down the list.

“Nelson and Reid.”

I looked around and saw another kid with sandy blond hair, a little taller than me, looking around the same way.

“Hey, I’m Charlie Nelson,” I said, sticking out my hand.

“Dave Reid,” he said with a thick Appalachian accent. “I know who you are though. My brother took me up to the Blue Ridge a while back and I saw you play.”

When he shook my hand his grip was firm and his hand was calloused and rough.

“Ohh, well, I hope you had a good time. This your first year playing ball?”

“Yep, ah figured it sounded like a good way to get out of my chores, at least for a bit.”

“Smart thinking.”

“Nah. Pa switched up my chores with my younger brother, so now I have more in the morning and have to get up earlier. I figured what the hell, I already tried out, so let’s go with it.”

“All right, this isn’t a social gathering. Everybody shut up. I’m going to walk you all through each of the stations, explain what you need to do, and how to do it safely. I’m sure some of you were going to think you already know all this and don’t need it and will tune me out. I want to make it clear I will not put up with any of that. If you do some of these wrong, you will end up hurting yourself. While I don’t want to lose a player before we even get started, I also don’t want to have to explain to your mothers and fathers how I let their precious child get hurt. So listen up, even if you think you know it all.”

Most of the stations were just benches lined up in front of the free weights. Someone had taped sheets of paper to each bench, listing muscle groups and exercises that targeted those muscle groups. Coach Dean walked us through each bench, demonstrating the right way to do a set and what to avoid keeping from getting hurt. Some of the guys did seem to ignore the instructions, rolling their eyes or trying to share knowing glances with someone near them. I, for one, was glad for the instructions. This was very different than what Chef had me doing and I would have probably been one of the ones to end up hurt.

We moved on from the free weights to machines designed to target leg muscles and then some stations that had no or one weight, for abs. There was occasionally a random comment or insult from the guys on varsity, who were doing their own thing, but that mostly came from the kids that seemed to hang with Harry.

We didn’t actually get any workout in, since the bell rang as he finished up with the last few stations.

“Okay, tomorrow when you get here, I want you to find the partner you were assigned and find your name on the list we’ll put up on the wall, that’ll tell you where you need to start. If your partner isn’t here, let us know and we’ll make sure you have someone with you. I want you to get to work going through sets. You may have noticed there isn’t enough time to get through everything in one period, which means you don’t have time to mess around. I expect you to get to work as soon as you get your partner. Alright, get going.”

After conditioning class, my schedule went back to how it had been last semester, which meant English. Rhonda was still sitting on the other side of the room from me, but that could have been because everyone sat more or less where they’d been at the end of the previous semester.

We hadn’t spoken except for a few words in passing since she’d left me for Aaron and the disaster that had followed. We’d had the one conversation in her room, which I thought meant we might end up at least friends again, but it seemed I was wrong. She’d sat with my lunch group for a few days at the end of the semester, but other than that, there’d been nothing.

I’d thought about her some over the holidays. I wasn’t ever going to forget what she’d done and we’d never get back together, but that didn’t mean I didn’t still care for her. It’s cliché to say you still want to be friends, but I did. She’d always had an issue with the constant need to social climb and Aaron had known just how to get to her. In the end, she’d been unable to see past her own ambition.

With the rumors of her having died down once some new scandal took over the school I thought we might start talking again, but we’d been in class together for a week now, and she never even looked my way. Considering all the time we spent together before things went south, I’d come to rely on having her to talk to. She brought a different perspective than Hanna or the other people in my life. I guess most of all, I just missed my friend.

“Hey,” I said, catching up to her after class.

She looked startled at first, which wasn’t surprising since she’d looked pretty lost in thought when I’d run to catch up to her. After that, her expression changed to something I couldn’t really read.

“Hey,” she said after a beat.

“We haven’t talked since that afternoon in your room. I wanted to make sure you were still doing okay.”

“Yeah, I’m doing fine. I guess you were right, it would blow over once the next big thing happened, although I think I have you to thank for that. Once you kicked Aaron’s ass, that was all anyone could talk about for a while, even over winter break. Now it’s something about a junior girl getting caught before first period giving her boyfriend a hummer in the bathroom by one of the janitors. Next week it’ll be something else.”

“Good.”

“I just wish you had video of kicking Aaron’s ass. It would have been fun to watch.”

“So do I.”

“Really,” she said, looking at me strangely.

She knew me well enough to know I wasn’t one to need some kind of trophy or gloat over beating someone else.

“His dad is suing us for assault. They’re saying I attacked him for no reason and have put his college scholarship and possible NFL career in jeopardy.”

“That’s ridiculous. You’d never attack someone for no reason, and even if you did, Aaron more than deserved it.”

“Right now it’s just my word against his. Besides, his dad can afford to waste money on lawyers, we can’t. Even if it goes nowhere, Mom’s really worried about affording it.”

“I’m sorry,” she said.

She sounded like she meant it, but at a distance, like how someone might feel bad about a sad story on the news.

“So you’re sitting with your friends again?” I asked.

She’d stopped at the entrance to the cafeteria, but I’d noticed most of the girls at her normal lunch table looking our way with interest. After Aaron passed around the compromising pictures of her from their brief time together, her friends and pretty much everyone else had ostracized her. She’d spent the last few weeks of last semester sitting by herself at lunch. I also noticed Camille wasn’t with them, which was unusual. That girl was a hanger if ever there was one, always latched onto whoever was the current hotness of their group.

“Yeah, everything kind of worked itself out after word of Aaron’s beat down went around.”

“It wasn’t a beat down; I just immobilized him to keep him from taking any more swings at me.”

“Sure,” she said, again somewhat disinterested.

She’d started looking around, impatiently, like she wanted to keep going to get her lunch, but not so much that there was an implied invitation for me to join her, since we hadn’t ended our conversation. I almost just ended it there, since she was obviously not looking to reconnect our friendship, but I couldn’t help trying one more time to save her from herself.

“You need to be careful with them. They showed their true colors. They’re only interested in being friends with whoever gets them the most status or whatever. You really need friends who’ll have your back, regardless of what happens. Don’t let them drag you back into the popularity game. The offer to come sit with us still stands.”

Rhonda sighed and gave a half-eye roll before looking at me directly for the first time since we started talking.

“Look, Charlie, I appreciate it. I know you mean well and you’re trying to help, but you and I are very different people. For one, you don’t have to care what people think about you around here, ‘cause you have your own thing going on. Once high school is over, you’ll go off and be in a band and you won’t look back. Me? This is what I have. I need to get the most out of the next few years and make sure I’m positioned for college. Sororities look at things like if you were homecoming queen, head cheerleader, and on the right committees and clubs seriously. And a good sorority can make sure I have the right connections after college. I know you don’t understand, but this is how it is for the rest of us. I’ve already got Camille working hard to get on varsity and maybe even make captain next year. She’s latched herself onto Aaron as soon as I got dropped; dumb bitch thinks he’ll help her get there.”

I looked around and sure enough, there was Camille sitting with Aaron and his friends, leaning over to Aaron, whispering something in his ear.

“The juniors on varsity this year are a joke. I’ve already talked to Karen, and she thinks there’s a good chance the girl who’ll most likely get captain will need a co-captain, and she thinks I could get it if I play my cards right. I appreciate what you’re trying to do, but this isn’t going anywhere. You’ve made a lot of enemies already and I don’t need you weighing me down. You’re a good guy, Charlie, but you and I can’t be friends. Anyway, I gotta go.”

She turned and walked away. I pursed my lips and pushed down the mixture of sadness and anger that washed over me. I shouldn’t have been surprised, since that was who she’d always been, but I was. She’d been completely crushed when I’d talked to her in her room, refusing to get out of bed with none of her friends there to talk to her. Now she was going back to those people.

While it hurt, since I was the only one who hadn’t turned my back on her, despite having an actual reason to, I finally settled on feeling pity for her. She hadn’t learned anything from what happened with Aaron.

Next time she was on her own.