Two-Minute Drill - Mike Lupica [27]
Sometimes Chris would struggle. Sometimes he’d give up entirely and start firing his cards across Scott’s room like Frisbees and saying this was a stupid game and math was a stupid subject and he was stupid.
“You want to stop?” Scott said the first time Chris got frustrated today.
“Nah,” Chris said. “You know our deal. I just need a twenty.” Then he made the motion basketball coaches made, tapping their shoulders with their fingers, when they wanted a twenty-second time-out.
“There’s never one easy day,” Chris said. “You get that, right?”
“Dude,” Scott said, grinning at him, “who ever said this was going to be easy?”
They went back to playing “24” until Chris said his head was going to officially explode and couldn’t they please go outside and throw the ball around for a while?
It was the last thing Scott wanted to do today, be anywhere near a football or a football field, but he relented.
On their way through the woods, Scott said, “Don’t you ever get tired of playing football?”
“Never.”
“You love it that much?”
“That’s why you play, dude,” Chris said, running toward the field. “Love of the game.”
Now, Scott told himself.
You have to tell him now.
When he came out of the woods, Chris was running crazy patterns on the field, the dogs chasing him, barking away as usual. Chris seemed happier to be out here than the dogs, maybe because it meant he was through studying for the day.
Scott walked over to him when he finally stopped and said, “Hey, there’s something I need to tell you.”
Chris looked at him, as if he knew something. “Please don’t tell me you’re quitting studying with me.”
“No,” Scott said, “I’d never do that. But I am quitting football.”
Then he went right into why, doing it the way they had with Chris’s parents that time, not giving him a chance to say anything. Scott didn’t tell it the way he had last night with his own parents—he skipped a lot of parts because Chris had been there—yet still left out what had happened in the parking lot. He knew that if he told Chris about what Bren and Charlie and Quinn had done, it would just rip the team apart.
“I’m turning in my uniform tonight,” Scott said. “It’s not like anybody’s gonna miss me. The only way Coach ever noticed me was when I got his son hurt.”
Then he started running, like he was going out for a pass, putting an arm up the way you did when you were open.
Or maybe he was running away from what he’d just said.
When he was about twenty yards away, Chris Conlan threw a pass so hard that Scott felt like the ball took a couple of fingers with it as it went sailing through his hands.
“Wow,” Scott said, forcing a smile even though his hands really hurt, “where did that missile come from?”
Chris didn’t smile back. Just continued to stare at him.
“I don’t like quitters,” Chris said. “That’s where it comes from.”
This wasn’t Chris his friend now. This wasn’t even the Chris who’d called him “brain” in front of Jimmy Dolan.
This was the quarterback.
Scott was getting the kind of look he’d see from Chris on the sidelines after he’d messed up or somebody else on the offense had messed up and the Eagles had either turned the ball over with a fumble or interception or just not made the yardage they needed on fourth down.
A look that made you want to duck.
“Can I say something?”
“No.”
“I’m not allowed to explain?”
“You just did. Mr. Dolan and Jimmy hurt your little feelings and so now you’re taking your ball and going home.”
Maybe it was the tone of his voice, the way he seemed to be mocking the whole thing, but now Scott got mad.
“What are you,” he said, “my father?”
“I’m your friend,” Chris said. “And I thought you were mine.”
“What, I’m not good enough to be your friend now because I’m not a good football player?”
“I’d rather be friends with someone who’s not a good player than with a stinking quitter.”
“If this is your way of trying to talk me out of it, forget about it,” Scott said. Yelling now. “My parents couldn’t do it, and neither can you!”
“Who’s trying to talk you out of anything?” Chris said.