Football Nightmare

by Matt Christopher

  “But, like I said before, what you choose to do is up to you. Just know that, whatever you decide, Mom and I will always be here for you. But you already know that.”

  Keith nodded, grateful for what his dad had said. “Yeah, sure I do. And thanks. I’ll think it over.”

  “Good.” Mr. Stedman looked up and studied the sky. “Know what? It’s too beautiful a day to spend working on the yard. Want to toss a football around for a while?”

  “Yeah, sure!” said Keith.

  “Hang on a minute and I’ll get the ball.”

  Keith sat and thought about what his dad had told him. Maybe, he thought, he’d been thinking too long and hard about that game. Maybe he ought to try to give it a rest … maybe …

  “Sorry it took me so long,” said Mr. Stedman as he returned with the football. “Ready?”

  Keith admitted to himself that he felt nervous as he walked into the yard. It would be the first time anyone would have thrown him a ball since … since that day last fall.

  His father threw a lazy, soft pass and Keith felt his whole body get tense as he reached for it … and bobbled it on his fingertips, before getting it under control and hanging on. He flipped the ball back to Mr. Stedman, who threw it back again, slightly harder and on a flatter line.

  After a few more catches and throws, Keith was feeling more at ease. His father waved at him to cut across the yard, then fired a bullet that Keith snared easily.

  “Nice! You know,” said Mr. Stedman, “you’re looking like you did last season. Really.”

  Keith smiled, but said, “Sure. When there’s no one looking and it doesn’t matter, I’m a superstar.”

  “Maybe you’d look this good even with a bunch of fans whooping and hollering in the bleachers,” said his father, cocking his arm to throw again. “Hi, Heck.”

  Keith turned to see Heck in the driveway, dismounting from his bike.

  “Hey, Mr. Stedman,” said the other boy. He looked at his friend and nodded casually. “Hey, Keith.”

  Mr. Stedman tossed another pass to his son, overthrowing it slightly and forcing Keith to lunge for the ball. Keith grabbed it and hung on.

  “Looking good,” Heck said, clapping. “Is it okay if I get in on this?”

  Keith hesitated. Mr. Stedman said nothing and kept his expression neutral. “Sure,” Keith said. “Why not?”

  He flipped the ball to Heck, who threw it to Keith’s father. Within a few minutes, the three were tossing the ball around just as they had done many times over the years. And Keith was surprised that it was normal and natural. A little later, Mr. Stedman excused himself and went inside, while the boys kept going.

  At one point, Heck’s throw to Keith was low and to one side. Without stopping to think, Keith dived and made a shoestring catch just before he hit the ground.

  He got up and brushed dirt off his pants. “Did you do that on purpose?” he demanded, staring hard at Heck.

  “No way! The ball just slipped. I’m a running back, not a quarterback, remember?” Heck looked convincing, Keith thought.

  “But,” Heck added a moment later, “I have to say, you still have good hands, buddy.”

  Keith smiled. Heck was right about that.

  “Listen, if we went to the park, we could air it out more,” suggested Heck. “What do you say?”

  Keith liked the idea. “Let me just tell Dad where we’re going,” he said, running to the front door and calling his father.

  When Mr. Stedman appeared, Keith said, “We’re going to the park for a while.”

  “Fine. Have fun,” his father replied.

  Keith was turning to go when a thought struck him. He turned back. “Did you call Heck up and ask him to come over when you went to get the football?”

  Mr. Stedman grinned. “You caught me. Are you mad at me?”

  Keith tried to keep his face straight, but he couldn’t help smiling back. “Nope. Thanks.”

  “See you later,” said his father, patting Keith on the arm.

  As the boys biked to the park, Heck said, “Listen, about yesterday. … I shot off my mouth too much.”

  “That’s okay,” answered Keith. “I thought about what you said, and you probably had a point. Anyway, no hard feelings.”

  At the park, Keith and Heck threw longer passes and ran patterns. Keith had just made an over-the-shoulder catch running flat out when he heard someone call, “Awesome play!”

  He discovered Cody watching from the edge of the grass. “Hey!” Keith called. “Been there long?”

  “Just a few minutes. Long enough to see that you look good. We could sure use you this year. I don’t want to push it or anything, but … is there any chance you might change your mind and show up tomorrow?”

  Keith looked from Cody to Heck and back, and said nothing.

  “If you don’t want to, then that’s that,” Cody added. “But, is there any chance?”

  After chewing on his lower lip a moment, Keith said, “Maybe.”

  The boys played for a while longer, then split for lunch. Keith helped his dad around the yard the rest of the afternoon. His father didn’t say a word about football, but it was all Keith thought about.

  That night, at dinner, Keith made an announcement.

  “I changed my mind about football. I’m going to practice tomorrow — if Coach Bodie is willing to let me play.”

  “Yay!” shrieked Traci, clapping her hands.

  “I imagine the coach will be happy to have you there,” Mr. Stedman said.

  “Of course he will,” Mrs. Stedman agreed.

  “By the way, what made you decide to go out, after all?” Keith’s father asked.

  Keith swallowed the piece of steak he’d been chewing. “I thought about what you said yesterday, and you were right. About not being afraid all the time, I mean. I don’t want to be afraid of messing up all the time. If it happens, it happens, but I’m going to give it my best shot.”

  He grinned at Traci.

  “I thought about what you said, too, you know, how you didn’t want your last football memory of me to be me lying facedown on the dirt? I decided I didn’t want other people to remember me for that, either.”

  “Now you’re making sense,” said Mr. Stedman.

  Keith frowned. “I thought you weren’t going to influence my decision.”

  “I didn’t. I waited until you made up your own mind, and now I’m telling you I think you’re doing the right thing.”

  “Huh,” Keith muttered. “What if I’d said that I still didn’t want to play?”

  “In that case,” said Mr. Stedman, “I still would have said you were doing the right thing. But I would have realized that maybe you were a different kind of boy from what I believed you were.”

  Keith decided to take it as a compliment.

  6

  The next afternoon, Keith and Heck walked onto the field where the Bucks were having their first practice of the season. Now that he had decided to come out for the team after all, Keith was feeling a mixture of eagerness and tension. He wanted to get started and was remembering how much fun football could be, but he was worried about what Coach Bodie’s attitude would be and how the rest of the team would feel.

  Would the coach be cool toward him because of his earlier unwillingness to play? Would the other Bucks welcome him back, as Heck had assured him they would? Was it possible that they might not be as happy to see him as Heck thought?

  Well, he’d find out soon enough, now that he was here. On the field, Keith saw several players already present, wearing helmets and pads. A few were pulling footballs out of canvas bags, while others stretched and warmed up. It was Cody who was the first to spot Keith and Heck. His face broke into a broad grin, and he yelled, “Yo, guys, look who’s here!”

  It seemed to Keith that several Bucks looked surprised to see him there, but he couldn’t read their facial expressions behind the helmets and face masks, so he had no way to know whether it was a pleasant or unpleasant surprise.
He would have to wait and see.

  It was clear that Cody was delighted. He raced up to Keith, wrapped his arms around him, and lifted him in the air.

  “I knew it! I knew you’d be here! All right! Yo, Coach, hey, look who’s here!”

  Coach Bodie, who had been writing something on a clipboard, looked up and saw Keith. He smiled and walked over.

  “Keith! I didn’t expect to see you with us today. Does this mean that you want to play, after all? I hadn’t heard anything about it.”

  Keith suddenly felt tongue-tied. He should have called the coach last night! It was really stupid, just showing up like this when he had said that he wasn’t going to play. Now Coach Bodie must think he was a total idiot, walking on the field as if there had never been any question about it.

  “I, uh, no, I guess I should have let you know, but … the truth is, I only decided I wanted to play last night and … I guess I wasn’t thinking. I mean, I don’t know whether you even want me now, and if you don’t, it’s my fault for not being, for not —”

  “Whoa, settle down,” said the coach. “Of course I’m happy to see you here, and I was hoping you’d think better about quitting. I think we can have ourselves a great season, and you can be a big part of it. We’re going to get started in a few minutes, so if you want, you can get reacquainted with some of the others and get loose.”

  Coach Bodie walked off just as Billy Brundage, last year’s starting quarterback, and probably this year’s, too, came up and exchanged hand slaps with Keith and Heck. “Hey, great to see you. When you weren’t at the meeting last week, I was afraid you weren’t coming out this year. We’re going to have a great season, I can feel it!”

  Several other Bucks who Keith knew swarmed around and greeted him happily. Heck poked an elbow into his friend’s side. “What did I tell you? They’re happy to see you!”

  But Keith noticed that a few players had not come over. One he recognized right away: Larry Vincent, a tall, thin wide receiver who had played behind him the previous year, who had had problems with his coordination. Larry had probably figured to be a starter if Keith was out of the picture, and might not have been thrilled to see him show up today. Larry was talking to a boy Keith didn’t recognize. He turned to Heck.

  “Who’s the dude with Larry Vincent?”

  Heck shrugged. “New guy in town. I can’t remember his name, but I think his family moved in next to Larry’s.”

  “Come on, I want to introduce myself.”

  Keith and Heck walked over to the two boys, who watched them approach, showing neither pleasure nor hostility.

  “Hey, Larry,” said Keith. “Good to see you.” He turned to the other boy. “I’m Keith Stedman.”

  “Jason Cole,” said the new boy, who had a pale, freckled face and large hands with long fingers. “How you doing?”

  “Hey, Keith,” said Larry. “Heck, how’s it going?”

  “Pretty good,” Heck said. “Jason, I’m Heck Szymanski. Good to meet you.”

  “Hi, Heck,” said Jason. Then he turned his attention back to Keith, staring at him with obvious curiosity. Keith was sure that Larry had been telling Jason about the Dropped Pass.

  Well, okay, Keith thought. I did drop the pass. Like Dad said, I can’t focus on that, even if someone else wants to. “Jason, what position do you play?”

  “I was the quarterback on the team where I used to live,” said Jason, grinning, “and Larry says your other quarterback is too old for this league, so maybe I can replace him. If not, well, I could be a runner or a flanker or something.”

  Keith nodded. “Well, Larry’s right, the guy who used to back Billy up isn’t playing with the Bucks this year.”

  “Good to have you with us,” Heck said, reaching out for a hand slap, which Jason gave him.

  “Thanks,” replied Jason. “I heard you were good last year.”

  “Yeah,” said Larry. “We almost had an undefeated season.”

  Before Keith could decide whether Larry meant that as a dig, the coach blew his whistle. “Okay, let’s group up over here,” Coach Bodie called out, clapping his hands. He carried his clipboard under one arm.

  “Great!” the coach exclaimed, looking at the group of boys. “Good to see that so many of last seasons team is here again. We had a lot of success last year, and there’s no reason why we can’t do it again — if we do our work and think and play as a team.

  “Those of you who have worked with me before know what I expect from you. For those who haven’t, it’s pretty simple. I expect everyone to give his best effort at all times, to be sportsmanlike, and keep his head in the game. I know that people will make physical mistakes — trip, drop a ball, whatever — and I don’t have a problem with that, unless a player makes a habit of it.

  “But mental mistakes are another matter. If you forget what down it is, or miss a blocking assignment, or run the wrong pass route, then you’re probably not concentrating on the job at hand … and that is the land of foul-up that I don’t have much patience with.

  “Okay. We only have two weeks before our first game, so we’ve got our work cut out for us. We’ll start out today with a little warm-up, and then we’ll break into two groups and work on our offense. I’ll work with the backs and receivers, while my assistant, Mack, works with the linemen on blocking.”

  Mack, a powerfully built man whose cut-off sweatshirt showed off his muscular arms, had been a star tackle on his college team. He smiled and nodded when his name was mentioned.

  The warm-up was a short workout with light calisthenics. Coach Bodie didn’t believe in a lot of pushups, situps, and stuff like that, although he had no problem if players wanted to do that on their own. But he liked his team to work on their stamina and wind, and ended each practice with a run.

  When the backs and receivers went to work, the quarterbacks, including Billy and Jason, would give a receiver or back a pattern to run (with any necessary explanation provided by the coach), and then throw a pass.

  At first, the coach assigned Larry to work with Jason rather than Billy, the probable starting quarterback. Keith thought Larry was ready to complain, but stopped at the last moment, since he would have annoyed both Coach Bodie and Jason.

  Keith, Heck, and Billy watched as Jason sent Larry out on the first pattern of the day. Larry made an inside fake and cut sharply toward the sideline. Jason’s pass was slightly wide, but Larry made a nice lunging catch.

  “He’s faster than last year,” Heck observed.

  “Yeah, and he didn’t get his feet all tangled up like he used to,” commented Billy. Keith kept silent for the moment. But it appeared to him, too, that Larry was looking better than he had the previous year.

  When Keith came up to the line for a pass from Billy, the quarterback told him to run a deep hook; he was to start downfield fast, stop short, and make a tight turn inside. The pass, if thrown correctly, would be there for him once he had hooked.

  Keith made his fifteen-yard downfield run, put on the brakes, and turned to his right, but the pass was off target, reaching him at ankle level. The best Keith could do was to get one hand on the ball, which bounced and rolled on the ground.

  As Keith trotted after the loose ball, he heard snickering coming from the group. He felt a surge of frustration. The pass had been poorly thrown and impossible to catch. He angrily scooped up the ball and started back with it.

  “Sorry! My fault!” Billy called, and Keith put on what he hoped would be a convincing smile. But he saw Larry whispering something to Jason, who smiled and nodded.

  A few minutes later, Billy sent Keith deep and tossed him a slightly wobbly, underthrown pass that Keith did well to reach back and pull in with one hand.

  “All right!” Heck yelled, and Billy clapped his hands. Keith noticed that even the coach, who did not give out praise easily, nodded and seemed pleased. He felt a little better. But, at the same time, Keith realized that Larry was far from the awkward, uncoordinated athlete he had been a year earli
er. He was looking good, running tight patterns and hanging on to every ball that came near enough. Larry was good. Possibly, he might be as good as Keith himself.

  His preoccupation with the idea that Larry was now a serious rival for the starting position must have taken Keith’s mind off the practice for a moment, because a little while later, he mistakenly cut to the middle while Billy threw a pass toward the sideline.

  Disgusted with himself, he kicked at the dirt before looking up to see Coach Bodie frowning at him.

  “Sorry!” he called out. “I wasn’t thinking. It won’t happen again!”

  As he went to get the ball, Keith heard Billy call out some encouragement. But he was still annoyed at his blunder, and thought to himself that, this year, he was in for a real battle, and he couldn’t afford to mess up like he had just done.

  Or else he might find himself on the sideline a lot more than he wanted, once the games began.

  7

  You looked good yesterday,” Heck said, as he and Keith headed for the second day of practice. Cody was with them.

  “And the whole team was glad to see that you decided to come back,” said Cody, to which Heck nodded in agreement.

  Keith wasn’t so sure. “Thanks, guys. I guess I did all right, and I know you two are happy that I’m playing, and that some others are, too. But, ‘the whole team’? I don’t think so. Not everyone.”

  Cody looked startled. “Huh? What are you talking about? Who wasn’t glad?”

  “Larry Vincent didn’t look overjoyed, for one,” Keith pointed out.

  Cody’s face took on a look of disgust. “Oh, him. Well, so what? The dude is a loser. Don’t pay any attention to him, and don’t worry about anything he has to say, either.”