by Tim Green
"Look," Tate said, pointing toward the top row of the Dragons bleachers.
Troy followed the line of her finger and saw a big man and a tall boy with dark curly hair, each of them dressed in red, cheering with the rest of the Dunwoody crowd: Jamie Renfro and his father.
"The rats," Troy said.
Seth came up from behind, put an arm around Troy, and said, "It's gonna have to be a shoot-out."
"What's a shoot-out?" Tate asked.
"Both teams score every time they touch the ball," Seth said. "Whoever has the ball last wins."
"We have to score every time?" Troy asked.
Seth pressed his lips tight, then lowered his voice and said, "Unless we get a turnover, I can't see how our defense is going to stop them. The good news is that I know you can do it."
The energy in Seth's voice went through Troy like an electric current, and as he ran out onto the field after the kickoff, he believed he really could do it.
Because they were going to call all the plays at the line, the Tigers' offense didn't bother to huddle. The "no-huddle" offense would put extra pressure on the defense, making it harder for them to get plays signaled in from the sideline and to make adjustments to different formations. Troy knew the no-huddle offense would cut down on the Dragons' ability to run complicated blitzes.
Hopeful, Troy lined up behind the center and called out his first play as part of the cadence.
"Red Tango 17," he said, barking out the signals above the noise from the crowd. "Red Tango 17..."
The Dragons' defensive backs and linebackers crept up toward the line of scrimmage and shifted to the left, expecting the Tigers to run there. Troy broke out into a huge grin. It was all he could do to keep from laughing with joy.
He knew now for certain that Jamie Renfro's father had given the playbook to the Dragons. But the new Red Tango 17 play would send Rusty Howell, the Tigers' fastest man, straight down the field for a pass.
"Hut!" Troy said. "Hut! Hut!"
He took the snap and rolled to his right. Nathan and the rest of the Tigers' line chopped at the defenders' knees but slowed them only a little. The enormous Dragons surged toward Troy in a wave. He ran for his life toward the sideline. Rusty sprinted downfield, passing the defenders who raced toward Troy thinking the play was a run.
Just as the red wave of defenders was about to crash down on Troy, he set his feet and fired the ball.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
TROY WATCHED THE BALL'S flight and Rusty racing toward the end zone with his arms stretched. The thought that maybe he'd thrown it too far flickered in Troy's mind, only to be snuffed out--along with everything else--when the Dragons' linemen swamped him.
"I cut my guy down like a blade of grass, but half the defense buried you and rang your bell," Nathan said, helping Troy to his feet.
"What happened?" Troy asked.
"With me blocking for you? Touchdown. What else?" Nathan said nonchalantly. "Can you hold for the kick?"
Troy wobbled a little on his feet but shook the cobwebs out of his head and started a slow jog down the field toward the end zone, where Tate was already setting up her tee for the extra point.
When Tate kicked it through to tie the score, the three of them ran off together, slapping high-fives and smacking shoulders with the rest of the team. Troy took off his helmet and pointed to Jamie Renfro up in the stands, grinning and giving him a big thumbs-up.
"Looks like his head is about ready to explode," Tate said, giggling when she saw what Troy was doing.
"Serves him right," Nathan said. "The traitor."
The game was indeed a shoot-out, with each team seeming to score on every possession, but the rest of the Tigers' touchdowns didn't come as easy as the first one. As the game wore on, the Dragons relied less and less on the plays they thought they knew and more and more on their superior size, strength, and speed. Still, Troy's ability to read the defense, some good play by the Tigers' receivers, Tate's sure leg, and Seth's strategy of having Troy throw on the run all worked. With less than a minute to go in the game, the Tigers were down by just seven points, 42-35.
Troy worked the offense down the field on what would be the last Tigers' possession. With only four seconds remaining, he hit Rusty in the end zone for a touchdown, making it 42-41.
The Dragons crowd went silent, and the Duluth fans pumped out a roar of their own that rose and fell in Troy's ears like ocean waves. But instead of celebrating with Rusty and his teammates in the end zone, Troy made a beeline for Seth, who wore a worried look.
Kicking the extra point would tie the game and send them into sudden-death overtime. If the Dragons won the coin toss, they'd likely score and win. The Tigers' other option was to go for a two-point conversion by either running or passing the ball into the end zone from the three-yard line. That would win the game by a point and send them to the Georgia state championship.
"What do we do?" Troy asked Seth, gritting his teeth so hard that his cheeks ached.
The NFL linebacker looked down at him and asked, "What do you think?"
"I don't want to win or lose on a coin flip," Troy said.
"We can't run it," Seth said. "They're too big. It'd have to be a short pass, but only the long passes have been working for us. I don't like our chances."
"Then let's fake the kick," Troy said. "Get them out of their regular defense."
Seth's face brightened and he grinned at Troy. "I love it."
Seth cupped his hands and yelled to his players, "Kicking team!"
"I'll roll right," Troy said, his heart hammering away now, "and send the ends up and to the right on different levels."
"Like two Ls," Seth said, nodding.
"Only I don't throw to them," Troy said. "That's something they might be ready for."
"You can't run it in," Seth said. "They'll have a safety on either side."
"I won't run it," Troy said.
The referee set the ball on the three-yard line and signaled Seth to get going.
"You're talking in riddles," Seth said, scowling.
"A throw back," Troy said. Everyone would go to the right, but they'd send just one player back to the left, a classic trick play.
"To who?" Seth asked.
"The kicker," Troy said.
CHAPTER TWELVE
"TATE? WELL, I DON'T call you a football genius for nothing," Seth said, grinning again and nodding. "They'll never pick it up. Go!"
Troy sprinted out to the huddle. As he went to the line, Troy couldn't help glancing up at Jamie Renfro. Like the rest of the Dragons crowd, the Renfros were on their feet. Troy wanted to win for a lot of reasons. He wanted to be a star player. He wanted to be noticed by coaches and college scouts. But he also wanted to show Jamie Renfro and his coach-dad how foolish it had been to sit Troy on the bench all season.
The fans in both bleachers cheered wildly now, and Troy had to shout. He drew the play in the grass for his teammates as he spoke, then looked at Tate.
"Tate," Troy said as loud as he could, looking into her big dark eyes, "you fake the kick, actually swing your leg. I'll pull the ball at the last second and you take off into the end zone. They'll all come for me, and you'll be wide open."
"Me?" Tate said. Her eyes widened and glistened at him like glass.
"You can do it," Nathan said, slapping her shoulder pad.
Tate rolled her lower lip under her upper teeth but nodded.
Troy broke the huddle. They jogged to the line. Tate set her kicking tee down in the grass and marched off her steps. Troy knelt down over the tee and looked back at her.
Tate smiled weakly. Troy smiled back and winked with an affirmative nod. He turned and signaled for the snap. It came like a bullet. Troy snared it and rested it on the tee for a split second before pulling it up just as Tate swung her foot.
From the corner of his eye, Troy saw his line collapse and a blur of red surge at him like a typhoon. He tucked the ball, jumped up, spun around, and sprinted for the right side of th
e end zone. The Dragons came fast. The safeties covered the ends, sticking to them like glue, but that's where Troy kept his eyes, knowing that if he looked at Tate it might give the trick away.
He was nearly to the sideline with defenders all around him and no chance at running into the end zone before he cranked his hips and head around and set his feet to make the throw. He held it as long as he could, then launched it an instant before being buried in red. Little comets of light exploded across his field of vision, then went out. In the darkness at the bottom of the pile, Troy grunted in dismay.
When he'd let the ball go, Tate was nowhere to be seen.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
AS HE FOUGHT HIS WAY up through the pile of bodies, Troy heard the explosion of cheers. He batted another arm off his face mask, stepped on someone's leg, and tripped forward out of the pile like a zombie breaking free from his grave.
There, in the end zone, atop the shoulders of the entire team, Tate sat with one hand holding up the ball and the other pointing a single finger to the sky. The scoreboard confirmed it for him. Somehow, from somewhere, Tate had caught his pass in the end zone for the two-point conversion. The Duluth fans poured over the fence, swarming the end zone. The Tigers were in the championship!
As Troy ran for the melee, Seth scooped him up, holding him by the waist, hollering and spinning him in a circle as he sliced into the middle of the Tigers players and fans. When they reached Tate, Nathan was already there, holding her up. Troy flung his arms around them both, hugging them and screaming with joy as they, and the players and coaches beneath them, collapsed into a pile of laughing, bellowing winners.
After a minute of mayhem, Seth's shouting could be heard by everyone and the team assembled in an orderly line behind Tate to cross the field and shake hands with the dejected Dragons. Afterward, Seth gathered the team by the Tigers bench, with the parents and fans staying back at a respectful distance. Troy and his teammates had to strain to hear Seth's voice, it was so hoarse and raspy from shouting.
"We won the North," Seth said, referring to one of the two regions in the state, "and that's an incredible accomplishment for a team that barely made the playoffs. But you believed, and now we go to the state championship. You believed and you had heart, and we're not done yet!"
The team cheered.
Seth held up his hands and the players gradually grew quiet.
"Next week, we're going to win it all," Seth said. "That's how I want you to think. We're going to enjoy a day off--I should say you guys will enjoy a day off; I've got to play a game against Seattle--and then we're going to prepare like no other team has ever prepared. We're going to come up with a plan to beat the pants off whoever they send at us, however good they are, however big they are, however fast, however strong. We are the Tigers and we will be champions!"
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
WHEN THE CROWD FINALLY dispersed, Troy climbed into Seth's big yellow H2 along with his mom. His mind spun with the thought of being the quarterback of a state championship team. It would set him apart from his peers and put him on the track he ached for: the road to the NFL, not as a football genius, but as a real player. If Troy could win next week's game, high school coaches, college coaches, the media, other players, and fans would rally around him in the years to come, giving him every advantage he could hope for. He would be marked as a champion.
The thought of that made Troy worry, though, because it was at moments like this throughout his life--just when everything seemed to be going great--that things turned sour instead.
Troy knew Seth was headed to Wright's Gourmet for their favorite sandwiches, but on the way, he pulled into a newly constructed shopping center where half the glass storefronts were still plastered with real estate ads. Only a handful of cars rested in the smooth parking lot, and most of them were at the far end, in front of a Fantastic Fitness Center marked by its big red neon sign. In the middle of the shopping center was a large steakhouse that appeared to open only for dinner.
"What's this?" Troy asked, eyeing the fogged glass of the storefront on the near end of the brick shopping center.
"A little unorthodox medical treatment," Seth said. "A vitamin shot and an adjustment. It won't take long."
Troy scrunched up his face.
His mom said, "A lot of the players get things like acupuncture and vitamin shots and back adjustments."
"Players and old people looking for the fountain of youth," Seth said, getting out of the truck.
"Well," Troy said, "if I'm going to play in the NFL one day, maybe I should check it out."
"Come in if you want," Seth said.
Troy's mom said, "I hate to drive this thing, but I'm going to run across the street to the Kroger and get some orange juice. I'll meet you guys back here."
"Why do you hate it?" Seth asked, his voice still hoarse, as she scooted over into the driver's seat.
She shrugged and said, "It's a gas guzzler."
Seth scratched his head and said, "Well, I need some new wheels anyway. Maybe a hybrid truck."
Troy's mom tilted her head and smiled lovingly at Seth. Seth put a hand on her cheek and when Troy's mom leaned over and kissed Seth, Troy blushed and looked away, climbing out of the truck and waiting on the curb with his eyes on the ground.
Seth hopped out and patted him on the back. Troy's mom rumbled away, high up in the H2, and Troy followed Seth through the dark glass door whose fancy gold letters read MERCURY MEDICAL GROUP. Inside a small waiting room, two bulky black leather chairs rested on a thick gray rug with a brass lamp between them. Large prints of modern art paintings hung in chrome frames from the white walls. Troy sniffed at the new smell of the carpet, then folded his arms across his chest and shivered.
"Why's it so cold in here?" he asked Seth.
Seth pointed to a big vent up by the ceiling and said, "The AC unit for the whole building is right over us. It has to pump hard to get all the way to the other end for Fantastic Fitness, so the doc's place is always cold. It's nice in the summer, though."
Seth opened a heavy wooden door, went down a short hall, gave one knock, and went right into a large office where a man, surrounded by piles of papers and magazines, worked at a computer. Beneath his lab coat, he wore a bright green cardigan sweater over a white T-shirt. His tan skin had an orange tint to it. Three faded leg bones on his desk held down papers that rustled in the air blowing from a second AC vent directly above him.
Next to the desk, a skeleton hung from a chrome metal stand. Two detailed diagrams of the human body were plastered onto the wall behind it. On the far end of the room, an exam table stood amid an island of green marble, and shelves and counters of black granite lined the walls. The man, tall and thin with spidery brown hair on his arms and poking up from the collar of his white T-shirt, rounded the desk and extended a hand to Seth.
"Good to see you," he said, nodding so that long strands of bleached blond hair had to be swept back from his eyes--eyes so cold and blue that Troy felt like they could look right through him.
"Troy," Seth said, "this is Doc Gumble."
Troy shook the doctor's cold, damp hand.
"Hey, little fella. Uh," Gumble said, looking from Troy to Seth, "he's going to wait in the front, right?"
Seth frowned and looked at Troy. "He was interested in how this whole thing is done. I'm good with it if you are."
"Honestly? I think it's better if he waits out front," Gumble said, looking at Troy with cold, knowing eyes that made Troy happy to leave. "It's better. Really."
"Well, I'll be right out, buddy," Seth said, winking at Troy. "You know, doctor's orders and all that."
Troy nodded and stepped outside. He was halfway down the hall when he heard two quick snaps that made him spin around. Worry froze him in his tracks and he returned, pushing his ear to the office door. The sickening sound made Troy wonder if the doctor hadn't broken Seth's neck. With his heart hammering, he turned the doorknob and opened it just a pinch. He rested his forehead on the doo
r, angling it so that his eye was even with the crack, and held his breath.
Seth lay on the table with his head in both of Gumble's hands. The doctor was snapping it a second time, first one way, then the other, and Seth's vertebrae crackled like a bundle of dry sticks. Seth groaned, and Troy contorted his face. His stomach heaved and he turned away.
Without a sound, Troy closed the office door and hurried outside. He scanned the area for his mom and saw her pulling into the lot when he noticed a small silver car in front of the steakhouse. It hadn't been there before. In the front seat was a man whose face Troy couldn't quite make out because of the glare.
Troy's mom pulled up and beeped the horn, and by the time Troy circled the H2, the car had pulled out of its spot, heading for the exit. As it passed, it slowed, and the passenger window rolled down. The driver leaned across the seat and snapped a picture of Troy, then kept going.
Troy's mouth fell open and he blinked as the silver car screeched out of the parking lot. When the camera came away from the man's face, Troy recognized the driver.
Brent Peele.
Troy's mom rolled her window down and asked, "What's up?"
"Nothing," Troy said, wishing it were true.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
WHEN SETH CAME OUT, he and Troy climbed into the H2. Troy opened his mouth to tell his mom and Seth about Peele, but it seemed too strange. It seemed like he'd dreamed the whole thing. Maybe his imagination was running away with him. Maybe one of the hits he'd taken during the game had left him confused. Maybe he was dehydrated or something. The doubt kept him quiet.
At Wright's Gourmet, Troy got his favorite: a Rebel Rueben with a piece of chocolate cake and a root beer to wash it down. He pushed the thought of Brent Peele out of his mind, and the three of them talked and laughed about the Tigers' victory. Troy's mom asked who they'd have to face for the state championship.