Carter Finally Gets It

by Brent Crawford

  The next ball goes about ten yards again, but this time it’s straight. And straight is good! The imaginary referee lifts his arms high above his head and yells, “It’s good!” It’s not far enough to be good for much, but it’s a start. And each time I kick, the ball’s going a little bit farther than the last. It’s not going fifty yards yet. I don’t think it’s going even twenty. To be honest, I’m not sure how far a yard is, but if I practice every day, I’ll be hitting them from fifty yards easy.

  4. GINORMOUS Struggle!

  Pre-football workouts begin for incoming freshmen. The older guys have been working out all summer, so we’ve got a lot of catching up to do. The coaches show us how to lift the weights properly, but I don’t need any help. My dad and I have worked out at the community center five times already, and I’ve seen about a million Bally commercials on TV. Those chicks are hot and strong, and they do NOT work out in the Merrian High gym. All we get is an occasional softball chick.

  We’re only supposed to do two body parts each day and start out “light” so we don’t hurt ourselves or get burned out, but I want to get jacked! Going light will never get me huge. So I’m doing all of the exercises . . . today! And if you want to get GINORMOUS, you’ve got to go heavy! That big, mean-looking kid from Hawkus middle school who stared me down at the Pizza Barn is using the big weights like the older guys, but the rest of us freshman are just using the bar or like, the littlest bitty weights. We look sooo weak.

  “We’re not gonna get anywhere just lifting the bar, dude,” I explain to EJ, who seems to have his doubts. “If you want to be a wuss, then let’s do the small weights. People will always pick on us, girls will never talk to us, but we’ll always have each other, dog,” I say.

  EJ has no argument for that, so we start loading up the bar. I think a safe place to start is with the second heaviest weights. And we’re kicking it off with bench press. “How much ya’ bench?” We’re about to find out. I lift the bar with one hundred and fifteen pounds on it. JEEEZZZ! It’s heavier than I thought it’d be. My arms are starting to shake like a Tickle Me Elmo doll. I’d better put this bar back where I found it.

  Then EJ barks out all the encouragement I need: “Let’s go, you pussy!”

  With that I try to lower the weight slowly to my chest. The lower part I did really well, but the slowly part is going to take some work. The bar crashes into my chest like my arms aren’t even there. It knocks the wind out of me. All of it!

  “Uuhhh!” I wheeze in pain.

  My spotter seems to think something is funny back there. EJ laughs and tries to lift the weight off me, to no avail.

  “Lift it off me, punk!” I whine, still trying to push.

  “I can’t, dude!” he says through the laughter.

  “You’ve got to help me!” I scream, and kick my legs.

  Even I think that’s funny, and now I’m laughing. EJ stops lifting so he can do an impression of me. “You gotta help meee!” he wheezes through the shakes and tears rolling down his face.

  I’m starting to panic. He tries to squat down and lift the weight with his legs. But with just gym shorts on he’s basically sticking his nuts in my face and jumping up and down laughing.

  “Dude, get your nuts out of my face!” I cry out.

  This gets the attention of a few other kids, who are now looking our way. This is not what I had in mind by “getting pumped.” I’m just trying to breathe at this point, and I stop pushing. Which is a big mistake, because the bar rolls toward my neck. I’m turning blue, and so is EJ, from laughing so hard.

  Then, out of nowhere, Nick Brock throws EJ out of the way and lifts the bar off my neck with one hand. He slams the weight back onto the rack and points his muscular finger at my red face. “Quit jackin’ around, you twerps!” he yells, and goes back to his thousand-pound workout.

  Dang it! I’m even redder from embarrassment than from lack of oxygen. EJ was the one who was “jackin’ around.” I was just trying to survive.

  “Let’s do this, EJ,” I say as I load the bar with tiny weights.

  I’ll show Nick Brock I’m serious. I’ll do every pully and press thing. I’ll lift every weight (the little ones) in this place! I want to make sure Nick Brock sees I’m not “jackin’ around”! And I won’t be a twerp for long.

  The next morning

  Oh God. I can’t move. Dang it! I’m paralyzed. I’ve paralyzed myself. “MOM!!! Mommy??? Mom, I can’t move!” I yell to nobody.

  I’m going to have to do this alone. I’m so alone. I am sooo sore! I think my muscles are going to rip off of my bones if I move even an inch. I try to sit up, but my stomach is just a worthless ball of pain. I roll out of bed, crash onto the floor, and crawl toward the hall. I finally get to the bathroom but can’t support myself to pee. I’ve got to sit down and do this chick style. Owwww! The muscles in my butt don’t like the hard toilet seat one bit. My dad must have heard me screaming, because he’s waiting for me when I hobble down the stairs.

  “What’s the matter with you?” he asks.

  “I . . . Muscles . . . Ahh . . . Huge. Pain,” I attempt to explain.

  He gives me a handful of Advil and tells me to stretch as much as I can. Stretch? If I stretch, the muscles will come off. I have “Workout—Get Huge” written on my hand, but I think I’ll go to the pool instead.

  5. Tig Ol’ Bitties

  I didn’t even have to ride my bike to the pool today because Hormone picked me up in his NEW CAR! The car’s not even close to new, and he doesn’t have a driver’s license, but his dad said he was sick of driving him around, and got him this little Honda CRX. (Having divorced parents isn’t all bad.) It only has two seats, but somehow Hormone, Nutt, EJ, Doc, Levi, and I have squeezed in, and we’ve still got to pick up Bag.

  We all limp through the front gates, and I’d swear that Amber Lee, Chubby Abby, and Bitchy Nicky are checking me out as we hobble past the lounge chairs. Only one day in the gym and I’m already getting noticed. My chest is one big bruise, but it’s looking pretty swollen too. They’re checking out my pecs! Either that or my trunks are up my butt or something.

  I struggle to get my shirt off, when EJ points at my chest and asks, “Hey, are you sore right here?”

  Before I can respond—WHAAAMM!—he punches me in the left pec as hard as he can. Oh, it hurts sooo bad. I can’t make a noise loud enough to express my feelings, so I just kneel down on the concrete. My boys howl with laughter. I plan my revenge.

  * * *

  We swim around for a little bit to get the blood flowing and then hit the snack bar. Bitchy Nicky marches up to our table like somebody has pissed her off, and in a loud cheerleader voice demands, “Carter, I need to talk to you.”

  “S-s-sh-sure,” I reply, wondering what the hell I’ve done.

  My boys say nothing, but suspicions are up, and questions will abound when I return.

  We walk toward the baby pool, and she informs me, “You know, Carter, I have a friend who’s into you.”

  What the hell? I thought I’d killed her dog by the way she stomped up to us. “Yeah, w-w-wh-who?” I ask, but I know who it is. Amber Lee’s been kicking herself for shooting me down. She’s decided to disobey her father and run away with me.

  “Yeah, my friend Abby thinks you’re the bomb,” she says with a smile.

  Abby? Who the hell is Ab . . . ? “Chu . . . Abby, huh?” I ask my feet.

  Chubby Abby? She’s on the drill team. Drill team is where girls go when they get cut from the cheerleading squad for being too fat. Abby is not one of the fattest ones, but she’s not exactly skinny, either. She’s cute, though. She sang at the talent show in seventh grade. She was awesome at first, but twelve- and thirteen-year-olds are not the supporters of the arts she had hoped. We started to throw things at her, and she ran off the stage crying. Man, I don’t want to go out with Chubby Abby. I want to run away with Amber Lee!

  “Uh, cool,” I say, trying not to make a face.

  “Do you like her?” she as
ks, like a junior detective in a bikini.

  Of course not! My friends will totally make fun of me if I go out with Chubby Abby.

  “I-I-I dunno, yeah, I mean sure, Abby’s cool,” I say.

  Why did I say that? I don’t want to get poor Abby’s hopes up and then shatter them when she finds out I’m not into her.

  “Are you going to Maria’s party tonight?” she asks.

  “Yeah,” I say.

  “Well, we’ll see you there,” she says, and then scurries away. She’s wearing a towel around her waist, but you can still tell Nicky has a nice butt. Why couldn’t it be Nicky who’s into me?

  I totally brought this on myself. I had English and home ec with Abby last year, and I was always talking to her. Chicks think that just because you’re talking to them you want to get married or something. I was always cracking jokes and making her laugh. You see, Abby doesn’t scramble the mainframe or cause the stutter, because I’m not into her! I’m not trying to impress her with my razor wit. I’m not worried about what she thinks. I wish I could like her, because she dresses really cool and she can crack a mean joke as well. She used to call Ms. Porter “Ms. Porno” right to her face. Abby’s real smart, so nobody would think she would bust a porno joke. She’d say it under her breath, like, “Ms. Porno, I don’t get where the adverb is.” And when Ms. Porter got to yelling at some kid with her lisp, Abby would put up an imaginary umbrella to protect herself from the spray. I started doing it too, because that’s funny. In home ec, I’d pretend to be the Swedish Chef from Sesame Street and yell, “Morgan-A-Morgan-ah-MORG!” as I was chopping vegetables up and shooting them all over the room.

  The teacher would yell, “Carter! KNIFE!!! Knife, Mr. Carter!” But Abby thought it was funny. If I liked her, I’d never have busted a Sesame Street joke in front of her.

  I sheepishly walk back to my boys, who turn into a flock of hens before my eyes. We’re some of the toughest guys in our class, but you’d never know it today.

  “S’up with that, Carter?” EJ asks, full of suspicion.

  “Was she asking you about me?” Nutt asks.

  “No, nothin’, she just told me that Chubby Abby’s into me.” I shrug like this happens every day.

  A gasp flies into the air. I know what’s coming next: they’re going to start crowing on me and making fun of Abby. But that doesn’t happen.

  “You know Chubby Abby isn’t so chubby anymore,” Bag observes.

  “Yeah, she’s still got those tig ol’ bitties, though!” Nutt adds, and high-fives Bag.

  I don’t remember Abby having . . . wait a minute! Abby does have pretty big boobs. I was staring at them on the second to last day of school last year. I’d forgotten all about them. How is that possible?

  “That’s hot fresh meat, dog!” Doc yells.

  Nutt does a little dance, squeezes some imaginary fruit, then sings, “Ol’ Carter’s gonna get that juicy juice. He’s gonna get that juicy juice!”

  We all laugh at him for being such a tard, then walk back to our spot by the diving boards, right past Abby, Nicky, and Amber. They don’t seem to notice us. Which is weird because we basically do a drive-by shooting. Shooting a thousand looks at Abby’s boobies. And damned if they aren’t tig ol’ bitties! And she isn’t so chubby. She’s solid and nicely featured in a brown bikini. Her boobs must have gotten warm or something, or her gawk alert is going off from seven guys not so subtly staring at her chest at the same time. She turns beet red and rolls over onto her stomach, and lo and behold, baby’s got back, too! It’s as if she’s saying, “You think my fun bags are nice, Carter? Check out the junk in my trunk!”

  I didn’t talk to her or anything, but I did bust my double flip off the low dive. No smack. She had to have been impressed.

  6. Lynn’s Holy Grail of Chick Knowledge

  School starts in nine days, but I’m going to my first high school party tonight! It’s just going to be freshmen (and Maria’s parents too), but it’s completely different. I’m going to have sex tonight, I’m pretty sure. I ransack my closet trying to find the perfect ensemble. I try on a couple of things, but everything I own is so junior high. It’s got to be perfect. It’s got to scream “SEX!” I want to stand out. I want to be a new man. A man chicks can’t resist.

  Mom and Lynn found out about the party because I have “party at Maria’s” written on my hand. They must have sensed my wardrobe struggle, because Lynn just burst into my room and threw a new shirt at me. It’s simple and cool, and it matches my Nike Shox. She tells me I have to wear jeans with it and to stand up the collar, but I tell her, “That’s gay.”

  She smiles and replies, “No, Carter, writing ‘deodorant’ and ‘party at Maria’s’ on your hand . . . that’s gay. Who’s the girl?”

  “W-what? I don’t know anything about any g-g-girl,” I stammer.

  “Carter, you’ve been getting dressed for an hour, and you have an entire tube of my gel in your hair—Who is the girl?” she demands.

  I tell her how Nicky said that Abby’s into me, and she gets all excited. “Oh my God! I have step class with Abby, she is sooo cute,” Lynn squeals. “Wow! I can’t believe she likes you.”

  I hear a crashing sound from downstairs, and my mom yells, “What’s not to like? Carter is charming, smart, confident, funny, handsome . . .” and all that crap she’s always spouting.

  “Whatever, just be cool and don’t lunge at her or anything,” Lynn orders.

  “I’m not gonna lunge at anyone,” I reply (I don’t think). “I don’t even really like her; she’s too—”

  “Too what?” Lynn barks. “You’d better not say fat, because she’s not. Abby’s skinnier than I am, and I’m not fat! Abby’s more like, voluptuous.”

  “Voluptuous” must be the female equivalent to “husky” for guys.

  I’m thinking about writing “no lunging” on my hand as I back away from the conversation and stroll out the front door.

  “Hey, playboy,” Lynn says as I pull my bike out of the garage. She has a strange expression on her face. If I didn’t know her better as a scourge of humanity and the permanent thorn in my side since birth, I’d think she’s coming at me with genuine concern.

  “Just because Nicky says Abby’s into you doesn’t give you the right to be a jerk. Abby isn’t some slut you’re just gonna have sex with,” she explains.

  What? Obviously she doesn’t know the Abby I saw this afternoon at the pool.

  “She’s a cool girl, and if you really don’t like her, don’t mess with her,” she continues. “You should like her, though, because Lord knows when another girl will be delusional enough to express interest in you.”

  If this is just going to be an abuse session, my friends are waiting for me to do this very thing at a party. I throw my leg over the seat, but Lynn grabs my handlebars, looks me in the eye, and drops her Holy Grail of Chick Knowledge on me.

  “Just talk to her,” she says. “If you feel yourself trying to brag or be impressive, just stop and ask her a question— a question about her! Ask about drill team. Ask about her singing. Find something about her that you think is especially cute tonight and compliment her on it. Not her boobs or her butt, Carter! Just stick to her clothes or jewelry for tonight. Her hair and her eyes come later. And even if her shoes or toes are cute, don’t say anything about them. Some girls think it’s weird if you like feet. So avoid the subject. And only one compliment, two at the most! You don’t want to cross over into stalker territory. If you run out of things to talk about, just ask her another question. The question is your bread and butter. Got it? Don’t try to get her drunk or drag her into some back room, bathroom, or shed!”

  We may be crossing over into some personal stuff here, where guys have treated her with less than respect. She notices that I’ve spaced off, and flicks my ear back into the moment.

  “Ouch!”

  “Just don’t be a horn dog,” she continues. “Abby’s meeting you at a party; you’re not on a date. You’ve got to play
it cool if you want to get anywhere later. Don’t seem too interested. Let her come to you a bit, but don’t seem like you’re uninterested, either!”

  “Defense!” I say.

  “What?” she asks.

  “Like, in football or basketball when you play defense, you’re just reacting to what the other guy is doing,” I explain.

  “Yeah, that works, but try not to use sports metaphors in romantic situations,” she suggests.

  “Okay,” I reply.

  “This is tricky stuff,” she says. “Your little ADD brain might short-circuit during the process, but if you can find the balance, you’ll get a hell of a lot farther a hell of a lot quicker.”

  “You mean I can have sex with her sooner if I do all this stuff right . . . right?” I ask.

  “Focus!” Lynn barks. “Blow her off a little bit. Talk to your friends some, and then talk to her some. Be cool. Talk about school, football, movies, and above all . . . HER! Don’t talk about farting, sex, or video games. If you get lost, ask another question. Now, if it’s going well, kiss her good night. Don’t try to suck her face all night, though. And if it is going well, you have to kiss her good night. Don’t chicken out! If you do, she’ll think that you don’t like her. When you feel it’s time, take her by the hand and get away from your friends.”

  “But how will my boys know that I made out with her?” I interrupt.

  She flicks my ear again and asks, “What do you care what those dorks think?”

  I shrug and say, “I don’t care what they think; I’m just saying it would be easier to prove like, in a court of law or something, that I made out with a chick if I had eye witnesses. But I totally get what you’re saying. When it’s time to get busy . . . break out.”