A New Novel by Gary Broughman
(Editor’s note: Each weekend we’ll publish one chapter of the new Christian novel Which One of You? here at Christian Heartbeat.)
Chapter Twenty-two
Friday night under the lights. We were playing our home opener tonight. In small
towns like ours, even beach towns, everyone says “we” when it came to the high school football team, even people not a bit involved. “Who we playing tonight?” Or, “We playing at home tonight?” I had done it myself, and to tell the truth I never truly followed the team.
But this Friday night in September, I had a personal reason to say “we.” Sagan would be on the field.
Beau McCarthy had insisted on coming to the game, even though it meant a quick
turnaround at his hotel. I had only an hour to shower and change after racing
east from the Orlando airport. But we made it and Sagan had quite a cheering
section gathered at the 40-yard line. Myself, Beau, Carolyn and the two kids --
Scott so excited about having played his first game Wednesday night that he
couldn’t stop talking, Jerry had always come to the games. He was a local boy who
played for the school himself -- back in the days of leather helmets he joked.
And of course Becky. Yes, Becky, beaming with the high color of pride in her
son and looking more beautiful than ever. She had dressed to show her beauty,
so that if someone asked “who was that brunette” and they heard back “she’s that kid Sagan’s mom,” people would nod and say tough kid, heck of a player for a kid who never played
before, and his mom, some good lookin’ woman. I noticed and Beau noticed and Jerry noticed that Beau was aware. But I
knew she didn’t do it to attract attention. She could always do that. She did it to tell the
town, we’re proud of who we are. We belong. Don’t you dare look down on us.
Unfortunately John-John was not among us. He would have to wait until morning
to be bailed out. I wasn’t about to miss Sagan’s gridiron debut. I asked Jerry if John-John had tried to contact him. He hadn’t, and Jerry went into a guilt-tinged speech about how busy he’d been all day getting things done so he could come to the game.
Of course, the evening was full of smiles, handshakes and comments about my
appearance in national TV. I guess I was supposed to act like I’d accomplished something, or won the lottery. Maybe do a Gomer Pyle imitation
and say, “Golly! That New York City sure is exciting!” Most of them I just answered with a smile and something like, “glad you were able to see it.” But some wanted to comment on how I’d “put that Krissy Collins in her place,” which wasn’t at all what I was trying to do; I was trying to lift her out of her place.
We won the toss and chose to kick off. Sagan was on the kickoff team and had
gained the coaches’ respect as the wedge breaker, also known as “kamikaze man.” It was his job to run hard and low into the return team’s five-man wedge, scattering them like human bowling pins. With the wedge
destroyed the ball carrier becomes easy prey for another tackler. It didn’t seem like such an enviable task, but then Sagan was accustomed to giving
himself up.
The stadium lights were on, blending a diffuse glow into the natural light of
early evening. I watched the ball arch high and land in a runner’s arms at the five-yard line. He raced forward toward the forming phalanx of
blockers. Suddenly I caught sight of Sagan, easily sidestepping a preliminary
block attempt and bearing down on the wedge. They had barely started forward
when he hit like a low flying Howitzer shell. Bam! Bodies flew but not Sagan’s. He stalled but a half second, started forward again and planted his facemask
right on the ball carrier’s numbers. The runner was so shocked that the ball flew loose and we recovered.
First and 10 on the enemy 25.
A rousing cheer swept the stands. I could see Becky was smiling and clapping,
but maintaining her poise. She had expected her son to succeed and so did I.
Beau was seated behind her and he leaned down with a grin and whispered
something in her ear, which led to a shared laugh. I wasn’t sure if he was up to something, but if he was, so be it. She had to have
somebody and the hunting grounds at Jerry’s Ocean Deck were not that fertile.
We scored on that first possession and led by 14 at half. Sagan played on the
kickoff and receiving teams and in passing situations on defense. He was still
learning the ropes on what to do and when. But each time he got his chance, he
made an impact. When the final gun sounded, everyone was talking about the
opening play and how it was the defining moment. Interest in my visit to the
Krissy Collins show had disappeared, and Carolyn teased me, saying all Sagan
had to do was knock a few people silly in order to steal the limelight from me.
“It’s a great country,” I laughed in response, happy to quit talking about myself for a minute. As I
said, high school football in Florida is a big deal.
We waited for the players to come out. Sagan was so excited he might have
actually put together a paragraph, except that Scott kept babbling, imitating
the opening kickoff collision, first being Sagan ripping into the wedge and
then the others flying helter-skelter. After a minute Carolyn asked Scott to
settle down and Sagan said his girlfriend was going to bring him home. “Good enough, son,“ I said, ruffling his hair with my hand. “We’ll see you when you get home.“
Becky stood back a few feet, Beau McCarthy a little behind her. Before walking
off, Sagan shared a glance with her, both of them smiling quietly. In my mind I
could hear them saying, “it’s been a long road for us but we’re going to be OK.” I don’t think there’s another day in my entire life that I recall with as much pleasure or in such
detail as that Friday in September.
McCarthy and I had agreed to meet Saturday morning for a run on the beach and I
woke up raring to go. So much had changed for me that I’d fallen out of my usual habits. Morning runs on the beach were one of the first
things I envisioned when we decided to move here, but after several weeks I’d yet to follow through. McCarthy arrived at 7:30 a.m. The tide was going out
and a nice expanse of hard white sand welcomed us. He wore nylon running shorts
and no shirt, looking very lean and well muscled. Yes, he told me, he liked to
take care of himself, “running, lifting, pretty much every day,” he said. We decided to run south to start. Except for a few older couples on
morning strolls, we had the beach to ourselves.
“How quick a pace do you like? I asked, starting out at a trot.
“Don’t hold back,” he said. “I’ll see if I can keep up.”
He was John-John’s age, so I guessed I had 15 years of youth on him. But like I said, he looked
like he could hold his own.
“Alright,” I agreed. “I’ll set the pace on the way down and then you can lead on the way back. Deal?”
“Sounds good.”
Flagler Avenue was two and a half or three miles to the south, five or six
miles round trip. I began stretching my stride in a nice even pace, but not so
quick we couldn’t talk. He stayed right on my elbow and I wasn’t surprised that the first thing he asked about was Becky. I gave him the
basics. Apparently he’d been talking with my father and knew most the details about Sagan and what
happened with my church. He told me a little about his life in Canada, how he
had married then divorced 10 years ago, explaining along the way why he didn’t come back after the Carter amnesty wiped away all possibility of criminal
charges. Canada was different, he explained, “and not just the funny colored money.” He felt at home there, he said. “A different sense to it. It suits who I am.”
We stopped at Flagler, just below the deck at Jerry’s bar. Nothing was stirring yet. I pointed up at the building and said, “this is where she works, Becky I mean. Did she mention she’s a bartender?”
“No,” he said. “But that’s an honorable profession. I have great respect for people who actually work for
a living.”
“Just thought I’d mention it in case you--”
“Listen Dietrich, she and I seemed to hit it off. Would it bother you if I asked
her out while I’m here?”
So I wasn’t imagining it. The attention he paid her meant something. I felt a twinge of
jealousy but quickly suppressed it. I had been suppressing my feelings for her
since we first met. There was much to be admired in Becky besides her beauty,
but what she did for me wasn’t about her anyway. She somehow answered the “what if” questions of my teenage years, solved the mystery of the fascinating girls who
excited and terrified me. Just knowing that Becky felt something for me,
knowing that if I wasn’t married we might … just knowing released me from my wish to replay that night in the backseat of
Roger’s car when I had my chance but didn’t know how to take it.
“Becky’s a big girl,” I told McCarthy. “She can make her own call on that. Just don’t jerk her around and then go back to Canada. She’s had her share of jerks already. I don’t generally worry about her and men. If there‘s one thing she knows, it‘s how to handle men, but you’re a step up from her usual league. She could get confused; so keep it above
board, please.”
“My word pastor. I’m an honorable man.”
“Alright,” I said. Your turn to set the pace.”
He led us back to the north, immediately increasing the rhythm I’d set. I’d been taking it easy on him, figuring he was in his late 50s. But there had
been no need for sympathy; he continued to push the speed higher and higher.
Both of us were breathing hard, and as I ran a step back off his right shoulder
I was being hit by sweat flying from his body. We passed the half-way mark and
I though surely he’ll have to slow soon, but no, he kept it up. I could hear him inhaling and
exhaling, drawing deep, but it didn’t seemed forced. Just visible ahead in the distance I spotted the landmark
series of dune walkovers that told me we were entering the home stretch. I
pulled up next to him, and smiled between my teeth as I labored for breath. “Try to keep up with me? Who you kidding?”
He glanced at me without smiling and found one more gear, going almost into a
sprint. I matched him and let my long legs fly, eating up as much sand as
possible with each stride. I could feel my stomach starting to protest but we
were now just three hundred yards from the house. His breathing sounded
labored, and as I glanced to the left I saw he had fallen a few feet back. I
heard a loud, hissing groan come from his direction as he dug deep and pushed
himself into a full sprint, pulling back even with me. Was this the Olympics, I
asked myself. Why should either of us want to win? But for some reason at that
moment it seemed important and I answered with my own sprint and edged ahead.
When we passed the walkover to my house, I pulled up. Done. He kept going 20
yards further, apparently to a farther finish line. I was happy. We both got to
win.
Beau came weaving back to where I was bent over, sucking oxygen into my lungs.
He put his hand on my shoulder and bent next to me, side by side. His face was
beet red and I guessed mine was too. “That was a hell of a workout,” he laughed.
“Yea,” I said. “What was that about? I think we went a little overboard.”
“Sometimes the competitive spirit comes out when it shouldn’t. Anyway, you clipped me at the end there.”
“It honestly wasn’t a race,” I said.
“Sure it was. But a race between friends. A great way to start the day brother.
Everyone gets tested and everyone wins; what’s good for you is good for me, and vice versa.”
I wasn’t exactly sure what he meant by that. Maybe I’d know before long.
“I need to shower, have something to eat, and go bail John-John out of jail.”
“I’m coming with you,” he said.
