Here's a blip from the novel I'm editing. I just added the scene that starts chapter 10 last night while I was revising so I thought I'd share.
“So have you decided if you’re
going to homecoming or not?” Cooper asks on Monday in Physics while we wind the
rubber band on our slingshot.
“Why’s
everyone so worried about homecoming?” I ask as the rubber band snaps off the
handle and back at my face.
“Whoa,
careful now.” Cooper grabs my hand that is holding the slingshot, and slides
his other arm through and between both of my hands so that he can reach the
other side and strap the rubber band back on. He’s standing so close. The whole
room feels like the outside right before a thunderstorm. He smells like that
dark quiet sky. I can feel the pressure of the heavy clouds ready to burst with
rain. “There,” he says, securing the band. He takes his hands away from mine,
but he doesn’t back away. “I’m sorry.
You’re still off the homecoming topic. That’s cool. What are you doing this
weekend.”
It’s
Monday. I barely know how to get through today let alone make it to the
weekend. “I don’t know. We have that meet on Friday. Watch the Husker game
Saturday.”
“Oh,
sweet! Football’s a big deal here, huh?”
I
set the slingshot down on our worktable and turn to face him rather than stand
by his side. “A big deal? This is Nebraska. Husker football is the only deal.
We have no pro sports, we have a legacy of a football program, and nothing else
but cornfields and cows. The population in Memorial Stadium on game day is
equivalent to what would be the third largest city in Nebraska. We’ve sold out
every game since 1962. People live and die by Nebraska football.” My hands are
on my hips, and I realize I sound like a typical Nebraska person trying to
defend the thing we’re most proud of in our state. Most people just think we
ride cows to school or something, which is not true either.
“I
didn’t mean to ask it as a question,” he says, laughing at me. He leans a
little bit closer to me so that I really have to look into his clear blue eyes.
“I happen to love football and have no emotional attachment to a college team.
You could say I’m in the market to become a fan.”
He’s so close to
me. Why is he so close to me? Just when I think my head is going to explode he
steps away. “So do you have plans to watch the game with anyone?” he asks
slowly, picking up the slingshot and twirling it in his hands and not looking
at me.
Holy shit. Is he
asking to watch the football game with me? Like does he want me to ask him to
watch it with me? Or does he think I have a ton of friends to watch it with? I
was going to watch with Dad and Bryce. Oh, God. He can’t watch it with just my
dad, brother and me. What would he think? That I am a total loser. He probably
already thinks that. I’m overreacting. He doesn’t want to watch it with me. “I,
well, no. Well, yeah, my dad and Bryce, I mean. I guess.”
“Oh, family time.
Cool.” He nods, still looking down at the slingshot, his bangs flopping into
his face so I can’t see his expression.
What does that
mean?
“Guess I’ll have
to get you to teach me the ways of the ‘Skers another time.” He looks up, a
huge grin on his face, and makes like he’s going to snap my nose with the
slingshot. “Time to test this baby out.”
The rest of class
is spent testing our slingshots. Class the rest of the week is spent in
lecture. In practice we run and there is no mention of the game. Or homecoming.
Until Friday. We
have an away meet after school. On the bus ride home, Cooper plops down in the
seat next to me before Lydia can. He has his phone out and a book entitled History of Tradition: Nebraska Cornhusker
Football and another called Football
for Dummies.
“OK,” Cooper says.
“Since you won’t watch the game with me, I thought we could go over a few
things so that I’m ready when you do watch a game with me.”
I raise my
eyebrows at him. “First of all, Football
for Dummies? Aren’t you from Washington? You’re, like, American, how can
you not know football. Your home state is right next to Oregon.” I frown. “And
you said you loved football! You just told me that!”
“I do love
football. The idea of it, at least. I love the idea of it here. Here it’s
something that unites the whole state. Something everyone cares about and talks
about, and I want to be part of that. But I don’t know the rules. That’s where
you and these come in.” He waves the books and his phone in my face.
I nod. “OK, well,
you’re going to get the history of what it means from that book.” I point to
the Nebraska one. “The rest of the stuff? Grab a notebook. We’ll start there.”
I draw out a
simple offensive scheme with eleven Xs to represent eleven players. I point to
the Center. “This is the Center. Usually a stockier guy so the Quarterback can
see over him. He starts every play with the snap of the ball. Next to him are
your Offensive Guards. Big dudes. Next to them are the Offensive Tackles. More
big guys, but they’re the most athletic players on the O Line because they
protect the QB’s ‘blind side.’ So, all these guys make up the Offensive Line
and are in charge of protecting the Quarterback from the Defensive Line.” We go
on like this for every position on both sides of the ball. Cooper nods. He
doesn’t ask questions. I feel like this is super elementary, but you have to
know the actors to know how they influence the story, right?
When we get to the
rules, I’m not a good teacher.
“So this guy just
shifts a little and he gets a false start?”
“Yes.”
“But why? Like he
could itch his nose and get called. But the defensive player could hop over the
line and hop back and not get called if the play hasn’t started yet. But the
defensive player would get call for off-sides, not false start, even though
they seem like the same thing?”
“Yes,” I say
slowly, frowning. “I don’t know why. I’m sorry, I didn’t make the rules. I
think to get the rules we have to watch a game.”
“Alright then.”
Cooper sets the books aside. “I thought you’d never ask. When works for you?”
And, thus,
tomorrow, Cooper is meeting Dad, Bryce, and me at Bailey’s to watch the Husker
game. God help me.
Chapter 10: In Which I Try on Far too Many Frilly Dresses But Talk
Football Like a Dude
Like I said
before, football is The Only Thing going on in Nebraska, especially in a small
town like Landview. I guess I understand why Cooper wants to care about it. This
is our third game of the season. He’s probably gotten the memo that if he wants
to be able to participate in conversation on Fridays before the Saturdays games
and on Mondays after the games, he got to watch.
The
first couple of games of the season should be kind of boring game-wise. The
hype of the start of football season is still there, but the University pays
smaller schools ungodly amounts of money to have the team come here and get
pummeled by Nebraska. It’s supposed to be more like practice games before
Conference play starts. However, our quarterback throws a ball like a
kindergartener (I say this because even I could throw a perfect spiral when I
by the time I was in fifth grade—every Nebraska kid has a football unite every
year in PE. I’m pretty dang positive all of them do, at least) and our coach is
a hot head. So, it’s kind of a crap-shoot what this year will bring. We have
the money and the history to recruit big time, but, and I don’t blame anyone
for feeling this way, who wants to go to Nebraska when you could go somewhere
warmer to play an outdoor sport? We won the first two games of the season with
only a few cringe-worthy moments.
Nebraska
football games are of the few things that I can count on my dad and Bryce not
to be late for. We get to Bailey’s at 10:30 in the morning to pick a prime
watching spot before the game starts at 11:00. I keep an eye on the door,
watching for Cooper.
“So
this guy who’s coming to meet us. Is he a friend or more than a friend?” Bryce
asks. Bryce. Not my dad, my little brother tries to get the scoop on Cooper.
“A
friend. He’s on the cross country team. He’s new here. You texted him that one
time.” I adjust the sleeve of my favorite Herbie Husker t-shirt. It’s our old
mascot, the old Herbie with blonde hair and a beer belly, not the new dark
haired and slim Herbie. Even though old Herbie might play into a stigma about
fat farmers, that I don’t like at all, I like him better than the new Herbie. I
don’t know why. I also hate Lil’ Red. He totally creeps me out.
“Just
a friend, huh? Why are you chewing your nails then?” Bryce continues.
Ugh.
I take my hand away from my mouth. “He’s a friend. Trust me.”
“Your
knees are a little bouncy for someone not nervous about meeting a friend,” says
Dad, getting in on the let’s-get-a-rise-out-of-Jaisa action.
“I’m
anxious for the game,” I say.
The
waitress comes and saves me, asking what we’d like to drink. Water with lemon
around the table.
Cooper
arrives at 10:55. Early, but not an obsessed person like us. He’s wearing a
charcoal grey Nebraska t-shirt with red lettering and dark jeans. My dad and
Bryce both stand to introduce themselves to Cooper and shake his hand. Cooper
sits between me and Bryce across the table from my dad. I lay out the drawings
I’d made on the bus last night. Our waters have been delivered to the table. Go
time.
Nebraska
wins the coin toss and we elect to kick. The kick is high and long, from the
looks of the flags around Memorial Stadium, there’s no wind in Lincoln. A
perfect day for football.
My dad tells
Cooper about what Lincoln is like on game day as the TV station pans out of the
stadium to people’s tailgates. “There’s just a sea of red. As far as you can
see. People are grilling at eight in the morning. People set up yard games and
some even have caterers and bands at their tailgate spots.”
“No way?”
“Yes,” I say. “And
you can just be walking down the street and random people will yell at you to
come to their tailgate.”
“Or you can just
sneak cookies off of people’s tables as you walk by,” Bryce adds.
The Nebraska
defense goes three and out forcing the other team to kick. “Nice defense by the
Blackshirts, right?” Cooper asks.
“Well, yes.” I
nod. “Kind of. Did you read about the Blackshirts in the history book?”
“Yeah, if Nebraska
defensive players play well, they get a black shirt,” Cooper says.
My dad rubs his
beard and doesn’t take his eyes from the screen as he says, “We’re hoping the
coach waits until the kids have actually earned them this year. Last year,
breaking tradition, he gave them out after summer camp. We were new to the
conference; and in one of our first games, we let a team score 63 points on us.
63 points. That’s like a basketball score.”
“It was not a good
day at the Jamison household,” I muttered, remembering how Dad left Bryce and
Mikah at the bar to finish watching the game by themselves in an attempt to
bring new mojo to the team. And probably, also because he couldn’t stand to
watch any longer.
The Husker
quarterback throws an interception after marching the team steadily down field
and getting into field goal range. The entire bar moans.
My dad tells
Cooper about Nebraska’s (and his) glory days, about winning the National
Championship in 1994, 95, and 97. My dad had been a senior in college at
Lincoln in 1994. He uses his hands while he describes the plays to Cooper. When
he tells Cooper the story of Brooke Barringer taking over the starting
quarterback position after Tommy Frazier’s injury, there might be tears in his
eyes. Cooper nods politely. He probably read about this in his Husker History
book already.
We finally score a
touchdown and the crowd on the screen releases thousands of red balloons into
the sky as is the tradition for the first NU points scored.
Bryce and I break
down plays and penalties for Cooper. My dad paces and I eat too many nachos
when we throw another interception.
“Really? Come on.
It’s not that bad,” Cooper says. “We’re up 14-0.”
“Uh, yeah, it’s
that bad. We’re playing a nobody team. We should be killing them,” I say, while
loading another cheesy, sour creamy nacho.
“She’s right,”
Bryce says. “Killing them. No contest. It should be like you running against
me.”
Halftime comes and
goes and the Huskers come out with a statement running the kick off all the way
back for a touchdown. Bryce and I jump up and down. We high five all the people
at all the tables around us.
My dad comes back
and sits down. “I thought we were going to have to make you leave,” he says to
Cooper. “You might not be bad luck, though.” He takes a drink of his water
while Cooper looks at me for an explanation.
“For real though.
If we’d lost this game, we would’ve said you gave us bad mojo,” I tell Cooper,
shrugging. He looks between me and my dad like we are both crazy, then I
giggle.
“Huh, well, I see
how welcoming you guys are.” He looks away from me to the TV like he’s too cool
to talk to me. Then he yells, “Wooo! Pick six! Interception!” He stands and
high fives all the tables around us. Cooper and Bryce chest bump.
I jump up too.
“You know the rules!”
“I know the rules!
And I care that we scored!” Cooper throws his arm around my shoulders and pulls
me to close to him as we jump in celebration.
Nebraska ends up
winning 42-0. We’re 3-0. Decent start to the season. Cooper shakes my dad and
Bryce’s hands after walking out of the restaurant with us.
“Thanks for
letting me hang on family day. Thanks for not treating me like a noob,” he
tells them.
“Hey, man. Thanks
for not being bad luck,” Bryce says. “You can probably come next time too.”
When he says that, Bryce winks at me, huge, completely obvious to Cooper.
Great. Now Cooper probably thinks I want him to come all the time. Do I want
him to come hang out every weekend?
Cooper turns to me
and his sparkly, dumb, smiley, rainbows, and butterfly eyes twinkle at me and
give me goosebumps. I smile at him and forget to be annoyed with Bryce. “Think
you’ve got it down?” I ask.
“Thanks to my good
teacher,” Cooper says, taking a step closer to me.
“Are you a Husker
fan?” I ask.
“I’m a fan of
anything that makes you smile and yell and jump up and down like that. I like a
little fire in my Succubus.” He laughs and nudges me with his elbow.
I don’t know how
I’m supposed to respond to that. I think it was a joke. But he may have been
flirting with me? I shrug and say, “Well, good. I guess. I couldn’t be partners
with anyone who wasn’t a football fan anyway.”
“Oh, Miss Jamison.
So cool.” He stops laughing, but still smiles when he thanks me for inviting
him. He hugs me goodbye while Dad and Bryce pretend to not be waiting for me in
the car. “I’ll see you on Monday,” Cooper says as he walks away.
When I get in the
car Dad and Bryce sound like a couple of monkeys wooo-ing and ow-ow-ing and
making kissing noises.
“I didn’t kiss
him,” I mumble. Not that I ever want to kiss anyone in front of my dad, but I
think, maybe, I kind of wish Cooper had kissed me.
