Fourth Down Baby: A May-December Romance (24 page)

I turn to leave the living room and toss words back over my shoulder. "I'll be glad to. After I take a shower."

There’s no way I’m going to show up smelling like I do. Even after a light practice, I still smell like ten pounds of wet leather, foam padding, and plastic football armor . . . and that does not work for dates. I strip down and grab the bar of Irish Spring off the soap dish, glad that it’s both cheap and works super-quick at covering up football smells. I can shower in three minutes if I want, and I do, walking naked down the hallway to my room, where I pull on a fresh set of khakis and a button down shirt. Yeah, I can get dressed up, too. I make sure my pits are sublime and grab twenty dollars out of the little cigar box that I use. I should keep all my cash on me. I know Dad steals from me, but if I do that, he’ll just shake me down. If I keep some of it in the box, he filches from me, but I actually end up keeping more of it.

I'm distracted as I tuck the twenty bucks into my front pocket, surprised I still have that much. Dad must have gotten a sale on his cheap booze this week. I'm so distracted that I don't notice that Dad has gotten himself to his feet, only to catch me with a sucker punch to my left eye as I come back past the living room. "That's what you get, you little bastard."

I grab at my eye, not so much hurt as surprised. Dad's half drunk, and I've got fifteen pounds on him, and a lot of my body is muscle while his is . . . sloppy shit. Still, it hurts, and I'm shocked, an involuntary tear coming to my eye because his alcohol-covered knuckle nailed me literally directly in my eye, and that shit burns! I push him back into the living room, where by some miracle of luck, he falls back onto the couch instead of onto his ass in the middle of the room. "You . . .”

Fuck it. I don't need a fight with the old man tonight. I walk out, ignoring his half-understood screams, and go out to my car, rubbing at my eye the entire way as I drive. I stop a little bit up the block from Whitney's house, knowing I'm way early but not knowing what else to do. Getting out of my car, I wonder how to break the ice, and what I know about her. Not a damn thing, really, except that she's hot as hell, and there is something about her . . .

"Flowers, maybe?" I say to myself, then look around. I see one of those planters that people use by a mailbox a few houses away, and inside are some flowers that remind me of the way her hair gleamed in the sun when she was trying out yesterday. They're almost the same dark, nearly blackish brown red. I run over and grab them. What the hell.

Holding my fistful of flowers and still rubbing at my eye, I walk the short distance to Whitney's house and ring the doorbell. There’s some rustling inside, and Whitney opens the door, surprised that I'm here. "Troy!"

I nod, trying my best smile. "Hi, Whitney. I know I'm mad early, but Coach cut practice short, and I was thinking . . . well, tonight's a school night, and I figured your parents would want you home early. You know, class tomorrow and all."

Whitney looks uncertain, but still nods. "Okay, one minute. Let me tell my mom that I'm leaving early."

I
don't really know
what to make of Troy when I open my door and see him standing outside my house. Sure, my heart's in my throat and my pulse shoots through the roof, but he looks different than he did yesterday. First of all, he's got either the beginnings of a black eye, or something got in there, because his left eye is puffy and red, and hanging from his hands are red flowers that look suspiciously like the geraniums that the Tuckers have planted around their mailbox down the street. There are even little bits of dirt still hanging from one of the flowers, which was pulled up by the roots.

Still, despite his strange appearance, it’s Troy, and even with the eye, he’s so handsome it's disturbing. Besides, there is something about the way he’s looking at me, with an intensity and a power that is just irresistible, and I nod. "Okay, one minute. Let me tell my mom that I'm leaving early."

I only half-close the door and run into the living room, where Mom is sitting on the couch. "Your date?"

"Yes, Mom. He says that he got out of practice early, and that he thought it'd be better this way. You know, with school tomorrow and all."

She smiles politely and sips at her after dinner tea. Mom's really into the church, and never even touches alcohol unless she's taking communion. "All right, honey. Be careful, and remember to be a lady."

I roll my eyes. Like I'm going to repeat the mistake she made. She's only thirty-five, having me when she was eighteen because she'd gotten caught up with some guy and gotten pregnant. I’m not going to be that dumb, and even if Mom wouldn't approve, I have a condom in my purse, one handed out by some safe sex advocates at the mall last year when I went shopping with Dani. Better safe than sorry, you know. "I'll be fine, Mom. Besides, Troy's too tired from football practice to get up to anything, you know."

"I know football players, honey. Let's just say I'm glad you're wearing jeans. Have a good time."

I run over and give her a kiss on the cheek and leave the house. I find Troy waiting on the front walk, still looking angry, his eye puffier than ever, with the flowers in his hand. "Here, I picked these for you."

"Mrs. Tucker's going to kick your ass if she sees you with those," I say, taking them and giving them a smell before setting them in a pot on my porch. "Thank you, though. I'll make sure we don't get in trouble for them."

"Well, come on then," Troy says, reaching out and taking my hand. "I hope you like fish."

"Why?" I ask, but Troy doesn't answer, and I let it slide. Instead, we walk back to his car, which I see is older and more beaten up than mine. It has to be from the nineties or earlier. "Nice car."

"Piece of shit is more like it," Troy says, opening the door for me. "Not for long, though."

"Oh? You're getting a new one?" I ask as Troy goes around. He glowers, and I start to feel bad. I mean, I don't know anything about him except that he's built like a Greek god, he's a superstar athlete, and he's tagged every piece of ass from here to California. That's not exactly what I want to talk about on a first date. I try a new tactic. "So what classes do you have this year?"

Troy shrugs and hangs a left toward downtown. "Spanish, Geometry, English . . . normal stuff. Doesn't really matter. I'm on cruise control at Silver Lake. I know what I’ve gotta do for my next step."

"Which is?" I ask. He sounds more confident, and I admit, sexy. I like a man who knows where he's going in life.

"The NCAA. I tear it up on the field, and I've got my ticket punched. My GPA is fine—I can cram in an SAT course or something to get that up enough, and then I'm getting the fuck outta this two-horse town. NCAA, then NFL. Don't really care where there . . . except for Cleveland. I ain't going to Cleveland."

"Why not?" I ask. "Too cold?"

Troy laughs, then he looks over, realizing I’m being serious. "Sorry. No, it's that Cleveland has just about the worst football team in existence. Shit, Detroit's better than they are. You . . . you don't know much about football, do you?"

"Just what I've seen at a few games I've been to for school," I say, kinda blushing. "Dani got me to go a few times. I didn't really get it except that you were trying to get the ball into the end zone."

"Well, that’s better than some girls," Troy says, shaking his head. "Why'd you go out for cheerleading then?"

"Kind of a Dani Vaughn redemption project," I reply, and I’m actually enjoying talking about myself a little for once. "You know, I've been the invisible girl for most of school, and I wanted to do something this year. So, Dani had me start practicing on my own over the summer, and with my new diet, I kinda filled out. Speaking of diet, you said something about fish. Why?"

"The Crab Shack has a good special on baskets," Troy says, all confident again. "I was thinking we could grab two baskets to go and then just go hang out over on Slater's Point. You know, watching the river?"

I frown, and Troy looks over. "What?"

"Uh, my bad. I guess I should have told you. I have a bad shellfish allergy. Like, we go to the Crab Shack, and the next place we go isn't the Point, but County General. Sorry."

"Well, why the hell . . .” Troy starts to yell, then he takes a deep breath. He pulls over and slams his car into park, shutting off the engine. We're in the parking lot of a laundromat, and he gets out, walking around before slamming his fists on the hood of his car and yelling to the sky.

I should be scared. Troy is looking and acting like some sort of caricature from an abusive boyfriend movie, and we're still on our first date. But I'm not. There's something about the way his eyes look that tells me he's not angry at me, and in fact, he's got a lot of rage inside him, but there's something about the fact that he actually pulled over and didn't keep yelling at me that tells me to approach him.

"Sorry," he gruffly grumps as I come out of the car. "I shouldn't have yelled."

"No . . . but I'd like to know why you did," I say softly, taking his hand. "Yesterday, you were Superman, as Dani called you. Today, I can tell you're not having the best of days. What's up?"

Troy shakes his head, and I respond by not letting go of his hand, but instead squeezing it. "Come on, Troy. You didn’t make me spend six periods today debating in my head whether to call you up and cancel this date based on your rep, rip up my neighbor's flower pot, come to my house with what looks like a shiner nearly a half-hour early, and then go screaming to the sky like you're challenging Thor to strike you with a thunderbolt, and not get to at least talk to me. Tell you what. Change that Crab Shack plan to Mickey-Dees, and we can still go hang out at the Point. But if you think you're getting in these jeans tonight, buster . . . well, you might as well keep on yelling.”

Troy stops trying to pull away and instead tilts his head, looking at me differently than he had yesterday or even a few minutes ago. Yesterday, I'd been a piece of meat, a hot piece of meat, I could tell, but just meat nonetheless. He’d still had that look when he picked me up. But now . . . Troy looks at me like he's seeing me for the very first time. "Okay. Uh, I only got twenty bucks though, so are you cool with just a Big Mac meal? I might be able to spring a McFlurry if I can scrape some change from between the car seats."

"Or," I say, patting my pocket, "you can let me give you the five bucks that I have in my pocket, and the two of us can both eat what we want. But I don’t think we’ll need it—I mean I’m pretty sure we can both eat McDonald’s for less than twenty bucks."

Troy smiles a little, and I like this smile. It still makes my body do little pulses of strange feeling, but it's a warmer, more honest smile than before. I smile back. "Deal. But only if our total goes over twenty dollars."

We drive to McDonald's and get our meals, the smell of the fries filling the car as we drive the few miles out to the Point. It's the local Lover's Lane and is situated on a small rise, not really a point in the river, but close enough to have earned it the name Slater's Point. Shutting off his engine, Troy opens the bag then closes it. "Do you want to eat in the car or outside?"

I think about it and look out at the sunset. We're still in late summer, after all, and the sun doesn't go down for another half-hour at least. "That rock over there looks kinda nice. What do you think?"

Troy sees where I'm looking, and a little smirk comes to his face. He's obviously been up here before, and I'm betting he's done more than just have a picnic on that rock. However, his smirk falters, and that haunted look comes back to his face. "Okay. It's a good spot, I think."

We take our paper bags of food over to the rock and sit down, unpacking. Troy's a bit surprised when I fold my hands and bow my head, and when I look up, it's my turn to be embarrassed. "Sorry. Habit from my Mom."

"Your Mom's one of those, huh? Not my scene, but I respect it,” Troy replies, taking a bite of his cheeseburger. "From what I've seen, if there is a God up there, he isn't interested in my life."

"What do you mean? Your life seems pretty perfect in my opinion. Big man on campus, easy path to college, tons of friends . . .”

Troy sets his burger down and looks at me like I'm crazy. "You're serious, aren't you? Jesus, Whitney, you really don't know me very well, do you?"

It’s my turn to be angry, as if somehow I'm supposed to know Troy Wood's life story. "Excuse me, Mister Five-Star QB, but they don't issue out your biography along with the Social Studies textbook. Admit it—until yesterday, you didn't even know who I was! You're not the one who's spent three years being called Pancake Nelson, or do you think I didn't know about that?"

I realize I’m raising my voice and standing up, and I've not even taken a single bite of my food. Troy stares at me, his powerful jaw muscles working, and he sets his burger down, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. "You're right. I was wrong. I'm sorry, Whit . . . just, today's been one of those days that I'd like to forget, you know what I mean?"

"What happened?" I ask, sitting back down on the warm rock. "And I'm not going to crack any jokes, I promise."

"What do you mean?" Troy asks, confused. "What's wrong with jokes?"

I shrug and pick up a fry, sticking it in my mouth. "I guess I've gotten tired of being teased, that's all. It's hard to talk to people when you know that if you tell them how you really see things or how you feel, you're going to get teased. But . . . that's for another time, maybe. Tell me about your day."

"Well, football went like shit today," Troy starts, closing his eyes. He kind of half turns away from me and looks out over the river, his elbows resting on his knees and his head hanging. "If I keep playing like practice today, that idea of an easy scholarship isn't going to be coming my way. Hell, if I keep going like today, I won't even be starting by Homecoming."

"Everyone has bad practices," I say, scooting over next to him. For some reason, I put my hand on his leg, then kind of wrap my arm through his and take his hand. "I mean, I don't know football, you know, but nobody can be perfect all the time, right?"

Troy nods and opens his eyes, looking out at the river. "I have to be. At least on the field—I need to be. If I'm going to get out of this town, away from . . .”

"Away from what?" I ask. "Because I know this town isn't all that bad. We're not San Francisco or Seattle or anything, but it could be a lot worse."

Troy swallows and looks down again. "Just . . . home life's tough, you know? The eye . . . that isn't from football."

I gasp, moved. I mean, Mom's strict on the church side of things, and sometimes it’s strange having a mom who is younger than all of your teachers and gets confused for your older sister when she goes shopping with me, but Mom loves me. When she has gotten boyfriends, she's always put me first, which has cost her a few of the guys, but we both agree that we’re a package deal, at least until I head off to college. Most of all, Mom never lays a hand on me. "Troy . . . why don't you tell someone?"

"Like what? 'Hey, I'm a total worthless shit who has a drunk for a father and no mother, since she abandoned me to that asshole when I was three, and the only hope I've got of not going down the same path is to get into the NFL.’ I'd get laughed right out of school."

I'm shocked to see Troy, who I'd never even imagined would be insecure, at least based on what Dani told me at lunch today. He hangs his head, then laughs bitterly once before looking at me again. "Hell of a first date, isn't it?"

I smile and lean my head on his shoulder and give his hand a squeeze. "I could think of worse. All day, I figured you'd bring me here or to some other place, where you'd try and talk your way into my pants. In case you don't know, the girls on the cheer squad know about what you and your buddies were doing in the stands yesterday. Dani filled me in on it. I guess I've been more innocent than I knew."

Troy chuckles and we relax, just watching the river roll by. "Can I be honest? When I asked you out yesterday, I had the same idea as the other guys. The way they reacted when you started practice . . . you damn near caused a scene, and a fight between the guys—me included. A lot of them saw you as something like that McFlurry that we've got melting here. A little bite of dessert."

"And you?" I ask, not offended, but for some reason, I just want to know.

"I think . . . well, let me put it this way, and sorry if it takes a while. After fucking up at practice so much today, I apologized to the guys for screwing up. I've never done that before, and like you said, I thought I'd get jeered for it. Instead, a couple of the guys really stuck up for me, and I thought a lot about what Coach keeps telling us. Own it. Own your fuckups and your victories both. So I'm not going to lie. You're hot as hell, and you can't teach that. But talking with you now, I'd be lying if I said that all I wanted was to, as you said, get into your pants."

I laugh and put my hand on the side of his face, turning him to look at me. "Well, at least you're partially honest."

I kiss Troy, surprised by my forwardness, but I relish the feeling of his lips on mine, and even though I've only kissed a few boys before, I can't compare any of them to Troy. We don't rush, and there's nothing forced about the way we get closer and closer, his lips so amazing on my skin. He kisses to my neck, and I feel electricity in parts of my body that I'd never felt before with a guy, my whole body feeling tingly and almost humming. I realize now why Mom keeps warning me about guys. If Troy pushed right now, I'm not sure I'd be able or even willing to stop him, but he doesn't. Instead, he kisses back to my lips and I reach out with my tongue. Troy responds, and it's even more amazing than I'd ever imagined.