Two Roads from Here

by Teddy Steinkellner

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  To Court,

  Will you go out with me?

  Yes

  No

  Maybe

  “The present is a battleground . . . where rival what-ifs compete to become the future what is.”

  —The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet, by David Mitchell

  “BEWARE AND WARNING! . . . The adventures you take are a result of your choice. You are responsible because you choose! . . . Remember—you cannot go back! Think carefully before you make a move! One mistake can be your last . . . or it may lead to fame and fortune!”

  —Choose Your Own Adventure series, by R. A. Montgomery and Edward Packard

  HOMECOMING WEEK

  BRIAN MACK

  I sat outside Coach’s office with a feeling like my brain was about to give birth to a radioactive midget. The vibration was dull but intense, throbbing as hell and steady, too. Whomp. Whomp. Whomp. Whomp. The pounding was so hard I could almost hear it. It was like the little fetus was trying to speak. Like it wanted to tell me something.

  I had to get my mind off my head before it drove me insane, so I stared at the stuff outside Coach Dent’s door—the pennants, team pictures, and plastic trophies.

  Mostly, the space is a shrine to Coach’s golden boy and not-so-secret crush, the best quarterback in the state and the worst human being in the world: DeSean Weems.

  There’s a photo of DeSean leaping over a linebacker with his arms stretched out like he’s Sexy Teenage Jesus. Here’s one of him with some smoking-hot dance team chicks and some off-brand cheer babes. There’s a pic of him slopping chowder at the old folks’ home like a friggin’ community service angel. Here’s DeSean in the locker room, hoisting his league MVP trophy to the sky. You can see part of my ass cheek in that last shot.

  There are other pics on the wall too, from way back in the day. These were the Dos Caminos teams that went all the way and won California state championships. The Bulldog glory years, my dad always says.

  In the team photos from the eighties, everyone has hair down to their shoulders, back before those manes shriveled up into those skulls and those guys became assholes forever. Coach Dent is in the back row, pushing three bills and rocking about seven chins, which are stats even I can’t dream of putting up. My pops is in the center, holding the team ball and wearing the grin of a dude who just got laid, probably by not-my-mom.

  The last CIF title team is up there too, the miracle kids from ten years ago. My brother’s squad. Kyle is kneeling in the front row, all rigid and robotlike, with the dopest diabolical Ivan Drago flattop that I tried in vain throughout my whole childhood to re-create until I realized my hairline was beginning to disappear at age thirteen.

  There’s no pic up from last year. I wasn’t able to finish the season last year. No one likes to talk about last year. Not Coach Dent, not my dad, not Kyle, not DeSean. They’re locked in on now. We all are. This is my senior season. This is my last chance.

  My head hurt looking at the photos. And not just my head. My stomach felt gurgly as crap, like Taco Tuesday meets the Tea Cups at Disneyland. My eyes stung from how burningly shiny everything was around me, I mean the glare was hella bright, like my-thighs-during-winter white. And my ears were still ringing. My temples were still thumping. The baby midget in my skull was screaming. It wanted to die.

  “Big Mack!” Coach called out from behind the door. “Come on in, son.”

  I took one last look at the DeSean wall, flipped it off because why not, and got out of my chair. I felt the world spin for a moment, forced myself not to puke, and took a deep-ass big-boy breath. Then I did it. I walked right into Coach’s office, right into my future, straight toward my date with density.

  Wait.

  No.

  Destiny. That’s the word I want. Destiny.

  Well, considering the sheer girth of mine and Coach’s asses combined, I guess density makes sense too.

  Density, destiny, density, destiny, density, destiny, density, destiny.

  Goddamn.

  My head really hurt.

  • • •

  “Whose time is it?”

  “OUR TIME!”

  “Whose time is it?”

  “OUR TIME!”

  “Whose time is it?”

  “OUR TIME!”

  “GO SENIORS!”

  “WOOF WOOF WOOF!”

  “GO DAWGS!”

  It was lunchtime. Five hours before Coach’s office, way before my date with fatness. I was in the Greek Amphitheater, smack-dab in the middle of the stage. Everyone at school was surrounding me, cheering their heads off, losing their minds.

  I was about to have the most badass moment of my life.

  I bumped chests with Ernesto. I dominatrix-smacked Tua across the man titties for good luck. Then I turned to the crowd, and I gave them a freak show they’ll never forget:

  I slapped my thighs and did a couple of high stomps, like in one of Tua’s Polynesian dances. I flexed my guns, which I’m guessing put some freshman honeys straight through puberty. Then I ripped off my “#69 MACK” football jersey, and when everyone saw what was underneath, they got ridiculously hype.

  On my fat white belly, I’d had some rally girls paint a big-ass blue bulldog along with the words “SENIORS, BITCHES.” It was our school logo, but way fiercer-looking, plus kinda sexy too, just like yours truly. And when everyone saw me take that dog for a walk, when they saw me jump up and down and side to side and jiggle that nasty tummy beast all around, they all went crazy, and they loved me. They loved me so hard.

  It was time.

  With the crowd still climaxing, I turned around and gazed up at it, all twenty-five feet of it. All twenty-five lathered-up, death-defying, legend-making feet of the object of my dreams:

  The Grease Pole.

  Dos Caminos is the only high school on the Central Coast—probably in all of California and maybe in all of America—that has the Grease Pole tradition. Basically there’s this huge pole with a bell at the top. Every year in October, during every Homecoming Week in our school’s history dating back to, like, farmers-doing-it-with-cows-because-they-were-so-bored-and-lonely times, the pole gets all smothered in Vaseline and crap. Then the whole school comes out to the Greek at lunch to watch as teams of three twelfth graders climb on to each other’s shoulders to try to ring that bell.

  No one’s actually done it in a decade, not since my brother and his buddies made history back during his senior year. Every single year it’s supposed to finally happen, and every year it doesn’t. It’s like the Messiah coming back, or Tua learning how to read.

  But this was it. This was our time.

  “Nesto,” I said, “Remember, when you’re up there, don’t look down. And, Titties,” I said to Tua, “when you’re on my shoulders, keep your knees locked. I don’t want your butt all in my face.”

  “Aww, yes, you do, cuz,” Tua said.

  “Only if we ring the bell,” I said. “If we do that, you can put your butt wherever you want.”

  “Okay,” Tua said, grinning. “In that case, I’m rubbing it up on Nikki Foxworth.”

  I mean-mugged him dirty. “You shut your obese, illiterate mouth,” I said. “Nikki is mine.”

  Tua nodded and mouthed the words �
��my bad.”

  “Anyway,” I finished. “Enough about your bloated ass. It’s time to kick the Grease Pole’s ass.”

  “Come on, boys!

  “Let’s get it, Dawgs!

  “LET’S GOOOO!!!!!!”

  With everyone in the whole school still shrieking like horny baboons, me, Ernesto, and Tua stepped across the safety padding and up to the pole.

  The whistle blew and I got low. The three of us decided I’d be base since I’m slightly fatter than Tua, and also because bottom dude seems like the most important dude on the team, and look at me, just look at me, look at my effing belly dog—I’m the man, I’m the man, I’m the man.

  Tua got on my shoulders and I held steady, even though he’s built like the most depressing Weight Watchers “before” picture ever. Then, using the pole for leverage, he slowly stood up straight, and while he did stumble for a sec, which blocked my entire field of vision and gave me a total eclipse of the moon-crack, I somehow kept my balance because I’m the patron saint of cool friggin’ shit.

  Ernesto had problems getting up too, but I kept barking orders at him, and he scrambled up my back, and eventually Tua’s as well. I couldn’t look up because I didn’t want to strain my neck, but I knew he was close to the bell. I could hear everyone around me getting loud, like real loud, like louder than they got when we advanced to CIF semis last year, like louder than whenever DeSean flashes his fake asshole smile at a pep rally, like so loud it felt like time was slowing down, so loud I knew my life was about to change—

  And I heard it! I heard that angelic sound. I heard the ring of that goddamned glorious bell, and I heard everyone going crazy, and I got the biggest life boner, and I felt like a gladiator superhero porn star god—

  And in that moment, come on, I had to do it. I had to gaze out and see my people—

  My backup linemen, Cody, Hector, and Ian—aka Grundle Boy, Chalupa, and Scrotum Face, aka Scrotes. They were all so into it, and Scrotes was humping the air for some reason, which is so Scrotes—

  The rally girls, the cheerleaders and dance team chicks, they were so stoked too, especially Mona Omidi—aka the Moaner—who was staring at me eyes all wide, mouth all open, ready to lick her lips and taste the Big Mack, but I’m not going anywhere near the Moaner as long as I have a chance with—

  Nikki Foxworth, my personal rally girl, not to mention my special lady of the moment, who I didn’t spot sitting with the other girls, which meant she was probs behind me, snapping pictures of my ass, which she called cute the other day—true story, haterzzz—

  And speaking of haterz, where was DeSean Weems, because I had to peep the look on his face, I just had to, so I turned my head, more to the left this time, and I saw the back row of benches, and I didn’t see him at first, but then I spotted him, but it was kind of annoying, since DeSean was turned away from me, because he had someone next to him—a girl, big shocker, a brunette I think, and he was getting kinda handsy with her, and it looked like—wait, punch me right in the diddle—was that—?

  And that’s all I remember for the next few minutes.

  That’s when five hundred pounds of offensive lineman came crashing on my head.

  I must have spaced for a sec there, watching DeSean, and when I lost my focus, I guess my body just gave. I staggered backward, and that little hitch made Tua lose his balance, only instead of falling back, Tua fell forward, because all of Tua’s weight is located in his tits, and so with Nesto tumbling on top of him, Tua and his dirty pillows came crashing onto me, and as all that double fatness plummeted my way, Tua kneed me in the forehead.

  I didn’t wake up at first. Not for, like, ninety seconds. Nesto told me everyone held their breath the whole time, because what if I was dead—or worse, given the big game—injured.

  And when I eventually came to, some rando adults made me answer basic math questions, like a special needs turtle from a stupid app for babies.

  And in fifth and sixth period I couldn’t pay attention, because everywhere I looked I saw fuzzy little stars, and I kept hearing this weird-ass rumbling, like God had tummy troubles.

  And after school at practice, I missed five or six easy blocks, and I poured my Gatorade on my chin instead of in my mouth, and DeSean tattled to Coach Dent about how I’d done the Grease Pole without team permission, that goddamn glory boy snitch.

  And that’s the story of how I ended up in Coach’s office this afternoon.

  That’s how my Concussion Baby was born.

  • • •

  “So . . . you think you can suit up Friday?”

  “I dunno,” I said. “I dunno.”

  “Well, how are you feeling?” Coach said. “Because that’s the most important thing, son.”

  I shrugged. “I dunno. I—”

  “But you know,” Coach continued, adjusting his visor and leaning forward. “This here’s a crucial game. Lagunita’s only a game behind us in League, so we need this thing if we want a shot at CIF.”

  “I know,” I said. “And—”

  “And it’s quite a moment for DeSean, too. He’s going to have scouts there from USC, UCLA, and Oregon. You realize that? USC, UCLA, and Oregon. It’d sure be great if he had his Big Mack out there, protecting his blind side.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “Yeah—”

  “And you remember what happened last year, of course. You making that whole big deal out of one little hammy tweak. You choosing to sit out semis even though the doctors said you were good to go. I’m sure you, ah, remember how that went for us.”

  I didn’t say anything. I just sat there in the office, surrounded by all that memorabilia, Coach staring lasers at me, my brain throbbing like a mofo, my mouth hanging open like a fool.

  “So, what’ll it be, son? Don’t you want to redeem yourself?

  “Don’t you want to help your friend out?

  “Don’t you love the game of football?

  “What’ll it be, Big Mack?

  “What’ll it be, Brian?

  “What’ll it be?”

  ALLEGRA REY

  I felt unkind being so secretly judgmental toward everyone around me, but when I was sitting in the Greek at lunch today, I couldn’t help but observe that all of the people were behaving exactly like little groups of animals as they gossiped and ate their food and waited for the Grease Pole competition to start. So I did what I always do when I’m waiting for Wiley to show up somewhere:

  I composed a mental challenge for myself.

  “A pride of lions.

  “A herd of buffalo.

  “A gaggle of geese.

  “A murder of ravens.

  “An implausibility of gnus.”

  “Are you okay?” Wiley said as he plopped his backpack down and took a seat next to me, proceeding to open up and simultaneously inhale his Nutter Butters and Fanta—

  Oops, there it is. I’m judging again.

  “I’m fine,” I said. “I’m thinking of animal collectives. I’m attempting to see how many I can name.”

  “Oh . . . ,” Wiley said. “Well, I don’t know what animal whatevers are, but do you mean, like, um . . . a lameness of freshmen?”

  “Ooh, that’s a great idea!” I said. “I was actually thinking up real ones, but let’s do that instead—let’s invent high school collectives!”

  “Okay,” Wiley said, smiling.

  “A glitter of theater kids,” I said.

  “A Hot Cheetos bag of stoners,” Wiley said.

  “An indifference of hipsters,” I said.

  “A vomiting of cheerleaders,” Wiley said.

  “A meat processing plant of football players,” I said.

  “An awesomeness of band geeks,” Wiley said.

  “A super-awesomeness of band geeks!” I elaborated.

  “AN ORGY OF BAND GEEKS!!!” Wiley stood on the bench and bellowed, far more than a little too loudly.

  Everybody within a ten-foot radius of our spot immediately turned around and shushed us, eyebrows arched in int
ense disdain. Apparently we’d out-animaled even the most bestial of high school animals, right as they were attempting to watch their primal phallic ritual. I felt so embarrassed.

  “So sorry,” I whispered to no one in particular. “Come on, Wiley. Let’s go, before people shush us again.”

  “We’re fine,” he said. “No one cares.”

  “I care.”

  “But I wanna see Big Mack fall on his fat ass!”

  “There’ll be plenty of that on Friday night,” I said. “Are you coming with me or not?”

  “Sweeten the offer.”

  “What if I . . . let you pick our after-homework movie?”

  Wiley snapped his fingers. “Now we’re talking. I’m kind of in an eighties mood, so maybe Teen Witch? Or Top Gun? Oh, but you’ve never seen Election, right? You’d like it. It’s about an overachiever who dominates everything in her path, not that you could relate. Hmm . . . I haven’t watched a good puppet movie in a while. What are your thoughts on puppet sex?”

  He regarded me very intently as he awaited my thoughts on puppet sex. I looked back at him like, you are too preposterous. Wiley took a final swig of his Fanta, the residue of which dyed his wispy pseudo-mustache a vivid shade of traffic-cone orange. I shook my head and grinned.

  “Come on,” I said. “And wipe your mouth.”

  • • •

  The rest of the afternoon proceeded in typical fashion, with me checking items off my to-do list while Wiley tagged along. Before lunch ended, I stopped in with Cole Martin-Hammer to discuss Interact Club logistics and confirm this week’s Philanthropy Friday at the retirement community. I also made a cameo appearance at Math Club, where the mathletes acted snobbish toward Wiley and wouldn’t allow him to have a slice of pi pie, which led to me giving Wiley my pi pie instead, which was too bad because I’d been looking forward to eating that.

  Next I had AP Chem, in which Mr. Aspell did the sweetest thing by telling me what a pleasure it had been writing my letter of rec for my scholarship applications. I said thank you, and that I would be sure to keep in touch with him next year, hopefully from Stanford.