QB 1

by Mike Lupica

  “All the work we’ve done, we done it for a reason.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Coach J said, “But you’ll make a play tonight that has nothin’ to do with the way you’ve prepared, all the time we spent lookin’ at film. It’ll just be about the gift you have to make a play when you have to. That magic I believe you got inside you. Trust it.” Sounding like Nate, another one who’d always talked about magic.

  Then he walked away, and Jake jogged out on the field after Melvin Braxton returned the kickoff to the thirty-five-yard line. On the third play of the game, he scrambled to his right after the pocket started to collapse, started to run out of field, then saw Calvin break free, running down the middle with that great speed of his. Jake had enough time to stop and plant and throw the ball as far as he could. Calvin had to slow up slightly, break stride just a little, waiting for the ball to come out of the night sky and the lights. But once the ball was in his hands, he ran away from everybody for a sixty-yard score. The kick was good. They hadn’t played two minutes yet, and it was already 7–0.

  Calvin came over to Jake on the sideline and said, “It was worse waiting for that ball than it is for class to end. That all you got?”

  Grinning at Jake.

  “Pretty much,” Jake said. Then bumping his helmet on Calvin’s.

  But Coach McCoy was right about this game the way he was right about a lot of things. The Bulldogs did want it, too—did they ever. And they were good. Brett Conroy came right back at them, completing the first seven passes he threw, like he was never going to miss, took his team down the field and finally handed it to Moose Mosedale, who piled in from the one.

  It was 7–7, and Jake was as excited as he’d been coming out of the tunnel, as if the game was starting all over again. This was why you played. This kind of night, this kind of opponent, stakes like these. Didn’t matter whether you grew up in Granger or Redding, Laredo or Huntsville or Abilene. This was the kind of game you grew up seeing somebody else play at the same time you were dreaming about playing it yourself. This was Texas, Jake knew, as much Texas as anything else in the whole big state. This was the town in the stands, families, friends, and strangers alike, every one of them feeling like they were a part of something, that they were going to somehow help you win tonight.

  The defenses settled in after the Redding touchdown and it was still 7–7 at the end of the first quarter.

  It was 14-all at the half.

  By the time the fourth quarter began, the teams were tied again, 21–21, the league championship still out there on that field, waiting for somebody to just take it.

  After giving up that opening touchdown pass, the Bulldogs had been putting double and sometimes triple coverage on Calvin all game long, holding him to just three more catches—none for longer than ten yards. Now, on a third-and-four, four minutes left in the game, Jake faked a handoff to Spence to freeze the linebackers and safeties, and looked up to find Calvin with some daylight on a slant route. It had big play written all over it. But the Bulldog cornerback saw the play developping and closed the gap quickly, just getting a hand in at the last second, knocking the ball loose, incomplete. Another punt for the Cowboys.

  Now Brett Conroy’s chance to eat up some field and maybe the rest of the clock, get another score, and take the night back with him on the bus to Redding. If so, the Bulldogs would be going to the sectional finals and the Cowboys would be going home.

  Jake knew he could be that close to the end of the season, 3:54 showing on the scoreboard clock.

  Brett got his team moving, short passes mostly, out to their forty, then past midfield. Then all the way to the Cowboys’ twenty, third-and-three, a minute-fifty left. Cullen Field was as quiet as it had been all night, Jake standing there at the fifty, nothing to do but watch the other quarterback.

  He’d had a lot of practice at that, watching his brother when he was a high school quarterback, now watching Brett Conroy as he tried to take Jake’s season, maybe before Jake ever got to take another snap.

  Calvin standing there with Jake now.

  “This ain’t the way the movie’s s’posed to end,” Calvin said. “For me or for you, Cullen.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  “Somebody’s got to stand up and make a play,” Calvin said, “so we can get back out there and finish our unfinished business.”

  He said it Texas-style.

  Bidness.

  Of all the players, it was Bear Logan who stood up. The Cowboy defense was expecting a run, the Bulldogs this close to scoring, guessing the offense would play it safe while eating up more of the clock. And sure enough, Brett Conroy put the ball in Moose Mosedale’s belly. But then he pulled it out, straightened up, saw his tight end open in the left flat. What appeared to be a perfect play-action pass.

  Paid no attention to the fact that Bear Logan was spying him.

  Paid no attention to Bear at all, who, despite getting in on a couple of tackles hadn’t done much to make the Bulldogs pay him much mind.

  Bear waited until Brett Conroy released the ball, stepped in front of the Redding tight end, and made the first interception of his life, going all the way back to when he and Jake played Pop Warner together. He didn’t even try to advance it, for fear he’d fumble, just wrapped his arms around the ball and fell to the ground. But when he got up, more excited than Jake had ever seen him on a football field, he held the ball over his head like it was a trophy and got a huge cheer out of the Granger fans.

  Cowboys’ ball at their fifteen-yard line, Jake with two time-outs in his pocket. Minute-forty left. As he ran out on the field with the offense, Bear coming off, Jake took time to wrap his arms as far around him as they’d go.

  “I knew you had it in you, big man.”

  “Well, I sure didn’t know,” Bear said.

  “Can’t believe you didn’t think about puttin’ on a couple of juke moves like you were Calvin.”

  “The only move I got is the one I just showed you. I fell down.”

  Coach Jessup had sent Jake out with four plays: a quick out to Roy, a sideline route to Justice, a screen to Spence, then a deep cross to Calvin if Justice could do his job and legally pick the Redding safety without ever making contact with the kid.

  But Jake didn’t want to wait to put the ball in Calvin’s hands, Despite how tight the Redding D had been playing him.

  He grabbed Calvin when the huddle was breaking, said, “Can you get loose?”

  Calvin just smiled.

  “Sorry,” he said, “I didn’t realize that was a serious question.”

  “Gonna fake it to Roy,” Jake said, “and then see if we can go big.”

  He dropped back into the shotgun, took Nate’s snap, faked a throw to Roy on the left sideline, then rolled to the opposite side. The fake had drawn the extra defenders off Calvin, who streaked across the field and got away with a pro-style shove-off on the safety closest to him. He then broke his route and cut to the inside of the field, running hot. Jake’s throw wobbled a little more than he would have liked. So did Eli Manning’s sometimes. The ball still found Calvin in stride at the forty. Jake thought for a second he might break all the way for a score, but the corner on Justice’s deep route down the right sideline saw what was happening, ended up with a good angle on Calvin, and brought him down from behind at midfield.

  Just like that, they’d cut the field in half, brought the crowd to a roar, and brought a little panic to the Bulldog defense.

  Jake hurried the offense to the line and hit Justice on a sideline route from there, another first down, stopping the clock. He then threw the screen to Spence, who tried to get out of bounds, but couldn’t. Jake had no choice but to burn his second time-out. Thirty seconds left.

  He knew the Bulldogs would be guarding the sidelines tight, so he took a chance and squeezed one in to Calvin over the middle, who took what the
defense gave him and went down.

  Jake immediately called his last time-out.

  Twenty-one seconds left, at the Redding twenty. Too far to count on making a field goal.

  As Jake started toward the sideline, Coach McCoy and Coach J came out to meet him.

  “Spread ’em out,” Coach McCoy said. “Then just pick out the one you like the best.”

  He nodded.

  When Jake got back to the huddle, Nate pushed back his helmet just far enough so that Jake could see the big smile on him.

  Nate said, “This is more fun than eating pie.”

  Jake couldn’t argue with that.

  He spread out his wides and went for it all with Calvin on first down, but overthrew him, the ball sailing overhead. It was the worst throw he’d made all night. The incompletion stopped the clock again.

  On second down, Justice and Roy were covered deep. Calvin was double-teamed, as usual, but recognized that while the defense wasn’t about to let him get into the end zone, there was a soft spot in between. Jake hit him with a bullet at the twelve and Calvin sprinted out of bounds. Clock stopped.

  Third-and-two.

  Ten seconds left. Just enough time to run another quick play and get out of bounds to stop the clock for a field goal attempt. Or going for it all with a play into the end zone.

  Jake looked over at Coach J, who put an index finger up near his nose.

  Number 1.

  Just somehow get the ball to Calvin. There was no logic to Jake’s belief in him, at least right now. The Redding defensive backs, even though a couple of them looked like they were a head shorter, had done the best job covering Calvin that any team had all season. And now the field itself was shorter, giving Calvin less room to improvise—at a time when everyone on the field knew that Jake would be looking for him.

  Maybe his belief was just based on something as simple as this: Calvin would make a play when he had to.

  Jake knelt in the huddle and called the play. Told the guys they were going to complete the pass and walk off the field winners.

  Went with a quick count. Straightened right up. But just as his arm came forward, just as Calvin made his move, the Bulldogs’ middle linebacker, number 50, took a step to his left. Either lucky or smart, it didn’t matter, he was standing where Calvin was headed, and if Jake threw it anyway, he might pick the ball off the way Bear had just intercepted Brett Conroy’s pass.

  Jake pulled the ball down and circled back to his right, arm up, looking for somebody, anybody, to throw it to. But Calvin was still jammed in the middle, Roy Gilley had slipped and fallen in the middle of the end zone, and Justice was in the far corner, covered.

  And then Jake saw a lane.

  Saw that the defense was more afraid that he’d throw than run, the linebackers having backed up, trying to cover everybody at once.

  Jake decided he could beat them all to the pylon.

  Pulled the ball down, stopped faking the throw, and ran to the five-yard line. Then the three.

  Saw a safety coming straight at him, saw number 50 coming from his left. Decided the best thing to do was dive for it, not take a chance on getting hit hard by either one of them, coughing the ball up.

  Jake thought: Let’s see if I can fly.

  He launched himself toward the pylon, not knowing that number 50 had launched himself at the same time, like some kind of missile in a helmet and pads. Jake never saw him coming, didn’t know he was coming until he got hit in midair, felt himself helicoptering around, somehow not twisting around but twisting over, which was why he landed on his back, his helmet snapping hard against the turf, the last thing he remembered as the Friday night lights of Cullen Field went out on him.

  28

  JAKE NEVER BELIEVED HE’D BEEN KNOCKED OUT. THE DOCTORS would tell him later it was just hitting the back of his head, even with the protection of his helmet, that made everything go dark on him, even though he could hear another huge cheer come up out of Cullen Field.

  When he opened his eyes, he saw Coach McCoy looking down at him, and Coach J, and Nate. And Doc Mallozzi.

  But the face closest to Jake belonged to Troy Cullen, looking as scared as Jake had ever seen him, mostly because he’d grown up believing his dad wasn’t scared of anybody or anything.

  “Dad,” Jake said, “what are you doing here?”

  “Where the heck else would I be?” Jake could see the hurt in his face. “My son just got leveled.”

  “Dad, I’m okay.”

  “That’s what I’m down here to find out,” Troy Cullen said in a rough voice. “Was like that boy dropped you out a window ’n’ you landed on your head.”

  In that moment, Jake realized the football was still in his right hand.

  “Did I score?” he said.

  “Yeah,” his dad said. “Yeah, you did.”

  “I’m okay,” Jake said.

  “Course you are,” Troy Cullen said. “You’re my son.”

  Nobody at Cullen who’d seen the play, nobody who’d talk about it all week on the radio, could believe that Jake had managed to hold on to the ball, not after the hit he took and the way he’d spun around in the air—like John Elway in a Super Bowl one time; Jake had seen the play on the NFL Network—and especially the way he’d landed, no time left on the clock.

  Jake?

  He still wouldn’t be able to believe afterward how fast his dad had made it down out of his seat, where he’d apparently been all game, and onto the field, almost as quickly as the coaches and Doc Mallozzi had.

  At home later, when Jake would ask his dad where he’d been before kickoff, Troy Cullen would say, “Can’t a man use a restroom?” and Jake would smile.

  But for now, out on Cullen Field, the lights still shining bright, his dad let Doc Mallozzi take over. Doc asked Jake if he felt well enough to sit up. Jake told him he thought he did, that he just felt a little dizzy, was all.

  Doc and Coach J slowly pulled Jake up to a sitting position, and then Doc started asking him questions, asking him the last thing he remembered, if he remembered the play he’d called, asking him if he’d heard the cheer from the crowd that went up after the refs’ arms went up and signaled the touchdown.

  Jake said he did.

  “How many points you guys score tonight?” Doc asked.

  “Enough to win,” Jake said. “Twenty-seven. Unless everyone’s waiting for an extra point?”

  Doc nodded and shined a light into his right eye, then his left, asking if the light hurt. Jake said, “No. My head hurts a little, is all.”

  “A little or a lot?”

  “Little,” Jake said. “I’m okay, really. Can I stand now and celebrate with my team?”

  Nate and Bear were there, helping Jake slowly to his feet, and it was then that Cullen Field exploded into as big a sound as Jake had ever heard there, for his brother or for anybody else.

  He walked between Nate and Bear up the sideline to the Cowboys’ bench, his dad right behind him with a hand on Jake’s shoulder.

  Jake still had the ball under his right arm, the ref having told him before he left the field to keep it, because he’d by-God earned it.

  Jake watched the scene play out and wondered if he could be dreaming and wide awake at the same time.

  29

  THE HEADACHE BEGAN THE NEXT MORNING WHEN JAKE WOKE up, and it stuck around.

  He should have felt on top of the world. When news came the previous night that Shelby had lost in overtime, Jake went to bed knowing he had quarterbacked the Cowboys all the way back to to playoffs, the sectional final against Sierra that could lead Granger to the state finals.

  Yet, sitting in Doc Mallozzi’s office Saturday afternoon, Jake felt anything but great. Not only was his head pounding, but Doc had just told him that he would have to sit out next week’s game.

  It meant that
if they lost, Jake had lost his own season by winning last night’s game for his team.

  “Jake, it’s a low-grade concussion,” Doc said. “I can’t write it up for Coach McCoy as anything but. And the rules of our league say that if you get even a low-grade concussion, you have to sit out the next week’s game.”

  Jake said, “I feel fine. It’s just a little headache.”

  “No such thing as a little headache after the hit you took. You blacked out for a moment there.”

  Libby Cullen said, “And you were sick to your stomach all last night, even though you never did throw up.”

  Jake was on the examining table, legs hanging over the side, nearly touching the floor. He looked at his mom and said, “Mom, you told?”

  Knowing he sounded like he was ten.

  “Your father played when he shouldn’t have played. You’re not going to.”

  Jake looked over at his dad.

  “She’s right,” he said to Jake.

  Jake said, “You know you would’ve made them let you play, if it was you.”

  “And I’d’ve been dead wrong,” Troy Cullen said. “Those of us who played, in the day, only wish we knew then what we know now. Turned out I was one of the lucky ones, because even as hardheaded as I was about head injuries, I wasn’t so hardheaded that I kept playing after my docs told me that I’d get to the point where I couldn’t remember what I had for breakfast.”

  Jake started to say something. His dad held up a hand.

  “I see how a couple of my teammates ended up,” he said. “I consider myself lucky I only forget some of the things I do, get the headaches I do sometimes.”

  Doc said, “Jake, we haven’t even talked about how sensitive your eyes still are to light today, and how tired you clearly are, even though you tried to give me a head fake and say you weren’t.”

  “It’s a chance to go to the state finals!” Jake said.

  “And if the Cowboys get to the states,” Doc said, “somehow figure out a way to get ’er done without you next week, then we’ll see where we are.”