Nothing Else Matters

by Leslie DuBois

  She couldn’t help it. She just couldn’t understand why he would do something like that.

  “Okay, I guess I deserved that,” he said, holding his nose. “I’m sorry. I just thought it would make you break up with Scott and then I would have a chance with you. I was right.”

  She breathed in deeply trying to restrain herself from punching him again. He was right. She had let racial pressure affect her relationship with Scott. And the racial conflict turned out to be fabricated. Shaking her head she said, “You have to fix this. You have to fix it now. There are a lot of people hurting over this.”

  “What do you want me to do?”

  “Come with me.”

  Chapter 23

  Reyna just didn’t understand me. She didn’t understand that I didn’t have a choice. It’s not like I wanted to play this game. I had to. What was I supposed to do? Go tell Coach or Sam that I didn’t feel good? I would sound like a weak complaining baby. Sam would laugh outright. Coach would just think I was nervous.

  And after reading about Lupus all night, I realized that this might be my final game. No school would want me on their team in my condition. If this was going to be my last game, I was going to make it one to remember.

  When the opposing team made the kick off to us, I noticed Reyna slink onto the sideline and take a seat next to Doc. A tinge of guilt crowded my mind. I was putting her through hell. No matter how much she wanted to avoid this situation, she couldn’t leave me completely. She wanted to make sure I was okay.

  Per Sam’s instructions I was set to play offense, defense, and special teams. This basically meant that I would be on the field all night. An exhausting prospect for any athlete, but especially for me who had doctor’s instructions to not play at all.

  Freddie caught the ball then did a lateral to me. I ran like my life depended on it past defender after defender of Laughlin Academy. My life did kind of depend on it. I couldn’t risk getting tackled. When I made it into the other team’s end zone, the crowd erupted into deafening cheers. I had scored a touchdown within the first minute of the game.

  In the end zone, I leaned over with my hands on my knees trying to catch my breath. It proved more difficult than usual. My chest ached. I thought my lungs would explode. One run down the length of the football field and I was already exhausted. I looked up in the stands and saw my mother sitting in the front row next to an unidentified man who must have been the Notre Dame scout. She pursed her lips into a tight line and gestured for me to move. Apparently, I had been resting too long. I could hear her already calling me weak and lazy during her inevitable half-time tirade.

  I looked over at Reyna. She was on her feet and wore an expression of worry. More for her sake than for my mother’s I got myself together and jogged to the bench.

  ***

  Reyna was ready to pull her hair out. Only five minutes into the game and Scottie already had trouble breathing. How could no one realize this? How could no one see he was in trouble? She glanced over at Amber Freaking Sullivan, who was standing on someone’s shoulders yelling the fight song, and wanted to spit fire at her. How could she date him for two months and know nothing about him? How could she not tell he was in pain?

  Scott went to sit down on the bench for a moment then had to jump back up to play defense. After the first play she could tell his thinking. He was going to play smart and intercept every pass. He was just fast enough to do it. But how long would this last?

  She jumped to her feet when the crowd started screaming. He’d intercepted the ball and was now running toward another touchdown. A member of the other team was right on his tail. Reyna feared the worst. He’d be tackled, collapse a lung, lose oxygen to his brain, have a seizure and die right there on the field. She fought hard to hold back her emotion. Tears threatened to gush forth. She couldn’t breathe. Thankfully, the play ended with Scott running out of bounds. No tackle.

  A time-out was called.

  “Are you okay Reyna?” Doc asked, studying her face.

  She shook her head. “No! I’m not okay. He could die out there.” She couldn’t hold back the tears any longer and cried into Doc’s arms.

  “Come with me,” he said, leading her off the field.

  “I’m not lying, Doc,” she said once they had reached the locker room. “He’s really sick. He’s the one that’s lying because he feels obligated to play. You have to stop him.”

  Doc pinched his chin. He seemed to be studying her words. “I’m inclined to believe you now. I’ve known you for years and I’ve never seen you get this emotional.” He sat down on a bench obviously weighing his options. “The problem is Coach Reed. He’ll never take Scott out of a championship game without a solid reason. Is there any way you can get some kind of proof from Scott’s doctor?”

  Reyna wiped tears from her eyes as she filled with hope. “I’ll find Stu and get his number.” She dashed out of the locker room in search of Stu.

  She found him where he usually hung out during games. Behind the bleachers smoking with his friends. Stu normally didn’t smoke for fear that the nicotine would show up in the urine samples he provided for Scott. But that night, Reyna could tell he was so nervous for his brother, he needed a fix.

  “Stu, I need info on Scott’s doctor. Doc will pull him from the game if I can get an official order.”

  “Here, I have him on speed dial.” Stu tossed his cigarette and fished his phone out of his pocket.

  Thankfully, Dr. Schaeffer was the doctor on call at the medical university hospital. After they paged him, she was able to speak with him directly.

  “What do you mean he’s playing tonight?” he asked once Reyna explained the situation. “I gave him strict instructions not to. He doesn’t understand what he’s dealing with. Let me speak to his coach.”

  Reyna kept one eye on the field as she ran back to the sideline in search of Coach Reed. Scott was in trouble. She could tell he was looking for an opening so he could run it in again. But apparently, Laughlin had decided to shut Scottie down. Three defenders chased him out of the pocket. He searched for a teammate to throw to, but no one was open. Then the unthinkable happened. Scott was sacked. Laughlin Academy’s number 37 barreled directly into Scott’s chest.

  “No!” Reyna screamed.

  The ball flew out of Scott’s hand. Laughlin recovered the fumble and ran toward a touchdown. In the excitement, most people didn’t notice that Scott wasn’t moving.

  “What happened?” Dr. Schaeffer said over the phone.

  “He’s down. He’s not moving. Oh God, he’s not moving.”

  “Okay, listen to me very carefully, Reyna. This is extremely important. If Scott’s not breathing you have to tell —” Just then the phone was knocked out of her hand by a player running onto the field. Reyna dropped to her knees to find the phone as the crowd grew silent realizing something was wrong with Scott. She looked up and saw several players bending over him. One of them took off Scott’s helmet and checked for a pulse.

  Finally, she spied the phone. It had been kicked under the bench. She crawled to it, picked it up then heard Dr. Schaeffer say, “Tension cardiac arrest!”

  “What?”

  “Tension cardiac arrest,” he repeated. “Tell me what’s happening?”

  “Um, someone’s doing CPR.”

  “No! Haven’t you heard anything I’ve said?”

  “I … I dropped the phone.”

  “CPR won’t help! They’re forcing more air into the pleural space and putting more stress on his heart. You have to release the pressure before you do compressions. This is what you have to do … ”

  Following Dr. Schaeffer’s instructions, she grabbed her medical kit from the sideline and a straw from the water station.

  “You have to hurry, Reyna. Scott has four minutes before possible brain damage. And get them to stop CPR before they force him into a heart attack.”

  “Tension cardiac arrest. Stop CPR. Tension Cardiac arrest!” she yelled, pushing her way through
the crowd that had formed around Scott.

  Reyna pulled a knife out of her medical kit ready to do whatever the doctor told her. Just as she got Scott in view, someone knocked her to the ground.

  “Get away from my son. What are you doing to him?” Sam yelled while dragging Reyna away.

  The phone dropped again.

  Reyna pulled her arm free and looked at her watch. It had been over three minutes since Scott went down. She looked over at Scott lying motionless on the field. His lips were turning blue. Oxygen wasn’t getting to his head. He could be brain dead soon.

  “Let her go! She’s right.” She heard Doc yell. He knelt beside Scott and started cutting through his uniform.

  She tried to break free from Sam. She needed to help Scott, but Sam kept pulling her away. Stu appeared out of nowhere and tried to pry Sam’s hands off of Reyna, but he wasn’t strong enough.

  “The phone! Get the phone!” Reyna yelled to Stu. He let go of Sam to find the phone as Reyna continued to struggle with her. Thankfully, Harry and Ben grabbed Sam and held her back, allowing Reyna to get to Scott.

  Stu gave the phone to Doc, whose eyes expanded as he listened to what Dr. Schaeffer said about Scott’s condition. Reyna sat next to him and watched as he slit open Scottie’s chest. As if on cue, she handed him the straw. Once inserted into his chest cavity, fluid and blood shot out causing everyone to gasp. Reyna didn’t react. There wasn’t time to. Once the pressure was released, the Doc gave the okay to start CPR. Reyna breathed life into Scottie’s mouth as the Doc followed with chest compressions.

  Doc and Reyna worked in tandem trying to revive Scott until they heard the sirens of the ambulance pulling up on the field. “We’ll take it from here,” the EMT said gently easing her aside. “Good work.”

  “We have a pulse,” the other paramedic said as they placed Scott on a stretcher.

  Reyna looked down at her blood soaked clothing and fainted.

  Chapter 24

  “So what are we dealing with here? When is he going to be up and about again?” I heard my mother’s voice, but I wasn’t quite sure where we were or who she was talking to.

  “I plan on keeping him here for observation for a couple of weeks. There’s still a danger of him falling into a coma.” I recognized Dr. Schaeffer’s voice. I must have been in the hospital.

  “Weeks? Basketball practice starts on Monday.” I heard Sam start to pace.

  “Ms. Kincaid, do you have any idea how close Scott was to death tonight? If Reyna hadn’t been there he wouldn’t have made it.”

  Reyna? Reyna saved my life?

  “So let’s say he does fall into a coma or dies or something,” Sam said as if she hadn’t heard what the doctor said about Reyna. “Is there any way I can harvest his sperm so he can father my grandchildren?”

  “Excuse me?” was the doctor’s only response. He was probably just as shocked as I was from the question, but unfortunately I couldn’t react. I couldn’t move.

  “Don’t look at me like that. I’m not some sort of monster. I love my son. If he dies, I just want to make sure someone can fulfill all his dreams. It would be a shame to let his talent go to waste. I just want to carry on his legacy.”

  No she didn’t. She just wanted someone in her family to be a famous athlete. She wanted someone with her bloodline to win a gold medal. She knew she wouldn’t get it from Stu. So I was her only hope. Would this woman stop at nothing?

  “I guess you can do that if you want. You’re his mother. You have the power to make his medical decisions in case he’s incapacitated.”

  “I mean, don’t get me wrong, I want him to be okay. I just want to make sure we have a Plan B.”

  I drifted into blackness again.

  ***

  Reyna sat curled up in a couch in the waiting room of the hospital. Still trembling from what had just happened on the field, Stu sat next to her and wrapped his arms around her. Reyna snuggled closer to him and relished the embrace. She would have preferred Scottie’s arms around her at this point, but Stu provided a measurable amount of comfort.

  “He’s gonna be fine. He has to be,” Stu whispered more to himself than to Reyna. He held her tighter then continued to stare at the door that led to where Scott lay.

  She had woken up a little over an hour ago in the Citadel locker room. At first, she couldn’t remember what had transpired, but once she looked down at her blood soaked clothes it all came flooding back to her.

  “Oh my God. Scottie, where’s Scottie?” She jumped up from the bench upon which she was lying. “Is he okay?”

  “He’s at the hospital,” Doc said in a reassuring voice while trying to ease her back down to a lying position.

  She gasped as a vision of herself standing over Scott’s bloodied body appeared in her mind. “Did I hurt him? I messed up didn’t I? I was just trying to help. I made it worse didn’t I?” She started shaking and sobbing.

  “No, Reyna, you saved his life. Because of you, Dr. Schaeffer was able to tell me exactly what to do and I was able to release the pressure in his lungs. If not for you, he would have died on that field.”

  “So, he’s okay? He’s gonna be okay?” She took short shallow breaths trying to keep from hyperventilating as she slowly gained control over her emotions.

  “All I know is that he was breathing when he left here. You’ll need to go to the hospital to find out anything more.”

  “Well, let’s go.” Reyna jumped off the bench ready to dash out of the door.

  “You might not want to go out through the main entrance. There’s a news truck out there waiting for you.”

  “For me? Why?”

  “Are you kidding? Reyna, you’re a hero.”

  “A hero? Please,” she said, wiping tears away from her face. “Look at me. I’m a blubbering idiot. I just did what had to be done. No more, no less.”

  Reyna borrowed one of Scottie’s T-shirts then did her best to scrub the blood off of her white leather pants. She avoided the cameras by taking a side exit, and then didn’t lay off the gas pedal until she made it to the hospital. She found Stu in the waiting room and joined him in the mind numbing, heart-piercing wait to find out about Scott’s condition.

  She hoped for the best and tried not to think of the very plausible possibility that she hadn’t acted fast enough and he’d suffered brain damage. Or worse, that he had slipped into a coma. She stuffed her face into his T-shirt and breathed in his scent. He always smelled like Irish Spring soap and peppermint. She tried to think good thoughts, but no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t make La Cienega smile.

  Reyna didn’t know how long she and Stu sat in that waiting room without word from Sam or the doctor, but eventually, students from the game started filing in. One by one, white and black, they hugged Reyna and Stu and offered their best wishes. Then the team themselves came, still in uniform.

  “We won,” Andrew said. “We won for Scottie.”

  “We know what Amber and Derek did,” A.J. said, speaking for him, Tyrone, and Lawrence. “We’re happy we could get in the game in time to help out.”

  “Where’s Derek?” Reyna asked.

  “He’s feeling pretty guilty about everything right now. If he hadn’t made that banner we wouldn’t have boycotted the game and maybe Scottie wouldn’t have felt so obligated to play,” Lawrence said.

  Reyna nodded, although she wasn’t sure if this was true or not. Scott was so driven to play sports she wasn’t sure if anything would have stopped him. Sometimes she thought he didn’t feel like a worthwhile human being if he wasn’t playing or, better yet, winning a game. She remembered vividly the bouts of self-deprecation and depression he battled with every time he lost. This on top of Sam’s tirades was enough to make any person crazy. She didn’t know how he had dealt with the pressure for so long. It was like he needed to win in order to feel loved. Fortunately, he didn’t have to battle his dark emotions too frequently. He was so good, he rarely lost.

  “I’m sure Derek wil
l come by to talk to you guys later. But it was his idea to give you this,” Lawrence added. The players passed a trophy through the crowd until it reached Reyna’s hand. She hugged it as if it represented everything Scottie was fighting for.

  A sort of vigil started as students spilled out of chairs onto the floor inside and out of the waiting room. It seemed as though the entire population of Charleston Prep was at that hospital praying for Scott. The news vans had migrated from the Citadel field to the hospital parking lot. For the second time in one week, Charleston Preparatory School had headlined the nightly news.

  As the minutes turned to hours, students began to leave. When the crowd thinned, Reyna saw Amber sitting alone on the floor in a corner of the waiting room. Tears smeared her make-up. She may have been psycho, but she probably really loved Scott in her own way. And she seemed truly sorry for the mess she had caused.

  Reyna approached her. After placing her arm around her, Amber broke down in tears. “I’m so sorry for everything, Reyna. I’m not really like this. I’m not some racist psycho. I don’t even care about the election. I just wanted Scott. I…I knew the banner would freak you out. I had no right. I was just so jealous of what you and Scott had. I wanted him to look at me the way he looks at you. Can you ever forgive me?”

  “I already have,” Reyna answered.

  Chapter 25

  I awoke to more voices floating around me. I heard Sam again. The sound of her voice made me cringe inside. I wanted to crawl deeper into the blackness, but then I heard Reyna. I wanted her closer to me. I wanted to touch her, to feel her skin against mine again. I wondered if she was still mad at me for how I’d treated her in the locker room before the game. No, she could never stay angry with me for long. She swore she would never talk to me again after I stood her up for the seventh grade dance, but that didn’t last.

  I remembered getting ready for that dance. I had rented a tuxedo, but decided it looked too dorky so instead I wore just the jacket with a pair of khakis and a Carolina Panthers Jersey. I looked pretty good if I do say so myself. I had even bought Reyna a corsage. I was all ready to go and so excited that I would get to dance with Reyna all night. I wanted to hold her close and smell her coconut scented hair. I liked her so much. But when I asked Sam to take me to school that night, she refused once I told her I was going with Reyna. Instead, I got a lecture from her about my future responsibilities as a star athlete. I had a reputation to maintain. That reputation didn’t include Reyna.