“Don’t care if you do or you don’t,” Carter replies. He pushes the door open, holding it for me. “All I care about is winning the championship and that means you’re on the field and not in the stands. However you go about doing that is none of my concern. If you fuck up, then we’ll talk.”
He tilts his head and waits for me to go, but I’m not ready. Not until I have my own say. “You already gave me this lecture when you recruited me last spring, remember?”
Carter showed up at the gas station where I was working and asked me if I was going to fill tanks all my life or if I wanted something better. I told him to fuck off but the asshole kept showing up. He eventually wore me down with the promise that he could raise my stats high enough to get a look from a Division One football team. All I needed was a decent quarterback which was him, of course. What sucked was that he was right. I didn’t have a decent quarterback and unless someone threw me the damn ball, I couldn’t do shit. One night of viewing his videos on Youtube convinced me that I should transfer. I made up my mind fast.
“Yeah, some people need a refresher is all,” he says, chin out.
“Not me or maybe you haven’t been paying attention in practice.” You only have to tell me once how to run a route or execute a play and he should know that by now.
Carter dips that obnoxious chin in acknowledgment. “You’re right. Sorry.”
“You two done having your love fest so that the rest of us can leave? I want to get a BJ from one of the cheer squad before class,” Mason LeFleur complains from behind me. Mason is our resident manwhore. The guy seriously cannot function without a mouth on his dick every other hour. I think he has a problem.
“You only have ten minutes before shop starts,” Carter reminds him.
How he keeps everyone’s schedules straight, I’ll never know. As Mason argues that shop isn’t a real class since you’re required to just produce one project by the end of the semester, I slip out.
“Careful of the girl, too,” Carter calls after me. “Team rules.”
I flip him off. I’ve heard that lecture too. Bros before ho’s, he said. That’s the pledge we all make. Not that the girls are ho’s, of course, but that the team comes first. Always, which is why he said “team rules,” which is code for don’t do anything that fucks with the team.
I’m good at multitasking, though, so I’m not worried about securing both the girl and the trophy. Winners win and I’m a winner. And today, winning starts with meeting \Alice. Thanks to Carter, I have a name and a class schedule. She’s also taking honors English. In fact, her class schedule is eerily like mine except she’s taking two more science classes than I am. I hate science and would rather stab myself in the eye than sit through advanced classes about that shit. I like reading, arguing, and art, which makes us perfect complements to each other. When I reach the front steps, there’s a horde of guys sitting along the stone barricades.
“What’s going on?” I ask a pimply-faced underclassman. I know he’s younger than me by the way that he immediately steps to the side and gives me space.
“Ah, we’re waiting.”
“For what?”
“For the girls.”
“For the girls to do what?” I scan the grounds. There aren’t any girls. It’s like a sausage convention on the stairs.
“For the girls to arrive.”
“Are you fucking kidding me?” Every single one of these assholes is sitting here waiting for the girls of FU to roll up in their cars? What a mess. I don’t want Alice to go through that her first day. I stroll to the middle of the ding-a-ling convention and place my fingers in my mouth, executing a loud, ear-piercing whistle. Everyone snaps to attention. I spot a couple of junior varsity players and point my fingers at them. “Get every one of these dickheads inside.”
They don’t move. I clap my hands. “Now. Team rules.”
The JV boys scramble into gear and in the next minute, the stone steps are clear. I walk down the wide staircase to the sidewalk and wait. At any minute, she should be pulling up. I inspect the cars—the Rolls Royces, the Bentleys, the Beemers, the Mercedes. Toward the end of the line is one white Tesla. My favorite car. I’ve had my eye on those since it was released. Someday, after I sign my big NFL paycheck, I’m buying one—and whatever else Alice wants. The line moves slow as the students spill out of their cars and move on into the school. Some are surprised that there’s no one waiting. Some give me odd looks. I pay zero attention to any of them as I’m focused on finding one single girl.