Jockblocked: A Novel (Gridiron Book 2)(17)
I look at it from all angles. Every. Single. Angle.
Me, I’m a one angle kind of guy. As in, the easiest option available to me. The path of least resistance.
This particular issue needs more finesse. Coach wants me to persuade Ace to give up the quarterback position, for f*ck’s sake. And to persuade the guys—including the offense, who are rabidly loyal to their QB—to support this course of action. They say you can’t make an omelet without breaking a few eggs, but in this case, I’m smashing the entire frickin’ carton. There’s no way to do this without pissing off some, if not all, of my teammates.
And seriously, when did I become the omelet chef in this scenario? I’m not sure I even want to be captain, dammit. Responsibility makes the back of my neck itch. I’d much rather be one of the happy, oblivious sheep than the stressed-out shepherd who has to guide them.
Except…the thing is, I can’t say no, not when it comes to football. This sport is in my blood. I live and breathe it. I’m good at it. And, corny as it sounds, I think I was meant for it.
I wasn’t ever supposed to play football. I’d been born prematurely, with a weak heart, having been nourished for the last twenty or so weeks in the womb by only a tiny bit of placenta. The rest had detached from the uterine wall. I was lucky to be alive.
My mom coddled me, and my dad watched me with worried eyes. I didn’t look like I could run a mile, let alone deliver a hard hit, until I was fifteen.
Somewhere along the line, I shot up like an unchecked weed. Filled out. Starting lifting and took to football as if I were weaned on Gatorade and leather.
One reason I’m so good on the football field is my uncanny instinct to know exactly which weakness I can exploit in the easiest, most economical way, ensuring that my hits at the end of the game are as hard as the ones at the beginning. Part of it comes from hours of film study, which helps me to immediately recognize what play is going to be run based on the position of the offensive players. The other part is God-given talent.
I operate the same way off the field. I don’t have to analyze or overthink the dilemma but just pick the solution that makes the problem go away the fastest. There’s no film study for life. Or if there is, I haven’t found it.
This is why, for the last four hours, I’ve been watching videos of Mr. Texas. The captain’s patch is currently burning a hole in my desk drawer, but I don’t want the captaincy bad enough to dick over my quarterback. I might not always love what Ace does on the field. There’ve been a few games when the offense couldn’t generate more than thirteen points and made the load on the defense f*cking hard. And even though we won those games, a few of us grumbled under our breath. But thinking you’d like to kick your quarterback in the ass is one thing; doing it is entirely different.
Hammer studies me and comes to some inebriated conclusion that requires him to drag my reading chair from by the window over to the desk.
He folds his hands and gives me a serious look. “Do you have a f*cking test or something? You can’t be failing any classes yet. The semester just started two weeks ago.”
“I’m not failing anything. You smell like you took a bath in a tub of vodka, Hammer.” I wave a hand in front of my nose. “Where were you?”
He lifts his shirt and sniffs. “Fuck, I can’t smell anything. Do I really stink, because I got a girl coming over in”—he checks his phone—“ninety minutes.”
“Then you best go take a shower.” Anything to get him out of here.
“Nah, I mean, if you got a problem, brother, then I can meet up with this chick later.” He types something into his phone and looks up at me with bleary eyes.
Damn, he’s a good friend, and frankly, I need someone to share this shit with. As soon as this recruit signs his intent papers, it’s going to be all over the news anyway. But…I’d rather talk to a sober Hammer. It’s hard to tell with him. His capacity for alcohol is kind of shocking.
“How much of your stink is from your drinking and how much is just from you rolling around on the floor of the Tau Omega house?”
He throws up his size fifteens onto the desk, and I push them off. “I had four shots.”
Four shots is sober for Hammer. I wheel away from desk and turn around. “Come here.”
He leans over, one hand braced against the desk. “Please tell me we’re watching porn.”
“With you hovering over me like a mother on her first recruiting visit? I’m not even going to watch a cooking video with you this close.”
“Mmm. You know I love me some Giada De Laurentiis. That chick is a f*cking goddess.”
“Swear to God, you touch your dick right now and I’m going to punch you in the nuts.” I click through my list of previously played videos and pick the one where Mr. Texas played the worst. He only passed for 240 yards that game, and his team only won by twenty-two points. Only.
Hammer makes a grunt of annoyance when the video starts playing. “Shit, son, are you so bored during the off-season that you’ve resorted to watching highlights of North Arlington High? This is what you’re blowing me off for? Jerking off to some high school player in Texas—” He stops talking when the quarterback slides out of the defender’s grip, steps up into the pocket and releases an arrow thirty yards downfield off his back foot. “Wait, what did I just see?”