Take a Look At Yourself

Today was the day. I was facing off against my sister’s boyfriend, and Carmen was taking on her rapist. It would be sweet, sweet victory if we actual got to hurt Chad. The only way we could do that would be to beat him on the field.

Truth be told, I was surprised we were playing at all. Ever since that article had come out, we were entirely different people. Half of the time, we were barely playing as a team. Coach Peterson hadn’t really done anything to help bring up our moral either. Granted, the article never made it out thanks to Carmen’s down, but we all felt the effects of it.

Brian had actually started drinking again. He was back on a downward spiral. All of us mentioned in the article were. Mike’s entire game was off. He hadn’t thrown an accurate ball in several days. Johnny didn’t want to do anything but his homework. Zacky was avoiding everyone and not showering in the locker rooms. Carmen was moody. It was like I was the only one that was okay. And that sucked.

Pulling on my helmet, I made my way to the field. This was our last game before bowl season. If we won, we would be playing against Alabama. If we lost, we would be playing against Oregon. It wasn’t a situation where this game mattered in the long run. But, it mattered to me. Winning this game would be the catalyst to my plan.

The crowd road as our orange jerseys came out. We weren’t spirited. I wasn’t sure they could tell. Coach made some motions and onto the field we all went. The entire game felt different. It was like we were individuals working individually as opposed to the team we normally were. This game already felt off. I honestly knew we were going to lose.
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Fourteen minutes left in the game, and we were down fourteen to twenty-eight. I had no idea how we even got on the board. I had no idea how we were even playing defense. There was so much running through all of our heads. Carmen refused to even come on the field. She would just flip off Peterson and sit on the bench.

I watched as our defense took on Chad. So much of me wanted to be on the field and tackling that bastard. After what Carmen had told me, all I wanted to do was fuck that dude up. It made you the worst scum of the earth to rape anyone.

The whistle blew and I saw the perfect passing arm that was Chad’s arm. Another touchdown for UCLA. Half the arena had already left, knowing we would never come back from this. We just weren’t a football team anymore. Half of us hated each other, and the other half had personal crises going on. Not to mention, we were all still reeling from Carmen being here.

“Well, we’re fucked,” Brian said and set his helmet down. “Why are we even going to try for a bowl game in the next couple of weeks? We’re gonna lose that one too.”

I looked over at my best friend. “Doesn’t matter. Bring the guys over after the game. I need to talk to you guys about something important.”

He nodded and looked back at the field. We had no idea what was going to happen after this, but I don’t think any of us cared. Football used to be our lives. Then Mike had come along and turned it upside down. If he had just let Carmen’s antics go, we would all be okay. I would never had to have learned her secret. It was a hard secret to bare.
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So, we lost. We knew we would. Coach didn’t even have to talk to us. He just stared, knowing he had played a role in our failure. The entire team was off, and we would probably never recover. Next year he could probably beat Alabama. It just wasn’t in our cards this year. We went 13-1. That was as good as we were ever going to be.

Once I was showered and settled into my apartment with a cold beer, I waited for my boys to arrive. We had all grown up together in Huntington Beach. Music had been our lives from ten to eighteen. We had all dabbled in sports… Jimmy had taken a different route than the rest of us, but that was okay. But our parents asked that we pursue school before music. And once we had all been accepted to the same school, music became less of a focus.

I still wrote. The lyrics and the tunes helped me relax, but it was nice. It was my escape in a way football had never been. I should have pursued music instead of computer science. Sometimes that’s just the way it went.

“So, what are we doing here?” Jimmy asked as he grabbed a beer from my fridge. “It feels like we haven’t seen you in forever.”

I watched everyone but Brian grab a beer. He poured himself a glass of water and perched on the end of my couch. At least he had gone with a non-alcoholic beverage this time. Once everyone was content, I made sure I met each of their eyes.

“I know I’ve been MIA lately. We all knew that college would take us down different paths. And after this article bullshit, it just seems like everything has been weird.” I sighed. “I made friends with Carmen Harrison. And since we started hanging out, things have been hectic.”

“Okay, Matt, I really am not in the mood for the beating around the bush game. Just tell us what the fuck we’re doing here.” Zacky glared. He was not the same person after coming out.

“Yeah, no, I understand. We need to pull the Gregory stunt from high school.”

Four pairs of eyes looked at me. They knew I meant business that I was bringing up that particular time from our lives.

“Why?” Johnny swallowed.

“Harrison was raped by her father, her father’s partner, and her father’s partner’s son.”

Notes

Updating again.