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Bleachers

By John Grisham

The approach of the 1992 season caused great concern in Messina. The year before the team had lost three games, a civic disaster that had them grumbling over their biscuits at Renfrow’s and rubber chicken at the Rotary lunches and cheap beer at the tonks out in the county. And there had been few seniors on that team, always a bad sign. It was a relief when weak players graduated.

If Rake felt pressure, he certainly didn’t show it. By then he’d been coaching the Spartans for more than three decades and had seen everything. His last state title, number thirteen, had been in 1987, so the locals were suffering through a three-year drought. They’d been through worse. They were spoiled and wanted a hundred wins in a row, and Rake, after thirty-four years, didn’t care what they wanted.

The ‘92 team had little talent, and everyone knew it. The only star was Randy Jaeger, who played corner and wideout, where he caught anything the quarterback could throw near him, which was not very much.

In a town the size of Messina, the talent came in cycles. On the upswing, as in 1987 with Neely, Silo, Paul, Alonzo Taylor, and four vicious loggers on defense, the scores were lopsided. Rake’s greatness, however, was winning with players who were small and slow. He took thin talent and still delivered scores that were lopsided. He worked the lean ones harder, though, and few teams had seen the intensity that Rake brought to the field in August 1992.

After a bad scrimmage on a Saturday afternoon, Rake lashed out at the team and called a Sunday morning practice, something he rarely did because, in years past, it had upset the church folks. Eight o’clock Sunday morning, so that the boys would have time to attend worship, if they were able. Rake was particularly upset over what he perceived to be a lack of conditioning, a joke since every Messina team ran sprints by the hundreds.

Shorts, shoulder pads, gym shoes, helmets, no contact, just conditioning. It was eighty-nine degrees by eight o’clock, with thick humidity and a cloudless sky. They stretched and ran a mile around the track, just for a warm-up. Every player was soaked with sweat when Rake called for a second mile.

Number two on the list of dreaded tortures, just behind the Spartan Marathon, was the assault on the bleachers. Every player knew what it meant, and when Rake yelled, “Bleachers,” half the team wanted to quit.

Following Randy Jaeger, their captain, the players formed a long, reluctant, single line and began a slow jog around the track. When the line approached the visitors’ stands, Jaeger turned through a gate and started up the bleachers, twenty rows, then along the top rail, then down twenty rows to the next section. Eight sections on the other side, then back on the track, around the end zone to the home side. Fifty rows up, along the top rail, fifty rows down, up and down, up and down, up and down, for another eight sections, then back on the track for another loop.

After one grueling round, the linemen were drifting to the rear, and Jaeger, who could run forever, was far in front. Rake growled along the track, whistle hanging around his neck, yelling at the stragglers. He loved the sound of fifty players stomping up and down the bleachers. “You guys are not in shape,” he said, just loud enough to be heard. “Slowest bunch I’ve ever seen,” he grumbled, again, barely audible. Rake was famous for his grumbling, which could always be heard.

After the second round, a tackle fell to the grass and began vomiting. The heavier players were moving slower and slower.

Scotty Reardon was a sophomore special-teams player who weighed in that August at 141 pounds, but, at the time of his autopsy, weighed 129. During the third round of bleachers, he collapsed between the third and fourth rows on the home side, and never regained consciousness.

Since it was Sunday morning, and a no-contact session, both team trainers were absent, at Rake’s instructions. Nor was there an ambulance close by. The boys would describe later how Rake held Scotty’s head in his lap while they waited for an eternity to hear a siren. But he was dead in the bleachers, and he was certainly dead when he finally arrived at the hospital. Heatstroke.

Paul was telling the story as they walked through the winding, shaded lanes of the Messina Cemetery. In a newer section, on the side of a steep hill, the headstones were smaller, the rows neater. He nodded at one and Neely knelt down for a look. Randall Scott Reardon. Born June 20, 1977. Died August 21, 1992.

“And they’re going bury him over there?” Neely asked, pointing to a bare spot next to Scotty.

“That’s the rumor,” Paul said.

“This place is always good for a rumor.”

They walked a few steps to a wrought-iron bench under a small elm tree, sat, and looked at Scotty’s headstone. “Who had the guts to fire him?” Neely asked.

“The wrong kid died. Scotty’s family had some money, from timber. His uncle, John Reardon, was elected Superintendent of Education in ‘89. Very highly regarded, smart as heck, smooth politician, and the only person with the authority to fire Eddie Rake. Fire him he did. The town, as you might guess, was shocked by the news of the death, and as the details came out there was some grumbling about Rake and his methods.”

“Lucky he didn’t kill all of us.”

“An autopsy was done on Monday a clear case of heatstroke. No preexisting conditions. No defects anywhere. A perfectly healthy fifteen-year-old leaves home at seven-thirty on a Sunday morning for a two-hour torture session, and he doesn’t come home. For the first time in the history of this town people were asking, ‘Why, exactly, do you run kids in a sauna until they puke?’”

“And the answer was?”

“Rake had no answers. Rake said nothing. Rake stayed at home and tried to ride out the storm. A lot of people, including many of those who played for him, thought, ‘Well, Rake’s finally killed a boy.’ But a lot of the diehards were saying, ‘Heck, that kid wasn’t tough enough to be a Spartan.’ The town split. It got ugly.”

“I like this Reardon fellow,” Neely said.

“He’s tough. Late Monday night, he called Rake and fired him. Everything blew up Tuesday. Rake, typically, couldn’t stand the thought of losing in any way, so he worked the phones, stirred up the boosters.”

“No remorse?”

“Who knows how he felt? The funeral was a nightmare, as you might guess. All those kids bawling, some fainting. The players wearing green game jerseys. The band playing right along here at the graveside ceremony. Everybody was watching Rake, who looked quite pitiful.”

“Rake was a great actor.”

“And everybody knew it. He’d been fired less than twenty-four hours earlier, so the funeral had the added drama of his departure. Quite a show, and nobody missed it.”

“Wish I’d been here.”

“Where were you?”

“Summer of ‘92? Out West somewhere. Probably Vancouver.”

“The boosters tried to convene a massive meeting on Wednesday in the school gym. Reardon said, ‘Not on this campus.’ So they went to the VFW and had an Eddie Rake revival. Some of the hotheads threatened to cut off the money, boycott the games, picket Reardon’s office, even start a new school, where I guess they would worship Rake.”

“Was Rake there?”

“Oh no. He sent Rabbit. He was content to stay at home and work the phones. He truly believed that he could exert enough pressure to get his job back. But Reardon wasn’t budging. He went to the assistants and named Snake Thomas as the new head coach. Snake declined. Reardon fired him. Donnie Malone said no. Reardon fired him. Quick Upchurch said no. Reardon fired him.”

“I like this guy more and more.”

“Finally, the Griffin brothers said they would fill in until someone was found. They played for Rake in the late seventies “

“I remember them. The pecan orchard.”

“That’s them. Great players, nice guys, and because Rake never changed anything they knew the system, the plays, most of the kids. Friday night rolled around, first game of the season. We were playing Porterville, and the boycott was on. Problem was, nobody wanted to miss the game. Rake’s folks, who were probably in the majority, couldn’t stay away because they wanted the team to get slaughtered. The real fans were there for the right reasons. The place was packed, as always, with complicated loyalties yelling in all directions. The players were pumped. They dedicated the game to Scotty, and won by four touchdowns. A wonderful night. Sad, because of Scotty, and sad because the Rake era was apparently over, but winning is everything.”

“This bench is hard,” Neely said, standing. “Let’s walk.”

“Meanwhile, Rake hired a lawyer. A suit was filed, things got ugly, Reardon held his ground, and the town, though deeply divided, still managed to come together every Friday night. The team played with more guts than I’ve ever seen. Years later, one kid I know said it was such a relief playing football for the sheer fun of it, and not playing out of fear.”

“How beautiful is that?”

“We never knew.”

“No, we didn’t.”

“They won the first eight games. Undefeated. Nothing but pride and guts. There was talk of a state title. There was talk of a new streak. There was talk of paying the Griffins a bunch of money to start a new dynasty. All that crap.”

“Then they lost?”

“Of course. It’s football. A bunch of kids start thinking they’re good, and they get their butts kicked.”

“Who did it?”

“Hermantown.”

“No, not Hermantown! That’s a basketball school.”

Did it right here, in front of ten thousand. Worst game I ever saw. No pride, no guts, just show them the next press clipping. Forget a streak. Forget a state title. Fire the Griffins. Bring back Eddie Rake. Things were sort of okay when we were winning, but that one loss ripped this town apart for years. And when we lost the next week we failed to qualify for the playoffs. The Griffins quit immediately.”

“Smart boys.”

“Those of us who played for Rake were caught in the middle. Everyone asked, ‘Which side are you on?’ No fence straddling, bud, you had to declare if you were for Rake or against him.”

“And you?”

“I straddled the fence and got kicked on both sides. It turned into class warfare. There had always been a very small group of people who were opposed to spending more money on football than on science and math combined. We traveled by chartered bus while every academic club carpooled with their parents. For years the girls had no softball field, while we had not one but two practice fields. The Latin Club qualified for a trip to New York but couldn’t afford it; the same year the football team took the train to watch the Super Bowl in New Orleans. The list is endless. Rake’s firing made these complaints louder. The folks who wanted to deemphasize sports saw their opportunity. The football bubbas resisted; they just wanted Rake and another streak. Those of us who played, then went to college and were considered somewhat enlightened, got caught in the middle.”

“What happened?”

“It smoldered and festered for months. John Reardon stood firm. He found some lost soul from Oklahoma who wanted to coach, and hired him as the successor to Eddie Rake. Unfortunately, ‘93 was reelection year for Reardon, so the whole mess turned into one huge political brawl. There was a strong rumor that Rake himself would run against Reardon. If he got elected, he would anoint himself Coach again and tell the whole world to go to heck. There was a rumor that Scotty’s father would spend a million bucks to reelect John Reardon. And so on. The race was ugly before it started, so ugly that the Rake camp almost couldn’t find a candidate.”

“Who ran?”

“Dudley Bumpus.”

“The name sounds promising.”

“The name was the best part. He’s a local real estate swinger who’d been a big mouth in the boosters. No political experience, no educational experience, barely finished college. Only one indictment, no conviction. A loser who almost won.”

“Reardon held on?”

“By sixty votes. The turnout was the largest in the county’s history, almost ninety percent. It was a war with no prisoners. When the winner was announced, Rake went home, locked the door, and hid for two years.”

They stopped at a row of headstones. Paul walked along them, looking for someone. “Here,” he said, pointing. “David Lee Goff. The first Spartan to die in Vietnam.”

Neely looked at the headstone. There was an inlaid photograph of David Lee, looking all of sixteen years old, posing not in an Army uniform or a senior portrait, but in his green Spartan jersey, number 22. Born in 1950, killed in 1968. “I know his youngest brother,” Paul was saying. “David Lee graduated in May, entered boot camp in June, arrived in Vietnam in October, died the day after Thanksgiving. Eighteen years and two months old.”

“Two years before we were born.”

“Something like that. There was another one who hasn’t been found yet. A black kid, Marvin Rudd, who went missing in action in 1970.”

“I remember Rake talking about Rudd,” Neely said. “Rake loved the kid. His parents still come to every game, and you wonder what they’re thinking.”

“I’m tired of death,” Neely said. “Let’s go.”

* * *

Neely couldn’t remember a bookshop in Messina, nor a place to get an espresso or buy coffee beans from Kenya. Nat’s Place now provided all three, along with magazines, cigars, CDs, off-color greeting cards, herbal teas of dubious origin, vegetarian sandwiches and soups, and a meeting place for drifting poets and folksingers and the few wanna-be bohemians in the town. It was on the square, four doors down from Paul’s bank, in a building that sold feed and fertilizer when Neely was a kid. Paul had some loans to make, so Neely explored by himself.

Nat Sawyer was the worst punter in the history of Spartan football. His average yards per kick had set record lows, and he fumbled so many snaps that Rake would normally just go for it on fourth and eight, regardless of where the ball was. With Neely at quarterback, a good punter was not a necessity.

Twice, during their senior year, Nat had somehow managed to miss the ball with his foot entirely, creating some of the most watched video footage in the program’s history. The second miss, which was actually two misses on the same punt, resulted in a comical ninety-four-yard touchdown run, which lasted, according to an accurate timing of the video, 17.3 seconds. Standing in his own end zone, and quite nervous about it, Nat had taken the snap, released the ball, kicked nothing but air, then been slaughtered by two defenders from Grove City. As the bail was spinning benignly on the ground nearby, Nat collected himself, picked it up, and began to run. The two defenders, who appeared to be stunned, gave a confused chase, and Nat tried an awkward punt-on-the-fly. When he missed, he picked up the ball again, and the race was on. The sight of such an ungainly gazelle lumbering down the field, in sheer terror, froze many of the players from both teams. Silo Mooney later testifed that he was laughing so hard he couldn’t block for his punter. He swore he heard laughter coming from under the helmets of the Grove City players.

From the video, the coaches counted ten missed tackles. When Nat finally reached the end zone, he spiked the ball, didn’t care about the penalty, ripped off his helmet, and rushed to the home side so the fans could admire him at close range.

Rake gave him an award for the Ugliest Touchdown of the Year.

In the tenth grade, Nat had tried playing safety, but he couldn’t run and hated to hit. In the eleventh, he had tried receiver, but Neely nailed him in the gut on a slant and Nat couldn’t breathe for five minutes. Few of Rake’s players had been cursed with so little talent. None of Rake’s players looked worse in a uniform.

The window was filled with books and advertised coffee and lunch. The door squeaked, a bell rattled, and for a moment Neely was stepping back in time. Then he got the first whiff of incense, and he knew Nat ran the place. The owner himself, hauling a stack of books, stepped from between two saggy shelves, and with a smile, said, “Good morning. Lookin’ for something?”

Then he froze and the books fell to the floor. “Neely Crenshaw!” He lunged with as much awkwardness as he’d used punting a football, and the two embraced, a clumsy hug in which Neely caught a sharp elbow on his bicep. “It’s great to see you!” Nat gushed, and for a second his eyes were wet.

“Good to see you, Nat,” Neely said, slightly embarrassed. Fortunately, at that moment, there was only one other customer.

“You’re looking at my earrings, aren’t you?” Nat said, taking a step back.

“Well, yes, you have quite a collection.” Each ear was loaded with at least five silver rings.

“First male earrings in Messina, how about that? And the first ponytail. And the first openly gay downtown merchant. Aren’t you proud of me?” Nat was flipping his long black hair to show off his ponytail.

“Sure, Nat. You’re looking good.”

Nat was sizing him up, from head to toe, his eyes flashing as if he’d been guzzling espresso for hours. “How’s your knee?” he asked, glancing around as if the injury was a secret.

“Gone for good, Nat.”

“Sonofabiscuit hit you late. I saw it.” Nat had the authority of someone standing on the sideline that day at Tech.

“A long time ago, Nat. In another life.”

“How about some coffee? I got some stuff from Guatemala that gives one helluva buzz.”

They wove through shelves and racks to the rear where an impromptu cafe materialized. Nat walked, almost ran, behind a cluttered counter and began slinging utensils. Neely straddled a stool and watched. Nothing Nat did was graceful.

“They say he’s got less than twenty-four hours,” Nat said, rinsing a small pot.

“Rumors are always reliable around here, especially about Rake.”

“No, this came from someone inside the house.” The challenge in Messina was not to have the latest rumor, but to have the best source. “Wanna cigar? I got some smuggled Cubans. Another great buzz.”

“No thanks. I don’t smoke.”

Nat was pouring water into a large, Italian-made machine. “What kinda work you doing?” he asked over his shoulder.

“Real estate.”

“Man, that’s original.”

“Pays the bills. Pretty cool store you have here, Nat. Curry tells me you’re doing well.”

“I’m just trying to breathe some culture into this desert. Paul loaned me thirty thousand bucks to get started, can you believe that? I had nothing but an idea, and eight hundred bucks, and, of course, my mother was willing to sign the note.”

“How’s she doing?”

“Great, thanks. She refuses to age. Still teaching the third grade.”

When the coffee was brewing properly, Nat leaned next to the small sink and stroked his bushy mustache. “Rake’s gonna die, Neely, can you believe that? Messina without Eddie Rake. He started coaching here forty-four years ago. Half the people in this county weren’t born then.”

“Have you seen him?”

“He was in here a lot, but when he got sick he went home to die. Nobody’s seen Rake in six months.”

Neely glanced around. “Rake was here?”

“Rake was my first customer. He encouraged me to open this place, gave me the standard pep talk have no fear, work harder than the other guy, never say die the usual halftime rah-rah. When I opened, he liked to sneak down here in the mornings for coffee. Guess he figured he was safe because there wasn’t exactly a crowd. Most of the yokels thought they’d catch AIDS when they walked in the front door.”

“When did you open?”

“Seven and a half years ago. Couldn’t pay the light bill for the first two years, then it slowly came around. Rumor spread that this was Rake’s favorite place, so the town got curious.”

“I think the coffee’s ready,” Neely said as the machine hissed. “I never saw Rake read a book.”

Nat poured two small cups, on saucers, and placed them on the counter.

“Smells potent,” Neely said.

“It ought to require a prescription. Rake asked me one day what he might like to read. I gave him a Raymond Chandler. He came back the next day and asked for another. He loved the stuff. Then I gave him Dashiell Hammett. Then he went nuts over Elmore Leonard. I open at eight, one of the very few bookstores to do so, and once or twice a week Rake would come in early. We’d sit in the corner over there and talk about books; never football or politics, never gossip. Just books. He loved the detective stories. When we heard the bell ring on the front door, he would sneak out the back and go home.”

“Why?”

Nat took a long sip of coffee, with the small cup disappearing into the depths of his unruly mustache. “We didn’t talk about it much. Rake was embarrassed because he got sacked like that. He has enormous pride, something he taught us. But he also felt responsible for Scotty’s death. A lot of people blamed him, and they always will. That’s some serious baggage, man. You like the coffee?”

“Very strong. You miss him?”

Another slow sip. “How can you not miss Rake once you’ve played for him? I see his face every day. I hear his voice. I can smell him sweating. I can feel him hitting me, with no pads on. I can imitate his growl, his grumbling, his biscuiting. I remember his stories, his speeches, his lessons. I remember all forty plays and all thirty-eight games when I wore the jersey. My father died four years ago and I loved him dearly, but, and this is hard to say, he had less influence on me than Eddie Rake.” Nat paused in mid-thought just long enough to pour more coffee. “Later, when I opened this place and got to know him as something other than a legend, when I wasn’t worried about getting screamed at for screwing up, I grew to adore the old fart. Eddie Rake’s not a sweet man, but he is human. He suffered greatly after Scotty’s death, and he had no one to turn to. He prayed a lot, went to Mass every morning. I think fiction helped him; it was a new world. He got lost in books, hundreds of them, maybe thousands.” A quick sip. “I miss him, sitting over there, talking about books and authors so he wouldn’t have to talk about football.”

The bell on the front door rattled softly in the distance. Nat shrugged it off and said, “They’ll find us. You want a muffin or something?”

“No. I ate at Renfrow’s. Everything’s the same there. Same grease, same menu, same flies.”

“Same bubbas sitting around biscuitin’ ’cause the team ain’t undefeated.”

“Yep. You go to the games?”

“Naw. When you’re the only openly gay dude in a town like this, you don’t enjoy crowds. People stare and point and whisper and grab their children, and, while I’m used to it, I’d rather avoid the scene. And I’d either go alone, which is no fun, or I’d take a date, which would stop the game. Can you imagine me walking in with some cute boy, holding hands? They’d stone us.”

“How’d you manage to come out of the closet in this town?”

Nat put the coffee down and thrust his hands deep into the pockets of his highly starched and pressed jeans.

“Not here, man. After we graduated, I sort of migrated to D.C., where it didn’t take me long to figure out who I am and what I am. I didn’t sneak out of the closet, Neely, I kicked the darn door down. I got a job in a bookstore and learned the business. I lived the wild life for five years, had a ball, but then I got tired of the city. Frankly, I got homesick. My dad’s health was declining, and I needed to come home. I had a long talk with Rake. I told him the truth. Eddie Rake was the first person here I confided in.”

“What was his reaction?”

“He said he didn’t know much about gay people, but if I knew who I was, then to heck with everybody else. ‘Go live your life, son,’ he said. ‘Some folks’ll hate you, some folks’ll love you, most folks haven’t made up their minds. It’s up to you.’ “

“Sounds like Rake.”

“He gave me the courage, man. Then he convinced me to open this place, and when I was sure I had made a huge blunder, Rake started hanging around here and word spread. Just a second. Don’t leave.” Nat loped away toward the front where an elderly lady was waiting. He called her by name, in a voice that couldn’t have been sweeter, and soon they were lost in a search for a book.

Neely walked around the counter and poured himself another cup of the brew. When Nat returned he said, “That was Mrs. Underwood, used to run the cleaners.”

“I remember.”

“A hundred ten years old and she likes erotic westerns. Go figure. You learn all sorts of good stuff when you run a bookshop. She figures she can buy from me because I have secrets of my own. Plus, at a hundred and ten, she probably doesn’t give a darn anymore.”

Nat put a massive blueberry muffin on a plate and laid it on the counter. “Dig in,” he said, breaking it in half. Neely picked up a small piece.

“You bake this stuff?” Neely asked.

“Every morning. I buy it frozen, bake it in the oven. No-body knows the difference.”

“Not bad. You ever see Cameron?”

Nat stopped chewing and gave Neely a quizzical look. “Why should you be curious about Cameron?”

“You guys were friends. Just wondering.”

“I hope your conscience still bothers you.”

“It does.”

“Good. I hope it’s painful.”

“Maybe. Sometimes.”

“We write letters. She’s fine, living in Chicago. Married, two little girls. Again, why do you ask?”

“I can’t ask about one of our classmates?”

“There were almost two hundred in our class. Why is she the first you’ve asked about?”

“Please forgive me.”

“No, I want to know. Come on, Neely, why ask about Cameron?”

Neely put a few crumbs of the muffin in his mouth and waited. He shrugged and smiled and said, “Okay, I think about her.”

“Do you think about Sara?”

“How could I forget?”

“You went with the bimbo, but in the long run it was a bad choice.”

“I was young and stupid, I admit. Sure was fun, though.”

“You were the ail-American, Neely, you had your pick of any girl in the school. You dumped Cameron because Sara was hot to trot. I hated you for it.”

“Come on, Nat, really?”

“I hated your guts. Cameron was a close friend from kindergarten, before you came to town. She knew I was different, and she always protected me. I tried to protect her, but she fell for you and that was a huge mistake. Sara decided she wanted the all-American. The skirts got shorter, blouses tighter, and you were toast. My beloved Cameron got thrown aside.”

“Sorry I brought this up.”

“Yeah, man, let’s talk about something else.”

For a long, quiet moment there was nothing to talk about.

“Wait till you see her,” Nat said.

“Pretty good, huh?”

“Sara looks like an aging working girl, which she probably is. Cameron is nothing but class.”

“You think she’ll be here?”

“Probably. Miss Lila taught her piano forever.”

Neely had nowhere to go, but he glanced at his watch anyway. “Gotta run, Nat. Thanks for the coffee.”

“Thanks for coming by, Neely. A real treat.”

They zigzagged through the racks and shelves toward the front of the store. Neely stopped at the door. “Look, some of us are gathering in the bleachers tonight, sort of a vigil, I guess,” he said. “Beer and war stories. Why don’t you stop by?”

“I’d like that,” Nat said. “Thanks.”

Neely opened the door and started out. Nat grabbed his arm and said, “Neely, I lied. I never hated you.”

“You should have.”

“Nobody hated you, Neely. You were our ail-American.”

“Those days are over, Nat.”

“No, not till Rake dies.”

“Tell Cameron I’d like to see her. I have something to say.”

* * *

The secretary smiled efficiently and slid a clipboard across the counter. Neely printed his name, the time, and the date, and put down that he was visiting Bing Albritton, the longtime girls’ basketball coach. The secretary examined the form, did not recognize either his face or his name, and finally said, “He’s probably in the gym.” The other lady in the administration office glanced up, and she too failed to recognize Neely Crenshaw.

And that was fine with him.

The halls of Messina High School were quiet, the classroom doors were all closed. Same lockers. Same paint color. Same floors hardened and shiny with layers of wax. Same sticky odor of disinfectant near the rest rooms. If he stepped into one he knew he would hear the same water dripping, smell the same smoke of a forbidden cigarette, see the same row of stained urinals, probably see the same fight between two punks. He kept to the hallways, where he passed Miss Arnett’s algebra class, and with a quick glance through the narrow window in the door he caught a glimpse of his former teacher, certainly fifteen years older, sitting on the corner of the same desk, teaching the same formulas.

Had it really been fifteen years? For a moment he felt eighteen again, just a kid who hated algebra and hated English and needed nothing those classrooms had to offer because he would make his fortune on the football field. The rush and flurry of fifteen years passing made him dizzy for a second.

A janitor passed, an ancient gentleman who’d been cleaning the building since it was built. For a split second he seemed to recognize Neely, then he looked away and grunted a soft, “Mornin’.”

The main entrance of the school opened into a large, modern atrium that had been built when Neely was a sophomore. The atrium connected the two older buildings that comprised the high school and led to the entrance of the gymnasium. The walls were lined with senior class pictures, dating back to the 1920s.

Basketball was a second-level sport at Messina, but because of football the town had grown so accustomed to winning that it expected a dynasty from every team. In the late seventies, Rake had proclaimed that the school needed a new gym. A bond issue passed by ninety percent, and Messina had proudly built the finest high school basketball arena in the state. Its entrance was nothing but a hall of fame.

The centerpiece was a massive, and very expensive, trophy case in which Rake had carefully arranged his thirteen little monuments. Thirteen state titles, from 1961 to 1987. Behind each was a large team photo, with a list of the scores, and headlines blown up and mounted in a collage. There were signed footballs, and retired jerseys, including number 19. And there were lots of pictures of Rake Rake with Johnny Unitas at some off-season function, Rake with a governor here and a governor there, Rake with Roman Armstead just after a Packers game.

For a few minutes, Neely was lost in the exhibit, though he’d seen it many times. It was at once a glorious tribute to a brilliant Coach and his dedicated players, and a sad reminder of what used to be. He once heard someone say that the lobby of the gym was the heart and soul of Messina. It was more of a shrine to Eddie Rake, an altar where his followers could worship.

Other display cases ran along the walls leading to the doors of the gym. More signed footballs, from less successful years. Smaller trophies, from less important teams. For the first time, and hopefully the last, Neely felt a twinge of regret for those Messina kids who had trained and succeeded and gone unnoticed because they played a lesser sport.

Football was king and that would never change. It brought the glory and paid the bills and that was that.

A loud bell, one that sounded so familiar, erupted nearby and jolted Neely back to the reality that he was trespassing fifteen years after his time. He headed back through the atrium, only to be engulfed in the fury and throng of a late-morning class change. The halls were alive with students pushing, yelling, slamming lockers, releasing the hormones and testosterone that had been suppressed for the past fifty minutes. No one recognized Neely.

A large, muscled player with a very thick neck almost bumped into him. He wore a green-and-white Spartan letter-man’s jacket, a status symbol with no equal in Messina. He had the customary strut of someone who owned the hall, which he did, if only briefly. He commanded respect. He expected to be admired. The girls smiled at him. The other boys gave him room.

“Come back in a few years, big boy, and they will not know your name,” Neely thought. Your fabulous career will be a footnote. All the cute little girls will be mothers. The green jacket will still be a source of great personal pride, but you won’t be able to wear it. High school stuff. Kids’ stuff.

Why was it so important back then?

Neely suddenly felt very old. He ducked through the crowd and left the school.

* * *

Late in the afternoon, he drove slowly along a narrow gravel road that wrapped around Karr’s Hill. When the shoulder widened he pulled over and parked. Below him, an eighth of a mile away, was the Spartan field house, and in the distance to his right were the two practice fields where the varsity was hitting in full pads on one while the JV ran drills on the other. Coaches whistled and barked.

On Rake Field, Rabbit rode a green-and-yellow John Deere mower back and forth across the pristine grass, something he did every day from March until December. The cheerleaders were on the track behind the home bench painting signs for the war on Friday night and occasionally practicing some new maneuvers. In the far end zone, the band was assembling itself for a quick rehearsal.

Little had changed. Different coaches, different players, different cheerleaders, different kids in the band, but it was still the Spartans at Rake Field with Rabbit on the mower and everybody nervous about Friday. If Neely came back in ten years and witnessed the scene, he knew that the people and the place would look the same.

Another year, another team, another season.

It was hard to believe that Eddie Rake had been reduced to sitting very near where Neely was now sitting, and watching the game from so far away that he needed a radio to know what was happening. Did he cheer for the Spartans? Or did he secretly hope they lost every game, just for spite? Rake had a mean streak and could carry a grudge for years.

Neely had never lost here. His freshman team went undefeated, which was, of course, expected in Messina. The freshmen played on Thursday nights and drew more fans than most varsities. The two games he lost as a starter were both in the state finals, both on the campus at A&M. His eighth grade team had tied Porterville, at home, and that was as close as Neely had come to losing a football game in Messina.

The tie had prompted Coach Rake to charge into their dressing room and deliver a harsh postgame lecture on the meaning of Spartan pride. After he terrorized a bunch of thirteen-year-olds, he replaced their Coach.

The stories kept coming back as Neely watched the practice field. Having no desire to relive them, he left.