3
True to his word, Virgil snuck food to the stables pretty nearly every night. Teena stayed, and they came to be friends. He soon discovered that she was sometimes bold and mischievous, able to skewer his family and the hired men with dead-on, sarcastic imitations, while at other times shy, sweet and gentle.
It was weird, but Teena held up a sort of mirror to his brothers, allowing Virgil to see them differently, like he saw a picture when he held it up to the light, and turned it backward. Very strange.
In the meantime, he played scrimmage games with the junior varsity Wildcats, lifted weights, and continued training, becoming stronger by the day. There were things he liked: being outdoors of a fine, sunny afternoon. Towel fights in the locker room. Cold orange Gatorade when he was wobbly and faint with thirst. Receiving the ball, pulling it in, and the sheer, balletic joy of dodging pursuit. Making a touchdown, even in scrimmage, felt good. Dog-piles did not.
Eleven guys were plenty heavy piled on top of you, and when they were also gouging, cursing and burrowing after the ball, stabbing their fingers through your face mask, things could get unpleasant. No one else complained, though, and neither did Virgil. Coach said to run every scrimmage play like it mattered, because what they were doing, really, was practicing for life.
Sitting on the bench one night, in the humming glare of tall field lights, dog-tired from beating himself to death against a tackling dummy, Virgil sure hoped that life would turn out to be more than pain and insect bites.
A sudden, shrill whistle-blast signaled the end of a play, and Billy Ross loped over. Grinning broadly, he downed three glasses of Gatorade from the sideline cooler, then collapsed onto the bench beside Virgil, shoulder pads rattling like hail. Like Virgil, Billy was young. Unlike Virgil, he truly loved this stuff. Clearly pleased with himself, the rangy, dishwater blond crumpled up and tossed away his paper drinking cup, accidentally knocking his white practice helmet off the bench.
Lightning-quick, Billy caught it, then sat there dusting the thing, reverently admiring all the gouges and scars his skull had avoided.
"Didja see that catch, Virge?" He boasted, still grinning. "Blake drilled it right over my shoulder, and bang! I had it, like it was welded to my hands. Then, whoosh! Right to the end zone! They couldn't touch me, man!"
His grey eyes were on fire, his voice filled with awe and laughter.
"Buddy, I am so psyched! I am ready! I just wish our first game was tomorrow!"
"Yeah, me too." (True enough, actually; Virgil couldn't wait to have the first big test over with.) Watching doomed bugs dart in and out through the field light's halogen blaze, he added, "I'm counting the days."
"Better get out there and get some more carries, then," Billy advised warmly, getting up again. "Make sure coach sees you busting your butt, or..." And this was the absolute worst thing Billy could conceive of, "...he might not let you play."
Virgil Tracy accepted Billy's hand up, donned his helmet, worked the mouthpiece back into place, and 'got out there', a taped-up and armored, human ball-carrying machine.
Later:
When the house and outbuildings were dark, and he'd brought supper to the stables, Virgil talked the matter over with Teena. She was in one of her 'wild' moods again, having trouble sitting still long enough, even, to eat.
"You can call me 'Sharie' sometimes," she told him, around a mouthful of ham. Then, for the tenth time, she got up to wipe a viewing hole through the fogged window, and peered outside. He'd never asked her just who it was she waited for.
"Sharie... is that your middle name?"
She turned away from the window, darted back (kissing several horse muzzles on the way) and took a huge bite from a buttered roll.
"Naw, I don't got a middle name, but you can call me Sharie sometimes, okay?"
"Okay. Like, now?"
"Uh-huh. Now, Sharie's good. Other times, it's Teena."
Okay. Virgil hoped she didn't have one of those 'split personalities', but he had to admit that he'd have... well..., more than liked her, anyway.
"Y' know," he began, praying not to make a complete fool of himself, "you could be my girlfriend, if you ever got out of the stables. I mean, most guys don't have girlfriends who live in a stable, unless they're really into livestock..."
Sharie laughed, and threw a piece of her roll at him.
"Okay, funny guy," she responded, making her voice sound like the bleating of a sheep, "I'll be your behhhhst girl!"
Bounding over, she ruffled the wavy brown hair at the top of Virgil's head, and then darted back to the window and defogged her spot. Still nothing. Whatever she waited on hadn't come. Selfishly, Virgil allowed himself to hope that it never would.
Changing the subject, but with a fine warm glow, still, because she'd sort of agreed , you know, to be his girlfriend, Virgil asked,
"What d' you think about football?"
Sharie returned to her plate, finished the peas, then started on the custard pie, folding some of the food into a napkin to 'save for later'.
"I dunno," she replied, carelessly. "Looks to me like a lot of guys beating each other silly for a dumb pointy ball that don't even roll right."
"Well," he said, laughing a little, "if it's rolling, something's gone wrong with the play, and being pointed makes it easier to throw. But... it's not the ball, really."
He badly needed to know if he was being loyal, or just a coward. Terribly serious, Virgil asked,
"If, uh... Would you do something you didn't really like, just to make somebody else happy?"
Sharie's head cocked to the side, and her mouth twisted slightly in a pale, pained smile.
"Sometimes, Hon," she told him, "I think that's all being a girl is."
Virgil blushed.
"S- sorry. I was talking about football, not..."
"Yeah, only I don't got answers to either one. I'm hiding out with the horses, Virgil. What the heck do I know?"
Yeah. Sighing, Virgil went over and sat on the hay bale beside Sharie. Draping a friendly arm across her thin shoulders, he said,
"Maybe we'll figure it out, together, huh?"