Bella watched Ty leave, pouting. ‘You could say thanks … asshole.’
‘Yo.’
She flinched, almost throwing the next copy away. When she saw it was just Deshaun she relaxed. ‘Jesus, Dee.’
‘Something wrong with the freshy?’ He held his hand out.
She gave him his copy and laughed. ‘Something’s always wrong with him.’
Deshaun sneered, though it quickly faded. ‘Thanks.’ He smiled ducking out of the room. His smile vanished.
He saw Ty up ahead. He ambled through the hall, zoned out. ‘The freshies are always so fuckin’ weird.’ He bumped past Ty. When Ty didn’t react, he looked back. Ty was in a different place. Physically, he was present, but he was already running the simulations, trying to find the best way to beat Marshall.
“He gonna get killed walkin’ home like that. Gonna step out into the street and fuckin’ pancaked.” Deshaun kept walking, speeding up when he saw the next boy come out of the room. He didn’t have the time to give Ty a ride … not like he’d give that ungrateful freshy a ride, anyway.
“Had I ever been like that?” He wondered as he exited the building. It was hard thinking back to a time when football had made him so starry-eyed.
Middle school might’ve been the only time. But he felt like every middle school kid dreamed of stardom. It was the perfect age for it, right when you could really imagine being in the NFL and everything that actually meant, when ANYONE could feel special during any game.
“If a freshy’s still actin’ like that, they a retard, or arrogant as fuck. Or both.” He reached his car, a 2010 Ford Focus. It had a few bumps and dings, and had seen plenty of miles, but it still got the job done. Deshaun dumped his bag in the back seat, then got into the driver’s. “Was Ty different?”
He spat out the window, failing to remove the awful taste the thought left in his mouth. No matter how much he wanted to convince himself Ty was just lucky, it’d been eleven games—even one where Deshaun didn’t show—and Ty was still balling out.
“He ain’t better than me.” But, like an addict reaching for the crack pipe even though they know it’s going to do more harm to them than good, Deshaun went to his phone. No college offers greeted him, neither in his texts, or his email.
He threw his phone into the passenger seat and peeled out of the parking lot with squealing tyres, almost hitting Ty on his way out, as Ty walked his bike out of the lot.
‘Fuck!’ Deshaun punched the horn. Though Ty didn’t acknowledge him, and still had that absent look, he’d stopped before stepping out into the car’s path.
Deshaun sped down the road, though calmed and slowed once the school shrunk out of existence in his rear-view mirror. His hands shook against the steering wheel. He told himself to relax and pulled into the nearest parking lot. He switched the car off and sat back.
‘Relax, dumbass motherfucker.’ He took a deep breath; his hands continued shaking. His eyes fell on his glove compartment. Reaching over, he popped it open and snatched a small bag from it. It could’ve been called a purse, but calling it such came with a broken nose courtesy of Deshaun.
From it, he retrieved a few things. Papers, a lighter, and most importantly, a half-full zip-lock bag of the devil’s lettuce, as his mama called it. He began rolling a joint with the quickness and precision of years of practice.
He knew smoking wasn’t helping his athletic prowess, but it was this, or drive home with shaky hands, dreading every second he got closer to his destination. It was this or lay awake at night, replaying every painful loss until the sun was up.
The lighter sparked to life. His eyes zeroed in on the flame, the joint hanging between his lips. He lit the end and took a deep drag. He sunk against the seat, closed his eyes, and relaxed.
Smoke wasn’t the only thing he exhaled. All the nerves, the worry, it was all expelled. Unfortunately, he didn't expel the thoughts about the upcoming game against Downey and Isiah, but he could now focus on them clearly.
Isiah was a freshy too. Deshaun laughed before taking another drag. He wondered what kind of luck he had to catch the tail end of a generation of monsters that was coming in. He tried not to think that if he was the same age as them all, he probably wouldn’t even hit varsity.
The flame crept slowly along the length of the joint. When Deshaun’s phone buzzed on the seat beside him, he put it on silent without looking at it. He knew it wouldn’t be an offer, and he knew there weren’t any envelopes waiting for him at home, either. Two angry parents maybe, but not an offer.
After finishing the joint, he tossed the butt from the window. In his earlier, more foolish days, he’d tried smoking in the school parking lot, but even on days like this when he’d stayed back so late, he’d still get caught. The two-week suspension was nothing, but the whooping he got from his parents after the school called them, he never wanted to repeat.
Thinking of home, it was about time to get back. Showing up this late, ignoring those calls, he would’ve been liable for another whooping in the past, but it was a lot harder to whoop an eighteen-year-old.
No, now you just got a lecture about how you’re a man now and it’s time to start acting like it or you’ll get thrown out. He sighed, the engine sputtered to life, and he was on his way again.
Fifteen minutes later, he was pulling into the alley next to their home. It was two stories, but thin, squished in between a laundromat and a thrift store. It was a dump, and unfortunately, it was Deshaun’s dump.
He squeezed the car through to the small backyard that was home to a garden bed full of dead plants, a small clothesline, and his dad’s Chevy.
He parked next to the Chevrolet, popped some gum in his mouth, sprayed himself down with deodorant, then went in through the backdoor and into the kitchen.
‘Where the fuck you been, boy?’
“Hey, to you too, dad.” He didn’t meet the man’s scowl.
The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.
Deshaun Banks Senior was a big, grumpy man. His arms were big, his legs big, and his belly so big it almost bumped the edge of the fryer he hunched over. Sweat glistened on the skin of his head that poked through his tightly rolled cornrows, and salty patches sprinkled throughout his pepper-black goatee. His brow, deeply wrinkled even at the best of times, now formed a deep, mountainous region across most of his face.
Deshaun Junior focused on the bubbling fryer. ‘I told ya practice was gonna run late.’
‘Practice.’ He said the word like he was coughing up phlegm. ‘You still trying that football bullshit? It ain’t gon do nothin’ for you. I need your help here, where you can actually do something with your life. You know how backed up we are cause you ain’t here?’
Junior looked around the little kitchen. Despite its size, his dad had squeezed everything he needed into it. In one corner, a fridge stretched almost to the ceiling. The freezer was in the basement, under the stairs. There were two sets of deep fryers which Deshaun Sr. stood in front of now. A decent sized grill, plenty of counter space with an overhead heat lamp bathing half of it in a deep orange glow, chicken sandwiches and fries were already piling up under it.
‘Is Junior back?’ A woman pushed through the swinging door from the front house into the kitchen.
Junior’s mama, Sharon, was a couple of years younger than her husband, though neither had hit forty yet. Her brown eyes still sparkled with youth. Lush, wavy brown hair fell to her shoulders, and she went to great lengths to keep it gorgeous with weekly salon visits. Her full cheeks always lifted into a smile at the sight of her baby boy, though she frequently had to wrangle them back down and give him a stern look, as she did now. Junior had no idea how his fat old man snagged such a beautiful woman.
‘Where were you, young man?’ she asked, fists on her hips.
‘Football practice,’ Deshaun Sr. answered for his son. ‘You hear that? He was at football practice instead of here at home helping his family.’
She frowned, her eyes darted between her husband and son. ‘Well, that’s gonna happen sometimes, but, ain’t it ‘bout time that football ended?’
Junior bit his cheek to stop from snapping. ‘If we lose, we’re done. We’re playin’ good this year, we might win State.’
‘That’s great, Jun—’
Deshaun Sr. guffawed. ‘Yeah, and the A’s might win the World Series too.’
‘Cook ya damn chicken.’ Sharon whacked her husband’s shoulder.
‘Our defence is the best in Cali,’ Junior said, leaving out the fact it was mostly thanks to JJ and Ty. ‘Ya’d know if ya came to my games for once.’
‘Maybe that’s fine for you to keep playing at being a football star with all ya little friends, but a real man’s gotta work, and you gonna have to start working seriously, too, boy.’
Sharon groaned. She pulled Junior into the side dining room, it was a narrow place made even more claustrophobic with the noisy wallpaper. Even with only a small table and a few chairs, the room felt cramped.
‘Junior, things are gettin’ busier. I know ya really like this football stuff, but, if it’s not goin’ nowhere, maybe it’s time ya started takin’ on more responsibility here.’
Junior’s shoulders slumped. He expected such dismissiveness from his dad, but it hurt twice as much hearing it from his mama. He kept his mouth shut and didn’t argue.
‘Just go on out there and get started on them deliveries, alright? I’ll see about convincin’ that stubborn bastard out there to take a night off and see your next game.’
‘Okay, Mama,’ he mumbled. He started for the door, then stopped. He shouldn’t ask, but he needed to. Hope glimmered faintly in his eyes as he looked. ‘No mail came for me today, did it, mama?’
She wanted to lie, but she couldn’t, not to her baby. Even if it was going to snuff out that glimmer, she had to be honest. She shook her head.
Junior quickly turned away, went back into the kitchen, packaged the meals, listened to the addresses his dad barked at him, marked them down, then took the food back out to his car, all without saying a word.
Checking his list, he knew it was going to be a long night. The business was growing too big for the three of them. Apparently, they weren’t making enough to bring in another employee or find a better house to live in than their current shit hole. That’s what happened when you cut into your profit margins to compete with how cheap the big chains were.
Back and forth he went, making multiple deliveries at a time before racing back home just in time for the next batch. Most of the time, he was lucky enough just to get enough tips to cover the gas.
It wasn’t until midnight when he finally flopped into bed. The upstairs bedroom was narrow as well, he’d hit his head more than once on the slanted roof when waking up from a nightmare or particularly loud alarm—usually a shout from his mama because the alarm hadn’t woken him despite its ringing being heard throughout the house—and it could only fit a single bed, but it was his place. He was free in his room. His parents respected him that much, at least.
He closed his eyes, trying to sleep, but his mind had other ideas. Surprisingly, it wasn’t thoughts of the next meeting with the Vikings, or memories of the recent game that kept him awake.
He went back much further, to his freshman year. He had been starry-eyed back then, at least in the beginning. It didn’t take long for those eyes to become dull.
Learning that he’d only made it to JV wasn’t that bad. It was to be expected, only the REALLY special players went straight to varsity in their freshman years. Either way, his goal hadn’t changed, he was going to win State, and he didn’t mind letting everyone know every damn practice.
“I shoulda kept my dumbass freshy mouth shut.”
It wasn’t just his JV teammates that had to hear it. The seniors caught wind of it too, more like they couldn’t escape it. So they decided to shut him up.
He’d almost forgotten the memory. It lay in the back of his mind, buried under four years of dust, but it had always been there, waiting to remind him … maybe it always was reminding him. He might not’ve thought of the specific day, but the message imparted to him that day always came to the forefront of his mind every time he checked for an offer that was never coming—he wasn’t shit.
Four of the seniors, all captains, had waited for him after one practice—he stayed back for another few laps in those days. When he went for his bike, they were waiting for him.
They said little, just that they were sick and tired of hearing his voice. Freshies should know their place. He wasn’t winning State. And most importantly, the message that their fists and feet drilled into his head—he wasn’t shit.
The beat down was bad, but he could stand back up. He didn’t take it lying down either; he swung back even though they outnumbered him. One wild swing caught one of them on the jaw, another in the balls. It only made things worse, but at least he wasn’t taking it like a bitch.
He didn’t know whether it was the shot to the jaw or the crotch (probably both) that gave the seniors the idea of trashing his bike. That was taking it too far. He needed that bike, not only for getting to and from school—or wherever else he wanted—but he made deliveries with that bike.
Two of them held him back and kept beating on him. They made him watch as the others drove over his bike and crushed it. If they couldn’t crush him or his dreams, they crushed his bike instead.
His dad was irate after that, and Junior had earned himself another whooping. Deshaun Sr. said Junior had to have done SOMETHING to provoke the other boys to such lengths, and in a way, Junior believed him.
His mama wanted to press charges, not just for the bike but for the beating too. Deshaun Sr. wasn’t averse to getting compensated for the destroyed bike, seeing as it was a part of his business, but Junior never told them which boys did it. That’d just make things worse for him. Even if they were only going to be around for another year, he doubted they’d leave him in a state where he’d ever be able to play football again.
With this memory flooding back, he recalled another. All those captains had gone D1 at the end of the season. They hadn’t won Regionals, but they were damn close. Deshaun remembered they had a proper star freshman back then too, a young JJ who was more of a captain as a freshman than any of those seniors would ever be.
Deshaun’s season didn’t go quite as well. The beating might’ve crushed him physically, but his dreams were still alive. … For a month, anyway. The JV team started 0–5, they didn’t even make Regionals. Deshaun’s dreams of State died then.
Those seniors, his dad now, they were right. He wasn’t shit. He punched the slanted ceiling. ‘I’ll prove ‘em wrong. I’ll prove ‘em all fuckin’ wrong!’
Deshaun's passion and dreams ignited again, but he and the Dons weren't the only ones dreaming of championships. They weren’t the only ones yearning for revenge against Warren. And those seniors from Deshaun’s freshman season, and his dad, weren’t the only ones who thought Deshaun wasn’t shit.