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“I don’t know,” I said. I paused and stared at his face. I smiled too big. “I like it here, I guess!”

  “Oh. Weird,” Tommy said.

  We stared at each other for a few seconds.

  “What are we supposed to do?” he asked.

  “Talk about what it’s like to be a student, that kind of thing,” I said.

  “Do we have to?” he asked.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe not?” I felt my ears heat up. “Do you want to talk about something else?” I asked.

  He sat down at the desk next to me. “Not really,” he said. He started doodling in his notebook. He drew a pig with an arrow stuck in its head.

  “Whoa,” I said. “That’s a fine-looking pig!”

  “Thanks,” he said.

  Then I watched him draw for twenty minutes until the bell rang. I felt a cloud of doom around us. I understood Tommy Bode in a weird way, okay?

  Chapter 2

  I Have Some Massive Sacks of Baggage, My Friend

  Before we go any further, this is important to establish: I have problems.

  Not, Oh dude, I can’t find my wallet! Crap! (Even though I definitely lose my wallet a lot. I actually don’t know where my wallet is right now.)

  More like, Oh dude, my dad killed himself when I was a tyke. Oh shit, I found him hanging and he was twitching, shivering, because he’d just done it, because he thought Jerri had taken me and Andrew to school and daycare.

  I mean, I’m sure Dad didn’t want me to find him. I was five years old.

  Except I left my snack bag on the floor of the garage. (It was my job to buckle Andrew into his car seat and I often dropped my crap on the floor.) So Jerri yelled at me, turned the car around, drove back down the main road, pulled back up the long driveway, and told me she didn’t want to get out to open the “damn garage door”—and she told me to hurry, so I ran in through the front door and through the house and opened the inside door to the garage and I found Dad there.

  Shivering. He was twisting a little. The beam with the rope creaked. Our step stool was knocked over under him. I couldn’t move. I can still see how his neck looked smashed sideways. He had to have just done it. A minute before? A couple? What if he saw me? His little boy. The last thing he saw?

  And I turned and the air sucked out of me like a backward explosion and I had to scream, but I couldn’t, and the walls melted away and the floor rolled and I tried to run but cracked my face against the side of the open door—witch whistles ripping in my ears—and I bled in a heap and up above me, Dad died.

  If I’d run right out to Jerri, maybe she could’ve saved him? Really, probably not.

  You know what I remember Jerri saying when she finally came in? “Where did he get that rope?”

  This happened. It’s the truth. It’s part of me like my hair is part of me.

  I’m a great football player. I am blessed. I have problems.

  Chapter 3

  Jerri Has Problems

  It’s important for me to remember that Jerri has problems too. I mean, holy balls, she was nineteen when my dad knocked her up. She was a widow at twenty-five! Poor Jerri! Poor, sad, Jerri!

  Except I could’ve used an actual parent in the house last fall. I needed someone to help me deal with all this crazy stuff that came from being recruited. Recruiting was super intense for me—more than for most players because colleges didn’t know who the hell I was until I was already a junior. Most elite players get recruited early and visit schools several times. I only really had time to visit once (which I put off—couldn’t make decisions) and just a few places, so it was like a feeding frenzy.

  All fall, football programs kept calling me. Many college coaches showed up at my games and at the house. I got constant IMs and texts and Facebook messages and tweets from people all over the country trying to get me to go to whatever university to play football, and I had no idea how to respond, what to do, how to make a choice. Thanks for calling! What the hell is an Illini?

  Occasionally, a coach or a coach’s wife called Jerri to talk to her about the educational culture at whatever school. Jerri would be sitting at that kitchen table, her head buried in some book, the phone would ring, and she’d scream, “Get it!”

  I’d pick up and call from the basement, “It’s for you, Jerri.”

  She’d get on the line and say something like, “That’s not my business. Felton is the one making a decision. Thanks for your interest.” Then she’d hang up.

  Downstairs, I’d think: Help! What am I supposed to do? What the hell is an Illini?

  On Thursday of the week I became Tommy Bode’s senior mentor, after it became clear I was shivering in my shorts (I’d forgotten plays in practice on Wednesday), my football coach, Coach Johnson, who is a real adult and a good dad, helped me choose four universities to visit. He tried like a trouper. We sat down in his office after our team’s Thursday walk-through to discuss what I wanted.

  “What do you want to major in, Felton?” he asked.

  “I don’t know, Coach,” I said. “Probably not agriculture.”

  “No,” he agreed. “What are you interested in?” he asked.

  I thought for a few seconds. “Football?”

  “Are you saying you want to study football?”

  “Not exactly. But I do like football.”

  “Yeah. That’s good,” Coach said.

  Before my growth spurt, I always wanted to be a comedian, but I hadn’t seen “comedy” in any of the college brochures.

  “Other things, Felton. Academics.”

  “Why did your son pick Iowa?” I asked. I was stalling for time.

  “It was his only Division I offer. You’ve got a lot more choices than Ken. What are your interests?”

  “I mean, I like Frisbee. I like TV. I like…I like smart comedy.” Shit.

  “Felton,” he exhaled. “Come on, son. You’re good at school. What’s your favorite subject?”

  “English, I guess.”

  “Okay. That’s something. How about this? Let’s choose three schools with good academic reputations and one school known primarily for football.”

  We ended up choosing Wisconsin, Northwestern (not smart for me), a School That Shall Not Be Named, and Stanford. Two were close to Bluffton; one was a giant national football powerhouse; and one was near San Francisco, where Aleah might end up.

  I went home and told Jerri. She looked up from her accounting book and said, “Northwestern? That’s dumb.”

  “Oh,” I said. “Yeah, I guess.”

  I went downstairs to my bedroom and thought, Thanks for all your help, Jerri.

  That tweak, that hole in my stomach, opened big. I am alone in the giant universe of pain! That’s crazy crap. I thought, You are pretty crazy. I thought, Thanks so much, Jerri.

  Granted, Jerri has problems.

  Chapter 4

  Aleah

  Late that night, Aleah and I Skyped. Since we first got together, a year and a half earlier when her dad was a visiting poet at the college in Bluffton, we’d barely seen each other at all except for Skype. Those couple of months that she was in town were awesome. They were great. Aleah and I are like one person with two heads and two bodies. We’re so in sync when we’re together that it’s weird. (Like mind-melding aliens.)

  We biked together and went to Country Kitchen and laughed through eating sandwiches and made out in her basement and walked through the cow-pie-smelling Bluffton evening holding hands. I was pretty damn sure we’d get married and probably live on the side of some mountain in a giant house with a piano that she’d play and blow me away with, but then she went back to Chicago and we barely saw each other and we broke up once (over the prior summer). When we’re apart, we’re not so good.

  It was a little past midnight. Our Skype connected. Aleah was lit only by her computer. She wore white flann
el pj’s. She sat on her bed. She whispered because I assume her dad, Ronald, was asleep in the room next to hers. “Hi there,” she said.

  “Hey. Big news. I have my college visits set up.” I whispered too, even though Jerri sleeps like a brick.

  “Oh,” she said, nodding. She didn’t look happy. “Good?”

  “I’ll be at Northwestern in a few weeks!”

  She perked up. “Can we see each other?”

  “I think! Why not? I’m staying in a hotel! Can you stay with me?”

  “I’m going to stay with you even if I can’t!” she said.

  “Yes!” My heart began to beat. I thought of Aleah stretched out on a bed next to me. That’s good. That’s not lonely. “It’s going to be awesome to kiss you.”

  She nodded and smiled.

  “I’m visiting Stanford too. Any chance you can go? Maybe visit that school you liked out there?”

  Aleah didn’t say anything. She just stared at her screen.

  “Hello?”

  “Maybe,” she said.

  Here’s the thing: the only reason I chose to visit Stanford was because a few weeks earlier, Aleah had said she’d researched good football schools near San Francisco because there’s some conservatory in San Francisco that teaches composition (I thought she meant paper writing, which confused me, but she meant music writing) and Stanford seemed like a good place for me. So…

  Here’s the other thing: Aleah doesn’t have to go to college if she doesn’t want to. She was paid professional money to play in Germany over the summer. She had constant, growing offers. I knew this. But I hoped. Back when we were sixteen, we said we’d go to college in the same place.

  “Are you okay?” I asked. “What’s wrong?”

  “Daddy’s angry at Jerri,” Aleah whispered. “She has a bunch of his books and she won’t respond to him, but he needs his books back.”

  Here’s one other thing: Jerri and Aleah’s dad dated over the summer. Jerri broke up with him because she wants to focus on school. (Jerri developed a bad habit of dating my friends’ dads, by the way.)

  “What books? Maybe I can find them,” I said.

  “Dang it,” Aleah whispered. “Daddy’s awake. I have to go.”

  “Oh. Okay,” I said. “Okay, I love…”

  Aleah was gone. The Skype window closed.

  I sat in the light of my laptop. Alone again. I had to go to sleep. We had a game the next night and I play better if I’m rested (although I’m never exactly rested). The house was dark. I lived in the basement. The basement is a door away from the garage where my dad died. This didn’t ever bother me when I was younger. Why didn’t it bother me?

  My stomach tweaked. The hole got big. I texted Andrew: You awake?

  No, he replied.

  I have a hole, I texted.

  Are you being gross? Or trying to be profound? Andrew texted.

  I feel weird, I texted.

  Let’s talk tomorrow, brother. We should talk, he replied.

  We didn’t talk because I had a football game against River Valley and I scored three touchdowns and ran for 228 yards and then I went for pizza with Cody, Karpinski, Abby Sauter, and Jess Withrow.

  It was a great night.

  Accelerating Fall

  Recruiting, Mumble Mouth, Justify Your Existence, Pig Boy, The End

  Chapter 5

  Barfed Upon in Madison

  I made two recruiting visits during football season—Wisconsin and Northwestern—and two right after the season—the School That Shall Not Be Named and Stanford—because they’re not so close to Bluffton and I needed time to travel.

  I went to these schools to see if I liked them, to see if I wanted to move to one of these foreign places where I would be part of a football program, be part of a “culture.” (That’s what the coaches called life in the program—a “culture.”)

  Not enjoyable for me. I didn’t really know what I was looking for, so I didn’t ask questions. Plus, I didn’t like most of the football coaches—didn’t like the way they talked, the way they moved, the way they smelled. Didn’t like their haircuts or their clothes or their big-knuckled hands. These dudes make me jumpy, squirrely. The football players, for the most part, seemed like young versions of these big-knuckled, powerful old dudes.

  I didn’t know how to talk to them.

  I didn’t want to talk to them.

  What a dork!

  They didn’t like me either. In the end, at the end of my visits, I think most of the coaches and players wanted to punch me in the face.

  At least no one actually punched me. That would be bad press for the program for sure.

  Headline: Coach Punches Top Recruit’s Dumbass Face!

  ***

  Wisconsin Visit

  Before visiting Madison, Wisconsin, home of the University of Wisconsin, I sort of figured I’d end up a Wisconsin Badger. Especially if Aleah didn’t go to college. Everyone else thought I’d be a Badger too. The university is close to Bluffton (only like an hour away). Madison is a cool town. I’d have some friends there. (Abby Sauter, who is a great friend, the best, is going to Wisconsin.) I was excited to make this trip.

  Because I’m from Wisconsin, the Wisconsin coaches set me up to hang out with another Wisconsin “product.” (Players from a state are considered “products” of the state. Other Wisconsin products include cheese, sausage, beer, and also lawn mowers.) The dude they set me up with is named Bart Kunzel. He’s a giant lineman from a town called Hartland (near Milwaukee). He’ll be a senior next year, and if he doesn’t break a leg or get his knee ripped in half, he’ll definitely play in the NFL.

  He was okay. Fine. I just didn’t have much to say to him. I stuttered a lot. Mumbled. I asked him if he’d ever visited the Milwaukee Zoo. He said no. Then I asked him if he ever saw the famous shit-throwing gorilla at the Milwaukee Zoo. He said, “How would I see the gorilla if I never went to the zoo?”

  Good point.

  He squinted at me.

  On Saturday evening, after their game against Illinois (an Illini is some kind of Native American, I found out), Bart picked me up at my hotel. He limped because his knees hurt. Then he took me to this giant beer party crushed wall to wall with people who smelled like they’d had whole bottles of body spray blasted all over them (like there’s some body spray car wash near campus and everybody walked through it on the way). Still, riding just underneath the sweet chemical fragrance, you could smell a horse-butt, monkey-donkey animal smell in that packed house.

  I stood smashed in a corner for an hour trying not to smell anything and then this girl stumbled out of nowhere and puked on my foot. “Ha, ha, ha!” everyone laughed.

  “Ha, ha,” I said.

  After I spent ten minutes trying to wipe the barf off my shoe onto the little bit of grass that wasn’t trampled dead in the front yard, we went back to a dorm and played video games with a bunch of other giant football players.

  The dorm room smelled of ass, Doritos, and chew. (The farm boys in Bluffton dip tobacco constantly—I recognized that odor.)

  Have I mentioned that I’m kind of a super smeller? Smells kill me. Very intense. It’s a damn curse. I can smell squirrels that have bad breath way up in the trees. You might think I’m joking. (I’m sort of joking but not really.)

  While in that dorm, my ability to not be freaky exited my body. These football guys all barked like my friend Karpinski. “AAAHHHH. BAAHHH. DUUUDDE. BAHHH.” Back home, there’s only one Karpinski, not seven screaming, “AAAAAAHHH. BAAAAAH.” I began to get twitchy and I blinked a lot and I stared at dudes’ foreheads, which is a bad habit, and my adrenaline began flowing.

  I asked Bart to take me back to the hotel at midnight because my muscles were getting so wound I thought I might punch a wall.

  Bart said, “You sure? You want to hook up with some girls or some
thing?”

  “No, thank you,” I said.

  At the hotel, I showered for an hour and did jumping jacks and push-ups and stretched my hamstrings, which are naturally tight. Then I stared at the damn wall for like three hours before I fell asleep. (The remote control didn’t work and I didn’t feel like getting out of bed at that point.)

  What is wrong with you? I wondered.

  You’re a damn dipshit! I answered.

  Okay, maybe. But you’re disappointed too. Isn’t college about reading big books in an ancient library?

  I found out later that there are good libraries at Wisconsin, but I didn’t ask questions while I was there because I was unable to justify my existence to myself.

  The next day was a little better. Me and Bart stood on the actual field at Camp Randall (the football stadium), at the 50-yard line on the W in the middle, and he said, “Pretty awesome, huh?” And I said yeah because it did look really cool. (I’d seen it on TV—but this was such a different view.) I imagined cutting on that turf, running like a gorilla, bursting through a seam. I imagined fans doing “Jump Around” in the stands. (YouTube it!) I liked that.

  Then we met with the strength and conditioning coach who showed me these different workouts they do, including carrying bags of cement up the stairs, all the way up to the top of the stadium. Yes. I love working out. Carrying bags of cement sounded fantastic, I must say.

  Then Bart took me upstairs to the football offices, which are fancy (they were all fancy everywhere I went), and the offensive coordinator, a big-knuckled, slick-haired mofo, told me I might play some tight end at Wisconsin.

  “What?” I asked.

  Then he asked if I had a good time at the party the night before while he slapped me on the back too hard, which made my neck tense.

  I said, “This girl barfed in my shoe.”

  “Barfed?” the coach asked.

  “Well, a little barf,” Bart said. “Not really in his shoe. On his shoe.”