Hometown Favorite: A Novel Read Free

small rise a
short distance from the center of the celebrations. This bond
of humanity had one goal in mind: to unite their individual
desires and energies into a force powerful enough to win the
support and blessing of the gods of football, and to raise the
town of Springdale out of the universal plainness of smalltown America.
    Jake Hopper, the receivers' and quarterbacks' coach for the
Tigers, did not like standing with the other coaches and staff
and the team for these football rituals. He preferred anonymity.
He preferred the controlled discipline of the practice field or the blood rush of the game. He accepted these chaotic traditions as a necessary evil.

    He ambled through the crowd until he spied Cherie. Here
was a friend, a calm in the maelstrom. He moved toward her,
but a group of teenagers bolted in front of him, blocking his
path and nearly trampling him as they rushed to get a better
view of their heroes. He waited for the herd to pass and then
made steady progress toward his goal.
    Jake stepped up beside Cherie. "And what do you think of
our pagan rites?"
    "It's loud enough to bring down Jericho's walls," Cherie said.
"I should have brought my OSHA earplugs from the factory."
    "That assembly line working you hard?"
    Cherie cupped her hands over her ears. "Hard enough, but
I don't think it ever gets as loud as these kids"
    "Humanity changes little, I'm afraid, except through calamity, and then reluctantly," he said, approving his pithy statement
with a smirk.
    Jake Hopper gave of himself body and soul to taking the
God-given talent of each player and molding it. In his heart
of hearts, he considered himself a sculptor of living, flesh-andblood models, shaping and perfecting the fluidity of speed and
motion of the human body. And a well-executed, unrepeatable
moment on the field brought a bigger smile to his face than a
touchdown or even a win.
    Jake prized the singular bond between player and coach,
a bond of souls when competitive physical play brings out a
special bliss between men. Jake and Dewayne had that bond,
an idealized bond of a father and son, free of responsibility beyond the rules, discipline, and training necessary for the game.
Dewayne had no father. Jake had no children. Yet the two men
provided for each other what was missing in their lives.

    "Excuse me for being forward, but if all our sons had mothers such as you, the world would be whole," Jake said, a bold
statement, especially from someone unaccustomed to making
them. Perhaps the sips of vodka before arriving at the pep
rally inspired the boldness. He felt a pang of regret, a flushed
embarrassment at the compliment. He was thankful for the
darkness. It helped conceal his chagrin.
    At that moment, the music from the marching band raised
its decibel level, and the cheerleaders, shimmering pom-poms
stuck to the top of each raised arm, began their escort of the
senior boys to the front of the team.
    "Hush now. They're about to introduce my boy," Cherie
said.
    Jake turned his eyes away from Cherie and wondered how life
might have been different had he met Cherie in their younger
days. She might have spoken the same words just now but
substituted them with "our boy." The thought produced in him
a pang of regret.

     

Half a dozen buses hauled the Springdale Tigers, the cheerleaders, the marching band, and most of the student body to
the state championship game. Like a large military convoy, the
citizens of Springdale followed the buses for the two-hour drive
to the stadium in Jackson, Mississippi. Sly, Dewayne, and Jesse
sat in the very back of the team bus. There was no boisterous
behavior or extraneous noise. The players had slipped into their
game zone. The season's preceding games had already made
the history books. This last effort would define the team and
the character of each individual player.
    "I ain't accustomed to losing, you know that?" Sly's voice was
louder than necessary. "I get my