The Season of Shay and Dane Read Free

Hall,
one after another, towering monuments honoring those families, all of their
status and wealth on display for everyone to see. And when I got to the top of
the steps, my stomach knotted—just the way it did at the start of a race. I reached
and pulled open the massive door—only to see what looked like a gilded palace. Ornate,
dark wood lined the grand walls from floor to ceiling. And the ceiling was as
high and long as the building was tall, and from it, five monstrous, dimly lit
chandeliers, with the exact same distance spaced between them, looked like they
floated down—stopping midair, and for as far off as the long corridor stretched,
each black and white, crisscrossing, diagonal tile was perfect and shiny, as if
they’d never been walked on.
    I had found my way to a
meek receptionist who led me to a waiting room and went off to tell them I’d arrived.
She brought me to a tall mahogany door that must have been as old as the
building itself and opened it for me. I paused just a moment before going in
and thought of the words coach said when he saw me off at the airport. “Just
be your unassuming self, and relax. They’re only people like you and me Dane. You’ll
be fine.” He was right. I looked at the four of them seated across the long
table, three men, one woman—their faces still bright with color, unlike most
people their age with sallow skin, as if they had never worried a day in their
life. And slowly I began answering their questions. . . and I watched, as the
stoic expressions of those blue bloods softened to a, “Young man with a special
talent.” You could see them forming the thought for themselves—country boy done
good. Now, not only did the scouts want me there, but the university as a whole
seemed interested. And two weeks later, when I took the envelope out of the mailbox
and tore my fingers through it. . . I opened a chance to give my family a
better life.
    Kip patted my back. “I
think you’re good to go Dane. Get a long night’s sleep and you’ll feel brand
new in the morning.”
    My body felt mostly
recovered. It wasn’t the little boy body lacking in tone and form anymore, I
was conditioned, and sometimes I got it—that I pushed myself a little too hard,
but each time I crossed the finish line for Yale and heard the cheering and
stomping, well,—there’s not much else like it.
    I take a minute
standing up from the table, savoring the restful state my body’s in and slowly stretching
my legs.
    “Top form for a star
athlete, huh Dane?” Kip had his back to me as he looked over his appointment
book.
    “Working on it,
thanks.” I yank my towel tight around my waist again and head off down to the
locker room to dress and walk back to the athlete’s housing. Tomorrow’s the
last chance I have for an early morning run through campus, I tell myself—to get
to hear only the pounding of my own two feet on the familiar path I’ve come to love,
before there are thousands of students you can barely manage to walk among.

2
     
     
    shay
    “Be sure and call us
when you get to your apartment.” Mom’s nervousness about me travelling back and
forth hasn’t gone away in the nearly two years since it began, not to mention
her anxiety about me living on my own without a roommate.
    I give her one last hug
before I board my flight. “Don’t worry, I will. And I’ll be seeing you in a
couple of months. I’ll be back before you know it, as soon as the semester
ends.” She gives me a weak smile. I can’t tell if it’s weak because she’s more
sad this time for some reason—there was something not right about it.
    I turn to give dad a
hug. “Love you Dad.”
    “We love you too. You
better hurry along. You’re already one day later than you wanted to be getting
back.” He picks up my carry-on bag and computer case and hands them to me.
    I walk towards the line
forming to depart, leaving them standing at the gate. I tell myself the smile is
nothing, and turn around to wave