What Was Left At Camp

Chapter 8. Four years later

I was tired and to be honest, quite annoyed. It was five forty five in the morning, on the first day of my Senior year in high school and I was already at school. Currently, I am standing with my coach on the football field waiting for our newest center linebacker for a 'special' one on one practice. I should still be in bed finishing my beauty sleep but for some reason this new kid, a transfer from some boarding school, had been unable to make any one of the practices we had held the last two weeks. Coach felt it was important we meet before our first official practice of the season.

I am Team Captain and the position he plays is vital to me as the Quarterback but why the special treatment? If he couldn't spare an afternoon out of his precious summer recess like the rest of the team had, then in my opinion he shouldn't be on the team.

"Is he gonna show or does six in the morning not work with his schedule either?" I directed my sarcastic question to my coach, kicking the grass beneath me out of boredom.

"We said six, Christian. He still has fifteen minutes before he'd be considered late. It sounds like you already have it out for this kid. As Team Capt-"

"I don't have it out for him, Coach. You should know me better than that. I just don't understand why the special treatment." I cut Coach's last works off knowing he would use my status against me.

"I sense a tone, Price" Crap Coach used my last name. That's never good.

"No tone, Coach. My apologies. Just tired, that's all!"

Coach Miller, was a great coach and in his day a one kick ass linebacker. He was a middle aged man with thinning light brown hair and dark brown eyes. I guess you can say he was probably in decent shape and he stood at a staggering six foot four. He was as good a man as he was a coach, and he had taken me under his wing when I first joined his team in freshman year. He had heard about me from my coach in middle school and by that time, just about everyone in our town knew who I was. The openly gay all star quarterback who some claim single handedly changed the social dynamic of the school... if not the whole damn town. But as good a man and coach as he was, you didn't want to piss him off. One telltale sign he was getting pissed was when your last name came out of his mouth.

Coach turned his head slightly looking in my direction with one eyebrow raised and a smirk on his face. "Are you telling me you need to run some laps to wake up or your coffee just hasn't kicked in yet?" he asked me with all seriousness in his voice.

"I'm sure the coffee will kick in soon... oh, there it is. Ahh. Energy!" I gave Coach a big cheesy smile and jumped in place a few times to prove I was ready for our little intimate practice with the new kid.

"Good because he's here" the coach gestured to a guy walking out of the back doors of our school, towards the field. Like myself, he was in full uniform. His football Jersey was all red with our school mascot, a hawk, printed on the front in black ink. We wore white pants with black and red stripes down the sides of each leg. Unusually, he already had on his helmet which was the reverse of our Jerseys with a red hawk printed on the sides of a black helmet. They were new this year, a design I helped create when the coach informed us only a few weeks ago the school had budgeted us the money for them.

Aside from his uniform I couldn't see much of the guy. One thing was clear though, I couldn't refer to him as a kid to myself or anyone else. This man... guy... walking towards us was my height if not an inch or two taller and looked like he was ripped. Even behind the football gear, you could tell he took very good care of himself and worked out regularly. Did I mention I'm six one so yeah, the guy was huge and no kid at all.

As he approached, rather slowly might I add, he walked with his head down. If he did glance anywhere other than the floor, it was to the sides but never forward or up. Weird. He also never fully addressed me when he finally made his way to us.