On his way up to football practice at Farrington that afternoon, Chris looked for Denise, but she wasn’t waiting on the bench. Her not being there depressed him more than he would have guessed it might.
Rock-bottom dejected, he made his way to the football field, headed for the locker room, and changed into his smelly P.E. clothes. The team wasn’t wearing practice pads yet. No one had even touched a football. Sergeant Arroyo believed in conditioning. And for the first week, he was putting everyone through a pretty brutal pace of calisthenics and running laps around the field.
When Chris emerged from the locker room, what he saw, instead of angering him, made him even sadder, if that was possible. Standing on the sideline together were Sergeant Arroyo and Jake. The two were talking and smiling.
Chris slumped down on the bleachers and observed the two. Jake was tallish, maybe an inch or two shorter than Chris. He figured that would make Jake and Denise about the same height.
Although young, Chris was strong and muscular, with no body fat to speak of. Jake had a strong-looking body, but he had obviously consumed his fair share of malasadas. If Jake was there to try out for the team, Chris wasn’t sure the guy could make it through the grueling gauntlet of physical challenges that would determine who made the cut.
Sergeant Arroyo blew his whistle and called for everyone to assemble at mid-field.
“Okay, gentlemen, today we’re going to start with something different. My son here is going to be timing you in a 40-yard dash.”
Jake, stopwatch in hand, smiled and waved to everyone.
“Okay, let’s line up at the goal line there and get started.”
Chris was frozen in place. His son? Geez. How, he wondered, with a father like that, could a son be that mean and stupid? And out of shape. For sure that was wrong. And why not try out for the team? Was he chicken or what?
“Andaya!” the sergeant yelled, “get your butt over here!”
Chris shuffled over to the assembled group.
“All right, men. As you come to the line, give me your name so I can write it down. When I blow the whistle, you take off for the line where my son is standing. He’ll start the clock when I blow the whistle, and he’ll call out your time when you hit the 40. Got it? Any questions?”
Silence.
“All right, you, Andaya, I want you up first.”
Chris, his mind a messy mush of all kinds of feelings and ideas swirling around, didn’t hear his name being called.
“Andaya!”
This time he heard.
“Yes, sir?”
“Get over here, Andaya. You’re first up. What’s with you? Are you sick?”
“What, no, sir, I’m good. Sorry.”
“Okay, let’s go.”
Chris faced the figure of Jake Arroyo, thought about Denise, but did hear the whistle. He crossed the 40 and kept going, slowing his pace and finally stopping to bend over and pant.
“Four point five one,” he heard Jake yell.
As the whistle blew, the next runner took off, and Chris jogged slowly back to the goal line.
He watched each team candidate run. When everyone had finished, it turned out that there was only one person, Orlando Galiza, a freshman from Dole Intermediate, who was faster than Chris.
“Okay men, line up,” called Coach Arroyo. And the rest of practice was calisthenics. After completing his timing duties, Jake Arroyo sat on the bleachers and watched the others get pounded into exhaustion.
The next day Chris met up with Allen and Andrew on the library stairs.
“So did you make the team?” asked Andrew.
“I don’t know. Nobody knows yet. I don’t know when Sergeant Arroyo is going to tell us who. But you know what?”
The two leaned forward as if what Chris was about to say was some deep secret.
“You know what? That pimple boy is Sergeant Arroyo’s son.”
“Nooooo,” said both.
“Wow,” said Allen, “the buggah must get his ass chewed all the time with one dad like that?”
“Yeah,” agreed Andrew. “I can’t imagine growing up with a father that strict.”
Just then Chris saw Denise cross the lawn toward Building B. Jake wasn’t with her. Chris was more concerned about where Denise’s head might be at than that Jake was missing. The newsflash that the reformed high-jacker’s father was his P.E. teacher and football coach, could not supplant his wondering about what his next move might be with her in their relationship.
When it was time for English, Denise came down the hall beaming joy at seeing her grammar hero waiting for her.
“Hi, Chris,” she said in a voice he’d not heard from her before. He liked it and wanted to hear it more. It sounded to him something like love.
“Hey,” he said, his spirits bouncing up.
All smiles, the two sat down.
“Any trouble with your grammar sheet last night?” asked Denise.
“No, it was no sweat,” said Chris. “You?”
“Um, it was easier than the night before. I didn’t have to ask my mom for help.”
Smiling, Chris said, “You think you had the most fun doing it of anyone in the class?”
Denise laughed. “No,” she said. “I did it, but I did not have too much or what I’d call fun.”
“Good morning one and all,” said Mr. Tolentino, strutting into the classroom like he meant it. “I’m not going to ask who had the most fun working on last night’s grammar worksheet. What I want to know today, is who enjoyed last night’s reading most?”
Several hands went up, including both Chris’s and Denise’s.
“Good, that’s very good,” said Mr. Tolentino. “If nothing else this year, I want to try to make reading enjoyable for everyone in the class. That’s my goal. If I don’t have one hundred percent of you loving reading by the time school ends, I’ll have to quit teaching and become a beach bum.”
Almost everyone laughed at this, even those who’d not raised their hand to the question of loving the reading last night.
At lunchtime, Chris was surprised to see Denise sitting by herself in the cafeteria. What luck.
“Guys, if it’s okay,” he said to Allen and Andrew, “I’m going to eat over there with Denise.”
The two elbowed each other. “Whoaaaaa,” they said. “Someone’s in love,” said Andrew.
Chris rolled his eyes, then turned and walked over to where Denise was sitting.
“Hey,” he said, “can I eat here?”
“Of course,” said Denise, smiling brightly.
Chris sat. “Ah, hey, so did you know that Jake is Sergeant Arroyo’s son?”
“Oh yes,” said Denise. “I knew that. And he has a twin sister here.”
She surveyed the other tables. “There, over there,” she said, pointing at a smaller shy-looking girl who was sitting at the end of a table in the corner.
“Wow,” said Chris. “How’d you know that?”
“Well, Jake told me. He told me that his sister saw him high-jacking some students the other day and told her father about it. From the way Jake was talking about it, I think his dad was really, really angry. Not that he hit him or anything like that. He just yelled at him. And that’s why Jake stopped doing it. He told me about giving the money back to the kids he took it from. And now he has to check in every day to let his dad know that he’s not done any bad things like that.”
This information, too, amazed Chris. So that was why Jake stopped being a jerk. Well good for his sister and good for Sergeant Arroyo, he thought.
“Ah, so where is he, anyway? He eats with you, doesn’t he?”
“Yes, usually. But he wasn’t in homeroom today, so maybe he’s sick or something.”
Chris and Denise finished up, and Chris headed off for P.E. class. When everyone had changed into their ridiculous P.E. clothes, they headed out to the field to await instructions from the sergeant.
And they waited.
“What you figure?” one of the boys said. “How come he late?”
There was lots of headshaking and mumbling. Then, walking out onto the field and heading in their direction came a tall, thin haole, Mr. Bridges, one of the school’s vice-principals.
“Hey everyone,” he said as he neared them, “can I have your attention, please. Ah, well, ah, Sergeant Arroyo can’t be here today, so please go back into the locker room, get changed, and then let’s all head up to the office. When the bell sounds, I’ll let you all go to your next classes.”
This was super strange. Jake out, the Sergeant out.
That afternoon, on the way to practice, Chris saw Denise waiting for her father. He went over and sat next to her. “Hey,” he said, “you know what’s weird? Jake’s dad was out today, too.”
“That is weird,” said Denise. “You think something happened to the family?”
“Huh, I don’t know.”
Just then, Denise’s dad pulled up. He swung the door open and called hello to Chris as Denise smiled goodbye and closed the door. But the car did not move.
Chris stood up to go but stopped to watch Denise and her dad talking.
All of a sudden, Denise opened the door. Chris could see that she was crying.
Denise slid out and walked over to Chris. “Chris, my dad just told me my mom is getting transferred to teach at Roosevelt. That’s close to my home, like I said before. It means it’ll be easy for mom to take me home if I go to Stevenson Intermediate. I’m starting there tomorrow.”
Chris knew what this meant, he understood she was saying she was leaving, but his brain wasn’t functioning normally. He stood there, his mouth open to say something, but he struggled to figure out what exactly that would be.
Finally, something came to him. “So you want me to tell Jake?”
Denise, looking at her grammar hero, sniffled, then smiled. “I guess, yes, that would be nice.”
“Okay,” said Chris, “I’ll tell him. I, uh . . .” Now he felt like crying, but because Denise was smiling, he held back. “I hope you have a good time there with all your old friends,” he said.
“That will be nice,” said Denise, nodding. “It’ll be good to see them. But I’m going to miss all my new friends here. Like you, Chris, and Jake.”
Chris smiled. He thought about hugging the girl he loved, the first girl he knew he loved, who was about to disappear, but he didn’t.
Denise leaned forward and hugged Chris. She was tall. Almost as tall as Chris.
He hugged her back. Just before he stepped into the car, she turned back and waved. “Goodbye, Chris, I won’t forget you.”
And with that, Chris’s heart jumped into Mr. Chan’s car and drove away, leaving him with nothing to pump blood to the rest of his body.
“So now I gotta talk to him,” Chris said aloud. “Just great. This is just fricken great.”
And with that, he headed up to Farrington for football practice.
Lanning Lee 