Over the Middle: A Sports Romance (11 page)

"Whatever you need, Coach."

He nods, then drops his bomb. "I want you on special teams too. They're burning us on kickoff and punt coverage, and I need someone who can form a blocking wall for the runners. Can you do it?"

Special teams. The suicide squad that is normally made up of second-stringers or crazy dudes who don't care about their health. If running routes and getting tackled is like getting into a minor car accident, special teams is like a car accident on the freeway going high-speed.

"Get me out there. Whatever you need."

Coach nods again, and the trembles start. I haven't felt the trembles since high school, and I know what they are. I'm not scared. I just want to get on the field, to play and fight and win.

* * *

O
ne minute left
. No more timeouts. We're down seventeen-thirteen. We need a touchdown, and it's seventy-two yards away.

"All right, guys, this is where we make ourselves famous," Tyler jokes in the huddle, looking around. I look around, too, and see my teammates. They're exhausted, beaten up, and just a little way from crumbling. We need to get fired up, and Tyler's trying.

He calls a run play, risky at this point in the game, but the Silverados aren’t expecting it either. If we toss it to the outside, we have a chance to gain yards and still get out of bounds.

I pop the defensive end before releasing to the outside. I see the defensive back coming on a collision course with our running back. I lower my shoulder and crash into his side, my body already aching from blocking on punts and kickoffs, but I don't care. The guy is blasted off his feet, and as I go tumbling down with him, I see our runner scamper for eight yards before running out of bounds, stopping the clock.

"All right, all right!" Tyler yells when we reform the huddle. Forty-nine seconds left. "That's what the fuck I'm talking about!"

"Tyler," I groan, and I'm feeling something grating in my elbow. I don't care. They'll have to chop off my arm to get me out of the game right now. "Let's close it out. I don't have two minutes left in me."

Tyler pulls me up and looks me in the eye. "Think you can do it, Touchdown? Or do we get Carlson in here?"

I nod. "I got this. After this, though, nobody calls me Touchdown.”

"You catch the ball, and I'll make sure of it. Don’t fuck this up, Duncan.”

"See you in the end zone."

We line up, and I can see the defense running through their schemes, adjusting to our formation.

I release quickly, praying that our right tackle can give Tyler enough time to get the ball off. I cut out on a flag route, turning my head to see the pass already in the air. Tyler's let it go just a little long, and I urge my tired legs to go just a bit faster, to cover the space a bit quicker.

It's on my fingertips, and I pull it in, knowing that my hectic pace sent me off-route. I'm in the defensive back’s zone now, and he's closing from behind fast, the free safety coming up fast on my left. I juke, spinning off one guy to feel the other hit me.

I bounce, refusing to go down. No fucking way, not with everything on the line. I run, as hard as I can, my arm screaming from that last hit but my fingers refusing to let go of the ball. I've been sitting on my ass nearly all week, and I'm tired, forgetting how much football hurts.

The goal line is only ten yards away . . . eight . . . five . . . two . . .

Someone hits me from behind, and I reach out with everything I have, praying I'm close enough. I can only hope the ball doesn't tumble from my fingers as I reach, pulling my knees up to prevent the ball from being blown down from an early touch.

I hit the ground and hear a whistle. The wind's been knocked out of me. I can't do much more than move my head, which is jammed into the turf enough that I can barely breathe. I turn my head to the side to see the side judge standing, his arms over his head signaling the touchdown, highlighted against the bright glare of the stadium lights and the black of the night sky beyond. It's the best touchdown I've ever scored, even if it's not the prettiest.

Twenty-four seconds left, and we're up, nineteen to seventeen. Someone pulls me to my feet, and I see it's Tyler, who's grinning. "How's it feel, hero?"

I look around, seeing the stadium still exploding in cheers, and my chest is heaving, I'm so winded. I hope I'm in better shape next game, or I'll die by the third quarter. "I need some fucking Gatorade."

Tyler pounds me on the back, laughing. "Done. And then?"

"I want to call Carrie."

I
wake up on Sunday
, and I'm feeling good. I'd caught the game on television, and I have to admit that I cheered when Duncan caught his touchdown pass.

I'd kept up to date with what he was doing, even if I was intentionally keeping myself away from football. Coach Taylor could tell Thursday that something was up, and he told me what Duncan had been doing. I prayed, as I slipped off to sleep on Saturday, that he'd call me soon.

Waking up Sunday, I know that I need him. My arms ache, and more importantly, my heart aches as I think of him, the sight of him hugging his teammates after his touchdown. The talking heads after the game were, of course, heaping praise on him, saying that perhaps the half-game benching helped him.

My phone rings, and I'm excited, thinking that perhaps it’s Duncan, but my excitement fades when I see that the number is a landline, although one I don't know. "Hello?"

The voice on the other end is a bit stuffy, officious, but unconsciously so, like someone who has been doing it for so long, they don't even realize it. "Miss Mittel? This is Lawrence Friar, Vice Dean of the Academic Board."

Vice Dean of the Academic Board. The Honor Committee. They're one of the staples of Western, and one of the reasons I'd selected the school. Modeled after the successful and long-running boards in the Ivy League and at the military academies, the Honor Committee has one purpose: to eliminate cheating. Even the athletes aren't exempt. An athlete at Western might get tutoring, might get easy classes, but they do have to turn in their own work and take their own tests.

"Good morning, Dean Friar. How can I help you?"

"There's no easy way to say this, so I'll cut straight to the point. Miss Mittel, there's been an accusation of cheating."

"Oh no! Well, of course, I'll be happy to help the Board in any way I can. Who is the accusation against?"

"It's against you, Miss Mittel. Would you mind coming to the Board offices?"

I'm shocked. What the hell is going on? "Of—of course. When?"

"As soon as you can would be best. We’d like to clear this up as quickly as possible."

"Y—yes, of course. Me too. This must be some sort of misunderstanding."

"I hope so, Miss Mittel. Please, as soon as you can."

I roll out of bed and grab the nearest set of clothes I can find, pulling on some jeans and a t-shirt. I walk across campus, trying to figure out what the hell could have caused someone to level an Honor charge against me. I mean, I make sure to list all my sources for all my papers, which I know is the biggest thing that people get rapped for by the Honor Board.

The Board has its own separate building on campus, a small, octagonal building that's made of granite, with a peaked roof that gives it an intimidating air, and the only windows are narrow slits on the upper floors. Frankly, I've always thought the Honor building looks like a cross between an old-fashioned jail tower and a rocket ship and has a sort of Gothic intimidation that would be complete if they would put the stocks or a gallows out front. I walk up to the heavy front doors and pull, finding them locked. Before I can think that perhaps I just got punked, the intercom next to the door buzzes. "Miss Mittel?"

"Yes, the doors are locked."

"I'll be right down."

I stand at the front of the building, feeling my nervousness grow with each second that passes. I start shifting back and forth, not sure what is going on, but I can't help my jitters. Finally, just when I'm about to hit the button on the intercom again, the heavy doors unlock, and the door opens up. They're bigger than normal doors, at least ten feet tall, and I see as they're pushed open that they're thick, too. In fact, if there's ever a zombie attack, the Honor building is a very good place to take cover.

"Miss Mittel, I'm Dean Friar. Please, come inside."

He’s probably a little over fifty years-old, with a big shock of white hair on top of his head that looks slightly curly, like maybe he should be the sort of man who always keeps his hair short in order to keep it under control, but he doesn't. He's probably been in academia his entire adult life and cut his teeth on the wild days of the seventies.

"Dean, I would love to know what this is about. I mean, I've never cheated on anything in my life." Now that I have someone to talk to, my jitters stop, but my nervousness doesn't. If anything, I'm getting more nervous by the second.

"I understand, but we need to go through the process. Follow me, please."

We go upstairs, where I see Professor Vladisova sitting in a conference room. There's only one conclusion that comes to mind—my organic midterm. "Professor? Do you think I cheated on the test?"

"You left the test room for several minutes," the Professor says in her heavily accented English, tapping a paper in front of her. "You come back in, sit down, and rattle off the rest of your questions at nearly impossible speeds, scoring them perfectly. Too perfectly, in fact."

"What?" I don't know what to say other than that. I'm being accused of cheating because I answered the test questions too perfectly?

"The Professor suspects that during that time you left the room, you looked up course materials," Dean Friar explains, gesturing me to a seat. "Now, this is just a preliminary questioning. Maybe we can clear this up. If so, then no formal paperwork will be started against you. It's also why I called you on Sunday. I hope we can clear this up without any disruption to your academic schedule. I've been doing this for a long time, and I don't like disrupting the lives of good students."

"Thank you, Dean. Professor, I swear to you, I didn't cheat on the test. I studied the night before, and those last questions, I noticed they were lifted almost totally word for word out of the book. Since I had just studied them, I was able to answer them quickly, that's all."

"Is it true that you left the test room with your cellphone?" Dean Friar asks. He's taken a seat at the table, his fingers folded in front of him, and I suspect that somewhere, something is recording what we're saying.

I nod. "Yes. I got a text message from someone, and it seemed important, so I stepped out to call them back. I explained I was still in the middle of a mid-term—they'd forgotten. After saying goodbye, I went back into the test room and went back to work."

"So you deny using the phone to look anything up?”

I nod my head vigorously. "Dean, if there were any benefits I got from that phone call, it was that I was somewhat distracted and got my out of my own way with the answers. I was kinda in another frame of mind after getting the call."

Dean Friar nods, then looks over at Professor Vladisova. "Is there anything else to your suspicions, Professor?"

She nods, and taps the paper in front of her again. "This. I was made aware of Miss Mittel's cheating by another student. I have a written statement from that student saying that she saw Miss Mittel using her phone for cheating purposes during the test time."

"What? No way!" I yell, caught off guard. "Who is making up lies like that?"

"The complaint came from Miss Brown, who was sitting behind you in the test. She says she saw you pull your phone out to access the Internet multiple times."

"No! She's lying! I—" I try to defend myself, but the name just hits me in the gut. Chelsea? Why is she saying I cheated? What the hell is going on? "The phone stayed in my pocket until that message. You even noticed the first time I pulled it out."

"This can be easy to clear up, then. Miss Mittel, does your phone have Internet capability?" Dean Friar asks. "I mean, not everyone has a smartphone, but many do."

"I do, sir," I reply, taking it out. "Here, take a look at my logs. I didn't access the Net the entire time. I only had the one text message, and then a phone call."

Dean Friar nods and turns on my phone. He swipes at the screen for a second, then turns it back around, handing it back to me. "Would you mind unlocking it?"

"Of course, sir. Just a minute."

I enter my password and hand the phone back to him, who taps at my screen. I don’t know what this proves, though. I could’ve easily just erased my browsing history. Instead, the Dean's face goes more pinched a minute or two later, and he sets the phone down to look at me. "Mind explaining this?"

I pick up my phone and see that the Dean's pulled up my data usage statistics for the phone with some app. The log shows . . . data usage during the test? What the fuck? "I . . . I can't explain this, sir. I didn't use the phone during that time, except what I've told you."

"Well, your data logs show that you accessed over twenty megabytes of usage on the day of the test," Dean Friar says. "Did you happen to use the phone to browse the web during that day?"

"No. I have my laptop, and my data plan doesn’t cover anywhere near that much.”

"Well, let's check your browser history then," Dean Friar says, taking the phone back and tapping away. How in the hell does this man know how to pull up all this stuff on my phone?
I
don't even know how to do that.

"Trust me, there's no—"

"Access of the course notes and lectures in your browser history?" He asks, showing me the phone. His wintry smile has totally disappeared, and Vladisova is looking like she's about to burst a blood vessel, she's so pissed off. "Miss Mittel, you seem to be digging yourself a deeper and deeper hole."

"No. There must be a mistake. I didn't cheat, I—I studied." That sounds pathetic, even to my ears. I might as well have
Liar & Cheat
on my shirt.

"I hope that’s the case. Miss Mittel, based on this, I still have to notify you of your rights under the Western University Honor Code . . ."

* * *

I
'm
in a daze as I walk back to my room, my fingers numb, and twice, I trip over random things in my path.

I get back to my room without killing myself and sag into my chair, still trying to figure out what the fuck just happened. I reach into my pocket to call Coach Taylor. He's always been sort of a mentor, but then I remember that I left my phone with Dean Friar. He said that the Honor Board would return my phone to me by Tuesday. I could have fought that, but what's the point? I'd look even more guilty than I do right now.

My computer beeps, and I see that I'm getting a call. I don't want to, but I get up and go over anyway, hoping that maybe this day could have at least some good news in it. I see that it's Mom and Dad, and I open the call. "Hey guys."

"What's wrong, sweetie?" Mom asks immediately. That's Mom. I can't put anything past her. She's always been able to read me like a book. "You look upset."

I think about lying but decide against it. I mean, what's the point? "I've run into some trouble, Mom."

"What kind of trouble, Carrie?" Mom asks. She turns her head and hollers over her shoulder. "Vince! Come here!”

"Mom!" I protest when she turns back around. "I'm not in preschool any more."

"No, but you don't need to repeat yourself either. Might as well let him hear you the first time,” she counters, and I can't argue. Mom works as an office manager, and she's always been a person who focuses on efficiency. Then again, when you have to measure your family time in blocks between your husband disappearing on the road for a week or more at a time driving a truck, and you're balancing a full-time job and a young daughter, efficiency is important.

"What's this about trouble?" Dad says, coming into the room on the other side, and he takes a seat. "What happened?"

"I've been accused of cheating on my Organic Chemistry mid-term," I said, trying to control my emotions. "The Dean of the Honor Board asked me some questions today."

"What? I mean, I assume you didn't cheat, but why would they think you did?” Dad asks, and I take a deep breath, trying to think of what to say.

“Of course I didn’t cheat. I got a single text message and stepped out to call Duncan back, then went back and took my test. But they're saying that I was pulling up course notes and lectures during the test time. My phone apparently even says so—it says I cheated. All I did was talk to Duncan for like . . . two minutes."

"Duncan," Dad says. “That’s the football player you were seeing, right?"

“He is, but he didn’t have anything to do with it. Another student, a girl I thought was a friend, accused me, and my professor went to the Board. Now I'm in deep shit, and I don't know why she’d accuse me.”

Dad gets angry, and I can see he's about to go off. His face is getting red. "I can tell you exactly how. I’ll bet you anything that slime ball had something to do with it.”

I try to force myself to stay calm, but it’s getting increasingly difficult. “I think I know him a little better than you do. I’ve been on the training intern staff for a year and a half now, remember? I've been working with him daily since June. We took a long time before we decided to start seeing each other."

Well, that's on pause right now, but I'm not going to tell you guys that, but that’s beside the point.

Dad, though, is already in full-on rant mode. "That may be true, Carrie, but he's scum. After you called, I checked up on him—just Google him, and it’s like a bad tabloid story. Parties, off-campus incidents, and a list of girls on his arm that stretches for pages. I thought I raised you better than that!"