Primal: Part One (10 page)

“I wasn’t particular about where, so long as it was football.”

“We already have a football coach,” the clerk told him.  “His name’s Donovan Mitchell.  He used to play in college, but he didn’t make it to the NFL, like you…”

Marquis wasn’t sure if the woman was being friendly or flirty.  He decided to give her the benefit of the doubt.  He preferred to maintain a private lifestyle, as any normal person would, but he hadn’t found much of that since his return to Overbrook Meadows.  A lot of women he met knew about his divorce and assumed he was still a millionaire.  That led to a lot of unwanted attention.

“Is your football team any good?” he asked her.

“Ummm…”

Sophia leaned on the counter, which brought her boobs closer to him.  Her blouse wasn’t very revealing, but Marquis had been single for quite a while.  He instructed himself to maintain eye contact.

“They have their ups and downs,” she told him.  “You know how it is when you’re coaching high school.”  She caught herself and giggled.  “Wait, you don’t, do you?”

Marquis smiled and shook his head.

“You can have an all-star team one year,” the clerk told him, “and you lose all of your starters when they graduate.  Or sometimes you have a really good player, then his parents move in the middle of the year and transfers him to another school.  You just have to do the best you can with what you have.”

Marquis nodded.  “What about the girls’ basketball team?  Are they any good?”

“They are,” Sophia said.  “I think they won half their games last year.”

Marquis chuckled.  He thought a fifty/fifty season was
okay
, rather than good.

“They had one girl who was really talented,” the clerk told him.  “I don’t remember her name, though.”

“Let me guess, she graduated already.”

“No.”  Sophia shook her head.  “She’s still here.  I can tell you one thing though…”

“What’s that?”

“The girls’ boosters are gonna
love you
!”

Marquis was happy to get some good news.  “Are they very active?”

“
Definitely
.  Those ladies will do whatever they can to help the team.  You should’ve seen them last year.  Sometimes it wasn’t nobody in the stands but them, but you couldn’t tell by how loud they were.”

Marquis grinned at that.

“And when they find out
you’re
the new coach, you’re gonna have to beat them off with a stick,” Sophia warned.

Marquis raised an eyebrow.

“I ain’t lying,” Sophia continued.  “Big, strong, tall, former NFL player coaching high school…”  She giggled.  “Boy, I can see them now.”

Marquis laughed at that.  He decided that he liked Sophia.  But then she raised a red flag by asking, “Are you married?”

He shook his head.

“Oh, don’t worry about me,” she told him.  “I’ve been married for ten years. 
Happily
married.  I’m just saying, with you being single, you will have to watch out for some of those ladies.  A lot of the parents, really.And some teachers too.

“We had a cute guy teaching Algebra a few years back.  He was only here for a year, but he got caught up in
two
affairs.  They didn’t fire him, or anything like that.  But it got tense up here for a while.  He quit at the end of the year.”

“That’s crazy,” Marquis muttered.  Out of all the reservations he had about teaching, that type of trouble had never occurred to him.

“But I’m sure you’ll be fine,” Sophia said.  “Just keep telling them no, and they’ll eventually back off.  Unless you find yourself liking one of them back, then, you know, be discreet – and make sure she’s not married.”

The secretary laughed.  Marquis found himself laughing, too.

CHAPTER TWO

COACH BERRY

(ONE ON ONE)

Mr. Walters was a tall man, though not as tall as Marquis.  His skin was dark brown.  He wore thick glasses with bold, black frames and a neatly trimmed moustache.  Marquis was impressed with the way he spoke and carried himself.  He was surprised to find that Mr. Walters was impressed with him as well.

“I didn’t think you’d take the position,” he told him.

The two men sat facing each other in a large office that wasn’t too cluttered.  Several degrees hung on the wall above the principal.

“I was a little hesitant,” Marquis acknowledged.

“I’m glad you gave us a shot,” Mr. Walters said.  “I think you’ll do well here.  We have a great athletic program.  Our girls’ basketball team is really good.”

“Is that right?”  Marquis didn’t tell him that he had already heard the girls were only average.

“Oh yes,” Mr. Walters said.  “They’ll have you thinking you’re coaching the boys.  One of them – I forget her name – but she’s the real deal.  She’s a senior this year.  I’m sure she’ll get a few scholarship offers.”

“I think I heard about her,” Marquis said.

“I take it you still have your eye out for a football position,” the principal said.  “You may not stay with us next year…”

Marquis already had the job, but he didn’t think it would be wise to tell his boss he would only be there temporarily.

“That’s fine,” Mr. Walters said before he could answer.  “I won’t make you cop to it.  But I’m sure you know it’s much too soon to be thinking about next year.”

Marquis wasn’t sure how to respond to that.

“Son, are you aware that you’ve got red flags all over you?” the principal asked him.

Marquis shook his head slightly.

“First let me say that I’m a fan,” Mr. Walters said.  “I’ve been impressed with you ever since you were running folks over at
Castleberry
.  I kept up with you a little bit when you were over at LSU.  I knew you’d make it to the NFL.  You had that speed, son.  Watching you run…”  The principal shook his head, momentarily lost in a memory.  “Thing of beauty.  When you got drafted by the Cowboys, I told my wife, ‘That boy is gonna be
great
!’”

“Thanks.  But I guess it didn’t turn out that way,” Marquis said.  He was still reeling from the principal’s
red flags
comment.

“No, it didn’t,” Mr. Walters conceded.  “But you know, God has a plan for all of us.  I hated that you had to quit, but I know you made the best decision for yourself and your family.”

Yeah, my family
, Marquis thought.  His ex-wife Pauladidn’t think he made the right decision by leaving football.  Sadly, they would probably be together now if he was still playing.  They’d be living the dream and living a lie.

“But the trouble you had when you came back,” the principal continued, “you need to know that’s on a lot of people’s minds.  They know about your drunk partying.  They know about the messy divorce.  They know about your arrest.  Any kid at this school can google you and pull up your mugshot.”

Marquis sighed silently.  He wondered if he would ever get past those dark, infamous nights.

“As you can imagine,” the principal continued, “a lot of parents don’t like the idea of someone with your background teaching their kids.  I can go on and on about all of the great things you did in high school and college and during your time with the Cowboys.  But they’ll continue to ask, ‘
What about the things he did when he came home
?’

“I’m going to have to answer that question a lot this year,” Mr. Walters said.  “And that’s no fun.  The last thing a principal wants is to have to convince a parent that their child’s teacher isn’t as bad as they’ve heard.  So it looks like we’re both taking a chance this year.  Lucky for you,” he said with a smile, “I’m a man who believes in second chances.  I believe you’ll love your job so much, you’ll forget all about coaching a boy’s football team.”

Marquis was on edge, but the principal’s smile and his honesty was disarming.

“I don’t think I’ll forget about football.  But you might be right,” he replied with a smile of his own.

“I hope I am,” the principal said and rose from his seat.

Marquis stood too.  They reached across the desk to shake hands.

“Welcome to the team,
Coach Berry
,” Mr. Walters said.

That was the first time anyone ever used that title officially.  Marquis liked the way it sounded.

“Thank you, sir.  Glad to be here.”

● ● ● ● ● ●

Mr. Walters didn’t have time to give him a tour of the school, but he showed Marquis where his classroom was and introduced him to four teachers on the floor who would be part of his “team.”

After meeting with them, one of Marquis’ new colleagues took him to the athletic center.  There he found a state of the art gym and an impressive basketball court.  Marquis would rather be on the football field, but there were obvious perks to playing and practicing indoors.

Before he headed back to his classroom, he was stopped by another new co-worker.

“
Marquis Berry
!”

He turned and saw a strikingly fit gentleman approaching from the weight room.

“Welcome to Finley High!” the man said as he drew near.  He reached to shake his hand.  “I’m Donovan Mitchell, the football coach.

“Oh.”  Marquis offered him a quick smile as they shook hands.  “Good to meet you, man.  I heard a lot about you.”

“Probably not as much as I’ve heard about you,” Donovan stated.  “I can’t believe you’re here.  A
real live Dallas Cowboy
at my school!”

“Nah, not anymore,” Marquis said good-naturedly.  “Haven’t been a Cowboy since 2012.  I’m just regular old Marquis now.”

“Man, get off that.”  Donovan’s smile was ear to ear.  “Three years is not that long ago.  For a hardcore football fan like me, it seems like it was just yesterday.  I remember when you ran for 189 yards against the Eagles.  Two touchdowns that game.  You were on pace to break Dickerson’s record.”

Marquis had heard that before, but he always downplayed it.  Eric Dickerson was the greatest running back of all time, in his opinion.  As good as Marquis was, he didn’t like to be compared to the greats.

“I doubt it.  I only played seven games,” he told him.

“C’mon,” Donovan said, shaking his head.  “You got a thousand yards in those seven games.  There’s no way you wouldn’t have broken that record.  I look up to you, man.  Even though you only played half a season, I think you’re one of the best to ever carry that pigskin – that’s taking your high school and college games into consideration.”

Marquis continued to shake his head.  “I don’t think so, man.  Not even.”

Donovan sensed their new coach was not comfortable talking about his past, so he let it go for now.

“Well, you’re here now,” he said.  “But I gotta ask:  Why aren’t you coaching
football
?  I mean, not that we don’t want you here…”

“I wanted to,” Marquis revealed.  “That was my goal.  But I was dragging my feet all summer.  Wasn’t sure if I wanted to teach, even though I majored in education.  By the time I made up my mind, it was slim pickings.  I could’ve taught science at a few schools, but this is the only one that still had a coaching position available.”

“And you knew it was a
girls’
team?”

Marquis found his new friend easy to talk to, so he was honest with him.  “The recruiter said I could coach basketball, and I
assumed
he meant the boys.  I think he knew what I was expecting, and he went on letting me think that.”  He chuckled.  “I guess I could’ve backed out at the last minute, but I figured it wouldn’t be so bad.”

“It’s won’t be,” Donovan said right away.  “They had a pretty good team last year.”

“Yeah, I heard they lost half their games.”

“No, they
won
half their games,” Donovan corrected him.  “It’s all about prospective, my brother.  Plus you’ve got one of the best athletes in the school on your team.”

“I keep hearing that.  But no one knows her name.”

“It’s Lisa Edmonds,” Donovan told him.  “She’s a point guard.  That girl can shoot the lights out.  And she’s as tall as a giraffe.  You don’t get that too often; tall girls who got handles.”

“Oh yeah?” Marquis said, feeling a little excited about his team for the first time.

“No doubt,” Donovan said.  “She’s good for at least twelve points a game.”

“
Twelve points?
”  All of his hope quickly faded.  “And that’s my
best
player?”

Donovan laughed.  “I take it you haven’t been to a girls’ basketball game in a while.  A good game for them might end with a score of 48 to 55, in which case twelve points is a lot.”

Marquis laughed.  “Okay.  I don’t think my expectations can get any lower.”

“They’re gonna surprise you.  Watch.”  Donovan had a twinkle in his eye.  “Unless you’re expecting all ofthem to dunk, then yeah, you can lower that expectation…”

Author’s note
: I hope you enjoyed this excerpt. 
One on One
is on sale now.  Thanks for spending time with my creative side.  I truly appreciate your interest in my books!  Please visit
www.keithwalkerbooks.com
for more information about me and my other novels.