The Extra Yard (16 page)

But it hadn't.

When Doc was finished, he turned to Coach Gilbert and Teddy's dad and said, “I think the boy made an excellent diagnosis. I think it's just a stinger.”

“He should get an X-ray, just to be on the safe side,” Teddy's dad said.

“You're not a doctor!”
Teddy said.

“I'm your dad,” he said. “And I used to be a quarterback, until I thought I was good to go after a hit like that. It wasn't a sack with me. I got downfield ahead of a ballcarrier and tried to throw a hero block. As soon as I did, I knew something was wrong. But it was a close game like this one, and I told myself I could play through it. And you know what happened? Before long I was going, going,
gone
.”

“You got hurt throwing a block?” Teddy said. “You never told me that.”

“Even though I was a quarterback, I wanted everybody to know I was a
player.
So I tried to play through an injury, and before long my career was over. I don't want that to happen to you.”

“But there's a difference between getting hurt and being injured, right, Doc?” Teddy said.

“I've never heard it put exactly that way,” Dr. McAuley said. “But yes, there is a difference.”

“If it was Brian, would you let him keep playing?”

“I would.”

Teddy's dad, his voice loud, said, “Well, this is about my son, not yours.”

“But it's still my team,” Coach Gilbert said. “And on my team, we go by what the doctor says. And if the doctor says Teddy can play, he can play.”

That didn't just shut up Teddy's dad. It shut up everybody until Teddy said to Coach, “Can I talk to my dad for a minute?”

The other adults walked away. So did Jack and Gus. Now it was just Teddy and his dad, sitting next to each other on the bench.

On the field Scotty Hanley had just been chased out of the pocket and had thrown wildly on third-and-long, which meant that the Wildcats were about to get the ball back.

“Before you say anything, hear me out,” Teddy's dad said.

“Talk fast,” Teddy said, “because I'm going back in.”

“It's your
arm
,” his dad said.

“You're right, Dad,” he said. “It is my arm.”

He got up and walked over to Coach Gilbert as Jake was calling for a fair catch on the Panthers' punt, and said, “I really am good to go.”

Coach turned and shot a quick look at Teddy's dad. Teddy turned and saw his dad hesitate, then nod.

“You get hit like that again, you're coming right back here,” Coach said.

Teddy grinned. “The only place I'm going is
there.
” He pointed toward the Panthers' end zone. Now Coach grinned.

“You know,” he said, “you might be more like your old man than you think.”

•  •  •

They started at the Panthers' thirty-nine yard line. When Teddy got to the huddle, Gus said, “Can you throw if you have to?”

Teddy said, “Can you catch if you have to?”

He handed the ball to Jake on first down. Jake got four yards, off right tackle. Then Brian got two more on second down, running to his left. While Teddy waited for Nate to come in with the next play, he checked the clock. Two minutes and ten seconds left. If they could get a score in that time, they would be the only undefeated team in the league.

He rotated his shoulder without making a big show of doing it. It still hurt. He wondered if they were going to let him throw on third-and-four. Or if they were going to run it twice if they had to.

Jake said, “Tight end curl.”

Teddy nodded. It was a ten-yard pattern. Coach Gilbert and his dad were going to find out right here if he could make a good throw that far.

He went with a quick count, faked a handoff to Jake, set himself in the pocket, didn't even wait for Mike O'Keeffe to turn around before he brought his arm forward. He felt a twinge as he did. But he didn't baby the throw. It was a spiral, right on Mike O'Keeffe's number 88. Mike secured the ball with both arms right before he got hit by both a safety and a linebacker. First down, Panthers' twenty-four. Under two minutes.

When Mike got back to the huddle, he nodded at Teddy and said, “Boy can play hurt.”

“Boy can play, period,” Gus said.

“Let's close this deal,” Teddy said.

But he got buried on the next play, what was supposed to be a pass to Gus. The Panthers came with an all-out blitz, including one of their safeties, right up the middle. Teddy had no time to even throw the ball away. Or get away from the rush. He managed to cover up, but the kid coming from his right landed on his throwing shoulder.

Teddy wasn't sure, but he thought the kid gave him a little shove as he started to get up. When he did, it was Teddy who was popping up off the ground and rolling the kid, number 58, off him.

“Hey,” the kid said.

“Hey what?” Teddy said, taking a step forward. “I'm not your mattress.”

Number 58 took a step toward him now. But Gus was there to walk Teddy back to the huddle.

“Feeling something on the shoulder?” Gus said.

“Just feeling it,” Teddy said, still eyeballing number 58.

“Like you said,” Gus said. “Let's close this deal.”

“You're right,” Teddy said. “Let's not waste any more time.”

But he felt himself smiling. Sometimes getting knocked down just made it feel all that much better when you got up. He looked over at the sidelines. Coach Gilbert and his dad were still about five yards out on the field, as if wondering how he was after taking a shot like that.

Teddy just waved them off.

Forty-five seconds left. Second-and-sixteen. Teddy faked to Jake again and threw a dart to Gus on the left sideline for ten yards. Third-and-six. The clock stopped.

Brian brought in the play: quarterback option roll. It was one of the new plays his dad had put in for this game. Teddy had the option of making a quick slant throw to Gus or pulling the ball down and running for the chains himself.

As they broke the huddle, Teddy said, “Like I asked you before: Can you catch?”

“Try me.”

But the Panthers' middle linebacker, who'd made smart decisions the whole game, made another one now. He read the play perfectly, jumping Gus's route as he came across the field from the left slot, almost daring Teddy to throw into his area.

He almost did. His arm was already coming forward when he spied the middle linebacker. But his big right hand saved him again and turned what was going to be a throw into a world-class pump fake, the kind Scotty Hanley had been making for his team all day.

Teddy decided to run for it, putting a good move on the Panthers' outside linebacker and getting a step on him to the outside, realizing he didn't just have a chance for a first down now, he had a chance to score.

He was at the five yard line by then and could see the middle linebacker who'd taken the pass to Gus away from him coming hard from his left, trying to cut him off.

Teddy didn't hesitate. He took one more long stride and then dove for the orange pylon, flying through the air with the ball in both hands, trying to make the same kind of play Jack had been trying to make when he wrecked his own right shoulder.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw the middle linebacker launch himself at the same time.

No fear from him, no fear from Teddy Madden. He was trying to win the game right here, and the other kid was doing anything he could to stop him from doing that, even if it meant a midair collision.

But this time the other kid missed. He landed behind Teddy. Teddy landed a couple of yards past the pylon, in the end zone and inbounds.

He didn't land on his shoulder this time. Just the football. It knocked all the wind out of him. He didn't care, because he knew in that moment he'd basically knocked the Norris Panthers right into second place.

Yeah,
Teddy thought.

Yeah, he could play hurt even if he couldn't catch his breath right now.

When he got to the sideline after Brian ran in for the conversion, his dad came up to him and started to slap him on the shoulder, but he stopped himself just in time.

“That shoulder must be made out of rock,” his dad said.

“Nah,” Teddy said. “Just my head.”

“Now that,” Coach Gilbert said, “
does
run in the family.”

T
he trip to ESPN on Sunday afternoon turned out to be a lot of fun.

They walked around what was known as the “campus” and really looked like one. They toured the sets where the network had done their NFL shows in the morning and would do them again later at night. They also saw the sets for the
Baseball Tonight
show, and
SportsCenter,
and where they did the
Mike & Mike
show during the week.

Teddy's dad showed them a couple of control rooms for
SportsCenter
, where he said the producers and directors and the technical people sat. There was another huge room, what looked to Teddy to be the size of a football field, where researchers, some of them not looking all that much older than Teddy and his friends, sat staring at computer terminals.

“What are they all doing, looking up the same stuff?” Gus said.

“No,” Teddy's dad said. “They're trying to find stuff that nobody else has, before somebody else finds it first.”

From there they walked past a cafeteria and down a long corridor to the studios for ESPN Radio. Teddy's dad pointed out where the host was sitting on one side of the glass, and where the producers sat on the other.

Teddy could see his dad thoroughly enjoying himself, acting as their tour guide and an expert on everything they were seeing. But Cassie was enjoying this tour the most, asking the most questions.

At one point Teddy whispered to her, “It's like you're trying to memorize this place.”

“I want to know my way around when I come back someday for work,” she said.

“So you're going to be the second coming of Hannah Storm?”

“No,” she said. “Just the first Cassie Bennett.”

“Hey,” Teddy's dad said, “you might be working for me when you do.”

“You looking to be a boss, Dad?” Teddy said.

“How great would that be?” his dad said. “Someday I'm gonna be the one calling the plays around here.”

Teddy's dad led them back outside, to the middle of the campus, where there were signs telling them how many miles away places like Wimbledon were. Cassie poked Teddy with an elbow and said, “Thank your dad for doing this.”

“Can't I wait until we're through?”

“No,” she said. “Thank him now and then thank him again later, so he'll know you really mean it. This has been, like, the best field trip ever.”

“Why can't you tell him that?”

She sighed and shook her head. “You can be so thick sometimes,” she said. “You do get that it will mean more coming from you, right?”

“But won't it technically be coming from you, since you're making me say it?”

She stopped him by putting a hand on his shoulder. “The next elbow will hurt.”

They picked up the pace and caught up with the others. When they did, Teddy said, “Dad, thank you
so
much.” He glanced at Cassie and said, “This has been the best field trip
ever.
”

“You're welcome, kid,” his dad said. He looked right at Teddy then as he said, “Sometimes you just gotta take a quick step back and appreciate things that are right in front of you.”

He was still looking at Teddy when he said in a soft voice, “I'm actually the one who should be thanking all of you.”

When they started walking again, Cassie stuck another elbow in Teddy's ribs. It
did
hurt, as promised.

“You're welcome,” she said.

T
he semifinals for the Walton Middle School version of
The Voice
were set for Thursday, at a last-period assembly.

They'd set up the competition a lot differently from the way they did the real
Voice
on television. But with two shows to go, Teddy and Jack and Gus and Cassie each had one singer still competing for the trophy the school was going to provide, along with a one-hundred-dollar cash prize. Two singers would be eliminated at the assembly.

In a week they'd put on their big show, the biggest in the history of the school, and declare a winner. But for now, there was constant chatter on social media, with kids in the school picking sides. As far as Teddy could tell, the majority of kids in the school thought Katie Cummings, the last singer for Team Cassie, was the favorite to walk away with the trophy and the cash.

Teddy's singer was Gregg Leonard, from the Wildcats. Gregg had shocked everybody on their team by not only trying out, but also by having a great singing voice. Jack had Vi Odierno, whose mother had been a professional singer and who had a pretty great voice of her own. Gus had his twin sister Angela. None of them were conceding anything to Coach Cassie and Katie. They were all competing to the end. The fact that this was for such a good cause just made the whole thing feel more intense, especially as they got closer to the finals.

Tonight, at Teddy's house, they were having their last meeting before the assembly. His mom was there, and Mrs. Brandon, and the four coaches. They'd cleared away the pizza boxes from the dining room table and were going over last-minute details, wondering if there was anything they had missed.

“Mom,” Teddy said, “there have been invasions we studied in history that weren't as well planned as this.”

“God is in the details,” she said.

Teddy pointed at Cassie and said, “Write that down!”

His mom narrowed her eyes. “I know you're funny, young man. Just not as funny as you think you are.”