Cold Calls by Charles Benoit

Author:Charles Benoit [Benoit, Charles]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780544239500
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Eighteen

EYES ON THE SCREEN, ERIC HEADED THE CORNER KICK from Ronaldo into the goal, putting Real Madrid up by three against Chelsea with ten minutes left to play, saying, “And—again—the crowd goes wild.”

Through the headset, Duane said, “That’s because the refs didn’t call the offsides. Again.”

“Spoken like a true loser.”

“I do my winning on a real team,” Duane said.

“Hilarious.”

“What? Too soon?”

The screen showed the goal again in slow motion.

“Not too soon to bury you,” Eric said.

The players were gathering at midfield for the restart when Eric heard the kitchen phone ring and, a moment later, his mother shouting his name, saying it was for him. Before, he wouldn’t have bothered, let his mom take a message. But that was before. “Gotta go,” he said as he logged out, then ran down the stairs.

“Hey, E-man. How’s it hanging?”

Garrett.

April’s brother.

That was one call he wasn’t expecting.

“Hey,” Eric said. “’Zup?”

“Need a hand moving some furniture. You busy?”

Later, when Eric thought about it, he realized it made no sense. Garrett lived in the dorm and it already had furniture. And if he needed help lifting stuff, there were plenty of guys there—guys who were much bigger than a high school junior. And Garrett knew a lot of big guys. But that was later, and when Garrett backed his Toyota out of the driveway, Eric wedged between two of those big guys in the back seat, he didn’t think anything about it.

Garrett shouted a thanks-dude over the pounding music, and Eric shouted a no-problem, then nobody said anything as they made their way out of the subdivision, onto one street, then another, then a highway, then an off-ramp and another street, eventually turning onto a county road that led away from town. The front yards got bigger the farther they went, the houses set farther from the road, the standard-size suburban homes replaced by McMansions, then older farmhouses, then trailer parks, then lone trailers and low ranch houses every mile or so. They’d been on the road twenty minutes when Garrett turned off the music.

“So, Eric, how’s soccer going?”

It wasn’t.

The coach had been there when the principal had suspended him, letting Eric know just how disappointed he was, telling Eric how he’d let the whole team down, how he’d tarnished the image of every athlete at the school. He talked about second chances, sure, and how next season Eric could start fresh, earn his way back to first string where he belonged, but that for this season he’d have to cheer his former teammates on from the stands. Three years ago, Garrett had been the team captain, and he kept in touch with the coach, so Eric was sure he knew all the details.

“I got kicked off the team.”

“Bummer,” said the big guy to his left.

“Yeah, bummer,” said the one on the right.

“Sorry to hear that,” Garrett said, not sounding sorry at all. “You staying in shape? Running, hitting the gym, that kind of stuff?”

“It’s only been a couple of days.”

“You’d be surprised at how fast you’ll get outta shape if you don’t keep at it,” Garrett said.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.