She gave me a funny look.
“One moment please,” she said politely. She picked up the phone and called someone.
“I can explain,” I tried to offer.
She just gave me a patient look. People in our line started to move to other lines. My phone chirped and I looked to find a text from Sandy Range, so I called her.
“You didn’t tell me you were going to Stanford for the weekend. I would’ve fixed you up. Anyways, since you’re in one of our partner stores, can you let them take a few pictures?”
“All I can say is I’m impressed that using this card had you on the phone in less than five minutes. Do you have a tracker on it or something?”
“Well, yes, we do. Who do you have with you?”
“I have my security guy. Why and how did you know?”
“You bought a different size. Is he fully outfitted with Range gear?”
“Let me ask,” I turned to Chuck. “Do you have any Range gear besides what we’re trying to buy?”
He shook his head no.
“No, he isn’t,” I told Sandy.
“Have him get clothes for the trip and put it on the card.”
“You’re the boss.”
I sent Chuck to get what he needed. I chatted with Sandy until the store owner came in with a camera. We took a couple of photos and Chuck and I were finally on the road. Sandy sent me another text letting me know that her travel department would arrange dinner tonight for my family, Chuck and our dates.
SINCE WE HAD WASTED almost an hour, we decided to change at the store and then drive over by the sports facilities. We were stretching when I spotted several games of flag football being played. I jogged over to get my football fix. I hadn’t touched a football since ‘the bet’ in Florida. I found a cute girl watching a few of the guys’ gear, and there was a football lying on the ground next to her.
I gave her my best smile. Dad always says you have to sell it.
“Hi, my friend and I are just in for the weekend. Do you mind if we borrow that football to play a little catch?”
She’d been reading a textbook, and she started to give me a ‘get lost’ look until she saw me. Then her attitude changed. She let us borrow it and I was soon playing catch with Chuck. I was going easy on him and just lofting the ball so it was easy to catch.
“I thought you were good. Is that all you can put on it?” Chuck teased me.
The next one I put a little more on it, not wanting to hurt him. He just snorted at me. Okay, big guy, let’s see if you can catch this. I rifled the next ball at him. You could hear it whiz through the air. He got his hands up but it squirted through and thumped him in the chest.
“Shit!”
“Too hard? You need me to back off?” I teased him back.
“Okay, I admit it, that was too hard. Man, you have an arm. How far can you throw it?”
I just smirked at him.
“Go long.”
He took off down the field and I hit him on a rope thirty-five yards down the field. He came trotting back. The girl that we borrowed the ball from came over.
“Hey, my boyfriend wants to know if you guys want to play. They just won their game, but a couple of the guys have to go study.”
I looked at Chuck with a glint in my eye, begging him to agree. He nodded. I tried to stay cool. I had forgotten how much I enjoyed this.
“We can play.”
She took us over to meet the guys. The team was made up of med students who were playing in their intramural league. Their next opponent was a fraternity. The girl’s boyfriend was Bert and seemed like a nice guy.
“What positions do you guys play?” Bert asked.
“He plays quarterback and I play wideout,” Chuck told him.
“Are you any good?” Bert asked me.
“I do okay.”
“Don’t let him fool you, he’s better than okay,” Chuck told Bert.
Bert just shrugged and introduced us to the rest of the team.
“Guys, this is David and Chuck. Since Larry’s leaving, David will take his place at quarterback, and Chuck will be a wide receiver. I’ll move to the other wide receiver slot and Bill, you move to center,” Bert said, getting everyone situated. “Our next game is against Sigma Nu. They won the fall league and beat us pretty handily in the playoffs. Remember, this is just for fun, but it’s more fun to win.”
That made me smile. We won the coin flip and decided to receive. The kickoff was bobbled and we were downed on the 10 yard line. They played flag football on a narrower and shorter field. I would guess it was only fifty yards long. The chalk lines were pretty much blurred, so I wasn’t sure. We got into the huddle and I took charge.
“Let’s get a quick score. Chuck, you run a post and I’ll roll out to the right. Go on the first sound.”
I dropped back into the shotgun and barked out, “Down!”
The ball came to me, and Chuck put a move on his defender. He obviously had played some ball. I drifted to the right and saw a couple of the Sigma Nu defenders shed their blocks and give chase. The safety bit on me running, and it left the middle of the field open with Chuck having position on his man. I launched a pretty spiral that found Chuck in the end zone.
The Sigma Nu captain rushed up to the referee and was throwing a fit. ‘Ringer’ was mentioned more than a few times. The ref came over to me and seemed irritated.
“We have a rule that if you play college ball, you can’t play intramurals.”
“I played high school football, does that matter?”
He laughed.
“No, I’ll straighten this out.”
It turned out that Sigma Nu was good. Neither team could stop the other. Once their captain settled down, the game became fun as we talked smack to each other. Bert decided that we had a shot, so he made a bet: loser had to buy the first round at a local bar. We ended up squeaking out the win.
WE WALKED WITH BOTH teams across campus to a local sports bar. This gave me a chance to see the campus. It was beautiful. The buildings have red-tiled roofs and solid sandstone masonry in a Californian Mission Revival style of architecture. The place featured rectangular stone buildings linked by walkways of half-circle arches.
Bert was playing tour guide. I was surprised when he told me that there were only about seven thousand undergrads. Each year they receive over thirty-five thousand applications, and only let in about twenty-five hundred freshmen. Stanford was even more exclusive than Harvard was.
I asked about the schools of medicine and business. They only offered graduate programs for those two. For undergraduates, they offered science degrees in biology and chemistry that would work for Tami. I could get a degree in mathematics or management science. After we graduated, she could go to med school while I got my MBA. Another direction I could go would be to enroll in their Theater and Performance Studies. There were options for us both.
The Sigma Nus walked into the Oasis and, from the reaction of the bartenders and servers, you could tell they were regulars. The manager found us several tables and pulled them together. I suddenly found that being a frat guy had some rewards: a bevy of sorority girls soon joined us. There weren’t enough seats, and I found a cute Asian girl sitting on my knee. She had a t-shirt on that had three triangles on it.
I figured if I was going to have a cute girl sit on my knee, I should clean up some. Chuck and I went to the restroom so I could wash some of the sweat off.
“What does the shirt of the girl that’s sitting on my knee mean?” I asked Chuck.
“She’s in Delta Delta Delta, or ‘Tri-Delts.’ It’s a sorority.”
I went back and found a beer waiting for me. I frowned when the girl sat back down on my knee.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
“Oh, sorry, I just don’t drink.”
“Let me fix that,” she said, and she grabbed my beer and drank it in one try.