The lips on Mr. Happy did not!
Peggy?
"Oh God!" I yelled.
My eyes snapped open as my arousal overtook me. I jerked fully awake and looked down into Tracy’s sparkling eyes.
“Did you like that?”
Was she kidding? Did I like that? Dear lord, this had to be the best way to wake up ever invented. Did I like that? “Yeah, it was okay.”
I had to remember that if a girl cupped my balls after she gave me the best blowjob of my life, I shouldn’t joke with her. I felt her slowly tighten her grip. Oh, crap!
“Tracy baby, that was incredible. You’re the light of my life, uhmfff, pleeeease!”
Thank God, she felt merciful.
“I think I like you begging me,” she said as she smacked my thigh. “The bus leaves in twenty minutes. Get your cute butt out of bed and get moving.”
I just grabbed my shorts and t-shirt. I had already packed my duffle bag at school, so I was ready to go in under five minutes. Tracy had borrowed her mom’s car. It turned out this was her first trip driving unsupervised. She made me nervous because she drove like a little old lady, but I didn’t want to put any pressure on her and get us killed. We got to the parking lot with ten minutes to spare.
“Are you coming to the game?”
“No, we have a JV game here today and then I’m going car shopping with Dad.”
I gave her a kiss.
“Thank you for this morning. That was the best way to wake up. I wouldn’t go to this game if my dad were buying me a car. Are you going to pick me up?”
“Not sure. Text me when you head back. I want to hear how many records you break today.”
“For you baby, I’ll try to break them all.”
WELL, IT TURNS OUT, Coach had a rule of no practice, no play. I found out right before kickoff. We were playing a new school that had been put into our division. They moved down from 6A to 5A over the summer. Which might not have been so bad, but they had made it to the semifinals of state last year.
It was one of those perfect fall afternoons to play football. It wasn’t too hot, and we had a huge crowd. Everyone had marked this game on their calendar as the game of the year. The only bad thing was it was so early in the season. You wanted to play a game like this towards the end of the year when both teams had had a chance to work out any issues they might have early. We were a decided underdog, being the away team and with all the injuries we had. They’d tuned up on one of the better teams in our division and beat them handily. All the papers predicted a rout, but you still had to play the game.
It was apparent they had a great defense. They read our veer as if they played against it all the time. The poor guy that had taken my spot had ten carries for two yards and three fumbles, two of which were deep in our territory. They took advantage of those turnovers and scored twice. We were down 14–0 at the end of the first quarter.
The good news was our defense played lights-out. If we hadn’t given them the ball in the red zone, this game would have been tied. I saw Kevin and Magic both in a heated discussion with Coach Lambert. He seemed to relent.
“Dawson, get in there.”
The refs got the ball set to start the quarter. We were third down and eight on our own 22 yard line. When I trotted out to the huddle, Luke smacked me on the helmet.
“Are you ready to kick some butt?” he asked me.
Before I could answer, Magic settled us down.
“Okay, veer left on two. And David, the ball’s coming to you.”
I felt my adrenalin start to pump.
“Down. Set. Hut HUT!”
You could hear the linemen grunt and the crack of pads as they dug in to influence their blocks. Magic slapped the ball into my gut and read the linebacker who had scraped off the nose tackle to fill the hole. I jerked the ball out of Magic’s hands. The linebacker went low. In football, the man that could get lower and bring some power had a huge leverage advantage. I didn’t hesitate. I went over him, stepped right in the middle of his back and broke out of the hole untouched. At first, I thought I had broken free, but they were well schooled and their pursuit caught me. As I went down, I saw the down marker. I felt I would be short, so I stretched to reach it. It would be close.
The crowd cheered, because you could feel this was a big play for both teams. The refs brought the chains out and the stick kissed the football, first down for the good guys! The next play called was veer left. This time Magic pulled the ball out of my stomach. The linebacker was pissed and intended to lay me out. Little did he know what was coming for him on the other side of the line of scrimmage. He should have talked to Kevin before he tried to bury me.
Have you ever heard the term heavy hands in boxing? It was where a certain boxer’s punches had much more impact than others’ do. This was especially true with body blows. George Foreman was a classic heavy-handed boxer. His body punches would devastate his opponents. It was the same way in football. Being hit by certain players just felt like every bone in your body was rattled. I did that. When I hit you, you knew it.
I think most of it was attitude. I just got into a zone and knew I would drive right through a player. I didn’t just hit them; I would explode through them. So when the linebacker went to crush me, I coiled up like a taut metal spring and exploded through him. You could tell when one of these hits happened. There was a distinctive crack of the pads that could be heard above the crowd’s roar all the way up to the press box.
Unfortunately for the opposing linebacker, I had gotten lower than he had. He also came at me at an angle. When I exploded through him, I took him off his feet and launched him five yards. He made one and a half rotations as he helicoptered to an awkward landing. You could hear an audible gasp as everyone in the stadium held his or her breath.
Magic had cut upfield inside the defensive end. The free safety had to step around his flying linebacker, so I didn’t see there was any chance he could make the play. I did see the cornerback get on his horse, and it looked like he had the speed to catch Magic. I let Magic cut up the middle and I tracked down the corner. He never saw me. His whole focus was to prevent the touchdown. It was like those great punt returns where you see a guy fly down the field and he gets clotheslined. It was one of the most exciting plays in football.
I hit him with my head in his chest and my pads came up under his. I took him off the ground, and I heard him grunt as his feet went towards his head. He just went stiff and I saw him shudder as he hit the ground. I looked up, and seventy yards later Magic danced in the end zone. The funny thing was that when we headed to the bench, the defensive team swarmed me. I thought Kevin would pee his pants, he was so excited.
Luckily, neither player was seriously hurt. They both were ready to go for their next defensive series. It was never my intention to injure another player. Both plays were clean, so I wasn’t worried about retaliation.
Those two plays turned the game around. In the first quarter, we had managed 34 yards of offense. From that point on, we gained 536 yards. I rushed ten times for 152 yards and scored one touchdown. Luke Herndon put up All-State numbers, 263 yards on 22 carries and 5 touchdowns. After I crushed two of their players, their whole defense had their heads on a swivel as they had to account for me on every play. Instead of trying to tackle me with proper technique, they started to dive and arm-tackle me.
We went home 63–14 winners over our biggest competition for our conference. Now we were one and one with the season looking up. If this were any indication, we could be playing in the playoffs for the first time in 13 years.
Someone caught the two plays on a cell phone and posted it to YouTube. The title was What if Superman Played Football? So guess what my new nickname was. The popularity of the video turned out to be good for Magic, Kevin and Luke as well. College scouts started to show up for our games.