“Hey, Mom,” I answer right before voicemail kicks in.
“Eliot, why didn’t you answer?”
“I was running.”
She clicks her tongue in disapproval. “I’m sure that’s not good for your knee. If you’d watch what you ate, then you wouldn’t need to run.”
This is the power of motherhood. She’s great at criticizing me out of both sides of her mouth. I’m eating too much and engaging in unsafe activities. Boss mother status achieved in two sentences.
I drum my fingers against the cheap laminate counter, regretting I didn’t go to breakfast with Masters. It’s karmic punishment, I suppose. If I turn down the good things that come my way, why should I be shielded from the bad? “I only run on flat surfaces.”
“I hope you’re wearing your longer pants. That scar is so visible when you get brown, dear.”
She always adds the dear, as if the fake term of endearment removes the sting of her words. I look down at my bare legs stretching out from the running shorts I pulled on. The scar looks like a sideways grimace. Most of the time I forget it’s there, but trust my mom to bring it up. I drop into a kitchen chair and settle in for the rest of her lecture.
“I have pants,” I say, not ready to outright lie to her.
“Good. You want to start out your time at Western on a good note. You don’t want to alienate the nice young men by not putting forth a good appearance.” Mom is the queen of appearances. In her book, as long as we look good, we are good.
Knox Masters didn’t seem to care, I want to tell her. In fact, I’m pretty sure he looked at my legs with a hell of a lot of appreciation. I rub my hand over the mark, though, because talking to Mom makes me self-conscious.
“Yes, Mom.”
“But I didn’t call to talk about that. I have terrible news. Your brother signed up for classes without consulting us!”
Good for him.
“He didn’t sign up by himself. He had a student liaison help him,” I point out. Mom must know. She, Dad, and Jack all visited Western together.
“That girl did not do a very good job then, because two of Jack’s courses are simply too difficult for him to manage himself.”
Dread is like a stone. Sometimes it sits in your stomach and makes you want to vomit. Other times it lodges in your throat and chokes you. Either way dread makes you feel terrible. Right now, I feel I am stone.
One thing that sold Jack on Western, other than their very real chance of winning the BCS National Championship title, was all the academic resources they have. Every athlete has a student liaison—an upperclassman—assigned to help him or her register. Every class has a tutor available. I won’t lean so much on you, he’d told me. I was thrilled. No more taking classes I didn’t like to make sure I knew Jack’s assignments. No more pretending I was interested in Battle Maneuvers of WWII. Most importantly, no more guilty conscience.
I happily registered for classes that interested me, like Creative Nonfiction Writing and Grant Management, the latter being a self-directed course involving writing a real grant proposal, which will look great on my resume.
“Uh huh.” If I hang up will this conversation end?
“I’ve called the Provost’s office, and they’ve informed me that the two courses you need to sign up for are full, but you can audit them. You’ll need to go today, however, and sign up.”
She rattles them off. One is a political science course, the other a sociology course. Neither sounds interesting to me.
“Mom, the time for registering is over. I did that this summer.” As did Jack. “I can’t add two classes to my schedule. I’m taking fifteen credits. That’s a full load.”
It’s not your mom you’re turning your back on here. It’s Jack.
She continues as if I haven’t spoken. “That’s nice, dear, but I’m sure two more classes won’t be a burden.”
What she means is that it doesn’t matter if it is a burden.
“What, can’t Jack drop those classes?”
“We don’t drop classes,” she says with an air of impatience. “What would his advisor think? You simply sign up and help as you always have in the past.”
“I need all my classes to graduate within two years. Besides, I don’t think it works that way.”
“It does. Haven’t you been listening? I spoke to the Provost’s office. They will allow you to add these two classes in addition to the ones you already have, but you need to go today. What time will you go today?” Her voice is sharp, losing the genteel quality she likes to put on to pretend that she’s a nicer person than she is. Truth is, my mother is a shark, but she has to be to live with my dad. Maybe she was soft at one time, and his constant cheating and absences wore it all away until she was just sharp points that stabbed at you until you bled. It’s a little amazing how far her points extend. How they still hurt even though we are miles apart.
My temples begin to throb. I really, really should have accepted that breakfast invitation from Knox Masters. “Western provides all the athletes individualized tutors. They’ll do a better job than me. Are you certain that I need to take these classes?”
It’s not a question. I know I have to take them. Jack is great at numbers and sucks at reading and writing. I suspect he suffers from a mild form of dyslexia, or maybe that’s how his mind works. I’ve been helping Jack out for a long time. That’s why I went to junior college with him when he didn’t get any D1 offers that made sense to my dad. That’s why I’m here at Western, even though I’d have liked to go somewhere else. Anywhere else.
“Do you need to ask that? Aren’t we in this together? Do you want your brother to fail? Aren’t you already responsible for the fact he wasted two years at that awful two year school out West? He only has two years of eligibility left. What if he doesn’t start this year?”
The list of horribles goes on. I tune her out and pull up the course catalog. The descriptions do sound reading/writing intensive. I bet he’ll have to write papers. He can memorize facts and do math problems in his head, but analysis of facts, reasoned conclusions that can’t be expressed in digits, are damn hard for him.
Then she pulls out the big guns.
“Need I remind you that your father and I write the checks for your tuition, or did you get a scholarship that we don’t know about?”
Masters asked me if I loved football, and the real answer is sometimes. Because while I can’t deny the glory of it, the game holds me hostage—or will until Jack graduates.
Frustration and hurt crowd out all the good feelings of this morning. When I ran the campus this morning, I thought about how it would be a new start for me. I found what appears to be an awesome roommate in Riley.
I’d make good friends, work on courses designed to help me get a good job out of college. Maybe I’d find the man I would marry. At the very least, I could find someone to watch movies with and kiss on Valentine’s Day.
On impulse, I’d run by Union Stadium to see where Jack would play, and when the gate hung slightly open and no one was around, I crept inside. It was so silent and so beautiful that I climbed to the very top and pretended that I was cheering on my brother and enjoying everything I loved about the game—the feats of physical strength, the excitement of the battle, the romance of it all.
Then Knox Masters came in, running fast like an arrow shot from a crossbow, straight and beautiful in motion. We’d flirted. We’d shared secrets. And after we’d run across the turf, I felt so…joyous in the moment.
Only to come home to this.
“I’m on it, Mom.”
“You’ll go right now?” It’s more a command than a question.
“Right now. I’m leaving as we speak.”
She sighs, but it’s not relief she’s feeling, but regret that she had to spend so much time talking me into something I should have agreed to do the minute I heard about it. Hell, I should have prevented it from happening.