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| (from https://manville.wordpress.com/) |
"Hey Bleeds, that's the first smile I've seen on that ugly mug all year," starts in Fas on the short bus ride to Manville for an important Mountain Valley Conference game with another neighboring town.
"Back with Mickie and I don't even have to kick the shit out of Charchie," Blaine concedes.
"That's two for the price of one," continues the hirsute noseguard leaning back over the bench seat. "Send Little Charch my way, would ya?"
"Call her Karma and she's not mine to give, so clamp it and get ready for this game, asshole!"
__________
On the night after the unexpected win over high scoring and previously undefeated Middlesex, Blaine had walked the three blocks from the Reed house on Hanken Road to Codrington Park. Half the team was standing around under the lights on the basketball courts in their red wool double B jackets with cream colored leather sleeves.
"Bleeds, what's up?" greeted Paul Perini,walking over with a toss of his head to flick thick black hair out of his eyes.
"Hey Paul. Has Mickie been here?"
"Not over here with us. Don't know about those hippies in the Kiddie Corral."
"Any parties tonight?"
"Nah, nobody's parents are out. Come on, let's shoot some hoops."
They kept lobbing and missing half court shots even after the lights went out in the late September chill until a cop car pulled up.
"OK guys, good game today but time to go home," warned Officer Romano from the rolled down window of his blue Plymouth Fury.
Blaine cut through the playground on the way out of the park without really knowing why he'd gone that way until he glimpsed the hunched figures in the Stagecoach.
"Is Karma in there?" he whispered into the darkness.
"It's always here," echoed back, "but she's got the Charchiemobile tonight."
Blaine hadn't realized he was still wound up even after a night shooting the shit with the guys until he snapped his toothbrush while brushing, so instead of heading up to bed, he went down to the rec room and turned on the TV, pacing back and forth in front of some rerun without even seeing it. Then he turned it off and quietly opened and closed the back door. It was after eleven when he took the twenty-minute bike ride down Longwood Avenue, up Vossellar, down Maple, and up Church Street to the 400s.
The big house was dark and headlights were coming up Church so he pulled his bike behind a boxwood hedge and ducked out of sight. The car drove slowly past and turned onto the side street of the corner house. A few minutes later a light came on in Mickie's third floor window.
"Pssst," he hissed, tossing a pebble from the pathway and hitting the screened window.
"Blaine, is that you?" she whispered sliding open the window. "I'll be right down."
"Everyone's asleep," she gasped, breathing hard as she came out the front door onto the wooden porch wearing blue jeans and a form fitting sweater that outlined every curve.
"I missed you at the park," he pleaded, pulling open the snaps on his varsity jacket.
"I had something to do," she explained, snuggling into his chest and leaning her head onto his shoulder, "but I've missed you too."
"Sorry I disappeared," he offered, reaching the jacket around her shoulders and pulling her close, her full breasts pressing into his belly.
"Oh Blaine, it's my fault," she sighed, sliding one hand down and up the front of his jeans.
__________
"Timeout!" shouts Coach Righetti making a T with his hands and then waving the Bound Brook quarterback over. "They're going to look for the power sweep so cut it back off-tackle with Bleeds leading the way."
Manville is ahead 8-6 after a long, grinding touchdown drive and a two point extra point on a quick pass over the middle. The Mustangs also have tough working-class players, though their eastern European fathers mostly worked in asbestos at Johns-Manville while Bound Brook's Italian and Polish men dealt in aniline dyes and plastics at American Cyanamid and Union Carbide.
The Crusaders had just countered Manville's touchdown with a drive of their own down to the Mustang 12-yard line where they stalled with less than two minutes left in the game. It's fourth down and nine yards for a first down, twelve for the probable winning touchdown. The red and white hadn't made a placekicking extra point all year, much less even tried a three-point field goal. It didn't occur to the coaches or the players to try a kick.
"Run him over, run him over, run him over," Blaine chants to himself from the ground as the halfback cuts inside the end, sprints past Blaine and the downed outside linebacker, and pops toward the corner of the goal line.
Bound Brook's speedy halfback doesn't like to get hit so he usually tries to outrun tacklers, but this time there's a cornerback tracking him toward the sideline. A quick glance tells him he'll be tackled out of bounds if he tries to make it to the corner so he just pretends to head there. When the defender's body commits to heading him off, he instead cuts hard toward the goal line and barrels full steam into the surprised cornerback. The head-first impact blacks out his vision and sprawls them both over the line. Blaine is there in an instant, helping him up.
"You did it!" Blaine marvels as they walk back to the huddle for the extra point try. "I had just said to myself 'run him over' and you did it."
Box Score
1Q
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2Q
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3Q
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4Q
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Total
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Crusaders (3-0-1)
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6
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0
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0
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6
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12
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Manville (2-2)
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0
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0
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0
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8
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8
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