The Lost Quarterback Returns novel · Chapter 2 of 24

Chapter 2: Wristband

Griffin signs the boy in, he outthrows my son, his birthday matches Rhett's, and the woman who carried our baby out of a fire storms the field to drag him away.

Griffin wrote the boy's wristband himself, and he used a gold marker so the number would show from the stands.

"One forty-one," he said, snapping the plastic around Dylan's thin wrist. "Fee's waived."

"I don't need charity," Dylan said.

"It isn't charity. It's an open tryout, and you're open."

Dylan looked at the band for a second, then shrugged and walked back to the line.

I stayed at the fence with my clipboard and watched him.

The coaches ran the quarterbacks through a seven-on-seven drill.

Rhett went first, and he threw a clean, careful ball that hit the receiver on the numbers.

Dylan went second, and his ball came in faster and flatter, and it hit the same receiver in the same spot.

The difference was only that nobody had taught Dylan to be careful.

On the next snap Rhett stepped up, panicked at a rusher who wasn't even close, and threw the ball straight to a defender.

A few boys groaned.

Rhett stood there with his face going red from the neck up.

Dylan jogged over and stopped in front of him.

"Your feet are early," he said.

Rhett stared at him. "What?"

"You drop back and your feet go before your eyes do. You throw it before you see him." Dylan shrugged. "Wait one more beat. You've got an arm."

"I don't need a lesson from some kid in duct tape," Rhett said.

"It's not duct tape. It's athletic tape." Dylan looked down at his cleat. "It's the same thing, I guess."

Rhett almost laughed.

He turned it into a cough and walked away.

My shoulders finally came down.

Two boys born on the same day stood eight feet apart for the first time, and only one of the adults watching them knew it.

When the drill ended I made myself walk to the water cooler where Dylan was drinking.

"Hi," I said. "I'm Alana. I run the paperwork here."

"Dylan."

"Where do you go to school, Dylan?"

"Wilkes Middle."

"What grade?"

"Eighth. I turn fourteen in March."

"What day?"

He looked at me oddly. "March ninth."

My hand tightened on the clipboard.

Rhett's birthday was March ninth.

Every March ninth I baked him the same lopsided carrot cake.

"Same day as my son," I said, and my voice came out almost normal.

"Cool," Dylan said, and went back to his water.

Griffin walked up behind me and set a hand on my shoulder.

"Same birthday as Rhett," he said, grinning. "That's a sign."

"It is," I said.

I didn't turn around, because I didn't trust my face.

A black Lincoln was pulling into the lot, slow and heavy, and I knew who was in it before the door opened.

Bernadette stepped out with her silver cane and her pearls and stood watching the field.

She was sixty-six and she had never once looked lost anywhere.

Her eyes went across the quarterbacks, and then they stopped.

They stopped on the thin dark-haired boy at the cooler, and they stayed there.

She didn't blink for a full five seconds.

Then she looked at me.

She said nothing, and I knew she had seen it too.

"Who is that child?" she asked, when she reached us.

"Dylan Dellinger," Griffin said. "He walked in off the street, Mom. You should see his arm."

"Dellinger," Bernadette said.

The word came out slowly.

A car horn blasted from the road.

Then a beat-up gray Corolla jumped the curb at the edge of the lot and stopped with its front wheel on the grass.

A woman got out already running.

She wore blue dental scrubs and a ponytail the color of straw, and she crossed the field in a straight line, ignoring the coaches shouting at her.

She grabbed Dylan by the arm.

"We're leaving," she said. "Now."

"Mom, I'm not done."

"You're done."

"Shanna?" Griffin said.

The woman froze.

Up close I could see the small black tattoo on her inner wrist, a number twelve, in my husband's old jersey font.

I had seen it at every anniversary dinner the foundation had ever held.

I had shaken that wrist.

"Mr. Hartsell." Her voice was high and thin. "I didn't know he was here. He isn't supposed to be here."

"This is your son?" Griffin said. "Shanna, you never told me he played. Look at him."

"He doesn't play."

"I do," Dylan said.

"Get in the car."

"Shanna," I said.

She turned toward me, and I watched the color leave her face.

I spoke quietly, because the boys were close and I wanted only her to hear.

"You carried two babies out of that hotel," I said. "Which one did you hand me?"

Shanna didn't move.

Nothing about her moved, except her thumb, which began rubbing the tattoo.

Then she smiled, and it was the smallest, ugliest smile I had ever seen.

"You said something like that once before, Mrs. Hartsell," she said softly.

"Ask your husband how it ended."

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