III
The situation called for fast action. The longer Billy Wade was off the team the more people would forget that he was ever on. Little by little the reasons for his debilitating “injury” would leak out Not only would his career be finished, the rest of his life wouldn’t be worth more than two cents, either.
Some argument ensued as to whom the campaign should focus on, Greg or the coach. Ryan, for instance, was adamant the progenitor of the plot against his buddy’s virgin shit-chute was his fellow quarterback, it’s purpose clear.., to get the position he couldn’t get in honest intramural gridiron competion. Harker and myself, though, we felt that the coach was equally to be faulted. What when you come right down to it, has anybody’s sex life got to do with how they pass and kick, how they run those yards? Another coach might be more enlightened, thus defusing the entire situation and denying Greg his Ill-gotten triumph.
Were we voting that our moves be made against Heyward, leaving Greg out of it? No, sir. “Our vote is that we take care of both the bastards.”
“Awwright.” Ryan could dig that the bigger the challenge the higher he usually rose. The only question in this case being the how, the when, the where—not easy to answer. While Greg lived alone, the coach was a young married who spent most of his time off at home with his bride. We had pictures of him In both venues, always surrounded by people. Wife, in-laws, relatives on the one hand.., team members, alumni, line coaches on the other.
“Maybe we’d better handle Greg first and then figure something for the coach afterwards,” Harker began to sigh, suddenly wondering if even the Studbusters could do the job in tandem, reputation or no reputation.
“Handling Greg without handling Heyward isn’t going to get Billy his position back.” It had to be both, at the same time. And Ryan was the jock with the lightbulb going on over his tousled head, the Studbuster who had the way we were going to do it conceived in a flash of inspiration. “It’s all in the timing,” he said, rolling a large piece of white wrapping paper open across the table between us and drawing us pictures. “When a coach and his first-string quarterback would naturally be alone together.”
“Is there any such time?” Harker wanted to know, while I was already whooping, “getting” Ryan’s drift a bit slower than was my usual wont Of course there’d be a time like that, especially for a graduating quarterback who wouldn’t be calling the plays for the varsity come the following fall.
The way the system worked at this school was that the coach would bring that very same letter man along with him when he scouted his freshman replacements, those high school “comers” who in their senior year would be wined and dined, offered cars and passing grades, fame and fortune, just sign. Just sign.
Once you show me some good stuff out there on the field come Friday night.
Billy Wade verified it all: how did Harker think he was originally recruited for this college as opposed to all those others? Coach Heyward had watched him play one Friday night in October, another in December—that one with Stu Burnside, one of his predecessors—both the coach and the quarterback painting a terrific picture of life in their fast lane. His final high school season wasn’t even done with but Billy Vinovitch’s future was secure.
Our job was to make sure that that rug wasn’t yanked so far out from under the athlete’s feet that he couldn’t land standing up. As Ryan originally said, it was all timing and our only chance was limited to maybe three hours this coming Friday night, if…
… if we could find some bright high school quarterback to help the Studbusters right a wrong. A tough teenager whose sense of decency and fair play was stronger than his desire to land a quarterback’s berth with Coach Heyward.
Tall order.
“Not necessarily,” said an excited Harker, using the metal studs on his wrist strap to scratch an itch in his exposed armpit it was his turn to match Ryan’s creativity, their friendly rivalry solving more problems for us than a hundred consulting physics professors. “Who says the guy who runs the yards out there has to be the guy they take out for that heart-to-heart?’’
In a flash everything was in place, Ryan and I both knowing that Harker was referring to his cousin Mario, a 20-year- old punk with a young bodybuilder’s physique who was. even better for our purposes, a real pain freak. Who could pass for 17. Sixteen, if need be.
Just the kind of kid a Studbuster would want to call on in circumstances like these.
IV
So.
Who was the coach taking his new star quarterback out to scout this Friday? Blond Tony Baker from Harding High? Chunky brunette Tim Malloy from Valley9 Swivel-hipped Dave Lancaster from Tech? Mario could be any of themgiven the right dye and the right uniform suitably adorned with the right grass stains and dirt.
It wasn’t the place for guesswork. The Studbusters had to know. Show up at the wrong playing field and Billy Wade Vinovitch might as well jump off the Empire State Building as plan an ongoing career in the NFL
“Your assignment,” I finally said to the client, the only one of us who could figure out a way to be legitimately in Coach Heyward’s office. “Maybe you’re returning something you forgot or something.”
Dangerous, but necessary. High risk for the one split second he’d need to glance at Heyward’s papers. Like a lot of coaches. Steve Heyward made a point of outlining everything. putting it down in writing; more than one clipboard was hung from nails strategically placed around the sides of the rolltop in that office. Plays, plans, line-ups, contingencies, schedules. The works.
What did Billy say?
What do you think? He said yes and later that day he just walked through that locker room and went on into those now off-limits precincts, making sure the team was outside in the middle of practice. It should have been the breeze that the cashiered quarterback assured me he’d find, my concerns notwithstanding. One split second to look at those notes? Hell, Billy expected he’d have whole minutes for the job. As much as a half-hour, maybe.
Vinovitch wasn’t a certified Studbuster. If he were he wouldn’t have been quite so cocky, believing as we do in the old axiom: if anything can go wrong it will.
It did… in the person of (oh, shit) Greg, who was himself entering that forbidden zone for a copy of the very same Friday night schedule. “What the fuck are you doing here, cunt?” he demanded to know, not really caring. It was an opportunity to lay into his nemesis some more, which he did with a will.
And a vengeance.
For his part Billy could only defend himself as best he could without striking back as aggressor. Having seen what he came to see it was his obligation to get his ass out of there as intact as possible. Furthermore: for the Studbuster plan to work Greg had to be in one piece, undamaged goods.
There couldn’t be bruises anywhere on that virile young body. “Why aren’t you fighting back, bitch?” the prancing victor was frankly curious to know. “Don’t tell me you’re really the faggot limp-wrist the coach thinks you are, huh? Huh?”
It was too much for the vanquished, whose knee suddenly propelled itself up, the action utterly divorced from the orders of Billy’s sensible brain. Fuck “no bruises, man.” the only way he could possible get out of here himself was to inflict bodily harm on his smarmy opponent The knee, fortunately, was wise enough to make sure that those potential bruises would only appear on that thickly corrugated and hair-flecked flesh which disguises discolorations just by its natural appearance, pimples and all. And it did the deed well.
Greg howled and doubled over clutching at his aching groin, saliva frothing in the corners of a mouth which twisted in absolute hatred. “I didn’t stay to talk about why,” Billy informed us upon his return to the precinct house, all three of our minds picturing him as he stepped over the writhing figure on the floor and made his way to the door.
“Fucking A,” said the new member of our party approvingly, Harker’s stocky young cousin Mario. “That’ll teach the asshole where to get off.”
Where we were “getting off” was at Valley High, where Tim Malloy was going to get the once-over as he played the lesser lights from Science and Industry. Where Steve Heyward and Greg Mayes were going to meet up with the Studbusters and justice was going to get itself done, right up the ass.
