Page 70 of After the Snap

“Oh, fuck you, Old Man.”

Sullivan bumps my shoulder on his way back to the line. “That was good.”

“Don’t encourage him,” King yells as I settle behind the center before he can come up with another complaint.

JJ stands behind the formation with his helmet tucked beneath one arm, watching the defense while I call out the protection. The linebacker shifts a step inside, and our center catches it at the same time I do, changing the slide before I have to say anything.

The ball hits my hands, and Tuck comes hard off the edge while the rest of the defense drops into the coverage we’ve spent most of the week preparing to see. King gets outside his corner, plants, and comes back toward me without giving away any extra ground this time. I let the ball go before he turns his head. It reaches him as he comes out of the break, and King snatches it against his chest with enough room between him and the safety that nobody has to argue about whether the defender could’ve made a play.

“Is that better?” He grins, spinning the ball onto the turf.

“Almost.”

“You are such an asshole.” King starts toward me, but the whistle cuts across the field before he gets there.

“Bring it in,” Coach Quinn calls, and the offense moves toward the middle of the field with the defense closing from the opposite side.

I fall into the group without thinking about where I’m supposed to stand anymore. Tuck shoulders his way into the space beside me while King keeps insisting that one perfect route should’ve earned him an apology, and JJ leans around Sullivan to tell him the first one looked like shit from behind the play.

“You’re a backup. Nobody asked you.”

“And I still saw it,” JJ responds as I grab King by the back of his shoulder pads before he can launch himself across Sullivan.

“Save it for Sunday.”

“You heard what he said to me.”

“I did, and he’s right.”

Tuck’s laugh is loud enough to draw a look from Coach, and King mutters something about quarterbacks being a deeply untrustworthy population while we crowd around Coach Quinn. He waits until the last few guys make it in before looking around the circle. The joking dies without him having to raise his voice.

“This is the last time I need anything from your legs until Sunday. Tomorrow, we’ll walk through a few things I want to clean up.” His gaze moves across us, lingering nowhere for long. “You’ve had a month to learn what the man beside you does well and what he needs from you when he doesn’t. Sunday is when all of that starts counting.”

My sweat cools beneath my pads while I look at the men packed around me. Sullivan taps the side of his helmet twice when he sees something in coverage he wants me to notice, Tuck gets louder when he’s worried, and King needs about seven seconds after being told he fucked something up before he can hear how to fix it.

Coach’s eyes land on me. “Break us down, QB.”

There’s no hesitation before the guys tighten around me. I put my hand in the middle, and the rest pile over it until I can’t tell whose belongs to whom. “Valor on three.”

The word comes back at me from fifty different voices, loud enough that I feel it against my ribs before we break apart and head toward the building. Fortunately for all of us, King has recovered from the devastating injustice of being asked to run a route correctly and has moved on to arguing with Tuck about music. He lost control of the locker room speaker sometime yesterday under circumstances neither of them can agree on, and, according to King, defensive players have “no respect for rhythm.”

“You played country music for forty-five minutes.”

Tuck pulls off his helmet. “People like country music.”

“Some people enjoy getting a colonoscopy. Doesn’t mean I want one after practice.”

Sullivan makes a strangled sound beside me as my eyes narrow on King. “You’ve been getting a lot of those recently?”

He misses half a step, and Tuck folds over laughing.

“When the fuck did you get jokes?” King demands, looking around like somebody needs to answer for it.

“I’ve always been funny.”

“No. You used to stand around looking disappointed in everyone.”

“Nah, just you.”