Chapter 13 Let's get ready to Rumble
Meredith
"Alisa, what do you mean you're to blame? Why would you say that? " I asked her curiously.
"Well I had asked him a question and I think it upset him, in fact I know it upset him. I just didn't know how much."
"Alisa darling, I don't think you did anything, you and Justin have not talked to each other in over three years. I think the shock of finally talking to you surprised him, but I highly doubt..." but before I could finish she cut me off.
"I 'm sorry, but it was about Brad and us. I know the question upset him because of the way he grabbed me, and I have never seen Justin looking at me the way he did. He was squeezing my arm so hard it hurt. "
"What? That doesn't sound like Justin. He would never hurt you Alisa, he loves you, Brad and Alex." Suddenly, as I turned around Justin was standing there behind me. "Justin!!!" I called to him, as I ran over and hugged him while still holding the phone. After a few minutes I stopped hugging him, but still held on to his hand.
"Alisa..." I said to her.
"I know, I'll let you go. Please tell Justin that I'm sorry about yesterday, and I'll talk to him in school."
"Ok, and Alisa I do hope you wont disappear on us again."
"I wont. Bye," she said as she hung up the phone. I then turned to look at my son and pulled him into a hug. " You are in big trouble Mr."
"I'm sorry Mom...I'm sorry for running out and not talking to you last nigh," He said, now hugging me back and holding on to me as if for dear life.
"Well you'd better have a dam good excuse young man," is all we both heard. When his father yelled out, we both turned around to see him standing with his arms crossed. Suddenly Justin looked at the ground like he used to when he was a little boy and upset his father.
"I am sorry papa...I had a few things I had to work out and ...." He stopped talking to his father as I stepped in front of him to try to calm his father down. I know Steven is more upset with Justin for upsetting me than he is with him for running out.
"Steven," I said as I placed a hand on his chest, "I'm ok now. Justin knows he was wrong for running out and worrying us last night, but he is going to be late for school if you berate him now. He's home safe now. I called in to work saying that I didn't think I would be in because I didn't know if Justin would be ok once he came home. Now that I see that he is, I want to go in. Can't we talk about this later when we get home?"
Steven looked at Justin, then at me, and was about to say something, but after seeing that I was ok he stopped himself.
"Fine, but I want him to talk to you and have this is resolved before I get home. He does have a big game this week." He smiled as he walked over to Justin and hugged him, then put his hand on his shoulder and smiled again as he ruffled Justin's hair. "Remember," he said, "You can talk to us about anything, we love you Justin."
"I'm sorry Papa." Justin said as his father walked out of the house. He then turned to me and said, " First thing after football practice we'll talk." He then kissed me and ran up stairs to get changed.
"Don't you want some breakfast." I asked him as he took off.
"No thanks mom. Katie made me breakfast this morning, I'm cool." I heard a door close, followed by the shower running.
I suddenly thought about what Alisa said about why Justin was upset. Why would Alex, Brad and Alisa upset Justin?
Brad
Fear sometime can cause the biggest adrenalin rush and cause you to do things that you normally would not do. Normally I would never drive a car to school, mainly out of fear of what someone would do to it. That is the one reason I never asked for one from my parents. I always turned it down and just told them to get me one for graduation, but today it was a matter of life and death. After the look I saw in Alex's eye I knew he was going to kill Tony, and I had to stop him. Today I knew I finally had to stand up to them no matter what the price would be. I quickly hopped into my mom's car and pulled out of my driveway heading towards school, wondering how could I stop Alex, then it dawned on me. It had to work it was the only way. Now, if I could only find her.
Alisa
Well, at least he got home ok, now I just have to find him. I'll look during lunch, I thought to myself.
"OH SHIT, " I said as I pulled into the parking lot and saw them all of them waiting at my parking space. Me concentrating on Justin this morning made me completely forgot my bigger problem. They surrounded my car as I shut off the engine.
"Alisa, I can't believe you. What is wrong with you?" Marissa asked me as I opened my door and stepped out into the crowd
" I'm sorry, Marissa. I know you're upset, but I'm not sorry about saying no to Blake."
"Alisa, do you know what going out with him would have done for your reputation? Why would you say no?"
"You don't understand. You guys are so blinded by his image that you can't see that Blake is a arrogant prick. "
"And Justin, what image does he have? He's just a dumb Jock," Meagan said, cutting me off before I could say anything else.
"Well, I know Justin, and I don't have to be anything other than Alisa."
"Whatever. I can see that just like this morning, there is no talking to you," Marissa said, rolling her eyes. Suddenly I heard a voice calling my name behind me.
"Alisa!"
Before I could turn my head to look around, everyone in front of me was looking at me with their mouths wide open.
"Alisa! " I heard again as I turned around.
"Brad?" Is all I could say, as I now was standing with my mouth wide open too.
" You gotta come with me now!" he said as he grabbed my hand and quickly dragged away from my group.
Justin
Ok, I got out of that for now, but when I get home I have to think of something to get my parents off my back. I pulled into the parking lot. Ok, I have to start thinking of the game tomorrow or I'm going to blow it. Just think football buddy. Football is the one thing that has never let you down in your entire life. I got out of my car and decided that I better find the guys to see what' up. Walking out of the parking lot, I suddenly felt a wave of fear and anxiousness, like something major was about to happen.
Alex
Walking around campus looking for Tony didn't work. I didn't know where Tony would be so, I went back to the parking lot and waited for the one person I knew would know where to find him, Justin. As soon as I saw him get out of his car I knew he would lead me to them. I now I was going to get pay back.
Brad
"Brad, you have to hold on a sec, and tell me what's going on," she said while running beside me.
I turned to look at her. "We don't have time! You have to help me!"
"I'll help you, but I can't help you if you don't stop and tell me what's going on," she said me as she stopped dead in her tracks. " I mean, you just sweep in and grab me away from my friends without so much as a Hi Alisa, Then you expect me to drop everything to run all around campus not knowing what I'm trying to help you do." She was smiling, but trying to look upset.
"Hi, Alisa." I quickly looked around.
"Gee, and hello to you too, Brad. God that looked painful." She was trying to get me laugh after seeing that I was upset.
"Sorry."
"Now will you tell me what's going on?"
"It's Alex. I have to find him. I don't have time to explain. We have to find him before he finds Tony and his friends," I told her as we started walking again
"You don't mean Tony Hunter from the football team do you, Justin's friend?
"Yep, that's the one."
"Brad what's he going to do?" She stopped walking and was giving me worried look.
"I don't know, but we have to get to him before he finds Tony," I said, walking over to her
"I think I know where they may be. Follow me." She said as she went from a brisk walk into a full all out sprint.
Damn. I had forgotten how fast she was, remembering when we were little and how she used to love running.
"Hey, wait up." I called, trying to catch her.
Justin
There they are. Ok, big game tomorrow. Homecoming, last game before playoffs, that's what you're going to talk about. Don't think about yesterday or last night. Don't think about anything but football, not about Alex and Brad getting back together, not about Alisa looking for Brad, and not about what Kate may or may not think or feel about you.
"What's up Just?" is all I hear as I snapped out of my trance approaching my friends.
"What's up guys?" I answer back, smiling on my face as Tony walked over to me.
"One more day, man," he said, reaching out to me.
After what happened yesterday I had no desire to talk to him, let alone touch him. When he touched my shoulder he made my skin crawl. " Yea, one more day."
The chant "State Champs" started. Some others made comments when Tony put his arm around my shoulder and we started to walk back towards where the rest of the group was sitting. Suddenly Mark and Joe got up from their seats and walked quickly over to us.
"Shit, what the fuck does he want?" one of them said to Tony, as he and I turned around.
"Alex? " I was staggered at the look I could see on his face. I had only seen him that mad once. It was once right before he stopped hanging out with me. It was the day I found out his new nickname and what it meant...
"Hey, Buddy" I said to him as I entered the lunchroom and saw that he wasn't sitting with his new friends.
It had been about three weeks since I had gotten a chance to talk to him outside of class. " If I didn't know you any better. I'd say you've been trying to avoid me," I said with a smile, sitting down next to him
"Justin?" He said, nervously looking around to lunchroom
"Hey, man what wrong? You haven't called or come over in three weeks. I know my mom's cooking is bad, but ..." I laughed and saw a small smile coming over his face.
"How many times do I gotta tell ya leave the jokes to me and Brad?" He was laughing too.
"Are you mad at me or something? I'm sorry if I did something to piss you off."
"You didn't do anything, Just," he said, looking at me and smiling again.
"Alex, You're one of my best friends, and I can tell something is wrong. You're mad at something. Is it Alisa or Bear?"
"No, I'm not mad at Alisa or Bea...Brad."
"You called him Brad! You never call him Brad when it's just us...what's wrong?"
Suddenly his expression changed and then I hear IT for the first time.
"O" Someone called out. As Alex quickly turned around and stood up, about 15 black kids walk over to, us all calling Alex 'O'. I guessed that was what he was going by now. Alex made a fist and hit other kids; fists. Giving a pound as I later found out it is called.
"Yo, who this?" one kid asked.
"This is my frien...this is Justin," Alex said as the kid looked at me.
"I seen you before...CS football, right?" He asked looking at me.
"Right, I played quarterback. I'm Justin Kemper," I said as I held out my hand.
He just looked at me with a smirk and said, "Yea, I remember you got lucky and beat us. I play quarterback for Stonewall."
"Yea, I remember you now. You're good. What's your name?"
"JC Washington, You better remember it, cause that's the name of the starting JV quarterback," one of his friends told me.
I just smiled as I thought about what my dad taught me. To always be humble, because no matter how good you are there is always someone better than you "You're good. The JV team will surely win a lot of game with you as QB."
Alex looked at me then, at JC. He seemed shocked.
"What's that supposed to mean?" he asked, getting into my face.
"Nothing, I mean you're going to be a good QB for the JV team," I said, looking at Alex and then at JC.
"Your damn right. With me and my boys, we're gonna have a bad ass football team, aint that right O?"
"What do you mean?" I looked at Alex and he was still looking at the ground.
"We're gona run things on the football team. Me and my boys," he said, as he looked Alex. "Ain't that right O? You are playing aint you. O?"
"You're not talking about Alex are you?" I asked with a smile as JC looked at me confused. "Unless he's gonna kick, Alex doesn't play football."
"What do you mean, he don't play football?"
"JC, Alex plays soccer and he's real good at it, and besides his mom won't let him play..." I realize what I was saying, but it was too late.
"Soccer? " he asked. "O plays soccer? And his mommy wont let him play football?" He started laughing along with the other kids and looking at Alex.
"Well what about you? Is your mommy letting you play with the big boys?" he asked me.
I was agitated because he was picking on Alex. "Yes, I'm going to play."
"Well you better be ready to back me up," he said with a smile.
"Actually, I'm really looking forward to playing backup, just not your backup. You see, I'm going to be a backup, just not JV. I'm playing Varsity backup," I said with a smile as I got into his face " See like after we beat you, we played for the championship, and the team we beat is the varsity coach's son's team, and lets just say he pushed me up to varsity because of that game."
"Whatever, O, we're goin outside. You coming or what?" was all he could say as he walked out of the lunchroom.
"What an asshole," was all I could say as I watched them walk outside.
"Is that who you're hanging with now?" I asked Alex as he got up and started to walk out after them.
"I'm going to get so much shit now because of you," Alex said, pissed off and not looking at me.
"I sorry, he just pissed me off. He acts like he's known you forever, picking on you, why did you let him do that?"
"I don't know, you don't understand...you can't understand," he said, dumping his tray in the garbage.
"And what the hell is up with this O thing, O?" I punched him lightly in the arm. Suddenly he turned around and had a look of hurt and anger, like I had never seen before.
"DON'T YOU EVER CALL ME THAT!" he yelled, turning and grabbing by my arm with tears and anger in his eyes.
"What the fuck, Alex. What's wrong?" He looked at me, then let me go and started to walk away.
"What the hell is wrong with you," I asked as I caught up to him and stepped in front of him. "First you stop hanging with me and start hanging with the homeboys, then you flip out because I call you a something your new friends can call you, but I can't? Your best friend?"
"You don't understand," he said, trying to walk around me.
As he stepped around I grabbed hold of his arm. "Oh, I guess I can't because I'm not black. Right, Alex? Or should I call you O? Oh, I'm sorry, I'm not permitted to call you that," I said as I gave him a shove. "Do you know what that feels like?" I was getting tears in my eyes as I pushed him again "What it feels like to be left out of your best friend's life?"
"Well do you know what that nickname means?" he asked, pushing me back and starting to cry himself. "It means OREO, Justin!" he said as he pushed around me and ran off.
I never got to say sorry to him for that, and now he had the same look in his eye that he had that day. Hurt and anger.
"Hey O," Tony said as he got closer, "Where's your boyfriend?" Tony says with a smile and starts laughing.
With one punch to the mouth Alex knocks Tony right to the ground. Joe, Mark and I were stunned beyond belief. Sudden Alex reached for Tony again, but before he could I grabbed Alex and pulled him away from Tony as Mark and Joe rush to help Tony. I quickly rushed Alex away from the group.
"Theirs my boyfriend, Bitch," he said as I rush him away before any teachers arrived to see the commotion.
"HAVE YOU LOST YOUR FUCKING MIND?" I asked him as I let him go. "WHAT THE FUCK DID YOU GO AND DO THAT FOR?"
Then out of the blue I heard my name being called. "Justin!"
"WHAT!" I answered, as I turned around and see Alisa. "Shit."
"Oh No! Please tell me we're not to late!" she says looked concerned.
"What do you mean WE? " I asked
Huff...Huff...is all I heard behind her " I think someone gotten faster in her old age." the voice from behind her says.
"Brad?" is all I can say, now total blown away.
"Hey Just," he said with a huge smile as my legs now turn to Jello.