Crystal just harrumphed and began to walk away.
“Why did you need to see me?” Matt asked.
She looked back and shook her head sadly.
“My roommate is gone for the next couple of days. I was going to see if you wanted to come over so that we could figure out what to do with her gone, but I guess we’ll never know.”
There it was. Matt’s day had just gotten worse.
Matt had gone back to the locker room to sulk. He was leaned back against his locker when John Johnson, the heir apparent to his left tackle next year, sat down next to him.
“What’s wrong?”
Matt looked at the mountain of a man. John was a meat-headed mouth-breather capable of only the most basic verbiage, like ‘ugh’ and ‘break’ and ‘John hungry.’ Matt was still mystified as to how they’d gotten this Neanderthal into USC. If the guy wasn’t crucial to Matt’s safety on the football field, he would have never befriended him.
“I’m pissed that the coaches are letting David Dawson play football. The guy is a pain in my ass,” Matt complained.
“He was nice to me,” John said, looking confused.
“It’s all an act. David is only out for David. He knows you might block for him, so he’s making believe he likes you,” Matt said.
John started to look mad.
“That’s not nice. Do you really think he’s like that?”
“He’ll do anything to get his way. You should be careful around him,” Matt said to poison the well. “You might even tell the other linemen.”
“I’ll take care of it,” John said and left Matt.
Matt felt terrible for what he’d just done, but he needed every advantage he could get.
He also had to fix things with Crystal. Right now, that was more important than what David was doing.
The girl at the sorority told Matt that Crystal wasn’t there. He didn’t believe her, but what was he going to do?
He called his dad. Matt shared with him everything that had been going on. He wasn’t happy when his dad laughed at him.
“Let me understand your dilemma. You’re melting down because a guy has walked on, and the coaches tell you he’s playing defense?”
“But he kicked my butt at camp.”
“Matt, I was there. That was a year and a half ago. From what I understand, while you were playing ball and learning the system, he was off making movies. Are you a better quarterback than you were back then?” his dad asked.
“Well, yeah.”
“Do you remember last fall when you called me complaining that you would never learn the plays?”
Matt grumbled under his breath. His dad took that as a ‘yes’ and continued on.
“Did you learn them?”
“Yes.”
“Will it take David just as long to learn the plays?”
“Probably longer if he really does play defense,” Matt said.
“If you get the majority of the snaps in spring ball and then preseason, does he have a shot at taking your spot?”
These were all things that everyone else had told him, but hearing it from his dad made him realize that he was being stupid. Matt had nothing to worry about. Once he was firmly in as the starting quarterback, David would never be able to take it from him. He was worrying about nothing.
“I get it,” Matt said.
“I would make it a point to befriend him. You need to look like you’re taking the high road and are a team player,” his dad advised.
“Thanks, Dad. Now, what should I do about Crystal?”
His dad laughed again.
“Son, you really don’t want my advice because I would tell you to move on.”
His dad was right; he wasn’t willing to do that. Crystal was the best-looking girl he’d ever dated, maybe the sexiest girl he’d ever seen. He’d heard all the rumors about her being a gold digger, but she’d never acted that way towards him. If she was only after money, she would’ve latched onto David. They’d behaved more like acquaintances than anything else.
Yes, she was high maintenance. But any girl that good-looking probably was. He would do whatever it took to win her back. Once that happened, he would be back on track.
Chapter 22
David
David walked into his accounting class and didn’t see his new friend. He might have scared her off last Thursday by teasing her that he wanted to cheat off her. Professor Scarpa made his entrance. As he was about to start his lecture, the girl rushed in and sat down beside David. She handed him a coffee and gave him a weak smile.
He took that as a peace offering and turned on his video to record the class. The girl glanced over and frowned when she saw what he was doing. David imagined there had to be some rule against it, but when he thought about what he’d paid in tuition, he figured that gave him the right. Plus, he’d seen other students doing it, so he shrugged it off.
At the end of class, their quizzes were handed back. David glanced over and caught her name: Alyssa Timmons. He also noticed that she had, in fact, missed question 3, which gave him a higher score. He showed her his 100%.
When the class ended, David introduced himself.
“Thanks for the coffee. I’m David, by the way.”
“Alyssa. You get the coffee on Thursday,” she said as she got up and left.
David chuckled as she just left him sitting there without even looking back.
After classes and his workout with Ridge, David headed to baseball practice. He found Andres getting dressed.
“I saw your ex in the football locker room yesterday.”
“Was she on her knees giving head?” Andres asked.
“Bitter much?” David teased. “No, but she walked in like she owned the place. She was looking for her new man.”
“Did I tell you what she told me when she dumped me? She said I was too needy and never had time for her.”
David tried to wrap his brain around how Andres had managed to want too much of her time while not giving her enough.
“That’s the typical move girls make. They blame you so they don’t have to be responsible for their actions. She should have just told you the truth.”
“If you’re going to go on about how I wasn’t good enough...” Andres said, getting mad again.
“That’s a given,” David said, dismissing it. “Honestly, I think she’s into me. My interested-female radar was pinging like crazy.”
Andres picked up his shoe and threw it at David, who easily dodged it.
“Let’s quit talking about your lack of a love life. I have something serious I want to talk to you about,” David said, picking up Andres’ shoe and tossing it back to him.
“Like if I would be okay if you banged one out with Crystal?”
“No, like we suck as a baseball team.”
Andres gave him a weak smile.
“As a matter of fact, Coach Deneau wanted to talk to me about that. You might as well come along.”
The two of them went to the coach’s office and found Coach Deneau meeting with the rest of the coaches. He gave Andres a funny look when he saw David with him.
“Since he’s my captain-in-training, I figured he should be here. David just told me that he thought the team sucked,” Andres said.
David hadn’t realized that was what was going on. He and Andres had traded off warming the team up before practice. Being a leader came to David naturally, so he hadn’t given it a second thought until just then.
The coaches laughed at hearing David’s characterization. They were surprised when he didn’t try to soften the criticism as most players would have.
“What do you think we should do about it?” Don Hob, the associate head coach, asked David.
David decided to not sugarcoat it.
“They’re acting like they’re normal college students.”
“They are normal college students,” Coach Burris, the volunteer assistant, said.