But they couldn’t stop the kid outside and still adequately cover the middle. They continued to get pounded. He was acutely aware of Ronnie. He fumbled. He was run over and faked to his knees. He fumbled again the next time he touched the ball, and, outraged at his performance, he raced up and threw himself at the blockers and runner on the first play afterward.
“Take it easy,” Ronnie called. “This isn’t the Super Bowl.”
On the next play, he threw himself forward again, driving in low and turning away from the oncoming legs that kicked and trampled. Two or three people went down, but not the runner, who leaped the tangle and kept going.
“Too aggressive,” Ronnie called. “Keep your head up. Don’t commit yourself too soon.”
“Who is that guy?” one of the Bridgeport kids said. “You got your own coach?”
Some kids laughed and he hunched over, bruised, panting, waiting for the snap. He couldn’t stop this kid, they were playing up to 10, the score was already 7–2.
They were on the road at night, jostling back and forth with the bumps, coming home from visiting. His mother’s sister lived in Norwich and the ride was not a short one. They went rarely because of it. He was slumped against his mother in the front seat, gazing into the darkness as they descended from the highway exit to the lonely road through the meadows and flooded salt marsh that connected Lordship to Bridgeport. Officially it was Lordship Boulevard, a two-and-a-half-mile blacktop outlined in low wooden guardrails which meandered through the swamp, skirting bays and tidal wetlands. Biddy’s father called it the Burma Road.
Kristi was taking up the entire back seat; she’d been sick the last few days and it was hoped she’d sleep on the way home. His father was driving badly. His mother was angry.
There were no lights on the road; the darkness was complete except for the tiny points of the houses ahead and the multicolored lights of the airport to the left. On the curves the car’s headlights flashed stands of cattails fading from yellow to deep brown in the glare, and white speed-limit signs surfaced from the black and swept by.
Curves were handled loosely, gradual turns corrected by jerks that made his shoulders quiver. His mother, looking out her window toward the sea, finally said something sharp and his father seemed to settle down.
His father had been angry since late afternoon; when they had been leaving Lordship, he had said, “Get in, get in, get in,” holding the car door open. “Your mother isn’t happy unless we’re on the move.” To which his mother had replied, “Your father isn’t happy unless he’s sitting on his ass.”
They continued around curves in the dark, Lordship’s lights growing larger. The grace of the movement of lights across the windshield gave him the pleasant sensation of being part of a dance.
“Just what makes that little old ant,” his father sang in a soft voice. “Think’ll he’ll move that rubber tree plant.”
His mother sighed.
“Anyone knows an ant, can’t, move a rubber tree plant. But he’s got — high hopes.” He patted Biddy’s thigh in time to his singing. “He’s got — high hopes.”
“Kristi’s sleeping,” his mother said.
His father’s voice dropped in volume. “He’s got high apple pie in the sky hopes. So any time you’re gettin’ low, ’stead of lettin’ go, just remember that ant: whoops, there goes another rubber tree plant, there goes another rubber tree plant.” His voice trailed off.
“Wanna take the wheel?” he finally said, and Biddy looked at him closely and realized with a start that he might be drunk. He looked hot and lazy. His hat was perfectly straight and there were beads of sweat under his sideburns. He was leaning back against the seat and had one finger hooked over the bottom of the steering wheel.
“Walt.”
“Yeah, yeah. C’mon, take the wheel. Don’t reach over. Get on my lap.” Biddy had never touched the wheel of their car while it was moving and had never wanted to, but he climbed onto his father’s lap.
“Walt.”
“Got it?”
“Walt. Biddy, leave the wheel alone.”
“I’m lettin’ go,” his father said.
The car sailed in a sickening diagonal across the road before big hands around his righted the wheel with a jerk. “Take it,” his father said.
He held on, feeling awesomely responsible for all of this, wanting his father to take the wheel back. In the distance he saw lights turn onto the road.
“Dad. There’s a car coming.”
“You’re fine.”
“Dad.”
“Walt.”
“You’re all right.”
The car came on them quickly and he seemed too far to the right, too close to the wood and cable of the guardrails, and he tried to compensate and the lights blinded him, his mother’s cry filling the car, and she grabbed the wheel just as his father did, and suddenly they were jerking to a stop, his father laughing, his mother leaning across him, her hands still on the wheel.
“You asshole,” she hissed, and he could see the dashboard light in her eyes, reflecting in small points off her lipstick.
That night in bed at Three Rivers Stadium he came out of a huddle next to Bobby Bryant and Matt Blair, turning to face the Pittsburgh Steelers. Strip the interference, Blair told him as he drifted into position. If they come wide to your side, you’re gonna have to strip the interference. Don’t think you can stop the sweep by just waving at them as they go by. The crowd noise resounded on the artificial turf, and TV cameramen hustled along the sidelines. He waited, opposite John Stallworth. The Steelers were in deep black and yellow, and the lights reflected in bright white circles off the gloss of Stallworth’s helmet. It was a Monday night in Three Rivers Stadium with the whole world watching, and he was trying desperately to hold up his end of the Minnesota Viking defense. The white horns of his teammates’ helmets angled in unison as they bobbed close to the line of scrimmage, waiting. Bradshaw was shouting signals over the crowd noise.
At the snap there was an explosion of speed and power and he watched the play develop for too long, picking up Stallworth only as the Steeler receiver lashed into him, driving him onto his back so that his helmet bounced on the artificial turf and the condenser microphones on the sidelines could pick it up. He was aware of his father somewhere in the crowd.
Blair stood over him, eyes looming out of the white cage and purple helmet. Man, you’re gonna have to deal with that, he said. Stallworth’s gonna be comin’ at you and you just gotta beat him to the guard or whoever’s leading the play. He pulled, lifting Biddy off the cold artificial surface, and in the defensive huddle Biddy felt as he had in the Oriole dugout: he wasn’t doing the job and they were going to get rid of him. Or worse, as he left the huddle and hunched opposite Stallworth once more: he was letting everyone down until they did.
While he diagnosed the next play, Stallworth moved like light and drove his shoulder and helmet into Biddy’s thigh, pinwheeling him around and knocking him out of the runner’s path. He lay on his side, arm pinned at an odd angle, watching Franco Harris score.
Oh, man, Blair said from behind him. You are just not willing to do what it takes, are you?
Every day for a week he sat next to Laura at recess. She sat alone during the free time the nuns allowed after organized games.