Chapitre 158: A Destined Rematch

As the bus came to a stop, Ty slowly rose from his sleep. He looked out of the window. Night had taken hold of the city and they were back in the Domínguez High parking lot. Still drowsy, it took him a moment to feel the weight of another body against his side.

Bella occupied the seat next to him, her head occupied his shoulder. He shrugged her off, and she snapped awake, almost falling out of her seat.

'Hngk—Hey! The hell ya do that for?'

Ty looked at his shoulder, wiping off his sleeve. 'At least you didn't drool on me.'

She thumped his arm, crushing his fingers against his bony shoulder. He winced, pulled back against the window, and shook his hand off.

She huffed, then said: 'Asshole. I don't drool.' Though she wiped her chin and mouth just in case. 'I don't think I'll offer you a ride home now.'

'Like it's up to you. Don't bother, my bike's here.'

'You shouldn't be biking home after the game … but it's your dumbass decision to make.'

'Whatever. Can you get out? You're blocking the way.'

'Are you calling me fat?' She looked at him with a dangerous glint in her eye.

An instinctive sense of danger alerted Ty. He'd heard and seen deadly dances involving the word "fat" and women plenty of times with his mother and older sisters before. He stayed his tongue for once in his life and looked to the exit. He could squeeze past her, but before he got out of his seat, he thought better of the idea; what if she took his squeezing by as an admission of her being so fat that he had to squeeze past her?

'No,' he finally said.

Her eyes narrowed in response to the lengthy pause before his eventual answer, but she accepted it, scooting into the aisle and letting him leave.

Being at the front, Ty didn't have to wait for anyone else to get out of the way, not that any of the other boys were in a rush to get off. They were still in high spirits; he could hear them laughing and joking behind him.

As Ty thudded down the stairs, Bella followed. 'By next practice, we'll know who we're facing, so … we'll let you know.'

'Thanks,' he muttered.

At the bottom of the stairs, now on the JV level of the double-decker, there was a hold-up at the door. Though here, the boys were eager to get out, eager to get home and leave the painful loss behind them.

Coach Long waited outside of the bus, greeting each boy with a smile and sending them off with a pat on the back. 'Great game today, Tyrese. You need a ride home?'

'No thanks,' Ty said, heading right past the coach without pausing.

Coach Long didn't take issue with this answer, nor did he think anything of it; there were several cars—several parents—already waiting to pick up their boys. If Ty turned him down, he probably already had a ride.

'Try not to get run over!' Bella shouted, drawing a strange look from her dad.

Ty flipped her off without looking. He picked up his bike and rolled it out of the lot before hopping on and pedalling home.

He thought ahead to the next practice and the announcement that awaited them all. Ty didn't need someone to tell him who they were facing next. He remembered what the bracket for Regionals looked like and knew the Vikings would win their first game too—they had to. His destined revenge was a week away.

He'd face them in the next round, and he'd CRUSH them.

That fantasy revenge game consumed his thoughts as he returned home.

He stopped in the driveway, walked the bike down the side of the house into the backyard, rested it against the fence, then he walked back to the front door and entered.

The house was cold and dark. The flashing light of the TV spilled out of the living room, and at the noise of the front door opening and closing, Megan came from the back of the house, hurrying to greet Ty.

'Welcome home! How'd the game go?' Despite the excitement in her voice, she kept it low; she must've already put the twins down for bed.

'It went as expected.' He retrieved the game ball from his bag and spun it on his finger for a moment.

Meg giggled and hugged him. Ty secured the ball like he was being tackled.

'Ah, you should've messaged me you were back. I saved you some dinner. It could've been warm and waiting for you. I'll go heat it up now.'

'Yeah, thanks.'

As Meg went to the kitchen, Ty headed towards the living room. Father was in his seat, a beer in hand, another bottle already empty at his feet. A six-pack lay within reach, two-thirds of it remaining.

The game was on: UCLA and USC—Bruins vs Trojans. Ty took one look at the scores and scoffed. The defences might've been worse than the JV team. "None of those DBs are better than me." His attention turned back to his father.

'Hey. I'm back from my game.'

Father gulped noisily, then asked: 'You win?'

Ty smiled and strode to a sparse bookshelf. Looking around the room, he was running out of space for his trophies. He set the game ball down in an empty but prominent spot, then turned back to his father. 'Of course.'

A grunt answered him.

Ty's smile dropped. Thankfully, Meg and the ding of the microwave called him away.

"Nobody cares. I don't know if they'll even care when I drop a Super Bowl ring in their lap."

"They'll care about the money you get."

Ty snarled. That tiny voice was annoying, but it was right.

'Ty? You okay?' Meg asked.

'I'm fine. Thanks for the food.' He took the hot plate of lasagne and headed straight for his room.

'Oh… you're welcome.' Even if she'd already ate, Meg wanted to sit with him at the table, to ask him about the game, but she understood he needed rest.

Ty took the food to his bed. When he entered, he heard the twins stifle giggles, two mounds in their beds as they hid under their blankets. He ignored them other than to say "go to sleep". Two heads poked out from the blankets, like fat caterpillars. They blew raspberries at him and complained he was no fun.

Exclamations about a scary monster in the room, followed by more giggles, met his attempt at an authoritative look. It was only when Meg called out through the door and warned them to quiet down that their giggles became more muted and they once again disappeared under their blankets.

Ty ignored them and ate, scrolling through highlights on his phone. "I'm better than all of them," he thought, even when clips from college and NFL games came on his feed.

As he ate, his mind drifted back to the game. They came away with the win—like he knew they would—but it had been too close.

"If that was Warren or Downey, we could've lost. We—I—have to do better." Vance was a stronger foe than he'd expected, even from the tape. He'd gone into the game thinking Kaiser were a balanced team, maybe a little run-heavy. So he thought that if he shut down their prime target, they'd crumble.

In the end, he wasn't exactly wrong, but it'd been much harder done than said. Watching film on Vance and how he manipulated his defenders to where he wanted them, and then dealing with it yourself on the field, were two vastly different experiences.

"How can I use that?" Ty mulled over the question as he polished off his plate. He was lucky Mother hadn't been home to cook. Meg's food was always better.

Focusing back on Vance, plays from the game flashed through his mind. He pushed aside his disruptions and his interceptions. Those wouldn't help him right now, other than inflating his ego and confidence. He needed to focus on the few times Vance actually got the better of him.

Vance was definitely physical. He utilised his size to the utmost. That wouldn't be any benefit to Ty. He chuckled to himself. Father wasn't tall, but he wasn't short either. Six foot at least, and Mother wasn't small for a woman either. Both were above average height, yet Ty's growth spurt still eluded him.

Whoever was in charge of this game, they knew Ty had to be nerfed to give everyone else a chance. Nevertheless, whenever Ty stepped onto the field, it was unfair for whoever he was up against. If he was the same size as the other boys, it'd be straight up overkill.

So using his larger frame to gain an advantage—like Vance did—was out of the equation, but maximising the advantages from his height and girth wasn't all Vance did. He had great body control too, and his foot placement was sneaky. The way he used his legs to cut off Ty's path, and keep Ty where he'd wanted, was the real trick.

He got in Ty's way frequently, always trying to be at the front, and he never relented that position once he'd won it. Even when Ty kept in front of Vance, he always looked to flip the route and positioning.

Ty grumbled. Vance also liked to hold his ground and prevent his defender from getting around him, trying to force them to run into or through him. Vance knew the refs were on his side, and that he could get away with that kind of stuff. Ty knew they wouldn't be as lenient with a CB.

'Fucking bastards,' he mumbled. The twins giggled some more, both whispering to one another that they'd just heard a naughty word.

Ty always had to fight whilst being outnumbered. That was just the life of a defender in football; not only were you against your opponent, but the refs too. If he tried even half of the shit Vance had got away with, they'd throw him in prison just cause his number was 21 instead of 87 and he was on defence instead of offence.

But he knew that. He'd known that since pee wee football. It was just another limiter to make things "fair" for everyone else. They had to make things interesting, right? No one would compete if they knew they had no chance against him.

It didn't mean Ty couldn't bend the rules a little. Every play, everyone—no matter the position—always grabbed their opponent. You just have to be sneaky. Holding in football wasn't illegal, getting caught was the problem.

"My feet. If I can disrupt their stride with my feet without tripping them … or at least without making it LOOK like I'm tripping." That was something Vance liked to do as well. He'd plant his foot right between yours, he'd enter your space and claim it as his own, like an in-fighting boxer. Maybe Ty could do that.

He turned over, curling up. He didn't know if that little trick would be enough to close the gap—the gap his teammates created by being worse than the Vikings last time, Ty was clearly better than Marshall—but he had to take any little advantage he could if he was going to be the greatest.

His arms. That was his strength, his equaliser. They couldn't take all his length. He was shorter than he liked, but his wingspan was over half a foot longer than his height. With these arms, he could reach the heavens.

He rolled onto his back and held a hand up to the ceiling. He could reach anything. In their previous match-up, Marshall had reached balls that shouldn't have been catchable—even Ty hadn't reached them.

Ty studied his fingers. "Just a fingertip… that's all it takes." His arm flopped down on the mattress.

With that thought in mind, and the memories of Marshall's bullshit catches replaying in his head, Ty drifted to sleep, hoping to find the answer to his Viking conundrum in his dreams.