“He walked in like he was already the Big Man on Campus. I admit, he is cute,” Tami said.
“And has a nice butt,” I mumbled.
She got a faraway dreamy look and sighed, to tease me.
“Wait, where was I?” she asked, and then gave me an evil grin.
“Mike being a jerk,” Alan prompted.
“He used to be a good guy, but it’s like he plans to sleep with all the girls at Wesleyan. The problem is he acts like he expects them to just fall at his feet. Mike also seems to be looking to get revenge on you.”
“What makes you say that?” I asked.
Tami contemplated what she’d just said. I suddenly had a good idea of how he would do it.
“Did he try to force you?” I asked.
Alan’s head snapped around, and he looked worried. Mike had gotten a reputation for not caring who he pursued or what the consequences would be. I wouldn’t put it past him to target my friends to sleep with them as an ‘f-you’ to me.
“No, but he has hit on me several times. I told him that if he kept it up, I’d tell you. Unfortunately, I suspect that’s exactly what he wanted. I’ve warned the rest of them to be careful around him,” Tami said.
“The rest of who?” Alan asked.
“Girls who’re friends of mine,” I said to Alan and then turned to Tami. “Jim almost killed him when Mike hit on Jim’s girlfriend. If Mike isn’t careful, he’ll piss people off there, too.”
Tami looked down and then up at me.
“I’ve heard Harper’s gone out with him,” she said and braced herself for the blowup.
I just laughed.
“What’s so funny?” Alan asked.
“Of all my friends at Wesleyan, Harper’s the one who bothers me the least. Maybe he should go after Jennie Wesleyan next,” I suggested.
I’d have to think about this. It was good to hear that Tami and my other friends hadn’t fallen for his charms. I would admit Mike was a good-looking guy. Tami even said at one point that she’d found him attractive. Now that he was out from under my shadow, it sounded like he planned to assert himself. I wished him luck. Wesleyan was nothing like Lincoln High. Girls like Jennie Wesleyan would use him, but he would never be a serious boyfriend. There were too many moms like Jennie’s who would never allow a scholarship boy to interfere in their plans for their daughters.
What Mike didn’t realize was that it was a tight-knit group. If he caused too many problems, Teddy Wesleyan would jerk his scholarship, no matter how much Mike helped improve their football team.
“How’s Damion doing?” I asked.
Tami had a genuine smile when I mentioned his name. Damion Roth was the Randy Moss-clone wide receiver whom I’d met at both Elite 11 and Elite camps. I’d introduced him to Teddy Wesleyan and then somewhat regretted it. Damion had been involved in an incident with Candy and Flee at Elite Camp in Houston. Bo had tried to help him but caught him with the daughter of the woman Bo was spending some time with. Damion had been sent home after his second incident with girls he really shouldn’t have been hanging around.
I wanted to see if he’d mended his ways or not.
“In fact, I’ve been tutoring him when I can. He only has good things to say about how you helped him. Believe it or not, he told Mike to back off when he witnessed him hitting on me. My only concern is that he’s struggling. He has to make up for the poor education he received and bad study habits. I suspect that’s because they gave him passing grades no matter what, to keep him eligible. The good news is he’s working hard.”
If Damion was doing okay, I didn’t need to bring up what Damion had done. Come to think of it, Tami knew all about it because I’d told her at the time.
With Mike and Damion at Wesleyan, they would have a much better team. I’d been told a couple of the guys who had been recruited at Washington had moved to Wesleyan when the whole mess was exposed last fall. Teddy was determined to build a winning team. I was sure they weren’t done recruiting.
I’d have to keep an eye on them. Wesleyan would normally be in a lower classification than us because they were a smaller school. Because as a private school, they didn’t have a defined attendance boundary, the HSAA treated them differently. They had a multiplier that was voted on by the member schools each year. Last year it was 1.65. You took their enrollment, multiplied it by 1.65, and that determined what class they would play in football. They had about 550 students, but with the multiplier, they would compete with other schools as if they had around 900 students. Lincoln High had a little over 800 students and played in class 5A, with 6A being the biggest. Wesleyan was on the verge of moving up to the top class.
We changed the subject. Alan told Tami about our Junior Class Projects and told her I was doing the class play. That was news to her because I’d somehow forgotten to tell my mom about it. For not the first time, I wondered why I was involved in so many things.
