Training Strategy Meeting -- in the boy's lockerroom!

Pete's Vagina
63. Locker Room
by Erin Halfelven

The crispness in the air said winter was not too far off, and I thought again about Christmas and what I might get for Lee. And Jake, too. School always seemed oddly quiet this early in the morning, with the eastern sky painted gold and the usual west wind bringing the smell of evergreens off the mountain.

No one around to see me park in the nearly full lot reserved for varsity athletes, and no one greeted me as I crunched across the gravel to the gym.

We had our regular 7:30 a.m. Monday meetings in the locker room, and this didn’t strike me as anything unusual. Hadn’t we been meeting there for what Coach Wilson called ‘training strategy’ all semester? And last year, too?

So why did I feel odd when I reached for the door handle?

I was a little bummed that no one had seen me parking Baby Blue in the varsity lot. Several people had already seen her, and not everyone had a 7:30 meeting. Regular class didn’t start till 8:15. But still, she was a beautiful set of wheels, and I wanted some acknowledgment.

I’d seen Jake’s big red Ford and Lee’s van in the lot, so I knew they were likely already inside, but still I paused with my hand near the door. Matt Poole, our right tackle and my main blocker on the field, stepped past me. He pulled the door open and held it.

“Something wrong, Pete?” he asked. I guess the look I gave him seemed a bit uncertain, but I still didn’t know what was wrong.

“I don’t know,” I admitted, but a little pang in my belly reminded me of what might be throwing me off. I made a noise and thanked Matt as I slipped past him.

#

The locker room was the same as it ever was. Two walls lined with tall lockers and two freestanding two-sided rows of small lockers. Benches made of two posts set into the concrete floor with three varnished wooden planks across them. One archway led to the showers, and another led to the foyer, where there were exit doors onto the campus or to the outdoor game courts.

Nothing was different—and even the smell had probably been the same since Coach Wilson was a student. The odor of sweat and soap imbued in the concrete walls had a sour, cheesy, rancid, reek. Not completely unappealing, even a bit comforting, weirdly.

The fourth wall had doors to offices and storerooms, including the coaches’ locker room, where I had been changing clothes since early in the season, after…other changes.

Wilson himself stood there with a clipboard, discussing something with one of the assistant coaches. Nearly all the team members sat on benches or stood around the larger locker room, dressed for classes, the murmur of their talking loud enough to ring on the concrete walls.

Matt walked in behind me and turned to grin at me before announcing. “Pete’s here!”

Dave Garcia turned and yelled. “Pete!” loudest, but everyone else shouted something at me, all of them grinning, some of them winking.

Winking? Yikes!

“Ow! My ears!” said Coach. I had covered my own with my hands, so I didn’t as much hear him as read his lips. Then I did hear him—and so did everyone else as he roared. “Quiet!”

My ears protested, but his shout did a lot to quiet everyone else, at least. They kept grinning at me, though, and I got even more winks. Embarrassed by the attention—and especially the winking—I moved closer to Coach and tried to stop giggling. It was funny but embarrassing. Were these the same guys whose bloodthirsty cheering had so freaked me out at the pizza meeting on Saturday?

“Okay, Pete,” Coach said to me in a more normal voice. “You’re here right on time! Let’s get this training strategy meeting started.”

At least Coach wasn’t winking at me.

* * *

Nothing much changed, week to week, in these meetings; we just went over the scheduling of practices and noted some specific areas Coach wanted us to work on. One real change was that Dave Garcia was going to be our starting fullback now and would get more time at quarterback, too—pretty much anointing him to be the starting quarterback next year, since he was only a junior. Jake and I and half the rest of the starting squads were seniors and would be graduating in the spring.

Everybody headed for the exits when Coach ended the meeting ten minutes early, but he motioned to me to come closer. Lee and Jake were also beckoning me, but I pointed at Coach and headed toward him.

He leaned down to put his head close to mine and said softly, “Coach Debbie wants to see you before class.”

“Coach Debbie?” I repeated. Debbie Stockmeyer was the varsity tennis and cheer coach and assistant dance instructor. I had a bad feeling about this. Miss, not Mrs. Stockmeyer, could pass for a Hollywood Starlet despite being ten years older than any of her students.

“She’s in her office,” he added, gesturing to the door leading to the coaches’ inner spaces. I frowned at Coach, but he wasn’t going to let me off the hook, stepping out of my way.

I glanced at Lee and Jake, who might have been glaring at each other but before I moved anywhere, Gilbert Goff, our strong safety, who I shared linebacking duties on defense with, stepped close, looking serious.

I made a pushback motion toward Lee and Jake because I had a feeling I knew what Gogo wanted to say.

“Megan says,” he began, confirming what I knew his subject was going to be, “that you two are not going to Homecoming together.”

My heart sank. Despite the foreshadowing, confronting our breakup hurt. “Yeah, no,” I mumbled.

“Is it okay with you if I ask her?” Gogo didn’t hide what it was he hoped I would say.

“Go for it, man.” I tried to keep any pleading note out of my voice. “She’s the best, so treat her right, or I swear to God I’ll trip you on the field and dance on your head.” I said it flatly, probably using up the last of whatever macho I retained.

“Thanks, Pete,” Gogo beamed at me. “Megan says to tell you she still loves you, but….”

I nodded before wiping something out of my eye.

“Uh,” Gogo stammered, not leaving yet. “You got a date?” he asked.

I nodded again. “Lee asked me last night,” I told him. I glanced at my guy, only five or six feet away now, and discovered him grinning like a raccoon in a pomegranate tree, as my grandfather would say.

I had to laugh. Then I hugged Gogo quickly before pushing him away. I wondered, did I do that to make Lee jealous? Probably.