Team Manager 1: SWISH!
Chapter 5
“WE NEED TO DO SOMETHING,” Brenda said at the informal gathering of the basketball team. She was the smallest on the team, but also the oldest at nearly eighteen. “I’ve been on his end of abuse. Why do you think I chose not to be a cheerleader any longer? I’d go to war if I found out one of you had been raped or abused.”
“What can we do?” Rosie asked. In a weird switch, she was the tallest player but also the youngest ninth grader on the team.
“We should make sure he doesn’t have to walk home alone,” Natalie said. “They caught up with him after he stayed late to help Coach with the team selection. It’s our responsibility.”
“Oh, just a minute girl. Coach says we have to put up with him as our team manager. Nobody’s paying me to be his babysitter.” The only other senior on the team, Carol had little use for underclassmen—especially Dennis. She was seriously reconsidering whether she even wanted to be on a team with these children.
“How much do you charge an hour?” Daniella asked. “Maybe we can pay you to care.”
“I don’t need this. I thought we were meeting for team business. When kindergarten gets out, call me.” Carol got up and left the room. Her teammates watched her go, wondering if she’d be back.
“Back to the problem,” Natalie said. “What else can we do?”
“Those three guys are the problem,” Diane said. “We should report them to the police.”
“I heard the sheriff came to visit Dennis later that night,” Roberta said. “Get this, it took him three hours to respond. And when he’d taken statements from Dennis and Coach, he said it was just his word against theirs. Everyone knows the Smiths are untouchable.”
“How do they get so much money?” Leanne asked. A tenth grade classmate of Natalie and Dennis, she was the only black girl on the team. That made sense in a way. Hers was the only black family in town.
“Oh, you don’t know?” Brenda asked. “What’s the major cash crop of this part of Iowa?”
“Corn,” chimed several of her teammates.
“And what’s the major ingredient of moonshine?”
“Corn,” whispered Leanne.
“Right. I don’t have anything against the alcohol industry particularly. If he created a legal business and paid the taxes, I’d say fine. Successful businessman. But Lee’s great grandfather started a still in the backwoods during prohibition almost a hundred years ago. Everyone knows they’re still making moonshine. And it’s stronger than legally allowed. Competes with Everclear,” Amy said.
“How do you know so much about it?” Leanne asked.
“My brother. He’s one of the bullies and brags about what Lee’s 180 proof moonshine will do to a man. So, I looked it up. 180 proof is ninety percent alcohol. In the United States, moonshine is limited to being distilled at eighty percent alcohol and can’t be bottled at more than 62.5%.”
“How do they get away with it?”
“Money,” Brenda said.
“And fists,” Amy added. “That’s how Jerry got involved. He and Harry were recruited to help Lee as an enforcer. If they can’t buy you off or you get too expensive, you can expect a beating. Probably beat until you’re crippled. I hear that’s what happened to Mr. Jenkins at the grocery store. That was before these three, though.” Claude Jenkins was fifty-seven years old and worked as a stock boy in the grocery store. A job he’d held since he was twenty years old after a beating so severe it left him brain damaged and with a permanent limp.
“I’ve been a classmate of Lee’s since kindergarten until he was expelled,” Brenda said. “He’s always been a bully. I don’t think he’ll ever change unless someone gives him a taste of his own medicine and leaves him in the same condition as Mr. Jenkins.”
“I personally don’t think we should do that,” Natalie said. “But can we work out a way for Dennis not to need to walk home alone after practice?”
“I drive to school,” Brenda said. “I can sometimes take him home. I wouldn’t want to do it every night. It would be too much like dating.” All the girls laughed at that.
“We can take a shift,” Roberta said. “With three of us, we’ve been driving to school since we got our licenses.”
“I’ll turn sixteen soon,” Diane said. “Mom’s already said Jude and me can use the car so she doesn’t need to come and get us after practice.”
“That’s really nice of you, Diane,” Natalie said. “I’m glad you’ll have transportation to get back to White Center. I was worried about that.”
“I think the rest of us can pretty much walk in a group,” Amy said. “It just means we don’t leave anyone behind.”
The Angeline Escort Service was born that day. They agreed that no one on the team would be left to go home alone.
Amy, however, had other ideas as well. That night she began her surveillance of the C-Store and started collecting the names and pictures of the people who came to the back door to get drugs from her brother.
The team managers workshop had been fun on Saturday. Dennis wished he’d had an opportunity like that the year before. He got a chance to meet managers from other schools when they all divided up by sport. The other girls’ team managers were all girls. They were a little suspicious of him at first. One even asked if he was gay. But by the end of their workshop together, they’d all exchanged phone numbers and checked the schedule to see when their teams played each other.
On Tuesday, he was preparing equipment after school and checking the balls to make sure they were at the right pressure. Then something caught his attention and he realized they had a problem. He carried the game ball Coach Byers had given him into Ardith’s office.
“Coach, there’s a problem we need to deal with, I’m sorry to say.”
“What is it Dennis. Was the game ball damaged?” she asked.
“Not exactly. It’s the wrong ball. This is a size seven ball and the rules say the women should use a size six.”
Ardith groaned. She knew the balls were different sizes and hadn’t thought a thing about it. She’d bet all the balls on the rack were size seven as well.
“I should have thought of that when we met with Coach Byers,” she said. “Hmm. I’m going to let you handle this, Dennis. Just take the ball back to Coach Byers and explain the problem. He ordered the balls for his team, so he probably needs it anyway. See if you can come up with a solution.”
He nodded and left her office. Before he went to see Coach Byers, though, he stopped to check his computer. Wow! Game balls like this one cost $70. He went back to the equipment cage and checked all the other balls on the rack, surprised to find there was about a 50/50 mix of size six and seven balls. He looked at the boys’ basketballs and discovered about the same mix. Then he headed for the office.
“What brings you over today, Dennis?” Coach asked.
“Coach Graves checked with the IGHSAU and got permission for our team to start training the first of October instead of the first of November since we’re a new team. So, I went to the cage and started checking the air pressure in our balls. I’m afraid we can’t use the game ball you gave us,” he explained.
“Why not?”
“It’s a size seven instead of the women’s regulation size six. There’s over an inch difference in circumference.”
“Well, that’s a fine pickle. I didn’t even think about that. We have the same thing in junior high. I wonder what we have for the junior high teams. Let’s take a wander over to the other side and see if we can rouse anyone there.” The two walked to the other side of the gym where the classrooms and locker rooms for the sixth, seventh, and eighth grade school were. The school was laid out in a kind of H-shape with the gym between the two schools. Jim knocked on the door of Coach Wilson’s office and was warmly greeted.
“How’s it going, Frank? Training any good prospects for us to latch onto next year?” Jim asked.
“Too early to tell. The youngest Long boy, Danny, is in sixth grade this year. That family practically eats and breathes basketball so I’ve got good hopes for him.”
“Yes, his brother Don is a senior this year. He’ll probably be our point guard. You’ve got two of their sisters on the girls’ team, don’t you Dennis?”
“Yes, sir. Judith and Diane. They’re really happy we have a team this year,” Dennis said.
“Frank, I’d like you to meet Dennis Enders. He’s the manager for our new women’s basketball team, the Angelines. Dennis, Coach Wilson.”
“I’m happy to meet you, sir,” Dennis offered.
“Ah. I heard the scuttlebutt about the women’s team. I suppose we’ll need a girls’ team here at the junior high next year to start training girls for high school. I doubt the school board knew what they were signing on for,” Frank said. “Welcome to the team, Dennis. What’s up?”
“We’re on a raiding mission,” Jim said. “We discovered most of our basketballs are size seven instead of six, including this new game ball. I got to thinking that we buy a few new balls for the junior high each year and I’m sure they are all size six since that is regulation. We could use a little help here.”
“I see. Yes, I try to spend every cent they give me in my equipment budget, so I always order a couple of new balls for the season. I could probably give you a few practice balls, too. Let’s take a look in the locker.” The three went to the junior high sports locker, a cage much like the one Dennis had a key for. This locker was filled with sports equipment—most of it smaller than what was in the senior high locker. There were racks of basketballs. On a shelf were three new game balls. “With the season cut short last year, we never did open one of our game balls. But I still ordered my allotted two for this season. Will this work for you?” He handed Dennis a new boxed ball and Dennis checked to make sure it was the right size.
“This looks perfect, Coach. Thank you.”
“We have a lot of kids that play in junior high. You might remember it from when you were here,” Frank said. “As a result, we use a lot of balls and have some designated for indoors and some for outdoors. I’ve even got a few of the size five balls that got mixed in from the elementary school. I don’t think we’ll miss this one.”
“Did you check the balls on your team rack, Dennis?”
“Yes, sir. About half of them are the correct size. I discovered, though, that about the same number on the JV rack were sixes. I thought we could swap them out if it was okay with you, sir.”
“I think having you working a new sport for us will result in all of our equipment getting better organized. Let’s go report our success to Coach Graves. Thanks, Frank.” They walked back to the high school, both pleased with their acquisition.
On his way out of school from the equipment cage, Dennis encountered Brenda.
“Hey, Team Manager, how’s it going?” Dennis was surprised at her friendliness. Even when he was managing the JV team last year, he avoided the cheerleaders. Maybe their reputation of being stuck up was just because they were always getting a lot of the wrong type of attention.
“Um… Hi, Brenda. What brings you down here so late after school?”
Brenda did not tell him she was waiting for him. “Oh, I had to meet with Ms. Sanders, our cheerleading coach. I had to turn in my pompoms, so to speak.”
“I hope it went okay.”
“She wasn’t happy with me. Especially when I spilled the beans on what was happening among the cheerleaders already this season. You’d think those bitches would at least wait until after the boys’ team tryouts before they started arguing about who was going to get what player. It gets pretty ugly. Want a ride home? I’ve got my car.” Dennis was shocked. Not only had he never talked to a cheerleader before—or former cheerleader—he certainly never expected one of the prettiest in school to offer him a ride.
“Really? Gee, thanks. I kind of hate walking home alone these days. Not that I’m scared or anything. It’s just…”
“Hey, anytime I’ve got my car, I’ll give you a lift. We all know what happened last week.”
“How?”
“Small town, you know? Once one found out, we all knew. We talked to Coach to make sure it would be okay for us to offer to give you a ride or to walk with you. She told us about some of the things you’ve done already for the team and… We’re your team, Dennis. You can count on us,” Brenda said as she started her car.
“I… Thank you. I just don’t want to feel like I’m hiding behind girls’ skirts all the time.”
“Hmm. That’s an interesting idea. Maybe we girls should wear skirts more often. Surely, it would be more fun to hide behind our skirts than our blue jeans.”
“Um… Uh… Well, your blue jeans are nice, too.” Brenda smiled at the blushing boy. Like most almost-eighteen-year-olds, she knew exactly what she looked like from behind in her tight jeans. She fanned at her face a little with one hand.
“Whew! That suddenly got steamy. Don’t get the wrong idea. I mean, we’re not going to date or anything. But I don’t mind being noticed.” She grinned at him and he breathed in relief. “When do we start practice?” She knew, of course, because the schedule was posted on the athletic bulletin board. But she needed a new subject.
“We can’t start before Tuesday, the first of October. But Coach wants an organizational meeting this Thursday. We need to make sure everyone has her health form turned in and we need to order uniforms. I think she plans to spring for pizza.”
“That’s something you’d never see a cheerleading coach do,” Brenda laughed. “She’d be all like, ‘Now girls, eat healthy. We have to watch our figures. Keep things appealing.’ And we’d all be like gagging in our throats.”
“You don’t sound like you liked cheer. Why’d you keep doing it?”
“You might not have thought about it yet, but when you start making college applications, you need to put down your extracurricular activities as well as your academic achievements. Cheer counts as a team sport for most schools. I think basketball is one step better, though.”
They pulled up in front of Dennis’s house and he got out of the car.
“Thank you for the lift, Brenda. I really appreciate it.”
“Anytime, Manager. See you tomorrow.”
Dennis couldn’t help himself. He was fifteen and went to bed with fantasies playing in his head.
“Okay, Team!” Ardith called the meeting to order. “We are official. The IGHSAU has recognized us and we have managed to put together a schedule of ten games before we reach the Regional Tournament in the spring. I’ll be looking to see if we can pick up any additional games so we get more experience, but at this short notice having ten games is successful.”
“Coach?” Amy raised her hand. “What is that IGA stuff?”
“The IGHSAU is the Iowa Girls High School Athletic Union. For some reason, the powers that be decided we needed a separate association from the IHSAA. Basketball was the first sport sanctioned by the IGHSAU back in 1925 when the IHSAA refused to sanction girls’ sports. Since that time, it has grown to sponsor ten different sports for girls while the IHSAA sponsors only seven for boys. Ladies, we are joining a prestigious organization and should be proud of our accomplishments already.”
The girls all cheered their coach’s comments with yells like “Girl Power!” “Angelines!”
Then the coach got down to the schedule for practice and games with the State Tournament scheduled the first of March.
“We are a triple-A school with our enrollment of 212. Most of the teams we have scheduled in regular season are in that class but we have two games against four-A schools and one against a two-A school. If you think our school is small, you should see theirs!” Ardith said.
“Now, we have the privilege of electing our first team captains today. I believe we should have two captains to share the position. You should think of competence in the sport, leadership, encouragement, and character. We’ll do this in the best way we can. I’d like you each to take a slip of paper and write on it the names of the two girls you think should lead our team. We’ll tally the results and either declare a winner or a run-off. The top two vote getters will become captains. We won’t reveal the totals.” Dennis handed out scraps of paper and pencils. The girls looked around the table at each other, then set to writing the names. Dennis collected the ballots and tallied the total. He handed the results to Ardith.
“You girls are amazing. You were unanimous in one choice and all but two in the other choice. I’d like to introduce you to your new team captains: Brenda Grant and Natalie Armor. It’s really great to start our team with a captain who will graduate this year and one who will hold the torch going forward.” They applauded.
“Now, the moment you’ve all been waiting for. Measuring for uniforms. The boosters have raised nearly $2,000 to get our team started. If you have a favorite number, make sure Dennis gets it marked down as well.”
“What are you going to measure?” Judith asked.
“Bust, waist, and hips. You don’t need to remove any clothes for this. The uniforms are cut just a little loose, so it’s unlikely that any of you girls who are still growing will outgrow them.”
“Gosh, Dennis. With the height and weight measurements you took during tryouts and these measurements, you’re going to know more about my body than my boyfriend does!” Roberta whispered to him.
“I won’t tell,” Dennis whispered back.
He didn’t really know what the measurements meant. The girls all looked beautiful as far as he was concerned. What a 32" bust translated to in terms of cups or bra sizes, he had no idea. He just thought they were all beautiful.
“Hey, let us give you a ride home tonight,” Natalie said. “I hear Brenda got to give you a ride a couple days ago. No fair playing favorites. Come with us.”
“Um… You sure? Okay. Let me grab my backpack.”
Roberta and Daniella got the front seat and Dennis crawled in back beside Natalie. That was really nice.
“That was so embarrassing,” Natalie said, apparently to the car at large. “Coach took all our measurements and just spoke them out loud so everyone would know exactly how developed we are. I feel bad for Amy and Rosie. I mean, I’m not sure they’re wearing training bras yet. They might need new uniforms by the end of season if they sprout as fast as I did.”
“I felt bad for Diane. She’s always been a little heavy. I know she’s self-conscious,” Daniella said.
“At least I think I’m done growing there,” Natalie continued. “I suppose if I grow another two inches up, I could support another inch around. What do you think, Dennis?”
“I um… think you’re all really pretty,” he said. He turned his face away and pressed his burning cheek against the cold glass of the window.
“Gees, Natalie!” Roberta said from the driver’s seat. “You’re embarrassing him. Coach said no bullying. Don’t push it.”
“Oh, no! I didn’t mean that! I’m sorry, Dennis. I didn’t mean to sound like I was bullying you. I… We like always tease each other and I didn’t think that you might interpret it differently. I’m sorry!”
“It’s okay,” Dennis replied. “I didn’t think of it as bullying. It made me kind of feel like one of the girls.” They all laughed at that. “You don’t know what I went through last year. At least you aren’t chasing me down a street trying to make me…” He cut off what he was saying so abruptly that even Roberta turned her head to look at him.
“What did they make you do, Dennis?” Natalie whispered. He could see a tear forming in her eye and knew he was near crying as well.
“I don’t really want to talk about it,” he rasped. “Please.”
“Don’t worry. It’s a closed subject as far as we’re concerned,” Natalie said, reaching out to touch his hand. “But if you ever, you know, need to talk with someone, you can count on us, okay?”
“Thanks.”
“After all, you’re one of the girls,” Daniella said, breaking into a fit of giggles.
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