Team Manager CHAMP!
Chapter 4
DENNIS WAS ON the tractor at the Abernathy place early Saturday morning. He’d talked to Randy while they were baling straw and Randy said to proceed as planned with the hay harvest and prepping the field. He’d still be paid by the men’s group on behalf of the new owner. There was no information regarding who owned the place now, only that Lyle and his family had leased it from the agent.
He didn’t expect any problems with mowing and raking. They’d used some of Abe’s equipment on Randy’s straw field and Randy agreed to loan his tractor for the baling and hauling to help speed that process up. The weather had cooled slightly overnight and he kept his shirt and overalls on as he worked through the morning.
When he saw two girls jumping up and down near the barn waving at him, he assumed it was time for lunch, though it didn’t seem he’d been out that long. He shut down the tractor and mower and walked across the field to the barn, thinking about a little roll on a blanket with his girlfriends.
Only it wasn’t his girlfriends who met him. Anna and Caitlyn, Coach Lyle’s daughters, were waiting for him.
“Hi, Coach Dennis,” Caitlyn greeted him. “Mom said you were probably working up a thirst out there and we should bring you some water.”
“Thank you, Caitlyn. That was very thoughtful of you.”
“We baked cookies this morning and Mom said you’d probably like some to keep your energy up,” Anna said, holding out a plate.
“Oh, yum. Chocolate chip,” Dennis said, accepting a cookie.
“It’s from one of those refrigerator doughs you can buy at the grocery store,” Caitlyn said disparagingly. “It’s not like she really made them herself.”
“I cooked them!” Anna complained. “Your water just came out of a faucet.”
“Did not. It’s bottled water.”
“Right.”
“Hey, you don’t need to fight about this. I really appreciate you bringing me a morning snack and drink. It was very thoughtful of both of you.”
The girls were suddenly very bashful and just stammered, “You’re welcome.” Two almost thirteen-year-old seventh graders. Dennis groaned inside while trying to keep a mask of congeniality in place. They weren’t the first girls from summer camp who’d greeted him or hung around. It seemed half the girls from sixth through eighth grades had been in the bleachers next to the crew at the football game the previous night. Well, he was going to spread the joy around a bit.
“You know, I heard Natalie talking to Brenda the other day about how she missed having her little sisters in the house. I bet if you talked to her, she’d love to teach you to make cookies from scratch. She’s done it with my sister, Peg. In fact, all the Angelines love to bake and cook.”
“Really?”
“Why don’t I give her a buzz right now and see what she’s up to?” Of course, Dennis didn’t call. He texted Natalie and asked if she’d be up to teaching Anna and Caitlyn to bake cookies. The response was instant and Dennis answered his phone.
“Hey, love. Anna and Caitlyn brought me a snack out to the field for morning break. They’d both love to learn how to bake those snickerdoodles you make. Want to show them?”
“Now?”
“Sure. If it’s okay with their moms.”
“I’ll call Josie and make the invitation. Tell the girls I’ll be over to pick them up in twenty minutes.” She disconnected.
“Well, Nat’s calling your moms right now to see if she can pick you up for a baking lesson. I hope you’re up for it,” Dennis said.
“Yes!” the girls said, jumping up and down. They jumped to give him a quick peck on the cheek and took off running toward the house. Dennis gave a sigh of relief and headed back to his tractor.
A couple of hours later, Dennis saw a woman near the barn waving for him to come in to lunch. When he approached, he once again found it was not a girlfriend, but Lyle’s wife, Josie.
“Hi, Josie! I wasn’t expecting you to bring me lunch after the girls brought me cookies and water this morning,” Dennis said, trying not to sound disappointed.
“Oh, I didn’t make this up. When Natalie came to get the girls this morning, she asked me to bring you the lunch she had prepared. Of course, I agreed. How often do we three all get a Saturday morning alone in the house without the girls? Sorry I can’t stay to eat with you, but Lydia is kind of keeping my place warm for me while I ran out with this. Enjoy!” With that, Josie turned and sprinted for the house.
Dennis shook his head and snorted. Well, he set that up!
When Dennis got home, he found all his girlfriends at the house, as well as Peg, Dot, Anna, and Caitlyn. The kitchen counter was piled with cookies!
“We all made our favorites!” Natalie exclaimed, hugging her boyfriend. “You started something.”
“The cookies all look great, but what are we doing for dinner?” Dennis asked.
“Josie and Lydia invited us all over to their house for dinner tonight. Just go get your shower and change. We’ll get to go inside the house.”
“Oh. Okay, I guess,” Dennis said.
“Don’t worry, honey. We’re all going to the barn tonight after dinner,” Tori whispered. “I mean all the girlfriends and you. Not the children.”
He could tell Tori was a little frustrated by the chaperones as well. He slipped off to the bathroom and got showered before he rejoined the family for the trip back out to the farm.
“Hey, can I help on the grill?” Dennis asked. He was relieved to see the pile of hamburgers headed for the grill rather than finding Lydia and Josie had spent all day cooking. Lyle had a huge gas grill.
“That would be great! I’m trying to practice for next weekend. I figure there will be all this crew and at least another couple of families,” Lyle said.
“You mean, you’re going to try to feed the haying crew? That’s not fair. Let us contribute, too,” Dennis said.
“Oh, the guys who are coming out to help bale told me they’d bring all the meat and their wives would be out with everything else we need. All I’ll have to do is cook it. Grab those tongs and turn the sausages, would you?”
“Sure. I guess we’ll start baling on Friday since there’s no school, but we won’t have a full crew. This field takes about two days just to drop the bales. It’s stacking that takes the time and effort,” Dennis said. “I guess we’ll put up more haystacks next to the one beside the barn. I haven’t heard what we’re doing with this cutting.”
“I’m not in charge of that. When it comes to work in the field, I’m just a strong back. I do what I’m told.”
“Randy’s made sure I learn every step of the process,” Dennis laughed. “And I still don’t know what comes next most of the time.”
“Hey, you guys. I was instructed to take the men some pop,” a voice said from behind them. Dennis turned to see his coach approaching.
“Coach Ardith! I didn’t know you were out here this evening,” Dennis said.
“I got an invitation from Lyle.” She handed them both Dr Peppers. “And that’s something we talked about. When we’re socializing like this and there aren’t any people around to impress, I’ve told the girls to just call me Ardith. That goes for you, too. We don’t need to be ‘Coach’ anything unless that’s what we’re doing.”
“That goes for me, too. Just call me Lyle when you’re out here in my home.”
“Yes, sir. Um… Lyle. Uh… Ardith. I guess you should just call me Dennis,” he laughed. Ardith could see the blush on his cheeks, though. She put an arm around his waist.
“Really. We can just be friends when we’re away from school,” she said. Dennis turned toward her and nodded.
“Okay. We’re ready to start shoveling meat on the platters,” Lyle said. “Dennis, that platter’s for the sausages. I’ll heap this one with burgers.”
They got the food onto the platters just as the girls with Dot, Josie, and Lydia brought salads, chips, and beans to the picnic table.
“Well, that day didn’t go the way I expected,” Dennis laughed when he and the girls finally made it to the barn that night. It was a pleasant night to be in the stall together without getting too hot.
“Were you expecting a ‘hot lunch’ date?” Natalie snickered. “You almost got one, but then I got saddled with those girls! Did Josie show up in tiny shorts when she brought you your food?”
“Um… She had shorts on and a T-shirt. I don’t think she had anything else on, though. She was kind of in a hurry to get back to what she and her partners had been doing. She said Lydia was keeping her place warm for her,” Dennis laughed.
“Geez! Both his wives are hot. You know what I think?” Diane said. “I think they were probably cheerleaders in college—or maybe even high school—who decided to share one macho man between them.”
“There’s enough of him to go around,” Leanne said.
“Do you suppose Coach Ardith—I mean Ardith—was auditioning tonight? Damn, she’s got nice legs,” Rosie said.
“No kidding. And the rest of her isn’t bad either,” Brenda said. “She might have been auditioning, but was it for Lyle or Dennis?”
“Bren! You can’t be serious. She’s like eight or nine years older than us. Why would she be interested in me?” Dennis laughed.
“I don’t know. I saw she had her hand around your waist at the grill.”
“That was just a… you know… uh… Seriously?”
“It could go either way,” Natalie said. “She’s eight or nine years older than us, but eight or nine years younger than the Kellys. I don’t think she’d make it with them. If they’d only been together a couple of years like we have, then maybe she’d try to fit in. But the girls are almost thirteen. They’ve been together a long time.”
“Still, you know, we shouldn’t be thinking about Ardith that way. She’s our coach and teacher and stuff. She’d get in trouble if she was messing around with students. I think the department’s had enough scandals without that,” Dennis said. He had to admit, Ardith had been in gym shorts, like his girlfriends, today. And for twenty-seven, she really looked good in them. He’d definitely had thoughts about her that way.
The first meet of the cross country season was at the Comets’ on Thursday. Everyone was excited to get a chance to run. It was an open meet with ten schools participating. There would be six races so as many runners as possible would be able to compete, including the junior high runners, who were thrilled to catch the team buses. It was a different experience for Dennis to ride the boys’ team bus, but these guys all accepted him as their front runner. They’d all be chasing him. And they got their share of cheerleaders riding the bus with them, including some of the freshmen. The cheerleaders wouldn’t make most of the cross country events, but they wanted to show the team they supported them. After all, the cheerleaders had been working out with them all year.
The first race was for junior high girls. Sixty-five runners took their places and four of them were from Bartley. It was a two-mile race, and all the older runners lined the course to cheer them on. Dennis was surprised when Anna and Caitlyn came in third and sixth in the race, just fifteen seconds apart. The other two junior high girls ran well, too. All four were blushing as their older teammates and cheerleaders yelled, “Go Angelines!”
Then the junior high boys lined up to run, including four Bartley boys among the seventy runners. Again, the Bartley boys made a respectable showing with one of their seventh graders charging in at ninth place. Getting the hint from the cheerleaders, the older boys all chanted, “Wolverines, Wolverines!” each time one of the young runners crossed the finish line.
Seven Angelines lined up for the freshman/sophomore race at five o’clock. The rest of the team yelled themselves silly as Liz came across the line in fourth place and one of the new freshmen girls, Carrie, finished sixth. Bobbie came across in twenty-fourth place with the four other freshman and sophomore girls showing well.
It was worrisome to the coaches that Bartley had only three freshman and sophomore male runners. With several former football team members swelling the junior and senior ranks, many freshmen and sophomores saw an opportunity to win a place on the football team. Nonetheless, the three boys placed 30th, 47th, and 59th of the sixty-nine runners.
The weather was perfect with the sun low on the horizon and the temperature seventy-two when the junior and senior Angelines took off on their race at six o’clock. It looked like a burgundy sweep at the front of the pack for the first half of the race, but a runner from the Turkeys opened up a lead Janice couldn’t match. She came in second with Diane and Tori only a few seconds behind. It was too bad there was no team competition in this race. It was strictly individuals.
The six-thirty race for junior and senior boys saw nine Bartley runners line up in the seventy-one-runner field. Dennis took off fast, but from the first step there was one runner opening up distance on him. Dennis ran the race in 17:35, but the elite runner ahead crossed the finish line more than a minute ahead of him. Donnie and Dave placed sixteenth and nineteenth with the other guys all making a good showing. They headed home that night with hope for a good season.
There was no school on Friday because it was county fair day, kicking off Labor Day weekend.
Unfortunately, Dennis and his crew couldn’t join those festivities as they had the previous year. They were out in the field just after sunrise to begin baling. It was just Dennis and the girls on Friday because normal people still had to work. That included Lyle, who was busy getting the team ready for their trip to the Eagles. The crew knocked off early, thinking they would travel the hour and a half or more to get to the game. It would probably be longer since they would need to go around Des Moines at rush hour on Friday night. By the time they’d gone to their homes to shower, there was no energy left to go out again. After a few sleepy ‘goodnight’ text messages, they all sacked out in their own beds.
Saturday morning, they were back at work in the field, but this time were joined by the Browns, the McDonalds, and the Larsons, each of whom brought at least one piece of equipment to help. True to his word, Lyle was out stacking the bales and lifting them to the top layers. All told, they got 4500 bales in and stacked.
Everyone headed up to the farmhouse where Lyle immediately switched gears to hamburger chef. This time, there were also a few beers brought out, but none of the teens were caught imbibing. Dennis looked around but didn’t see Ardith anywhere. He was just a little disappointed.
Having gotten all the hay in, the teens spent Sunday at the fair. They didn’t camp, preferring to return to Tori’s barn for the night. There was more playtime in the shower than they normally had. No one seemed interested in drying themselves and rushing to bed. Instead, they were like kids playing in a sprinkler, laughing and jumping and sliding across each other’s body. Kisses were shared freely and caresses were easy to come by.
Dennis found himself pressed between Natalie and Lana in a corner of the stall as they competed for his mouth with theirs and stroked him with two soapy hands to see how far he would spurt. It was getting close for Dennis who had a hand in each girl’s pussy, when they were hit by a spray of cold water, bringing their play to a sudden end as their laughing girlfriends rinsed them off.
“That was unfair!” Lana pouted. “We almost had him.”
“I bet Lana he’d shoot all the way across the stall with both of us working on him.”
“What was the bet?”
“Winner gets to ride the next erection first.”
There was a quick shuffle as girls turned off the water and grabbed for towels so they could get to the next event. They didn’t notice Lana turn to face the corner and thrust her butt out, nor Dennis quickly thrust his renewed erection into her. No one stopped their quick trip to bliss.
“That was sneaky,” Natalie whispered as she threw a leg over Dennis in the sleeping stall. She settled back on his cock and began slowly posting up and down. “I wish I’d thought of it.”
“You all ran for towels as if someone had shouted basketball,” Lana giggled. “I expected you to all be running around naked shooting baskets.”
“Too much flopping around,” Brenda interjected from between Lana’s legs where she was lapping up the mess. “I guess I’d play bottomless, but not topless.”
“Ouch,” Amy agreed as she sucked on one of Natalie’s nipples. “I don’t have that much to flop, but I’d still want protection on the girls.”
“I love what you have to flop,” Dennis said with a hand on Amy’s breast and a hand on Natalie’s. “I don’t think we need to turn basketball into a sex sport to make it better. We can save sex until after the final goal.”
“Gonna be a lot of that this winter,” Lana said. “I just have a… ohh… fee… ling… Brenda!” Lana lost her train of thought as Brenda used her talented tongue to bring the girl off.
Labor Day included the second annual family barbecue. The teens prepared “all” the food. That meant potato salad, deviled eggs, baked beans, and grilled burgers and sausages. It did not include the dozen other dishes that families brought along to the party. Everything from Caesar salad to chili to sour cream raisin pie made its way to the afternoon cookout. Dennis was joined at the grill by Lyle and shortly, Ardith brought them drinks.
“I’m glad someone thought to invite you to our cookout,” Dennis said.
“Seems we end up in the same position, no matter where we’re cooking,” Lyle said. “Put the big men on the grill.”
“And let the woman no one trusts to cook anything run drinks to them,” Ardith laughed. “Someday, I’m going to whip up my special dish and surprise everyone.”
“What’s your special dish?” Dennis asked.
“Don’t know yet. I haven’t made one,” Ardith laughed. “I probably have more ready-to-microwave meals in my house than any house in Iowa.”
“Um… You’re always welcome to join us,” Dennis said. “I mean, you know, we always fix a lot for dinner because two or three almost always join us. You could even join us for Sunday afternoon cooking if you wanted to. That way you could take a dish or two home with you for later in the week.” Dennis could feel his face heating up. He glanced at Lyle and saw him grinning as he focused on the grill. He felt Ardith’s hand on his shoulder.
“Thanks, Dennis. Sometime I’ll take you up on that offer,” she said softly.
Cleanup and the Labor Day bonfire wrapped up the day and people moved toward their homes. Tuesday was back to school and the regular grind, so no one stayed late.
For Dennis, having all his DMACC classes on Monday and Wednesday meant he had a long study hall at Bartley on Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday. He did his weight training in the school fitness room and then worked on the online portion of his classes and on any homework he had for his two classes at Bartley.
Every afternoon following school, he led conditioning exercises that were attended by the students, teams, and many from the community. If it rained, they worked in the gym.
On Saturday, a limited team went to Luther College for the All American cross country races. It wasn’t really all of America, but it did draw competitors from Minnesota, Illinois, Kansas, and Nebraska. It was an invitational and runners had to have placed in State or national competition the previous year. Dennis was the only boy from Bartley, but the girls were offered a team slot, so six would make the trip. Janice, Liz, Judith, Tori, Diane, and a freshman named Carrie, who’d placed sixth in the freshman/sophomore meet the previous week were the girls’ team. Competitors all had to have posted times under twenty-three minutes.
Like the Drake Relays, there were no class divisions at the All American. Instead, the races were divided by age. There were races for college men and women, for high school varsity and junior varsity, and for middle school.
Dennis ran a season best of 17:18 for thirteenth place among the 176 runners. He was pleased to be within a minute of the winning time posted by a boy from Minneapolis. Janice managed a tenth place finish in the women’s varsity race and led the team to eighth place out of the 28 full teams represented.
Though it was only the seven of them on the bus with Coach Ardith and Coach Andy, they were jubilant and a little rowdy on the way home. Janice, Liz, and Carrie blended well with Dennis’s three girlfriends on the bus.
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