"I mean, you know, is she in shape?"
"Other words, is she fat?"
"That's it."
"No, she exercises two hours a day and eats only lettuce. She looks great and she'll want you over for dinner tonight."
"For lettuce?"
"For whatever you want. Can I call her?"
"No, not yet.Let's just talk."
There was no talk for a long time. They watched a pickup truck roll to a stop near the gate. The driver was a heavyset man with faded jeans, a denim cap, a thick beard, and a limp. He walked around the end zone and down the track and as he stepped up to the bleachers he noticedNeely and Curry sitting higher, watching every move he made. He nodded at them, climbed a few rows, then sat and gazed at the field, very still and very alone.
"That's Orley Short," Paul said, finally putting a name with a face."Late seventies."
"I remember him," Neely said."Slowest linebacker in history."
"And the meanest.All-conference, I think. Played one year at a juco then quit to cut timber for the rest of his life."
"Rake loved the loggers, didn't he?"
"Didn't we all? Four loggers on defense and a conference titlewas automatic."
Another pickup stopped near the first, another hefty gentleman in overalls and denim lumbered his way to the bleachers where he greeted Orley Short and sat beside him. Their meeting did not appear to be planned.
"Can't place him," Paul said, struggling to identify the second man and frustrated that he could not. In three and a half decades Rake had coached hundreds of boys from Messina and the county. Most of them had never left. Rake's players knew each other. They were members of a small fraternity whose membership was forever closed.
"You should get back more often," Paul said when it was time to talk again.