Senior Year Box Set

I was looking forward to putting it all behind me. My wife had also grown tired of my hours. Covering high school sports meant I was out most evenings to see a game. She wanted me home at night. She observed how unhappy I was becoming and finally sat me down for a talk.

I opened up about all my frustrations, including how even my paper wanted me to start doing vlogs and creating Internet content. Of all the changes I saw, what I hated most was the complete lack of depth to anything. I was too old to try to keep up with the young reporters. They seemed to be able to whip out a blog by tapping on their phone for a few minutes.

I imagine my wife didn’t really want me underfoot 24/7. She knew me well enough to recognize that I would slowly go crazy, sitting around the house all day. I expected that if she had to be around me that much, she would start contemplating ways to collect on my life insurance.

Then she had an idea I never thought of: reality TV.

She suggested that I should do one on the kid from Lincoln High that my granddaughter thought was ‘dreamy.’ My wife had seen on several sports networks where they would follow a football team around that I could model it after. Instead of following around college or pros, I would be doing high school ball.

The ‘dreamy’ guy was David Dawson. If I was ever going to do something like this, he would be the perfect candidate. David had been named the Gatorade Player of the Year his junior year. He was also a model and actor who’d just stolen the Millennium Falcon, if our ‘fake news’ was to be believed. At his most recent baseball game, over twenty thousand people showed up.

David wasn’t your typical athlete because he was more than that. I found him to be goofy and honest, but he had a drive and ambition second to none. Over the past three years, he’d grown to where he was now: the best quarterback in the nation, according to all the recruiting services. David was one of those rare players who elevated the play of his teammates. I’d been privileged to see him grow into that lofty position. In more than 25 years of sports reporting, he was the best high school athlete I’d ever seen.

It amused me that he was still the kid I’d met back then. His fame hadn’t jaded him. I loved it when he would predict the scores of games and afterward, his ‘aw shucks,’ thanking God interviews. If there was anyone I would be excited to cover, it was him.

I talked to my editor about my wife’s idea, and he sent me to one of our friends at a local TV station. He thought it was too big for them, so he got me in contact with SportsTV. They loved the idea and wanted to buy it from me. I told them only I could get them the access, that David wouldn’t do it with anyone else.

I realized it was a gamble, but I knew David. He wouldn’t like this at all. We’d become friends over the last three years, and I hoped he would go for it if I was involved. SportsTV gave me the green light if I could get everyone to agree. Lincoln High was easy; David, not so much. The little shit wanted to be able to reject content. I didn’t blame him because these types of things tended not to just show the good but also to wallow in the bad. He did have an image to protect, so I agreed.

David had been invited to the USA Under-18 baseball tryouts and was doing well. When they saw that, SportsTV contacted me about starting the documentary early. They hired me as a reporter to interview him. They pushed the documentary’s production schedule forward so we could capture footage of him representing us in international play.

SportsTV couldn’t have been happier with David. He came across as the type of teammate everyone would want on their team. He showed what I already knew, that he was a great guy. David was also the best player on the field. That wasn’t me wearing rose-colored glasses because I liked him, it was what his coaches and teammates all said. It was confirmed when he was named MVP of the tournament.

When the tournament ended, it was back to football. I was eager to see what David and his teammates could do this coming year. I predicted that they would win their third straight state championship, making them possibly the best team in the state’s history. Although I realized it wouldn’t be easy, I would be a willing passenger on this ride.

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Chapter 1 – Let’s Get This Party Started Thursday August 25

I woke before my alarm. I heard the rumble of thunder and rolled over to find Duke snuggled up to my back. He would never be a guard dog. He feared both thunderstorms and the vacuum cleaner. Neither one had ever done anything to him, but try explaining that to your dog.

“Hey, Buddy. You okay?” I asked, and he beat his big tail on the bed in response.

I swear Labs have no feeling in their tails. He’d cleared off a coffee table or knocked over a baby with it a time or two. I reached over his body so I could scratch his chest.