CHAPTER 4
At lunch on Friday, Logan was waiting in line in the cafeteria. It was pizza day, like every Friday. Logan tapped his fingers on his tray as he waited.
“Hey, Logan,” someone said behind him. Logan turned.
It was Andrew again, the wide receiver from the football team.
“Oh, hi, Andrew,” Logan said.
Andrew smacked his lips. “Man, I love pizza day,” he said. He peeked around Logan to get a look at the line. “What’s taking so long up there?” he called out. “I want my lunch!”
The woman behind the counter waved at him. “You keep it down, Andrew,” she said, smiling. “You’ll get your lunch.”
Andrew laughed and then looked at Logan. “So we’re playing your old team in a few hours, huh?” he asked.
Logan nodded. “Yeah,” he said. “The River City Cyclones.”
The line inched up slowly.
“Is that going to be weird?” Andrew asked. “I mean, I can’t imagine having to play against the guys on the Wildcats. And all I have to do is run and catch.”
“What do you mean? Why would it be weird?” Logan asked. “Playing is playing.”
They had reached the food. Logan got two square pieces of pizza. He also took a bowl of vanilla pudding and a bowl of peas and carrots.
Andrew turned to the server and smiled. “I want four slices, Carol,” he said. “Let me have four slices.”
Carol, the server, laughed. “Hey, Andrew,” she said, “if you’re paying for two lunches, you’re getting two lunches.” She gave him the four slices he’d asked for and laughed again.
The two of them walked to the cash register and paid. “Why would it be weird to play against my old team?” Logan asked again.
“Well,” Andrew said as they left the line and headed toward the tables, “you’ll be rushing their quarterback, going after their running backs . . . you know, tackling them. I don’t know, I think that would be pretty tough.”
Andrew shook his head and headed to the table at the far side of the room, where the whole football team was having lunch. When Logan didn’t follow him, Andrew turned around.
“Hey, man,” Andrew said. “Why don’t you come over and eat lunch with the rest of the team today? Just because you’re the new guy doesn’t mean you have to eat lunch alone.”
Logan looked down at his pizza. He thought about what Andrew had said.
Logan was going to have to play against his old friends. He’d have to do his best to make sure the River City quarterback couldn’t complete a single pass. Even worse, Scotty was a running back. He’d have to tackle Scotty.
Logan looked back at Andrew, who was standing there waiting for him.
“Actually, um,” Logan said, “I’m supposed to be meeting with Mr. Goulet, um, about my French class project. So I better head to his office.”
That was a lie. Logan just couldn’t bring himself to have lunch with his new football team. It felt like he was cheating on a friend.
Andrew squinted at Logan. “Okay,” he said. “Sounds like fun.”
Logan shrugged. “Yeah,” he said, heading to the door. “I don’t have a choice though, I guess.”
He quickly left the cafeteria, carrying his tray of lunch. He headed for the library, where he hid in a corner to eat his pizza. It felt like rocks in his stomach.