Her Name in the Sky (2 page)

“Alright, alright,” Luke says, pulling his shirt down and holding his palms up in surrender.

The cheerleaders take to the floor to lead everyone in organized cheers while the band plays the fight song again. Clay holds the microphone in his left hand and grins out at the display like it’s entirely for him. The band reaches the end of the fight song, allows for a minute-long intermission, and then plays the fight song all over again.

The pep rally ends when the costumed school mascot—a yellow tiger sporting a red St. Mary’s shirt, and whom the administration officially refers to as “Mr. Tiger” but whom the entire student body calls “Hot Little Mary”—bursts onto the center of the gym floor and dances to the fourth repeat of the fight song. The gym goes crazy with cheers and shouts to the costumed tiger, and the noise level peaks so high that Hannah’s ears ache.

Then the music abruptly stops, and the cheerleaders and football players and students look around for the source of the disruption. Mrs. Shackleford stands on the court sidelines, slicing her hands back and forth over the air in an
Enough
kind of gesture, and then she walks to the center of the gym and takes the microphone from Clay.

“What are y’all on today?” she says. “Save some of this energy for the game tonight! Let’s all bid farewell to Mr. Tiger, and then we’ll start dismissal with the freshmen.”

“Bye, Hot Little Mary!” “We love you, Hot Little Mary!” “Get it, Hot Little Mary!” the students around the gym shout, and Mrs. Shackleford frowns at the bleachers, her mouth pulled tight in disapproval.

“Were you planning on giving the whole school a strip tease?” Joanie asks Luke when she joins them in the hallway. Around them, other students drum on each other’s booksacks and push each other down the hall, and the whole vicinity has that air about it like something is going to happen.  

“It was only for
you
,” Luke says. “But considering you were on the other side of the gym, what was I supposed to do?”

“You should have let him take it all the way off, Han,” Joanie says. “You deprived us all of another great Luke-Manceau showdown.”

“There’ll be more,” Hannah says.

“A whole semester’s worth of them,” Wally says.

“Can we talk about how the band played the same song like twelve times?” Joanie says. “Do they not know anything else? I felt like I was riding in the car with Hannah, being forced to hear the same song on repeat for twenty minutes.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Hannah says, “would you like me to choose something else from my library of three-thousand songs
that you accidentally deleted when you were wasted
?”

Joanie rolls her eyes. Luke takes her hand and says, “Aw, do you not know how to respond when we publicly shame you?”

“I am above conflict,” Joanie says. 

Wally snorts, and Hannah shoots him a sideways smirk. Luke looks down at Joanie with exaggerated pity, almost like she’s not in her right mind.

“I hate all of you,” Joanie says. “Come on, Luke, let’s go before I change my mind about wanting to hang out with you. Han, will you take my bag home?”

“Take it yourself, lazy.”

“Come on, it’s like two books. Can’t you at least put it in the car?”

“Fine.”

“Tell Mom I’ll be home to change before the game.”

“I’m going to tell her you’re fornicating in the park and she’d better buy you a new chastity belt.”

“Shut up. You are disgusting. Bye, y’all,” Joanie says, and then she grabs Luke’s hand and pulls him toward the senior parking lot.

Hannah swings Joanie’s bag over her arm and looks to Wally, who leans against the white cinder block wall. He smiles knowingly at her. “Does she really only have two books in there?” he asks.

“Of course not,” Hannah says, rolling her eyes. “Feels like she’s been lugging a dumbbell around.”

“Want me to carry it?”

“I got it.”

“Don’t tell me you two were waiting around for me,” someone calls. They turn to see Clay striding toward them, his football jersey stretched taut over his chest. “What’d y’all think of the pep rally?”

“It was awesome,” Hannah says. “You were as
dashing
as ever.”

“Don’t make me blush, Han,” Clay says, clapping a hand to her shoulder. “Where’s everyone else?”

“Joanie and Luke just left,” Wally says. “Can you hang for a bit, or do you have a team meeting?”

“Nah, I can hang. Where’s Baker?”

“Haven’t seen her yet,” Hannah answers. 

“Let’s go out to the parking lot,” Clay says, brushing past them. “It was crazy in there. I need some air.”

Hannah and Wally lean against the back of Clay’s truck while Clay talks up his excitement for the game. He bounces up and down on his toes and pounds his fists against each other, his statements getting increasingly repetitive. Hannah blinks against the late afternoon sun. The parking lot has mostly cleared out and only a few stragglers linger around the remaining cars. The air tastes crisp and clean, like it always does in January, and Hannah breathes it into her lungs while she rubs her hands over her bare knees to warm them.

“But how lucky am I that I get to play one last game for St. Mary’s?” Clay says. “This whole Diocesan Cup thing is awesome.”

“I find the whole thing weird,” Hannah says. “Making schools vie against each other for something that doesn’t even mean anything?”

“Doesn’t mean anything?” Clay says, his expression incredulous. “Are you kidding? Dude, like Baker said, it’s a chance to show we’re the best. Fifty years of competition with Mount Sinai and we can finally prove we’re better. We’ll have bragging rights for the
next
50 years! Besides, think about that prize money. If we could pour that into the football program—”

“Everyone talks about Mount Sinai like they’re the enemy,” Hannah interrupts, “but we’re part of the same diocese. The same
Catholic diocese
. Don’t you find that a little hypocritical?”

“Mount Sinai people suck,” Clay says. “Half the kids Wally and I went to middle school with ended up going there, and they were all douchebags.”

“That’s true,” Wally says, lifting his shoulders.

“Anyway, I just have this feeling about tonight,” Clay says. “I can’t explain it, but I know we’re going to win. You know?”

“Yeah,” Hannah and Wally say together, Hannah giving up on arguing with Clay.

Clay runs a hand through his dark hair and mutters “Big night” for the third time, and then a building door opens several yards behind him.

Baker walks slowly out to the parking lot, her eyes glazed over in thought, her hands pulling on her booksack straps.

“Hey,” Clay calls to her. “What took you so long?”

Baker jerks her head up, seemingly startled by the question. “Hey,” she says. “Clean up. You know how OCD Mrs. Shackleford is. And then Ms. Carpenter wanted to debrief with everyone on student council afterwards. Y’all weren’t waiting on me, were you?”

She’s looking at Hannah; Hannah meets her eyes and shrugs easily. “We were just hanging out. How do you feel?”

“Pretty good,” she smiles.

“No points this time, though,” Hannah grins. “Such a wasted opportunity.”

“I know, I’m kind of ashamed of myself.”

“What are you talking about?” Clay says.

“Hannah wrote me a list of Dares for the assembly,” Baker says, unfolding the notebook paper Hannah had slipped her that morning. “Look at this.”

Clay takes the note from her, and Hannah and Wally walk up beside him to read the message:

Bake,

Here are my suggestions for your speech today. I think you’ll find this list comprehensive and inspiring. Ten points to you for each one of these gems you manage to work in—

-Deliver the entire speech with your eyes closed. Never explain why

-
Ask for volunteer Tributes to come forward

-
Shake the microphone cord at Mrs. Shackleford and tell her you challenge her to a jump rope competition. Loser has to do body shots off of Manceau

-
Interrupt yourself halfway through, make your eyes go wide, and shout, “OH MY GOD! I JUST SAW JESUS UP THERE IN THE STANDS!”

-
Tell the student body we are going to “clobber the fuck out of those Mount Sinai douche-bitches”

-
Call Fr. Simon “Mother Simon,” then pretend you just got confused

-
When Clay speaks, stand at the back of the gym and shout, “He doesn’t even go here!”

-
When Hot Little Mary runs in, tackle him/her/it to the ground, then yell for back-up

-
End the speech by invoking prayers for the football players’ herpes outbreak; proclaim your faith that their discomfort will not prevent them from winning

Good luck, you’ll be awesome.

PS please don’t lose this note, as it might result in my being suspended and/or expelled.

PPS now that you’re 18, you might actually be held accountable for this stuff…so keep that in mind. Happy birthday!

“You are crazy,” Wally laughs, looking at Hannah. “What if someone had found that?”

“That’s why I didn’t sign it,” Hannah says.

“Han, it would take about two seconds for anyone in this school to figure it out,” Clay says. “Who else would give Baker a note like that?”

“Nobody,” Baker says, taking the note back. “Only Hannah.” 

The temperature drops to the low 40’s that night. Hannah watches Wally squeeze his shoulders tight together as they walk into the football stadium. She burrows her hands into her jacket pockets and clutches the warm screen of her cell phone, feeling it vibrate with a new text message, knowing that it’s Baker wondering where she is.

“You want something from concessions?” Wally asks her.

“I’m good.” 

“You sure? I’m getting a Coke. You want one too?”

“Alright,” she says, reaching into her purse for her wallet.

“Don’t,” Wally says, lightly knocking her arm. “My treat.”

They hike up the stands with their drinks in their hands, the paper cup burning Hannah’s fingers with cold. The sea of people around them—students, parents, siblings—moves like one mass in response to the game. Hannah climbs upward and upward until she sees Baker, her dark hair reflecting the light of the stadium lampposts, sitting in the middle of a row, surrounded by people on all sides. “Here,” Hannah says, tugging on Wally’s sleeve and leading him into the row of people.

“Hey,” Baker breathes when she sees them. “Hey, Colby?—Katie?—Would y’all mind moving down a little bit?”

“How are we doing?” Hannah asks her.

“Clay just threw a perfect pass to Jackson and Jackson scored a touchdown.”

“Excellent.”

“Regular or Diet?” Baker asks, tapping Hannah’s cup.

“Regular,” Hannah says, offering it to her. They spend the next few plays trading the drink back and forth, and Hannah’s stomach hums with the familiarity of it all.

Clay throws a 20-yard pass to Danny Watkins, who runs the ball another ten yards into the end zone for the second touchdown of the game. The stands erupt with noise, the St. Mary’s band leading everyone in the fight song, and Clay gallops backwards with his hand in the air, his finger pointing at the goal posts as if to say
Told you we’d make it happen
.

Wally leans down close to Hannah, his eyes bright and his mouth open in a big smile. “Remember the first time Clay talked to us about football?” he says.

Hannah laughs as she claps her hands hard together, her skin burning against the cold. “When he told us he’d be quarterback by junior year? And we’d be the most popular kids in school?”

“And you said ‘That’s nice’ and went back to your Geography homework.”

“Guess he showed us.”

“What are you two laughing about?” Baker asks, passing the Coke back to Hannah.

“Clay,” Hannah says, the one-word answer sufficient enough to make Baker smile knowingly.

The crowd falls hushed as they wait for the kicker to score the extra point. Hannah watches the boys on the field, white light illuminating their bodies and making the whole game look more special than it is. Miles, the kicker, surges forward and kicks the football, and it spins a perfect arc through the goal posts, setting off the crowd into a fresh flood of cheering.

“Hola, amigos,” Joanie says, shuffling into their row, oblivious to the screaming people all around her. “Sorry we missed the big play.”

“We paid a visit to concessions,” Luke says, holding a carton of nachos in his hands, “and I’m happy to tell you that we’ve already eaten two hot dogs and a pack of Sour Patch Kids.”

“And now you’re gonna share those nachos with the rest of us?” Hannah asks.

“Hell no,” says Joanie.