Page 144 of Hell Bent

Four yards for that first down. Only four yards.

Jennifer said, “I can’t watch.”

Dyma said, “I have to pee so bad. Why do I always have to pee at the end of big games?”

Ben said, “Maybe you should’ve gone at halftime.”

Dyma said, “Ididgo at halftime. I also drank two bottles of iced tea since then.”

“Why?” Ben asked.

“Because I was nervous, all right?” Dyma said.

The quarterback raised his leg and stamped it on the ground. His head turned once, twice. And Owen snapped the ball.

Harlan was running. Not all the way down to the end zone, because they weren’t risking it. Running about six orseven yards, over near the sideline, and doubling back. Full of confidence that he could beat the defensive player who was almost on top of him, and already practically leaping for that catch.

The quarterback looking for the perfect moment, running one way, running the other. No panic in him, but now there was somebody else coming around the outside, running straight at him. The quarterback saw him, danced backward, head going left and right, looking for his throw.

Another guy appeared so fast from the blind side, you almost didn’t see it happen. The two players converged, and Briscoe saw only the one coming from the openside. A hand slapped the ball in his hand as he cocked his arm to pass, and the ball fell to the ground.

“Incomplete pass,” Jennifer said. “That’s OK. It’s OK. We still have twenty-three seconds.” She was bouncing Nick like crazy again, but he wasn’t crying this time. A football kid, I guessed, because somehow, he could always recognize his dad down there.

It was going to be a fifty-two-yard kick after all. But Sebastian had done that before. He could …

Something was happening on the field. The officials were standing in a little group of three, conferring. The clock was stopped, the numbers displayed on the screen, big and white and accusing. 0:23. Sebastian was on the sideline, poised to run on, his chin strap buckled.

He didn’t run on. Instead, the screen was showing a replay, then showing it again from another angle. The quarterback’s arm going back. The defender slapping the ball. The ball tumbling to the ground. Over and over.

I said, “What’s happening?”

Ben said, “It’s not an incomplete pass. They’re going to rule it a sack.”

“Isn’t it the same thing?” I asked. The replay was stillrunning on the big screen. In the stands, half the crowd was cheering. The other half was booing. I couldn’t even work out which was which.

“No,” Ben said. “His arm wasn’t going forward. It’s a sack, and the ball will get placed at the spot of the sack instead of at the line of scrimmage.”

“What?”I said.

Ben said, semi-patiently, “If it’s an incomplete pass, they go back to the line of scrimmage. But it isn’t. Briscoe was at the Niners’ 45 when he was sacked. And it’s fourth down.”

Yes. It was. The Devils called their last timeout, and Sebastian jogged onto the field, exactly like normal, and lined up back there. Sofarback there. Seven yards behind the line of scrimmage, and the line of scrimmage was forty-five yards from the goal line and fifty-five yards from the posts.

It was going to be a sixty-two-yard kick. Could anybody even kick a football sixty-two yards? I had no idea.

The ball was in the snapper’s hands. The players were lined up, poised, expectant, ready to throw themselves into the breach and stop the defense from reaching Sebastian. And I couldn’t breathe.

The Niners called a time out.

“Icing the kicker,” Ben said.

“What?”I said again.

“They have two timeouts left,” Ben yelled over the roar of the crowd, which had increased in intensity until it was like standing next to a moving train. “If he misses, it’s the Niners’ ball. They don’t even have to run a play. The QB just takes a knee, time expires, and they win. So they’re using one of their timeouts to get in Sebastian’s head.”

“How do you evenknow?”I yelled back, since everybody was still just standing around on the field.

“I’m not in school yet,” Ben said, “and tutoring and homework don’t exactly take the whole day. I can read footballrules and research schools and walk Lexi, or I can watch TV or play lame computer games, and I’m getting kind of tired of those.” I heard him, but faintly, like his voice was coming from a long way away.