Page 74 of The Backup Plan

The first time I picked up a real football, I got stung. My mom never wanted to let me out of the house again, and I fought to play anyway. The first day of MPA, my first summer camp away from home, I got stung.

My parents wouldn’t let me go back. And when I got offered a spot to sit next to you at UT, I was so afraid I’d ruin my dream if I lived it I said no and came here.

Ethan

You wanted it so much you said no?

Cameron

Tennessee was home. The backup plan, because I just knew that if I came here to UND, I’d get stung and lose my airway and have to go home, and at least going home would be okay because it wouldn’t be the end.

Ethan

You were really going to come here? Why didn’t I know that?

Cameron

Because you were a senior commit when I was recruited. You weren’t at the spring camps.

I got the offer and committed to UND less than a week later.

Ethan

You’d have been on my bench. Jesus. I’m a little sad right now. We’d have torn this place up.

Cameron

You’re a little sad? I’m fucking miserable.

Ethan

You didn’t have a great game today, man, but let’s put it in perspective.

Cameron

Football is not the problem. It’s everything but the actual game of football.

Beer, tequila, whisky, screaming and fires and cops and podcasts and magazines and one fat bumble bee.

Ethan

You know it’s bad when it’s nothing but sentence fragments. Got any verbs?

Cameron

Scream is a verb.

Ethan

You used screaming like a noun. That makes it a gerund, which is more or less a noun. What were all your nouns verbing?

Cameron

My God.

Ethan

They told me I had to major in something. I picked English. Sorry. Tell me what happened.