I swallowed away the burning taste of bile.
“Yeah,” I groaned.
“Can you move?”
I nodded.
“Can we take you off the field, or do you need to stay here a while? Do we need to call a doctor?”
“I’m okay,” I said. “I can get up.”
“I’ll help him,” Chip said. “It was an accident, Coach. Really.”
“I know,” she said. “Why don’t you get cleaned up, Darius? Do you need me to call your parents?”
“No. I mean, yeah. I’ll get cleaned up. You don’t need to call my parents.”
“All right. Cusumano, get him to the locker room and see if you can find Coach Steiner.”
Chip helped me up.
“I can walk,” I said.
“Okay.” Chip pulled my arm over his shoulder, anyway. His back was drenched with sweat, and he didn’t smell particularly nice, but I probably didn’t either. “Come on.”
Chip led me to my locker in silence.
The pain was starting to wear off, but a wave of nausea was replacing it, radiating out from somewhere deep behind my belly button. I leaned my head against the cool metal of my locker and closed my eyes.
“Hey, don’t fall asleep,” Chip said. “That’s how you die.”
“I think that’s concussions.”
I kept my eyes closed, but I could just picture Chip’s eternal grin.
“Well, I concussed your balls pretty bad.”
“Yeah.”
“For real, though. I’ll be right back. Will you be okay for a second?”
“Yeah.” I pulled away from my locker and took out my towel and soap. “I’m gonna shower off.”
“Okay, but if you see blood going down the drain, make sure to scream really loud.”
“Gross.”
I showered off as gently as I could. There was, mercifully, no blood. My testicles felt tender, and suddenly very precious, but whole.
I toweled off and padded back to my locker. I was stepping into my boxer briefs when I heard Chip’s voice coming around the corner.
“I got you an ice pack, in case you... oh.”
Chip and I stared at each other for a second.
I mean, we’d been in locker rooms together before, but I don’t think he’d ever seen me naked.
In that moment I felt very naked indeed.
