AN: I'm in the process of editing this story after a long time of not looking at it. Right now it's REALLY rough.

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The worst day of my life started out so well.

It was the last day of football two-a-days of my true freshman year of college. I'd surpassed all my coaches' expectations both on the field and in the weight room. They'd recruited me as a linebacker, but had moved me to defensive end at the beginning of camp. I might even get to start the next year as a red-shirt freshman.

Even then as an eighteen year old, I would admit that I was a troublemaker. I never got into anything too serious, just little things. I was smart, but school was a joke to me. I'd gone to college to play football. Not that other parts of the experience hadn't appealed to me as well. I loved being out on my own. My parents were both super brainyintellectuals who had no interest in sports andI'd always fought with them at home, so they were equally glad to have me out of the house as I was to be living on my own. Up to that point, being emancipated had been incredible, and I was planning on exercising my freedom by attending a huge party being put on by the older guys on the team that night to celebrate the end of camp. I was the only freshman invited and proud of it.

I tended to make friends quickly. I had always tended to be loud, engaging, and incredibly entertaining while mildly drunk.I had alwaysloved being the center of attention.

One of my roommates was a highly touted recruit at quarterback, and the other was a halfback. I'd only known them for three weeks, but I liked them both well enough. They were a little too serious sometimes, but other than that they were good guys. Mac, the QB, seemed even stranger than me. That morning he had already been up for a half hour before me so he could go on his morning run. As if we didn't run enough during practice, the guy ran every morning and evening.

Crazy.

Jimmy-D, or JD as I called him, was the epitome of the normal college student. He loved sleeping in. Not that I didn't, but I couldn't sleep until mid-afternoon like him. That morning I went into his room and kicked his bed. He groaned a little.

"Five more minutes, mom," he mumbled in his sleep.

I walked around to the other side of the bed next to the wall, laughing to myself mirthfully. Being a self proclaimed troublemaker, I could never pass up the opportunity tocreate a little havoc. I lifted up the side of JD's bed until he rolled off the mattress and onto the floor, his entire body wrapped up in his sheet like some kind of mummy on acid. Just the sight of him was hilarious.

He sat up, rubbing one of his eyes andI laughed at him sitting there, looking stupid.

"Your mommy isn't here to let you sleep five more minutes, is she, JD?"

He picked up a pillow from off the floor and threw it at me. "Shut up, Clint!" was all he could manage at such an early hour.

I caught the projectile and threw it back at him. "Come on, we're late. We have practice in an hour," I said, still laughing, just a little bit.

JD got up and crawled back into bed. "Wake me up in a half hour," he groaned, pulling his twisted blankets over his head and in the process leaving his legs completely uncovered.

I shrugged. "Okay," I said before walking out of his room and back to mine.

My room wasn't as big as JD and Mac's, but I liked having my privacy. I got my stuff together and slung my duffel bag over one shoulder, picking up my keys off my dresser as I walked out the door of my room. I went down to my car and threw my bag in the back, then got in and started it.

A lot of guys on the team hated riding in my car, but I loved it. It was a two door sports car that had seen better days. That morning I drove over to McDonalds first (my coaches never need know)to get something to eat, then I drove over to the football complex.

JD was fifteen minutes late to practice that morning, and I heard a little of his position coach chewing him out as I was getting a drink of water. "Why're you late, Doss?"

"I overslept. Mac just woke me up twenty minutes ago before he left...I didn't have a ride," JD puffed, out of breath already from having run all the way across campus from our complex.

"Don't you have an alarm clock or something?" his coach yelled at him.

JD shifted his weight from one foot to the other, anxiety lining his face. I didn't blame him, Coach Miller really looked pissed. "Yeah," he admitted. "But I turned it off. I told Clint Young to wake me up a half hour before practice."

Miller's face went just about purple at that suggestion. "Well guess what, Doss! Young was given a scholarship by this University to come here and sack the shit out of the other team's QB, not to be your mommy! After practice you owe me five wind sprints for every minute you were late. And don't let it happen again! Now get warmed up, and make sure you stretch!"

Jimmy noddedbefore hestarted to jog around the field to warm up. I couldn't help but laugh at him. I didn't think he would hold it against me for long. He knewthat getting his ass chewedwas his own fault.

I'm moving through that day quickly, because I don't like thinking back on it much. I cringe every time I do.

After practice in the morning, the equipment people brought us all sandwiches, and I took mine to the D-line conference room where the D-linemen and O-linemen watched film during the season. During the summer, the O-line took over the room the linebackers usually used to watch film, and the LB's would hang with us in the D-line room. Complicated, huh? I didn't even mention how complicated the skill players and special teams arrangements get.

See, football players aren't that stupid.

I laid down on the floor in the front of the room with my sandwich, kicking off my shoes and rolling onto my stomach. It was nice in the cool, dark room. Since I was tired and starving I began to inhale my food. I tended to do that. It drove my mom crazy. When I was a kid she used to tell me that someday I was going to choke and die.

Obviously, I'm willing to risk it.

When I finished my sandwich, I crumpled up the wrapper into a ball and tossed it toward the trash can. It would've gone in perfectly, if a LB named Aaron Jordan hadn't attempted an interception. He dropped it on the floor, as usual.

I simply shook my head in shame. "You suck, Jordan. At this rate you'll never make an interception, ever. You could use that glue shit they banned in the NFL, and you still wouldn't catch the damn ball. Never mind a Subway wrapper," I informed him, playing the part of the cocky freshman as usual.

Aaron laughed and walked over to me. He still had his shoulder pads on, even though an unwritten rule banned bringing practice equipmentanywhere in the complex that wasn't on the field or in the locker room. It tended to stink too bad.

"Shut up, Young," Jordan snapped at me jokingly."Freshmen should be seen but not heard."

A defensive tackle named Ronnie Shay was walking by with a sandwich and a PowerAde. "Young, shut up? That'll be the day," he said, walking on.

I smiled, pointing after the bigger lineman. "See? It'll never happen. Dude, seriously. Why'd you bring your practice gear in here? You stink," I informed him almost-harshly.

Aaron only pished in my general direction. "And you don't? I'm going to go take a shower right now, maybe you should take one too."

"Na, I don't take showers with linebackers, or any other guys. Your sister maybe...but not guys," I quiped.

Aaron stepped on my back and stood on me, bouncing a little. If he'd had shoes on I would've killed him. As it was I was too tired to move.

"You going to take that back, Young?"

I laughed. "Sorry, Jordan. I like you and all, but I don't swing that way."

He got off my back and smacked me across the back of the head. "I meant about my sister, asshole. I warned her about you the day you met her," he said, pretending to sound pissed.

I looked at him over my shoulder, smiling mischievously. "Does that mean she was curious about me?"

Aaron scoffed at me a little bit. "You wish," he sneered as he walked off towards the door and out of my line of sight.

I let my head rest on my arm, snickering for another minute or two before I shut up and listened to a few of the upperclassmen bust each other's balls. I usually joined in on that, but I was kind of tired.

I started drifting off to sleep, thinking about the party that night. Then I realized that I had no clean street clothes to wear. After practice that afternoon I'd have to go home and do laundry. Maybe if I was really lucky, my mom would realize how much she's missed me and do my laundry for me, begging me to never leave again.

Yeah, that'd be the day.

To my great pleasure, I did finally fall asleep...until someone turned the lights on. At first I thought the coaches were waking us up for practice. I groggily sat up and looked around.

"Who turned on the lights?" I heard JJ Ross, a starting D-end, ask from across the room.

Ronnie James got up and sprinted out of the room and down the hall; a rare display of speed from the big guy. We heard him yelling down the hall somewhere. "Yeah you better run, Bowen! You do that again and I'll kick your sorry ass until you can't sit down! Stupid punk kid!"

Jon Bowen had struck again. He was another big time recruit in my class. A QB, like Mac. Unlike Mac, Jonwas like the younger brother from hell. He'd do anything to get on your nerves, knowing you couldn't do anything about it because he was a quarterback. Personally, I hoped Mac would kick his ass for the starting job someday.

Ronnie came back, having tired of chasing Bowen down the hall. He turned the lights off once again, and I laid back down. I heard JJ snickering across the room from me. "I can't wait until that little bitch gets what's coming to him. Someday someone's going to haul off and deck him, and I just pray to God that I'll be there to see it."

I laughed a little like everyone else, then started to fall back to sleep.