The Big Time

CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE

TROY KICKED AND THRASHED, but the hand held tight.

"Hey!" came a shout from below.

Troy stopped kicking and said, "Tate?"

"Take it easy," she said in a hissing whisper.

"Are you nuts?" he said, letting go of the ladder rungs and dropping to the ground. He stuck his face into hers so that he could just make out her features in the dark. "You scared the heck out of me."

"Sorry," Tate said in a loud whisper. "I was trying to keep quiet. I saw you go across the tracks with this ladder practically from my house, and I followed you. What are you doing here?"

"What are you doing, Tate?" he asked, whispering himself now. "You've got football practice."

"So do you," she said, poking him in the chest with a finger, her voice still hushed. "I'm just the kicker. We need you if we're going to win this thing on Saturday. When Seth told us you weren't coming to practice, I hopped right out of his truck and told them to go without me."

"Well," Troy said, touching the coin in his pocket, "I can't tell you what I'm doing."

"Okay," Tate said, nodding as if she wasn't surprised. "I'll come with you."

"You can't," he said.

"You look like you're scared," she said. "Your face is as pale as a ghost's."

"I'm not scared, Tate," he said, growling. "Now leave me alone, will you? I've got to do something important, and I can't talk about it, okay?"

Tate stepped back from him, and without whispering at all she asked, "We're still friends, though, right?"

"Of course," he said, letting his head sag before holding it up straight. "We're always friends, Tate. You know that. But I have to go."

"Okay," Tate said, nodding at the wall. "I'm sure it's about your dad."

Tate peered at him through the dark, but Troy said nothing.

"I understand, Troy," she said, sounding a bit sad. "I'll be at my house if you need me. For anything."

"Thank you, Tate," he said, then turned and climbed back up the ladder, pulling it up behind him so that he could use it to climb down the other side.

When he finished lowering it, he turned to say good-bye, but Tate had already disappeared.

"Bye," he said, so softly it was swallowed by the breeze. Then he scrambled down the ladder and set off for G Money's mansion.