No Surrender

Chapter 1

"TOUCHDOWN DONOVAN!!!" The announcer screams through the microphone. Rosewood High school 20, Auburn High school 5. I run out onto the felid with Sean, Joey and Matt over to Hunter, who gestures us to huddle.
"Okay guys. We have Auburn locked. If we can keep this score the same way it is right now, we could win. Now let's get our heads in the game and lets do this!!!" We break and get on our lines. All I can think about is Ethan. He would have loved this, being a senior, playing one of our last football games, just being able to play together one last time.

Time ran out as soon as it started. We won. The fans went crazy, the cheerleaders began to say their legendary cheer and the other team left with their heads down. Matt walks over to his beautiful girlfriend, Sarah, who kisses him lovingly. Sarah is a nice girl with a cute smile. She and Matt met in Art class his sophomore year and her freshmen year. It's fair to say that we are happy for him. After the game, we all meet at Sean's truck, for a traditional celebratory drink.
"Did you see that cheerleader for Auburn?" Matt asks, smiling stupidly at Sean, who throws a football from the back of the truck at Matt's head.
"DUDE!! You have a girlfriend!!!" Sean yells as Matt stumbles up and returns the ball.
"What Sarah doesn't know won't hurt her" he smiles as he says this.
Joey stumbles over to us, his eyes red and his face dazed. It's not like him, he was always so alert and never doing stuff like this. I knew it from the moment I saw him. He was doing drugs.
"Woah, Joe! You been a little high in the sky lately boy?" Hunter asks, giving him a friendly shove. Joey stumbles and stands back up. He knew I knew, he gave me a ashamed of himself.

Ever since Ethan died, Joey was never the same. He shut us all out, even me, and only talked to us when we would ask how far he ran on that play or something. Other than that, Joey was not Joey anymore. I knew he was doing drugs because a few days after school started, I had to go to my truck to get a few textbooks when I saw Joey at Michi Paul's car, giving him something and Michi gave him a paper bag. I tried to figure out why Joey was acting like this, he wasn't insane, if you know what I mean, he just wasn't like that. He wasn't sad or anything, he had a few girlfriends here and there, but he seemed pretty happy with his life.
All of a sudden, a car horn blasted, scaring us all to death. It was Coach Aims.
"You boys drinking?" He asks us, eyeing the bottle in Sean's hand. Sean put it down slowly and kicked it under the truck.
"No sir, just messing around sir" Matt says casually. Clearly, he is drunk.
"Nate, make sure to drive Mr. Rymes home." He tells me. He treats us more like sons after Ethan died.
"Yes sir. Have a good night coach." I say, putting one arm over a drunken Matt and bringing him to my car.
"Hey joe..." I say to Joey, who is climbing into his dad's car "call me, okay?" Joey nods his head and they drive away.
"Call me, okay?" Matt mimics, as I put him into the car, he whacks his head on the car roof.
"Shut up." I say as I shut the door on my passed out friend.
All I could think about was Joey, and if he was okay.

After I got home, I picked up my phone and dialed Joey's number. His mother, Fiona, answered.
"Hi Mrs. Amis. It's Nate, is Joey.. I mean... Joe home?" I ask. I remembered, Joey hated being called Joey... He wanted to be called Joe.
"I'm sorry, honey.. Joseph is asleep right now. I will tell him you called, okay sweetheart?" Mrs. Amis was always so nice to me, mainly because of how close me and Joey were.
"Okay. Thank you, have a great night." I say, then hang up.
I look around my blue walled room. A team picture sits above my desk. It was the last team photo with Ethan in it. We all looked so young, not to mention badly dressed. My hair was long and shaggy blonde, the only kid on the team, besides Ethan, to not have a mow hock. Ethan had jet black short hair slicked back. I missed those times, when we were just kids playing around in the backyard after practice. I just didn't understand what caused Ethan to do what he did. The police determined that he was abused by his mother to the point where he didn't want to live. His mother got remarried a year after Ethan died and had three children, Heather, Gavin and Adam, and moved to Idaho. She was a selfish person, she didn't care about him. I turn off the light and close my eyes. I think of anything that could help me sleep tonight, but my mind is purged with the thoughts of Ethan, Joey and the boys. If only you could vacuum out your mind after a tough day. I FINALY drift off to sleep.

Dear Reader,
Sorry it took so long to publish this!!! I've been so busy with school that I didn't get a chance to finish it. I am currently working on Chapter 2 and there are many more twists and turns to come! Hope you all enjoyed!!
From,
cmorgan2017