Page 1 of Make the Play
1JASON
Radio blaringand windows down to let in the warm summer breeze, Jason speeds down the freeway, feeling good.
As they are most years, football tryouts have been grueling, but they’re over now, leaving Jason free to enjoy his last weekend of freedom before he goes back to work full time next Friday.
The new school year might not start until the week after, and he might not have as much prep work as some of the teachers, but there’s a lot more to get ready as the PE teacher than most people realize, especially with his second job as head football coach at the high school. Hell, he's spent all summer working on his playbook, watching old game tapes, and looking for ways to help his players achieve excellence. Losing several members of his starting lineup to graduation left a gaping hole in the team, but Jason is looking forward to the challenge. Though, perhaps not as much as he’s looking forward to this afternoon.
Taking the next exit onto Carrillo Street, he turns up his music until he can’t hear himself think, feeling his fatigue fade with every mile he drives closer to his brother’s house. When Charlie, one of his older brothers, originally threw him a barbecue to celebrate Jason’s last weekend of freedom during his first year of teaching six years ago, none of them realized it would become a tradition.
Jason has the route to Charlie’s house on the top of the hill memorized, and it only takes a few side streets and turns before he feels worlds away from the freeway. Cruising down the palm tree lined street in the cozy suburban neighborhood Charlie calls home, Jason can’t help but smile. Most of the houses in this area were bought by developers and rebuilt in the last few years, but Charlie’s little bungalow sits nestled at the end of the street in all its aged glory.
The house might be small and unassuming compared to its neighbors, but the property in the back is massive because of its location on the corner, which affords picturesque views of Santa Leon and its coastline. According to Charlie, the views and privacy are exactly why he bought it. Jason also privately thinks it’s because Charlie was the first of them to get his own home and wanted a backyard big enough for them to get together. Granted, they have their parents’ house, which they all still frequent, but there’s something special about hanging out with your brothers watching the sun set behind the glittering coastal views.
By the time Jason parks in the driveway and makes his way down the side yard, he can hear Charlie’s atrocious taste in music blaring over bluetooth speakers. Despite the volume, his music isn’t loud enough to drown out the sounds of Charlie and Andrew bickering. Jason pushes open the side gate to find his twin brothers facing each other, identical looks of exasperation marring their faces.
If it weren’t for the fact that Charlie looks like he got dressed in the dark in his neon green shirt, paint-stained jeans and cow print crocs while Andrew looks like he just came out of a board meeting in pressed khakis and a button-down, Jason isn’t sure he could tell them apart, especially not since they got the exact same haircut. The jury is still out on whether they did it on purpose. Neither of them will answer him when he asks, so he assumes it’s another one of their weird twin things.
“The patio furniture is fine,” Charlie tells Andrew, brandishing a pair of bright yellow tongs at him like a weapon. “Chill out and sit down.”
“I’m always chill,” Andrew protests. “But if I weren’t, it would be because you don’t take anything seriously.”
“I take anything seriously that warrants it.” Charlie shrugs.
“Do you two ever stop bickering?” Jason interjects, pretty sure neither of them noticed him come in.
“Oh, Jason’s here,” Andrew says, validating his theory. “Hi.”
“We don’t bicker,” Charlie says. “I tell him he’s wrong and he denies it. It’s a very friendly conversation between two adults.”
In a clear ploy to annoy Andrew, and in sharp contrast to actual adult behavior, Charlie sets down his tongs on the edge of his barbecue before inching backwards to move one of the potted plants behind him. Despite Andrew’s growing frown, he pushes it into the center of the patio, something even someone like Jason, who doesn’t have strong opinions about how other people organize their yards or homes, thinks looks strange.
“You’re absolutely insufferable,” Andrew sighs, wasting no time moving the plant back to where it was before. “I’m trying to give your yard a semblance of order.”
“Who said I wanted order?” Charlie counters at the same time Oreo, one of Charlie’s outdoor cats, streaks by so fast Jason only gets a brief glimpse of her black fur before she disappears into the bushes behind Agnes, Charlie’s mostly blind cat who is asleep in the shade. There’s no sign of his other cat or the dog.
“I need a beer to handle you two,” Jason groans, desperate for something cold to drink. While he wasn’t the one running drills at tryouts, spending all week kicking his kids into shape after most of them spent the summer eating junk and not exercising was enough to give him a raging headache.
“Beer and Coke is in the cooler,” Andrew helpfully supplies. “With ice, because I brought some over.”
“Yeah, well, who bought the beer?” Charlie asks.
“Me,” Andrew smirks. “You know because I put it in your fridge last week when I brought you groceries because you were living on takeout.”
Charlie opens his mouth then closes it again, clearly realizing he can’t argue. Jason laughs, shaking his head before walking to the large red cooler situated on the edge of the deck. He flips the lid open, grabbing a beer and popping the can. He chugs half of it before he realizes Andrew and Charlie are staring at him.
“What?” he asks, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.
“Where’s Theo?” Charlie asks.
“Uh, at home I’m assuming. Why?”
“Why?” They echo, abandoning arguing in favor of doing that freaky twin thing they do where they can speak in complete unison without even trying. “You two always come together.”
“I mean I called him on the way over but he didn’t answer,” Jason says, refusing to tell them about the time he’d used his spare key a few weeks ago and got an eyeful of something no brother ever wants to see. He realized then it’s smarter not to use his spare key unless it is an actual emergency anymore. “I did talk to him last night, though, and he said he’d be here with Alec.”
“Huh,” they both say, heads cocked to the left at the exact same angle. With their hair now cut in exactly the same style, Jason is reminded of when they used to dress more alike growing up and no one, not even their parents, could tell them apart.
“Stop that,” Jason grumbles.
