HIGH SCHOOL ATHLETES LEND A HAND WITH LOCAL CHARITY

Beneath it is a story about Jeffrey and Eric as high school juniors, volunteering their time to collect toys for a shelter a few miles away from Meridien. “The two boys have made it a habit to volunteer all over Crenshaw County,” the article states. I put the clipping to the side and pull out the next stack of pictures and memorabilia. Snapshots of football players goofing around on the beach during a campout. Programs from several football games. Newspaper clippings from homecoming parades. If you look past the haircuts, these pictures and articles could easily be about my class of Guardsmen.

Eric Vance shows up in almost all the pictures and articles that feature my father. When I reach the section of pictures and papers from their senior year in high school, my father is alone.

JEFFREY JACKSON SIGNS LETTER OF INTENT TO PLAY FOOTBALL AT COASTAL TEXAS COMMUNITY COLLEGE

LOCAL ATHLETE JEFFREY JACKSON NOMINATED FOR GOVERNOR’S SERVICE AWARD

JEFFREY JACKSON AWARDED FIRST TEAM ALL-STATE QUARTERBACK POSITION

Underneath all that is a picture of Eric and my father in shorts and Crenshaw T-shirts. My father smiles widely with his arm around Eric, who is holding a tiny bundle in his arms wrapped in a pink blanket.

I lean back against the bed, and my hand brushes against the forgotten bowl of parsley paste on the floor. Gently, I lift my T-shirt and paint it on my ribs myself.

· twenty-six ·

ELIJAH

I wake up way before my alarm goes off. In fact, the sky is still dark when I open my eyes. I try to close them again, try to quiet my head and go back to sleep, but there’s no way that’s going to happen. I glance at my phone. It’s only about an hour before I’m supposed to be awake anyway. Screw it.

I get dressed and throw some extra clothes and toiletries into my backpack and sneak quietly out of the house. I pull my backpack straps as tight as I can and do some stretches in the dark in the driveway before I take off running toward school. I know the weight room at Crenshaw opens at six for anyone who needs to lift in the morning instead of after school. That’s the plan I have in my head as I take off, working up a good sweat as I run down Main Street.

Frankie would probably say I’m running from something. Thoughts in my own head. The expectation of a ton of people here in Meridien that I’m just a screwup. The thought that I’m always going to make the wrong choice. The fact that all these perceptions are possibly based on a giant lie my father told to protect his best friend twenty years ago.