For some reason, that fails to make me less nervous about all of this. It was a fantastic idea when it first hit me, and it’s still a great idea, but I can’t shake the feeling that I’m about to get in trouble for something. Or get the rest of the guys in trouble.

I guess it’s harder to quiet that old worried Julian than I thought it was going to be. As we get closer to the school, my stomach just keeps flipping and flipping. I hold my head in my hands to keep the dizzy feeling at bay.

“Hey,” Elijah says next to me. “It’s going to be fine.” He smiles, then reaches across my lap and links his pinkie through mine.

The darkened football field is covered in dew when Bucky pulls the truck right up to the chain link fence. Elijah and Darien hop the fence with Crisco and settle down to wait for the rest of us to lower piglets from the bed of the truck.

Bucky sticks a yard sign right by the gate that reads PIGLETS COURTESY OF CRENSHAW COUNTY HIGH SCHOOL AND REDD FAMILY FARM at the insistence of his father. “I want my piglets back,” his father told us this morning, laughing. “At least this way I know someone will return ’em to me.”

I hand the first one over.

“Slippery little sucker.” Darien laughs as he holds the squirming piglet while Elijah slathers it in Crisco. The two of them are laughing like hyenas while the rest of us watch from the bed of the truck.

“Let him go, let him go!” Elijah exclaims after he’s sufficiently covered it in grease.

None of us can breathe because we’re laughing so hard at the first little pig loose on the big field. The little guy takes off like he’s been held hostage for months instead of just for a few minutes in the back of a pickup truck.

We continue our piglet bucket brigade until the field is hopping with tiny pink porkers. I’m lowering the last one into Elijah’s waiting arms while Darien jumps back over to wipe the Crisco from his arms when we hear someone yell from the Taylor field house.

“Hey! What are you doing out there! Hey, you!” the voice calls, and we see a man running from the equipment shed toward the field.

Elijah quickly drops the last pig and hops over the fence and into the back of the pickup just as we see a camera flash go off. Bucky throws the truck into drive and takes off through the grass toward the road, Elijah holding on for dear life in the open bed of the truck.

Bucky finally pulls over about a half mile from the highway, and we let Elijah get into the back seat.