Chapter 33: Monst’s Charge

Chapter update is here.

Find a quiet spot, turn the page, and let’s see what this story has been hiding 🌙

✦

Culver City’s return man was not tall, but he was built low and dense, all shoulders and drive. When he lowered his head, the collision had weight behind it.

The Normans’ coverage unit closed around him, trying to build a wall.

He broke the wall.

Two defenders grabbed cloth and shoulder pads. He dragged them anyway. From the sideline, Nolan saw Monte go down and slide almost five yards before his gloves lost their grip.

The coverage lane collapsed. The returner burst free, and no one caught him before he crossed the goal line.

Nolan watched his back.

Number 24.

Monst.

The name sounded like monster, and he looked the part.

Culver City did not send out the kicker.

They lined up for two.

The snap came short. The quarterback turned and put the ball straight into Monst’s chest. Blockers surged in front of him, and the running back carried a defender across the line as if the man were part of the uniform.

"Conversion good!" the home announcer shouted. "That is power football."

Culver City led 8-0.

A plastic bottle bounced near Nolan’s feet.

"Go back to Hollywood!"

The home crowd was welcoming him in its own way.

Nolan ignored them. Thomas was already ripping into the coverage unit and changing the tackling emphasis for the next series.

"Culver City is already playing without its starting quarterback," Ford said, nodding toward the opposite sideline. "He went down last week. Without him, everything runs through Monst."

"I remember that guy," Ford muttered from the sideline. "He was not built like that last year. What did he eat, concrete?"

As a running back, Ford understood the problem before anyone explained it. Monst’s contact balance could punish them all night.

"Looks like he found something stronger than breakfast," Ford added under his breath.

"Whatever he found," Nolan said, fastening his chin strap, "we still have to win."

He had money on this game. Losing meant bleeding.

The return gave BHHS the ball at its own thirty-five.

Nolan jogged onto the field and looked to the sideline. Thomas sent in the call by signal and wristband number.

Shotgun first. Test the depth of their defense.

The center snapped long. Nolan saw the tight end release up the seam, but two defenders were already leaning that way. A third shaded toward the route, hunting for an interception.

Nolan did not step back.

He threw from the spot.

The ball did not dip. It cut over the line, passed the midfield stripe, and kept traveling beyond the defenders who had read the first look too eagerly.

Flea had already found the open grass.

He caught it in stride, jabbed outside, made the corner miss, and sprinted until a safety dragged him down at the Culver City fifteen.

The end zone was close enough to smell.

"That scared me half to death," Katherine said in the stands, then immediately began explaining the route to Mia and Lisa.

"So the next play can score?" Mia asked.

"It should."

"Nolan’s arm is ridiculous," Lisa said.

Her attention had landed somewhere else entirely.

On the next snap, Nolan lifted the ball as if he were throwing again. Culver City’s secondary, already burned once, drifted toward the receiver in the back of the end zone.

Nolan handed the ball to Ford.

Ford bent around the other side, launched himself through contact, and landed in the end zone with very little dignity and six very real points.

"I have no doubt we are winning this," Ford said when he slapped Nolan’s hand.

The players knew what the crowd did not. After a week of practice, Nolan’s arm no longer felt like a surprise to them. He could throw deep without a dramatic windup. He could change angles like a magician. He could put a ball in places high school quarterbacks were not supposed to see.

In Ford’s private opinion, Nolan was already the best high school quarterback in California.

Mark started toward the field for the extra point.

"No," Nolan said, looking to the sideline. "We go for two and tie it."

Thomas stared at him.

"They do not know me yet," Nolan said.

After a short pause, Thomas gave the signal.

Trust.

From the two-yard line, Nolan took the snap and held the ball. His primary targets were covered. The secondary routes were tangled. A conversion was one play only. There was no second chance.

Two linebackers closed.

Nolan stayed calm.

He used the same little outside fake Flea had used on the long catch, shifted laterally, slipped between two bodies, and bought half a second.

Matic had worked back across the end zone.

Nolan fired.

Matic jumped, caught the ball at its highest point, and landed with both feet in.

"Good!" Thomas punched the air.

8-8.

The defense returned with a new obsession: every body near Monst, every lane squeezed before it opened. Culver City’s offense had lost its starting quarterback, and the rest of the unit did not belong in the same tier as their star return man.

Once Monst slowed, the Centaurs slowed with him.

By halftime, BHHS led by ten.

In the third quarter, Nolan opened the field. Deep balls, seam throws, quick changes, pressure escapes. Monst still flashed for Culver City, but a running back could be crowded. A quarterback who could throw and move was harder to cage.

If the Centaurs committed extra bodies to Nolan, someone else came free.

By the middle of the fourth quarter, the lead had reached twenty-one.

Before the next Normans drive, Thomas used his final timeout.

"Score here," he told Nolan, "and if we add two, this is over. They have no timeouts. High school quarters are twelve minutes, not fifteen. With the play clock, they won’t have enough possessions left."

Nolan nodded, but his mind was on Monst.

He had spent the entire game watching the details: foot rhythm, shoulder turn, how Monst twisted out of contact, how he protected the ball with one arm while still driving through a tackle. The forward surge was almost ugly. That was why it worked.

It was not elegant.

It was useful.

Nolan returned to the huddle and called Diamond.

The formation suggested pass, misdirection, and options out of the backfield.

When the ball was snapped, he did not throw.

He ran.

Thomas nearly swallowed his whistle.

"Are you out of your mind?"

Nolan could not hear him.

Across the field, Culver City’s coach saw the same thing and felt a sudden flash of hope. The BHHS quarterback had gotten arrogant. This was how comebacks started.

Nolan hit the wall of bodies.

For a moment, the ball vanished.

Then a player in orange and black twisted out of the pile with the ball clamped in one arm, shoulders low, legs still churning.

Number 88.

Culver City’s coach froze.

The posture was not similar to Monst’s.

It was identical.

Nolan powered through the last defender and fell across the goal line.

Thomas stared.

Impossible.

The two-point try should have corrected the illusion.

Instead, Nolan took the ball again, lowered his pads, and drove into the end zone through contact.

One time could be luck.

Twice meant something else.

From the sideline, Nolan had watched Culver City’s best weapon and stolen the shape of it.

✦

✦

✦

Ready for more?

The next Chapters are already waiting on my Patreon, along with early access, previews, and extra story updates 🗝️

/cw/TheBacklotFanfiction