When Sean hit puberty (or, rather, when puberty hit Sean), something discovered his face -- hair. At first he felt embarrassed, but at the same time, remembering all the steamy hours he spent behind his father in the bathroom, mock-shaving his glabrous face with an empty razor, he realized that something strange and irreversible had happened -- he'd slipped into being a man.
At length one day he decided to grow his sideburns. His father, a conservative man who scraped his face clean as a licked plate every morning, had sideburns a knuckle's width down from where the top of his ear joined his head. They had never changed. Sean had kept his the same but now he decided to experiment. He was shocked by the reaction. His mother said they looked nice, but if his father didn't like them, that didn't matter. And his father didn't like them. He did everything but threaten to cut them off himself. Sean immediately, bitterly, shaved them. The battle began. The sideburns went up and down like window blinds, depending on the moods of Sean and his father. Finally, one morning, when Sean was in his junior year in high school, he left the bathroom with hair rimming the line of his ears. His father glanced up and said nothing. Sean's heart leapt; for all appearances the battle was over. He walked out of the house like a thief with two diamonds.
At school he walked around as if he'd grown a new set of ears. Down the hall was Terry, Sean's good friend and fellow traveler in the world.
"Hey Sean!"
"Yeah?" Sean answered.
"I got that playbook from the coach." Terry reached his side. "We can practice on our own now."
"Yeah, that's good."
"I figure," Terry said, "we could drag home one of those tackling dummies and work out with that. You know, refine our fundamentals, like the coach said." Terry glanced up at Sean. "Hey, where'd you get the burns?"
"I thought I'd just grow them," Sean answered nonchalantly. "You know, just to see what they're like."
"Yeah, well, play it cool, the coach ain't gonna like that, you know. Remember Rico?" Rico was kicked off the team for having his hair show below the line of his helmet.
"Yeah, I know, but -- " He'd run out of words. He hadn't thought about the coach; he hadn't figured on that.
"Look, my old man, just like yours, rapped me across the cheeks for trying to grow mine." The class bell rang. Terry stopped, looked down his nose and said, with a connoisseur's air, "Man, are they gonna look nice. See you later." Sean slipped into homeroom just as the last bell rang.
At football practice he dressed quickly so that the coach wouldn't see the sideburns. He practiced hard. They started out with grass drills, sit-ups, jumping jacks, the usual routine. They split off into linemen and backs. Sean hustled over with the linemen, feeling oddly exuberant. The line coach waited to start West Point drills. Three offensive linemen lined up opposite three defensive linemen to work on blocking. Two tackling dummies were set about ten feet apart and all the action had to take place between the dummies. It was a fierce drill; they had to stand there and slug it out. Sean was on offense with Terry; opposite him was Paul Harkness. At the sound of the whistle, he slammed his head and right forearm into Paul's chest before Paul had a chance to get underneath him. Paul couldn't get his footing and Sean drove him back.
"Hey, Harkness," the line coach yelled, "you gonna let Riley push you back?"
For an answer Paul got back in his defensive stance. Sean got into his three-point stance. The four other guys just stood up and watched. The coach blew his whistle. Paul leaped out at Sean and slammed his right hand against Sean's helmet. Sean, thrown off balance, had to block with his left shoulder and Paul easily scraped off that. Sean waited for the coach's voice. "Hey, Riley, he skinned you there, didn't he? Once more!"
Sean was angry. He settled his cleats into the dirt, set his weight slightly back on his heels so that his arm would be freer for the forearm shiver. Electricity ran through his thighs. His breath echoed in his helmet. He watched Paul get down, badger-like, into the dirt. The coach blew the whistle. Sean shot forward, his head aimed low. His right arm, crooked for the blow, came up with the right shoulder pushing it from underneath. He heard a crack. His forearm and helmet had caught Paul under the chin; the crack had been the sound of Paul's teeth ramming together. Paul flipped onto his back and Sean was suddenly standing upright, looking down at him. Paul seemed to be choking; he had his hands around his throat. Sean ripped his own helmet off and knelt down to see what was wrong. The coach, taking his time, ambled over and took Paul's helmet off. Blood was running out the corners of Paul's mouth, and his breath rasped and bubbled. "You stuck him," said the coach, and he jabbed at his own Adam's apple. "You caught him right there." Sean looked at the coach, then at Paul, and back to the coach. Someone came up and helped Paul to his feet and off to the locker room. Sean picked up Paul's helmet and gave it to the coach. The coach looked at Sean for a moment, then shouted, "Next group!"
After the West Point drills they went to the sled and pushed it all over the field while the coach sat on it, calling signals. The sled runners dug up the ground, and the field looked like a drunken spider's web. Sean slammed into the sled pads, rolled off, hit the next one, rolled off, hit, roll, hit. His undershirt was wet, his practice jersey was jammed with mud, his cleats pinched, the thigh pads rubbed his legs raw. But the anxiousness was there. As they ran over for scrimmage, he thought briefly about Paul, then forgot him as he huddled with the team, heard the play, and ran out to the line. The seconds were playing defense, and he slammed into them hard. Once the scrimmage was over they did five 100-yard windsprints, got the sled pads, and ran in for the showers.
After Sean had knocked the dirt out of his cleats and walked, barefoot, into the locker room, he saw Paul sitting on the trainer's bench. He'd taken a shower, but his mouth still had blood on it and on the trainer's table Sean could see two of Paul's teeth. Sean suddenly felt sick and turned away. The trainer came over to him. "You smashed him good. Two teeth gone. Some others loose. Tongue cut up pretty bad. You got a damn good forearm." Sean stared at him. The trainer, hesitating when Sean said nothing in reply, shrugged his shoulders and walked back to Paul.
Sean slid out of his pants, hung them up in his locker, and began to slip his shoulder pads and jersey over his head. Someone started the water in the showers. Suddenly, just as his shoulder pads were coming off and his jersey was over his eyes, he was slammed into the open mouth of the locker. The lock catch ripped a searing ribbon of pain across his pectorals. With the shoulder pads jammed into his neck and the twisted jersey over his eyes, he was helpless. As he struggled to get out of the locker, someone kicked him and the breath went out of him. In the locker room he could hear shouts of "Cut it out!" and a lot of feet scuffling. Hands grabbed his ankles and pulled him out. His right side scraped along the bottom lip of the locker.
Once out he struggled to his knees and shoved the pads off; the scene momentarily startled him. The trainer was doubled up in the corner, and Paul was steaming down on Sean. The other guys in the locker room were either rushing for Paul or sitting to watch. Sean saw the fist coming, could even count the knuckles, but when it slashed across his eye it was only with the greatest effort could he understand he's been punched. He went blind. Paul, mouth freshly bleeding, grabbed Sam and dragged him to the shower. Sean could vaguely hear Paul mouthing something like "you bastard" but he knew that he was saying it in his own mind because Paul couldn't talk. He felt his head slammed onto the tile once, twice, and before he blacked out he saw four guys sitting on Paul, who was crying, and watched the water creep slowly up to his nose.
He knew he was in bed at home. His mother had just left the room. He thought his eyes were open but it was dark so either he was blind or the light was out. He could accept that. He could accept anything about now. He reached up to feel his eyes. His left one was swollen shut but the right one was okay. There was a large grapefruit on the back of his head. He felt as if two furrows had been plowed out of his chest and side. There was too much to think about. In the fog before sleep closed him up, Sean suddenly remembered standing before the coach with his helmet off. He lifted his hand and let it drag over the right side of his face. The morning's harvest of stubble was there, all right, but he could touch the sideburn as well. He smiled and drifted off to sleep.
It was two days before Sean got out of bed. The doctor had come to see him and said that he didn't think Sean had a concussion and to keep ice packs on the left eye. His mother bustled in with caravans of chicken soup, TV, ice cream, admonitions, concerns. His father was stolid. He'd found out the story from the coach and seemed glad that Paul, not Sean, had started the fight. The coach assured him that Paul would be thrown off the team and that Sean would be reinstated. That was his father's concern: that Sean had not started the fight. No one mentioned the sideburns.
It was Sunday when Sean got out of bed. He ran his hand across his face and felt with stale satisfaction the stubble there. He shuffled into the bathroom and, standing defiantly before the mirror, looked at himself. His left eye was a purple golf ball stuck on his face. He gazed harder at the mirror. The face seemed older to him with the stubble. He opened up the medicine cabinet, took down the razor and shaving cream, and turned on the water. The steam from the hot water made his eye feel better. He washed his face, then lathered up. He shaved slowly, taking care to clean the razor after each pass. Finally there was a bar of cream from the bottoms of his ears down. He slowly brought the razor up and, carefully, shaved the remaining hair so that not only did his sideburns go below his ear but they curved back under the lobes to a point. He peered at them. One swift stroke would lead him back to his father's grace. One stroke would get him out of trouble with the coach. He put the razor down, put the cap on the shaving cream, and placed them back into the cabinet. He went to his room and slept.
Monday morning at the breakfast table he calmly sat in his place and began to eat the cereal in front of him. His mother, coming from the kitchen, saw the sideburns. A small frown escaped over her face, which she quickly trapped. She looked at Sean, then over to his father, who was reading the paper, and sighed. Sean's father looked up at Sean to say good morning, and his mouth abruptly pursed tight. "Go upstairs and shave them off before you leave." He went back to his paper. His mother urged him with her eyes. He sat there. "Sean, I told you to go and shave. They look ridiculous." Sean just sat there. His father got up and threw his paper on the table. "I have to leave. If those aren't off by the time I get home, expect to lose some of your privileges around here." He pecked his wife goodbye and left the room.
Once he was out the door Sean's mother turned to him and said he should do it, just to keep peace in the family. Sean said nothing but thank you for the breakfast, kissed her on the forehead, and left for school.
At school people crowded around him and had two things to say -- Paul was a jerk for sucker punching him and the sideburns were cool. Terry, who helped him out for the day with special permission from the principal, shook his head and said they were outrageous but that nobody was going to let him keep them.
"What the kids think doesn't matter," he said while they shuffled through the lunchline.
"So?" Sean said. They found a place near the windows that hadn't been too messed up by the lunch shift before. The tables were greasy.
"So? We don't matter. You could walk into this school with your name carved on your forehead and someone would think it's cool. No one in this school's got any taste." He tore a mouthful out of his hamburger. "Look at Dawn over there." Sean turned his head carefully. Dawn was a "fuzzy-headed chick" as she called herself. She dabbled in astrology and ate nothing but wheat germ and yogurt and was as skinny as a chalk line. The school had tried to talk to her mother about her but Dawn's mother was either drinking or recovering. "What a burn-out. Her head is so far screwed on wrong that she'll be lucky to survive a strong wind. But she's cool, man. And there's Dino and that group, the dopers. A bunch of space cadets. They're not quite sure what planet they're on. And then there's us, the jocks, who'll kill to get status. And all the in-betweens. Nobody knows about anybody and nobody cares."
"What's your complaint? I'm just growing my sideburns." Sean smiled.
Terry looked at him. "I know you're not a dumb fuck, Sean. I know that. You know what the coach'll do if you don't shave those off. You know how crazy he is about hair. Remember Rico?"
"The coach is crazy. The nerves to his ass got re-routed to his brain."
"We all know that. But you know what you're doing with those sideburns?"
"Yeah."
Terry stared at him. "Yeah, you do. Well, it was nice playing with you." He stared down in disgust. "My lunch is cold."
Sean calmly finished eating his, letting his smile linger over his lips. The bell rang for class. Terry slid his tray to the end of the table, got up, and walked toward the conveyer belt to deposit his tray. Sean followed. Together they walked out of the cafeteria.
Throughout the whole day Sean went through classes with a dogged smile on his face. He was on automatic. Several of his teachers mentioned his sideburns, but Sean smiled on them and slowly moved on. Terry walked apprehensively beside him, wanting him to cool it but at the same time bowing to the strong hand of his friend. After the last class Terry threw his books into his locker, grabbed his laundry bag with this football stuff in it, slammed the locker shut, and started off for practice.
"Well," said Terry, "you comin'?"
"Yeah."
"You sure?"
"Yeah."
Terry shuffled his feet. "Well, let's go."
"Just a minute."
"C'mon!"
Sean paused, then said, "All right, let's go."
They stalked down the hall toward the gym. They collected other people on their way. Sean was the only one without a laundry bag. He walked with his hands in his pockets, his chin up, his eyes sparkling.
They entered the locker room and Terry and the rest began the routine of undressing and priming themselves. The coach was off in the staff locker room getting dressed. The room looked slightly askew through his one eye; everything was pleasantly out of focus. He saw the coach walk out, his grey legs and black track shoes and blue windbreaker slightly stretched out like an El Greco painting he'd seen one time. He walked over to Sean, grabbed his chin, and, moving Sean's head from side to side, looked at the sideburns. Sean didn't put up any resistance.
"Your father called me," the coach said. A shot of bile crawled up Sean's throat.
"Yes?"
"You know if you don't cut them off you'll be off the team. You know my policy about hair."
"Yes, coach, we all know your policy about hair." The coach's eyes narrowed when he heard the emphasis. "I know your policy. If I have these," he said, pointing to his face, "I guess I won't be able to hurt people like I hurt Paul." His insides were as cold as dry ice. He was beginning to shiver. "Coach," he said, articulating each word, "I'm the same ballplayer I was Friday."
"No, you're not. You don't care about this team at all." He turned to leave. "You're off it now until you cut them. And don't expect your place to be open when you get back."
"Coach!" Sean shouted. He was almost quivering out of control now. "I won't cut them! You can take your stinking rules and shove 'em!" Terry moved over and embraced him from behind. "Coach," Terry said, "please get out."
The coach leaned toward Sean. "Your father will hear about this, Sean, and Terry," he smiled sarcastically, "you can let him go."
Sean strained against Terry's grip. "Coach," Terry said plaintively.
The coach turned and left.
Terry let Sean go. The other guys turned to finish dressing. Suddenly Sean found himself alone. He moved out of the locker room and down the hall. His insides were jelly but his hands were calm and dry.
When Sean's father got home that evening the sideburns were still where Sean had left them. He was sitting in the window seat of the living room. He heard the front door shut, the sluff-sluff of his mother's feet as she walked (as she always did) down the hall to meet him, the hall closet open, the hangers rattle, the door shut, and crunch of the evening paper as it was shoved under his arm. The ritual had begun. His father came into the living room and, loosening his tie, sank into the sofa. Sean continued to stare out the window, the grey of the dusk like a salve on his tired eye.
"I talked to the coach today," his father began.
"Yeah?" He remembered at the last instant that his father hated yeah. "Yes?"
"He told me you abused him the locker room." Sean kept his eye on the window and said nothing.
"Is that true?"
"It all depends." He tried to buy time.
"On what?" The smallest hint of impatience in the voice.
"On what you mean by abused." He knew this would irritate his father but he couldn't help fighting to get out of the corner.
"Let's not play games, Sean." The formality of the sentence was a clue -- his father meant business and business usually meant punishment. "I want the truth."
"The coach said you called him about -- about my sideburns."
"I did."
"Well, he threatened -- he threw me off the team. So I told him what he could do with his rules."
His father pressed the advantage.
"The coach, as he told me, did not say you said it so politely. What was it you said?"
He knew his father's eyes were riveted on him, his gaze laced with punishment. He was in a trap. His father asked for the truth yet would be offended by it. That would mean a harder coming-down on him. But what did he have to lose? These adults had already sentenced him; truth was secondary.
"I told him he could take his rules and shove them." He enunciated each word. There was a silence from the couch. He didn't know whether his father was amused, which was unlikely, or so angry he couldn't speak. He waited. The sky outside had closed up shop. His eye rested on cold black glass.
"Well," his father said after a while. It had the resigned tone of an unpleasant but true discovery. "I don't understand your behavior at all. The coach is a good man and is working hard, has worked hard for years, to put a good team up. His rules are not arbitrary. He's not out to hurt you." He paused; Sean waited. "What I can't understand is why. Your mother and I have tried to give you a good life, with love and protection -- "
"Yes, I know, Dad, but -- "
"But what?"
"But -- " And even though it was the truth, Sean knew it would sound whiny and self-centered when it came out. "I could never really talk. I mean -- "
"We're talking now, aren't we?"
"You're talking. Not me." He fell silent, exhausted with the effort.
"Well, you've ruined your chance for college."
"I have not. My grades are still good. I don't need to play ball."
"It won't look good on the record."
"I don't care!" He'd never raised his voice to his father and now, after the quick silence of his words, he was scared and thrilled by the act. There was an immediate desire to apologize but he squelched it. He waited for his father.
"Well, Sean, you should care. This sort of thing will snowball. You'll surely lose the respect of your teachers and the principal. That's vital. And all for what? For two strips of hair? I must admit I don't understand."
His father's tone had changed, to a sort of bewildered defeat. Sean wasn't fooled by it. This was only the first round in a battle where his father would dog him and wear him down without ever challenging him directly. That is what made his father so hard to feel for. He was conniving out of love, deceitful out of affection. The fatigue had hollowed his bones. He turned to look at his father.
The room looked thin. His father was paler, skinnier, more dried-up than he ever remembered. He knew it was his eye that was playing the trick but everything looked stretched-out and two-dimensional.
"I want you to shave them off."
"It's my hair."
"Not while you're in this house."
"Then I'll leave."
"Go."
Sean knew it was stupid to go on. His father had him. He knew he'd apologize to the coach, knew he'd shave his sideburns, knew he'd feel humble.
"Stay or go?"
Sean didn't answer.
"You'll apologize to the coach, tomorrow. And tonight you'll shave those ridiculous sideburns off." His father rose, looking for sass. There was none. He left the room, evening paper tucked under arm.
Sean dragged himself upstairs. He could hear his parents talking in the dining room, the soft pliable murmur of his mother bending against the sullen breeze of his father. In the bathroom he carelessly opened the cabinet and took out the shaving cream and razor. As he lathered up he peered at himself squarely in the mirror. The lump was going down. The next day's stubble was already up. Taking the razor, his one eye staring at himself, he raised it and said, "Here's one for you, Paul. I hope I always kill you." Then, with a quick stroke, he attacked his face.