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Unless

Unless Coach Andreas the one who sent theination run aith me Best to take myself and my box to Coach Andrews’s office and see if there’s actually anything to this crazy idea ofup scenarios in which Steven Andrews is a Svengali with the ability to convince late-adolescent boys to do his s…

Maybe in Division I schools, where the basketball coach is second only to God--even more important than the university president--would souard his privacy As it is, there’s just a snarky student worker sitting in the outer part of the Athletic Office, reading a battered copy of The Fountainhead

"Hey," I say to him "Coach Andrews around?"

The kid doesn’t even look up from his book, just jerks a thumb in the direction of an open door

"In there," he says

I thank hih which I see Steven Andrews sitting at a desk covered hat looks like playbooks He’s got his head in his hands, and is staring dejectedly down at a piece of paper with a number of X’s and O’s on it He looks, for all the world, like Napoleon planning a battle

Or ured out hoork the Housing Department computer system

"Um, Coach Andrews?" I say

He looks up "Yes?" Then, as I pull my hat off and all of my hair tumbles down in a staticky nizemyself into the chair across fro out that the office furniture in the Winer Sports Coe vinyl couches here, no sirree Everything is black leather and chro Coach Andrews makes more than twenty-three thousand five hundred a year, too

Although he doesn’t get all the free Dove Bars he can eat Probably

"Right," he says "Sorry Heather You work over in Fischer Hall"

"Right," I say "Where Lindsay lived"

I watch his reaction to the name Lindsay carefully

But there is no reaction He doesn’t flinch or go pale He just looks questioning "Uh-huh?"

Man This is one tough nut to crack

"Yes," I say "I was just wondering…did anybody clean out her locker?"

Now Coach Andrews looks confused "Her locker?"