A few weeks go by and everything has been going great, we're undefeated, I'm playing like I haven't missed a beat, school is still boring though, and Nicole stopped talking to me but not a total loss. This week coming up is the homecoming game, they're having a pep rally at school that day and they told me I'm going to have to participate in a competition against other fall sports, they didn't tell me what it was though. I walk into the gym to get ready for the pep rally when a short blonde girl comes to me.
"Hey!! You're Jay right?"
"Yeah I am"
"Cool, I'm Samantha the head of the ASB, I heard you're the one that's going to be participating for the football team"
"Oh yeah, what are we doing though?"
"Oh you'll be competing in karaoke competition"
"You said what?!?"
"Don't worry you'll be fine"
"Greaaat thanks Samantha.."
I snap three times quickly and Buddy appears
"I already know Jay"
"What do you know?"
"You want me to give you a good singing voice but why it's just a fun little pep rally thing"
"I'm thinking ahead, hear me out"
"I'm listening"
"Everyone is going to be recording, they're going to expect me to sing terribly but when I surprise them with a good voice everyone will go crazy, people post about it and more people see it, the more people see it then the more eyes I get on my football tape, the more eyes I get on that.."
Buddy interrupts
"The more likely you'll get college recruits to look at you"
"Exactly! So what do you say?"
"Voice of an angel coming right up"
Buddy then disappears and time goes on, fifteen minutes later the pep rally starts and I'm sitting with my team on the gym floor waiting for the karaoke part. Samantha runs up and grabs the microphone and announces the game and calls us up, she tells us the songs will be chosen at random for us to sing. She has me go last which is perfect to surprise everyone. After a few people go it's finally my turn, we look at the screen as a randomizer wheel spins for a song, it comes to a slow stop and Samantha announces the song.
"Jay you will be singing…. Love by Keyshia Cole!!"
I think to myself
"Ain't no fucking way… well hope buddy came through"
The song starts playing and I get ready, the lyrics come up on the screen and I open my mouth, I hear my voice and think to myself
"Holy shit he fucking did it!"
Everyone is the crowd starts going crazy and my teammates are jumping up and down cheering me on. The song ends and I look around as the crowd goes wild with cheering. Samantha runs up
"We clearly have a winner, representing the football team, Jay!!"
The pep rally ends soon after and then lunch starts, I'm with some of my teammates when one of them speaks up
"Yooo Jay you're lowkey getting alot of views from your singing"
"Oh yeah that's crazy"
Then Sean calls out, with a different tone in his voice
"Hey… ummm some of the players from Washington high school are posting about you"
"What are they saying"
He looks at me with a concerned face
"One posts says 'this is the guy that's supposed to beat us tonight?' With laughing emojis"
"That ain't too bad"
"It gets worse. 'Well at least he has something to fall back on after we end his career tonight'"
I laugh
"Oh man these guys are hilarious, they haven't even won a game this season and got blown out every week, at this point they're just looking for some attention… maybe I should give it to them"
"What are you going to say?"
"Nothing too serious, just a little something"
I get on my phone and respond back to the posts with a short message
"I posted it"
Sean read it out loud
"See you tonight with a smiling devil emoji… that's it?"
"That's all I need to say, they'll see tonight"
All my teammates look at me with a smile and a laugh and one of them speaks out
"I see that look in his eye… yeah Washington done fucked up"
Lunch ends and I go back to class for the rest of the day, thinking of the game later tonight. It's the homecoming game so there's going to be a lot of people there, maybe it's time for my coming out party and to really put my name out there after this back and forth on social media.