The Tailgate Read Online Free PDF

returner for Harvard was tackled on the twenty-five-yard line, and the crowd sat down.
    Clen turned to Dabney. “Do you want anything?”
    She said, “Nope, I’m good.”
    He fidgeted in his seat. For all his enthusiasm about the game, Clen didn’t really like to watch football, or any other sport. Dabney was much better at it. She had been the head of the Pep Squad at Nantucket High School and the editor of the yearbook, she had played tennis and sailed at the Nantucket Yacht Club, and she had surfed every beach on Nantucket that could possibly be surfed. She had fished for stripers off the tip of Great Point, and she had hunted for ducks on Tuckernuck with her father. She had written her college essay about the duck hunting, actually, tying it into her relationship with her father, which was important and special since her mother had left when Dabney was eight years old.
    Abandoned her.
    Half the crowd was cheering, the red half. Harvard’s quarterback, Blood Dellman, had completed a seventeen-yard pass for the first down. Dabney bowed her head. Something was still off. Why this gnawing sense of insecurity? Why did she feel the need to mentally list all of her accomplishments and reassure herself of her own value? And why, at this particular moment, when she and Clen were finally together, did the memory of her mother leaving have to steal in—the one thing certain to make her feel worthless?Goddamn it—tears were now blurring her eyes. This was ridiculous and uncalled-for. Dabney did not do drama. Along with Most Popular, Smartest Girl, and Most School Spirit, Dabney had been voted Most Comfortable in Her Skin on the senior class superlative page.
    Dabney raised her head in time to see Jocelyn leave the stadium. She didn’t look at Clen or Dabney. Her eyes stayed forward, her chin raised, her camel-colored cashmere wrap flowing off her like cool water. Dabney gazed at the empty seat Jocelyn had left behind with the kind of relief one felt upon having an aching tooth pulled.
    A minute later, Clen stood. “I have to go to the john,” he said. “And I might get a Coke. Do you want one?”
    Dabney stood. “Yes,” she said. “I’ll go with you.”
    â€œYou stay here, please, and enjoy the game,” he said. “Protect our seats. I’ll get you a Coke. Anything else?”
    â€œNo,” she said. She sank down into her seat. She thought, He’s going out there to see Jocelyn. To smoke a cigarette with Jocelyn. He smoked cigarettes now. It was no big deal, except he hadn’t told Dabney, and he told her everything. Or he used to. Probably he was ashamed about it. But Dabney understood that he was under a lot of pressure with the newspaper, and pressure led people to smoke.
    Dabney watched Clen head up the concrete steps, out of the stadium. She redirected her attention to the game, but she could only focus long enough to watch Blood Dellman—whose given name was William Youngblood Dellman, a young aristocrat just like everyone else—throw an interception, which the Yale cornerback returned for a touchdown.
    The blue half of the stadium was keening.
    Advantage Yale.
    Suddenly, Dabney heard her name being called, and she saw Mallory and Jason picking their way across rows of people— sorry, ’scuse me —toward her. Jason took Clen’s empty seat and Mallory took the empty seat next to him.
    â€œWe found you!” Jason said. He seemed ecstatic about this fact, as though their plan all along had been to meet up, but Dabney knew this had not been their plan. “Where’s the big guy?”
    â€œI don’t know,” Dabney said. “He went to get a Coke or something, I guess.”
    They all watched Yale kick the extra point.
    â€œThis sucks,” Jason said. He stood up, cupped his hands around his mouth and yelled, “Come on, Harvard, you pussies!”
    Dabney looked past Jason at Mallory.