The instant he saw them, his body tightened.
His shoulders folded inward.
His chin dropped.
For one brief second, Cody looked less like a football player and more like an animal trying to disappear before a predator noticed it.
Brian turned back toward him.
"Hit the showers."
"But, Coach..."
"That's an order."
Cody did not move.
Brian softened his voice.
"We're done for today. Go."
Cody finally nodded.
He limped toward the locker room.
Brian watched Trent and Weston.
The two older boys stopped laughing.
Trent gave Brian an innocent little shrug.
Brian had seen that expression before.
It was the face of a kid who believed nobody could touch him.
Practice continued, but Brian's attention kept drifting toward the locker room.
He remembered another freshman from the previous year.
Marcus Lee.
Marcus had transferred suddenly after Christmas.
Rumor said he'd been jumped behind the gym.
Brian had asked Principal Gregory Wallace about it at the time.
Wallace had waved it away.
"Kids roughhouse, Brian. Don't turn everything into a federal investigation."
Marcus had never returned.
Brian had not thought about the incident in months.
Now he wondered whether he should have.
Thirty minutes later, practice ended.
Players disappeared toward the parking lot in waves of laughter and deodorant spray.
Brian stayed behind to speak with his offensive coordinator, then returned to his office.
The locker room was almost empty.
He heard a sound from the far row of lockers.
A sharp inhale.
Then a muffled curse.
Brian walked toward it.
"Cody?"
No answer.
He rounded the last bank of lockers.
Then he stopped.
Cody sat on a wooden bench with his football pants around his ankles and a pair of gray sweatpants bunched in his hands.
His right thigh was exposed.
So was part of his torso.
Brian had seen terrible football bruises.
This was different.
The boy's thigh was covered in deep purple, black, blue, and yellow discoloration.
Several injuries appeared to be days old.
Others were fresh.
Near the center of the worst bruise was a pattern.
Brian stepped closer.
He recognized it.
A crescent-shaped tread mark.
The print of a heavy boot.
Cody saw him.
His face collapsed.
He yanked desperately at his pants.
"Coach, wait."
Brian's eyes moved upward.
There were more bruises along Cody's ribs.
Small, concentrated marks.
Repeated impacts.
Someone had hit him in the same places over and over.
"Good God."
Cody pulled his shirt down.
"I'm fine."
"No, you're not."
"I fell."
Brian's voice hardened.
"You didn't fall onto a steel-toed boot five separate times."
Cody froze.
Brian crouched so they were closer to eye level.
"Who did this?"
Silence.
"Was it Trent?"
Cody looked away.
"Weston?"
Nothing.
Brian felt anger rising inside him, but he forced it down.
The last thing Cody needed was another angry adult.
"Cody, look at me."
Slowly, the boy did.
"You are not in trouble."
Cody's eyes filled.
"You understand me?"
A tear slipped down his cheek.
He wiped it immediately.
Brian continued.
"Whatever happened, you're not the one who should be ashamed."
Cody tried to laugh.
It came out as a broken breath.
"You don't understand."
"Help me understand."
For almost a minute, Cody said nothing.
Then something inside him gave way.
"They wait after seventh period."
Brian stayed silent.
"Sometimes by the loading dock. Sometimes near the boiler room."
"Who?"
"You know."
"I need you to say it."
Cody clenched his jaw.
"Trent and Weston."
Brian closed his eyes for half a second.
"How long?"
"Since September."
The answer hit harder than Brian expected.