“Team meeting 2:00. Sorry for the short notice.” I had no idea what to expect when the football team captain randomly calls a team meeting on a Sunday, five hours before it is scheduled to occur. It on posted our team’s Facebook page. The comments below wondered why and where the meeting would occur. The questions of where were answered quickly, “School library.” As of the questions of why... they went unanswered. As you do when you are required to be somewhere, I got dressed and went down to the public library. I was greeted by a sea of somber faces and puffy eyes. As I entered the room, my friend pulled me aside and explained to me about what had happened. His statement hit me harder than anyone I had ever faced on the field. I felt the already heavy atmosphere in the room fall to an even lower low as the coach entered. I took a seat, and listened to what he had to say. “Gentlemen, as you probably already know, one of the Islander Family has passed away. He may not have played on the field with you, but he was the father of one of you teammates, and is part of this family. Mr. Orr passed away last night, and your teammate is hurting; and I can see on your faces that you are hurting as well. Gentlemen, this is where the strength and will of a team is tested; and where you will prove that you are a family. You must be there for each other and your teammate. Not I, nor anyone else, can tell you how you feel, but you must speak up. If you are hurting, don’t bottle it up. Let us know. We are a team, and we will help each other get through this. If you want to write something for Leland, there is some paper on the desks over there.” There was a short, painful pause. Then, as one, we all slowly got up and walked over to the desks and wrote short, heartfelt messages to our teammate.

Once we had finished, we got together. The team captain said, with a shaky voice, “Alright boys, we, the seniors are going to deliver these letters to Lee’s house. He said that he wants to see us, so if you have time, try to get over to see him at some point today. If not, try to see him on Monday. Let’s get a 1-2-3 Family, 1-2-3 Nado. Ready?” Afterwards the seniors, myself included all got into our cars and drove over to Leland’s house. I could barely focus on the road. All I could think about was how this jovial man, that I knew, was gone.

I was one of the first to arrive, greeted by a house full of women helping the tearful Mrs. Orr. “He’s having a horrible day. He’s having a really horrible da-a-a-ay.” She said as she broke into tears, just as I enter the door. All of the women there are instantly at her side consoling her and hugging her, all the while keeping back tears themselves. One of the ladies told me that Leland was upstairs in his room. I walked slowly up the stairs, taking each step deliberately, feeling the carpet beneath my socked feet. As I reached the top of the stairs I could hear him. “Nooooooooo, oooooooooooooooh. Dad. Why? Why?” He was sobbing so hard. You never really understand death until you see the reactions that those who have had death happen close to them. I had always read books speaking of the words agony and pain. Never before had I realized what those words really meant. My friends agonized sobs cut to my soul. As I entered his room, our offensive coordinator was there right next to him murmuring something in his ear. There were a few other players there, waiting respectfully for Coach to finish talking to him. As soon as Coach stood up, those of us in the room rushed to Leland’s side and began to try to console him and whisper soothing things to him.

We sat by on his bed beside him until our team captain arrived. “Lee-man, these are from us.” He said, voice cracking, as he produced our letters to him. “I’m gonna put them right here on your desk so you can look at them when you are ready.” He put the letters on the one clear spot on Leland’s cluttered desk. Then we all, one by one, hugged him and whispered our own special words of consolation into Lee’s ear before turning around and walking out. I was one of the last to leave, the three of us who left together, Michael, Frank and I, each gave Mrs. Orr a hug as we left as she attempted to say thank you to us, but was unable to around her crying. When we finally left their home, we could see that the rest of the seniors were congregating in front of the building. When we reached them, we could see that they were just standing there in a broken circle, trying to focus on something, anything, that would take the pain away. We had to be strong for Leland.

After a little while, we decided that we should probably leave, as we turned to go, Leland walked out of their ground-floor apartment. He had stopped crying for the moment, but you could see that this calm wouldn’t last for long. He took a shuddering breath and said, “I want to thank you guys so much for coming out here, it means a lot to me.” The pitch of his voice climbing with each syllable. We turned, and as one went to his side and had a big, group hug around Leland. It was then when he began to cry again. We escorted him back inside and up the stairs before leaving for good.

The last thing anyone expected was to see Leland at practice the next week, but he showed up and worked hard in practice Monday through Wednesday as we prepared for our next game. He didn’t come to school, just to practice, we were there for him. During practice we practiced as we always did, but we didn’t ignore what had happened. We treated him well and constantly made sure that he was ok and feeling alright.
Thursday brought back all of the pain of Sunday in full. It was the day of the funeral. The ceremony was done in a local church at eleven o’clock in the morning. The whole football team was released early to attend. We wore our special game jerseys, on request from Leland. We have special jerseys that we only wear on special occasions; such as homecoming, senior night, our home opener, or in this case to a funeral. We sat in our own section as a team. I recognized most of the people in attendance, and it pained me greatly to see the pain, clear on their faces. The ceremony was shorter than I thought that it would be, only one and a half hours. I felt just as shocked and pained as I had on Sunday, when I learned about his death. I couldn’t think of anything to say. We took a solemn picture with Leland, and, as we did before, we each hugged him and whispered our own special words of consolation before going back to school, to try and put on a brave face and survive rest of the day.