Playing another day

By Jim Sacco

Published: August 15, 2008

STUARTS DRAFT — Looking like a 10-year-old confined to the yard while everybody else plays just out of reach, Buffalo Gap quarterback Ryan Sheridan rocked his body back and forth as he leaned against the chain-link fence.
In front of him, his fellow Bison ran real-time plays against Stuarts Draft. It’s tough, the senior says. “But if I’m not playing, I’m here cheering them on.”
Don’t worry, Buffalo Gap faithful, Sheridan expects to be back on the field in no time. A week or two, he says the doctors told him.
Sure the Bison are lucky to be getting him back. Sheridan, his gray hoodie pulled over his head, hands buried in the pockets of his jeans, is lucky to be walking.
Lucky to be talking.
Let’s be honest here — he’s lucky to be alive.
On Tuesday, he was driving his dad’s 1999 Toyota Tacoma after practice. He overcorrected on the road and slammed into a concrete mailbox. The truck flipped and Sheridan, looking sullenly at the ground, admits he wasn’t wearing his seatbelt.
That explains why he was ejected from the truck, sailed 70 feet into the air and was in a ditch for close to 40 minutes before he was found.
His father, Larry, knows what could have been.
That explains why he was rubbing his son’s shoulder as the defending Group A, Division I champs continued to run plays on the field.
That explains why Larry smiles every time Ryan talks.
That explains why everybody dressed in gold, black or some other form of “Bison Pride” gear stops as they walk past Ryan, asks him how he’s doing and tells him to “Stay strong” or “Keep your head up” or “Hurry back.”
“They were talking about surgery,” Larry says, recalling Tuesday night at University of Virginia Medical Center. Ryan, his 18-year-old son, lying in a hospital bed looking nothing like himself. Instead, all Ryan has are a few small fractures and a new outlook on things.
“Look, you can see his head’s a little off,” Larry says, pulling Ryan’s hood down and turning his head to the right. There aren’t many cuts visible, but a bruise the size of a silver dollar puffs out from behind his left ear. Swollen, replete with a sickly mixture of purple, black and yellow hues.
“When I was walking through town, people were saying, ‘I heard Ryan’s in a body cast,’ ” Larry says.
That’s a small town for you — somebody gets the sniffles in Churchville and the next thing you know, folks are saying they’re on their deathbed. But Larry reassured everybody.
“I told them he’s here, he’s walking.”
And grateful.
They didn’t keep time at Friday’s scrimmage. They didn’t keep score. Each team ran a set number of plays. You had to look at a calendar to figure out it was a scrimmage with the number of fans sitting on either side of the field. They cheered. They hemmed and hawed at penalties and went crazy when Pickle Nuckols proved that he hasn’t lost a step despite being a senior.
All the while, Ryan Sheridan watched and wished he was out there.
“I’m blessed,” he says. “Someone was looking out for me.”
Dad answers by simply pointing to the sky.
That explains the smile on the Sheridans’ faces.
That explains everything.