Jon and Biff were the first to arrive at the park and were able to stake out a section of the grassy area as a football field. Jon's mom joined shortly thereafter, followed by a slow trickle of what eventually became a dozen or so teenagers, plus Linda.
It was sort of amazing how Biff commanded the group. He'd say something, and everyone would just agree that it made sense. Now that Jon appeared to be in Biff's "in-group," he could appreciate the Mariana Trench that was the depths of Biff's charisma. When Biff said "me and the new girl are captains," nobody argued. When the "new girl" picked Jon as her first teammate, the other boys snickered until Biff shut them up. When Jon was immediately hit by a hard tackle on the very first play, it was Biff who took control. "Give him room to breathe. Can you get up or do you need help? Dougherty, that was a dirty play. You're sidelined for as long as Jon is."
And there wasn't any argument. Biff and Linda each took one of Jon's arms and lead him to the side of the field, and Ellis Dougherty walked himself to the other side without any argument, accepting the punishment that Biff had doled out.
Jon was almost thankful for this turn of events. Even after he managed to catch his breath, his ribs were still sore, but he was pretty sure nothing was broken and he didn't really want to play in this game in the first place. He wasn't sure he even wanted to watch it, but he wasn't sure he wanted to leave his mom alone with Biff.
On the very next play, it looked like Linda, taking advantage of her recently-gained forearm strength to play quarterback, wasn't going to have a chance to get the ball off before getting sacked: the boys around her were too tall for her to see who was open. But a moment later the ball released, and found its man just a few yards before the endzone, and he was able to run it in for a touchdown.
Jon's ribs seemed to throb even harder in that moment. As the players repositioned themselves for Biff's team to take offense, Biff walked over to give Linda a congratulatory high-five. Jon had thought he'd seen something shift, but with the two of them standing side-by-side it became crystal clear: Biff and Linda were now the same height.
