A Remarkable Band of Brothers
*This article orginally appeared in the Tallahassee Democrat on October 2, 2011. It was written by Jim Lamar.
Once-neglected youths unite as family under care of coach Wayne Longley at Boys Town
As the football spun through the air end over end, every player and coach on the Godby High sideline watched in silence.
If they could have summoned up a tailwind or suddenly moved the goalposts closer, they would have. If their prayers could have actually pushed that ball through the uprights, they were willing to find out.
Most of them had no idea what this field goal meant to their teammate. They had no idea the history Tryton Johnson was kicking away that night.
They knew part of the story, but not all.
They remembered back in May when the little short kid with the funny first name first tried to win the job as Godby's starting kicker. They remembered laughing at how his attempts at kicking ended with the ball bruising his teammates' butts. Tryton couldn't even kick the ball over the heads of his blockers, so they remembered wondering how he would ever make a kick in practice, much less in a game.
And they remembered seeing another teammate who always seemed to be around Tryton.
They remembered how Terell Clark would make a special effort to put his arm around Tryton and lift his spirits. They remembered noticing how the 5-foot-8 white kicker and the 6-foot-3 black linebacker shared a special bond — a bond that only brothers truly understand.
They knew that Tryton and Terell were friends, that they dressed in identical clothes most every day and that they rode to school together in a van driven by one of their assistant coaches. And if they knew what the Boys Town logo on the van represented, they did not make much of an effort to ask questions.
All they knew that night as they watched that ball spin through the air was that this was a key moment in their game against the rival Leon Lions.
So they all watched in silence, praying for a miracle, as that football sailed 38 yards, hit the crossbar and bounced straight up in the air.
The ball wobbled above the crossbar in slow-motion, or so it seemed. It hung in the air so long that it froze everyone on the Godby sideline in anticipation.
It stayed in the air just long enough for the story of Tryton Johnson and Terell Clark and their remarkable family to come into a much clearer focus.
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Terell Clark has no idea how old he was when they took him. He was taken to a local McDonald's restaurant with his older brother and younger sister. He thinks he was 6 or 7 years old, but he can't say with certainty.
It was his mother's birthday, he remembers that much. His mom was crying.
And he remembers sitting in that McDonald's for hours with the strangers who told him he could no longer live with his mother. They made phone call after phone call trying to find a home for Terell, his brother and sister.
The phone calls opened a door at a foster home — the first of seven homes Terell has lived in the last 10 years. It was at one of those homes where he finally learned why he was removed from his mother's custody.
"They said it was because she couldn't keep the lights on or put food on the table," Terell said. "They said something about drugs, but I didn't believe that. I knew she drank, or whatever. But drugs — I didn't believe them."
Terell shows no emotion when he talks about that day or any others from his childhood years. Perhaps it is because he simply does not want to share many details. Perhaps he has forgotten so much of it.
But he does remember his father. And Terell remembers what he believes is the last time he slept under the same roof with his mother, father and two siblings. It was in a car. That was their home at the time.
"I remember one time having to eat out of a garbage can," Terell said, staring at the floor as he spoke. "It was pizza. We found a pizza box that still had some left in it."
Terell's father went away after that. To jail, Terell thinks. But he is not certain.
Terell's story gets confusing at this point. He remembers living at certain foster homes and he remembers some of the troubles that forced him to move to other homes, but he struggles re-creating a timeline of his life.
That's understandable, of course.
With an absentee father and a mother who was apparently wandering the streets, Terell had no stability in his life. He and his brother and sister stayed together at various foster homes and group homes all over Tallahassee until they were finally separated more than two years ago.
Terell says his brother is now in Orlando. "I think he's going to a four-year college," Terell said, but he does not know the name of the school.
Terell and his sister were placed in separate houses on the Boys Town campus. The 10-acre campus on Tallahassee's west side has five family homes for neglected, abandoned or troubled children.
Terell, now 16, lives in one of those houses — a spacious three-bedroom home at the top of the hill overlooking the entire campus. It's the house where Terell has found a new mother and a new father who treat him like their own. It's the house where his awards and accomplishments are proudly displayed in frames in the family dining room and above the mantle over the fireplace.
It's the house where Terell and Tryton first met. It's the house where a kid named Shawn Morancy entered their lives.
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Though Tryton Johnson remembers a few more details about his childhood than Terell, he also struggles creating a timeline.
He remembers sitting on his father's lap at their home in Tacoma, Wash. They cheered as they watched "Stone Cold" Steve Austin wrestle on television.
That memory, an old photograph from a birthday party and a Harley-Davidson bandana is about all Tryton has left to remind him of his father. His dad was killed when Tryton was 4 or 5 years old.
Tryton's next memory is of Wisconsin, where his mother moved him and his three brothers around the time of his father's death.
He does not know much about his family tree, but he does know that each of his brothers has a different father. He remains close to one of them and has connected on Facebook with another. The third one is in jail.
Tryton remembers brief scenes from his childhood more than anything else.
He remembers a best friend in Wisconsin who used to invite Tryton to vacation at a lake home with his family. He remembers his mother struggling to pay rent and constantly moving the family to avoid evictions. Four or five times in a six-year span, Tryton said he changed addresses.
He remembers sleeping in a car one winter in Wisconsin. How many nights, he can't recall. But he knows it was cold.
He remembers being told that the family's next move was to either Arizona or Florida. His mom thought they could make a fresh start in a warmer climate, and Tryton said his mother sent his oldest brother to Arizona two weeks before the big move.
Tryton remembers hearing his mother tell his brother to get some money together to help with the fresh start.
"She told him to rob a bank," Tryton said. "And he did."
Tryton and the brother closest in age to him moved with their mother to Palm Beach County after that. They lived in a run-down trailer for a while and the two brothers began panhandling. Most of the time, the money was used for food.
Most of the time.
"When I think about this, it makes me sad," Tryton said. He looks at the ceiling as he speaks. His eyes begin to water.
"We did panhandling and I remember I had money," Tryton said. "I remember my mom said, 'I need a beer.'
"I said, 'I'm not giving you this money to buy beer.' But she got the money. She always got the money. And I would get so upset. I would cry in the store when she bought the beer."
The money spent on beer meant the rent did not get paid. So after they were evicted from the trailer, they slept under a palmetto tree.
"There were four of us sleeping under it," Tryton said. "If it was raining, we put plastic there to block the rain. But me and my brother slept on the outside and my mom and her boyfriend slept on the inside. And the rain would roll down right on top of us."
Tryton was 11 when "some lady from DCF" found him and his brother. She picked them up, asked some questions and dialed the phone.
"I remember she called my mom and said, 'You have 10 minutes to see your kids before they are gone,'" Tryton said. His eyes begin to water again. "She wasn't able to make it. Well, she didn't come to see us."
Tryton was sent to a shelter in Palm Beach County. He said his brother was sent to Miami. They spent eight days apart before being moved to Tallahassee.
"They told us that Boys Town was the only place we could live together," Tryton said.
That was five years ago.
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Shawn Morancy has no memory of his father. He remembers seeing his mother just once, when she visited from New Jersey a year or so ago.
Shawn learned how he ended up in foster care about seven or eight years ago. It's a story he is not sure he wants to share.
The pain from that story has haunted him for years. It's been the source of so much anger and confusion and rage that he knows exactly how people have viewed him for most of his life.
"I was a bad kid," Shawn said without offering any details.
He knows why he carries the anger. He knows his challenge is to somehow contain it. But that is no easy task. Shawn has fought so hard for so long to hide that pain from others that he is reluctant to talk about it again.
But he thinks about the question and he finally responds. He speaks without emotion.
"My mom dropped me off at a fire station," Shawn said. "Me and my sister. I don't know how old I was. I think I was like a few months old."
He said he spent about five years at a grandmother's house in Pahokee before being placed in foster care.
As he grew older, his troubles grew bigger. With each violent outburst, he was moved to another home. Finally, he was given a choice two years ago: Boys Town North Florida or a similar program in New York.
Shawn chose to stay in Florida, and he arrived in Tallahassee on March 16, 2009.
"I was scared, honestly," Shawn said. "I thought it would be like a prison, that I might get beat up or something. I didn't know."
He brought the pain with him to Tallahassee.
He picked fights with classmates at Cobb Middle School and he found other ways to get in trouble. Despite the discipline issues, school administrators developed a soft spot for Shawn. Some of them knew his background, and they knew the source of those anger issues.
Shawn broke hearts at Cobb the day his brother came to visit him. Shawn wanted to give his brother a school picture as a keepsake, but he didn't have a photo of himself to share. So he begged an assistant principal to help him.
The administrator took a photo of Shawn with a digital camera and made him a print he could give his brother.
The anger issues surfaced again at Boys Town a year ago. A phone call was made and Shawn was moved from one home on campus to another. That was when Shawn, Terell and Tryton became housemates.
It's when Shawn joined Wayne and Aiysha Longley's family.
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Wayne Longley played running back at Eustis High School in Central Florida, where he was raised in a home that placed a premium on family values.
His father, Wayne Sr., was one of the first black officers hired by the Leesburg Police Department. His mother, Carolyn, was a property manager for Section 8 housing. And Wayne Jr.'s parents showed their son just how much they believed in helping families in need.
"I remember plenty of times when I was younger that I would come home and there would be some family who needed help living in our house," Wayne said. "I would give up my room because someone needed a place to stay. I came home one time from college and the house was full with people I didn't know living there."
Wayne played football for three seasons at Union College, a tiny NAIA school in Kentucky, before a knee injury ended his career. He moved back home and completed his undergraduate degree at the Orlando campus for Bellhaven University, whose main campus is in Mississippi.
Wayne didn't know exactly what he wanted to do after graduation, but he knew he had a soft spot in his heart for helping kids. So he began counseling at the Lake County Boys Ranch near Eustis. It took three years before he finally realized it was not a good fit.
"They had a hands-on approach," Wayne said, "and I wasn't comfortable doing that. I understood that it helped accomplish the short-term goal, but I didn't think it helped change kids' behavior in the long run."
A relative told Wayne about an opening at Boys Town Central Florida in Oviedo. A newlywed at the time, Wayne researched how Boys Town family treatment homes were structured. He liked what he learned.
Six boys live in a house run by a married couple — called family teachers. The goal is to make each home as close to normal as possible.
The boys eat meals, complete household chores and take social outings together just like any other family. Good behavior earns them points for more privileges; bad behavior takes away the perks.
The family teachers serve as moms and dads. They arrange for trips to the doctor or dentist. They take the kids shopping for clothes or school supplies. They monitor school performance. And they teach life skills to the boys.
Church is a mandatory Sunday activity. The boy are allowed to take part in extra-curricular activities at their school, as long as they maintain their grades and comply with the rules of the house.
Wayne convinced his wife, Aiysha, to apply with him for the family teacher positions. They had met the year before at a church revival in Tampa and she understood that, as Wayne said, "this was a God call."
But Wayne and Aiysha were unable to serve as family teachers because she was just 19 years old when they married. She had to be 21 to live in a Boys Town home, and Wayne instead accepted a job as an assistant family teacher.
He assisted another married couple as they nurtured six boys under their care.
When that couple left Boys Town, Wayne saw the pain in the eyes of the six boys living in that house. He spent days at a time staying in the house to try to keep the boys on the right path. He vowed that he would do whatever he could to keep the family together.
"I remember telling Aiysha that those boys needed us, that I felt it was my responsibility to stay with them and give them the foundation they needed," Wayne said. "I asked her to re-apply as a family teacher."
Aiysha told him no. She had a newborn son to raise and staying home with Wayne III — Little Wayne, as he's called — was her preference. And she did not like hearing some of the stories Wayne told her about the behavior issues he encountered from some of the Boys Town kids.
"I fought him on it. I really did," Aiysha said. "But I also realized just how important it was for those kids. They needed a foundation. They needed stability. And I knew that this was something we had to do. It was our calling."
They stayed with Boys Town for the next few years and then made plans to take a break as Aiysha gave birth to daughter Daria. Most of the boys they had provided care to had aged out of the home, and Wayne felt the time was right to let another couple take over the next group of kids.
So the Longleys bought their own home and Wayne took a job counseling kids for another company.
"It was a good time to take a break," Wayne said.
The break ended less than a year later when Wayne asked Aiysha to return to Boys Town for their next batch of kids.
"It was easier coming back in because I had already been through it," she said. "I knew what to expect."
Instead of returning to the Oviedo campus, Wayne and Aiysha moved to Tallahassee and took charge of a home at Boys Town North Florida.
That was almost four years ago.
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Wayne apologized for the tears, laughing as he wiped his eyes.
"These are my sons," he said. "You have to excuse me."
The apology was unnecessary.
Like any other father — like any other parent — Wayne got emotional talking about one of his son's successes. As he answered questions about his Boys Town kids for more than an hour, Wayne was reminded of an incident where Terell got in a little trouble at home because of poor grades.
Wayne did not yell or punish Terell too harshly. Instead he delivered one of those "you can do better" speeches that every dad has memorized. He wondered for weeks if it made an impact.
"One day Terell pulls me aside and says, 'I need to show you something,'" Wayne said. "And he pulls out this paper and he hands it to me."
Terell had earned all A's and B's on his next report card.
"Those are the moments you live for," Wayne said, talking through the tears. "Those moments are what it's all about. That right there."
Wayne has plenty more of those proud stories he can share about each of his sons. He can talk about Tryton developing a remarkable sense of self-confidence or how Shawn continues to show progress in school.
But he can rattle off some not-so-happy stories, too. That's how it is in any family, as Wayne is quick to say. And that is the much deeper message Wayne and Aiysha hope others understand.
"We are a normal family," Aiysha said. "We're just like everyone else. And we try to give the boys as normal a childhood as they can have."
There is nothing normal about having six teenage boys living in one house. But Wayne and Aiysha do their best to make it appear that way.
The Longleys and their 11-year-old son and 6-year-old daughter live in a two-bedroom apartment that is attached to the back of the Boys Town house. The extended family of 10 lives a normal life.
They cook and eat meals together. They shop together. They vacation together once a year. They attend each other's extra-curricular activities as often as possible to show support — whether it's a football game or a band recital or anything else that comes along.
The six boys are encouraged to be active in school. They are required to be active at home, taking turns cleaning the house or maintaining the yard or doing the laundry.
The boys are proud of their home, too. They welcome visitors to their house and give a guided tour, showing off the photos and framed awards that adorn the walls. Tryton has a football autographed by former Florida State quarterback Christian Ponder on a shelf. Terell has a framed photograph of him and former FSU football star Corey Simon. Shawn has a Pahokee High football poster — the school he thought he would one day play for when he was a child.
But more than anything else, these boys have a home where they are loved and nurtured and given a chance to have a normal life.
And that has given each of them the strength to begin to distance themselves from their past — or, at least, live each day without being bogged down by their own history.
Wayne and Aiysha are a big source of that strength.
"I really, legitimately, love it here," Tryton said. "The people that work there — you know they aren't there just because they get all these benefits. I mean, why would they live with six foster kids and all six of them are going to have issues? Why would they help them? No one does that. They do it because they want to help us."
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Wayne Longley said he was not interested in coaching football until he saw how it could help one of his sons.
"I'll be honest. The only reason I started was because of Terell," Wayne said. "I saw that he had a chance to be a really good player but he was struggling with it. He was missing workouts and practices and wasn't completely committed to it.
"So I decided to coach. I figured if he saw me committed to it then it would help him commit to it, too. Sometimes they need a nudge."
It worked.
Wayne approached Godby head coach Ronnie Cottrell last spring about joining the program and he became an assistant coach for the offense.
After playing as a backup tight end on the varsity team as a sophomore last year, Terell emerged in the spring as one of the defense's most impressive players. He is considered one of Godby's top college prospects in the Class of 2013 and was expected to start this season at linebacker until a shoulder injury kept him out of the first three games.
He saw his first action Friday night when the Cougars won a non-district game at Crestivew.
"You could tell he was nervous because he actually lined up in the wrong place a few times," Godby defensive coordinator Brian Williams said. "But he got in there and made some plays."
He's not the only Boys Town resident who has made plays.
Tryton, a 16-year-old junior, won a heated competition in August to earn the starting kicking position. He has made all but one extra-point attempt and continues to build strength and improve accuracy each day in practice.
Six months ago, his kicks could not consistently clear the line of scrimmage. Two weeks ago, he was practicing 46- and 47-yard field goals in practice.
And Shawn, one month shy of his 15th birthday, is a freshman running back on Godby's undefeated (and once-tied) junior-varsity team. It is his first year playing organized football, but he has already caught the eyes of his varsity coaches.
Football is not the only common thread that Terell, Tryton, Shawn and Wayne share. But it is the knot that cinches their stories together.
They practice after school on adjoining fields each day. They ride home together following those practices. They celebrate each other's on-field successes and provide comfort to each other when adversity strikes.
Football is part of the overall learning experience for each of them. Wayne and Aiysha reinforce those lessons at home.
"I know the world is hard," Terell said. "They teach you to take criticism and how to deal with your frustration and expression and understanding. They teach you to turn your head when you have to.
"They teach you skills for life, for the world."
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Wayne was in the coaches' box high above Gene Cox Stadium on the night of Sept. 1. Shawn and Aiysha were in the stands, playing the roles of proud brother and mother. Little Wayne was working as a water boy on the sideline. The other Boys Town kids also were in the stands. One of them was playing in the band.
They all watched as their brother and son Tryton trotted onto the field to attempt the first field goal of his football career.
They watched in silence as the ball was snapped. Wayne recited the prayer that every parent of an athlete knows so well.
"Please don't miss. Please don't miss. Please don't miss," Wayne said, wringing his hands for extra emphasis.
And Tryton? He doesn't really know what he was thinking at the time. He just knew it was a field goal that his team needed.
And as soon as he kicked the ball, Tryton raised his hands in the air because he just knew it was good.
"He didn't even know it hit the bar," Terell said. "He didn't know until I said something to him after he came off the field."
The ball that bounced off the crossbar and froze in mid-air gave Terell, Shawn, Aiysha and Wayne another second or so to add even more fuel to their celebration.
As the ball landed on the back side of the crossbar, giving Godby three points and a 16-7 lead over Leon, Terell's face lit up with a huge grin. He protected his injured shoulder as he fought to position himself to be the first to congratulate Tryton when he came off the field.
Aiysha screamed "so loud I'm sure the whole stadium heard me" from her seat in the stands.
And Wayne "ran around like crazy" in the press box.
"I know I made a fool of myself," Wayne said. "But that's my son. What do you expect?"
At that time, no one in that stadium had any idea why Aiysha and Shawn were screaming or why Wayne was dancing or why Terell was smiling or why Tryton felt like he had conquered the world.
They did not know why that 38-yard field goal meant so much to those once-abandoned kids and the couple who has taught them what it means to be a family.
Today, they know the answer.