“I’m late, I’m sorry,” I say—though a confession never works with Cop Dad. He’s heard too many. “I was out with Addie—”
“And the team?”
My breath catches and the blood in my veins slows. The silvery patches at his temples blur.
“Dad—I—”
“You were going to tell me, I know.” He crosses his arms over his starched button-up, dark eyes reading me. I don’t know if it’s learned or a parental instinct, but Dad always seems to know exactly what I’m thinking. And right this moment, I’m thinking about what he’d most hate about this situation—my deception.
“I didn’t lie.” It’s the truth, and I hope he can hear it in my voice. I made Ryan lie, but I never lied.
“You did. You told Danielle you went out for cross-country.”
Oh, shit.
“And before you ask, Ryan didn’t snitch. The boy spilled his guts an hour ago, but I already knew. He didn’t tell me.”
I gape at him. If Ry didn’t tell, then who? Addie?
Dad knows a stumped face when he sees one. “Sarge’s grandkid plays for Rural. Better believe he was pissed that I hadn’t told him about your new position. Called me up as he was filing out of the stadium to congratulate me—to congratulate you.”
The way he makes it sound, the lilt of his voice, gives me hope that he thinks it’s cool. That I did something smart and grown-up and he won’t decapitate me for repeatedly sticking my hands an inch from Topps’s junk all week.
But the taint of disapproval sits heavily in his body language. So I wait.
Dad rolls his shoulders and sighs, his eyes never leaving mine. “Would you like to explain why you lied to Danielle and neglected to tell your parents about your latest athletic endeavor?”
I know this is a kindness. Dad giving me a chance to share my story rather than weather his questions. My dad is strict, but that doesn’t mean he’s not fair.
“Ryan didn’t tell you?”
“I want to hear it from you.”
I keep my voice low, trying to prove I can be an adult and not throw a hissy fit just because he thinks I will. I can be calm. I can be better than the girl who lost her cool and punched Stacey. Or threw her helmet at Jake. I can be more.
“I went to talk to Coach Kitt about softball and she told me I needed to prove to her that I’m a good teammate and can add value to the Tigers beyond my talent. So, I told her I’d join a fall sport—probably cross-country.”
I can’t tell if he knows this already, but I figure it’s as good as any place to start.
“And I really was planning to try out. But then the next day, the starting quarterback caught me on the track. He’d seen me with Ryan the day before, throwing around a football, and suggested I go out for backup quarterback. He’s getting over a broken collarbone and the team needed an extra backup and he thought I’d be good at it. I laughed at him and told him it was a dumb idea, but he sold me on it.”
“How?”
“Um, well, the quarterback, Grey, he’s Coach Kitt’s son.”
Dad’s jaw stiffens. “Did he tell you you’d have a spot on his mother’s team if you went out for football?”
“No, not exactly. I mean, it was more of I help him out and he makes sure his mom knows—”
“That’s coercion, Liv.”
I shake my head. It’s not like that… it’s not criminal in the way Dad makes it sound. I can still feel the outline of Grey’s lips on mine—and it’s probably visible, too. “It’s a favor for a favor.”
Dad frowns. “You’re doing a way bigger favor for him than you could ever possibly get in return.”
“That’s not true! The football coach signed off on it and—”
“That coach should’ve known better. And it’s not his decision to sign off on. It’s mine. It’s your mother’s. We know what’s best for you.”
Tears sting my eyes. “If you know what’s best for me, then why am I not at Windsor Prep?”
“You know exactly why you aren’t at Windsor Prep, young lady.”
“I was stupid, yes. But you guys could’ve talked to Principal Meyer. Danielle could’ve—”
“Talking you out of trouble is not going to teach you to be responsible for your actions.”
“But I’m being responsible here,” I say, my voice breaking. “I went to Coach Kitt. I asked what she wanted to see from me. And then I took an opportunity to show her exactly that. I made those decisions. Me. I did.” I could keep going, but my voice rises dangerously high and I have to stop or it’s going to crack.
Dad shakes his head. “I’m glad you tried, but you’re sixteen, Olive. Not an adult. You’re a great kid and a smart girl, but your decisions since May haven’t been the right ones. Football is dangerous. You need to trust your mother and me on this—”
“I need to trust you, but you can’t trust me?” I feel like a bitch cutting him off, but I can’t let him go on. “You tell me to be responsible for my actions in one breath, but in the next you’re telling me I can’t make decisions without parental consent?”
Everything about Dad goes rigid. To me, it’s so obvious and the truth, but to him I’ve gone too far.
“To make decisions, you have to have the ability to think things through.” His voice is leaden with disappointment. “And punching that poor girl at state is the perfect example of you acting before you think.”
“I have thought football through.” The words are a whisper—much weaker than I mean them to be.
“Have you?” Dad takes a step toward me. “What happens if you get hit?”
“I’ve been hit.”
He doesn’t blink or pause or acknowledge in any way that I’ve said something. He keeps going—snowing me under in examples of my shortsightedness.
“What if you get a concussion? Tear your ACL? Smash your collarbone in two like this Grey kid?”
With each scenario, his eyes flash and it’s almost like he’s not seeing sixteen-year-old me anymore, but his youngest daughter, all dolled up in white for her christening. I’ve regressed to babyhood with one simple decision.
“If you get hurt, then where will you be?” He stares at me as if he expects me to answer. But I don’t have one. And anything I throw out won’t be good enough. The tears spill over as he answers for me. I grit my teeth and force myself to keep looking at his face. “Not on the junior national softball team or in college, that’s for sure.”
“I won’t be on either if I don’t do this! Coach Kitt is never going to let me on her team without extra brownie points—”
He cuts me off with a line so similar to Danielle’s from the other night that I wonder if she told him everything we discussed. “Olive Marie, any coach worth her salt isn’t going to look talent in the face and turn it away.”
“This one will!”
I can see words forming on Dad’s face about my club team, but we both know we don’t have the money to pay for a premier travel team. “I need the kind of press that comes with a major run at state. The games I played this summer? They were fun. Were they enough to keep me on scouts’ radar for an entire year? Probably not.” My voice cracks and I draw in a big, shaky breath. “You know that.”