The room breaks out in groans and murmurs that Pearce chooses to ignore. “We got lucky and that’s the only reason I’m letting you off easy. Our next game is against Wilson Reed, and don’t think for one second I’m going to let you screw that up.”
Caleb elbows me knowing what playing them means for me. My nostrils twitch at the thought of seeing the assholes who all but booted me to save themselves. I nod at him in reassurance before trailing my focus back to Coach while he looks around the room at his spent players.
He’s right. We screwed up more times than I can count tonight. Dropped passes. Cracked defenses. These guys were good, but the Wilson Reed Raiders are better. They’ve always been the team to beat.
“I’m over it,” Pearce concludes, waving his clipboard at the team. “Clean up and get out of my face tonight. Rest up, fuel up, and we’ll meet to watch tapes so I can rip into you about what the hell went wrong first thing Monday.”
He exits, followed by the silent assistant coach, leaving us all to wash up and change. I’m waiting for Caleb outside the locker room when my phone buzzes. My parents reach out after games, but they usually give me time to get home. So, when I see the name and the short text attached I’m left staring at the screen in surprise.
Chaos: Heard it was a good game
I reread the text, then snort when a new one vibrates my phone.
Chaos: Still not wearing your jersey
A small grin curls half my lips and I only wipe it away when Caleb smacks my arm to indicate he’s ready. His eyebrows raise as he looks at me, his eyes narrowing slowly before he snorts in amusement. “Let me guess. That look has to do with a blue-haired girl.”
I say nothing, but I don’t need to.
He shoves me.
I shove him back. “Let’s grab some food before we head back.”
After grabbing subs from our favorite deli in town, we go home to the girl in question where I find her studying on the couch. Her papers and books are scattered everywhere, and the laptop I told her she could use is sitting open on the coffee table in front of her playing music.
Ivy may not say a lot to me when I’m home, but her roaming eyes tell me all I need to know when they linger in my direction.
I’m in serious fucking trouble.
“Whatever Coach told you today—”
“Don’t, Aiden.”
“Hear me out,” I tell her anyway. “I don’t know what Coach told you today but ignore him. He’s got his own problems and experiences that get in the way sometimes. He means well.”
Her eyes stay on her paper for a full minute before she sighs and lifts her gaze, her face clear of makeup and her hair pulled back. “I realized something after he left the bakery.”
I sit down next to her, picking up her legs and dropping them on my lap. “What?”
Her smile takes me by surprise. “That I’m worth more than some washed-up former football player’s opinion. He doesn’t know anything about me, and he never will.”
“Ivy—”
“No, listen. What he said sucked and I won’t lie, I wanted to throw something at him. But he knows nothing about me, so why should I let him dictate who I talk to? I can respect him for caring enough about you to warn me off, especially because Elena told me he used to be a pro player and probably has a lot of connections you can utilize.”
“That shit doesn’t matter to me.”
A shoulder lifts casually. “It should though. You’ve wanted this for so long, so why not play by his rules? I’m not saying I’m going to run away because some middle-aged man with a serious attitude problem told me to. I’m trying to make something of myself for once. I’m done running, Aiden.”
My throat bobs at her words. “And what about us?”
“What about us?” she returns.
I look down at her bare legs, smooth and soft and slightly scarred from who knows what. I trace one of the white lines on her calf and wonder how she got it. “Are we okay?”
She barely pauses this time. “As okay as we can be. I’m far from perfect, Aiden. I’m going to say stupid shit and shut down. It’s what I do. But I wouldn’t mind…” Her lips rub together in hesitation. “I wouldn’t mind a friend, even if you’re only going to be around for another month.”
My jaw ticks. “Coach told you?”
“Some of your teammates have loose lips,” she murmurs.
“I was going to tell you.”
“You don’t owe me anything.”
“Friends tell each other everything.”
“If anybody gets a free pass, it’s you,” she teases halfheartedly, nudging me with her leg. “I owe you for taking care of me when I was sick, even if the medicine you gave me tasted like ass.”
“How do you know what ass tastes like?”
All she does is grin.
It’s a few moments of comfortable silence between us with nothing but the music playing on the laptop before I say, “You are worth more than anybody’s opinions. I’m glad you know that already.”
She fidgets with the paper on her lap. “It took me some time, and a lot of bad experiences, to realize it.”
I want to ask her to tell me about it.
But I don’t.
I’m not sure I’m ready to know.
And I don’t think she’s ready to tell me.
So we enjoy each other’s company without another word spoken between us the rest of the night.
MOM flashes across my phone screen as I’m leaving the Arnold Sports Complex after getting reamed out again with the rest of the team about our last game. My body aches from a shitty night’s sleep from being in an uncomfortable position that left a knot in my neck and a tweak in my shoulder. Ivy was using me as her own personal pillow, and I refused to move because everything about the way her body was wrapped around me felt like old times.
“Hey, Mom. It’s not Wednesday.”
With my packed schedule this semester, we agreed on Wednesday calls since I could carve out time easier for my parents. Mom asks me if I’m eating enough, seeing anyone, and keeping up with my grades, and Dad asks about football. By the time I hang up, two hours usually goes by because Mom steals the phone back and hounds me about proper nutrition and getting enough sleep since I’m always on the go.
“I can’t just check up on my baby?”
Scratching the back of my neck, I tip my chin at a few passing guys from one of my classes. “I never said that. I’m just surprised.”
“You shouldn’t be. Break is coming up in a couple weeks and your father wants to know about plans since you’ve got a game that week. Are you coming here to have a late Thanksgiving, or should we come to you?”
I open up one of the glass doors to the building holding my Calculus class and blow out a long breath. “Didn’t you say Grandma was supposed to come over for Thanksgiving? There’s no sense of you coming here if she is. She hates traveling.”
As soon as she starts laughing, I know what she’s thinking about. “You just don’t want your grandmother causing another scene. I swear, the people we sat by in the stands last time were two seconds from getting security involved.”