“Sure, Coach.” My helmet hung in my hand as I nodded.
“St. Odell have some big players. Keep your eyes open and your head down, you hear me?”
A round of grunts filled the locker room. “This is the one, ladies. We win this and there’s no stopping us. We’re the ones to catch, the ones to beat.” His steely eyes ran over each one of us. “Gather in, Raiders on one.”
The locker room electrified as we prepared to run out onto the field. I focused on the huge blue and white ‘R’ painted beside the door; our lucky charm, a reminder of who we were and where we were going.
“Hey,” Jase came up beside me after the circle broke up. “You good?” It was the first time he’d tried to talk to me outside of practice in three days.
“If you’re worried I won’t get the job done,” I ground out. “I will.”
“Chase.” He snagged my wrist and I glanced back at him. “Come on, that’s not...” A heavy sigh escaped his lips. “This shit between us, it doesn’t feel right.”
“Yeah, well, a lot isn’t right anymore.” I shrugged him off and joined my teammates as we poured onto the field under the bright Friday night lights, silently praying I could make it through the next hour.
Hailee
“I can’t believe I let you talk me into this,” I whisper-hissed at Flick as we sat wedged in between a sea of blue and white.
“Call it research.” She flashed me a droll smile.
“More like a slow and painful death.”
“Really, Hails? You’re telling me not even a tiny part of you wants to be here to cheer him on?” Her brow rose, her expression dubious.
“Cheer who on?”
She gave me a knowing smirk. “If you think for one second that I believe this thing between you and,”—my best friend leaned in closer making sure no one around us could hear, not that anyone could over the simmering noise—“Fourteen is over, then you’re more foolish than I… oh, here they come.”
Imagine Dragons blasted over the PA system, whipping the crowd into a frenzy. Only it didn’t spark the adrenaline in my veins the way it had before. Not when I’d spent the last week trying to avoid my peers, which was hard when you spent almost seven hours of the day with them. As if that wasn’t enough, the atmosphere at home was toxic. And Cameron had barely looked at me all week. So sitting in amongst four-thousand Raider fans, cheering the team onto victory, wasn’t exactly my idea of escaping all the shit going on in my life.
But Flick was nothing if not persistent, and if I pretended really hard and tried to avoid searching out Cameron across the field, I could kind of convince myself I was here for research purposes only.
Well, almost.
Going into the fourth quarter, the game was tied. It had been hard to watch. Something was wrong in the Raiders camp, everyone felt it. My step-brother was pissed, yelling at his teammates every time they fumbled the ball or didn’t make the play, and Coach Hasson looked ready to blow a gasket on more than one occasion.
“This should have been a walk in the park for them,” Flick grumbled beside me. She’d really found her stride as the team’s latest fan, the blue and white ball cap sitting proudly on her head. “Come on,” she yelled as our defense took down one of the St. Odell Saints offense; the crowd responding with a ferocious roar.
The players switched, my eyes tracking number fourteen as he jogged onto the field, moving into position. Jason yelled the play, and there seemed to be a collective intake of breath around the stadium as he hiked the ball to Cameron who took off down left field, right under its trajectory. The crowd was enraptured, a crackle of anticipation in the air, as he hooked his hand up ready to receive the ball. It was a good pass, an even better catch, and the crowd went wild, the noise deafening.
“Go, go,” Flick yelled, her fingernails digging into my arm so hard I felt sure they might draw blood.
But I didn’t cheer, I couldn’t. My eyes were too focused on Cameron, the way he cut through the air, his strong legs eating up the yard markers. Thirty... twenty... ten.
“Oh God,” my best friend breathed as the world slowed down. A Saints lineman appeared out of nowhere, set on a collision course with Cameron.
“Flick,” my voice quivered as I watched, along with the rest of the crowd, as the huge defensive player ploughed into Cameron, knocking him into the air. His body sailed backward and he landed hard. The whole place winced, the four-thousand strong hiss of breath making my hair stand on end, nervous energy churning in my stomach.
It wasn’t my first game. I’d seen other players take a hit. Watched as bodies were strewn across the field like rag dolls, but I’d never felt the impact before.
“Flick.” My voice no longer sounded like my own as I clutched onto my friend while watching players swarm Cameron’s lifeless body.
“He’s fine,” Flick said, her voice catching. “He’ll be fine. Players take hits like that all the time.”
But he didn’t look fine.
He didn’t get up and shake it off the way players usually did. He just lay there, unmoving.
Deathly still.
Dread washed over me, sending my heart into meltdown as it crashed violently against my chest. Game officials were on the field now, attending to Cameron, who still hadn’t moved. Why isn’t he moving? Jason ripped off his helmet and began to pace beside his best friend, dragging a hand through his damp hair, back and forth, over and over, while Asher looked on with the rest of their teammates.
“Get up,” I breathed.
Why isn’t he getting up?
After what felt like an eternity, Cameron slowly sat up and the entire stadium took that first breath with him. “Thank God,” I gasped, barely able to get the words out over the lump in my throat.
Two officials helped Cameron to his feet, and Jason and Asher flanked his side as they ushered him to the team’s area on the sideline. A slow round of applause built around the bleachers until everyone was on their feet clapping for their beloved number fourteen.
Play quickly resumed, as if my world hadn’t almost ended, and the Saints took their offensive position. But I was too busy watching Cameron. He’d taken his helmet off now, his head hung low as one of the assistant coaches and the medical staff checked him over.
“Something’s wrong,” I said reaching for Flick when he leaped up throwing his helmet down and began to walk away. Jason went after him, the two of them locked in a battle of wills as Cameron glared at him and then mouthed something I couldn’t decipher, my distance making it too difficult to read his lips.
“Is he...?” Flick swallowed her words as we both watched Cameron stalk off the field without so much as a backward glance.
“He left,” I said, stating the obvious, feeling my stomach sink into oblivion. “He just left.”
“Maybe you should go after him,” Flick suggested.
“What?” I blinked at her. I couldn’t think straight. Something didn’t feel right. He’d been hurt, yes, but he’d seemed okay walking off the field, so what the hell had happened in those few minutes between him sitting down and storming off?