Her voice booms across the field.
Surrounding us are other practice fields and teams—men’s soccer, lacrosse, softball—and they’re all practicing, probably thanking the high heavens that they’re not us right now.
“After the twelve-minute challenge, we’ll go into strength. Forty pushups in a minute, sixty sit-ups. Then five-by-five-by-tens. This will measure how quick you are to change direction. You have five of these, and you must be under ten seconds each time. From there, we’ll move to thirty burpee pushups in a minute and then vertical jumps. There’s no requirement for vertical jumps, as this is just to see where you’re at and if you can improve.” She pauses and looks at the upperclassmen. “Everyone but freshmen better have improved from last year. If not, you’re giving us an extra mile after we’re done.” That was me last year. I made sure to improve my vertical this go-around. “And finally, we’ll end on your favorite, the one-o-five. Fifteen one-hundred-yard sprints. You have twenty-five seconds to make it downfield, thirty-five seconds to make it back to the starting point. Helpful hint to the freshmen? Stick with an upperclassman. They know the pace.” She claps her board and says, “Let’s get to work, ladies.”
Scarlett and I share a two-bedroom townhome. It has great living space, a cute kitchen, and is close to campus. Right now, as I lounge on the couch in nothing but a pair of clean underwear and matching Calvin Klein cotton bra, I could not be more grateful that it’s just me and Scarlett, that we’re not sharing with more girls.
“Jesus Christ,” Scarlett says, flopping onto the couch, wearing an oversized T-shirt and no pants. Our wet hair dots the gray couch while we stare at the ceiling. “Why did that feel more brutal than before?”
“I don’t know,” I say, gripping my forehead. “I honestly didn’t think we were going to make it at the end. I had a hard time keeping up with Sandra. If it wasn’t for her, I don’t think I would have beaten the yard sprints.”
“Well, you did run eight laps in ten minutes, so you gassed yourself early.”
I nod. “Yeah, I pulled a rookie move on the eight laps.”
The doorbell rings and I groan. “Ugh, that’s Rusty. What were we thinking telling him it’s okay to come over?”
“We weren’t,” Scarlett says, reaching for her bike shorts and slipping them on.
Too tired for even a shirt, I pull on a pair of black sweatpants, twist my hair up into a wet bun, and go to answer the door. When I open it, I’m greeted by a smiling Lincoln standing on the other side with a box of Frankie Donuts in his hands. His eyes immediately take me in and a sly smirk crosses his lips as he moves his gaze over every inch of my torso. Slowly.
He bites on the corner of his lip and says, “Damn, Mayhem, you have abs.”
I look at my stomach and then back at Lincoln. Maybe I should have taken two more seconds to put a shirt on. Already pink from sunburn, the heat of my cheeks intensifies from his compliment and blatant staring.
A little self-conscious—not sure why, really—I reach out and lift his chin. “My eyes are up here, Castle.”
“Yeah, but your abs are down there, and they’re carved,” he says with awe.
I’m simply too tired to stand in my doorway and go back and forth with Lincoln. “Are those donuts for me?”
“Depends”—he nods toward the inside of our townhome—“can I come in?”
Calling over my shoulder, I say, “It’s Lincoln with donuts. Should I let him in?”
“What kind of donuts?” Scarlett calls back.
“Frankie Donuts.”
“Good God, woman, of course, let him in.”
I chuckle and prop the door open. As he walks in, his eyes roam my body once more, then he takes his shoes off. I shut the door behind him and together we join Scarlett on the couch. Lincoln sits next to me and pops open the box.
The sweet smell of grease and calories permeate the air as I count a dozen donuts—half strawberry lemonade and half pistachio. This man might have just won a special place in my heart.
“Before you can have a strawberry lemonade, you must at least have a bite—”
He doesn’t have time to finish his sentence before I have a pistachio donut hanging out of my mouth.
“Yoink,” Scarlett says, grabbing a pistachio as well. She holds it up to a shocked Lincoln and says, “Cheers, bro.”
We both lean back against the couch and moan. It’s been a long few weeks of training and eating clean, so this donut is hitting all the right spots.
Lincoln clears his throat. “Should I leave the box on the coffee table so you three can have some privacy?”
“We don’t mind voyeurs,” Scarlett says. “Makes things more exciting when someone watches. Am I right?” She winks at Lincoln and from the look on his face, I’m pretty sure he doesn’t exactly know what to do with Scarlett yet.
I nudge the box in his hands and ask, “Are you going to have one?”
“Yeah, I was going to have a strawberry lemonade but now I’m worried if I don’t have a pistachio, they’ll all be gone.”
“I would suggest you grab what you want sooner than later,” Scarlett says around a mouthful of donut. “You can never tell with us.”
“Noted.” Lincoln snags a pistachio donut and takes a huge bite. “Fuck, these are amazing. Frankie cake donuts are good, but their yeast donuts have got to be the best in town. And I like that they don’t try to do all the fun flavors on a cake donut, that they use the yeast base too.”
“It’s why it’s so popular,” I say, right before shoving the rest of the donut in my mouth. Cheeks puffed, I say around the dough, “I love yeast.”
Lincoln snorts as Scarlett reaches past me and grabs a strawberry lemonade. “Come to Mama,” she says, right before taking an impressive bite.
Mouth still full, I stand and ask Lincoln, “Want a drink?”
“Yeah, whatever you have.”
From the kitchen, I hear Scarlett mumbling something about sweet strawberries, and when I come back into the room and hand Lincoln a bottle of Powerade, I catch him staring at Scarlett, confusion laced in his brow.
“She’s in her own world, let her be.”
“Got it.” He uncaps his drink and I shamelessly watch his hand wrap around the bottle and bring it to his lips. The liquid flows down his throat, the muscles contract. It’s surprisingly erotic, and I have to look away because it feels wrong staring at his neck. Half the drink is gone when he sets the bottle on the coffee table. “So . . . from the way you’re both not crying in the corner right now, I’m going to guess your tests went great today?”
I pick up a strawberry donut, break it in half and hand the other piece to him. Naturally he takes it and leans back on the sofa with me, but instead of facing toward the TV, he’s facing us. “I wouldn’t particularly say it went great, but we did pass.”
“Barely,” Scarlett says. “The burpees ate me alive and Indie didn’t pace herself during the twelve-minute test.”
“Gassed out at the end,” I admit, and take a bite of my donut. “I almost didn’t make the one-o-fives.”