“When I sleep with her, and trust me, I will, QB, you’re stocking my fridge with beer for a month.”
Abrams surveys his friend, and then shrugs. “Sure. I’ll take that bet.” Silas grins and a few of the surrounding guys laugh and cheer, egging him on. Abrams adds, “Because it’s never going to happen.”
“What if one of us gets to her first?” another guy joins in, blond and heavyset, one of the defensive linemen.
Abrams surveys the bulky guy and says, “Carter, if you somehow manage to work a miracle and sleep with her before either of us, I’ll stock your f**king fridge for a year.”
The locker room descends into laughter, and the topic falls away, and I wonder which poor coach’s daughter they’re targeting. We’ve technically got nine coaches on staff. I don’t know any of them well enough to know which ones have kids our age, but I’m fine being left out of that particular piece of information.
In fact, I wish I were in a different part of the locker room. It would be better for my focus if my cubby weren’t so close to Abrams and Moore.
Coach comes in not long after, and I wonder what would have happened if he’d come in a few minutes earlier.
“Listen up!” He doesn’t really need to yell. The team has a sort of sixth sense for when Coach enters the room, and everyone was already quiet. But his loud voice echoes around the room, and it makes him that much more intimidating. “As you know, we’re cutting practice a little short today.”
Some idiot behind me has the nerve to cheer, but from the “Oof!” that follows, I’m guessing someone already shut him up.
“Hot date tonight, Coach?” Abrams asks.
“Shut your mouth, kid,” he growls, but I can tell there’s no heat behind the words, not like there would be if someone besides his QB had said it.
“I might be giving you all the gift of a shorter practice, but I still expect there to be some blood, sweat, tears, and vomit left on my field today.”
Damn. I have a sneaking suspicion that I’m going to regret that extra workout I just squeezed in with Ryan. When he tells us to wear our pads, I know we’re in trouble. When we head out onto the field, a groan cycles back through the team as they spill out of the hallway.
Mat drills.
Or as they like to call it at Rusk, a bleeding day. I know they have them a lot during spring training, but the only time I experienced it was during my tryout for the team. Split into smaller groups, the team rotates through a series of stations, each one with a specific drill designed to make us miserable. If any group is too slow moving to their next station, the entire team starts over.
After my taste of it at tryouts, I didn’t stand, sit, walk, or sleep without aching for nearly three days.
Coach’s smile is the stuff nightmares are made of.
“Well then, gentlemen. Let’s get started.”
Chapter 8
Dallas
It’s Dad’s birthday, and we’re going out to dinner to celebrate. I had planned to wait for him in my car, as I had no desire to venture into practice, but here I am heading off to find him anyway.
I skipped lunch to squeeze in some extra time in the studio, and even though Dad said he’d be wrapping up practice early, I don’t trust him to actually stick to his word. My grumbling stomach pulls me out of my car, but my stubborn pride is what keeps me walking into the athletic complex.
As Levi said at the party, I’m here; he’s here. We definitely won’t be starting fresh, but I won’t be falling all over myself to avoid him either. College doesn’t have to suck because I’m sharing it with my ex and my dad—that frat party taught me that. I just have to take the good in with the bad and hope the good comes out on top.
That’s my plan for the meeting tonight with Carson, too.
So he pissed me off. (And made me confused and annoyed and self-conscious and a little bit hurt.) That doesn’t mean I have to completely shut down. That’s how the old me reacted after everything with Levi. That’s how I’ve always reacted with anything emotional. I can’t feel pain if I don’t let myself feel anything at all.
But I promised myself that things would be different in college. I’m starting over. And that means I can’t keep living the same way, afraid that everything is going to break me. I survived growing up without a mom. I survived a broken heart. I survived my first frat party and a stupid football player’s attempt to get me into bed just for kicks.
That’s why I’d decided in my little lunchtime dance session after my run-in with Carson that whatever he had to say, I could forgive him. Or understand. Or whatever. I’m not going to run away from the first real connection I’ve felt in years just because he didn’t text me back for a couple days.
I’ve spent too much time pretending, too much time on the outside, too much time feeling spineless. This time . . . I’m going after what I want.
I hear a whistle blow as I walk down the hallway that leads out onto the field. Tugging my messenger bag higher on my shoulder, I continue out onto the springy grass searching for my dad.
I pause, overwhelmed with the number of guys practicing and just how freaking big they are.
Toto, we’re not in high school anymore.
The players and coaches are scattered all over the field in small groups, all of them doing something different while a coach stands over them yelling. Normally, I would say that my dad would be easy to find. He’s the loudest person I’ve ever met in my life, but among all the coaches yelling and the players grunting and yelling back, it’s a barely controlled chaos. I walk along the perimeter, searching for Dad.